meeting #6

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garXiv:0806.0001
Date: Wed, 25 June 2008 19:30 CDT
Title: A Classic American Dinner in belated celebration of Obama's nomination-clinching
Authors: Sarah (chef de cuisine), Chris (sous-chef), Keren (pâtissier)
Categories: gastro-ph
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I decided to make what I think of as quintessentially American summer food. Not having a way to grill meant that my first thought, burgers, wasn't gonna happen, so I made BBQ beef sandwiches instead, cooking the meat all day in a slow cooker (not required.... you could just as easily do it in a low oven in a big Dutch oven). In addition, we had potato salad (everyone's version of this is different, but what I made is how my mom makes it -- such a taste of home to me!), green beans, and Caesar salad.

Keren made two delicious desserts: lemon meringue pie and chocolate souffles.

BBQ Beef Sandwiches
Mix together:
1 1/2 c ketchup
1/4 c. brown sugar
1/4 c. red wine vinegar
2 Tbsp Dijon mustard
2 Tbsp Worcestershire
1 tsp liquid smoke
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper (I bet I use more than this!)
1/4 tsp garlic powder (I left this out)

In a slow cooker or Dutch over, pour the sauce over a:
3-4 lb chuck roast

In a slow cooker, cook on low heat for 8-10 hrs (check early!) until falling apart. (I don't know just how to do it in a Dutch oven, sorry, but put in a slow oven for a long time.) Take the resulting chunks of meat out, shred them, and put them back in to the sauce to cook for another hour. Serve on hamburger buns.


Sarah's Mom's Potato Salad
3 large all purpose potatoes, boiled, cut in pieces, and still warm
2 hard boiled eggs, still warm
1 small white onion (golf ball size), chopped
1/2 tsp white vinegar
1/4 - 1/2 tsp salt
4-5 dollops of mayonnaise

Mix together. (My mom insists it will not be right unless the potatoes & eggs are still warm when you do so since that makes the flavors blend best.) Refrigerate until serving time.

meeting #4

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Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 19:00 CT (>3500kcal)Title: goatstro-phAuthors: Steph & Nathan
Categories: gastro-ph\\

It all started with a stew.  (Perhaps) it started 15 years ago at a birthday party in which Nathan and his friends topped a meal with coconut, apples, raisins and anything else with a pretty color.  Think of the stew as the "suicide" beverage of your youth in which you mixed all the 

soft drinks available at the soda fountain together, only the stew actually tastes good in addition to being a daring venture.  The stew is a lovely mixture of peanut butter, tomatoes, onions, and spices.  It looks pretty spectacular when cooked in a black chamba.

Before we cooked the stew, though, we needed to go get the goat.  The stew can be cooked with a variety of meats or be left completely vegetarian.  But we both wanted to try cooking goat, and we also wanted a reason to go to a real butcher in the city, so this was the perfect opportunity. 1/2 day of calling butchers later, we tried calling a grocer in Greek town.  They didn't have goat, but their supplier probably did.  That's how we found Olympic Meat Packers on Randolph & Canal.  When we asked for goat that would be appropriate for a stew, the butcher brought out 1/2 of a goat, carrying it by it's legs.  He chopped it up a bit, and we left happily with 4.5 lbs of goat.

Another dish we've been dying to master is the spongy Ethiopian bread injera. It turns out that the best way to get a sour flavor in injera is to use teff flour (teff is the smallest grain in the world!) and then to let the base sit for a few weeks so that it can absorb yeast from the air.  But we decided to cheat by using seltzer water as the leavening agent.  

The samosas turned out to be really fun to make.  We made 

the stuffing a day early and left the stuffing and frying to the day of the dinner.  The delicious sour flavor of the outer crust comes from using yogurt.  I think I'm a sucker for anything sour.We used a recipe from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything.

The evening turned out well, perhaps mostly because Chris hadn't slept in 48 hours.  We managed to feed him enough food to finally knock him out though.

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