Homemade Tortillas

Yesterday, we had taco night and one of the things that we wanted to do was to make our own tortillas. We had made them in the past and wanted to try them again, so we searched the Internet for a good recipe and came upon this one below by Ree Drummond, the Pioneer Woman.

We found that each batch made 15 tortillas and followed the instructions word for word with the exception of the second wait time. My comments are also below in red.

Anyway, the recipe is below...

Ingredients

• 2-1/2 cups All-purpose Flour
• 2-1/2 teaspoons Baking Powder
• 1 teaspoon Kosher Salt
• 1/2 cup Lard Or Vegetable Shortening
• 2 Tablespoons (additional) Lard Or Vegetable Shortening
• 1 cup Hot Water

Preparation Instructions

Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a large wooden bowl. Stir together.

Add spoonfuls of lard or shortening (use 1/2 cup PLUS 2 tablespoons), then use a pastry cutter to combine the ingredients. Cut mixture until it resembles coarse crumbs.

Slowly pour in hot water, stirring to bring mixture together. Lightly knead dough 30 to 40 times, or until it becomes a cohesive ball of dough and is less sticky. Cover with a tea towel and allow dough to rest for at least an hour.

Roll into ping pong size balls, place on a tray, cover with a tea towel, and allow to rest for another 20 to 30 minutes. (We did not wait the addition 20-30 minutes following rolling them into balls.)

When you're ready to make the tortillas, head a dark or cast iron griddle to medium/medium-high heat. (We used medium low heat in a cast iron skillet.)

One by one, roll out balls of dough until very, very thin.  (I didn't roll some too thin and they came out more like gordita shells from Taco Bell)

Throw tortillas (one by one) onto the griddle. Cook on each side for 20 to 30 seconds, removing while tortillas are still soft but slightly brown in spots.

Remove and stack tortillas, and cover with a towel to keep warm. Serve immediately or allow to cool before storing tortillas in a container.

To warm, nuke tortillas in the microwave, or wrap in foil and warm in the oven.

Helpful tips:

* Make sure the water you pour in is very warm.
* Allow the dough to rest, both after kneading and after forming into balls.
* Roll out very thin.
* Get the heat right on your stove: Too hot, and the tortilla will burn in spots. Not hot enough, and the tortilla will begin to crisp before you can get it to brown. I get my stove between medium and medium high heat; that seems to do the trick.
* Use a dark griddle or cast iron skillet to brown the tortillas.
* Cook just long enough to lightly brown the tortilla in spots; don't cook too long or tortillas will crisp. You want them to be soft and pliable when you serve them.
* Finally: Have fun! And enjoy them. They're absolutely scrumptious.

Mountainman Breakfast

Tonight we are having breakfast for dinner so I am making my "Mountainman Breakfast Casserole" in out 12" dutch oven. This meal can be made over a campfire of in the oven. Ours was in the oven tonight.

Ingredients:
2 pounds of sausage
2 pounds hash brown potatoes
8 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup of water
2 cups of shredded cheese

Step 1 - If using a campfire,heat fire to a bed of hot coals, else preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Step 2 - Beat 8 eggs with 1/4 cup of water.




 


Step 3 - Crumble sausage and cook. I choose to do this in a separate pan, but you can do it in the dutch oven as well.


Step 4 - Remove cooked sausage and drain on paper towels, reserving sausage grease in the pan.



 


Step 5 - Using the sausage drippings, brown the hash browns.

Step 6 - Coat the bottom of the dutch oven with the layer of hash browns. Here is where cooking the sausage and hash browns in the dutch oven would've saved some time (and clean up).
 
Step 7- Place the cooked sausage over the layer of the hashbrowns.

Step 8 - Pour your eggs over the sausage layer


Step 9 - Sprinkle the top of the casserole with the 2 cups of cheese. We used Colby-Jack for ours.



Step 10a - Cover the dutch oven and place in the oven, or...

Step 10b - Cover the dutch oven and cook with 8 coals underneath and 16 coals on top

Step 11 - Cook for 20-35 minutes, until the eggs are done

Step 12 - Enjoy!


I hope that you enjoy this recipe!

 

Egg In A Basket

This morning, I had a craving for eggs so I decided to make a really cool comfort food. Egg In A Basket.

The dish is typically made as bread with an egg in the center, cooked with a little butter or oil. It is commonly prepared by cutting a circular or square hole in the center of a piece of buttered bread and cooking a egg in the middle.

Step 1 - Pre heat a frying pan to medium heat. Too high of heat and the bread will burn before the egg was done. (See below)

Step 2 - Butter the bread on both sides.

Step 3 - Cut a circular hole in the bread. I usually use a small cup or mason jar.

Step 4 - Select a fresh egg. These are eggs from our chickens.

Step 5 - Place the buttered bread with the hole in it in a pre-heated pan

Step 6 - An egg is cracked into the "basket" cut into the toast. 

Step 7a - Don't burn the meal. I had the heat set too high and burned my first attempt at breakfast.

Step 7b - When the underside is grilled nicely and the egg white is a bit solid, flip it over.

Step 8 - Serve on a plate with pepper and enjoy!







 I hope that you try and like this. I know of a lot of people (myself included) that consider this dish to be a really good comfort food.

Around The Homestead - Prepping For The Hard Frost Tonight

Since Fall arrived, we've had aour share of colder than normal days. Today was 15° colder than normal. We're supposed to get our first real frost tonight. We've had some light frost which withered our grapes and what's left of our tomato and pepper plants.

Tonight the low is 29° for the town closest to us so it'll be 5-7 degrees colder here.

In order to prepare for the freeze, we dug our some old moving blankets that were given to us and wrapped our rain barrels with them, then secured them with bungee straps. The added insulation helped keep them from freezing last year (our first year with them). I originally thought that if they were full that they wouldn't freeze just do to the sheer amount of water, but have heard several stories of people whose water barrels froze partially, expanding and cracking them, so we didn't want to take any chances.

The second thing that we wanted to get done was to finish getting the remaining tomatoes and jalapeno peppers off of the plants.

Lastly, I stopped by the our chickens. Their feathers came in just in time and they were all fluffed and full. I removed their waterer for the night as it's an outside one and it's made of metal, so it'd definitely freeze.

Now all that's left to do is to make some fried green tomatoes or green tomato bread, which I have not tried, but it looks pretty good.

For those interested, here's how to make friend green tomatoes. Well, God made them, we just cook them.

1. Slice tomatoes
2. Dip in raw scrambled egg. 
3. Then dip in flour seasoned with salt and pepper. 
4. Some folks add a little heat like cayenne pepper.
5. Fry in olive oil for best health and flavor, until brown and soft. 

Although I've never tried it, here is the recipe for Green Tomato Bread, if you'd like to try it.

Enjoy the weather and stay warm!

Homemade Bread

Some of the earliest memories that I have are of going down our family friend, Mamie's house. Mamie and her husband Jim lived a simple life. She cooked everything fresh from scratch and he hunted. I remember going out back and looking at all of the hunting dogs who always seemed to be incessantly barking.

Mamie used to sit with me on her front porch and tell me stories and share some old wives tales as well.

One of the things that I really liked was going over her house and smelling fresh homemade bread being baked with the scent filling the whole house and even drifting outside. Even going inside and seeing bread pans covered with dish clothes was enough to make my mouth water.

Since then, I've been hooked on homemade bread. The recipe below is not Mamie's recipe, but is a basic one for homemade white bread.

Ingredients:

• ½ cup warm water
• 1½ T yeast
• 1 T sugar

• 1 cup boiling water
• ⅓ cup oil
• ⅙ cup sugar
• 2 t. salt

• 1¼ cups cold water
• 6½ cups flour

  

Instructions:

---

Step1

In a small bowl mix the ½ cup warm water, 1½ T yeast, and 1 T. sugar.

Let it sit for about 5 minutes or so.

---

Step 2



In a mixer or in another bowl mix the 1 cup of boiling water, ⅓ cup oil, ⅙ cup sugar, and 2 t salt.

Stir until it dissolves.

---

Step 3


Add in the cold water and mix and then add in the yeast mixture. (You want the mixture temp to be lukewarm before you add the yeast and thats why do you do this.)

---

Step 4



Add in 3 cups of flour and stir.
Let this mixture rise for 30 minutes.

---

Step 5


After 30 minutes, the mixture should have some bubbles from the yeast.

Add in 3 cups of flour. It should form a nice not sticky dough. Let this rest for about 30 minutes.

---

Step 6



Add in remaining 3 to 3½ cups of flour. It should form a nice not sticky dough.

Let this rest for about 30 minutes.

---

Step 7



Grease (with butter) and lightly flour the bread pans. This will help the bread to release from the pan and to come out easier.

---

Step 8


Separate dough into bread pans.

Cover with a dish towel and let these rise for about an hour (or until the dough has doubled in size) in a warm place.

Bake bread at 350°F for 35-40 minutes.

---

Step 9



Remove the loaves from the oven and brush the tops with butter.

---

Step 10


 Enjoy with butter or your favorite jam or jelly spread!

Homemade Pork and Beans

I saw this recipe on a friends Facebook page and really thought that it sounded good since we like pork and beans. Funny though, I don;t remember seeing it in the Ball Canning book, although that's where it's from. I'll have to go and look for some more gems in there!

Homemade Pork and Beans (makes 6 pints )

Ingredients:

• 1 quart dried navy beans (about 2 pounds)
• 1/4 lb salt pork, cut into pieces
• 1 quart tomato juice 3 tablespoons sugar
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice

 
Instructions:
Put beans in a large pot. Add water to cover by 2 inches. Bring to a boil and boil for 2 minutes. Remove from heat and let the beans sit for one hour. Drain and cover with boiling water; boil for 3 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand for 10 minutes; drain. (Instead of doing this, I soaked my beans overnight)
Combine tomato juice, sugar, salt, onion and spices and bring it up to a boil. Pack 1 cup of beans into hot jar and put in a piece of salt pork and then fill jar about 3/4 full with beans. Ladle hot tomato sauce to within 1 inch from top of jar. Remove air bubbles from the jar and refill to proper headspace if necessary. Wipe rims and add hot lids/rings to the jars. Process in pressure canner for 65 minutes for pints and 75 minutes for quarts at 10 lbs of pressure for weighted gauge and 11lbs of pressure for dial gauge.

Meals in a Jar - BOOK REVIEW

I recently had the opportunity to review the book Meals in a Jar: Quick and Easy, Just-Add-Water, Homemade Recipes by Julie Languille. The book describes "Ready-made meals" as a jar or bag with everything you need to create a complete meal with no additional ingredients. The book strives to focus on meals that combine taste, quality, convenience with preparedness and cost-efficiency.

In reading through this book, one quickly realizes that the meals listed could replace the standard MRE with the simple addition of water. The one caveat that I would mention is that the meals listed take a lot of advance planning and preparation (and in some cases a lot of food) especially since some of the ingredients listed in some of the recipes would need to be ordered online.

One thing that stands out when reading this book is the breadth of meals that are covered. There are over one-hundred meals from breakfast to dessert and everything in between that are not only good for practical preppers, but are also good for people who enjoy outdoor activities such as camping, hunting, fishing or hiking excursions.

In reading through this book, I immediately recall the simpler times when grandmothers would give the gift of meals in a jar as wonderful, tasty treats. Along that vein, the meals described in this book would make great gifts for new moms, holiday gifts as well as housewarmings. In addition to those events, ready made meals are great for when you need a quick prep meal for times when life gets busy with kids' sports, music and academic activities.

Although most of the recipes call for items that you may not have on-hand, they are easily found on the web. Once you have the ingredients and equipment needed, you should be ready to go. I should mention that the author uses plastic bags, called retort pouches which is similar to what the military uses for certain MREs.

All-in-all, this was a good book. If you are looking for a book that helps you create dried and dehydrated ingredient meals to store in mason jars then this book is for you.

Venison Recipes - Part 4

Hello!

Here is the next in the round of venison recipes. This one is interesting as people usually don't associate venison with Asian flavor.

Venison with Sweet and Sour Sauce

4 6-8 ounce venison steaks, trimmed of all fat, gristle and bone
Sauce
1 bottle dry red wine
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
1 lb fresh cranberries
1 lemon, juice only
2 sprigs rosemary
1 shallot, minced
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch mixed with equal part cold water
salt and white pepper

Prepare sauce. To large saucepan, add red wine and next 5 ingredients. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, uncovered. Lower to medium heat and reduce liquid by one-half. Remove rosemary and allow mixture to cool. When cooled, transfer contents to a blender or food processor and puree. If you wish, you can strain the liquid through a strainer to remove any large pieces. Do not attempt to process the HOT sauce in the blender or processor! It has to be cool. As soon as you turn on the machine, hot liquid cranberry sauce will spew out of the top and burn you and/or make a really big mess.

Return processed sauce to the saucepan and add brown sugar and half of the cornstarch mixture. Heat to boil. Add additional cornstarch mixture to thicken, if needed. Adjust sweet and sour flavors as desired by adding additional balsamic vinegar (sour) or brown sugar (sweet). Season with salt and pepper.

Season venison with salt and pepper. Grill, broil or pan sear until medium-rare. Spoon a little sauce on each plate. Slice venison across the grain and arrange slices over sauce. Garnish with additional cranberries, fresh herb, orange slice, etc

Venison Recipes - Part 3

Venison Pot Roast

2-3 pounds boneless venison roast
2 tablespoons cooking oil
2/3 cup tomato juice
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 cup finely chopped carrot
2 teaspoons beef bouillon
3 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup sour cream or plain yogurt

Trim fat from roast. In a 4- to 6-quart pot, brown meat in oil. Blot any remaining oil or fat. Add juice, onion, carrot and bouillon. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, covered, for 1 1/2 to 2 hours until meat is tender. Remove meat. To make a sauce, add water to juices to equal 2 cups of liquid. Stir flour into sour cream or yogurt. Stir into juices in pot. Cook and stir over medium heat until thickened and bubbly. Season to taste. Serves 4-5.

Venison Recipes - Part 2

Venison Stroganoff

1 pound venison sirloin steak
1 8-ounce carton sour cream
2 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup water
2 teaspoons beef bouillon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
2 tablespoons margarine or butter
1 1/2 cups sliced mushrooms
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 clove garlic
Hot cooked noodles

Partially freeze venison and slice across the grain into bite-size strips. Stir together sour cream and flour. Stir in water, bouillon, salt and pepper. Set aside. In a large skillet, cook and stir the meat in hot butter until done. Remove from skillet. Add mushrooms, onion and garlic. Cook and stir until done. Mix meat and vegetables together. Stir flour mixture into skillet. Cook and stir until thick and bubbly. Serve over noodles. Serves 4

Around our place...

Tonight it's cool outside... in the upper 30's. We also have the pleasure of having company over. Our oldest son's girlfriend, along with our oldest daughter's boyfriend are joining us for diner. After taking some daily items out to our compost bin, I asked our oldest son if he would like to help me make dinner. He wanted to and pretty much made it by himself with a little help.

We made meatloaf, brussels sprouts, a cauliflower, carrot and broccoli medley and macaroni and cheese.

Meatloaf

• 1 (10.75 ounce) can Campbell's® Condensed Tomato Soup
• 2 pounds ground beef
• 1 envelope dry onion soup and recipe mix
• 1/2 cup dry bread crumbs
• 1 egg, beaten
• 2 tsp soy sauce
• 1/4 cup water

The brussels sprouts were steamed and lightly coated with butter
The vegetable medley was also steamed and lightly covered with a cheese sauce.

It was well received by everyone and was delicious!

Venison Recipes - Part 1

The boys and I have had our opportunities to go deer hunting and although the ladies in our home don't like the taste of venison, we (the guys) still eat it whenever we get it.

I recently had an opportunity to introduce a love for venison to an elderly lady who works with me. She was given a 2 lb brisket that measures 6" x 6" x 2" from a deer harvest in Wisconsin.

She knows that we hunt and eat venison, so she asked for some help. She told me that she has tried venison before (in the 70's) and didn't like it due to the gaminess.

With that, I put together a list of recipes that I received from some friends that will hopefully help her to like it. I hope that these are helpful to you as well.

Rather than put them all in one long post, I am going to break them up so they are easier to read.

Bar-B-Que Venison

1. In a crock pot, combine a bottle of BBQ sauce and the roast and let it cook on low till its falling apart.
2. When the meat is done, falling apart, and tender, remove the meat from the crock and discard the liquid. 
3. Shred the meat with a fork
4. Add additional BBQ sauce until the mixture is juicy
5. Serve on buns, a little cheese on your bun is good.

* You can also heat up the leftovers and add some cooked pasta for a second meal.