Hilah Cooking

Sweet-Hot Green Tomato Pickles

Hilah — Fri, 25 May 2012 14:58:23 +0000

It’s like Girls Gone Wild in my kitchen! But with tomatoes … and with my top on.

This was an experiment that turned out well and happens to be easy, too!

We liked these chopped up and added to tuna salad, or just served with anything that might go well with chutney. They are sweet, sour, and quite hot. If you want them less so, maybe just use half a pepper in each jar.

The first test batch didn't last very long

Sweet-hot Green Tomato Pickles

Cook time: 10 mins

Total time: 10 mins

Yield: 2 half-pints

Ingredients

3 smallish green tomatoes (egg-sized)
2 habanero peppers
1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup water, divided
1/4 cup vinegar

Instructions

Cut the tomatoes into quarters and then halve each quarter to give 8 pieces.
Halve the habaneros and divide them between two half-pint jars.
Combine in a small pot: sugar, 1/2 cup water and the tomatoes.
Bring to boil over medium-high heat and boil, covered, about 4 minutes or until the tomatoes have darkened slightly and gotten soft.
Pack the tomatoes into the jars with the habaneros.
Add the remaining 1/4 cup water and vinegar to the pot and bring to boil again.
Pour hot liquid over tomatoes.
Seal.

And here’s a recipe for fermented green tomato pickles from Kate at Hip Girls.

Cucumber Salad

Hilah — Thu, 24 May 2012 18:59:36 +0000

My mom used to make this often and it was always one of my favorites. She called it quick pickles I think. Now, my friend Steph makes this for just about every potluck. She calls it “cucumbers’n'onions” and she makes the best. I tried to get her recipe once, but she just said, like anyone who’s been improvising the same recipe for years, “a little vinegar, a little sugar, yadda yadda, you know”. So I had to do some actual measuring (blech!) and adjusting, but this here’s a pretty good copy-cat recipe of Steph’s cucumbers’n'onions.

It’s a great thing to make the day before a big party because it just gets better in the fridge for the first couple days. After that, it’s still good, but definitely best if eaten within 2-48 hours of making it. Serve it with any grilled meat or even with sandwiches. A good rule is, if you’d serve pickles with it, you can serve this cucumber salad with it, too.

Cucumber Salad

Prep time: 5 mins

Total time: 5 mins

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

1 large cucumber
1 small white or yellow onion
1/3 cup vinegar (rice, white wine or champagne vinegar preferred)
2 teaspoons sugar
Pinch of salt
Optional: 1/2 teaspoon dried dill weed

Instructions

Use a fork to score the cucumber lengthwise, all around, cutting through the skin.
Slice very thinly.
Peel the onion, halve it, and slice into thin half-circles.
Dissolve the sugar and salt in the vinegar in a large bowl.
Add the cucumber, onion, and dill if using.
Refrigerate 1-2 hours before serving.

Notes

This keeps well in the refrigerator up to 48 hours, and keeps decent in the fridge up to 56 hours.

Fancy Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

Hilah — Tue, 22 May 2012 21:43:13 +0000

Grilled cheese sandwiches are an unavoidable part of learning to feed yourself. Many were the late nights and early mornings of my younger years fed by a grilled cheese. Sometimes, the only thing between my head and the floor was a quick and easy toasty GCS.

They don’t require much in the way of ingredients; any kind of bread or cheese will do and if you’re out of butter, you can saute the sandwiches in a little oil. They don’t require much coordination, either, provided your cheese is pre-sliced. They’re ready in a snap, provided you remember to turn the stove on. They’re really hard to fuck up, provided you remember to turn the stove off. All in all, a great invention worthy of praise from the lowliest drunks to the laziest tweens.

Here’s some ideas for fancifying the classic grilled cheese in those rare moments when hunger and clarity of thought coincide.

Fancy Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

Cook time: 5 mins

Total time: 5 mins

Serves: 1

Some new twists on an old favorite

Ingredients

For each sandwich, you need:
2 slices of bread
1 ounce of cheese
2 teaspoons soft butter
For a Margherita Use: tomato slices, fresh basil, mozzarella cheese, minced garlic
For Apples ‘n’ Chedd Use: sliced apples, sharp cheddar cheese

Instructions

Butter one slice of bread with 1 teaspoon butter and lay, butter side down, in a skillet.
Slice the cheese thinly and lay half the cheese on the bread in the skillet.
Top that with the other filling ingredients.
Top the filling with the rest of the cheese slices.
Butter the second piece of bread and lay it on top, butter side up. (For the Margherita, spread the minced garlic on top of the butter)
Turn the heat to medium and cook for about 2-3 minutes, or until the cheese has softened and the bread is toasted.
Carefully turn the sandwich and cook another 1-2 minutes.
Let cool slightly before cutting in half.

Notes

Experiment with different cheese and filling combinations:
Swiss, Muenster, or cream cheese
sliced turkey, ham, salami, or other lunch meats
sliced apples or pears
condiments such as mustard or sweet chili sauce or fruit jams

Hilah Talking – Recipe Q&A

Hilah — Sun, 20 May 2012 13:39:37 +0000

Your cooking questions answered! How to make pepper vinegar and whut in the hay-ell is a green tomato?!

Basil Walnut Pesto

Hilah — Sat, 19 May 2012 14:22:07 +0000

Here’s a basic pesto recipe for ya. I used the HUGE bunch of basil in my CSA box from Johnson’s Backyard Garden. I use walnuts because I fear a second experience with the dreaded Pine Mouth. Walnuts add the same creamy texture, I think. Pecans also work nicely.

Pesto can be frozen, too, in case you have an over abundance of basil. Just pack it in 1-cup (or whatever amount is convenient for your family) containers and pour a tablespoon of olive oil over the top, or enough to cover the surface. The oil keeps it from oxidizing and protects against freezer burn. I’ve found that thawing it over night in the refrigerator works best. I’ve also heard of people freezing it in ice cube trays, then storing the cubes in plastic bags, giving you perfectly sized blocks of basil paste to add to spaghetti sauce.

I use less cheese and less oil in my pesto than you may be used to. This is because I am a stingy cheapskate and Parmesan and olive oil are expensive. You can always add more oil or cheese to the recipe, or just sprinkle more cheese on at the table.

Basil Walnut Pesto

Prep time: 5 mins

Total time: 5 mins

Yield: 1.5 cups

Ingredients

1 large bunch basil
1/2 cup olive oil
1 large clove garlic (about 2 tablespoons minced)
1 ounce parmesan cheese, diced
2 tablespoons chopped walnuts
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Instructions

Pull the leaves off the basil and discard the stems. Rinse the leaves and measure. You’ll need 3 cups, lightly packed, for this recipe. If you have more or less, adjust the other ingredients to taste.
Put the oil in your blender jar first, then all other ingredients.
Blend until smooth.
Add salt if needed.

Notes

You may use pine nuts in place of walnuts for a traditional pesto sauce

The Hilah Cooking Roku Channel

Hilah — Fri, 18 May 2012 14:52:05 +0000

We got our own channel on Roku, dudes!

It’s been a few months in the works, but it’s ready for your viewing pleasure. We worked with a company called Fling to put it together. Well, I should say, Chris worked with Fling. I just sat around yelling, “Are you done yet? Can I watch it yet?” and generally being a pest.

If you’re wondering what a Roku is, it’s like a tiny box that lets you watch computer on your TV. Any webshows you like, plus shows you watch on Hulu or through NetFlix streaming, or individual Roku channels, of which we now are one!

Our channel is free to subscribe, so if you already have a Roku box, you can find us (right now) under “New”. Eventually, I imagine, we’ll be moved from there to the Cooking and Food section. You may have already seen some episodes through Blip TV’s channel — in fact, many people found us through Blip on Roku — but it would help us if you’d subscribe to and rate the HilahCooking channel.

If you’re thinking about buying a Roku, consider making your purchase through our Amazon affiliate link. We’ll get a little change from Amazon, and you’ll get to watch my dumb face on the bigscreen.

Fried Green Tomatoes

Hilah — Thu, 17 May 2012 17:36:10 +0000

We always had a little garden when I was growing up. Not like a farm, but just a little plot behind the house, down the hill a bit, under a giant cottonwood tree with a swing tied to its branches. I didn’t really have much to do with the garden, aside from harvesting. My parents would plant potatoes and tomatoes. Probably some other things, too, but that’s all I really remember. Too busy swinging on that crappy old swing I guess, getting splinters in my booty.

When the birds or bugs would get to the tomatoes before we could – when we’d find those hard, little green tomatoes with a big hole in one side – mama would make fried green tomatoes. Cut off the bad, fry the rest, make it good. I loved them so much. And even though, yes, I know the film by the same name (and cry every time I see it still…) I somehow kinda always thought no one else ate fried green tomatoes? I know it doesn’t make any sense. Obviously, anyone with a half a lick of sense and a green tomato in their hand is gonna know about fried green tomatoes. But still…

So I was kind of surprised when several people requested the recipe from me. I don’t know. Maybe I just seem like a person who makes good fried green tomatoes. It’s true. I am. I have no difficulty writing that. But honestly, they’re easy. The hardest part is finding green tomatoes if you don’t have your own garden.

Enter, Johnson’s Backyard Garden: a 200 acre, 100% organic farm just outside Austin. We’d visited this lovely paradise last year – actually almost exactly one year ago – and had a great time taking a farm tour from Brent Johnson: Head Farmer (not sure if that’s his official title or not, but it works for my purposes). This year I contacted them about green tomatoes. As it turns out, with 30 thousand tomato plants, they had … how do you say? … a buttload of green tomatoes. So we took another farm trip!

And, DUDE! Whoa! Let me tell you, JBG is blowin’ up! They added 146 acres in the last year and have plans to build a barn and commercial kitchen on site so they can preserve bumper crops of produce when needed.

Brent is a calm, kind, hard-working person. He runs his business as if every employee were family and strives to make the farm a community in itself. His reason for farming is to feed the people. And he means all the people, not just the yuppies. Right now, JBG is awaiting finalization of 501 c-3 status for a non-profit organization called FarmShare Austin whose mission is to make fresh, local, organic produce available to people who could not otherwise afford it. By partnering with other non-profits such as the Settlement Home for Children and the Salvation Army as well as other farms in and around Austin, FarmShare will bring Brent’s dream of feeding the people to life. Knowing that there are such good and capable people in the world as Farmer Brent makes me happy to be human. That he and his organic farm are here in Austin makes me lucky to be a human who loves vegetables. And I’m not just saying that because he let me take as many green tomatoes as I needed AND gave Chris and I each a full box of that day’s produce picks. Ahem. But he did.

And it is AWESOME.

Fried Green Tomatoes

Recipe Type: appetiser

Prep time: 5 mins

Cook time: 8 mins

Total time: 13 mins

Serves: 2

The classic cornmeal coated fried green tomatoes

Ingredients

Green tomatoes, however many you can get your paws on
Celery salt, garlic salt, onion salt, or salt-salt
For dredging:
1 egg
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup cornmeal
1/2 teaspoon salt and pepper, each
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
For frying:
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 tablespoons bacon fat (or more vegetable oil)
For serving, if desired:
Ranch dressing, lemon wedges, hot sauce

Instructions

Slice the tomatoes about 1/4″ to 1/3″ thick. Sprinkle the slices lightly with seasoned salt or regular salt.
Beat the egg in a small bowl and set aside
Combine the flour, cornmeal, and seasonings in another bowl.
One at a time, dredge the tomato slices in the flour mixture, then the egg, then back into the flour and set aside.
Once all slices are coated, heat the oil over high heat until a bit of flour sizzles when flicked in.
CArefully lay the slices in the hot oil and turn the heat to medium.
Cook 3-4 minutes or until golden.
Turn and cook another 3-4 minutes.
Drain on paper or a rack.
Sprinkle again with salt while still hot and serve now or let cool to room temperature.

Notes

The ingredient amounts given above for the dredging mixture should be enough to coat 8-10 slices of tomato (2 medium tomatoes)

If you’re in the Austin area and would like to support local farmers and take care of your health, please consider JBG’s Community Supported Agriculture program. You can sign up for weekly or bi-weekly deliveries of seasonal, fresh-picked produce to your home or office. There is an incredible crop of amazing produce ripening out in the fields right now: 60 varieties of tomatoes, cucumbers, okra, pattypan squash (my favorite!), colorful potatoes, Texas 1015 Sweet Onions, broccoli, cabbage, DELICIOUS watermelons and cantaloupes, specialty melons, plus so much more variety in the coming months.

AND… Bulk Tomato Sale! Pre-order different varieties of tomatoes for a huge discount! Personally, I’m hosting a salsa-making party thanks to this great offer. Me and some girlfriends are gonna order a mess of JBG tomatoes and make a mess in my kitchen with them. This is a great bargain! Get together with some friends and can or freeze your own salsa or tomato sauce. It’s fun and healthy.

Fried Chicken

Hilah — Wed, 16 May 2012 15:06:48 +0000

My mom used to take me and little brother to Zilker Park sometimes, back when we were shorter and more annoying. She’d pick up a bucket of KFC fried chicken to take along and set it in the shade on one of the cement picnic tables while we ran around and got all tired and whiny like kids do until the chicken had cooled to the perfect eating temperature. Then she’d use it as a bribe to get us to sit down and cool ourselves off a bit before we got heatstroke or something.

My great-grandma used to always throw down for a bucket of KFC when she was visiting, too, except she called it “The Colonel’s” chicken because she was old enough to remember the guy back before he had a chicken empire and was just a colonel. I think they even went to highschool together.

Maybe I made that up.

My dad’s always been partial to Church’s chicken. Myself, I like the Popeye’s.

At any rate, though it is possible to purchase quality fried chicken, it’s still pretty fun to make your own. Messy, yes, but I never saw no Colonel’s chicken with goddamn smoked paprika up in it! Slam! Burn on you, Colonel.

The spice rub is one of the most important steps here. Sprinkle it on your chicken pieces at least an hour before you cook to allow the salt and seasonings time to penetrate the meat. I skip the oft-used buttermilk soak; it impairs the crisping of the crust, and that is the most important part. Make sure your chicken is at room temperature before you put it in the oil, and make sure your oil is hot. Use a thermometer if you have one; if not, you’ll know it’s hot enough when it browns a bit of bread in under 30 seconds.

Fried Chicken

Recipe type: Main

Prep time: 1 hour

Cook time: 20 mins

Total time: 1 hour 20 mins

Serves: 4

Traditional crispy fried chicken with a special seasoned rub

Ingredients

1 2-3 pound chicken, cut up into 10 pieces (or equivalent chicken pieces)
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons coarse pepper
2 teaspoons smoked paprika
Breading:
1 egg
1/2 cup plain yogurt
1/2 cup water
Dash Tabasco, to taste
1 cup all purpose flour
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Oil for frying, 1/2-3/4 inch deep

Instructions

Put the chicken in a large bowl.
Combine the salt, pepper, and paprika and sprinkle the chicken with 5 teaspoons of the mixture. Reserve the remaining teaspoon for the breading.
Let the chicken set for one hour, covered, at room temperature if you are cooking now, or refrigerate up to 8 hours to cook the next day. (Before cooking, allow chicken to come to room temperature by leaving on the counter, covered, for 30 minutes.)
Assemble your breading station:
Beat the egg in a small bowl with the yogurt, water, and Tabasco
In another bowl, combine flour, cornstarch, cayenne, and remaining teaspoon of chicken seasoning mix.
Dip each piece of chicken once into the egg mixture, drain excess, then roll in flour. Tap off excess.
When all chicken is coated, heat the oil to 350 degrees F.
Fry the chicken, turning once: wings need 10 minutes total, all other pieces 12 minutes total. Keep the oil temperature between 350-365 F.
You will need to fry in two batches to avoid crowding the pan.
Allow cooked chicken to cool 10 minutes before eating hot, or allow to cool completely and then refrigerate to eat it cold the next day.

Habanero Lamb Curry

Hilah — Sun, 13 May 2012 14:29:11 +0000

The other morning, as we had coffee and breakfast, I asked Chris what he thought he might want for dinner. RED MEAT. He kind of hulked-out for a second and his voice got gravely and he forgot how to use pronouns. “Whoa whoa whoa!” says I, “Relax. I got this. You might need to change your shirt before you head to the office, buddy. Looks like your trapezius blew a seam.”

So after he was off, I got to work. I had some lamb stew meat in the freezer and a whole jar of this West Indian pepper sauce I made a while back and totally forgot about in the fridgerator. Blammo. It’s experiment-time.

Habanero Lamb Curry

Recipe type: Main

Prep time: 20 mins

Cook time: 2 hours

Total time: 2 hours 20 mins

Serves: 4

A slow-simmered, spicy Jamaican-style lamb curry

Ingredients

1 teaspoon oil
1 large onion, small diced
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
1 pound lamb stew meat
2 large cloves garlic, minced
1 large tomato, diced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup West Indian pepper sauce (my recipe or something similar)

Instructions

Heat the oil over medium-high heat and saute the onion until translucent.
Add the spices and fry another minute.
Add the lamb and garlic and stir to combine.
Add the tomato and salt and 1/4 cup of the pepper sauce and 1/2 cup water.
Cover tightly and simmer 2 hours or until the lamb is tender. You may need to add more water to prevent sticking.
Add the remaining 1/4 cup pepper sauce and serve.

I served this with a chickpea and greens dish I’m working on for my first commercial client job (!) and the tsatsiki from page 123 of the Learn to Cook Book and this nectarine chutney I posted on the community forum!

Recipe Q&A + Live Cooking Show info

Hilah — Sat, 12 May 2012 19:20:53 +0000

Your cooking questions answered, info on LIVE cooking shows, plus my NEW cookbook!

Check out my new book! http://caveladycooking.com

Chicken Fajita Salad

Blueberry Muffins!