Lentil Chili

We tried out the lemonade. I was slightly disappointed that it didn't taste special. It was still overly sweet, even after cutting a whole cup of sugar (next time I might cut it to 1 1/2 cups). To me, it tasted like Kool-aid Lemonade. I had expected something that would be like nothing I could get at the store. It's still good and the family thinks it's the best thing ever. Yesterday's menu: Breakfast - grits with just a little butter, Lunch - dinner leftovers, Dinner - spaghetti with homemade sauce (4 slices pepper bacon, 2 cans low salt tomato sauce, onion and garlic powders), salad. I stopped by the store to pick up the pasta since we're not buying it anymore and the family really wanted pasta. Eggs were on sale 99 cents a dozen so I picked up two. My plan was to buy some parmesan cheese but I only had 5 dollars. The pasta was $1.50 and I wanted two dozen eggs since we were starting to go through them fast again and Monday I paid $1.89 for a dozen. That didn't leave me much for cheese and the parmesan was nearly $3. I opted for cheese sticks - 1 mozzarella and 2 cheddar at 3 for $1. It's makes for pricier cheese per ounce but all I wanted was some for dinner as a treat so this worked perfectly. We're not eating cheese right now while we're trying to get my husband off of dairy. I noticed we've really missed it because I bought real butter on Monday (with the eggs to make the lemon curd) and we're going through it rather fast. It didn't help that we used nearly half of the butter in making the lemon curd. I don't have a recipe that I have made this week to share with you. I would have loved to shared my husband's soup recipe but it was really a dump of what we had in the kitchen (I think he used split peas instead of lentils but I haven't double checked). I have shared my lentil chili recipe just this last December so I thought - I'll share the famous Lentil Festival Chili with you. This is an award winning chili that is served every year during the Lentil Festival. They serve it from this huge bowl and it's free for everyone to come eat. It's so good and this recipe, though smaller than what they use, still makes a good vat of chili. Every year they do a lentil recipe contest so you may be seeing some more recipes posted as we try to find the perfect entry. World’s Largest Bowl of Lentil Chili Submitted By: National Lentil Festival -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- INGREDIENTS Lentils: 2 2/3 Cups Water: 3 Quarts + 1 Cup Onions, diced: 2/3 Cup Celery, diced: 1/3 Cup Carrots, diced: 1/3 Cup Tomato puree: 17 Oz. Pace brand salsa: 1 Cups + 1 Tablespoon Chili powder, mild: 2 Tablespoon Cumin: 1 Tablespoon Granulated garlic: 1 Tablespoon Granulated sugar: 2 Tablespoons Kosher salt: 1 1/2 Tablespoons Crushed red chili flakes: 1/2 Teaspoon 2/3 Cup water and 1/4 Cup cornstarch, stirred into a slurry Cinnamon: 1/2 Teaspoon Chopped cilantro: 1 Tablespoon Mexican chocolate: 2 oz. Green bell pepper, diced: 1/3 Cup Red bell pepper, diced: 1/3 Cup -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- DIRECTIONS 1. DO NOT INCLUDE CILANTRO OR CORNSTARCH SLURRY AT THIS TIME. Mix all ingredients together (EXCEPT cilantro and cornstarch slurry), bring to a boil, stir and cook (will take a couple of hours) until lentils are tender. 2. When the lentils are tender and the broth is well blended, add the cornstarch slurry and continue cooking until the chili consistency is very uniform. 3. Just before serving: add the cilantro, stir, serve.

Cast Iron Cookware

Cast Iron had always appealed to me. I don't know why but I really wanted cast iron cookware. The problem was - it intimidated me. As a teen, a friend's mom always had her cast iron filled with nasty rusty water (she was not a good housekeeper anyway). Her excuse was they were so hard to clean.
I am an overthinker so when I had decided I wanted cast iron, I started doing some serious research. Everyone I talked to made it clear that cast iron was not hard to clean and soaking it was ruining it. I took a scout class on cast iron cooking from a neighbor. Not long after, I found my chicken skillet (it's a deep skillet with a special lid for frying chicken) on the clearance rack. It was so inexpensive I had to buy it.
Once I got it home, I called up my neighbor in a panic - I didn't know what to do next. It was still intimidating. The truth is - in the beginning cast iron can be work. Many come pre-seasoned but my neighbor said he didn't put much stock in it. To season a cast iron means coating it with oil and baking it at 300 degrees for an hour (this may be debatable).
You can season your cast iron any time but I am a lazy owner so I rarely season my cookware this way. The reason is - I use them all the time and have gotten a good coating on my pans. My husband hasn't quite gotten the hang of it but it's not really that difficult.
The trick with cast iron is to have patience and never use soap on it. If you do use soap, rinse well and season in the oven. (I'll get to cleaning in just a moment).
I always set my cast iron (empty but with a thin coating of oil on the inside) on high heat and let it warm up. Sometimes the oil coating disappears and that's okay, I just brush on a little more (I use a silicone basting brush to oil my pans). Then I turn the heat down and cook. I can make fried eggs this way with just a little oil and no sticking but I have to remember that some foods just stick - like bacon so I always make the eggs first.
To clean my pans, I buy a round toilet brush from the dollar store (they look like large bottle brushes). The reason I use a toilet brush is because the handles are a little longer. This allows me to use really hot water to clean the pan. They won't come out squeaky clean but should be completely smooth and devoid of any food particles. The reason they don't come out super clean is because you want to preserve that oil finish. I wipe my pans with a towel and give them a quick oil if I think of it. I do have some cast iron seasoning stuff that comes in a tube but plain ole oil works just fine (I won the tube at a Dutch Oven contest).
I pick up my cast iron anywhere I can that's reasonable. I would love to have the money to buy the "good" stuff but I don't. I usually pick up my cast iron at grocery stores. They may not be brand name but they sure hold up just fine. It's not like buying any other cookware. The trick to cast iron is the care not the brand. You can even buy cast iron second hand. If it's really yucky - clean it really good and season well. They are amazingly durable. Don't let a little rust scare you - clean well and oil.
We had a garage fire (that took half the house) a few years ago. The garage was completely leveled - nothing salvagable. As my family is cleaning up the rubble, two cast iron pans were found completely unharmed. We had steelbelt tires and expensive tools that didn't fare as well so let me tell you - they are practically indestructible.

Hamburger Stew

I have a very busy week going on here and am sorry about falling behind. I'm not sure I will catch up or just let this week be a mess. My son starts high school in the fall and we are busy getting all the things in place for his transition.
The other night I made a pot of hamburger stew. I had intended to throw it in the crockpot for the next day but for some reason the dutch oven was calling to me. I love cooking in the dutch oven. This turned out to be a rather quick meal - one we could have eaten that night, if it wasn't bedtime. I cut it in half (sort of) and omitted the rice because my husband wanted noodles in the stew. We ended up serving the stew with macaroni but not together. I don't remember where I found this recipe but it's designed to be frozen for future meals.

Hamburger Stew
2 pounds ground beef
2 medium onions, chopped
4 cans (14-1/2 ounces each) stewed tomatoes
8 medium carrots, thinly sliced
4 celery ribs, thinly sliced
2 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
2 cups water
1/2 cup uncooked long grain rice
1 to 2 tablespoons salt
1 to 2 teaspoons pepper
ADDITIONAL INGREDIENT (for each batch of stew):
1 cup water
In a Dutch oven, cook beef and onions over medium heat until meat is no longer pink; drain. Add the tomatoes, carrots, celery, potatoes, water, rice, salt and pepper; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 30 minutes or until vegetables and rice are tender. Uncover; simmer 20-30 minutes longer or until thickened. Freeze in
3-cup portions for up to 3 months. To use frozen stew: Thaw in the refrigerator for 24 hours. Transfer
to a saucepan; add water. Cook until hot and bubbly.

I used:
1 pd hamburger
2 small spanish onions
3-4 carrots (they were broken so I can't be certain exactly how much)
3 stalks celery
4 red potatoes (these were good sized potatoes)
1 quart canned tomatoes
Worchestershire sauce (to taste)
Bay Seasoning (to taste)
I made sure there was enough water to cover everything and then served it with buttered macaroni noodles and shredded cheese.

Xavier's Dutch Oven Contest

My son entered the annual dutch oven contest for the second year this year (it's also the second year of the contest). Last year he did the one pot competition but this year he strove for the 3 pot division.
I promised I would share his recipes - I have shared the cornbread recipe before and it didn't quite work in the dutch oven (sadly costing him a ribbon) but the other two recipes were well received.
Low Country Boil
6 quart Dutch oven
Serves 6
Ingredients
• 8 teaspoons Bay Seasoning (or to taste)
• 12 red new potatoes
• 6 (4-inch) smoked link sausage (good high quality sausages will add better flavor)
• 6 ears corn
• 3 pounds fresh shrimp, peeled (I prefer peeled shrimp but you can use unpeeled for more flavor)
• 4 quarts water
Directions
Add water to Dutch Oven. Add Bay Seasoning and bring to a boil over hot coals. Add potatoes and sausage. Boil for 20 minutes. Add corn and cook for 10 more minutes. Add Shrimp and let cook for 1-2 minutes or until the shrimp is just done. Drain off water and serve.
*note – you can boil the sausages for 10 minutes prior to adding potatoes to give the water more flavor and then boil them 20 minutes.

*We used Andouille sausage which is slightly spicy but held up really well. Cheap sausages will lose their flavor so use a good quality sausage. Also be aware that shrimp shrinks so you want to use a larger size - we used Thai Shrimp which was a good size shrimp. We also ended up using only 2 pounds since it comes in 2 pound bags and it was plenty of shrimp.

Corn Bread
6 quart Dutch Oven
Serves 6
Ingredients
• ½ stick of butter
• 2 cups corn meal
• 2 teas baking powder
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups milk
Directions
Melt butter in Dutch Oven. In a bowl, combine corn meal and baking powder. Add eggs and milk. Mix together. Pour most of the melted butter into the batter, leaving a good film on the Dutch Oven. Pour batter into Dutch Oven. Cover with flat lid and top with coals (should have coals top and bottom, want to replicate a 350 – 400 degree oven). Bake 20 minutes or until Corn Bread is firm to the touch and browned.


Peach Caramel Cake
6 quart Dutch Oven
Serves 6
Ingredients
• 1 box White or Yellow Cake Mix
• 1 can of ginger ale
• 1 large can peaches with juice
• 1 cup brown sugar
• Oil
Directions
Lightly oil Dutch Oven. Sprinkle brown sugar around bottom of pot evenly. Top with peaches. Layer on cake mix but do not stir. Pour over ginger ale. You can press down on cake mix to moisten but do not stir. Cover with flat lid and coals. Set on additional coals (you want to replicate about a 400 degree oven). Bake 45 minutes or until cake is firm. Careful not to overcook the bottom.

*We experimented with this recipe in the oven with a regular cake mix and it worked fine. This past weekend I made a version of this with fresh apples instead of canned peaches and the Betty Crocker gluten-free white cake mix. It worked really well - I had to add a little more soda to compensate for the apples not being canned. It had good flavor and texture, even though the Betty Crocker mix is 1/2 a normal cake mix.