Ingredients:
butter and olive oil
1 cup matzo farfel or bits of broken matzo
1-2 handfuls dried mushrooms, soaked in hot water
handful of chopped parsley or other herbs
salt and pepper
Preparation: Melt some butter with olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat.
Add the matzo farfel and stir to cover in butter and lightly toast until slightly golden. Add more butter or olive oil if the pan gets dry.
Remove mushrooms from from water and squeeze out any remaining moisture. Reserve the soaking water.
Coarsely chop mushrooms and add to farfel. Stir to cover in butter.
Add some of the mushroom water to farfel mixture and stir. As the farfel absorbs the mushroom water, add more and stir.
Taste as you go to get the consistency you prefer. Then season to taste with salt, pepper, and herbs.
Matzotto (Matzo Farfel)
Lawry's Yorkshire Pudding
Ingredients:
2 cups flour
1 cup milk
4 eggs
1/2 teaspoon salt
Preparation:
Sift together 2 cups flour and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Make a well and add 4 beaten eggs. Blend; add 1 cup milk and beat continuously for 10 minutes. Let stand 1 hour. Heat oven to 450 degrees. Place 12-hole muffin pan in oven to heat. When hot, grease pan (butter, margarine, non-stick spray, etc.). Pour equal amounts of batter into muffin tins, and bake for 40 minutes.
More Lawry's Recipes HERE.
Yorkshire Pudding
The texture of a Yorkshire pudding is nothing like a pudding in the modern sense of the word. Not a custard, it's more like a cross between a soufflé and a cheese puff (without the cheese). The batter is like a very thin pancake batter, which you pour into a hot casserole dish over drippings from roast beef or prime rib. It then puffs up like a chef's hat, only to collapse soon after you remove it from the oven.
Given that it's loaded with beef drippings (read fat) or butter, or both, Yorkshire pudding is probably not the thing you want to eat regularly if you are watching your waistline. But for a once a year indulgence, served alongside a beef roast? Yummmmm.
Yorkshire pudding is traditionally made in one pan (even more traditionally in the pan catching the drippings from the roast above). You can also make a popover version with the same batter and drippings in a muffin tin or popover pan.
Ingredients:
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
2 Tbsp melted butter
2 eggs, beaten*
2-4 Tbsp of roast drippings
* If you double the recipe, add an extra egg to the batter.
Preparation:
1 Sift together the flour and salt in a large bowl. Form a well in the center. Add the milk, melted butter, and eggs and beat until the batter is completely smooth (no lumps), the consistency of whipping cream. Let sit for an hour.
2 Heat oven to 450°F. Add roast drippings to a 9x12-inch pyrex or ceramic casserole dish, coating the bottom of the dish. Heat the dish in the oven for 10 minutes.
For a popover version you can use a popover pan or a muffin pan, putting at least a teaspoon of drippings in the bottom of each well, and place in oven for just a couple minutes.
3 Carefully pour the batter into the pan (or the wells of muffin/popover pans, filling just 1/3 full), once the pan is hot. Cook for 15 minutes at 450°F, then reduce the heat to 350°F and cook for 15 to 20 more minutes, until puffy and golden brown.
Cut into squares to serve. Serves 6.
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The first ever recorded recipe appears in a book, The Whole Duty of a Woman in 1737 and listed as A Dripping Pudding - the dripping coming from spit-roast meat.
'Make a good batter as for pancakes; put in a hot toss-pan over the fire with a bit of butter to fry the bottom a little then put the pan and butter under a shoulder of mutton, instead of a dripping pan, keeping frequently shaking it by the handle and it will be light and savoury, and fit to take up when your mutton is enough; then turn it in a dish and serve it hot.'
The next recorded recipe took the strange pudding from local delicacy to become the nation's favorite dish following publication in The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy by Hannah Glasse in 1747. As one of the most famous food writers of the time, the popularity of the book spread the word of the Yorkshire Pudding. 'It is an exceeding good Pudding, the Gravy of the Meat eats well with it,' states Hannah.
"Take a quart of milk, four eggs, and a little salt, make it up into a thick batter with flour, like a pancake batter. You must have a good piece of meat at the fire, take a stew-pan and put some dripping in, set it on the fire, when it boils, pour in your pudding, let it bake on the fire till you think it is high enough, then turn a plate upside-down in the dripping-pan, that the dripping may not be blacked; set your stew-pan on it under your meat, and let the dripping drop on the pudding, and the heat of the fire come to it, to make it of a fine brown. When your meat is done and set to table, drain all the fat from your pudding, and set it on the fire again to dry a little; then slide it as dry as you can into a dish, melt some butter, and pour into a cup, and set in the middle of the pudding. It is an exceeding good pudding, the gravy of the meat eats well with it."
Mrs Beeton may have been Britain's most famous food writer of the 19th century but her recipe omitted one of the fundamental rules for making Yorkshire pudding - the need for the hottest oven possible. The recipe was further wrong by stating to cook the pudding in advance before placing it under the meat an hour before needed. Yorkshire folk blame her error on her southern origins.
Mrs Beeton's Recipe - 1866
1½ pints milk
6 large tbsp flour
3 eggs
1 saltspoon salt
Put the flour into a basin with the salt and gradually stir in enough milk to make it a stiff batter. When it is perfectly smooth and all the lumps are well rubbed down, add the remaining milk and the eggs, which should be well beaten. Beat the mixture for a few minutes. Pour into a shallow baking tin, which has been previously well rubbed with beef dripping. Put the pudding into the oven. Bake it for an hour. Then, for another 30 minutes, place it under the meat, to catch a little of the gravy that flows from it. Cut the pudding into small square pieces, put them on a hot dish and serve. If the meat is baked, the pudding may at once be placed under it, resting the former on a small three cornered stand.
Time: 1½ hour.
Sufficient for 5 or 6 persons. Seasonable at any time.
Popovers vs. Yorkshire Pudding:
James Beard, cook & author, has said that the resemblance between Yorkshire pudding and popovers is coincidental, because the popover has gone through several changes before becoming the recipe that it is now. He further stated that popovers are purely American. Popovers have also been called Laplanders and puff pops.
The popover is an American version of Yorkshire pudding and similar batter puddings made in England since the 17th century.
Ogden Nash, poet, inverts the historical order of events.
Let's call Yorkshire puddingA fortunate blunder:
It's a sort of popover
That turned and popped under.
Matzo Farfel Stuffing
Ingredients:
* 2 cups matzo farfel
* 5 large shiitake mushrooms, chopped
* 1 small onion, finely diced
* 1 1/2 tablespoons butter or 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1/2 teaspoon turmeric
* 1 teaspoon cumin
* 2 tablespoons fresh oregano
* 2 cups chicken broth or 2 cups vegetable broth
Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Saute onions in butter or olive oil on medium-low heat until translucent (about 5-6 minutes).
3. Add mushrooms, saute until mushrooms soften a bit (about 3-4 minutes). Mix in turmeric and cumin. Saute a few more minutes until mushrooms look totally soft.
4. Pour farfel into a large bowl. Toss in mushroom mixture with farfel. Add salt, fresh oregano and enough broth to moisten farfel, but not enough to make too soggy.
5. Put entire mixture into 3 quart baking dish (approximately 9x12 size). Bake for about 15 minutes in oven, turn heat to broil, then set under broiler for about 1-2 minutes to let top brown a bit (NOTE: watch carefully so you don't burn the top).
Mozzarella Stuffed Pretzels
Make Dough:
1. Dissolve 1 package active dry yeast or 1 cake yeast into 1 1/2 cups of warm water.
2. Add 1 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon sugar.
3. Blend in 4 cups of flour.
4. Knead dough until smooth on lightly floured surface for 10 minutes.
Pretzel Preparation:
Step 1
Roll 1 piece of dough into a rectangle and sprinkle your filling across the middle. Fold the bottom third of the dough over the filling. Sprinkle more filling over the folded part, fold the top third of the dough over the filling and pinch closed.
Step 2
Roll the dough into a 14 by 11 inch rectangle. Cut into seven 2-by-11-inch strips.
Step 3
Working with one strip at a time, pinch the long edges together, and roll into a 12-inch rope with your hands.
Step 4
Shape the pretzels on a baking sheet. Grab the ends of the rope and cross the left end over the right end. Cross the left end over the right end again to make a twist in the middle. Brush with beaten egg and top before baking.
Bake Pretzels:
Brush pretzel with 1 beaten egg. Sprinkle with coarse salt. Bake immediately at 425 degrees for 12-15 minutes. For hard pretzels, use only 1 1/4 cups water and add 1/4 cup melted butter. Make pretzels smaller and bake until brown
Basic Crepe Recipes
Recipe #1
From Carroll Pellegrinelli,
Ingredients:
4 eggs
1 cup flour
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons melted butter
Preparation:
Measure all ingredients in to blender jar; blend for 30 seconds. Scrape down sides. Blend for 15 seconds more. Cover and let sit for 1 hour. (This helps the flour absorb more of the liquids.) Makes 12-14 crepes.
Recipe #2
Ingredients:
1 1/2 c. all purpose flour
1 tsp. sugar
1/8 tsp. salt
3 eggs, room temperature
1 1/2 c. milk
2 tbsp. butter
Butter for cooking
Preparation:
Sift flour, sugar, and salt together into a bowl. Add eggs and mix together thoroughly with a whisk - mixture will form a thick paste. Add milk gradually and slowly, beating thoroughly until you have air bubbles. Add melted and cooled butter. Add flavoring now if one is desired (possibly 1 teaspoon grated lemon peel - 1 teaspoon dried herbs). Let batter stand for at least 1 hour until the air bubbles disappear. Makes about 16 crepes.
Perfect Popovers
Makes 6 Popovers:
Ingredients:
1 3/4 cups whole milk or half-and-half, warmed
2 cups bread flour*
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3 large eggs, room temperature
2 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
Makes 12 Popovers:
Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups whole milk or half-and-half, warmed
4 cups bread flour*
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
6 large eggs, room temperature
4 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
* Bread flour is a high-protein flour. The high protein help the popovers rise. All-purpose flour may be substituted but the results won't be as spectacular.
Note: The key to making great popovers is having the eggs and milk at room temperature or warm before mixing. It is also important to let the batter sit for an hour before baking it. Popovers do not freeze well and pre-made batter has a tendency not to work properly the next day.
Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Place oven rack on the middle rung and heat a empty popover pan for 5 minutes, or until it is hot. Place the milk in a bowl and microwave on high for approximately 1 1/2 minutes, or until warm to the touch. Spoon the flour into a cup and level it off with a knife (do not shake the cup to settle the flour). In a large bowl, sift the flour, salt, and baking powder togetherIn a blender combine the eggs, milk, melted butter, and Dijon mustard; process approximately 10 seconds until blended. NOTE: If you are making the 12 popover batch, you will need to blend in two separate batches, as the blender bowl is not large enough.
2. Add flour mixture to egg mixture in blender. Process approximately 10 to 15 seconds or until just combined. NOTE: Only mix the batter until small lumps are left in it, to reduce the risk of over mixing the batter. Scrape down the sides of the blender with a rubber spatula, if necessary. NOTE: Let batter rest for 60 minutes before pouring into the cups. Do not refrigerate the batter.
3. Once oven is the correct temperature and the empty popover pan is hot, quickly remove the popover pan from the oven; lightly spray the popover cups with a nonstick spray (the tins only need a thin coating of baking spray to prevent sticking).
4. Fill the popover cups almost to the top with the batter. NOTE: If you leave one of the cups of the pop over pan empty, fill it half full of water (this will help protect the pan from the high heat). Immediately place the pan back into the oven.Bake without opening the door for 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 375 degrees F. and bake for another 20 to 25 minutes or until deep golden brown on the outside and airy on the inside. Under baking can cause popovers to collapse after they’re removed from the oven. NOTE: Resist the urge to open the oven door. If you open the oven door, the heat escapes, the oven cools down, the steam inside the popovers condenses, and the popovers collapse.
5. Remove popovers from the oven, and unmold onto a rack. Pierce the sides with the tip of a sharp knife to let steam escape (this will keep the exterior crisp, the interior moist, and prevent the popovers from collapsing), and serve immediately with lots of butter.