I have been on a “whole plant” diet (kinda). Brown rice is a whole plant food. White rice is modified. Don’t Ask Me. Look it up.
Brown rice in the instant pot is a miracle. It is so much easier than white rice. I may never cook white rice again. I haven’t had a bad batch yet. It cleans up easier. It’s ridiculous.
No rinsing. Uses less water. Better for the planet. Maybe healthier.
Here is how it is done.
Add Brown Rice and Water in a ratio of 1:1 (one to one) into the instant pot. I have loaded it up with three cups of rice and water. It didn’t overflow. Somewhere more than that is the danger zone.
15 minutes at high pressure
5 minutes Natural Release
Quick release
Stir it a little bit while putting in another container.
And then?
Brown rice maybe the best thing for fried rice. It looks right. It’s maybe less sweet. I have only tried it twice, but very please with the results.
Run Buy It Now! An immersion blender. Mrs and I are messing around with Thanksgiving food today. I made mashed potatoes in the instant pot. The immersion blender creamed the potatoes instantly with no effort. Here is the one I bought.
Hamilton Beach 59765 Immersion Hand Blender with Blending Wand, Whisk and 3-Cup Food Chopping Bowl, 3-Piece, Silver and Stainless Steel https://a.co/d/461CgKX
Regular Mashed Potatoes
Mashed potatoes
Ingredients
Four large baking potatoes halves then 1/2 chunks
1/2 stick of butter
1/4 cup of sour cream
Salt & pepper
Recipe
Throw potatoes in instant pot
Cover with water
High for 10 minutes, instant release
Dump water, return to instant pot
I put most of the butter on the bottom to melt
Immersion blender the taters
Sour cream, salt and pepper to taste
Suffering may be an important of the delicious flavors we enjoy during the holidays. Try mashing your potatoes by hand if you need more flavor.
Jon Bruce
Plant based mashed potatoes
Steal a cup and half of potatoes from above
Tablespoon of minced garlic from the Costcos
Salt and Pepper to taste
Next time I would probably throw the garlic in a skillet first, add some green onions.
You can make your own Ranch Dressing. Buttermilk and a Ranch seasoning packet. This is how people did it back in the 70s when salad wasn’t invented. You can also make Ranch dip with Sour Cream and a ranch seasoning packet.
This seems to be right on the edge of a forgotten skill.
Bonus Tip- you can make onion dip with powdered onion soup packet and sour cream.
Conan was asked “what is good?” My answer… “To see your children driven before you and hear the lamentations.”
We had a perfect day to clean up storm damage. Friday it was 103 degrees. Today is was 72. In between, we lost the rest of the pear tree in the south field.
Last year, we lost about one third of it. This weekend, we lost the rest of it. It fell all the way down to the stump.
I loaded the saw in the truck and headed down. I made pear tree firewood for a couple of hours. I also cut a path into the woods. After dinner, Merryweather came out and pulled the tops inside the tree line. I stacked fire wood. We had a beverage.
After the sun set, we made a level line on the side of the house with lasers for a different project. Being a dad is awesome.
The Satur-Deluge Before
We were planning on dinner with Clark and Mrs. Clark. There was a big storm just north of the house. Mssrs and Mrs. Clark were wind bound. We had carry out that needed picked up. On the map, it looked like I could skirt the storm to the restaurant and pick up dinner. In reality, I drove into the storm and ended up parked on the curb of an empty building to avoid the sideways rain and hail.
On the way back, I damn near hydroplaned into the center divider on the highway. It was like the movie we had to watch in middle school. I just remember the hydroplaning and getting in trouble for laughing at the tear jerker after school movie.
Hail damage and a near death experience is a small price to pay for Pappy’s Barbecue. It’s still in my top 5. There is a location less than 15 minutes from my house.
The Sunday Before
I had rolled out the pool cover before the Satur-Deluge. It was filthy, but there was enough water on the cover to give it a good scrubbing. Mssrs and Mrs. Clark came over. The pool was used. We were heading out for dinner. We stopped and harassed Merryweather at his JOB. Our initial dinner plan was denied. We went to Salty’s Fresh Mex. instead. It was delicious.
Or how a $10 jar of cayenne pepper turned into a $200 spice drawer revamp.
When we moved to the new house, it seemed obviously that the spices were going in a drawer. We had kept them on a shelf in the way that had been passed down by our ancestors. The trick is… The new house has a ton of cabinets, and a relatively small number of shelves. The shelf that was the obvious candidate was taken down, because we were updating appliances.
This brings us to the drawer. I had initially just dumped everything in there. Covid resulted in a lot of additions. Indian spices. Greek Spices. No salt spices. I had to get a handle on it.
I had three sizes sorted alphabetically. Organized. Kinda.
I was at a graduation party the other day. The host had a cool spice drawer organizing insert. I started looking around at a way to take my spice drawer to the next level.
I have about thirty 4 ounce (regular store bought size) or smaller. I have another fifteen Costco sized or larger. I just got a jar of cayenne pepper that is ridiculous. A lifetime supply. It’s so big that I should probably just call this story. I over bought cayenne pepper and now need to over-buy spice drawer organization.
Current System – Three Sizes Sorted Alphabetically
It’s not awesome. Those tiny MCormicks might as well be in the trash.
Next System – Two sizes , alphabetically then Vertical
This is not nearly as bad as I thought. I did run into an early problem. Simply Organic Curry Powder and Garam Masala are about the same width as regular spices, but taller and two of them were breaking up my beautiful, orderly columns right at the start of the alpha sort. I pulled them out. Stored them separate which made the columns work. So now I am standing over here getting ready to do it again including the overly large “regular” jars.
Oh Me of Little Faith
Of course, Simply Organic Curry Powder and Garam Masala fit. You just have to believe it will fit. Have confidence in your systems.
When was the last time you went through your spice drawer?
Take a look. Throw out anything older than four years. We have moved a couple times in the past 10 years. The first time we moved it was Purge City. We didn’t move any food stuff. Look again. Update the ground pepper in your pepper shaker. Or upgrade to a pepper mill. Did you get a spice rack as a wedding gift? How long ago was that? Inherit a spice collection from somebody? Forget about fresh.
Every time I go through the pantry, or the fridge, or the spice drawer, I am surprised by something that has been around too long. The USDA has a https://www.foodsafety.gov/ for more information. There is also a USDA app called Foodkeeper. Just in case, you want to do a deep dive.
I am going to bide my time. Amazon has several beautiful things I might try. My main concern is beautiful systems don’t have crazy tons of spices. I don’t want to throw things out for the sake of a system.
Every time you see a lovely staged photo, there is a pile of shit that didn’t fit in the picture stuffed some where. Don’t make yourself crazy.
Add the sugar slowly, when the water gets close to boiling
Add the smushed strawberries..
Stir and Smush. Smush and stir.
Strain the syrup into a bottle. My strainer and funnel nest so I did this in one step.
Save the strawberry smush as a topping.
I have made simple syrup for cocktails a couple of times. I have also bought it from the store.
Last weekend, I was at the farmers market. Strawberries were $7 for a flat. $7 for 8 pints. I bought two. Gave a couple to the neighbors. Ate a bunch. Put some up for later.
Then I made Strawberry Simple Syrup. It is AMAZING on Hawaiian Ice. I need to do some additional research on how it tastes in an Old Fashion. #ilovescience
So the other day, Merryweather and I’s watched a little too much Good Eats Reloaded. We had seen an episode on Grilled Cheese. We made some nice grilled cheese with mom’s chili for dinner.
We got to talking about grilled cheese modifications. We actually used Dubliner Cheese for dinner. Merryweather went multi-cheese, mayo, mustard, paprika?. If Merryweather doesn’t learn how to tame if down about 20%, I am going to start calling him Squirrelly Dan. We had a nice dinner. To be clear.
Standard Grilled Cheese
Ingredients
Three unwrapped American Cheese slices. Pre-sliced American Cheese that was never individually wrapped. Probably from costco, maybe store brand, rarely Kraft.
Two slices of wheat bread probably from Aldi.
Butter
Directions
Butter a slice of bread
Slap it on a warm skillet butter side down.
Add Cheese
Add another slice of bread, butter side up
Cooked on a non-stick skillet at medium until brown.
Flip it brown other side
Plate & Consume
The experiment.
We had six slices of bread left. A large chunk of Velveeta block. Various Condiments. We split the cheese into equal portions.
Wheat Bread, Butter, Velveeta
Wheat Bread, Mayonnaise, Velveeta
Wheat Bread, Butter, Dijon Mustard on the inside, Velveeta
The Results
Velveeta is inedible, chemical tasting trash. It might have been better if we just hadn’t had nicer cheese for dinner. I love it. I use it for queso dip all the time. We cut the experiment short. We didn’t finish any of the sandwiches. Bleah.
Also
Mayonnaise spreads more smoothly than room temperature butter, so it looks more uniformly browned. I don’t eat mayonnaise, but it didn’t radically change the taste which was gross, because we used block Velveeta.
Mustard… I like mustard, but this wasn’t a fun new way to enjoy mustard.
Six Chicken Breasts (thawed) (like in the package from the store)
2 cans of Rotel
2 cans of Water
Directions
Put in a trivet
Place chicken on top of trivet neatly
Pour two cans of Rotel on Top
Add a can or two of water in the Instant Pot.
Cook on Poultry for 14 minutes
Quick Release
The Back Story
I had some chicken breast and basically nothing else in the fridge. Didn’t want to go out to dinner. So I searched Google for “Chicken Breast Instant Pot”. That is where I got the 14 minutes on the Poultry setting. I don’t know what it means. I checked the breast with the thermometer when I opened it. Thickest part – 190+ degrees Fahrenheit. It’s pretty good. I have used it in tortillas twice.
According to TasteOfHome.com <== Shadiest link I have visited in years, but the first quote I picked from another site was incoherent.
Poultry – This can make your favorite chicken recipes in a simple 15 minutes! You can adjust for “More” for 30 minutes, or “Less” for 5. This is actually great for when you need a quick batch of shredded chicken for a recipe.
Jon The Bruce 