Carolina Smashed Potato Pig Butt Bake and Reuben Quiche

After being home for almost a week we finally had the opportunity to head to Sam's Club and the grocery.  Our fridge was about as empty as it could be.  We'd been existing on carry out and canned or frozen food.  UGH!  I sat down with the Union Square Café and the Kansas City Barbecue Society cookbooks and made out our menu.  Actually, I could probably just cook my way through the Union Square Café cookbook.  Everything in there sounded good!  Then, at Sam's I bought the Gooseberry Patch Game Day cookbook.  Started reading that on the trip from there to the grocery.  Page 9.  Reuben Quiche.  Does that sound good or what?  Connie was particularly intrigued because it has Dijon mustard instead of the typical thousand island dressing.  Well then, we'd make something fun Sunday morning while we finished decorating for Christmas. 

After the trek to Sam's we dug into the rotisserie chicken.  Connie'd been craving mustard.  Something about that whole box of mustard that arrived from the Mustard Museum...  I used up some of a bottle making a fabulous mustard cream sauce.  It was super easy to make.  I sautéed some garlic and shallot in a bit of olive oil.  Then, I added Dijon mustard and white wine.  Once those were warmed through, I added some capers and cream.  Served over sliced chicken with a big salad on the side, it was perfect for a quick meal. 

So, over the weekend the weather conspired against us.  We were supposed to go south and meet our friends Sonja and Al for dinner Saturday evening.  Icy roads and Connie wasn't amused about driving.  Fine we'd stay home and make the Carolina Potato Smashed Pig Butt Bake from the Kansas City BBQ Society cookbook.  We debated and debated.  The recipe called for cottage cheese.  Connie'd never had cooked cottage cheese.  I had.  Mom used to make a skillet lasagna when we were kids.  It had cottage cheese in it and it worked just fine.  We'd bought ricotta just in case.  Then we did a taste test.  The cottage cheese won.  The ricotta was just too sweet.  Particularly given the fact there was BBQ sauce in the recipe.  Amazing.  Leftovers for lunch were just as good.  This is a reason to head to a bbq place and get some pulled pork!

Sunday morning we made the reuben quiche.  Total winner.  Making the crust out of "bread crumbs" was brilliant.  That allowed the filling to shine but gave it flavor.  Now, I can't wait to try variations on this recipe!  Best part is that we had leftovers for lunch. 

Sunday found us stopping by our friend Lou's house after the Colts win.  Ah, yes, this week they did not embarrass themselves!  We thoroughly enjoyed the game and Lou's hospitality.  Monday night I didn't have a menu item because I thought Connie had a bridge game.  Wrong-o.  So I moved a meal up the line and we were happy campers with asparagus and red pepper pasta from the Union Square Café cookbook and pear salad from the new Sunrise cookbook.  It was perfect with a bottle of Francis Ford Coppola Sante Chardonnay.  Did I remember to take photos of the finished dishes????  Of course not!  Hopefully next time I make them I'll do better :-) 

Carolina Smashed Potato Pig Butt Bake

Ingredients:

8 small (B size) red potatoes
1/2 c apple cider vinegar
1/2 t red pepper flakes
1 T black peppercorns
1 t salt
3 T corn bread crumbs
1/2 lb chopped pulled pork tossed with barbecue sauce
1 16 oz container cottage cheese
2 c shredded sharp cheddar (about 8 oz)
1/2 lb smoked bacon, fried crispy and crumbled (or, if you don't like it crispy like me, dice it then fry it...)

Directions:

 Put the potatoes in a medium saucepan and pour in water to cover.  Add the vnegar, red pepper, black peppercorns and salt.  Cook on medium heat for about 15 minutes or until the potatoes are done. 

The original recipe said 10-15 minutes.  At 10, the potatoes were not done enough by a long shot.  Once the potatoes are cooked, drain and let them cool slightly.  Take a glass or the palm of your hand and smash each potato to no more than 1/4" thick.  Sprinkle half of the corn bread crumbs in the bottom of a small baking dish. 

Lay half of the potatoes on top of the crumbs.  Cover the potatoes with half of the pulled pork.  Top that with another layer of corn bread crumbs.  Then top that with another layer of potatoes followed by a layer of cottage cheese

then one of pulled pork. Then, top the whole thing with the shredded cheese and the bacon. 

Bake at 300 for 30 minutes.

adapted from the Kansas City BBQ Society cookbook


Reuben Quiche

Ingredients:

5 slices rye bread, toasted and crumbled
4 T butter, melted and divided
4 green onions, chopped
1 1/2 c shredded Swiss cheese, divided
1/4 lb deli corned beef, chopped
1/2 c sauerkraut, well drained
4 eggs
1 c half and half
1 T flour
1 T Dijon mustard
optional:  dill pickle slices
 
Directions:

Mix the crumbled bread crumbs with 3 T of the butter.  Put into a 9" pie plate and pat into a crust.  Bake for 5-7 minutes at 375F.  The crust will be slightly golden. 

Sprinkle half a cup of the Swiss cheese into the crust.  Top that with the corned beef and sauerkraut,

followed by the rest of the Swiss cheese.  Lightly beat the eggs and add the half and half, flour and Dijon.  Pour that over the quiche and bake for 25-30 minutes at 375 F. 

adapted from Game Day by Gooseberry Patch

Steakhouse Steak

I'm working my way through a stack of old cooking magazines.  Like ten years old.  Antique.  Please don't ask me why I've saved them.  It's just that I hate to toss cooking magazines.  This morning on the way to work I read an old Cuisine at Home.  The lead article was about Steak House Searing.  Now, I've always been a steak grilling kind of gal.  Stovetop steaks were not on my radar.  Comes from having a father who thought the only way to cook a great cut of meat was on the grill.  Even though we didn't see him much since he lived in Orlando and we lived in Indy, grilling became part of our lives.  My brother, John, is the grilling pro.  Man, he's perfected grilling.  I can only hope to come close. 

Let's add up the facts.  1) I had an article about steak house searing.  2) There were a couple of pieces of tenderloin left from the trimmings from the holiday party.  They'd been in the freezer long enough.  3) I was REALLY hungry for beef.  Kinda the perfect night to fix some tenderloin.  Add in the fact that a gal who'd been a friend of my mom's and who'd played bridge with Connie died a couple of days ago.  She was the original creator of Jane's Rice - which is perfect with beef.  Oh, and we're having company for dinner tomorrow night so getting the house a bit clean was a great idea.  A quick dinner would help. 

Now, the magazine had some great sauce recipes.  Not on our diets these days...  I decided to make a change to the morel dusted ribeyes recipe and try the rub on the tenderloin pieces.  It turned out to be a good call.

What did we think?  I think I may have found my new preferred way to cook a piece of tenderloin.  The crust was perfect.  The interior was medium rare.  Flavor, great.  Tender.  We loved the steak.  And, the Jane's Rice was awesome as normal. 

Here's the basic premise.  Preheat your oven to 425F.  Cut the tenderloin into serving size pieces.  The article calls for cutting them about 2" thick. Mine were close to that but not perfectly shaped.  Rub the steaks with whatever rub you're using.  I used our morel dusted ribeyes rub but substituted brown sugar for white.  Then, you heat an ovenproof skillet.  I mean heat that skillet.  The recipe called for using oil.  I had some butter and thought that'd work.  Not so much.  I dropped it in the HOT skillet and it burned pronto.  Here's what it looked like after about 10 seconds:

I poured that out and wiped out the skillet and poured in some oil.  In went the steaks.  Five minutes on high heat, flip them then five minutes in the oven.  Pull the pan out - watch out for a hot handle! - and set the steaks aside to rest for five minutes. 

Now, the recipe in Cuisine at Home says this'll create rare meat.  It says to roast for seven minutes for medium rare and nine for medium.  My pieces were not uniformly thick AND I didn't remove them from the skillet immediately upon removing them from the oven.  So, I wound up with medium rare.  Which was fine.  I'd have preferred rare but Connie prefers medium rare so it worked out just fine for him. 

Corned Beef and Cabbage

Corned beef sandwiches from Shapiro's Deli.  Wow.  One of life's treats.  Right up there with the double cheeseburger from Workingman's Friend.  So, how can a meat that's so magical when slapped between pieces of rye bread then slathered with spicy mustard taste so incredibly mundane when boiled with cabbage and carrots and potatoes?

We've not had the New Year's Day corned beef and cabbage routine in our family.  No, my brother's mother-in-law, Pat, fixes pork and sauerkraut for New Years Day.  Probably my favorite meal of the year.  She's a wonderful cook and this is her best meal.  So, I usually buy a corned beef when they're on sale leading up to New Year's Day, then cook it later in January.  That's what I did this year. 

So, how do I fight the blahs?  Ramp up the flavor with beef broth and red wine.  I made this recipe up probably twenty years ago.  And, it's been my go-to ever since.

Corned Beef and Cabbage

Ingredients:
corned beef
potatoes
carrots
cabbage
garlic cloves
beef broth
red wine
peppercorns
bay leaf
seasoning packet from the corned beef

Directions:

Put your carrots and potatoes in the crockpot.  I use the baby carrots.

Then, quartered potatoes.  Rarely do I ever peel potatoes.  There's so much good in the skins that it just feels wasteful!

Then, put the corned beef on top of the carrots and potatoes.  Tuck about a dozen garlic cloves around the corned beef.

Toss in a bay leaf and about a tablespoon of black peppercorns.  Add the seasoning packet from the corned beef.  It'll have more good stuff like mustard seeds.  Pour in a couple of cans of beef broth and one of the little bottles of red wine.  It's about 3 cups of beef broth and a cup of red wine. 

Cover the crockpot and cook on low for 6-8 hours.

Just before serving the meal, quarter and core the cabbage.  Cut it into slices and steam it until it's nice and soft. 

Slice the corned beef.  Serve with the vegetables and a ladle of the broth.

If you're doing this on the stovetop, you can use a 46 oz can of beef broth and cook the cabbage in with everything else.