Monday Menu - a smoking edition

Ilex wanted to know about the smoker we used with the fish. We have a Brinkman Gourmet charcoal Smoker. It came from Lowes last November - cost $44.00. Inside it has a place for coals, marinade or water, and there are two cooking racks.


This was our trial run and we were happy with it. After it was started, it was good for the rest of the day. It did take a 10 lb bag of charcoal and then a bag of soaked apple wood chips - so not really eco friendly but then again, I'm not sure that smokers are. For that amount of charcoal, I did at least 20 lbs of fish. What I hadn't realized is that the coals kept hot for so long that I could have could have easily have done another round of food.

I do want to say that last summer we smoked fish and eggplant (separate occasions) using the Weber charcoal grill and the results were the same. The Weber takes a little more managing and doesn't hold as much food, but otherwise works about the same and serves two purposes.

Let me know if anyone is interested in the brine recipe for trout or salmon.

The Monday Menu + a recipe for laundry soap

This week's Monday Menu includes not only the typical Meal planner (recipes for the asking) but also a recipe for home made laundry soap is found at the bottom of this post.

This week I'm making cheese. As I've yet to buy or make a cheese press I'm going to start with Mozzarella. I'm going to start buying extra milk and saving it for cheeses. I may be this cow's only customer by the time I'm done with yogurt, cheese and milk for the kids. I tried my hand at milking today. I only got a quart before my muscles were fatigued. I'm going to work up to being able to help with the chores so the cow's owner can leave town on occasion.

With the mozzarella I'll make Panini sandwiches. I'll use the whey focaccia bread and then dress the sandwich with a spoon of pesto, and red onion and greens.

I've got whole roasting chicken in the freezer that need to be used and a smoker that has never been used so I thought I'd pair the two and learn to use the smoker.

We'll be having a few all vegie meals such as salad and corn, and I didn't actually get around to the tofu and shrimp dish so that will be coming up as well. I've got my head in the garden and am not really focused on the menu so much just now.

As far as the soap goes,we didn't always just run to the store and pay alarming rates for specialty laundry detergent that is bad for the environment. Really, making soap was normal a couple of generations ago. This recipe for soap comes from Soaps gone buy, a really great site with good prices where I've ordered the Fels Naptha and the washing soda. The borax is readily available here. For scented laundry, you may add a couple of drops of essential oil (gardenia or lavender) in 1/2 C vinegar to the rinse water.

Powdered Laundry Detergent
1 cup grated Fels Naptha Soap
1/2 cup washing soda
1/2 cup 20 mule team borax

Mix and store in airtight container or bag. For light loads, use 2 tablespoon. For heavy loads, use 3 tablespoons.

To make a large batch - grate 6 bars of Fels Naptha Soap and then add 3 cups of Washing Soda and 3 cups of 20 Mule Team Borax. Mix well and store in covered container.

TIP: Home made laundry soaps will NOT make suds in your washer so don't be alarmed. Fels Naptha Soap is a pure soap and typically makes little or no suds in the water. This makes it perfect for use in the new HE washers as well as traditional washers. You will also notice the need to either reduce your laundry softener or in most cases you can even eliminate the use of softener completely.

Now, go hang your laundry out on the line!

The Monday Menu - Breakfast Edition

This week's Monday Menu features breakfast. Commercial breakfast cereals are fast and convenient. They are also overpriced and only going to get more expensive as grain prices increase. I have not been buying these packaged cereals so that our food budget can keep pace with the increased prices at the grocery store. A cooked breakfast means getting up a little earlier or preparing the night before.

I believe that a cooked breakfast will have more far reaching effects than simply keeping pace with inflation. I think it matters that the kids go to school with a cooked breakfast warming them from the inside out. I think it will matter that they have memories of the smell and taste of cooked breakfasts. I hope it strengthens them in ways that go beyond nutrition.

Non-commercially prepared breakfasts include:

*eggs, toast, bacon
*Muffins (the variety is endless)
*Pancakes or waffles - these don't take too long to prepare but can also be individual frozen pancakes put into the toaster for a grab and go on a busy day.
* Hot rice with milk and butter
* Home made bread with jam.
* Yogurt with fresh fruit. With fresh milk from the cow I'm making yogurt twice a week.
* Spaghetti with egg. Mr. Greenjeans learned this from some Italians on a trip. He scrambles a couple of eggs with chili pepper flakes and then adds left over spaghetti noodles to fry for a moment and then scrambles in freshly grated Parmesan cheese.
* Omelets
* French Toast
* Left overs from dinner with things like quiche or potatoes being the best.
* Cooked cereal such as oatmeal, or malt o meal (buy the plain and add your own sugar).

Monday Menu

One thing I came up against last week as we have settled into eating at home more deliberately is that I didn't have enough meals planned so I throwing in one more this week:

Pizza - er yes the kind that is made at home. The kids want pesto and olives and things on theirs. Mr Greenjeans and I like caramelized onion and anchovies.

Spaghetti and salad - This is from Spaghetti sauce I've made in bulk and stored in quart jars in the freezer.

Chicken with Garlic and Sugar Snap peas and Dry fried Green Beans
Both of these recipes come from "The Breath of the Wok" book by Grace Young and Alan Richardson. This is one of my most favorite cookbooks in a very large collection. It isn't all recipes and chronicles the spirit of the wok. We were in San Francisco last year and went to the Wok shop they wrote about - it was a fine experience, and we spent all morning there, but I digress.

Shrimp Stuffed Tofu from this month's Cooking Light magazine.

Today i purchased a 32 Qt. Pressure Canner. This will be my learning a new skill. We've always frozen our batches of spaghetti in quart jars but now I'll be able to pressure seal them!

The Monday Menu

This Monday’s Menu comes from several different sources. For one thing, I’ve become aware that I need to get into both the (extra) freezer and the cupboard and use some of what is hanging out there. Maybe some of the things on the menu aren’t sustainable but they’re already in the freezer and I’m not throwing it away. On the brighter side, I have been out visiting other blogs this week and found some really inspiring foodie posts and want to try some of the recipes and I’ll provided links to those blogs.

One of the things I love about my house is the 7’x5’ pantry which is lined with shelves (24 inch shelves, mind you) and 9 foot walls. There is floor space for buckets and bushel baskets and is vented. I have to step down into the pantry as it is below floor level and the floor stays nice and cool. All that said, if not well-organized, I can and do lose stuff in there. So, I’m going in….send the dogs if you don’t hear from me….

Nee-chan is making Quiche tonight: She’s making the pie crust with a filling of a doz. free range eggs (we’re beginning to save the cartons for our future hens rather than composting them), spinach, and peppers. She makes a wall with the pie dough and we’re allowed some bacon in our side. Really quite vegetarian generous, I think. We’ll have a side of steamed artichokes that were on sale this week.
From the freezer we’ll have Lasagna during a busy night of the week. This was made for a party this winter (vegetarian and meat) and froze the leftovers in individual servings.

Also found in the freezer were chicken wings. Oh I do love them marinated in soy sauce, sprinkled with sesame seeds and grilled.

In the freezer, we still have strawberries from last year’s harvest and so we’ll be focusing on smoothies for breakfast.

Apparently the folks at the the spotted apron liked last month’s Cooking Light magazine too. They have a beautiful blog with great pictures so I’m trying their adaptation of the pasta, Makaruni Pasta with Baby Bella Mushroom Sauce. It looks wonderful.

With the left over fresh spinach I’m making Farmgirl’s Spinach soup

The pantry cleaning went well. I found very few things with more than one ingredient. One of those was a bag of powdered Hurricane drink mix from pre-Katrina New Orleans. Price tag read $3.99, and out to the landfill it went. There are the requisite canned veggies and tinned meats in case of disaster now neatly lined up with their labels showing nicely. But I also found several varieties of lovely organic rice. I liberated them from their plastic bags, cut the bags so to save the labels, and put them in glass jars with their labels showing. This will help keep them from getting lost.