health

Fondue 2014

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**This is an updated version of a planning post I wrote two years ago. We have streamlined the party (less stress) and this post and shopping list reflect the changes. This is mostly for my own use (to refer to in the future).

We like having our friends and family over to celebrate Jesus’ birth. We like Fondue! A lot! And what’s more fun than a bunch of little kids running around with a bunch of open flames on the table? =) This is where I give you all the details to help you put together a fondue party of your very own. Also, it helps me get ready and not make the same mistakes two years in a row! See how it all turned out here.

We own FIVE fondue pots, but that’s not enough so we always ask Kent’s parents to let us borrow one more for our party. I bought a few from Goodwill and Kent and I each had a couple from before we got married.

An easy way to prepare for this party is to order a fruit tray and a veggie tray premade and just use those as the dippers for dessert and cheese fondues. I think it is a lot cheaper to do it myself, but it’s also more work. It’s your party, so it’s your call – I won’t judge (I’ve done it both ways).

First, my shopping list:

  • raw ACV
  • PB
  • kombucha
  • strawberries
  • cherries
  • bananas
  • apples
  • pineapple
  • mandarin oranges
  • pound cake/angel food cake
  • sparkling mineral water LOTS!!!
  • bread
  • horseradish
  • 4 boxes TJ’s fondue
  • coffee ice cream
  • Sherbet
  • sternos

The night before the party:

  • get out the fondue bin from the basement
  • Set up all the pots with sternos
  • Get the punch bowls and cups out
  • Stack up the party plates.
  • Set up napkins and fondue forks

After lunch on the day of the party:

  • chop/slice all veggies/fruit/bread/pound cake and prepare on trays/bowls with several baggies of back-ups to bring out as the party goes on
  • prepare dipping sauces and put in ramekins (with extra in jars to keep in the fridge)
  • slice all the meat VERY THINLY

At the Main Food Table

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We serve two cheese fondues in ceramic pots like this heated by tealights and two meat-cooking fondues (broth and oil) in metal fondue pots like this heated by small sternos. We put raw meat on platters; then we put hot broth in one metal pot and hot beef tallow in the other. Then we put out dipping sauces for the meats.

Fondue Cheese from Trader Joe’s

We started using the boxes of Trader Joe’s fondue cheese and it’s delicious. We usually go through three during the party and have one for back-up. It’s great with any leftover broccoli on Christmas Day!

Cheddar Beer Fondue

1 lb sharp cheddar, shredded (or 1/2 Monterrey Jack and 1/2 cheddar)
1 Tbsp flour
1 1/2 tsp dry mustard
dash cayenne
3/4 cup beer
2 tsp Worcestershire sauce

In bowl, combine cheese, flour, mustard and cayenne; mix well. In a regular pan (not the fondue pot), combine beer and Worcestershire sauce. Heat (on the stove) until bubbling; gradually add cheese mixture and stir constantly until the cheese melts and mixture is smooth (about five minutes). Transfer to ceramic fondue pot with tea light.

Sassy Barbeque Sauce

1/2 cup ketchup
2 tablespoons molasses
1 tablespoon Braggs raw apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon sucanat
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon Tabasco® sauce
1/4 teaspoon granulated garlic
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

In a small heavy-bottom saucepan, whisk the sauce ingredients with 1/8 cup water. Bring to boil over medium heat, then reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Mustard Sauce

3/4 cup strained yogurt or sour cream
2 Tbsp Braggs raw Apple Cider Vinegar
1 Tbsp dry mustard
3 Tbsp hot mustard (or dijon)

Horseradish Cream Sauce

1 cup sour cream or strained yogurt
3 Tbsp horseradish
1 tsp Braggs raw apple cider vinegar
1/2 tsp sucanat
1/2 pepper
salt to taste

Mix well and chill before serving. We always have extra from the fondue party, so we eat it with filet mignon at our Christmas Dinner.

Served with:

  • crusty bread
  • broccoli
  • caulifower
  • carrots
  • cherry tomatoes
  • snap peas
  • apple slices

At the Dessert Table

We put this one near an outlet because we put the dessert fondues in two electric fondue pot like this. We use a crock-pot style pot because the sterno flame fondue pot heat is too hot for the dessert fondues – burned chocolate doesn’t taste good.

Chocolate PB Fondue

4 oz unsweetened baking chocolate
8 oz (1 cup) raw heavy cream (or heavy whipping cream if you don’t have access to fresh raw milk and cream)

1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup creamy peanut butter

1/2 tsp vanilla

Combine chocolate and cream in medium saucepan. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until chocolate melts and mixture is smooth. Add sugar and peanut butter; continue cooking until slightly thickened. Remove from heat; stir in vanilla. Pour into electric fondue pot.

Served with:

  • strawberries
  • cherries (if available)
  • sliced banana (sprayed with orange juice to prevent browning)
  • apple slices (with lemon juice to prevent browning)
  • pineapple chunks
  • mandarin orange segments
  • cubed pound cake
  • cubed angel food cake

Try to make the fruit as dry as possible so that the fondue won’t slide off. Also, the fruit should be chilled, which helps the chocolate to coat the fruit more easily.

Chocolate Fondue

16 oz sweetened chocolate
4 Tbsp Rum
1/2 to 1 cup cream or milk

Melt choc and cream in double boiler until smooth. Remove from heat and add rum. Transfer to fondue pot.

At the Beverage Table

I like to serve drinks at parties with my little cut glass punch cups. I have over 50, so that’s enough for most parties. People sometimes lose their cup and take another, so I usually have to wash a few in the middle of the party. If you use regular-sized cups, people will take too much punch, which they will put down and forget about, and you will run out before most of the guests arrive. Small cups make it last for the whole party, even if people get lots of refills. I bought my punch cups at Goodwill for pennies! I also like to put the beverage table near an outlet because I sometimes serve a hot punch in my crockpot.

Healthy and Tasty Eggnog (Triple Recipe)

5 local pastured (don’t eat grocery store eggs raw!) egg yolks (save whites for ginger bread house glue/icing)
1/3 cup maple syrup
pinch of Celtic sea salt
freshly ground nutmeg to taste
1 or 2 Tablespoons whey
1 Tablespoon organic lemon juice
3 cups raw milk (or pasteurized milk if you must, but NEVER ultra-pasteurized milk!)
1 cup raw cream (or pasteurized cream if you must, but NEVER ultra-pasteurized cream!)

You can use more cream and less milk if you like it creamy. Beat or blend egg yolks until thick. Add syrup, nutmeg, whey and lemon juice. Add milk and cream. Beat until frothy. Store in the fridge until right before the party. I usually double or triple this recipe for the party and serve in a crystal punch bowl. We like to float scoops of coffee ice cream on the top.

Cold Christmas Punch

kombucha with sherbet floating at the top =)

Sauerkraut, mmmmmm!

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I am popping in today to post the recipe from the little booklet that came with my Harsch crock, since I can never remember how much salt to add.

Never fill more than 4/5ths of the way up (the carbonic acid and the weighing stones need some space).

approx 5 – 8 kg of cabbage for the 10 L pot – I have the 5 L pot, so that means 2.5 – 4 kg cabbage (usually two big ones or three small ones fit nicely).

approx 5 – 8 g (max 15 g) salt per 1 kg of cabbage

If you need to add liquid (so that the stones are covered by 3 – 4 cm of liquid), use filtered and salted water that has been boiled and cooled (15g of salt for 1 L water).

FYI, my 5L crock makes about four quart jars of finished sauerkraut. Kent prefers the green cabbage over purple and he’s not a fan of caraway seeds, so plain green cabbage is what I usually make – and it’s delicious. Everett LOVES kraut juice when he can get it! I try to serve something fermented with EVERY meal. And, we found some real lactofermented kimchi at the commissary of all places. YUM!!!

 

What’s for Dinner? Brisket & Brie Soft Tacos with BBQ Sauce and Mango Chutney

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Holy Cow, this was soooooo good! Unfortunately, I didn’t think to take a picture until we had scarfed it all down, but this is pretty close.

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It was super quick and easy to make (less than 10 minutes total work tonight), but it does require some advance planning. I like this as part of “Save-a-step cooking” which is where you plan the leftovers as part of another meal. So, last night we made a brisket (slow cooked in a Dutch oven at 205 degrees for seven or eight hours, marinated and cooked in red wine – YUM!). And tonight, we used the leftover brisket for these tacos. Another thing you need to have in advance is the Mango Chutney. It’s a lacto-fermented recipe from Nourishing Traditions and it’s one of my favorite things!

So, you have to have mango salsa, brie, BBQ sauce, and leftover brisket. As long as you have these things, then it’s just an issue of assembly and it takes just a few minutes to make dinner.

Here’s the recipe:

Brie Soft Tacos with BBQ Sauce and Mango Chutney

Tacos loaded with shredded brisket, brie, BBQ sauce, and lacto-fermented mango chutney.

Ingredients

  • leftover brisket (we love it slow cooked 205 degrees for 7 or 8 hrs, marinated and cooked in red white, garlic, salt and pepper)
  • your fav Barbecue Sauce (we love the Sassy recipe from the Weber’s Real Grilling cookbook)
  • Lacto-fermented mango chutney (from Nourishing Traditions)
  • Tortillas (taco-size)
  • 8 oz brie, thinly sliced
  • butter, to warm up the tortillas

Instructions

  1. To assemble the tacos: Heat a griddle or large pan over medium-high.
  2. Heat up the brisket, then transfer to a bowl.
  3. Add some butter to the pan. Lay out the tortillas in the pan. Once warm, add the brie slices in a line down the middle.
  4. Then add brisket, BBQ sauce, and the mango chutney (all down the middle). The bottom should be a tiny bit browned and crispy.
  5. Fold over and place on a plate in a warmed oven while you make the rest.
  6. Sit down with your family while they sing your praises for this most delicious dinner!

I HIGHLY recommend you try this. If you do, leave me a comment and let me know how it goes.

Our Thanksgiving 2013 (pics, recipes, and my schedule)

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We had a wonderful Thanksgiving! We were thrilled to host Derm Dad’s parents, who drove down from Connecticut, and my mom, Mimi, who flew in from Kansas. And then, we also had our dear friends the P family for dinner on Thanksgiving day.

I didn’t actually take any pictures (bummer!), but here is one from last year (pretty much everything looked the same).

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Here are the recipes and the schedule that we used this year. I wanted to keep it simple, so we didn’t have a million different dishes, but it was still wonderful and even extravagant in its yumminess and abundance. If another busy mom of littles is reading this, you can do it! Just take a little bit every day and it’s really doable!

On Sunday, Kent and Adele made the Secret Ingredient Apple Pie (recipe HERE). He also made and baked a crust for the pumpkin custard pie. I also made my lactofermented apple chutney.

On Monday, Kent’s parents arrived and Grammy and Adele made a cherry pie.

On Tuesday, the 26-pound pastured turkey was delivered from our farmer, so I brined it (brine recipe HERE). I did modify the brine recipe a bit – I used Celtic sea salt instead of Kosher and blackstrap molasses (which I didn’t measure) instead of brown sugar. Don’t forget to bring the ingredients to a boil before dumping them in the bucket – it really brings out the flavors. I also made the fried onion rings for the green bean casserole (recipe HERE), but I didn’t use her instructions for the fried onion rings. Instead, I heated up some bacon grease and sliced some onions super thin on the mandolin slicer. Then I got two bowls and put an egg plus a half cup of milk in the first bowl and a quarter cup of flour plus a teaspoon or two of Celtic sea salt as well as some pepper. Then you dip some onions in the first milk bowl, then coat in the flour mixture, then drop in the hot oil until medium brown. Then scoop them out onto a towel-lined bowl or plate. Taste one from the first batch to see if the seasoning is right. My advice is to make more onions than you think you’ll need because they are soooo yummy and everyone wants some onions with each scoop of green bean casserole. – I snitched a few and they were VERY delicious! I also put the pie pumpkin and some butternut squash in the oven to roast for almost an hour. It stayed in there until I was ready to use in on Thursday.

On Wednesday, we were in Virginia for therapy all morning, so I didn’t get anything done except a few loads of laundry =). Next year I’d like to get both casseroles done on Wednesday.

On Thursday, I made the mushroom sauce and green beans for the green bean casserole (recipe HERE). Also, my mom made the sweet potato casserole and Grandy made his famous mashed potatoes. Kent also made the pumpkin custard pie and we baked the turkey in two hours (turkey recipe HERE) – we put it in at 11:30 and took it out to test the temp at 1:30. Grammy set the table (beautifully of course) with our wedding china and crystal goblets.

I even had time to make some calligraphy place cards! Of course, I forgot to take a picture until they were a bit soiled =) If you want to make something like this and you don’t really know how to do calligraphy (although I am hoping to learn how to do it the right way), just type the names on the computer and select a font that you like (I used Edwardian Script) then print it out and trace it so that your hand gets used to the shape. Then try to approximate the loveliness on your cardstock, making some parts thicker by going over it with your pen a few times.

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I HIGHLY recommend the turkey method we use because it results in a no-fail, delicious, moist, and extremely flavorful turkey that only ties up your oven for TWO HOURS!

I also tried a new recipe for the green bean casserole this year and I highly recommend it! It’s quite a bit more labor-intensive than using the onion topping from a can and the canned cream of mushroom soup (the method we always used growing up), but I have to say that it was worth it in flavor and also knowing that I wasn’t feeding MSG and other yucky chemicals to my family.

What’s for dinner? Butternut Curry Bisque

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This is a family favorite. I like to make this in my Dutch oven (in bulk), serve it for dinner, then freeze the rest in dinner-sized portions for later or for giving away. It freezes really well and stores great in gallon-sized freezer ziploc bags (laid out flat while freezing-then you can put multiple bags of different soups on their sides in a row for compact storage).

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FYI, these amounts are really just a starting point – I just put in whatever I feel like at the time =)

2 – 2.5 lb butternut squash
2 Tbsp butter (or more!)
2 carrots, sliced
1 onion, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
2 potatoes, peeled and cubed
5-6 cups homemade chicken stock
1.5 tsp curry powder
pinch nutmeg
pinch ground ginger
yogurt for garnish

Cut the squashes into halves and roast in the oven – then scoop out and set aside. Be sure to reserve the seeds (soak in salt water, then roast – yummy!). Melt the butter in your Dutch oven or any soup pot; add the carrots, onion, and celery, ; saute until soft. Stir in the squash and potatoes. Add the stock; bring to boil, then reduce heat and simmer partially covered for 40 minutes. Add curry, nutmeg and ginger. Puree with stick blender (or in batches in a blender). Return to saucepan; add more soup if necessary to thin and salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot with a large dallop of yogurt! YUMMY!

What’s for Breakfast? Quesadillas with Mango Chutney!!

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OK folks, the truth is that I don’t really “do” breakfast. After six years of marriage we’ve established a routine where Derm Dad either makes breakfast (and it’s always awesome when he does) or we don’t have anything (other than self-serve scrounging around for something super fast as we run out the door). So today, when Derm Dad asked me to handle breakfast (he’s furiously studying for his boards in about two weeks!!!), I tried something new AND it was super easy AND it was delicious!!! So now I am sharing this awesomeness with you, people of the internet!

Easy Breakfast Quesadillas with Mango Chutney

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(sorry for the mostly eaten pic. It was so delicious, I had scarfed most of it down before it occurred to me to take a picture)

Ingredients: tortillas, eggs, cheese, and lacto-fermented mango chutney

So, this is not something you can make on the spur of the moment unless you have mango chutney already made (it takes two days to ferment). So start a batch right away! It’s great on anything and it is soooo good for you!

I buy tortillas (sprouted are best if you have any trouble digesting unsoaked & unsprouted grain, and almost everybody does!) and throw the whole bag in the freezer. Then, when we want to use some I pull out the bag and in a few minutes the outer few are thawed enough to separate easily. That way you can always have tortillas on hand.

Eggs should be pastured, obviously. If all you can get is from the store, fine, they’re still very good for you, but pastured eggs are about 10 times more nutritious.

I used Parmesan cheese, because I had a few pieces already cut from the wedge (leftover from last night’s soup), but any cheese would be fine here.

And, lastly, you’ll need a batch of Mango Chutney, which is in the Nourishing Traditions cookbook and already described and in a video blog HERE. It’s my absolute favorite way to eat mango. In fact, I like to ferment almost all of my fruit. For this batch, I used cilantro from my very own garden! I left out the jalapeno pepper and we like it even better!

So, I just made some scrambled eggs (2 or 3 eggs with the whites and 3 or 4 yolks only), topped them with lots of cheese, fried the tortillas in a bit of Spring butter, then put a pile of eggs and cheese into the tortilla and folded it in half. I put a bunch of mango chutney on the top of the whole thing (regular salsa would be good here too).  And viola! DELISH!!

 

Be sure to check out more of my recipes HERE.