Jambalaya

Ingredients

• 2.5 cups chicken stock
• 1 22-oz. can of whole tomatoes
• 1 chorizo sausage (ours was frozen)
• 2 cups fresh shrimp, tails off, deveined, all that good stuff.
  
• 4 chicken thighs (again, ours were frozen), cut into small chunks
• 1 cup long-grained rice
• 1 very small onion, diced
• 1 tbsp dried parsley
• 1 tbsp beef bouillon
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp savory
• 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp cayenne
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 bay leaf

Thaw the chorizo and cook it until it's mostly done. Set aside.
Thaw chicken and chop it up. Set aside.
Put everything except the shrimp into a stockpot, large soup pot, or, ideally, a dutch oven. In a dutch oven, the rice won't stick to the bottom as it cooks. In everything else, it will.
Bring mixture to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat and set simmer for 20-30 minutes. A minute or two before the time is up, throw in the shrimp. Save the shrimp for very last because they're already cooked. If you put them in too early, they'll get all rubbery. And we don't want rubbery shrimp.
Eat.

Thoughts: This was sort of a complicated recipe, but my goodness, it was hella delicious. We added the chicken to the recipe, which was a fantastic idea (but don't do it unless you have leg or thigh meat). I'm surprised this recipe worked out so well, actually.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Rye cornbread muffins

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup cornmeal (plus extra, as needed - you'll see)
• 1/2 cup rye flour
• 1/8 cup sugar
• 1/2 tbsp baking powder
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 1/2 large egg, beaten (beat the egg first, then split it)
• 5 tbsp unsalted butter, melted and cooled

Preheat oven to 375 F.
Sift all the dry ingredients into a medium bowl (cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt).
In a separate bowl, whisk together buttermilk and egg.
Melt the butter. After it's cooled, whisk it into the buttermilk and egg mixture.
Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients; stir until just incorporated. If batter is too wet, add more cornmeal or flour.
Bake muffins about 15 minutes. Devour.

Thoughts: This is a halved recipe. It makes 6 muffins. Unfortunately, in the process of dividing the recipe, we forgot to divide the butter in half. So there's twice as much butter as there should be. This means that you do not need to grease the muffin tin. It also means that the muffins, while a little crumbly, will taste fantastically delicious. If you don't want fantastically delicious muffins, you can put in the correct amount of butter (2.5 tbsp). Also, the original recipe called for normal flour but since bugs have recently gotten into both our normal and whole wheat flour, the only thing we had left was rye flour. So we used that. And it was pretty good. You can tell the difference, but it's still predominantly delicious. I recommend crumbling these and serving them with the jambalaya.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Blueberry - Berry Cobbler

From the Best Light Recipe Cookbook.

Ingredients (filling, followed by topping)

• 6 cups berries (we used some fresh blueberries and some frozen berries)
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 2 tbsp fresh-squeezed lemon juice
• 1 tbsp cornstarch
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon


• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 3 tbsp cornmeal
• 1/4 cup sugar and 2 tsp sugar (for later)
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/3 cup buttermilk
• 3 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 1/8 tsp ground cinnamon

For the filling: Put oven rack in middle position and heat oven to 400 degrees.
Toss the fruit filling ingredients together in a 9-inch deep-dish pie plate.
Place pie plate on rimmed baking sheet and bake until fruit releases its liquid and is hot and bubbling around the edges. This should take about 20-30 minutes.
For the biscuit topping: Whisk the flour, cornmeal, 1/4 cup of the sugar, the baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a large bowl. Set aside.
In a separate bowl, whisk buttermilk, butter, and vanilla together - set aside.
In a third small bowl, mix the remaining 2 tsp sugar and the cinnamon together. Set aside.
When the filling is done cooking, stir the buttermilk mixture into the flour mixture with a rubber spatula until just combined and no dry pockets of flour remain.
Remove the fruit filling from the oven and stir. Pinch off pieces of the biscuit topping and arrange them on top of the filling. We actually had extra biscuit topping left over, so you don't have to worry about spacing them.
Sprinkle the top of the cobbler with the cinnamon-sugar mixture.
Return the cobbler to the oven and cook until the biscuit topping is golden brown and the filling is again hot and bubbling. This should take about 15-20 minutes.
Eat.

Thoughts: Delightful. We made this for a 4th of July party and people pretty much snarfed it down. This is a fantastic recipe. You could probably do this with blackberries too. Or whatever berries you want.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Scottish Scones

I found this recipe on epicurious.com. I've modified it slightly. Who needs cream of tartar? Seriously.

Ingredients

• 2.5 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 tbsp cold, unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
• 1 cup well-shaken buttermilk
• 1 large egg, beaten

Whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and baking soda. Add the butter, and, with your finger tips, squish the butter into the flour mixture. By the time you're done, the mixture should resemble a coarse meal.
Stir in buttermilk and egg until soft dough forms. I had to add more flour to get it to be less sticky.
Turn out dough onto lightly floured surface, and cut dough into three equal parts.
Knead each piece 3-4 times, then shape into a 6-inch round (1/2 inch thick). Cut into 4 wedges.
Heat griddle over low heat, then add scones.
Cook undisturbed for 3 minutes over low heat.
Increase heat to medium-low and cook for another 3-5 minutes, until scones are puffy and undersides are golden brown.
Turn scones over and cook for another 6-8 minutes, until those sides are also golden brown. Adjust heat if necessary. Do not burn these.
Turn the scones on each of their edges for 1 minute, until the edges are golden brown.
Check the scones for done-ness.

Thoughts: These were absolutely fantastic. There is no need for us to try to find a better scone recipe. There is nothing that can match these. Also, they were done on a griddle, which is a fantastic way to do them. They were moist and fluffy on the inside and slightly crispy on the outside. I cannot sing the praises of these scones enough.

Disaster Index: 1/10

No-rise Scones

This is from Sundays at Moosewood.

Ingredients

• 1.5 tbsp butter, at room temperature
• 2 cups flour
• 1.5 tbsp sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 3/4 cup milk

Preheat oven to 450 F.
In mixing bowl, combine butter and flour with your hands, rubbing the lumps of butter between your fingers and thumbs. Add the sugar, salt, and raisins. Slowly stir in the milk, until a soft (but not sticky) dough has formed. DO NOT OVERKNEAD.
On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough out into a 1/2 inch thickness and cut out 2-inch rounds. Place them on a buttered baking pan.
Bake for about 20 minutes, until just beginning to brown.
Eat while hot.

Thoughts: This was dreadful. There is no other way to say it. Dreadful. Why the hell would this recipe not call for baking powder? The little blurb before the recipe says "oh no, baking powder is so bitter. This way, you can savor the taste of the flour". Bullshit. No-rise scones are not worth it. They came out super flat (obviously) and so they probably cooked for too long. They were totally rubbery and over-cooked in the middle. Moving away from the cookbook's inadequacies, I also probably overkneaded the dough, though I sort of thought that if you don't have a leavening agent, you can't overknead. Perhaps I was mistaken.
There's nothing else to say. These totally sucked. I cooked the second batch at 10 minutes rather than 20 in order to attempt to remedy the over-cooked nature, but it didn't seem to help much. They were softer, but hardly more edible.
Fellow bakers, do not ever follow a scone recipe that does not call for baking powder. SO not worth it.

Disaster Index: 9/10

Liquored-up French Onion Soup

Ingredients

• 4 cups of sliced yellow onions (we used a mandolin slicer. It was awesome)
• olive oil
• 1 cup medium-dry sherry
  
• 1.5 cups white wine
• 4 cups beef stock (or veg)
  
• 1 tsp salt
• freshly ground pepper
• goat cheese
• toasted croutons (optional)
  

In a large stockpot over medium high heat, saute the onions with the oil for about 20 minutes, until the onions turn a rich golden brown color.
Deglaze the pan with the sherry.
Simmer uncovered for 5 minutes.
Add the white wine and cook for 15 more minutes, still uncovered.
Add beef stock, salt, and pepper. Bring to a boil, then simmer uncovered for 20 minutes.
If you want to make croutons, simply grill (or toast) some stale bread and then chop that into small pieces.
Add the croutons to the bottom of your soup bowl, spoon in some soup, and then dot with goat cheese.
Eat.

Notes: This soup would have been delicious but there was TOO MUCH BOOZE. I made a semi-serious error and accidentally put in twice as much alcohol as was necessary. The measurements in bold are INCORRECT. Halve those numbers. That's how much alcohol you need for this recipe. No more than that. We tried to remedy the situation by boiling the soup and cooking the excess alcohol off, but I think we just ended up over-cooking the onions. SO. Dan didn't mind it as much as I did. I couldn't finish the rest of mine. He actually ate leftovers.
This recipe could be good if I knew how to measure things.

Disaster Index: 4/10 (with right proportions, there is hope. Stay tuned)

Corn Risotto

Ingredients

• 2 ears corn
• olive oil
• 1 small yellow onion, diced
• 5 strips turkey bacon
• 3/4 cups Arborio rice
• 3 cups chicken stock (or veg stock, if you must)
  
• additional water, as needed
• salt
• pepper
• parsley
  

Using a sharp knife, slice the kernels of corn off of the cob. You should have about 1 cup of corn.
Heat oil in a large saucepan. Add the onion and saute until soft and fragrant (about 8 minutes). Add the bacon and saute for another 5 minutes. Add the rice, and stir with wooden spoon to mix with the onions. Start adding the stock, about 1/2 cup at a time, adding more when the rice has absorbed the stock. Do this for like, 15 minutes, until the rice starts to get tender. Add the corn and stir. Add enough stock such that the rice is tender but not mushy.
Stir in parsley, salt, and pepper. Eat.

Thoughts: This was pretty easy to make and it was super delicious. The corn and bacon make the texture sort of chewy, which is pretty delightful. This is super tasty. That's all I have to say.

Disaster Index: 1/10