5 posts tagged “cooking”
Well, frankly - the jury's divided.
OMG, that's foul.
This started out as a dare (kids, here's why you don't want to take dares - but if you do, cooking tripe is better than doing drugs or Ghost Ridin' the Whip or whatever other harebrained thing your friends can come up with - I think). I asked, on QnA Live, what I should put on my redesigned Web site. "Recipes for Tripe" was one suggestion. I thought "Me, trying to cook tripe" might be even better. I had trouble deciding which page - "Nutrition & Fitness" or "Humor"?
Holly's Cooking School - where the clueless meet the inept. Could be... either.
I just can't wait to see what this smells like while it's cooking.
Torshi-e Makhlut
(Recipe adapted from Food of Life, by Najmieh Batmanglij; commentary compliments of the chef. My copy of the cookbook is apparently the "old" Food of Life; I'm not sure if this recipe's in the "new" edition or not. I highly recommend any cookbook by this woman, though - the instructions are clear, the photos lovely, and your results are almost guaranteed to look like the pictures if you follow the recipes as written. Even if they don't, they'll taste great.)
2 large eggplants
2 green peppers
1 lb. carrots
½ lb. turnips
½ head cauliflower
1 lb. pearl onions
5 cloves garlic
½ c. chopped mint leaves
½ c. chopped parsley
½ c. chopped coriander (cilantro) leaves
½ c. chopped basil leaves
3-4 quarts wine vinegar
2 T. salt
½ tsp. freshly ground black pepper
2 T. gol-par (powdered angelica)
1 tsp. advieh (Iranian allspice; substitute allspice, if unavailable)
3 tsp. siah daneh (caraway seeds)
¼ tsp. cayenne pepper
1. Prick the eggplants with a fork to prevent bursting and bake on oven rack for 1 hour at 350ºF.
2. Wash green peppers and cut into small pieces. Scrape carrots, wash, and chop fine. Wash turnips and chop. Wash cauliflower and separate into small flowerets. Wash and chop celery. Clean and wash pearl onions. Peel and chop garlic cloves.
3. Wash herbs and drain. Dry thoroughly, then chop.
4. Place baked eggplant on wooden cutting board. Remove and discard skin; chop flesh into small pieces. Sprinkle with salt. Cover with a clean towel and let stand for about an hour.
5. Cook chopped eggplant in 2 c. vinegar over medium heat for about 10 minutes.
6. Place eggplant, 2 quarts vinegar, salt, pepper, gol-par, advieh (or allspice), siah daneh (caraway seeds), cayenne pepper, chopped herbs, garlic, and vegetables in a large bowl. Mix well. Add more vinegar if necessary.
7. Sterilize jars in boiling water. Dry thoroughly with a clean towel. Fill to within ½ inch of the top with the mixture. Sprinkle with salt and fill to the brim with vinegar. Seal the jars.
8. Store in a cool place for at least 10 days before using.
Notes:
It has been about 15 years since I last made this, because it's a pain in the ass to make. A food processor helps a lot, but it's easy to chop the vegetables too fine with it. That's not ideal.
When it comes to canning and putting up things in jars, I'm clueless; I do know that the lids should pop down in order to properly seal. As I recall, the mixture needs to be quite warm in order for the jars to seal properly; the cooling liquid sucks the lid down and forms a vacuum. As I recall, my sister-in-law and I got around he problem of jars that wouldn't seal on the first try by using a large stock pot for the "bowl" in step 6 and dumping the jars back into it if the seals failed to pop down after about 15 minutes. We heated the stuff up a bit, then tried again. Look, there's enough vinegar and salt in this stuff that no one's going to get sick.
My mother-in-law was convinced we were going to kill everyone in the family the first time we made this. She asked what kind of pot we were using. I said "anodized aluminum," as in that professional, semi-non-stick, fired-at-2000-degrees, indestructible shit that costs a fortune – not just some cheap-ass aluminum pot. She started spouting off nonsense about aluminum and vinegar combining to release deadly toxins. I yelled at my sister-in-law to open the windows, and then realized this was one of those old wives' tales that might have some basis in reality, but we weren't going to find out the truth of it first-hand any time soon. But use glass or anodized aluminum. Avoid cheap metal pots and Teflon-coated things, as the vinegar might damage them.
My mother-in-law wouldn't touch that batch of torshi for over a year. Maybe she got the last laugh, though. I hear the longer it sits, the better it tastes. I'm not sure how long is too long, though, so I suggest opening within 2-3 years (assuming the seal's intact) and using it within 6-12 months of opening it. Be sure to refrigerate after opening.
This is an incredible cookbook. I highly recommend it; not only are the instructions clear and easy-to-follow, but the pictures look good enough to eat and show you how the dish should look, when you're done. Amazingly, they actually do look that way, if you follow the recipes! I got this shortly after I was married, and my husband's family brags on what a good Persian cook I am. It's all thanks to these recipes.
As you can see in the picture, I must have measured wrong - get about double the jars you think you need, just in case. It was only supposed to make about half this much. Just as well, though; this is fun, but it isn't so much fun I need to do it more than once or twice a year!
