Our First Meat Pie

For some reason, I have wanted to make a meat pie for years. Something in my childhood imagination was fascinated by meat pies in historical fiction books, such as the Little House on the Prairie series. I also appreciate one-dish meals, especially for purposes of packing leftovers for lunch at work.

This recipe is still evolving. Something is needed to keep the meat holding together better, particularly when warm - I imagine this is generally accomplished with a gravy.

Beef Pie
Adapted from this version.
Ingredients:
1 small or medium onion, chopped
2 carrots, sliced
1 sweet potato, diced
fat for sautéing: butter, coconut oil, lard, tallow, etc.
1 lb. ground beef
several tablespoons ketchup
seasoning: unrefined salt, freshly ground pepper, paprika, herbs, gluten free soy sauce, etc.
two pie crusts

Note: these are mere suggestions. Want to use a different tuber than the sweet potato? Add celery or broccoli and nix the carrots? Use a different mix of seasonings? Do!

Method:
Melt some healthy, moderately heat-stable fats in a skillet; I used a combination of grass-fed butter and cold-pressed coconut oil. Add onions, carrots, potatoes, and additional veggies of choice. Sauté over medium-low heat for about 15 minutes until everything is soft and the potato dices are cooked through. Place cooked veggies into a mixing bowl.

Now brown the ground beef in the same pan. Once done, dump in with the veggies. Add the ketchup, a teaspoon or more of unrefined salt, and other seasonings to taste. Mix well.

Dump the mixture into a pie pan lined with one pie crust. Place the second pie crust on top and seal the edges.

Bake at 350°F. Mine took a good 30 minutes. I recommend starting to check after 20-25 minutes; it is done when the crust is lightly browned.

White Rolls...for a Health Nut?

If you saw my pie crust recipe, it may have struck you as odd that a self-confessed nutrition geek is advocating the use of white rice flour. Does not everybody know that refined grains are empty calories? Don't those aware of the harmful effects of whole grains just turn to healthier processing techniques or leave grains behind?

Sure. However, rice is a bit of an exception. Soaking and sprouting don't help much to mitigate the damaging effects of brown rice, but on the other hand, rice is relatively low in anti-nutrients to begin with when compared to other grains. Refining brown rice into white actually does a pretty good job of removing anti-nutrients. Now, it's true that this also takes away most of what nutrients were there in the first place. I am not advocating that anybody rely on white rice as more than a source of clean-burning glucose, and exactly what role if any rice should play in your diet depends upon what else you eat, but it generally is healthier than brown rice because brown rice removes nutrients from your body.

Thus, we use white rice flour along with pure starches such as potato starch and tapioca starch/flour on a semi-regular basis. The primary objection to these seems to be the claim that because of their high glycemic index as individual ingredients, consuming them in any context will cause unhealthy blood sugar spikes. I have known people with severe blood sugar problems to refuse white rice but eat moderate helpings of brown rice, apparently unaware that the difference in glycemic index is only one point (56 vs. 55) and the glycemic index of brown rice is the same as that of a Snickers bar! No, I do not recommend that anybody chow down on pure flour as a snack, but who would? To the extent that glycemic index matters (and that extent is scientifically controversial), what matters is the meal you actually put into your mouth. A high-glycemic meal is sometimes more accurately termed a fat-deficient meal. So loading your dinner rolls with grass-fed butter, pâté, real cheese, or herb-infused olive oil is entirely different from chowing them down naked.

So yes, we do eat white rolls, and I do consider a warm roll with my soup a non-compromise health food. They go perfectly with many meals and, reheated in the toaster oven from the freezer, contribute to a quick snack.

Rolls
Ingredients:
2 t. active yeast
1 t. sugar
1 cup warm (not hot) water or milk
1 egg
2 T. honey
2 T. melted butter or coconut oil
1 1/2 t. baking powder
1 1/2 t. guar gum or xanthan gum
1 t. unrefined salt
1/4 cup sweet rice flour
2/3 cup tapioca starch, potato starch, arrowroot starch, or non-GMO cornstarch
3/4 cup white rice flour
1/2 t. vinegar

Method:
In a mixing bowl, whisk yeast, sugar, and warm water or milk. Let sit for ten minutes or so to proof.

Whisk in egg, honey, and melted fat. Add dry ingredients, stirring between additions, and mix until thoroughly combined.

Scoop into silicone or paper-lined muffin cups. Let rise in a warm, moist place. Tip: Place unrisen rolls into a cool oven, place a wide baking pan at least 1" deep on the bottom rack, and pour boiling water into the pan right before you shut the oven door. This creates the ideal rise environment. With this technique, my rolls rise more than enough in 45 minutes.

Bake at 350°F for 20 minutes.

These keep on the counter for about a day and freeze excellently.

Note: Mr. D made these the other day using coconut flour instead of tapioca starch and skipping the rise time. They were totally different but quite delicious!

This post is part of Monday Mania.

Eating Liver

As I mentioned in my last post, my palate remains hard to please. I'm not alone when it comes to liver, though. Most people have to brace themselves and many can't seem to get it down at all. One exception is my husband, who can eat pan-seared slices of beef liver as if it's going out of style.

Which it has. I wish I knew the stats, but liver consumption has doubtless plummeted in the U.S., thanks to the besmirching of its nutritional benefits and the lack of reason to eat the dang stuff for pleasure. Considering that both modern analysis and the traditional practices of healthy cultures agree that liver from a healthy animal is just about the most nutrition-packed, toxin-free thing you can put in your mouth, that's a serious shame. In my kitchen I follow the custom of serving liver at least once a week. Once kiddos arrive, liver will be among their first foods.

This is more easily said than done! Seriously, I do. Not. Like. Liver. It tastes strong in the wrong ways. It's gelatinously mushy undercooked and toughens easily as it cooks. Tricks like soaking it in lemon juice or vinegar before cooking make no discernible difference to me. Other ways to make liver palatable have helped but I still had to force myself to eat it. Very recently, though, I made a liver dish that was good. Force myself to eat liver? No need! I am so particular about good nutrition that this made my day.

I won't lie to you or lead you on, fellow liver-haters - my liver salvation still has an offal flavor that prevents it from being delicious the way, say, ice cream is delicious. You probably won't be knocking each other down in line to get more than your serving or two per week, but there is some enjoyment in it. This is amazing to me.

I made, of course, a pâté. I had tried one before with moderate success but it would end up sitting forgotten in the back of the fridge. I could eat one cracker spread with it, but consuming several ounces per week was out of the question. It was easier to cut liver into bite-size pieces using scissors, boil for two minutes, drain, and douse in homemade ketchup, alternating bites with a nice side such as herbed mashed potatoes. That and relying more on naturally milder chicken liver than beef liver was the best I could do then.

This was it. I had bookmarked it last August but never made it, probably because I tended not to have an extra pound of bacon around that I was eager to hand-dice. Now I have packs of diced bacon around. The barely-tolerable liver was starting to wear even on my husband's palate of steel. Chicken livers were thawed in the fridge. It was time.

Contrary to my customary behavior, I changed very little in the recipe, mostly just cutting it down to fit the amount of liver my farm packs per bag.

Chicken liver and bacon pâté

Ingredients:
1/2 lb. diced bacon
1 medium onion, sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/4 lbs. chicken livers
8 T. butter
generous pinches of salt and ground black pepper
1 generous T. dried parsley

Method:
Cook bacon in a large skillet over medium-low heat. When browned, add onion and garlic and sauté until onion is soft and caramelizing. Add livers and cook until barely firm; as they cook, gradually add the butter, 2 T. at a time.
Transfer the skillet contents to a food processor. Add salt, pepper, and parsley. Pulse several times to get a coarse paste. Scoop into three mini loaf pans or, I assume, one medium loaf pan.
Refrigerate several hours or overnight. Turn onto a plate, prying out with a knife if needed. Serve with rolls or crackers, plus extra butter and perhaps cheese slices.

My First Real Macaroni and Cheese

I can't believe it's taken me this long to make macaroni and cheese from scratch. However, through a happy Groupon-related incident, we have multiple pounds of 100% grass-fed cheddar sitting around. Delicious and nutritious! Vitamin K2 comes in such delicious packages that its scarcity in most of our diets is a shame on multiple levels. On meatless days I tend more toward eggy main courses, but c'mon - macaroni and cheese is totally inspired, right? It was to me, anyway.

It probably took me longer to figure out how I would go about this than the actual cooking time entailed. You see, I grew up as most of us probably did, eating Kraft mac n' cheese at least once a week, and Velveeta shells when we persuaded Mom to get the "good stuff". Cringe. The occasional macaroni and cheese from scratch that I encountered at family functions actually disgusted me in my days as a super-duper-ridiculously-picky child, but a combination of exiting adolescence and nixing all gluten liberated me to being merely a picky eater. I feel like an exotic food connoisseur in comparison, despite not even liking Mexican food. Really. Or chili. Or anything spicy. Or peaches. Or lots of other random foods that are normally considered delicious. Suffice it to say I was the kind of kid who lived primarily on cereal without the milk, PB&J, grilled cheese, pasta if free of sauce, and mac n' cheese that came out of a box. Do we wonder why I developed such a terrible problem with gluten?

Getting back on track, I knew that this couldn't be hard to make from scratch, but exactly how would I do it? I doubt the custom of baking macaroni would come about simply because people like doing extra work, so I knew a broiling of cheese would be in order. Part of the point of having enameled cast iron cookware is that it can go from stovetop to oven, so I refused to do something involving more than one pot or dish, just because knew I could figure it out.

This ended up being my template, and I found the nutmeg subtle but a remarkable addition that I advise against skipping. The two of us polished it off with some green salad and called it dinner. As a side it should serve four.

Mr. D was rather crestfallen that we were having this on a Friday and thus were not putting sausage or diced bacon in it, but we both enjoyed it anyway. I expect we'll just have to have it again soon, properly porked.

Simple Macaroni and Cheese
Ingredients:
2 cups (a bit less than 1/2 lb.) gluten free pasta; I didn't have macaroni so I used fusilli
2 cups whole milk, plus extra if necessary
6 T. butter
1/2 t. mustard powder
several shakes of nutmeg
1/2 t. ground black pepper
1 cup finely grated cheese of your choosing, plus more to top before broiling

I added 1 t. salt as well and this ended up being a tad extra salty, so I think you should just salt to taste at the dinner table since saltiness will vary anyway based upon your choices of butter and cheese

Method:
Combine all ingredients except cheese in a saucepan over medium heat. Stir frequently to avoid scorching on the bottom and to ensure pasta cooks evenly.

Reduce heat and let pasta cook until soft, about 15-20 minutes, while still stirring often. If the pasta:liquid ratio is getting too high, add milk, a little at a time, and make sure you're cooking over a low heat.

Stir in grated cheese. Turn off the heat, cover, and let stand for five minutes to allow pasta to absorb a bit more liquid.

If your saucepan is not safe for the broiler, transfer its contents to a greased dish that is. Note that your choice of pan gives you power over how much delectable broiled cheesy goodness there shall be. Top your dish with additional grated cheese and place directly under the broiler for 5-10 minutes until desired browning is achieved. Serve while still warm.