MmmmCocoa!

Mama Jalackie’s World Famous Cocoa Recipe

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups of ground, pure, unsweetend cocoa powder, preferably free trade.
• 3 TBSP of UNSALTED Butter.  If butter doesn’t work for you, coconut oil can be substituted.  It may change the taste slightly, but it’s a delicious difference.  I actually encourage those who normally use butter to try the coconut oil option as well, since it really does impart a sweet, creamy flavor.
• scrapings of two (2) inches of vanilla bean pod, or two TSP of *real* vanilla extract.  (See below for simple instructions on making your own vanilla extract!)
• ½  TSP your choice of nutmeg, mace, cinnamon, anise or allspice.  Remember that nutmeg is not good for preggo mamas, so please choose one of the alternatives.  I’m most fond of allspice in lieu of nutmeg.
• ½ to ¾  TSP chili powder
• 1 cup coffee (light) cream (OPTIONAL, Dairy free alternatives work well too.)
• 3 cups milk.  You can use any milk here - cow’s, almond, rice, soy... if you don’t drink cow’s milk, I strongly suggest unsweetened original almond milk.  It’s very creamy and infuses the cocoa with a delicious, subtle nutty flavor.
• Demerara or turbinado sugar to taste.
• Cinnamon sticks or candy canes for garnish
• Bourbon, whiskey or rum, or coffee liquore if so desired.

DIRECTIONS

1. Melt your butter or coconut oil in a deep sauce pan over medium heat. Do NOT heat to separation where it’s possible to skim the solids off the top.  You want those oils to remain emulsified.
2. Using a whisk, temper in your cocoa powder.  The mixture will be very thick at this point.
3. If using cream, whisk that in first.  If you have a double boiler, now would be the time to transfer it to the double boiler.  Otherwise, turn the heat down to low.
4. Add in your vanilla and spices.  Whisk well for two minutes to ensure spices are well distributed and have begun to release their aromatics before cooling the cocoa with your milk.
5. At this point, your cocoa should have the look of a thick ganache, and should lightly coat a spoon when dipped in it.
6. Temper in your milk sloooowly, whisking gently the entire time.
7. Continue to heat on low.  DO NOT bring to a simmer, but bring it close.  At this point, add sugar to taste.  I usually use ¾ a cup, but we like it sweet over here. Whisk until sugar is melted and well incorporated.
8. Ladle into mugs, garnish with cinnamon sticks or candy canes, and enjoy!  This would also be the point where you would add your alcohol, making sure to put the alcohol in the mug BEFORE the cocoa, and then gently stirring to mix thoroughly.

BONUS! HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN VANILLA EXTRACT

• 3 large vanilla beans
• 1 cup top shelf bourbon (I like Jim Beam Black.)
• Glass jar with tight-fitting lid - I recycle pasta sauce mason jars for infused oils, home made extracts like this, and a whole host of other uses.

1. Cut a slice in the middle of each bean, leaving a bit at each end still connected so it looks something like this ()
2. Place vanilla beans in your jar and cover with bourbon.  Cap tightly.
3. Storing the bottle in a dark, cool place, shake it once or twice a week for six to eight weeks.
4. You may either strain and decant into another glass bottle with a tight fitting cap, or you may use as-is.  This mixture keeps indefinitely due to the high level of alcohol.  Use with with the same volume you would a commercial extract. (ex. 1 tsp is 1 tsp.)

Welcome to Florida in the fall!

A lot of people will say that we have no real season changes here - just moving from really hot to less hot - but that's not true.  Most years.

This year brings a very definite turn in seasons, and true to subtropical climates, it's very rapid. 

With it comes the standard round of illnesses - colds, coughs, sinus infections... Autumn Agues.

Oh, woe... what to do with sicky babies and sickie kids?

Well, do what I do - kick 'em outside to play the snot away, and then bring them back in and feed them well.

It is now well-known that it is not the weather itself that causes illness, but rather the effects of the body's adaptation to changes in temperature and atmospheric pressure that wreak havoc on all systems, including our immune system.

One of the best ways to assist the body in fighting back and retaining its strength during these adaptations is to feed it well.  This is particularly important for children, since their immunities are still forming and their metabolisms are lightening fast.

A very simple, tasty, nutritious meal is a thick stew, or pottage.  I like to make pottage with meat, but vegetarians and vegans shouldn't depair, since it's equally as tasty and nutritious without.  Here's a rough recipe... please keep in mind that I'm one of those cooks that doesn't measure, but rather goes on instinct.  If in doubt, always use less.  More can be added, but little can be removed without starting all over.  Additionally, don't be afraid to adapt or stray, or to tailor to the tastes of your family.  If you dislike one of my ingredients, don't despair about it.  Just change it up a bit!  Most importantly, enjoy yourself.  Enjoy prepping and cooking, and savor the meal.  It does equally as much for your spirit as it does for your health.

Beef Pottage ala Accidentally Mommy

• Beef for stew, well marbled***
• Beef broth, consomme, boullion or stock (I love love love "Better than boullion" concentrate.)***
• Root veggies of your choosing - potatoes, turnips, carrots, yams - anything works, really.
• One or two good sized onions
• Garlic.  I like a LOT of garlic - but that's your choice, really.
• Celery
• Butter***
• Flour***
• Seasoning - my usual defaults are sea salt, ground mixed pepper (pink, black, white peppercorns,) ground rosemary, a dash of parsley, a sprinkle of herbs de provence mix, and sometimes a little paprika and turmeric, if I'm using lamb, venison or rabbit, or if I'm making it vegetarian with seitan, TVP or tofu.

Chop your veggies and toss them into the pot, covering them with your liquid of choice. This includes your onions, but not your garlic.

Put a dollop of butter in a pan, and brown the stew meat with your garlic and your seasonings.  I like to get it really brown, so that I can deglaze the pan later with either broth or red wine.  You could use olive oil here, but I feel it imparts a flavor that doesn't mesh so well with the rest of the ingredients. 

Deglaze the pan if you so wish, and add that to the pot, along with the meat and garlic.

Cover and let simmer for as long as you want.  Depending on the thickness of your veggies, it could take as little as 45 minutes or as long as two hours.  You can go even longer, if you'd like.  Just make sure your root veggies are at least fork done before moving on to the next step.

So now that the veggies are done, you're going to make a medium roux.  The trick to a good roux is making sure you're using equal amounts of fat and flour, and that your fat is a high-quality fat.  I use salted butter, full-cream spring butter, if I can.  If not, the best butter you can find/afford will work.  Hell, whatever you have on hand will work, too.  Melt the amount of butter you're using (say, 1/2 cup,) over low heat.  Slowly whisk in 1/2 cup of flour to the melted butter.  Keeping it on low heat, whisk constantly until mixture begins to turn a light tan color.  Then do it some more.  You're looking to get a pretty, rich carmel color and smooth texture.  Whatever you do, DO NOT turn the heat up, and DO NOT stop whisking!  You will burn the roux, and it will smell awful.

Once you achieve that golden carmel color, incorporate it into your pottage/stew.  I use the whisk to whisk it into the top layer of the stew, and then a long-handled wooden spoon to mix it the rest of the way.

Experiment, have fun, and eat up!

*** Better than Boullion makes an awesome veg*n veggie and a mushroom base.  TVP, Seitan, Tofu... use whatever you prefer to sub the beef.  If you're veg*n, use a corn starch slurry to thicken instead of roux.  (To make slurry, add cornstarch to cold water and whisk.  Gently temper in mixture to pottage, taking care to make sure you mix as you incorporate.)

Feeding our families, souls and communities.

Before I go on, I'd like to let you all know that I'm not preaching.  Quite frankly, there are very few things that I'm passionate about enough to personally preach.  I simply want to share my experiences.

I became a locavore quite by accident.  I had known about the locavore movement, but didn't put much thought into it.  I shopped at a grocery chain that made it a point to use as much semi-local produce as possible, where I checked origins and made it a point to skip over anything non-US grown and avoided anything that deviated from the Southeastern area.  For a time, that was enough. Then I discovered the gems that are my local Farmer's Markets.  THAT'S when I was converted.  A sunny, summer afternoon spent people-watching, chatting up vendors, and buying some of the most beautiful tomatoes and Muscadine grapes I had ever laid my eyes on, all the while snacking on beautifully made artisan bread still warm from a vendor that gave it to us for free, in exchange for a smile and a hug from my outgoing and bubbly toddler.

Kinder Major after we got home from our first market adventure, circa July 2006!

That afternoon got me hooked on the soul-food that is interacting with the community in a small yet impacting manner, as well.  As my daughter played at my feet and I watched the busy goings-on of the downtown market, I saw many beautiful things.  Families still smudged with dirt, vending from the tailgates of beat-up 20 year old pickups laughed and played together between customers.  Mothers brought their children and fed them directly from the stands they just purchased their foods from.  Indigent residents came and bartered and haggled to afford vital fresh veggies and fruits that otherwise wouldn't be available to them, that provided them with the nourishment necessary to keep them going just that much longer.  Students, professionals, young, old, fashionable, scene, hippy... you name the demographic, it was represented.  It was and is a breathtakingly beautiful melding of our community, all gathered together to laugh and play.  Smiles are abundant between strangers, which we all know is a rarity in today's society.

These markets are so much more than food markets.  Locally made crafts, clothes and gift items, vocal advocacy for political and social issues, musicians, dancers, artists... they all gather to ply their wares, stances and performances.  There's something that appeals to every sense.

It's markets like these that truly feed us as a society.  Not just by providing nourishment for our bodies, but economic nourishment, social nourishment, and soul nourishment in the form of hope.  In today's society where so many are isolated by choice and by chance, these markets provide us with the opportunity to come together for a common purpose.  It provides the necessary soul-ular (get it?  Soul-ular instead of cellular?  I'm punny =P) vitamins of smiles, kindness, laughs and camaraderie.  It helps to rebuild our faith in our fellow man, if only for a few hours each week.

I didn't become a locavore to spit in the face of Big Agriculture, nor to perpetuate a socio-political movement or simply because my friends were doing it and it was trendy.  I became a locavore because I realized that by feeding my family the (literal) fruits of my neighbors' labor, I was feeding their families as well as my soul and our communities. 

This year I plan to take my locavore-ism to the next step, with a garden that should produce enough to feed my family comfortably, as well as allow me to reach out individually to someone who is in need, since there will undoubtedly be more than enough to share.  I've said in jest that even in the worst-case scenario, I would have enough extra to set up my own vendor's stall at the market, but that goes against what it feels right in my heart to do.  The profit I'm looking for isn't monetary - I want to give back the good feeling I've been blessed to receive that comes with knowing that someone cares about me and my family, and is willing to share their good fortunes with me.  That, in my opinion, is the key motivator behind home-base locavoreism.

So that you gain more than just my rhetoric from this post, I'm going to leave you with links to finding out how to become locavores in your own communities and a recipe.  Happy Nurturing!

http://www.localharvest.org
http://www.eatwellguide.org
http://www.eatwild.com/

Vegetable Squish
***Please note:  All measurements are approximate.  I'm a firm believer that cooking is based more on feeling and heart than measurements and calculations, but I acknowledge that not everyone cooks that way, which is why I provided the estimates.  :)

• 5 large tomatoes (two cans of diced tomatoes can be substituted, or you can mix fresh and canned.  I often make this substitution, simply because tomatoes get eaten like apples in my house and I never have enough left.)
• 4 mid-size crookneck/yellow squash
• 4 mid-size zucchini
• 2 large onions
• 1 TBSP minced garlic
•  Fresh ground pepper, to taste
•  Fresh ground sea salt or kosher salt, to taste

The layers in which you add your veggies is important, so take heed.  In a large pot, add garlic.  Dice tomatoes, making sure to reserve all liquids.  Add to pot.  Coarsely chop onions, add to pot, stir to combine with tomatoes and garlic.  Chop squash and zucchini, making sure to discard ends. Layer on top of the onion/tomato/garlic mixture on the bottom. 


At this point, cover your pot and simmer on low.  The idea is to cook the tomatoes well along with cooking the onions to translucency, while steaming the squash and zucchini.  


After ten minutes of simmering, mix to combine the squash and zucchini with the tomato-onion-garlic mixture.  Cover and simmer until squash and zucchini are tender to taste.  (We like them very mushy, so it's usually another 20 minutes or so for us.  YMMV.)  


When veggies are fork-done to taste, add ground pepper and the salt of your choice, mixing to incorporate.  Cover for another five minutes to let flavors mingle.  Remove from heat and serve over white or brown rice, or egg noodles.


I generally serve this over white rice with stew beef marinaded in a honey-sesame teriyaki sauce.  It's a very flexible dish, though, so experiment and enjoy!