'Tis the Season for Nuts and Bolts

First of all, we have snow.

For those of you who know where I live, this occurs maybe once a year if we are lucky, and usually in the 1-5 cm mark. Then it froze. Hello ice covered city....

Back to the food. Bad brain, bad!

This time of year is the season of giving, and one item that everyone loves (especially the men at my work, who still beg for more, even when I gave them the recipe...) and is adaptable for normal people, gluten free, dairy free, nut free, etc.... is Nuts and Bolts (aka Chex mix)

I actually have a Word document typed out, but can't attach a file, so here's hoping copy & paste works!

SUCCESS!!!

Wet Ingredients

·         1 lb butter (can use vegetable or lightly flavoured oil to make dairy free)

·         1/4 – 1/3  c of Worcestershire sauce

·         1 – 1 ½ tbsp garlic powder (not garlic salt, otherwise way too salty)

·         1 – 1 ½ tbsp onion powder (not onion salt, otherwise way too salty)

·         1 – 1 ½ tbsp celery salt

·         2-3 tbsp chili powder (or to taste)

·         Squirt or two of hot sauce (optional) for extra kick

Dry Ingredients

·         1 box Cheerios

·         1 box Shreddies

·         1 bag pretzel sticks

·         1 lb peanuts (roasted, un-roasted, red skins, doesn’t matter)

·         1 box oat squares / corn squares (optional) un-sweetened unless you like sweet & salty

Here I have about 1/6 cup of chili powder, 1 tbsp of garlic powder, 1/4 tbsp of celery salt and 1/2 tbsp of onion powder.

Gluten Free Options

·         GF Worcestershire sauce (use 1/3 to 1/2 c for more flavour, not as strong as Lea & Perrin’s)

·         Certified GF Rice O’s

·         Certified GF Rice Chex (honey nut works great for sweet & spicy style)

·         Certified GF pretzles (Glutino works best)

·         Un-roasted peanuts (to ensure no cross-contamination)

·         Can use Oat squares if able to eat oats

·         Can use corn Chex, but check for barley malt (not GF w/ barley malt)

 

Other Random Yummy Ingredients

Cheese Nips

Cheese sticks (like form the Bits and Bites mix)

Gold Fish

Different kinds of Chex mix (if you are in the USA they have way more options)

Different kinds of nuts

 

1.       Pre-heat oven to 250*

2.       Melt wet ingredients in a pot or a quart glass measuring cup over low heat on stove. Do not melt in microwave, otherwise the celery salt will not completely dissolve

-  Taste test the sauce, and add more seasonings to how you like it (try not to lick the spoon)

3.       Evenly divide the dry mix between two large roasting pans (turkey sized is best)

4.       Pour the sauce over the dry mix, and stir to coat using a wooden / plastic / rubber utensil (metal will just mash it into crumbs)

- you can pour the sauce in batches, making sure to evenly coat everything, until all of the sauce is gone 

5.       Bake for 2 ½ - 3 hours, stirring every 30 minutes

6.       Do not worry if the mix seems soggy; it will dry out as it cools

7.       Place in large containers and eat for breakfast, lunch, dinner, 2am...

Yes, I know that this makes a massive amount of mix, but you can easily halve or quarter it.

So you don't have chili powder. Use Tex-Mex spice instead. Change it up. I never make it the same twice.

 

How to Make in the Slow Cooker (you read that right!)

 

You can also cook it in the slow cooker (if you have a large sized one)

Mix everything and dump in slow cooker.

Turn temperature to High, and set for roughly THREE hours, stirring every half hour.

But it will get soggy you say? Nope. Fold up a large towel, and place it under the lid, allowing the excess moisture


to evaporate. It may still be damp after three hours, but dump it on a cookie sheet to cool, and it will crisp up right away. 

 

ENJOY!

Carrot Cumin Soup

This recipe is slightly altered from the original I had at my girlfriend's house.

First of all, is the tea towel not absolutely correct?

Cast of Characters:

• olive oil
• onion
• garlic
• cumin
• carrots (this is great if you have say, 20 million pounds of carrots)
• stock (poultry or veg, your choice!
• cilantro
• goat cheese (optional but amaze-balls)

Thanks to Dear Hubby for pouring me a glass cider; I had had a super rough day at work. 

Start by pulverising your garlic and onion, but don't fret if they are not all the same size; it's going to be blended up.

We had a 2 kg bag of baby carrots (as a rule, I don't like them, but beggars can't be choosers when at Costco)

Chop the carrots into vaguely the same size so that they will cook evenly. 

Toss a glug of olive oil in your stock pot, and let it get hot over medium heat.

Add the cumin (I think I have about 2-4 tablespoons here)

Let it become one with the oil and nicely fragrant.

Add in the onion and garlic, and stir to become one with the cumin.

Fire the carrots in the pot, and stir to combine. 

Once your onions have softened a bit, and the carrots as well, add in your stock.

I originally started with four cups, but ended up using eight. 

Bring up to the boil, and simmer until the carrots are fall apart cooked.

Option A: Use a stick blender
Option B: Use a normal blender, but leave the steam vent open, so that it doesn't explode in your face. I do not want to be held responsible for any injuries.
Option C: Use a food processor with the steam vent open.

Brrrrrrrrrrrr. Wiz until it is smooth and silky.

Adjust the salt and pepper and any other spice you like as  you see fit.

Grab your nicely washed cilantro, and rough chop down to the stems.

Tip of the day when buying the big logs of goat cheese: freeze it, then slice off what you need with a bread knife!

Garnish the soup with crumbled goat cheese and cilantro and some crust bread or crackers.

Kosher Counter Pickles!

I know, I know. It's been more than a month. But seriously, it's been one giant poo-nami after another for the last two months straight.

I have declined from calling the pickles what my family actually calls them, as the two friends who taught us how to make them can't remember who taught who! We know them as Jana (named for my past BFF's Mum) pickles.

List of ingredients:

• 25 lbs of local pickling cucumbers (henceforth referred to as cukes) 
• 2-3 heads of garlic (you can totally add more)
• lots of fresh dill weed and dill stalks
• pickling vinegar (double check, it has a high acid content than normal white vinegar)
• Kosher pickling salt
• can you believe that THREE grocery stores were out when I was looking for it? Had to use the stuff that they sell in the canning section of Canadian Tire...)
• chili flakes (optional if you like it spicy)
• grapes leaves (optional, adds extra crunch)
• canning jars, lids and rings
• massive stock pot for making the brine
• lots of counter space!

The first step is not pictured because I am an airhead.

Wash your pickles. There are two ways to do this:

1. wash by hand in the bath tub/sink by gentle rolling the pickles between your hands (like Play-Doh) until no grit remains
1. Do Not Scrub or they will be ruined. You need the skin on them 
2. wash in the washing machine. Totally NOT Joking here. This only works if you have an upright (non-front loading) 
1. Run a rinse cycle with no soap. Put the pickles in after on the gentlest setting, and run through a rinse cycle again.

Wash you jars. You can do this by hand (pictured below) or in the dishwasher as its own cycle

Sterilize the jars on a cookie sheet in a 200 * F oven for 15 minutes. I set my oven to 225 because it is colder than Pluto's sad, sad heart.

Peel all the garlic that your little heart desires, and blanch for 1 minute in boiling water, quickly placing them in an ice bath to halt the cooking process. You can either leave them whole, or slice the bigger ones into smaller sizes.

Recipe from Mum.

Brine. It will singe your nose hairs.

• 2 cups of pickling vinegar (make sure that it says pickling as it has a higher acid content that you need to stop mold)
• 1./ cup Kosher salt
• 6 cups of water

This brine recipe only makes 3-4 jars, so you may need to quadruple it or more.

Boil your snap top lids for 5 minutes, and keep hot until you are ready to use them.

Dump the brine ingredients in the biggest pot you have (Not copper; it can react) and bring to a roiling boil.

As soon as you have everything in its assembly line, start your engines!

• washed and air dried-ish pickles
• brine
• garlic
• dill
• jars
• lids
• rings
• funnel
• magnetized lid grabber
• hot jar grabber (optional but useful if they are smoking hot)

Take your jars out of the oven, and drop as much or as little garlic as you like. 

Plunk down the dill heads, weed and chopped up stalks. (the stalks can be about 3-4 inches long, but just below the neck of the jar)

Chili flakes time! My Hubby and my co-worker's Hubby sit in the closet and eat hot pickles. Whatever makes you happy so that you don't have to share...right?

Now the crazy part. Trying to get the pickles in jars that are hotter than Satan's hot sauce.

Swearing is ok when you are in the process of losing your finger prints....I find that tilting the jar on its side and shoving them in that way leads to the least amount of angry digits.

Cram and keep on cramming until you literally cannot fit another teeny weeny pickle in. I like an assortment of large and smalls to fill in the gaps.

 Grab your canning funnel (it's a super wide mouth funnel) and pour in enough hot brine so that it comes to just below the neck. You want the pickles covered.

 I had to poke that sucker back down.

Wipe the rim of Each and Every jar with some damp paper towel to ensure that no grit or anything interferes with the seal.

Take the magnetic stick and grab a hot lid from the pot. If there is still water on the lid when it goes on the jar, that is perfectly fine.

Plop the lid on the jars, place the metal ring on and tighten the lid. You only want it finger tight (that means no cranking the lid on)

Rinse and repeat until you are done. Took me about 3 hours start to finish for about 25 lbs, and I got 23 jars.

Place the finished jars somewhere that they will not be disturbed, touched, bumped or breathed on.

Leave them along for 24 hours. You will hear random popping sounds, which are the leads doing their job and sealing. 

A sealed jar no longer shows the circle on the lid, while an un-sealed jar has the circle bit popped up.

If after 24 hours there are any jars that didn't seal, put them in the fridge. They will still turn into pickles, but they can't be stored in a cupboard.

Walk away for 6-8 weeks. Resist the urge to open a jar and check. The longer they sit the better they are.