Caprese Salad

Caprese Salad from a second batch of Mozz we made yesterday, olive oil, fresh basil and pepperoncini.

The use of 1/4 tsp Calcium Chloride gave us a better curd.  The block of cheese was 1 lb, 4 oz.

First Mozzarella

So the first batch of Mozzarella was a success, it stretched the way it is supposed to and was firm, shiny and tasty.

They say that there is nothing like sampling warm fresh cheese, I would concur with that sentiment.

It melted nicely on the pizzas, Marilyn hid the other goodies like red pepper, onion, and kalamata olives under the cheese.

I used regular old grocery store milk, Country Fresh brand.  The curds that developed were small and didn't need to be cut.  I used 1/8 tsp of Calcium Chloride, I'll try 1/4 tsp. next time to see if we get a better curd.

I will need to figure out something to do with all of the whey that is left over.  I saved two quarts.  I'll probably use it in bread.

Next time I'll weigh the finished product before we start sampling it. There was a nice big log of cheese, plenty for the two pizzas with almost half left over.  Most of that has been subsequently eaten.

Overall very satisfying.

The quest for cheese

We bought a cheese making kit the last time we were at the brew store.  It is a kit from cheesemaking.com 

We find that the type of milk used to make cheese is kind of a big deal.  You can't use anything that is ultra-pasteurized.  They suggest that the best is whole milk that is not homogenized.  This type of milk is available here at Friske's but it is $3.60 per half gallon.

At a local farm I can get unpasteurized raw milk for what works out to $8.30 per gallon after signing a six page contract, paying a contract fee and then a weekly maintenance fee for a "share of a cow" that would get me a gallon a week.  What lengths to get around overreaching government intrusion into what we eat?

Research shows that most grocery store milk will work if you add small amounts of calcium chloride.  Isn't that the same chloride that they put on dirt roads to control dust?  The non-salt ice melter?

It is commonly available in brewing and dairy supply stores.  It is sold in some grocery stores as Pickle Crisp, an ingredient that replaces the liming process used to keep pickles crisp.

No stores in Charlevoix of course.  The nice people at  Eastport Market ordered it up for us and we got it Saturday.

So cheese is next.

Ginger Ale

I'm a big fan of Sandor Katz who wrote Wild Fermentation, in fact his newest book the Art of Fermentation should be here this week.  

I tried his recipe for Ginger Ale some time ago.  It involves creating a "ginger bug" from ginger and sugar dependent on wild yeast from the environment.  I ended up with a sticky mess after several days and lost interest.

We have been looking at making cheese and I discovered Fankhauser's Cheese Page. There are recipes there for both ginger ale and root beer.  The recipe for ginger ale is nearly the same as the Wild Fermentation recipe except that instead of using wild yeast it uses cultured yeast.

I used a cup of sugar, a bit more than a tablespoon and a half of fresh grated ginger, the juice of one fresh squeezed lime and a quarter teaspoon of champagne yeast in two quarts of water.  They use plastic two liter soda bottles.  I used a half gallon glass growler bottle that I got from Tom, in fact I think I have three of those.  I let it ferment under an air lock until the big bubbles stopped, three days I think.  Then I strained and bottled it in two champagne bottles and a beer bottle.  I left them at room temperature for two days.  This morning I opened the little bottle.  I should have chilled it first as I lost almost a quarter of it as it foamed out on the counter and the sink.

It is excellent and super simple.  They say it is less than one percent alcohol.  I need more champagne bottles as I will be making more of this.  In the mean time I will make due with brown long neck beer bottles, also from Tom.

The recipe called for the juice of a lemon but I had a lime which resulted in a very refreshing taste.  Next time I will try a lemon.

UPDATE 1/18 - The new book Art of Fermentation gives a possible cause for the failure to make a "ginger bug" from commercial ginger root.  The book says that ginger root is irradiated to kill any bad bugs.  Likely killing the multitudes of yeasty flora that would normally be present to create a proper "ginger bug".  I have a new batch of ginger ale going using the same 1/4 tsp of champagne yeast. this time with a lemon.  I think it will be great!

Upping the ante on Sake

The Doburoku that I have been making is really more rice wine than Sake in the eyes of Sake aficionados.  Both are made from the four ingredients, water, rice, koji and yeast.  Making true Sake requires more of a ritual in terms of the process.  

With Doburoku you put all of the ingredients together and let it ferment.  With Sake, first you make a starter culture of Koji, yeast, water and rice.  The starter called the Moto is created in a low temperature environment, around fifty degrees Fahrenheit, barely above the yeast's low temperature rating.  Then the starter is added to more Koji and rice that doubles the amount of mash in each of three additions over four days.  The Moto requires about two weeks and the additions and fermentation another three weeks.

Wow, complicated.  I'm really happy with the quality of brew that I get with the "throw it all together" version.  In spite of that I am ready to go to the next phase.  I brought the little refrigerator that used to be in the office in from the barn.  It turns out that at the lowest setting it maintains a temperature right around fifty degrees, perfect.  I had a nice big batch of Kome Koji  that I made last week and a big batch of steamed rice that I made Friday night.  

The result is a big batch of Doburoku fermenting in the cold closet and a double batch of Moto fermenting in the little fridge.  I figure if it is going to take two weeks to make the Moto, I might as well double it so I can run two batches once it is ready.

It should be interesting.

2013 Sake and mushrooms

The last batch of Sake went into cold ferment in the last days of November.  It was very cold up there in the guest bedroom, hovering in the low fifties.  The clean laundry piled up according to color on the guest bed keeping watch.  Each day a vigorous stir of the mash to add Oh-two to the mix to keep the ferment healthy.  A faint smell of alcohol / Koji in the air (and the smell of Marilyn's hair spray).

That batch came out a couple of days ago.  The cold ferment and perhaps a reduction in the amount of citric acid applied gives it a very nice flavor, one that calls to me late at night on a Sunday night / Monday morning.

There is another batch of Kome Koji incubating in the chamber (oven with the light on).  I have decided to make batches according to the size of my pressure cooker rather than the size the recipe calls for.  More than double the 400 gram recipe size.

The blue painter's tape icons over the BAKE and LIGHT buttons attempt to control the temperature and prevent the melting of the Koji that occurred a little while back.

Mushrooms: I raised some Shitake mushrooms on logs back in the previous century, way back in '97. We had lots of mushrooms for four or five years, fewer in the latter years.

GC Farms will be trying mushrooms again.  Shitake on logs using plug spawn.  I'll do a couple of burns to create some patches for Black Morels and cut a Beech tree for some fire wood and some oyster mushrooms. I'm thinking sawdust spawn for the oyster mushrooms.

I'll probably get a pressure canner for sterilizing culture media for more 'shrooms and maybe canning some salsa.

It is a weird new year that we enter into.

Do you know what the three percent is?

New years spike

Blogger's stats aren't all that they could be or at least I don't know how to make the best use of them.  If I post on FB or G+ that I have updated the blog, maybe twenty or thirty of my closest friends and family might venture a peek over here.

On the first of the month the views went to more than double that without a new post or any notification?  WTF?  The stats did not reveal (or I don't know how to use them) where that traffic came from.  Hackers I thought, not likely. 

I posted a comment on a Patriot's blog, WireCutter's blog, I think that is what caused the spike. Did you know he is famous: http://ogdaa.blogspot.com/2013/01/thats-right-motherfuckers-im-winner.html

Anyway, thanks to KL, for introducing me to III%, and those assumed hits to the blog.  I'm spreading the word.

Sake post to follow

End of jokes about using the oven for incubating Kome Koji

Cutting to the chase (is that the right idiom?).  Don't forget to check the incubation chamber before pre-heating the oven. Pictures to follow in the morning.

Yesterday, one ruined dairy thermometer.

Today one ruined batch of Kome Koji, Eff-en-eh.

"not for use in conventional oven"

Marilyn remembered to take the Koji out of the oven on Friday and didn't notice the thermometer.

I turned the oven on yesterday to heat dinner and didn't check first, crap.

For those late to the party, the oven-light keeps the oven in the mid eighties, perfect for Koji.  350 degrees is good for heating up the Spanakopita, not good for my Rubbermaid TakeAlongs.

Update, Christmas eve, having left the damaged bowl out on the counter waiting the dumping of the contents on the mulch pile, it is incredibly looking better than ever.  I think I will use it in a batch unless it shows signs of contamination, so far only white fuzzy Koji.

Noble Fish & Hopman's

Visited Hopman's for some brewing supplies and Noble Fish Japanese Market to find short grain polished rice.  Success on both counts.  Noble Fish is run almost exclusively by Japanese, the older people were very respectful of an old white guy that actually was making sake from scratch.

Got a giant strainer, some real straining bags and other supplies from Hopman's. What a nice store, everything you could need for beer and wine brewing. Marilyn got a cheese making kit so fresh mozzarella and ricotta are in the near future.  We have to find milk that is not "ultra pasteurized", haven't really looked yet.  

At Noble Fish we got a bamboo steamer, a fifteen pound bag of Nozomi premium short grain rice for more sake brewing.  They are famous for high quality reasonably priced sushi.  I got an eight-pack of California Rolls and they were excellent.  Very fresh, cucumber, avocado and crab meat.  No raw fish, hoping Marilyn would try them. Not.  Perfect amounts of pickled ginger and wasabi.  I'll be back.  

  

Sampled the sake pictured below last evening.  It is very good, a bit drier than the last batch and likely higher in alcohol by volume.  It fermented most of the time below 60 F, down in the low fifties for much of the time, just short of four weeks in primary fermentation stirred each day.  It went longer than I thought it would and was a little worried that it might be a bit bitter from lactic acid build-up.  The low temperature likely slowed fermentation in a good way.

I tasted it both the clear stuff and the combined stuff as it is supposed to be, the milky stuff has the nicer flavor.

There is another batch still going strong, with new rice and new Koji Kin I'll probably start another batch in the morning.

Newest batch

Doburoku.  Both jars are full to the brim. The one with more fines is the second pour.  Straining though the bag I made out of a T-shirt and using a kitchen colander is kind of a pain.  I need something to make that process easier.   I'll be getting some brewing supplies today at Hopman's, I'll be on the look out for some labor saving devices.

12-12-12 12:12:12

Twelve

Twelve

Twelve

 Twelve

 Twelve

 Twelve

Couldn't resist a post at that time! Sorry.

BTW another batch of Doburoku is ready!

  

Grilled peppers

We use grilled peppers fairly frequently.  Often Anaheim peppers to eat with meat, mild red peppers on pizza, yesterday Poblanos to go with wiener schnitzel (pork).  Marilyn likes the Hungarian Hots, me not so much (the peppers;-).

You know, the darken up the skin with high heat and then let them steam in an aluminum foil envelope method.

Don't have a gas grille and can't see firing up the charcoal for a couple of peppers.

We have tried using the burners on the gas stove, lots of wasted heat and time consuming, but it works.  A little better method uses one of those BBQ stainless steel fish-grates over the gas burner, the grate distributes the heat quite a bit better, still difficult to get an even char.

I have an old Primus butane torch used for waxing cross country skis (yep, really old).  It works way better than the stove burners, much faster and more even cooking.  Can't find replacement fuel canisters in the states, only Europe and New Zealand. 

Primus X-C Waxing torch, the new Pro Culinary torch, both sitting on the Fish-Grate as mentioned above.  For those with eagle eye the blue masking tape is a reminder to not shut off the Koji incubation heating element aka (oven light).

So after searching tons of websites I found that there is a standard butane cartridge that can be found at hardware stores (even at Ace here in BFE) and in bulk at GFS.  It is the same cartridge used for those one-burner portable chefs stoves.

Research on the net yielded lots of culinary torches that use this common cartridge.  The Iwatani Professional Torch Burner model CB-TC-PRO has excellent reviews from commercial kitchens and chefs.  It has trigger ignition and adjustments for gas and air.  With four GasOne cartridges it was just over forty bucks on Amazon.

Marilyn's birthday present from Mark and Diana.  It arrived Thursday and was used on the poblano peppers with outstanding results last evening.  With the burners and other torch it was difficult to get  into crevices or the depression around the stem.  Where it didn't get a good char it was difficult to peel.  Not so with the butane torch.  It is almost scary hot and it is super fast.

I don't normally eat much dessert, but I may have have to make some Creme Brulee just to get another opportunity to play with my Marilyn's new toy. 

Pressure cooker for the steamed rice

Sake requires steamed rice, it doesn't touch the water when cooking.

We have one of those big seafood steamers.  Two parts of porcelain covered steel, the bottom part has a spigot on it.  The top part has holes in its bottom for allowing the steam up into the top.  Probably have to heat up a gallon of water and the rice needs to steam for one hour.  Heats up the house a lot, good for a really cold day.

I should remember to shoot the photos from a lower elevation ;-)

I read someone was experimenting with a pressure cooker.  We have this little six quart cooker from TFAL and it has a nice stainless steel steaming basket perfect for the rice.

Only two cups of water and twenty minutes cook time after it comes up to pressure.  A major savings in time and energy.

The big bonus, it made the best Kome Koji so far.

Naan Bread from frozen

First time experiment with freezing extra dough balls before the final "rising" stage.

The Naan bread recipe in the Chicken Curry recipe a few days ago makes about sixteen little balls.  We don't need that much bread for a couple breast halves.  We set aside four balls to rise and cook immediately. The remainder we froze in zip lock sandwich bags four to a bag.  Since then we have had occasion to use these loaves and they are as good as the fresh.  Take them out of the freezer, as they warm up they will rise to about double.  Flatten out by hand and cook in the cast iron pan with a little olive oil and sea salt.  

Excellent fresh bread with very little effort.