Blog #9: Polish Perogi

5 things I learned from the DeVry visit:

I learned that DeVry is not a very good option for me.
I learned that DeVry made up their own result names for the MB personality test. I am an INFP or an INTP depending on the day. I have had to take the full test 4 times.
I learned I don't want to install equipment.
I learned school doesn't have to be expensive
I learned that their are very clever ways to use technology to attract students attention and sell your product, in this case, a school.

The Perogi:

My favorite fact about this dish is that it has eleven accepted spellings. This is likely because it is and incredibly widespread and variant dish, embraced by many eastern European and central European countries. Despite how prolific variations are, it is generally associated with the nation of Poland, and the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The name comes from the slavic root pir- which means festivity. The dish has ceremonial significance in multiple cultures.

Five common dishes prepared in Polish cuisine are:
1. Kotlet schabowy
2. Zrazy
3. Kielbasa
4. Golabki
5. Bigos

The process was very complicated for me, I have trouble understanding how dough is made and gauged. Also, it was confusing to me that the potatoes were cooked, then wrapped and cooked, and finally cooked a 3rd time on high heat. This seemed redundant. The keys to success are properly sealing the dumplings and not dropping the dough.


Check the recipe here.
They were pretty tasty, a great snack to keep you going through the day. I didn't get hungry until mid fourth period, that is impressive.

Blog #8: Swiss Fondue

5 roles of onions in cooking:

1. In powdered form, onions can serve as a potent and flavorful seasoning.
2. When caramelized and reduced, the can serve as the star of a dish such as in French onion soup.
3. "Pickler" onions can shockingly pickled to produce a powerful snack.
4. Sweet onions can bring surprisingly light but sugary flavor to dishes highlighting fresh foods.
5. The texture of onions is highly sought after as it literally explodes in a juicy but crisp crunch.


Although Fondue began as a Swiss and French dish specifically referring to dipping foods into a communal pot of melted cheese, the term has since been broadened to include any cooking method involving a communal pot of hot liquid. The three most prevalent types of Fondue are:

1. Traditional Cheese Fondue-often chunks of bread or cooked meat are dipped.
2. Sweet Chocolate Fondue-Fruits or sweet breads are dipped.
3. Fondue Bourguignonne- Uncooked meats are cooked in hot oil.

This information and more can be found here.


Check out the recipe.
Unfortunately I did not get to particpate in the making or consuming of this dish, but I can say from the one New Years Eve in which I ate at the "Melting Pot", it is delicious.

Blog #7, Apple Fritters and Bouletten

I wish I had understood how the batter was made, I was in charge of heating the oil. In any case, we slices apples into roughly 16 slices, which were then dipped in batter and fried in boiling oil. It all seemed to be pretty basic with the exception of maintaining the correct oil temperature, which Sidney seemed to have a good eye for, our finished product was delicious.

Although I had trouble finding the origins of German fried apples, many recipes seemed to both suprisingly and predictably contain onions. I cant imagine how they improve the flavor profile of something so sweet, but I am under the impression Germans will add onions to many dishes.

Check out this recipe.

Bouletten is a word used specifically in Berlin to describe a dish formally called Fleischkloesschen, or "meatballs". The dish is often served by street vendors, with traditional hamburger condiments.

More information on this dish can be found at this German FAQ.

It is made by mixing an egg with a bulk of ground meat as well as bread. The resulting glob is then fried, in a boiling fat, which forms a nicely textured crust. I do not eat beef, and did not sample our finished product, but I imagine the secret is in the meat to bread ratio, as well as perhaps the addition of dry breadcrumbs to the fried crust. It looked slightly less healthy than a McDouble.

An individual german recipe.

Blog Number 6: Creme brulee and German potato pancakes

Creme brulee is a desert that dates back to at least the late 17th century. It has been recorded under a variety of names including burnt cream, as well as Trinity and Cambridge cream, in acknowledgement of two schools that branded their coat of arms upon the dish. The dish is a custard, with a caramelized sugar contrast on top. The sugar is hardened by tempering, or applying heat generally in the form of a butane torch. Learn this and more here.
Our result seemed promising, but I feel like using a butane torch would have been a much more efficient method of caramelizing the sugar rather than a broiler. I do understand however, the hazard of giving butane torches to High School students.


 Check out Alton Brown's recipe.

A Kartoffelpuffer is simply another word for a German potato pancake. The potato is the staple in most German, as well as neighboring cuisine. They rely on starch and meat, often with or including beer.

Oktoberfest is a beer festival in Germany that lasts roughly half a month. Although traditional German and Bavarian cuisine is available, the reality is that it is a beer festival and everyone is there for the beer.
 Our result was not bad. It looked a little too eerily similar to a McDonalds hash brown, and had a little too much onion for my taste. I was however starving, and it made for a nourishing and semi-palatable mid-day snack.

Doesnt look to bad.
Check out the recipe.

Blog Number 5: French Cousine and Desserts

Apparently, the concept of the tart began in the middle ages in the form of meat tarts. Tarte Tatin is a form of flipped tart with crust on the top. This particular dish allegedly was born in France in 1898, and although the details are disputed, it is universally accepted that the dish was made on accident. Tart dough is made using the rubbed dough method which entails delicate finger work to massage small amounts of fat into flour to make a nice crumble. Choux paste is a light dough used to make puffy pastries, such as eclairs and puff pastries.
Like usual, when making this dish I diligently gathered ingredients, and mixed dry ingredients, while Connor whipped up pastry cream. After putting it all together, I cleaned up and did not get to taste the finished product, although it did not look bad.

Check out the recipe
In addition, we made croissants, although these ended absolutely miserably. Connor insisted that he knew the "real way" to roll croissants and the directions we had explicitly given were wrong. In any case, the "cutting in" method that we used to provide delicious flaky texture was completely nullified, and the finished product was simply a homogeneous melted mass, and a picture would be an embarrassment to post. Real croissants look like this:

Check out the recipe for this picture

French Sauces

Roux: A mixture of flour and fat used to thicken sauces.

Dechamel: Commonly known as white sauce, it often mixes with Roux to form sauce bases.

Demi-Glace: A rich brown sauce made by mixing equal parts veal stock with sauce espagnole.

Hollandaise Sauce: An emulsion of egg yolk and butter, often containing citrus seasoning. It is creamy and smooth.

Vinaigrette: An emulsion of olive oil and vinegar, which can be seasoned in a grand variety of ways.

*vocab word; Emulsion, a mixture

Information conveniently compiled here

Blog #4: Shepard's Pie and Buttermilk Biscuits

Shepard's pie, originally known as cottage pie, originated in Western Europe as a hearty meal that could be afforded by common folk as it was composed of mashed potatoes, vegetables and cooked meat scraps. recipe Ground beef was used in this recipe, likely because it has alot of surface area and was easy to cook with the vegetables. We basically cooked a skilletfull of vegetables and ground beef, then poured that into a mashed potato shell.
  I do not eat beef, so I did not sample our final product, which looked a little bit like this picture from this website.
As a vegetarian friendly accent to our dish we made a buttermilk biscuits recipe. Like most pastries and breads this recipe includes a leavening agent, which is used to created gas bubbles and soften the final product. Butter has to be "cut-in" to the dough in order to produce the flakey texture one associates with biscuits or perhaps scones. I personally think this is the most crititcal part of the final product.

this picture came from here

Three countries that make up the British Isle are Ireland, Scotland and Mediocre Britain. The climate in this area is relatively cloudy and rainy. The Isles have been traditionally sustained by grains such as oats, which grow well under these conditions. The isles themselves formed when the tectonic plate craton Baltica buckled into terrane Avalonia. wiki
We made simple scones:

Allrecipes
>2 cups all-purpose flour

1/3 cup sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, frozen

1/2 chocolate chips

1/2 cup sour cream

1 large egg Allrecipes

Scones originated in Scotland as heftly disk of flattened oats which were cut into slices. Once the recipe included baking powder, people began to see potential and the scone diffused to Europe and the world. Our scones were absolutely great I was impressed.  wiki

, and we made Bread Pudding

HubPages

6 slices day-old bread

2 tablespoons butter, melted

1/2 cup raisins (optional)

4 eggs, beaten

2 cups milk

3/4 cup white sugar

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon vanilla extract Allrecipes

Bread pudding is has actually been made in different forms all over the world, but among the most famous is that from England and France. It is popular because it transforms stale bread into a tasty baked goopball.