It was way too cold to be out on the trail this past week so I decided to spend some time enjoying one of my other hobbies, cooking. The mere mention of my being in the kitchen might bring to mind the misfortune I encountered from (thoughtfully I still contend) rearranging the kitchen cabinets to make life a bit easier for her Ladyship. Thankfully, this time around I was able to get in and out of the kitchen not one but three days in a row without so much as a mild threat of being sent to our backyard camper. This is a circumstance for which I’m mighty grateful, considering that subzero temperatures have not always been a deterrent in the past.
I’m not going to try passing myself off as a chef – not even close. But I do know my way around a kitchen at the novice short order cook level – you know, eggs, grits, grilled cheese, that sort of thing. Beyond this, I think I fairly well proved my basic kitchen skills while serving as chief cook and bottle washer (and butler, and housekeeper, and chauffeur, and chamber maid…) for her majesty, Lady Yvonne of Brownton Abbey, while she was laid up with a broken ankle last fall. Sadly, at the tail end of that tale, despite six weeks of creative kitchen cuisine, I was banished to the camper for some minor misdeed of which I cannot at this moment recall.
Getting back to my time in the kitchen last week, my first undertaking was to bake bread, which happens to be my specialty. Not sissy sweet breads, but real breads – the old fashioned smell good kind that require yeast and lots of kneading, that you cut and slather a slice with butter as soon as it comes out of the oven. I won’t bother with sharing a favorite bread recipe. There are so many too choose from, and besides, there’s really no secret to baking good bread; just follow the directions and make sure you get the temperature right to properly activate the yeast.
Occasionally I like to experiment with recipes I’ve never heard of. While Lady Yvonne was off having her golden locks coiffured last week I decided to stir up some Greek-style green beans and tomatoes, a recipe I happened to hear discussed on the radio. This recipe is super easy to prepare – translation, “it’s hard to screw up”. I’ll rattle it off for you (note: you can halve this recipe for two). Place ¾ cup olive oil in a large skillet; add ½ medium sweet onion chopped (about one cup); and two cloves of garlic chopped; let simmer a few minutes on low heat; add 2 pounds fresh cut green beans or substitute two 14-16 ounce cans cut green beans drained; add two chopped tomatoes or substitute one 14-16 ounce can of chopped tomatoes drained (use more if you like lots of tomato); add two teaspoons of sugar and salt and pepper to taste (consider a small dash of cayenne pepper instead of black pepper). Cover and let simmer on low heat (don’t boil!) for 45-60 minutes, stirring occasionally. This is a recipe you can experiment with, such as adding a bit of beef seasoning or bacon bits.
Mostly, I like anything made or cooked with peanut butter. This taste traces back to childhood when my family qualified to receive large – jumbo size – cans of U.S. Army surplus peanut butter. Like Bubba Gump shrimp, we ate peanut butter every way imaginable. In addition to grape jelly the peanut butter sandwiches we carried to school were just as likely to include mayonnaise, raisins, pickles, honey, cheese, banana, apple slices, leftover scrambled eggs, and anything else Mom might happen to find in the cupboards or refrigerator on any given day. You’d think I would have grown tired of peanut butter or maybe even have come to hate it, but, having consumed a few thousand pounds of peanut butter over the past 60 odd years, it remains among my very favorite foods. True enough, hardly a day goes by that I don’t eat peanut butter on toast with whatever is handy to go along with it – with a big slice of tomato being my favorite when they’re in season.
So, it’s no wonder I keep an eye out for peanut butter recipes. Here are a few from the “P” section of my recipe box: Spinach and peanut butter stew (a recipe from West Africa), peanut butter and Cajun noodles (a recipe from New Orleans), and crunchy peanut butter quiche (I think that one is from the Jif Peanut Butter kitchen).
But my hands down favorite is Peanut butter, bacon, and spaghetti, as recommended by the author Beanmom.com. Here’s the recipe, which I’ve altered just a tad. 8 ounces spaghetti uncooked; one 10 ounce package frozen peas or substitute a can of peas drained; ½ cup chicken broth; ½ cup milk; ¼ cup creamy peanut butter (of course I add a smidge more); 1 tablespoon soy sauce; ½ teaspoon sugar; 6 slices cooked bacon chopped; parmesan cheese; salt and pepper. Cook the spaghetti adding the peas during the last 2 minutes; combine the other ingredients in sauce pan except bacon, cheese, salt and pepper; heat until sauce thickens, 8-10 minutes, stirring as needed; drain spaghetti and peas then combine sauce with spaghetti and peas; as served, sprinkle with bacon, salt and pepper to taste, and top with parmesan cheese. Bean Mom suggests the option of some cooked bite size chunks of chicken.
Serve with your favorite green salad, and I recommend peanut butter cookies and a scoop of chocolate peanut butter sorbet for dessert. Yummy! Hey, if your not sure, ask yourself these questions. Do I like peanut butter? Do I like bacon? Do I like spaghetti? If the answer to all three is yes, as Julia would say, “Bon appetit!”