Ralph's Water Chestnuts

Do you like water chestnuts? I haven't had one in a super long time; I didn't care for them back then. Maybe I will now.


But what are they, really? Larousse says it like this:

The tuber of an aquatic plant originating in Southeast Asia, having a prickly coat enclosing crunchy white flesh with a delicate flavour. Water chestnuts are sold either fresh or canned and are used in Chinese and Vietnamese cooking to accompany hot fried dishes and to give texture to stuffings. They are often served as a garnish mixed with green vegetables and bamboo shoots. A popular dish is lotus leaves stuffed with water chestnuts and rice. The tuber can also be used fresh as a dessert or preserved in sugar.

Ralph's water chestnuts available in the ethnic aisle of Ralph's for $0.79 an 8-oz can.

Stater Bros. All Vegetable Shortening

All out of the Spectrum stuff, I selected Stater Bros. brand since it's cheaper than the only alternative, Crisco, at that particular store location.


Considering the ingredients, maybe I should've spent a little more. Ew, partially hydrogenated oils, which means there might be trans fats.


Am I concerned enough to return it? Uh, no. I'll just do my best not to buy it again.


And this crazy plastic-lined foil liner is a really good reason to avoid it too. I spent 5 minutes trying to get past it. A knife was employed.


There you have it. Shortening. Let's make pie!


Stater Bros. all vegetable (partially hydrogenated oil) shortening, available in the oil aisle in a 3 lb. container for $5.99.

That makes each of 6.5 cups about $0.92.

Albers Enriched Hominy Quick Grits

This is something I'd never think I'd buy. Grits. I'd always associated them as that thing of Flo's she regularly suggested Mel kiss.

What is enriched grits? Corn, or maize, enriched with vitamin B3, iron, vitamins B1, B2, and B₉.

Plus we never ate them at home when I was a kid because Dad said they were gross. I never had to eat liver either.


If you want to make some, here's the instructions.


I just need some for my chili. And with what's left (a lot), I might just make a recipe from the Alber's site.


Alber's quick grits, available in the cereal aisle near the oatmeal and cream of wheat, for $5.79/2.5 lbs.

Roast Anaheim Chile Peppers

Looking sort of like a junior pasilla or poblano pepper in size and shape, Anaheim chile peppers are much more in-your-face vibrant green.

Look at the Anaheim's compared to jalapenos.


I needed to roast these, so went about it, for the most part, as described in the recipe:

To roast chiles, place over high heat on gas or electric burner. Cook, turning with tongs occasionally, until skins are completely blackened. Place chiles in heavy plastic bag; close bag and let stand 15 minutes or until cool enough to handle. Peel blackened skins under running water. Slit chiles; remove veins and seeds.

Just like any other pepper, throw it on a burner on the stove-top.

Turn the pepper with tongs occasionally.

Watching the skin blister is highly entertaining to me.

Until the whole thing is black. Don't be alarmed if the pepper catches on fire at any point, it only lasts a second.


Throw the hot, black pepper in a bowl and cover it so it can sweat.
 
I always have bowls, but not bags.

After about 15 minutes, or until cool enough to handle, the skin will wipe right off with minimal finger friction.


And the kicker part is that the directions say to rinse them to get all the black skin off. That contradicts The Complete Meat Cookbook*. I rinsed one.

Chop off the tops, run a slit down one side, squeegie the veins and seeds out, and the peppers are ready to chop, dice, or mince.


Anaheim chile peppers, available in the pepper section of Grower's Direct for $1/lb.

*The Complete Meat Cookbook says:

Char and blister the peppers, turning occasionally, over an open flame or under a hot broiler. Put them into a plastic or paper bag for 10 to 15 minutes or so to sweat and loosen the skins. Scrape off the skins and remove the stems and seeds. You can wash the peeled peppers under cold running water if you want, but this can reduce the flavor slightly.

Collard Greens

Purchased just yesterday, these collard greens are starting to wilt.


Checking out the Ratto Bros. site, I learned that collards should be stored in high humidity (90-95%). Fortunately, they'll perk up nicely if you just let them soak in water for awhile, maybe an hour. You want to do that anyway to rinse any earthy stuff away.


Roughly chopping into 1/2" dice, I can tell collards, even more so than kale, are not some wimpy greens. These babies are pretty hardy.


Looking for collard greens, or greens in general, in the Larousse turned out fruitless. Must be too non-French in 1984 when my copy was printed! I did learn that cotton candy is called "candyfloss" or barbe a papa.

Ratto Bros. collard greens available in the produce section of Ralph's for $1.49/bunch.

H Brand Pearl Onions and How to Peel Them

Having peeled boiling onions once, I really had to consider whether I was going to adhere to the next recipe in every aspect or not. Peeled pearl onions are available in frozen bags after all and that'd be really easy.


Sucking it up, I wound up with a bag each of white and gold pearl onions. I had no idea there was an option.


I wonder if the tag on the boiling onions had directions how to peel them like these pearl onion labels do (click either pic to see).


The images below depict the essentials of the directions, but have slight variance because I followed Aidells directions in the stew recipe.

Salted water brought to boil; both bags of pearl onions added.


The onions cooked for 2 minutes before they were drained and transferred to a water bath.


About 1.5 hours later (only because I was busy, not because it was necessary), the onions were drained before they were peeled. This was accomplished by cutting the root end off the onion and then squeezing the onion which squirts out from its outermost skins.


Not hard, but not quite as simple as I'd expected. It did take me 30 minutes. Some onions needed more coaxing and brute force than others. Maybe cooking for 3 minutes would be better than 2.

H Brand Pearl Onions, white and gold, available at Grower's Direct in 10-oz packages for $1.99.

C&H Pure Granulated Cane Sugar

Ready for another bag, I ended up choosing the regular ol' granulated white cane sugar rather than the organic sugar like last time. The internal debate went on for about 6 minutes.

It started when I happened to notice the organic stuff is from Paraguay. Unsure exactly how far Paraguay is from southern CA, I figured it was farther than Hawaii, where America's cane sugar grows.

This time I bought "local".


Rather than ponder whether I made the "right" choice of buying local vs organic, let's just do a visual comparison. Here are the regular and organic cane sugars.


Isn't it trippy that the regular one is so totally white with small granules while the organic crystals are larger and soft brown (ecru, beige, light brown, off white)? I'd been wondering if I was imagining that the organic sugar was bigger. I'd been wondering if I was just seeing things.

C&H Pure Granulated White Cane Sugar, available by the 10-lb bag in the baking aisle of Costco for...crap, I didn't annotate it on the grocery list. According to the Costco page, it's $4.99. That makes each teaspoon about $0.004 or $0.21/cup.

Clear Creek Distillery Kirschwasser

Kirschwasser, aka cherry water, aka alcool blanc.

A white spirit, a true fruit brandy distilled from cherries; it should not be confused with the sweetened cherry brandies made by most of the great liqueur establishments.

The type of cherry used depended originally on where the distillate was made, but nowadays firms reputed for their Kirsch, such as those in Alsace, Franche-Comte, and the Black Forest in Germany, may have to buy in fruit to supplement the local cherries. The kernels of the cherries are included in the 'mash'.

As with many spirits that are widely used for culinary purposes, there are less expensive types of Kirsch, which are used for flaming pancakes, incorporating with whipped cream and fillings for pastry and cakes, and in confectionery. The top-quality liqueurs are particularly appreciated as a digestive after a meal.

So says the Larousse Gastronomique. I say this cherry brandy smells like tequila.

Clear Creek Distillery Kirschwasser, available in the fruit brandy section of BevMo! by the 375 mL bottle for $29.99 each.

Ralph's Italian Style Diced Tomatoes

When I bought three cans of Ralph's diced Italian style peeled tomatoes in juice with basil, garlic and oregano, I neglected to read the ingredients.

It was one of those times when I guessed the store brand would have less ingredients as they typically do. Wrong.


To my chagrin I find high fructose corn syrup as the third ingredient, which may or may not be the reason why the tomatoes look so saucy.


Does it taste good? Well, of course it does, sweet tomatoes - how would that taste bad?

Ralph's diced Italian style tomatoes, available in the canned vegetable aisle with the 500 other varieties of canned tomatoes, for $0.88/14.5-oz can.

Honey Maid Honey Grahams

It's been a long time since I've had a need for any graham crackers.


That was back when I tended to gravitate to the name brands just because I thought they'd be "better" than the generic or store brand.

Didn't know they're made in Mexico.

Now that I read labels, I chose the name-brand grahams because it, unlike the store brand, does not contain high-fructose corn syrup. Just sugar and honey, like it should be in my opinion.


Making crumbs is simple. Toss the crackers, broken, from each of the three individually wrapped packages in the box into a blender.


And grind 'em up in batches. That'll yield the perfect quantity for cheesecake or cheesecake bars.


Nabisco Honey Maid graham crackers, available in the cracker aisle of Stater Bros. for $3.49/14.4 oz box.

And looking up "graham" in the Larousse Gastronomique I found out that graham crackers are named after Sylvester Graham:

American nutritionist (born West Suffield, Connecticut, 1794; died Northampton, Massachusetts, 1851). He became the leader of a crusade against the bad eating habits of his compatriots, denouncing excessively spicy condiments and overindulgence in meat. For him, the cure-all was bran and it was essential to make bread exclusively from wholemeal flour. Bread and biscuits (cookies) sold under his trademark have to be made with flour containing all the original bran. Graham bread, marketed in the United States and in Europe since the mid-19th century, was the first internationally consumed bread. It is a wholemeal (wholewheat) bread with a very dense texture and it keeps extremely well. Graham crackers, still one of the most popular American crackers, are made with wholemeal flour and named after Sylvester Graham.

Fascinating!