One Year Ago Today

It was one year ago today that we were here in Hilo for the closing on our house. We needed some furniture and our local furniture store Koehnen's in downtown Hilo was featuring a real deal. If you came in a costume, you got 25% off of your purchase. So, for a small investment of a costume, we were able to save several thousand dollars. We went to Wal-Mart to find a costume and there was only one adult costume left and it was even missing the hat. It was "Big Daddy" a New Orleans Parade style costume in purple crushed velvet. I had brought along a little headband with devil ears on it and Wes had a beautiful lei that was presented to us by our real estate agent when we landed in Hilo, so we had a costume! Hence Big Bad Daddy Devil was born. This year he is going to be a Dalmatian. Here are some pictures from that day one year ago. It seems like a very long time considering all that has happened in the last year.

Spooky Image

Wes in his new chair, which is used every night!

Our salesman ringing up the sale

Next post... this year's Halloween Party!

Show and Tell Fridays

Most fridays I do what we did in elementary school on Fridays... I have "show and tell" where I spotlight a favorite blog of mine and then using the "links" from that blog, wander around the internet and sharing with you what I have found. This is an actual class picture of my 4th grade class. Can you find me? Probably not unless you knew me then.

Today I am starting with a beautiful blog, full of eye candy from the top of Mauna Kea mountain. It is done by Tom, an astronomer and fellow FBI Blogger who came here from the UK.

Tom's Blog is one you are going to enjoy seeing. He gets fabulous sunsets and sunrises up there on top of the clouds and his viewers benefit from his many sleepless nights. So click away and enjoy his photography! From Tom's blog roll I found Alice and her rather amazing blog:

A Thousand Monkeys and a Camera. Alice comes all the way from Chattanooga, Tennessee, a place I used to visit when we lived in Atlanta. I have even stayed in the funky Chattanooga Choo Choo Hotel there, made up or rail cars and cabooses. I also love the very state of the art Tennessee Aquarium, which in my opinion is the best aquarium in a land locked state. Another interesting thing about Alice is that I see she lists links of a few towns on her site and one of them is Huntley, IL, which was a few miles from our house in Sleepy Hollow, IL ! So, for whatever reason we have a geography link of sorts. And then I also see that she is a supporter of the Matthew Shepard Foundation three more cheers for the girl! Me too! And then I see she is a lefty like me and she also does food porn... come on now how did I just happen to click on someone with whom I have so much in common? Kismet I suppose. Make sure and click on her food porn page while you are visiting!

And so who did Alice lead me to? Go ask Alice! Sorry, I could not resist. Alice led me to:

101 Cookbooks, a site which I have visited before and really do like, so get a load of this page about Holloween Food ideas there! Hedi has some really good ones, like Roasted Pumpkin Salad and Thai-Spiced Pumpkin Soup. Those two sound really wonderful to me. I do have a friend, Damon Tucker who does not like pumpkin one little bit. I discovered this when I posted about making Pumpkin Ravioli! Heidi Swanson lives in San Francisco (where I lived before moving to Hawaii) and started her blog when she came to the realization that she had over 100 cookbooks and just kept buying them, but making her same repertoire of recipes for daily life. She decided to stop buying cookbooks and start opening her cookbooks and trying new recipes and ideas. She was however unsuccessful at not buying cookbooks ... I can totally relate here... but she did cut back. For our benefit,. Heidi did start cooking from her library and since 2003 she has been blogging about her adventures in the food world.

And so that is our three random blogs for Show and Tell Friday! I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.

Fried Okra

This one is for Keith, my friend from Georgia who is working on the mainland. I miss him!

Last night's supper was in the style of comfort food. At the farmer's market yesterday I picked up some tender and velvety okra, so dinner was centered on that. I do okra in several styles, but last night I opted for the simple southern style (recipe below) I learned living in coastal South Carolina, which could have been the entry point for okra into our nation's food system, though some claim it was New Orleans. Wherever it came into our country, we know that it is a delicious addition to our American menus.

Brief history of OKRA: Okra's lineage started on the banks of t he nile where it grew wild. The egyptians cultivated this relative of the Hollyhock, cotton and hibiscus. Eventually the seeds made their way throughout Africa and the middle East.

It was prized as a vegetable and the dried seeds were used as a substitute for coffee... no I am not going to try that! Because of the slave trade, okra made its way to America via the Caribbean. About the same time (early 1700's) it also was noted as having made it to Europe. Okra is probably most famous as a thickening agent in gumbo but there are many ways to prepare and utilize this vegetable.

Okra grows year round in tropical climates and must be picked 3-4 days after the flower develops or the fruit becomes tough and fibrous, but then it can be used for making paper and ropes. I have grown the red variety and I am partial to it.

It only takes 60 days from seed to fruit and once an okra plant is established it can supply okra for a family's needs. While I love fried okra and pickled okra

many of my favorite recipes for okra are from Northern India. You can also grill it and use it as the base for a variety of stews centered around North African and Turkish cuisines.

Last night I prepared it in the simple southern tradition, though there are even many variations on this theme, some use only cornmeal others add flour, seasonings etc. I have even thought of doing a coconut breading for it someday. Here is last nights rendition:

Fried Okra with Smoked Sea Salt

8-10 Okra pods 3-5" in length

1/2 cup buttermilk

2 eggs beaten with a fork or whisk

reserved buttermilk

1 cup flour for dredging

1/2 cup yellow cornmeal or polenta

1/2 cup all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 tablespoon raw sugar

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

1 cup of peanut or canola oil

Smoked Sea Salt or medium grained salt

Cut okra into 1/2 inch slices

soak in buttermilk for 20 minutes

Strain, reserving buttermilk for breading

Mix eggs & buttermilk till incorporated

Stir together the cornmeal flour mixture

Preheat oil in a frying pan to 350 degrees

Dredge okra in flour in small batches

Dip okra in egg mixture

Dip okra in cornmeal/flour mixture and drop into hot oil. Turn after the bottom appears to be golden brown.

Remove with a spider or screened spoon and drain on paper towels. Salt immediately and serve while warm and crispy.

Here is our dinner from last night, grilled pork chops, mashed potatoes, grilled local corn and fried okra. Stay tuned for another okra recipe soon.

Wordless Wednesdays Gooey Double Chocolate Brownies with Toffee

Morning Walk Cell Phone Pics

Every morning my friend Maria and I get out and walk three miles, more if it is flat. Most mornings we have a route that goes across the highway and over the old road to Honoli'i and back. It is filled with raspberries, guavas, avocados, breadfruit and waterfalls with the treat of watching surfers at Honoli'i midway. On Wednesdays, our friend Noel joins us as we go to the farmer's market first and then trek past the canoe sheds, past the "yacht harbor" and over to the beautiful Lili'uokalani Gardens. I take pictures most every day. I have been saving them up and will be sharing more of them with you soon. Meanwhile, today we drove North to Onomea and walked around the old sugar fields and past the long shuttered Pepeekeo Sugar Factory. I only had my cell phone with me, so these are not as high quality as I usually post ... but I could not resist taking a few pictures of the things we saw today. I hope you enjoy them too.

Taro Growing

Remnants of an old building basement

The Public Access to the Ocean

Ocean views

Giant Gear from the Sugar Industry

Momma Cow

Twins in the shade!

Eye Candy: Digital Fruit Art

Here are some photos I worked over in Photo Shop. These were taken at the 12 Trees Project in Kona. You can see a full article I did about Ken Love and the Twelve Trees Project in the Fall issue of Edible Hawaiian Islands Magazine.

Here is one for my acid loving friend Sam Dooby: Pineapples

Lardolicious! Manteca de Hawaii

The road to Mole is paved with Manteca. So is the road to good tamales. I am making both this week and those posts will follow complete with step by step instructions. This post is about rendering lard, I kid you not. In Mexican Cooking, we call it Manteca. It is a very easy process and one that rewards you with some wonderful stuff. Many things taste better with Manteca and the Spanish word just sounds a heck of a lot better than lard.

Home rendered lard is healthier for us than many of the hydrogenated vegetable fats and surprisingly has some health benefits when of course it is used in moderation. It of course is not vegetarian or vegan. It is a 100% natural fat and one third of it is composed of stearic acid, which is beneficial to cholesterol levels & circulation. Lard is also high in oleic acids and high in monounsaturated fatty acids. Lard has half the level of saturated fat of palm kernel oil or coconut oil, often touted as more healthful replacements for partially hydrogenated vegetable shortening. Here is an interesting article on the subject of fats in the New York Times.

So, if you are going to use Manteca, do not buy the supermarket variety... make your own! It is easy to do and will give you the best quality and healthiest kind of lard.

While our grocery stores lack a lot of things here on the big island of Hawaii, one of them is not pork fat. The pig is Godlike in this culture and not only can you find stacks of pig fat, you can find pigs feet, pig heads and almost everything between the snout and the tail. I bought four packages of beautiful white fat for $5 at KTA.

I brought it home and cut it up then slowly cooked it until the fat was rendered and we were left with some crispy cracklings or chicharrones.

Sprinkled with a little smoked sea salt and hot sauce they are harder to resist than a potato chip. Of course I suggest a little self control and moderation where chicharrones are concerned.

You can render the fat in the oven or on the stove top. Since it was a warm day, I opted for the stove top. I had to do my rendering in two batches. Each one took about 20 minutes on a low flame.

Once the fat is rendered, the chicharrones will be golden brown and crispy. Line a sieve with a coffee filter or paper towel and place it over a large pot or bowl. Pour all of the renderings and chicharrones into the colander. Allow to drip for at least 15 minutes, longer is better. Once the lard has been rendered it will be a golden oil that eventually turns white when it completely cools. You can store it in the fridge or freezer. It will keep for a few weeks in the fridge and at least a year in the freezer. You can also render goose fat, duck fat, and beef fat in much the same way.

Come on, I know you have lard envy about now...

The next post will be on making a deep velvety and complex mole colorado and then some butt kicking tamales! Tune in for more fun and food!

Pumpkin Ravioli!

I love the flavors of pumpkin and sage in the fall. Here is a recipe I have made twice in the last two weeks, once for a party and again for fun. All you need to add is a salad and some focaccia.

You can use pumpkin, butternut squash or sweet potato in the filling. You can make your own pasta dough, buy sheets of pasta (if you live on the mainland in an area that has gourmet markets) or you can use won ton wrappers for the pasta. These instructions are for the later method. I did them with home made pasta sheets the first time and won tons the second time, they were equally good both ways.

Pumpkin Ravioli with Brown Butter, Candied Ginger and Fried Sage

Filling:

1 1/2 # of winter squash, pumpkin or sweet potato roasted till tender and pureed.

1/4 cup chopped candied ginger

1/2 cup fontina cheese, grated

2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh sage (you could also use basil)

1/2 of a whole nutmeg freshly grated

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

fresh ground black pepper

pinch of salt (I use my smoked salt here)

2 TBS maple sugar

Pasta sheets or won ton wrappers for ravioli (I used 1 recipe of pasta dough or two packages of won ton wrappers)

Water, pastry brush

Ravioli cutter

1/4 cup of butter (more if you follow the Paula Deen School)

1/4 cup chopped hazelnuts

1/2 cup sage leaves fried in olive oil (fry just before serving so they are crisp)

Stir the filling ingredients together. Lay out your pasta sheets. Depending on the size of your ravioli cutter, determine how much filling you will need for each ravioli.

They should be lightly stuffed, just a little puffy. I used a large round cutter and a small ice cream scoop to measure the filling. Place the filling on the pasta and then go around the filling with water using the pastry brush. Place the top sheet of pasta on the bottom sheet and lightly press the seams where you painted the water. Using a ravioli cutter, cut through the pasta and place the ravioli on a floured piece of waxed paper or silpat. Continue till you have used up the filling. The ravioli may be frozen between waxed paper at this point.

Boil water in a large pot and dunk 3-4 ravioli at a time into the water for about 2 minutes. They should be al dente. Remove with a slotted spoon or spider and allow to drain slightly. Continue till all are cooked.

When ready to serve, melt the butter in a frying pan and add hazelnuts. Add Ravioli and cook just till the butter starts to brown. Remove to a platter and top with the butter and hazelnuts, then add the fried sage leaves.