Categories
Archives
Search
The Turkey is a bird that is used in many delicacies. It is a North American bird that is closely associated with Thanksgiving dinners. However, it is also consumed on other occasions. Turkey is generally preferred because it is high in protein and low in fat, as compared to other dark meat. Some common breeds of Turkey are: Narragansett, Bronze, White Holland, and Bourbon Red.
Turkey can be roasted, smoked, deep fried, grilled or microwaved. Turkey can be used for appetizers, soups, salads, sandwiches, entrees and more. Dishes rich in proteins yet low in carbohydrates can also be prepared from Turkey. Turkey can be cooked using highly complicated recipes, or it can also be used for preparing some quick and easy dishes. It is very important to follow some guidelines while cooking Turkey. These include: use only cooked ingredients in the stuffing, use only fresh stuffing; stuff the Turkey just before roasting; thaw the Turkey properly, and so on. Selecting the right kind of oil is also important–the oil should have a high smoke point.
Turkey dishes require special seasonings, spices and other ingredients. Bread crumbs, onion, eggs, garlic, ginger, pepper and oil are some of the commonly used ingredients. Some ethnic Turkey dishes are: Turkey tenderloins with black bean and corn salsa, enchilada Turkey soup, smoked Turkey breast ratatouille melt, Turkey satay with spicy peanut sauce, Mediterranean Turkey and eggplant stir-fry, Turkey and oriental noodle salad, Turkey cassoulet, Thai grilled pizza, Turkey scaloppini Portuguese-style, West Indies minced Turkey, spring rolls with Turkey, moo shu Turkey with duck sauce and pancakes, pasteis con Peru, Thai green curry with Turkey and couscous, Turkey Brazilian with white rice, Turkey Kiev, curried tenderloin of Turkey with curried blueberry sauce, Swiss Turkey marsala and others.
Some other delicious Turkey dishes that can be made are: grilled Turkey brat hoagies, Turkey chili, Turkey breast Diane, Turkey enchiladas, garlic roasted Turkey, ginger lime Turkey strips, seasoned Turkey with rice pilaf, Turkey sausage with pasta, Turkey bratwurst kabobs, Turkey lasagna, Turkey meatloaf, Turkey parmesan, Turkey sausage, Turkey scaloppini, stir fried Turkey with walnuts and cashews, grilled southwestern Bratwurst, Turkey pizza, Turkey burgers and so on.
There are also prepared Turkey dishes available. These contain all the stuffing and have to be just taken from the freezer and roasted. There are several Turkey recipes available over the Internet in exclusive websites.
Turkey provides detailed information about turkey, turkey hunting, turkey recipes, deep fried turkey and more. Turkey is the sister site of 1200 Calorie Diabetic Diets.
By the 17th Century, with the popularity of coffee ever
increasing in Europe, the interest of the then World Superpowers
- Britain, France, Netherlands, Portugal and Spain - also grew.
Up until this point, coffee imported into Europe had come from
the Arabian Peninsula, over which none of these nations had any
control. The Europeans had sample coffee and liked it, and now
they wanted to start producing it for themselves. The race was
on to establish their own coffee plantations in their respective
colonies.
It was the Netherlands who took an early lead in this race. In
1616, Dutch spies successfully managed to smuggle a coffee plant
out of Mocha (Yemen). Although, to begin with, they were only
involved in small scale cultivation. This changed in 1658, when
they defeated the Portuguese to take control of Sri Lanka. Very
soon coffee plantations spread all over Sri Lanka and into
Southern India. Then, in 1699, the Dutch started production in
Indonesia, when cuttings were successfully transplanted from
Malabar (India) to Java.
Without help from the Dutch, the other Superpowers would not
have got out the starting blocks. By 1706, the first coffee
beans from Java had reached Amsterdam, along with a coffee plant
for the Botanical Garden. From this plant, a number of
successful cuttings were made. These new plants soon found their
way into various botanical gardens throughout Europe as they
were given as gifts to visiting dignitaries.
One such plant was given to King Louis XIV of France in 1714, by
the Burgermeister of Amsterdam. The plant was re-homed in le
Jardin des Plantes in Paris. Several years later, a French Naval
Officer named Mathieu Gabriel de Clieu, while on leave from his
station in Martinique, asked for the King’s permission to take a
cutting of this plant back with him. Unfortunately for him, the
King refused his request. Convinced that the Caribbean would be
an ideal place to cultivate coffee, de Clieu led a daring
moonlight raid on the Jardin des Plantes to secure a cutting.
In 1723, de Clieu began his journey back to Martinique, with his
newly procured coffee cutting in tow. He kept the shoot in a
glass cabinet, which he would bring up onto the deck each day so
it could be warmed by the sun. If de Clieu had thought that the
hard part of his mission was over, he would have been wrong. As,
during the journey, one of the men on board (allegedly with a
Dutch accent) tried to wrestle the plant off de Clieu, managing
to break a side-shoot in the process. The crew had to fend off
an attack by pirates which lasted nearly a whole day; a storm
descended that shattered the glass cabinet; and the portable
water supply ran so low that de Clieu had to share his water
ration with the plant.
Finally de Clieu returned to Martinique, where he successfully
cultivated the coffee plant. Some twenty months later de Clieu
had his first harvest, which he distributed among the island’s
doctors and other intellectuals. As luck would have it, at the
time the cocoa plants on the island were doing badly after a
recent volcanic eruption, so coffee was soon adopted by the
locals. Within three years, coffee plantations spread all over
Martinique and to the neighbouring islands of St. Dominique and
Guadeloupe. Coffee production was so successful in the Caribbean
that King Louis XIV forgave de Clieu for his earlier
transgression, making him governor of the Antilles.
The coffee plant had become a very desirable object. In 1727,
the Brazilian government decided it was time they joined the
coffee market. Using the guise of an intermediary in a boundary
dispute between the French and Dutch in the Guianas, Brazil sent
Lieutenant Colonel Francisco de Mello Palheta on a mission to
steal a coffee plant from the French. Using his charm and
charisma, Palheta befriended the governor of French Guiana’s
wife. Once the dispute was resolved, the governor’s wife
presented Palheta with a farewell gift, a coffee cutting
concealed in a bouquet of flowers. From this scant shoot grew
the world’s largest coffee empire.
The British did not seriously compete in the coffee race until
1796, when they took control of Sri Lanka from the Dutch. With
the arrival of the British, even more land was cleared for
coffee plantations. So much so, that the relatively small island
of Sri Lanka briefly became the world’s largest coffee producer
in the 1860s. However, in 1869, a lethal fungus known as coffee
rust arrived on the island. This fungus causes premature
defoliation of a coffee plant, seriously weakening its structure
and reducing its yield of berries. Since rust was not considered
to be a serious disease, the British continued to clear more
land for coffee plantations during the next decade. It was not
until 1879 that they realised the seriousness of the situation.
Unfortunately by then it was too late: the productivity of the
plants had declined so greatly that they were no longer
economically viable.
Luckily for the British, a successful marketing campaign led by
the British East India Company for tea entitled “the cup that
cheers”, back in the early 18th Century, had laid the
foundations for tea to become the British national drink.
Between 1700 and 1757 the average annual tea imports into
Britain more than quadrupled and consumption continued to grow
steadily for the rest of the century. So when coffee rust
devastated the coffee plantations of Sri Lanka, and later India,
production simply switched and the coffee plants were uprooted
and replanted with tea. Although Britain continued to cultivate
coffee on a limited amount of colonial land, mostly in Jamaica,
Uganda and Kenya, by the end of the 19th Century tea had
surpassed coffee as the beverage of choice.
If there is a cuisine that America can truly call its own, then
this has to be it.
So much so, that I’m going to make no attempt to replicate the
many and varied recipes that make up that country’s version of
“salad”.
Hopefully, one of my readers will take up the challenge and
produce a cookbook that is devoted entirely to American salads
in all their glory.
What sets them apart?
It’s really very simple. Fresh, brightly colored ingredients,
stuffed with flavor and oozing with contrast in terms of texture
and appearance. In my view, heaven on a plate.
But you don’t have to wait for the cookbook to come out. Just
use your imagination.
One of the backbones of an American salad is the use of crisp.
fresh lettuce, and in particular the younger leaves. A classic
example of this is the Caesar salad, which has gained a firm
foothold here in Australia.
Not that Caesar would recognize it - or even Caesar’s Palace
where this particular dish is reputed to have begun its career -
from the strange concoctions that find their way onto Sydney
restaurant tables.
The golden rules
The first rule is, everything must be fresh. The second rule is,
everything must be fresh. Guess what the third rule is?
I knew it. You are way ahead of me!
You also need to consider color. I’m not talking about the
violent clashes that fruit such as tomatoes can introduce,
although they may be very welcome, but simply go back to basics
and always try to introduce at least three colors into your dish.
The same is true of flavors. There is no need to stop at three,
but you certainly should not have less.
Salads are great. Because they are usually cold,(warm chicken
salad is an obvious exception) almost any number of flavors can
be introduced without canceling each other out.
It follows, therefore, that the same is true of ingredients. The
amount and variety is infinite, limited only by your imagination.
Handling
Salad leaves are much more delicate than they first appear and
will reward careful handling.
Try to avoid washing them, for example; just wipe them with a
damp cloth or sponge and dry them with kitchen paper afterwards.
That’s important. Salad dressing will not stick to wet leaves.
It contains oil, remember.
And above all, never ever cut salad leaves with a knife. They
will quickly go brown at the cut edge and limp shortly
afterwards.
Instead, tear the leaves with your hands just before serving,
which is also the time to add any dressing. Treat any herbs,
such as basil, that you may be adding in exactly the same way.
The later you leave this, the crisper your salads will be.
In this way, you can keep your salad leaves wrapped in a plastic
bag in the crisper compartment of your refrigerator right up to
the last moment. Treat them well and they will keep fresh and
crisp for days.
A word about dressings
As a general rule salads need to be dressed.
Personally I find that the simplest dressing is the best, but
having said that I don’t want to anticipate what our future
author of “Great American salads” will have to say on the
subject. After all, it may be you.
There is, however, a simple rule of thumb which is very useful
to know. The classic French dressing, vinaigrette, is really
made up of only two ingredients. One is lemon juice (or wine
vinegar), and the other is olive oil. And there is a definite
relationship between the two.
If you want your dressing to be slightly sharp, you use one part
lemon juice to three parts olive oil.
A softer dressing is produced by using four parts olive oil.
Now, once you know that, it really doesn’t matter whether you
are using lemon juice, vinegar or any other acid base, the
proportions are exactly the same. What’s more, you can easily
introduce some terrific flavors into that base.
Try this for example: one part balsamic vinegar, three parts
olive oil and a few drops of truffle oil.
When it’s fresh, this is sensational. But it’s still very good
even after three or four weeks in the jar. Sometimes I think I
may never use any other dressing.
One final point, there is only one good way to dress a salad -
with very clean hands. There just is no better way to get your
dressing evenly distributed over every glistening leaf, without
over-doing it.
Now, as a departure from my normal practice, I’m going to list
some ingredients which go to make up a really good, hearty
salad. You can select some of them, all of them or none of them,
but I hope they will give you the inspiration to put together
salads which are way ahead of the dreary tomato, cucumber and
limp lettuce that finds its way on to so many summer plates.
Ingredients
Red onions, white onions, brown onions, garlic, green beans, raw
carrot, raw cabbage, hard-boiled eggs, cold poached eggs, warm
poached eggs, cold chicken, warm chicken, croutons, cooked
beans, tuna fish, anchovies, toasted pine nuts, walnuts,
tomatoes, cucumbers, citrus fruit, parmesan cheese, pecorino
cheese, apple, pear,raw egg, Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco,
chilies, gherkins, capers, cooked meat, cooked and raw fish,
prawns, crab, lobster, mushrooms, asparagus, broccoli, and just
about anything else crisp and edible that you can think of.
Has this given you a clue?
Great! Maybe you really will be the one to produce our “Great
American Salads” cookbook.
Now let me give you an easy family salad which you can also
share as a lunch with friends.
You need very crisp leaves and I use cos lettuce for this, which
I shred into a bowl. My dressing is as follows:
in a non-metallic bowl I put two red onions finely chopped; four
bacon slices, crisply fried and crushed; two anchovies, shredded
using two forks; one grated, hard-boiled egg; one tablespoon
balsamic vinegar; four tbs grapeseed oil; one raw egg yolk.
Whisk this combo until blended and combine with the leaves just
before serving. Pile into a serving dish which you have rubbed
with a raw garlic clove, and dust with grated peccorino or
parmesan cheese.
Serve with bread and white wine, both of which should be crisp.
Fresh, uncooked veggies are so healthy and it’s important to
work them into your meal plan somewhere. The majority of
American’s don’t eat enough vegetables and most vegetables
consumed in the American
diet are cooked potatoes in the form of french fries.
American’s need more vegetables in their diet - and not in the
form of crispy fries.
To work more fresh uncooked vegetables into your diet, try
eating more salads. Salads are a great source of vegetables and
are a great appetizer to any meal (or meal themselves). Try
these salad toppings for a wholesome gourmet salad:
Another great way of getting more fresh vegetables into your
diet is by snacking on them. Buy baby carrots or other
vegetables as a healthy
alternative to chips. They don’t have the cholesterol or
sugar that processed snacks have and are filled with healthy
vitamins, minerals and enzymes that your body so desperately
needs. If you are not a fan of eating vegetables alone, there
are great dips that accompany fresh veggies that are healthy,
too.
Try these great tips in eating more vegetables - and live a
longer and healthier life!
Non-stick woks do not require seasoning, and come with simple cleaning instructions from the manufacturers, while steel carbon and iron woks require seasoning. Cleaning a seasoned wok is a lot different than a non-stick wok, and this is what we will cover here.
We will start with an important reminder: Do NOT use a steel wool scouring pad (or any abrasive product) on a seasoned wok, EVER! It will waste all the effort you put forth in seasoning your wok, and will require you to re-season it again.
A freshly seasoned wok will need some extra tender-loving-care. Immediately after cooking each dish, rinse the wok with plain hot water only. It is important to not use any other cleaning product to avoid damaging the seasoning. Often, there will be some bits and pieces of food particles stuck on the surface of a freshly seasoned wok. To remove them, gently lift them off with a bamboo brush (highly recommended), or a non-metallic scrubber. Then rinse the wok once more with plain hot water. To dry the wok, instead of wiping it dry, put the wet wok on the stove and set it on high heat. Heat the wok until a faint smoke arises from the bottom, then either let it cool and store it away, or continue to cook another dish. It is a common practice for chefs in Chinese restaurants to immediately put the wok back on the stove, pour hot water into the wok, scrub it quickly with a bamboo brush, dump out the water, and then place the wok back on the hot stove while he/she prepares another dish. By the time he/she is ready to cook the next dish, the wok is already hot, dry, and primed to go. It takes literally seconds to go through the drill once you get some practice. This process allows the traces of grease from the last dish to settle into the carbon steel’s pores, further seasoning the wok.
After you are finished cooking a meal, cleaning the wok, and ready to put the wok away, it is always a good practice to apply another thin coat of cooking oil. Store it in a dry, airy spot until you use it again (hopefully, very soon). Once the wok is well-seasoned, it becomes self-sufficient, and will not require re-coating again. As mentioned before, It takes time, care, and regular use before a wok develops a patina, where the wok becomes virtually non-stick, and the dishes impart that elusive “wok hay”. In addition, clean-up and care will be easy, requiring little time and effort, often only involves rinsing it with plain hot water and little scrubbing, as none of the food should stick to the wok.
As the black patina develops from frequent repeated use, it will also appear on the bottom exterior. It is also a layer of carbon from cooking at a high heat. In a household kitchen, where the stove does not reach as high a temperature as it does in a restaurant, this is actually a good thing. It helps conduct the heat faster, concentrates the heat to the bottom of the wok, and brings the wok to an even higher temperature. A nice bonus is that it also enhances the flavor of the dish. So, there is no need to scrub the exterior of the wok, either. Just a simple hot water rinse after cooking should be enough.
In Part 5, we’ll talk about all the nice little friends that you can get along with your wok, the accessories.
Helen Fan grew up in a family that has owned various Asian restaurants all over North America, from Vancouver (Canada), Houston (Texas), Decatur (Illinois), to Chicago (Illinois). She, and the rest of the Fan family are now sharing their decades of knowledge on the art of Chinese cuisine at http://www.ChineseHomeCooking.Com
You can read more of our articles at http://www.ChineseHomeCooking.Com/resources/resources.htm