#DisasterKitchen

sometimes I bake stuff.

[disaster-kitchen]

A place to detail baking endeavors. In particular, I wanted a place to talk about my forays into Grandma's recipe box:

But I'll also reblog any fun food things I find on tumblr that look good.

I'll update this post with tags as things get going.

[kyuohki]

We made Yakimandu today! I ate too much!!

FILLING

DangMyun (glass) Noodles

1 lbs ground beef

1 1/2 to 2 cups Cabbage, chopped

1 medium Sweet Onion, chopped

Garlic powder

Black pepper

Salt

5-6 Eggs

DOUGH WRAP  (Sorry, mom measures with her heart…)

? Flour

? Water

Makes approx 36 large mandu!  Om nom! (It's best to make these with a lot of hands on deck to cut down on prep time. Assembly line these suckers if you can!)

Mix flour and water to bread dough consistency.  Place in bag and refrigerate.

Cook 1 bundle DangMyun according to package.  Rinse with cold water and drain.  Cut down to approx. 1 inch length.

Mix ground beef, cabbage, onion, spices, and egg together until well combined. Then add noodles (add half first, mix and assess the meat to noodle ratio. You dont want the noodles to overpower the filling!)

Prep bowl of flour to dip mandu into.  Roll out dough into approx and 5 inch rounds.  With your finger, damp edge of dough with water, then fill, stretching gently wrap to fold over and pinch closed.  Dip and lightly coat bottom and sides in flour to prevent mandu from sticking to each other, and place onto a rack set in a sheetpan. Note:  You can also use an XL empanada/turnover press! If you use this, just remember to give the seam a good press and some classic folds to the top of the dough to make sure they dont fail when cooking!

Boil in water (with salt or a teaspoon of oil) for approx 10 minutes to cook dough and meat filling, stirring extremely gently to prevent sticking or breaking the dough.  Remove and place on racks to dry.

Once all the mandu have been boiled and are dry, deep fry until golden to crisp dough (the first set may be light).  Remove and place on racks to drip off excess oil.

Then serve with soy sauce and devour!!!

[prismatic-bell]

Me: I want fudge nobakes

Recipe: you need two cups of white sugar

Me: FUCK

Me: can I sub brown sugar? Guess we're gonna find out

Recipe: also a cup of milk

Me: FUCK

Me: I have heavy cream

Me: this is turning into one of those one-star mommy blog reviews

Me: gonna try anyway

The cookies: :D we look decent

Me: *nibbles the last little bit that came out of the pan*

Me: *turns slowly to the finished cookies cooling on the counter*

Me: I AM NEVER MAKING THESE WITH WHITE SUGAR EVER AGAIN.

[alexseanchai]

omfg that sounds delicious

also not that surprising, since the difference between white and brown sugar is the presence of molasses and the difference between cream and whole milk is the presence of water, more or less, so basically you subbed in more flavor per ounce from two different angles

[prismatic-bell]

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/11029/no-bake-fudge-cookies/

No raisins, sub brown sugar (loose, not packed) for white and heavy cream for milk. Don't actually measure your oats, just throw them in by handfuls while you mix until you reach your desired consistency.

[smallercommand]

I've never seen this recipe before with raisins, but that sounds good. IME, you can sub the milk for anything milk-like, the sugar needs something sweet, mostly solid at room temp, and can go as low as 1/2 c without really affecting the taste, but you CANNOT change out more than 1/2 of the butter for a liquid-at-room-temp fat if you want them to set up. (Cue the time I made these for a school bake sale at a classmate's house: her house was very crunchy-granola in a 1970s way and only had honey for sweetener and veggie oil for fat. They never set up.)

[pronouncingitwang]

at some point in your life you will be boiling fruit, water, sugar, and lemon juice in a pot to make a syrup or jam. the instructions will tell you to simmer for a certain amt of time. your timer will go off and you will look at the pot and go, "hm, this doesn't look thick enough. maybe i'll let it go for another 10 minutes." this is the devil speaking. it's only so liquid right now because it is at boiling point. it will thicken when it cools down. learn from the follies of my youth and do not let this happen to you

[yokowan]

at some point in your life you will be making a sauce or a stew in which you need to add cornstarch to thicken it. and you will prepare a slurry of starch in cold water and think "this looks like way too little starch to thicken this amount of liquid." this is the devil speaking. cornstarch instantly polymerizes at 95°C and if you add too much it will turn into an impossibly thick goop.

[le-jardin-inculte]

at some point in your life you will be making some sort of cream based dessert that requires gelatin to thicken it. and you will soak some gelatin sheets in water and think "this is too few gelatin sheets for this amount of cream." this is the devil speaking. it will thicken in the fridge and if you add too much you will end up with milk jelly

[shithowdy]

at some point in your life you will be baking cookies. you will take the sheet out after twelve minutes as the recipe instructs and the cookies will still be glistening and soft. "these don't seem cooked enough," you will think to yourself, "i should place them back into the oven until their edges are nice and golden." this is the devil talking. this is how you get dry, overdone cookies. the cookies will continue to bake on the warm sheet for several more minutes and then harden up after sitting on a rack for a while. trust the process. trust the process.

[whitachi]

at some point in your life you will be adding a small pasta to a soup and you will think "that is not enough small pasta." this is the devil talking. the pasta will absorb the stock and expand. this is how you end up with a soup that is a solid mass of soggy ditalini.

[araceil]

At some point in your life you will be adding garlic to a dish and you will think "that is not enough garlic." These are angels speaking. They are correct. Add more garlic.

[yummyinmytumbly]

Easy Oatmeal Baklava Cookies

[fullcravings]

Cherry Almond Cupcakes

[disaster-kitchen]

get yourself some baby potatoes. or just a bag of waxy ones. red, yellow, purple, whatever. small ones with thin skins. if they're big-ish, halve or quarter them so they cook faster.

boil or steam/pressure cook them until done. (10 minutes with 1c water in the instapot, or bring a pot of salted water to a rolling boil, cook potatoes 10-20 minutes.) preheat your oven to 425.

drain the potatoes and dump them onto a rimmed baking sheet. I recommend lining with foil because these *will* stick. take a fork and smash each potato. drizzle olive oil *generously* all over them. more oil than that, trust me. sprinkle with salt, grated cheese, your favorite spice mix. (these were tossed with pesto.) get some chili oil involved. what doesn't go with potatoes? don't skimp, potato absorbs a lot.

Chuck in the oven for 30 minutes, tossing halfway through. serve with more cheese or sour cream or labneh. you get crispy bits from smashing them, buttery soft potato flesh, and all your yummy seasonings.

best potatoes. foolproof potatoes. go forth and potato!

[cooking-thru-shortstack]

Cardamom & Coconut Milk Sweet Potato Pie - 5 Stars

Vegetarian (depending on fat selected for the crust)

This is a heavenly pie. Cooking through these books has made me very familiar with the process of baking a pie from scratch, and while this one is not the easiest to make, it is worth so much more than the effort it takes to make it.

The cardamom and coconut milk bring out the natural sweetness of the potato while giving it a creamy, light decadence and a touch of sophistication. This pie made people light up at work, and having tried it still warm from the oven and then again when chilled, it's fantastic both ways -- but best when cold, which is the mark of a good pie in my book.

The crust is also one of the less fussy and neat crust recipes I've made, possibly ever? It's buttery and flakey, and you can apply this crust easily to something savory as well as the crust itself is not sweet. According to Scott's notes on the subject, he got the dough recipe from Cook's Illustrated, and the fat needs to be extremely cold. I used lard for the first time and put it in the freezer about 30 minutes before beginning the crust, and the results were fantastic. Shortening works too.

I had to take this pie out and bring it over to a party (we were running late), so the picture below you can see the surface that the pie hasn't fully settled just yet. Didn't stop anyone from enjoying it.

Ingredients for the crust:

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1 1/2 tsp sugar

6 tbsp cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4 inch pieces

4 tbsp cold lard or vegetable shortening

1/4 cup ice-cold water

Ingredients for the filling:

1 1/4 pounds sweet potatoes (about 1 extra large potato or 2 medium potatoes)

2 cloves

3 cardamom pods, smashed

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup tightly packed light-brown sugar

2 tbsp all-purpose flour

3/4 tsp kosher salt

1/2 (14 oz) can unsweetened coconut milk(shake the can well before opening and measuring)

Make the crust: In a food processor, pulse together the flour, salt, and sugar. Add the butter, using your hands to coat the pieces with the flour. [Actually, don't do this. This is a bad idea because if you do and you want to do it safely, you have to remove the blade and therefore flour will get into the space where the blade normally rests and it's annoying. Scott, not sure if you were thinking this one through, bud.] Pulse for five 1-second bursts. Add the lard (or shortening) and pulse about four more times, until there are no dough pieces larger than a pea. Don't overprocess. Turn the mixture out into a large bowl.

Add 2 tbsp of the ice-cold water to the dough. Using your hands, fold the water into the dough, pressing it into a ball. The dough is ready when it barely comes together; add another tbs of water if needed. Use your hands to shape the dough into a flat disk about 4 inches wide. Wrap the disk with plastic wrap and put it int he refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. (You can leave it there for up to 2 days.)

Lightly flour a work surface. Unwrap the chilled dough and, using a rolling pin, roll it into a circle about 10 inches wide, dusting it with additional flour as necessary so that it does not stick to the work surface. Transfer the crust to an 8 or 0 inch pie tin.

Make the filling: Preheat the oven to 325˚. Peel the sweet potatoes and cut them into 1 1/2 to 2-inch pieces. Add the sweet potato pieces to a baking dish small enough to fit them rather snugly (an 8 by 8 dish will work well). Add 1 cup of water: the water level should be about 1/2 inch deep. If it isn't, add more water until the depth reaches about 1/2 inch. Add the cloves and the smashed cardamom pods. Cover with aluminum foil. Bake until the sweet potatoes offer absolutely no resistance when their centers are pierced with a knife, about 45 minutes.

Pass the sweet potatoes through a food mill, potato ricer or sieve into a large bowl. Let cool. Strain the cooking liquid (you should have between 1/4 and 1/2 cup).

Increase the oven temperature to 350˚. Add the beaten eggs to the sweet potato puree, mixing well. Add 1/4 cup of the spiced cooked liquid and mix well. IN a medium bowl, stir together the granulated sugar and brown sugar until no clumps remain. Sift the flour and salt into the bowl of sugar and stir. Add the sugar-flour mixture to the sweet potatoes and stir well, until the sweet potatoes and sugar are uniformly combined. Stir in the coconut milk.

Add the filling to the pie tin. Trim the dough hanging over the edges of the pie and crimp the edges with a fork. Bake until a cake tester or knife placed in the center of the pie comes out clean and the top of the filling is cracked in places, about 1 hour. [Note: I did not have any cracks, but it was indeed cooked all the way through. Go by what your tester says, but if you want to bake longer than an hour, cover the crust with tinfoil.] If the edges of the crust start to darken before the filling is cooked, cover the rim of the crust with foil.

Let the pie cool before serving it by itself or with sweetened whip cream or ice cream.

[cooking-thru-shortstack]

Double-Decker Broccoli Tacos - 5 Stars

Vegetarian

I had been looking forward to making this since I first flipped through this book. This looked like a slam dunk through and through, and I WAS RIGHT.

The bean hummus/dip is delicious on its own, and could easily just be a party dip with some chips, and the shallot vinaigrette, for being so dead simple, was pretty tasty too.

Preparing this was easy, used relatively few dishes (aside from calling for a blender and a food processor), and the end result was gorgeous. Crunchy without dropping bits of corn shell everywhere, salty, tangy, and so incredibly satisfying.

This, the ramen, and the muchim sandwich -- these three superstar recipes carry this book.

Ingredients (makes 8 tacos)

1 shallot, halved lengthwise

3/4 cup white vinegar

3 tbsp olive oil

Salt

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed

1 tbsp tahini

2 garlic cloves

1 tbsp black sesame seeds, toasted in a dry skillet on high heat for 30 seconds or until hot and fragrant

1 tsp sugar

1 pound broccoli, cooked

8 flour tortillas

8 corn taco shells (the hard-shell kind from your childhood)

1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese

2 tbsp fried shallots (the Vietnamese ones found at Asian markets are amazing, but any fried onions, store-bought or homemade, will do)

2 tbsp dry-roasted peanuts, crushed

Make the vinaigrette: Place the shallot, vinegar, oil and 1 tsp of salt in a blender and puree until smooth. Set aside.

Make the hummus: In a food processor, combine the drained beans, 1/2 cup of water, tahini, garlic, lemon juice, sesame seeds, sugar and 3/4 tsp of salt and process until smooth. Set aside.

Heat a skillet over medium heat and add the broccoli. Add the vinaigrette (you'll need about 3 tbsp) a little at a time, tasting as you go, until you have a warm, tart broccoli salad.

Heat the tortillas (either wrapped in a damp towel, which itself is wrapped in aluminum foil) in a 400˚ oven for 10 to 15 minutes, in the plastic bag they came in in a microwave oven or individually over a stovetop burner.

To assemble the tacos, spread a tablespoon or so of black bean hummus on each tortilla. Fold each smeared tortilla around the corn taco shell so that the hummus glues the two together. Spoon a tablespoon of the feta into the bottom of each corn taco shell. Divide the broccoli salad evenly among the 8 tacos. Top each with some fried shallots and the crushed peanuts and serve.

[disaster-kitchen]

one of the nice things about doing meal kits for a while is the ability look at the proposed meal in a given package and go "fuck that". We were supposed to make a Greek salad tonight, but I'm not inclined to trust mystery lettuce with a cyclosporiasis outbreak happening. Instead, I took the chicken breasts, seasoned them on both sides (salt/pepper/Greek seasoning blend), and chucked them into a 425 degree oven for 15 minutes. (I can't cook chicken breast on the stove to save my life, but 15 minutes at 425 generally comes out perfect.)

Threw some sourdough bread with a few slices of provolone under the broiler, then added my chicken and some kimchi, and made a pretty fucking fantastic sandwich.

Anyway. note to self, for future reference, instapot red lentils:

1:2 lentils to water

3 minutes if plain, 10 minutes with paneer or potatoes

[disaster-kitchen]

Honestly, I take comfort in the fact that I will never be accused of being AI. would AI produce pictures this bad? hell no.

Anyway. These are Martha Stewart's Creamy Lemon Bars, notable for coming in second place in The Kitchn's Lemon Bar Recipe Showdown. (First place went to a finicky new york times recipe, and fuck that noise.)

I fucking love lemon bars. And I really love these lemon bars, because they're 6 ingredients and basically fool proof.

1/2c (1 stick, 113g) unsalted butter

1/2c confectioners sugar (powdered sugar)

1/4 tsp salt

1c all purpose flour

4 egg yolks (what am I gonna do with 4 egg whites? idk. cocktails, maybe. a shitty omelet, if I'm really lazy. I could try meringue for the first time. sky's the limit, as long as the sky in question involves egg whites.) (I'm also really bad at separating eggs. I feel like I've gotten worse at this over the years. maybe eggs have gotten shittier.)

1 can sweetened condensed milk (these are the small cans full of thickened, sweetened dairy goo. The stuff you get in Vietnamese coffee or Thai iced tea. NOT evaporated milk. Sweetened. Condensed. Milk. I said this recipe was fool proof but there are some fools out there who can't read labels.)

3/4c lemon juice (3-4 large lemons; I also zested them, but the original recipe doesn't call for zest. my opinion on lemon bars is that they should punch you in the fucking face with lemon. zest those suckers, it's not like you're gonna do anything else with your spent lemons.)

Oven to 350, line a 8x8 pan with parchment. Recipe says to butter the pan, too, but that feels like overkill to me; I used a single sheet of parchment and folded in the corners, so there wasn't any spillover and it came out of the pan cleanly.

In a stand mixer, beat the butter, sugar, and salt until fluffy. I probably could've beaten mine longer; the fluffiness contributes to the tenderness of the crust, supposedly.

mix in the flour until combined and crumbly. the dough is pretty sticky; press it into the pan and up the edges a bit, and prick with a fork all over. Bake 15-20 minutes, or until light golden brown at the edges. I underbaked mine just a smidge, I think.

Meanwhile! Juice and zest your lemons. I like to joke that I'll never be able to make vegan lemon bars because I inevitably zest some of my knuckles in there along with the lemon, but I actually did pretty good this time.

Whisk the lemon, egg yolks, and condensed milk together and pour over the hot crust. Bake another 25 minutes, or until just set (only slightly jiggly in the middle).

Let cool to room temperature, then refrigerate at least 2 hours before removing from the pan and cutting. dust with powdered sugar before serving.

Be careful covering these with plastic wrap before they're fully chilled/set; the custard will cling and then you'll get a fucked up surface like you see in my second picture up there. And be careful covering them in general, because they'll form condensation and you don't want that dripping onto the surface.

The condensed milk cuts the sourness to manageable levels without making them sickly sweet, and it gives the bars a really lovely, cheesecake-adjacent texture. (It's not quite that thick, but it's a lot less gooey than standard lemon curd). I don't care that much about crust as long as it's not soggy/greasy, and this crust bakes up fine. A little crispy, holds up under refrigeration.

I'm really just enchanted by how easy the condensed milk makes the filling: egg yolks, lemon juice, canned goo. easy peasy, lemon squeasy, literally.

[disaster-kitchen]

between the heat wave, convention, and ceiling collapse I really haven't done much baking. tomorrow we have a lot of errands to run, but I'm determined to bring something to work on Monday, so! disaster by democracy, lightning round!

what should I bake

blackberry lime custard bars, but hold the blackberries because of cyclosporo

you still have so much mochiko. pandan butter mochi or bust.

those frangipane blondies you've been thinking about for months

oatmeal chocolate chip cookies to finally use those mini chocolate chips

lemon bars. bitches love lemon bars.

something else (leave a comment)

Voting ended onJul 13

it's entirely possible I'll run out of energy before I bake anything tomorrow, but I want to feel like I've accomplished *something* that isn't cleaning-related.

[disaster-kitchen]

aight, lemon bars it is! And then maybe later this week I'll do butter mochi if it's not too hot. (it's going to be too hot, but I can dream.) thank you all for participating in this most recent disaster by democracy, we will now return to our regularly scheduled dictatorship. <3

[disaster-kitchen]

These "So Easy" Boozy Bars Get the Party Started (Even Better Than a Margarita!)

They’re even better than the cocktail.

[disaster-kitchen]

between the heat wave, convention, and ceiling collapse I really haven't done much baking. tomorrow we have a lot of errands to run, but I'm determined to bring something to work on Monday, so! disaster by democracy, lightning round!

what should I bake

blackberry lime custard bars, but hold the blackberries because of cyclosporo

you still have so much mochiko. pandan butter mochi or bust.

those frangipane blondies you've been thinking about for months

oatmeal chocolate chip cookies to finally use those mini chocolate chips

lemon bars. bitches love lemon bars.

something else (leave a comment)

Voting ended onJul 13

it's entirely possible I'll run out of energy before I bake anything tomorrow, but I want to feel like I've accomplished *something* that isn't cleaning-related.

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

Who wants to hear my controversial cooking opinion

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

#go for it

I don't think the bay leaf does anything.

[thoriumcoredaluminosilicate]

"What we found is not shocking but the quality of your ingredient matters. Fresh bay leaves and newer dried bay leaves (i.e. not the ones that have been in your cabinet for five years) give the best flavor while old dried bay leaves have lost their strength."

https://www.allrecipes.com/do-bay-leaves-do-anything-8546584

So you just have to buy fresh and throw out whatever you don't use instead of using spices that are shelf stable.

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

I have a tree. They go in the pot thirty seconds after picking. They could not possibly be fresher.

[estrogenesis-evangelion]

it could be 20 seconds if you ran

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

Website hate mail game et cetera

[jmtorres]

i found out what bay leaf does!

if you have a gut syndrome or beans make you toot, bay leaf helps prevent problems?????

[fullcravings]

Chewy Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

[disaster-kitchen]

Dumpling Lasagna

Imagine every bite of your favorite dumpling - pork, ginger, soy, sesame - stacked into individual portions. No folding. Just chili crisp