Sweet and Sour Cabbage Salad

 Sweet and Sour Cabbage Salad

        Recipes You Can Bank On A Branson Cookbook, published in 2010 is a "community cookbook". I love this kind of cookbook and seeing the recipes people share.  You know if you share a recipe to a cookbook, it's one of your favorites.  This recipe is based on the Amish Sweet And Sour Cabbage Salad recipe on page 43. The original calls for 2 16oz bags of shredded cabbage or coleslaw mix; I used one bag and did not use the optional sweet pepper strips.  I also did not use a dash of seasoned salt which is called for in the original. I halved the rest of the ingredients since I was only using one bag of cabbage/coleslaw mix. I liked this cabbage salad; it's nice and simple. Try it as a side dish or add a scoop to a pulled pork or barbecue sandwich. 

Ingredients:

1/2 cup sugar (I used Stevia)

1/4 cup vinegar

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup salad oil (I used avocado oil)

1 tbsp chopped pimiento 

1 tbsp finely chopped sweet red pepper

Dash celery salt1 16oz bag shredded cabbage or coleslaw mix (I used a tri-color blend)

Directions:

Combine sugar (or Stevia), vinegar, salt, oil, pimiento, red pepper in a jar or container with a tight lid and shake well. Into a large bowl, add 3/4 of your cabbage/coleslaw and pour dressing over. Stir, cover and chill for 3 to 24 hours. Mix in the final 1/4 of cabbage/coleslaw when ready to serve.  

Sweet and Sour Cabbage Salad

Carrot & Cabbage Noodles with Sweet Chili Sauce

 Carrot  & Cabbage Noodles with Sweet Chili Sauce

    This yummy recipe comes from the Thai Kitchen Cookbook - The Essential Guide To Thai Cooking copyrighted in 2000. If you're like me, trying to eat out less and you like Chinese and Thai food, you try and learn how to make it at home. This is a nice little cookbook and I look forward to trying more recipes. 

Ingredients: 

7oz rice noodles (stir-fry or thin)

3 tbsp peanut oil (I used canola oil, because the peanut oil I found was so expensive)

1 tbsp finely minced garlic

1/2 cup red onion, finely chopped (I used red shallots)

2 tsp brown sugar

1/2 cup carrots, coarsely grated (I had baby carrots and grating those was impossible; I thinly sliced them lengthwise and they were just fine)

1 cup green cabbage, coarsely chopped (I think I used a little more)

2 tbsp Thai Kitchen Spicy Thai Chili Sauce (I used a crispy chili pepper in oil)

2 tbsp soy sauce

Optional: Crushed peanuts

Optional: Cucumber, thinly cut like matchsticks (I did not use cucumber until I tried it with leftovers)

Optional: Thai Kitchen Sweet Red Chili Dipping Sauce (recipe from the book below)

    1 tbsp fresh red chili, minced (again, I used the crispy chili pepper in oil)

    1/2 cup rice vinegar

    1 tsp salt

    1 tbsp sugar

    1 tsp garlic, minced

Instructions For Noodles:

Bring two cups of water to boil. Turn off heat and place rice noodles into the hot water for three to five minutes or until the noodles are soft, and cooked through, but not mushy. Rinse with cold water for thirty seconds. Drain well and set aside. Heat oil on medium-high heat in a large wok or skillet. Add garlic and stir fry for one minute.  Add onion and brown sugar. Sit fry for two to three minutes until the onion is soft. Add carrots, cabbage, chili sauce/chilis and soy sauce. Stir fry for five minutes. Add the noodles, mixing well and stir fry for three to five more minutes.  Serve immediately with sweet red chili dipping sauce and crushed peanuts if desired. Serves three to four. 

Instructions For Sweet Red Chili Dipping Sauce:

Into a small pot, add all ingredients and stir constantly over low heat, until the mixture thickens to a syrupy consistency. I somehow didn't cook this sauce and served it cold. Although it was thin and not syrup-y, I really liked it, so try it without cooking if you like. 

Carrot & Cabbage Noodles with Sweet Chili Sauce

    

Week 47 - Pepper Cabbage

 Pepper Cabbage

Week 47 of 52

Side Dish #7

    Side Dish number 7 comes to us from Amish Dutch Cookbook, copyrighted in 1960 and I believe the copy I have was printed in 1971. I'm guessing that the year copy is, is 1971, as the last year listed is 1971. The recipes in this recipe booklet are from restaurants and hotels in the Pennsylvania Dutch/Amish region of Pennsylvania. In the introduction of the booklet, some of the history and traditions of the Amish are explained. It's pretty interesting and I feel a connection to the region, as the first of my ancestors who immigrated to America, came over in 1727 on a ship called "Friendship" and settled in this area.  While this ancestor was not Mennonite or Amish or German (he came from Switzerland), I am kinda fascinated with this region. 

    This recipe is from Haag's Hotel in Shartlesville, Pennsylvania. At first when I finished this recipe, I wasn't super happy with how it turned out. The sweet/sour/tangy flavor wasn't as strong as I'd hoped. I thought the cabbage I had selected for this recipe was "medium" sized, but maybe it was too big? Could that be one reason that it wasn't as tangy as I'd hoped, since there was maybe too much cabbage for the amount of liquid? After chilling in my refrigerator for a couple days or so though, the flavor is stronger. I do like this recipe. I like the crunch and the tangy-ness and it makes me feel healthy. Although I prefer a hot German slaw, I would try this cold cabbage slaw like dish again.

Ingredients:

1 medium green pepper, shredded (I chopped finely)

1 medium green cabbage, chopped finely (or diced)

3 stalks of celery, thinly sliced

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar 

1/2 cup water

poppy seed (optional)

Directions:

Combine vegetables in a large bowl. In a small bowl, combine the apple cider vinegar, water, salt and sugar. Pour over vegetables and combine thoroughly. Refrigerate to blend flavors and to cool. Serve cold with poppy seed sprinkled on top, if desired. 

Pepper Cabbage

Week 1 - Gado-Gado

 Gado-Gado

Recipe 1 of 52 in 2022

Salad #1

    Recipe 1 of 52 in 2022 in my 52 recipes in 2022 self-challenge, is an Indonesian salad.  The recipe is included in Favorite Recipes of America - Salads. It was submitted for inclusion by "Mrs. Mort B. Brigadier, Officer's Wive's Club, Canal Zone, Rep of Panama". This 1968 cookbook is part of a set of four which were sold in a cute little 'box' sleeve/cover. I was lucky enough to find the entire set quite a number of years ago.  

    This recipe was a little bit of a pain, but would be easier if you prep the vegetables the day before or earlier in the day.  Although I said it felt like a pain, I am saying that, because I was making it after work and it felt like a lot. As I was preparing this recipe, I was skeptical of how I'd like the mixture of flavors, but I did end up really enjoying this salad dish.  I served my Gado-Gado over white rice, but this would be good by itself or brown rice.  Maybe even quinoa. All I know is that I'm going to take a dish over leftovers just by itself for lunch at work tomorrow, and I know I would definitely make this again. 

    The recipe makes about eight servings, depending on your serving size. 

Ingredients:

1 lb bean sprouts

1/2 lb cabbage, chopped

1/2 lb green beans, chopped

1 tsp salt

2 tsp brown sugar

1 tsp lemon juice

1 tsp soy sauce (I used a dumpling sauce, which has soy sauce in it (I didn't have plain soy sauce) and it worked just fine as a substitute)

1 onion, sliced (I used a medium to large sized onion)

1 or 2 cloves of garlic, chopped and fried

1 tsp ground red pepper (I used a spicy red pepper mix by Ariel's Spices)

1/4 to 1/2 lb peanut butter (I used chunky; perfect for this recipe)

1 cucumber, sliced

1 bunch radishes sliced (I used about 8 radishes from a bag I had bought; I had to go to four stores to find radishes) 

2 hard boiled eggs, sliced

(optional) red chili pepper flakes 

Directions:

Remember to wash all of your vegetables before cooking. Parboil the bean sprouts, green beans and cabbage "in a small amount of water" for several minutes. I  used 3/4 to 1 cup water in the largest skillet I have.  3/4 cup water would be a good starting point if you try this recipe, and because of volume of the vegetables, using a large pot may work better for the par-boiling.  I used large kitchen tongs to carefully toss my ingredients, as they cooked down and it did work out just fine. If using a skillet, take care when you are par-boiling the vegetables. I did not measure how much time I par-boiled this mixture, but you'll want to cook them to where they are softened, but still have a bit of crunch.  When your vegetable are cooked, drain the vegetables and reserve the stock. Return the stock to your pan and stir in the salt, brown sugar, lemon juice, soy sauce, onion, garlic, red pepper and peanut butter. You need to make sure to cook the peanut butter down.  It will melt into the sauce. 

The original recipe says to layer the cabbage, beans, bean sprouts, cucumber and radishes in a salad bowl. This didn't sound right to me, so I used a large casserole dish. I spooned the cabbage, beans and bean sprouts mixture into the bottom, followed by a layer of my cucumber slices, then the radishes and finally the sliced egg.  The original recipe says to serve the peanut butter dressing with the salad. I did not. I poured it directly over top of the salad. And you know what? It was perfect.  Sprinkle with red chili pepper flakes for extra kick. 

Try this salad out and let me know what you think.  

A side view of Gado-Gado salad

Layered vegetable and sliced egg

Gado-Gado salad

Gado-Gado salad over rice

Lemonchick's Turkey & Vegetable Soup

 Lemonchick's Turkey & Vegetable Soup

    Well, I had a little bit of an unplanned hiatus. I had planned to make fudge the week February 14th and then we had a major ice/snow storm (It snowed twice that week) which knocked out power for millions of Texans, all over the state. Some had no power for 5 days or more. Some like me, had multiple power outages, which in some cases lasted hours at a time and others for short periods.  My longest outage was about 18 hrs. Some had power on and off constantly the whole time and some never lost any power at all. I won't go into any more of that, but I will say the fact that we had the weather wasn't the issue, it was the power outages causing no heat in freezing temps. So, that is one of the reasons for the delay in another post. 

    Anyhow, back to the business at hand. When I went shopping the other day, I picked up a package of soup vegetables at a Fiesta grocery store, for just over $4.00. Most Hispanic grocery stores will have these packs of soup vegetables.  All you have to do is chop up the veggies, add them to broth, add seasonings and meat if you like. There was plenty of chopped vegetables and it would have been just fine without meat. The pack I got came with onion, a type of Mexican squash that I don't know, a small bit of corn, cilantro, carrot, a small red-skinned potato, cabbage and a piece of celery.  

    I prepped my veggies by washing them first and then chopping them into small pieces. You can chop them as small as you like. I put my carrot, potato and corn into the soup pot which I had poured two 32oz containers of chicken broth and 3 cups of water (I'd turned the pot on to start heating while I was chopping the vegetables) into. I added the cabbage, squash and celery, followed by two cubes of Knorr tomato bouillon with chicken flavor and about 5 cloves of garlic (finely diced). I added a little more than two cups of cooked, chopped turkey meat and 1/4 cup of quick cooking brown rice and boiled everything until my harder vegetables were soft. Honestly I didn't time it. Just cook until your vegetables are as tender as you like. I added chopped cilantro and 1/4 teaspoon and cooked it just a little bit longer, before serving myself a bowl with a sprinkle of sriracha sauce. The verdict? Yummmmmmmmmm.  And, now I have food for the whole week, because it was a huge pot of soup! 

Options: Use vegetable stock and leave out turkey for a vegetarian version.  Change it up and add different seasonings.  I did not use salt in mine, but you can salt to taste. Use beef broth and use chopped beef. Use chicken, instead of turkey. Sprinkle queso fresco or a bit of your favorite cheese on top when you serve. Make it your own!

Ingredients:

1 pack of soup vegetables (Mine had a wedge of a small cabbage, 1 small red-skinned potato, 1 small Mexican squash, 1 piece of celery, 1 piece of corn-on-the-cob, cilantro and about 4 or so good sized pieces of a giant carrot)

2 32oz containers of chicken broth

3 cups water (I used straight from the faucet, because I'm fancy)

5 cloves garlic (or to taste)

1/4 teaspoon pepper

2 tomato bouillon cubes with chicken flavor (or plain ol' chicken bouillon cubes)

1/4 cup quick cooking brown rice

Sriracha or your favorite hot sauce for extra flavor in your bowl

Hot Cabbage Slaw

 Hot Cabbage Slaw (German Style)

    Bonus post today for Christmas Eve!! After making the stuffed cabbage leaves a few days ago, I had so much cabbage left over, that I planned to make a hot German style slaw. I used a recipe for a Hot Slaw that I found in my 1990 edition of The Fannie Farmer Cookbook. It was different that another recipe which I've used and I did do some seasoning not in the recipe. Two egg yolks, water, butter and vinegar are stirred together (and stirred constantly) in the bottom of a saucepan until thickened. I had about 1 lb of cabbage chopped up already to go, so once the mixture in the saucepan was thickened, I stirred in my chopped cabbage and cooked it until it was softened and then I added my seasonings. 

    I like poppy seed in my hot slaw and I used 1 teaspoon in this dish. I hadn't had quite the full 1/4 cup of vinegar (Oops. I should have made sure I had enough before starting) so the other seasoning I added, was to help give it more flavor. I added about 2 1/2 teaspoons of Trader Joe's spicy mustard seasoning.  I also added 6 strips of cooked and crumbled bacon. I made sure to incorporate all of the seasonings and bacon with the cabbage. Although it wasn't as vinegar-y as I like, I am happy with it.  

Stuffed Cabbage Leaves

 Stuffed Cabbage Leaves

    So today is Sunday, and I made this recipe yesterday.  It was good! Not super complicated, but it seemed like a lot of prep work.  This recipes came from the same cookbook as the last recipe, this 1959 Farm Journal's Country Cookbook.  

    One curious thing about this recipe was that it doesn't say to cook the sausage that goes in the filling and the second thing is that the recipe calls for you to put a whole, small onion in the baking dish with the rolls.  I didn't understand the onion thing, so I ended up doing some onion slices with what was left from the onion is used for part of the filling. The recipe called for seasoned rice and I chose to use  one cube of Knorr's "Caldo de Tomate", which is tomato bouillon with chicken flavor. 

    The first step was I browned the sausage and while that was working, I started chopping up the green pepper, onion and celery.  Next I put the cabbage which I had removed the core/heart from on a large pan and poured boiling water over it, covering with the lid. The hot water wilts the leaves and makes them easier to remove. I also cooked the rice in the microwave while all this was going on. Once the sausage was browned, I drained the grease and put the sausage in my mixing bowl.  I added butter to the skillet and cooked the onion, celery and green pepper, which I cooked for 2 minutes, stirring frequently. When the rice was done, I added that to my mixing bowl and then added the veggies, mixing it all up.  

    Now, one thing I changed was the recipe called for 'thyme', which I thought I had and didn't, so I modified the seasoning (Sometimes you have to use what you have on hand and that's okay).  Instead of one 1/2 teaspoon of thyme, I used 1/2 teaspoon of  Trader Joe's "Italian Style Sofrito" mix, which has onion, tomato, sea salt, garlic, chili pepper, parsley flakes, crushed red pepper, rosemary and sage; one 1/2 teaspoon of parsley flakes and one 1/2 teaspoon of Penzey's Spices "Ozark Seasoning", which has salt, black pepper, garlic, paprika, mustard, ancho, celery seed, caraway, allspice, ginger, cardamom and cloves. The recipe also calls for 1/2 teaspoon of salt. I mixed the seasoning in with the rice and sausage mix.  

    Once my filling was all ready, I took the cabbage and pealed leaves off, laying them on paper towels to dry off a bit. I sprayed a 9x13 baking dish with cooking spray and used a spoon to scoop some of the filling onto leaves, one at a time. I rolled up the leaves with the filling into little "packages", placed them in my dish and secured them with toothpicks. The recipe calls for using a 1/4 cup of filling for each leaf, but I "eyeballed' it and it worked out fine.  I made 12 rolls aka "packages".  Once the pan was full, I poured the tomato juice and water over the rolls and added the rest of the onion, which I had sliced. I baked in a 350 degree pre-heated oven for one hour (my house smelled good). 

    I was hungry, so didn't let it cool for very, long, before I served myself a roll with a piece of buttered sour-dough bread.  I rather enjoyed this dish and plan to make it again. I proclaim it a success!! I am however plotting to try an all veggie and sausage (or without) version. You could easily leave out the sausage and season without the chicken and tomato bouillon, for a vegetarian dish and just do what I want to try, all veggies.  Maybe even crumbled tofu or paneer cheese would work.      

    So, as always, if you try this, let me know what you think.