We should have a "What are you cooking?" thread. Now we do.

[midwayfair]

It looks like eating it would hurt your body quite drastically!

There are worse ways to go!

[hammerheadmusicman]

Indeed, death by sub is probably quite a good one!

[Bret608]

Hey, I'm a Louisiana native (now living in Wisconsin too, no less!), so let me weigh in on your finding with the shrimp in Jambalaya.

I think the bigger ones almost always taste better than the small ones. That goes for gumbo as well. I usually get them from the Asian store or even frozen at Target (they're not bad!). I don't remember what count but I think something like 25-30. I like what you did with the slicing them in half.

Also, and I know this isn't typical, but I like sliced, smoked sausage in Jambalaya much better than the ground Jimmy Dean type that some people use, so I think your use of kielbasa was on the right track.

I hear you man, that jumbo size shrimp was a small revelation. I have always just gravitated to the gumbo size because that's what we had growing up--my Dad would get the small sizes right off the boat for like a dollar a pound. My Mom would devein every single tiny shrimp! The big ones can be machine deveined I think. I'ma gonna start using the bigger ones and splitting them so I can still get   piece of shrimp in every bite :-)

I would think that Chorizo would be good in jambalaya. Andouille is just a really rustic, coarse and dry sausage; I can find several things labeled andouille in WA where I normally live, but it tends to be just regular high-processed sausage with a lot of cayenne added, and it adds too much heat for my kids. I used to keep a stash of Savoie's or Richard's andouille and tasso, but nowadays i just go for the plainer stuff.

You could always make your own andouille.

Dude, no one wants to know how the sausage is made.

Oh, I don't know, I'm not too squeamish about these kinds of things. On a field trip to South Louisiana when I was a kid, I was the only one who tried "boudin", a Cajun-style sausage. That's been how I roll ever since. At my father in law's family home in Laos, I witnessed tripe being processed/cleaned to go in the salad "laap" for a big celebration. It didn't bug me much. On the other hand, it's industrialized/factory-style food production that freaks me out. So if it's that sausage, I guess maybe I don't want to know how it's made! 

Yeah, Andouille makes gumbo too hot for my kids too, at least the one that can't handle spice as well. I've always thought of it as a French/Cajun version of chorizo, which I love. I like the Mexican chorizo a lot as well. If you take it out of the casing, fry it with onion, and serve it on tacos with an avocado/tomatillo salsa (Rick Bayless recipe), it rules!

[midwayfair]

Oh, I don't know, I'm not too squeamish about these kinds of things.

Heh, it's an old quote (edit: mis)attributed to Otto von Bismarck
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Otto_von_Bismarck

My solution with Andouille was to chop it into little bits and use it in place of red pepper flakes.

[Bret608]

Nice!    I had no idea how many quotes were attributed to the guy, whether correctly or not!

[davent]

Harvest day, a taste of things to come. I've been growing this garlic on since 1994, only once in that time have i had to buy any and it was pathetic compared to the homegrown.





Can't wait for these to ripen, finally a truly black tomato!


dave

[midwayfair]

Nice, Dave. One of my favorite parts of home grown garlic is that you get to use the greens, which usually can't be bought.

What's the tomato varietal? I love dark tomatoes. They make unbelievable sauce.

[davent]

Hi Jon, We've a few farmer's markets in the area so no shortage of scapes for sale at outrages prices, afraid most of ours end up in the compost, an over-abundance of goodness.

The tomatoes are Indigo Rose, new i believe this year to my seed vendor. We've tried all kinds of so-called blacks but nothing else approaches these in colour, all the others usually show a purple shoulder with a deep red body. Bases of those in the picture are still green so will be interesting to see and finally taste a nice ripe, just picked warm golfball sized orb of summer... Another new to us this year is Slava (to replace Bloody Butcher which i couldn't find seeds for this year) and they've been in our salads for over a week now, tastes really good for an early (for us) tomato.

Bon appetite!
dave

[derevaun]

Nice garlic! What variety do you plant? I sometimes grow it, otherwise grab a year's supply at the farmer's market. I look for Inchelium and Music, which both grow well in my dirt. Inchelium keeps for nearly a year--it's still good when the early varieties show up.

I like to do scapes in a stir fry, but my main use is hanging it on the branches of the sapling trees in my yard, to discourage the deer from eating the leaves off.

[davent]

Thanks! Not sure what variety it is outside of being  hardneck, bought the initial unnamed bulbs from a local grower (almost 20 years ago) so knew they're viable for this area. Keep selecting out the biggest bulbs with the most cloves as my source for next years crop. When i first started i was usually getting ~four cloves per bulb, now getting 6, 7 very large, juicy, sharp cloves per bulb, single cloves are large enough to replace the multiple cloves called for in recipes. Still eating last years harvest which is tired, we're ready to dig into the new, some have already gone into the dill pickles my wife put down on the weekend. Man I love summer!

dave

[chromesphere]

Its nearly dinner time here, you guys are making me hungry!

I have a small vegie patch in our backyard and like to do the whole "fresh" thing.  These are ricotta and spinach ravoli.  I tried to make it as homemade as possible.  Basil and tomatos in the sauce are homegrown.  I made the pasta myself and obviously the filling.

Amazing how good food tastes when you start using fresh stuff.

Paul

[midwayfair]

^Paul, you have fresh basil in the middle of winter? I'm so jealous.

[hammerheadmusicman]

It's a bit warm in Down there still at this time if year!

[chromesphere]

^Paul, you have fresh basil in the middle of winter? I'm so jealous.

Busted.  I took that photo during summer   You could grow it during winter here, but you would have to screen it from frost.

The coldest inner suburbs of Melbourne get during winter is approx. zero.  Maybe, into a couple of negatives.  Unfortunately that's just cold enough to kill off things like basil and tomato's.  But I like the change of season.  Also allows you to grow winter veggies as well.

[davent]

Paul, You can bottle some of that red sunshine up in the summer and come the middle of winter crack it open and have that wonderful taste of summer, a powerful reminder as to how much winter sucks. Looks delicious and we are coming into our tomato prime!

Tonight, grilled Mahi Mahi filet with backyard garden, fresh salsa; Salva Tomatoes, Genovese Basil, garlic, olive oil, wine vinegar a touch of lemon (foreigncontent), then steamed backyard green beans, they grow on an 8 foot trellis and some of the plants have topped it out and are half way back to the ground, locally farmed corn-on-the-cob slathered in butter, garden salad and for dessert, wild blueberry pie. Summer...

And that said, i only grilled the fish and grew the vegetables, everything else was from my wife, Terri!

dave