What's Cooking?

[rps]

3 minutes ago, MOPanfisher said:

I LOVE asparagus, the rest sounds good too.  If it ever raise I might have some asParaguay this year.  Replanted some last year.

Some vegetables - asparagus, green beans, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, and cauliflower are examples - I could enjoy at any and every meal. And fruits, too. Tomatoes!

[Johnsfolly]

RPS inspired I decided to make my own tartar sauce for the fried crappie. Now we normally make our own tartar, but today I followed the recipe link that RPS sent and made the mayonnaise as well. I did not deviate from the recipe and was pretty happy with the results. Very easy to make.

BH - don't worry we are very familiar with our chickens here at Follyfarms. Each are handled with care. So not worried about the raw egg in the mix.

So I chopped capers and the Betterhalf's homemade sweet pickle relish and added that to the mayonnaise. I also added about a teaspoon of powdered mustard, tsp of rice wine vinegar, and tsp of garlic powder. Mixed well and ready to serve.

We ground bread crumbs and I mixed in oregano, s&p, and garlic powder. So I breaded the fish, seasoned flour, egg wash (more follyfarm eggs), then coated with the Italian syle bread crumbs. Does anyone remember Gordon Elliot's Door Knock Dinners show on Food Network where he and a chef would go into someone's house and make a gourmet meal with what they had in their fridge and pantry. Well I have no claim to be a chef or that  this was a gourmet meal. However, I dug around in the freezer and pantry to find what to make with the fried fish. I pulled out a can of black beans and a can of chili flavored kidney beans. So I mixed the two beans, added Dijon mustard, dried onion, a spoon full of bacon grease, ketchup, brown sugar, dash of liquid smoke, and then added, possibly a little crazy, but diced black mission figs. I cooked this as long as possible to allow the "baked" bean flavors to meld. I found some frozen spinach. I cooked the spinach with garlic powder (again) and a mixed vegetable spice mix. The last piece to the meal was heating up leftover asparagus.

 

[ness]

2 hours ago, rps said:

I just finished the mise en place for tonight.

I have two portions of chicken cordon bleu that I bought at Harter House on a tray to go in the oven. I have orzo ready for a quick boil; I also have mushroom, onion, garlic, and chives ready to saute and turn the simple pasta into a pilaf. Last I have trimmed asparagus ready to pan roast and blacken.

 

I can be there in 4 hours....

[ness]

Ooooh. Capers in tartar sauce. Why  didn't I think of that!

 

[BilletHead]

        Nice bird John,

   We at one time had chickens. Various chickens including mixed banty, hoodans like the one you have, turkins and other crazy breeds. Then we had ducks, turkeys and guinea hens. A few cotournix quail also.  The guineas were a hoot. Very wary and the best watch dogs. Every once and a while when we wanted to eat one I would stalk them and take one with the recurve bow.

     So it looks like lots of fresh eggs but not fresh fried chicken .

BilletHead

[Johnsfolly]

5 minutes ago, BilletHead said:

Various chickens including mixed banty, hoodans like the one you have, turkins and other crazy breeds

We definitely are hobbie chicken owners. Love the variety in the breeds that we have and the different types of eggs that we get from each. When we first started out we lost on straight run chicks and ended up with 5 roosters and 5 hens. Our little Japanese black banty rooster is the only one we still have. He's feisty, but thank goodness he doesn't know how to use these hooks.

5 minutes ago, BilletHead said:

So it looks like lots of fresh eggs but not fresh fried chicken

No fried chicken from any of our hens. Too much laying makes them only good for chicken stock. Too tough to eat any other way.

[BilletHead]

         You filing down those spurs? Tough old hens but they make good eats with noodles!

BilletHead

[Johnsfolly]

13 minutes ago, BilletHead said:

You filing down those spurs?

We did trim them down. The points were pretty nasty.

[ness]

8 minutes ago, Johnsfolly said:

We did trim them down. The points were pretty nasty.

Eeeew. You're not supposed to eat them! ?

[MOPanfisher]

We used to have a bunch of chickens, would get 200 to 400 chicks every year and raise them and start butchering when they were big enough to split in half to fry.  I was the guy taking care of them, never hated any animals as much as I hated them things.  My favorite job was catching and head chopping.  When they got to the perfect size we would have butchering days, when we would clean as many as 96 at a time, those day we recruited grandma to help.  I bet I could still cut one up to fry in a couple minutes.  Only good things about them were lots of fried chicken (including livers and gizzards) and plenty of fresh chicken guts for trotlines.  We had some Bantys running around eating bugs, some laying hens, a few geese (close second on the most hated list) and for a while guineas.  Can still remember the day the big old game rooster that liked to attack everything, made the poor choice to attack my German Shepard.  Poor old dog thought he was gonna get his butt whipped, I gave him some extra feed instead and then cleaned the rooster.  Honestly I don't miss them a bit.  Remember mom pressure cooking the old hens and that dang rooster.  Today a crock pot would render them tender and make some good noodles.