Coffee heat rising

food

An attack of asceticism

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{sigh} Decided to kick the caffeine habit for awhile and so now have a fine caffeine deprivation anemia headache. Today being only the second day of this moment of ascetic virtue, I expect another day or two of migrainish crabbiness.

Once when I went off the killer brew, the headache lasted an entire week! Dang. Hope this goes away sooner than that. I’m allergic to aspirin, acetaminophen and ibuprofen, so headaches and other minor pains are experiences to be…well, appreciated. LOL! As in “it feels so good when it stops.”

Normally, a cup or two of regular tea will dull or even kill the pain. Tea has less caffeine than coffee (heh…at least, the way I brew coffee, the result of which will melt a teaspoon left in the cup any length of time), and so it works for backing off the much stronger coffee. After a day or two, I can drop the caffeinated beverages altogether with no further effects.

Just to perfect my misery, I also decided to get off the sauce for awhile. I usually have one or two glasses of wine or beer a day. Probably two is too much, and two is the normal dose around here. Problem is, I tend to slip over that threshold with wine: an open bottle is too easy to tip over into a glass, especially  if you haven’t finished your meal and you think, “Oh well, a tiny swiggle more won’t hurt.” Several tiny swiggles more and you’ve consumed half a bottle of the stuff! Because I have to get up, walk across the room, retrieve a new bottle of beer from the refrigerator, and open it, I’ll invariably stop after two or even one: the minor effort of having to move around and flip off a top is enough to signal that enough beer is enough.

The immediate cause of this frenzy of self-deprivation was yesterday’s conversation with La Maya. She’s determined to go on a diet, and she remarked that a mutual friend has lost a lot of weight but is drinking again and so seems to be gaining it back. I’d like to say our friend is more of a lush than I, but as a practical matter a half-bottle of wine is about a half-bottle too much. So we won’t be calling her kettle black.

Also lately I’ve been having a lot of heart palpitations, diagnosed as “stress attacks” by the worthies at the Mayo. These can be pretty scary, because they cause lightheadedness that at times makes me feel like I’m going to pass out. One of these occurred the other day while I was riding down a long escalator, which was a bit alarming. More often they happen when I’m driving at a high rate of speed on some road where there’s no place to pull over. So far they haven’t caused an actual faint, but I suppose there’s always a first time. Whether there’s a connection between these episodes and the coffee or the wine, I don’t know.

But I do know that sometimes the body seems to get saturated with caffeine, resulting in an overall sense of angst and jitteriness. That’s when it’s time to get off the bean. And I suspect there’s a connection between early-in-the-day caffeine and night-time insomnia. Even though my coffee consumption ends by about ten in the morning, older people metabolize drugs (which is what caffeine is) more slowly than younger ones. So it makes sense that the stuff could build up in your system over time and begin to affect you over a 24-hour period.

Interestingly, opinions are mixed about the real harm or benefits either of my favorite potables cause. We’re told by the worthy authors of Wikipedia that

Coffee consumption has been shown to have minimal or no impact, positive or negative, on cancer development; however, researchers involved in an ongoing 22-year study by the Harvard School of Public Health state that “the overall balance of risks and benefits [of coffee consumption] are on the side of benefits.” Other studies suggest coffee consumption reduces the risk of being affected by Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, heart disease, diabetes mellitus type 2, cirrhosis of the liver, and gout. A longitudinal study in 2009 showed that those who consumed a moderate amount of coffee or tea (3–5 cups per day) at midlife were less likely to develop dementia and Alzheimer’s disease in late-life compared with those who drank little coffee or avoided it altogether.

Very nice. On the other hand, as we learn from the same source,

Coffee prepared using paper filters removes oily components called diterpenes that are present in unfiltered coffee. Two types of diterpenes are present in coffee: kahweol and cafestol, both of which have been associated with increased risk of coronary heart disease via elevation of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) levels in blood. Metal filters, on the other hand, do not remove the oily components of coffee.

Yes. Well, I happen to favor French-press coffee, qui s’en fie de paper filters. I’m doomed!

As for wine, medical researchers apparently like the stuff, because they can’t bring themselves to condemn it wholeheartedly. Let’s get real here: it is, after all, booze. Nevertheless, we learn that

Population studies have observed a J curve association between wine consumption and the risk of heart disease. This means that heavy drinkers have an elevated risk, while moderate drinkers (at most two five-ounce servings of wine per day) have a lower risk than non-drinkers. Studies have also found that moderate consumption of other alcoholic beverages may be cardioprotective, although the association is considerably stronger for wine. Also, some studies have found increased health benefits for red wine over white wine, though other studies have found no difference. Red wine contains more polyphenols than white wine, and these are thought to be particularly protective against cardiovascular disease.

Hmh. I’ll drink to that.

Problem is, we’re never clearly told what “moderate” consumption is. The Brits would have us believe “moderate” means about a third of a small wine glass or half a pint of beer—a sip or two that, IMHO, would never last through a full meal. Five ounces, however, is a fair amount: almost half of one of my huge burgundy glasses. Here’s one of those monsters with five ounces of water measured into it:

Two swiggles of that much wine, and I’m cha-chaing around the kitchen. w00t!

The whole idea of depriving oneself of the minor pleasures of life in the name of some health or moral benefit has always struck me as dubious. Life is difficult, after all. One has few enough small joys (or large ones). Does it really make sense that taking away the small pleasures that make life worth living is going to make things better?

I doubt it.

However, experience has shown that long-term consumption of the type of Europeanized cowboy coffee I happen to favor will build up a state of tenseness and may contribute to the alleged “stress attacks.” Since I have nothing to be stressed over just now, it’s reasonable to run a test to see whether the caffeine has anything to do with that.

And the wine and beer? Well, like my friends, I certainly could stand to lose five or ten pounds. That beloved beer, in particular, is adding mostly empty calories. Now’s the time, while the weather is good, to be exercising, cutting calories, and running off some fat.

How to make real cranberry sauce

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Good TG dinner. Guest asked me for a recipe for the cranberry sauce we served. Videlicet:

You need:
1 bag of fresh cranberries
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
1 orange
1/2 stick cinnamon or a few twists of a cinnamon grinder, or about 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
a few twists of a nutmeg grinder, or about 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg

saucepan
sharp paring knife or vegetable peeler
slotted spoon
small serving dish

Using a sharp knife or vegetable peeler, peel the zest off an orange. Cut the orange in half.

Combine the sugar and water in the saucepan and bring to a boil. Allow to cook down about 1/4. Add the cranberries, orange zest, and spices. Bring back to the boil and then turn down to medium heat. Cook gently until the berries burst. With the slotted spoon, lift the berries out of the syrup and place in a dish. Pick out and discard the cinnamon stick and the orange zest (actually, this makes a candied orange zest that can be eaten or chopped finely and served over the berries or over ice cream).

Remove the seeds from the orange and squeeze the juice into the remaining syrup. Reduce (boil down) the syrup by about 1/3 to 1/2. Pour this over the berries. Cover and chill.

Trees and the frugalist

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The orange harvest is about consumed. I think two more oranges are left, out of my reach-tomorrow morning I’ll have to drag the step stool into the back yard and retrieve those. Arizona sweets, the two trees each bore at least a couple hundred fruits this winter, ripe in February and sweet as candy. For the past three months, I’ve been eating a half-dozen a day.

What a wonderful bounty!
apr19olives

I can’t imagine ever having a house without at least one fruit tree. My last shack had two Arizona sweets, a grapefruit, and a fig tree. This one, in addition to the two orange trees, has an amazing Mexican lime (pictured at right) that just now is covered in fruit and two young Meyer lemons, both of which blossomed in gay profusion this spring.

Manny, the current owner of SDXB’s former abode, has added plums and peaches to the existing grapefruit, orange, and tangerine trees. He insists he can get these to thrive here, and indeed, one of my colleagues has managed to grow edible peaches, apricots and plums in our scorching Valley of the Sun.

How frugal is a backyard fruit tree? I don’t know. The fig certainly was frugal enough: nothing much had to be done to it to make it bear. Citrus, though it’s fairly drought-hardy, needs plenty of deep watering and three doses of fertilizer each year to produce juicy, sweet fruit. If the tree bears a lot of fruit in a season, probably it’s a savings over buying that many oranges or grapefruit. And at 99 cents apiece, a lemon tree doesn’t have to make many lemons to be pay for itself. Lemon trees are notoriously fecund. At the grocery store, 99 cents a Meyer lemon does not purchase!

My water bill last month was $102. The lowest bill of the year, when hardly any water runs on the landscaping, is $70. The base rate is around $60. So all of the landscaping, including flowers and the pool, is costing around $32. Let’s guess the trees cost about $20 of that. Say the oranges bore 200 fruits this year. That’s a conservative guess; in fact, 6 oranges consumed per day x 3 months = 540 oranges, and I gave a bunch of them to friends in addition to the half-dozen I ate every day. But for the sake of easy math, let’s figure $20 ÷ 200 oranges = 10 cents apiece, roughly, per month, over about six months: 60 cents apiece.

That doesn’t figure in the fact that the water also goes on the lemons, the lime, the tomatoes, and the herbs. Still, the savings is probably not great…unless you figure that each orange tree actually bore about 270 oranges…. I was too busy picking and eating to count.

Tree-ripened fruit is so wonderful and so much better than grocery store produce, I’m actually dreading having to fall back on cardboard strawberries and barely ripe watermelons. Clearly, though, if the fruit falls on the ground and spoils or gets eaten by birds, it’s no bargain, neither water nor fertilizer being free. You have to have a way to preserve them.

Some people preserve citrus juice by freezing it in ice cube trays and storing the solid cubes in plastic freezer bags. You can make marmalade out of just about any citrus, and lemons lend themselves to lemon butter. Soft-skinned fruit can be canned or turned into jam, jelly, or butters. It’s a lot of work and I’m not sure I’d want to do it. That’s why I’m glad I live where citrus grows.

SDXB discovered that if you have a certain number of fruit trees on your lot-say, your house was built in an old grapefruit orchard, as many now centrally located 1950s Phoenix tract houses were-and you sell some of the produce, your lot qualifies as a farm and you qualify for an agricultural subsidy. You not only get a bunch of not-quite-free fruit, but you get a break on your taxes. Now that’s frugal!

Figs in Brandy

Wash a bunch of fresh, ripe figs. Prick them in a few places with a fork. Place them in a French canning jar with its rubber gasket in place. Cover with inexpensive brandy. If desired, add a little cinnamon or nutmeg. Store in the refrigerator.

Serve over ice cream.

Lemon Cream

Grate the zest of three lemons and then squeeze and collect the lemon juice. Next, beat five eggs plus five egg yolks until they are light and fluffy; then slowly beat in a cup of sugar, beating until the mixture is thick and pale yellow. In a large mixing bowl, whip four cups of heavy cream. In the top of a double boiler, pour the lemon juice over one tablespoon of gelatin. Allow the gelatin to soften and then stir over hot water until the gelatin dissolves. Stir the lemon-gelatin into the eggs, and then fold in the heavy cream. Chill in individual glasses or dishes and serve with whipped cream.

Lemon Curd

  • 2 yolks of extra large eggs
  • 2 extra large whole eggs
  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • 1 ½ Tablespoons minced lemon zest
  • 1/3 cup lemon juice
  • 2 ½ Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

In a saucepan (about a quart size), whisk the ingredients together. Stir over medium low heat until the mixture coats a metal spoon, about 8 minutes. Pour the lemon curd into a bowl or French canning jar, cover, and store in the refrigerator. This can be spread on good bread or coffee cake, or served over ice cream.

This recipe can be doubled, tripled, or even quadrupled. Larger amounts require somewhat longer cooking, up to about 20 minutes. Of course, it can be made (to excellent effect) with Meyer lemons.

Meyer Lemon Marmalade

Thinly slice about six Meyer lemons, discarding the seeds and ends. You should have about three cups of sliced lemon. Place these in a bowl and cover with water. Let stand overnight.

Then bring the lemons and water to a boil and boil them uncovered for 10 minutes. Again allow to stand overnight.

Measure the lemon-water mixture and add an equal amount of sugar. Bring this mixture to a boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Then lower the heat but cook rapidly for about 45 minutes, until the marmalade sheets off a spoon. Pour the hot marmalade into hot, sterilized canning jars and seal the lids. This makes about six cups.

Drunken Orange Slices

Peel one or more ripe, fine oranges. Slice horizontally into quarter-inch-thick slices. Layer in a wide stoneware serving bowl or enameled pan, and cover the fruit slices with Grand Marnier or brandy. Chill for several hours, or let stand at room temperature for an hour or so and serve. Makes a great dessert as it is or served over ice cream.

Amber Marmalade

Take three oranges, three lemons, and one grapefruit. Halve these and seed them; then slice them very thinly. Measure the amount of fruit this produces, and place the fruit in a large nonreactive bowl or pan. Add three cups of water for each cup of fruit, and let soak for 12 hours.

Then place the fruit and its water into an enameled pot. Boil it for 20 minutes, and again let it set for 12 hours.

Sterilize some canning jars and lids.

Again measure what you have. For each cup of fruit and juice, add three-quarters cup sugar. Cook this combination in small batches, no more than five cupfuls at a time, until the fruit is clear and the syrup falls off a spoon in a sheet. Remove it from the pot, let it cool a few minutes, stirring. Pack the marmalade in the sterilized canning jars, seal them, and store them in a cool place.

Lime Marmalade

Thinly slice limes to make about one quart. Add 1 ½ quarts water and let stand overnight. In a nonreactive pot, cook the limes slowly for 2 or 2 ½ hours, until they are tender.

Measure the lime and juice. Add 2/3 as much sugar. Bring the mixture to a boil; turn down the heat and cook rapidly until the marmalade sheets off a spoon, 30 to 60 minutes. Pack the marmalade in hot sterilized jars, seal them, and store in a cool place.

Ceviche

Cut about five pounds of white-fleshed fish filets, such as halibut or sole, into small pieces. Place in a glass or stoneware bowl. Add three minced onions, 2 cups lime juice, and 1 Tablespoon olive oil. Stir together; be sure the fish is covered with lime juice at all times. Add some minced hot peppers. Cover tightly and marinate in the refrigerator for one to three days.

Jicama con limas

Chill a jicama in the refrigerator. Wash it, peel it, quarter it, and cut it into quarter- or eighth-inch-thick slices, or into slender sticks. Squeeze fresh lime juice all over it. Sprinkle with salt and eat as a snack.

Quite Possibly the Highest and Best Use of Limes

Quarter a Mexican or key lime. Open a bottle of pale beer, preferably Triple-X or Corona. Squeeze the lime into the open bottle and then push the lime quarter down the neck into the beer. Consume. Repeat.

Frugal Friday Recipes: Beef Burgundy

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Having run low on craft projects, I’ve decided to change the Friday department to recipes and cooking posts, something I’m never likely to run out of.

Last weekend I made an awesome boeuf bourguignon for some friends. It was mighty pricey: about $45 for all the ingredients. But so far, that roast has yielded 12 servings…and counting. The guest meal was wonderful, and every leftover variation has been really good, too. So, I thought I’d share the original recipe with you. Next week: all the meals that came out of it.

This recipe is not hard to make, but it requires a half-day to cook. So, plan to be around the house while it’s simmering.

You’ll need…

  • 3- to 6-pound rump roast (other cuts of beef will work)
  • 3 or 4 pieces of bacon (probably not necessary for chuck roast)
  • olive oil
  • 1 or 2 cut-up carrots
  • 1 large or 2 small cut-up onions
  • 1 bottle inexpensive but drinkable red wine
  • 1 can or box of low-salt, high-quality beef broth or beef bouillon, or two or three cups of home-made beef broth
  • 1 bay leaf or sprig of rosemary
  • 1 tsp (more or less) thyme
  • 2-inch strip of orange zest, or 1/3 tsp bottled orange peel
  • 1 large or 2 moderate-sized tomatoes
  • tomato paste
  • 2 or more cloves of garlic
  • salt and pepper
  • about ½ pound fresh mushrooms
  • about 20 small white onions
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • sour cream, if preparing gluten-free meal; or a tablespoon or two of butter with a like amount of softened butter
  • good-quality egg noodles (or, for gluten-free dining, potatoes or rice)
  • sharp paring knife
  • saucepan
  • deep, heavy frying pan or large-diameter stock pot, with lid
  • another frying pan
  • stock pot or other large pot for cooking noodles
  • water
  • cutting board
  • serving plate

First, place the bacon in the saucepan with a couple cups of of water. Heat the water to a simmer; allow to simmer about ten minutes.

Meanwhile, wash and cut up the carrot, onions, and tomatoes. Peel and chop the garlic. Set aside.

Drain the bacon. Dry it in paper towels. With a sharp knife, slice the fat away from the meaty part of the bacon strips. Slice the fat into thin pieces.

Dry the saucepan. Skim the bottom with a little olive oil. Place it over low heat with the meaty pieces of the bacon. Let the bacon meat cook slowly while you’re doing the next step.

Rinse the roast and dry it well with paper towels.

Cut the strips of fat into one- or two-inch long pieces. Take your knife and punch a hole in the meat, and then with the tip of the knife gently push a strip of bacon fat into the roast. Be careful not to cut yourself.

Repeat this until you’ve worked the bacon fat into holes all over the meat, top, bottom, and sides.

Keep an eye on the cooking bacon meat while this is going on. When it’s crisp, turn off the heat and set the saucepan aside with the bacon and cooking grease in it.

Pour enough olive oil into the big frying pan to skim the bottom. Place the pan over medium to medium-high heat, warm the oil, and then brown the meat on both sides. After you’ve turned turn the meat to the second side, add the cut-up onions and carrots. Stir around as the meat continues to brown. After they seem to be cooking, add the garlic.

When both sides of the meat are nicely browned, pour in about three-quarters of the bottle of wine. Add enough beef broth to just cover the meat. Add the tomatoes, the orange peel, the thyme, and the bay leaf or rosemary. Stir in a heaping tablespoon of tomato paste.

If the broth is not simmering, leave the heat on medium-high until it comes to a simmer. Then turn the heat down so that the pot will stay at the simmer. Cover the pot and go away.

Depending on the size and the cut of the meat, cooking should take two to four hours. After about 90 minutes, check every 15 or 20 minutes for doneness. The finished meat should be tender but preferably not disintegrating.

While the beef is cooking, wash and dry the mushrooms and cut off any tired-looking ends of the stems. If they’re very small, leave them whole. If they’re more than an inch or so in diameter, slice them in half or quarters lengthwise. Peel the onions (an easy way to do this is to drop them into a pan of boiling water for a minute or two, then drain them into a colander and cool quickly under cold water), slice off each end, and cut a cross into the root end of each onion.

Take the onions and place them in the saucepan you used to cook the bacon meat. Place the pan over medium heat and gently stir the onions and fried meat around for a couple of minutes. Add about ½ inch of water to the pan, cover, and simmer for a bout a half-hour, until the onions are just tender when pierced with a knife. Set aside.

Pour some olive oil in a clean frying pan and place over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot, add the mushrooms. Stir or toss the shrooms until they’re lightly browned, around five minutes or less.

When the meat is done, take it out of the pan and set it on a serving plate.

Meanwhile, place a large strainer or colander over a large bowl, and pour the pan juices through it. Push the juices out of the vegetables, and then discard the vegetable residue. Pour the juices back into the pan, and place the pan over high heat on the stove.

Allow the stock to boil down about 50%. If desired, add a little more wine or tomato paste, or both. Herbs can also be added-more thyme, a bit of marjoram, a dash of lavender, whatever you have at hand. When the stock has cooked down to about three cups, lower the heat.

If you wish to thicken the stock with sour cream, wait until you’re ready to serve the meal. Then reheat the stock gently but do not bring it to a boil (if it boils, the sour cream will curdle). Stir a few tablespoons of sour cream in to thicken a bit. This is useful if a guest is sensitive to gluten. To serve a gluten-free meal, substitute potatoes or rice for the pasta.

But if everyone can eat flour, the classic way to thicken this sauce is with a beurre manié. Take equal parts of white flour and room temperature butter and mash them together. One or two tablespoons apiece will probably do. With the broth simmering vigorously, stir pieces of the flour-butter paste in a little at a time, stirring until the sauce thickens. Taste the sauce; season with salt and pepper if necessary.

Place the meat back in the sauce and add the onions and mushrooms. The roast can be served immediately or may be set aside and reheated later.

If you are serving noodles, fill a stock pot with water and place it over high heat. When the water comes to a boil, add a package of noodles and cook until just soft. If you are serving potatoes, peel and boil them (or simply clean and boil, if you are using tiny new potatoes or fingerlings). If you are serving rice, cook according to package directions.

Slice the meat and serve with the sauce and noodles (or other starch). A generous green salad will suffice for vegetables and extra color.