Popcorn made on the stove

Life has been extraordinarily busy for me lately and I feel like I have little time to focus on food. It’s sad, really, because I have been getting such interesting produce in my CSA box. I just don’t have the time to cook the eggplant or celery root, and as a food blogger that is a hard thing to swallow. The reason, of course, is I get things I don’t normally cook with and all I want to do is make something and share it with you! I’m thanking my lucky stars that this madness is only temporary and eventually I’ll be able to get back to cooking (and posting) more regularly.

The other night I grabbed my camera, and decided that a good post to share with you would be on how to make popcorn on the stove. I’ve only made it this way three times, and I am completely sold. For years, even growing up, I have made popcorn in a popcorn popper, and while that’s great, I’ve discovered that popcorn done on the stove lends a more nuanced flavor. The way that this popcorn is done means that you don’t need to add extra butter or salt once popped – just sprinkle on a few of your favorite seasonings and you’ve got a tasty and well balanced bowl of popcorn.

How to Make Popcorn on the Stove
This recipe is based on the Perfect Popcorn Recipe from Simply Recipes

• 2 tablespoons canola, peanut or grapeseed oil (high smoke point oil)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/3 cup popcorn kernels (try to use organic)
• Additional seasonings to taste

In a large saucepan (about 3-quarts), add your oil, salt and two or three kernels, then cover and put your stove on medium heat. When your kernels pop, you’ll know that your pan is hot enough to take the remaining kernels.

Note: I have tried using oil with a lower smoke point (sesame oil, specifically), and it works, but it does make the kitchen smoky if you’re not careful!

Adding oil, salt and a few kernels

Add the remaining kernels, and remove from heat for about 30 seconds. This allows all of the kernels to be brought up to the same temperature and makes it so they are all more likely to pop.

Adding the rest of the kernels to the pan

Return to the heat source, cover with a lid. Make it so the lid is partially cracked so that the steam can escape. Every once in a while pick up the pan slightly and shake back and forth so that your kernels do not burn.

Shaking allows the kernels to move around and not get burned

Pretty soon, your popcorn will begin popping. Continue to shake periodically because the popped corn is more likely to burn on the bottom of the pan.

Finally - it's starting to pop!

Once there are about two or three seconds between each pop, turn off the stove and take the pan off of the heat. It will still continue to pop for a few seconds, but it’s pretty much done at this point.

You can add melted vegan butter and additional salt if you like, but I have found that the oil and salt that I used to pop the kernels is sufficient. I just like to mix in a little bit of nutritional yeast, and sometimes a pinch or two (or three) of cayenne pepper to give it some heat.

I've added nutritional yeast to this batch of popcorn

Do you ever make stove-top popcorn? What are your favorite seasonings? And do you have a favorite oil?

Yummy popcorn!

P.S. Here’s a great little video showing these steps in action.

Stuffed Grape Leaves

I am not big on making New Year’s resolutions, and this year I have made only minor ones that I’ve already broken. That said, here’s one that I am confident I can keep up throughout the year. My resolution is to try to make more foods outside of my comfort and cultural zones. While I love the food I grew up on – the mashed potatoes, fried okra and apple pie, I think that it’s too easy to always fall back on those. It’s time to break out a little and try my hand at new cuisines.

One thing I have wanted to learn how to make for quite some time is stuffed grape leaves, also known as dolmas or dolmades, a food that can be found in many areas of Europe including Greece and the Middle East.* Because this is made in a variety of places, it can be made in many different ways, so this is just one recipe of many that you can try. (Quick note: not all stuffed grape leaves are meat-free. If you buy it from a store or order it at a restaurant make sure that you’re getting vegetarian [vegan] stuffed grape leaves.)

Stuffed Grape Leaves
Makes about 50 or 60 dolmas
This recipe is based upon My Own Famous Stuffed Grape Leaves found at allrecipes.com

• 2 cups uncooked long-grain white rice
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh dill (I did not have fresh dill, so I used about 2 or 3 tablespoons dried dill)
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley leaves
• 2 quarts vegetable or vegan chicken broth
• 3/4 cup fresh lemon juice, divided
• 60 grape leaves, drained and rinsed
• hot water as needed
• 1 cup olive oil

Gather together and prepare your ingredients.

Preparing ingredients for making dolmas (stuffed grape leaves)

In a large saucepan saute your rice, onion, parsley and dill in a couple of tablespoons of olive oil over medium to medium-high heat for about five minutes. Add half of your broth to the rice and turn down the heat, and let simmer for about 10 or 15 minutes.

Sauteing and cooking rice for stuffed grape leaves

Don’t allow the rice to cook completely, and once the 10 or 15 minutes is up, take it off the heat.

Undercooked rice

Stir in about half of the lemon juice and allow to cool for a few minutes. I used a strainer to make sure no small seeds were added into the rice.

Squeezing and using fresh lemon juice

Take one grape leaf, with the shiny side down and the protruding veins facing you, and add about one to two teaspoons of rice mixture close to the bottom of the leaf.

Grape leaf

Then proceed to wrap your grape leaf by following these steps:

1. First, fold the bottom left part of the leaf over the rice.
2. Then, fold the bottom right part of the leaf over the rice.
3. Fold over the top left portion of the leaf.
4. Fold over the top right portion of the leaf.
5. Roll up the rest of the leaf.
6. Done!

How to roll up a stuffed grape leaf

Place each stuffed grape leaf into a large saucepan, and make sure that they are placed tightly together.

Stuffed grape leaves pre-cooked

Once all of the stuffed grape leaves have been added to your saucepan, sprinkle the remaining lemon juice over them, then pour the cup of olive oil and remaining broth over them. Place a plate top side down on top of the stuffed grape leaves to weigh them down and keep them submerged.

Preparing the stuffed grape leaves to cook

Cover the saucepan with a lid and cook on medium low to medium heat for about 30 minutes (the original recipe calls for a full hour, but you may find that your rice is too mushy if you cook them for that long). Let these sit in the refrigerator for several hours overnight, then serve cold. You can serve these as an appetizer, a snack or with a salad.

Stuffed Grape Leaves

These are so easy to make, although I will say that I imagine that these would be easier to make with fresh grape leaves. The leaves I purchased were stuck together and if I wasn’t careful some leaves tore easily making them unusable. It also seems it would be better to select your own leaves because some were already torn or had holes in them. I would imagine that these would be a great thing to make when your herb garden and grapes are coming into their own in the summer, that way you can rely on your own backyard for ingredients.

Despite some frustrations with the grape leaves, I think that these turned out great and I’m impressed with how simple it is to make them. While they don’t taste exactly like what I’ve had from the store, they do taste similar and taste just as good. They are lemony and spicy, and I love how fresh these taste.

Have you made these before? If you haven’t made these, have you had stuffed grape leaves before, or are these completely new to you?

Yum.

*I had asked my Facebook fans what cuisine they wanted me to make next on Novel Eats. It was a tie between Greek and Middle Eastern, and as you can see, everybody won! Become a fan of Novel Eats on Facebook so you, too, can help me in times of culinary indecision. :)

Stopping off for gas, I realized that I had not yet fulfilled part of rule #11: beef jerky, so I spent five bucks on a large bag of Oberto brand jerky. It looked like tree bark but smelled like a dead animal that had been left outside for a few weeks. I hadn’t tried the stuff in years, actually, since it’s expensive, and to be honest, I always associated beef jerky with the suburban/redneck element of my hometown, which was an element that I had spent most of my postsurburban New Yorker-subscribing life distancing myself from. Still, on this morning I was hungry, the sack of jerky was on the passenger side, and with Rush blaring on the car radio, I decided to try it. And Oh My Ever-Loving God. It went straight to my bloodstream. I was flying. This was the best thing I had ever tasted! If this was what conservatives ate, I was ready to sign up for the John Birch Society right then and there.

-Conservatize Me by John Moe

When a book has me visibly laughing or weeping while on the subway, you know that it has grabbed me. I try to maintain a normal composure since I am in public so as to not seem like I’ve lost my mind (at least for my own benefit), so laughing usually winds up being more like smirking. I smirked often throughout Conservatize Me. I tend to be more left-leaning myself, although I wouldn’t consider myself a complete liberal, so I respected John Moe’s self-inflicted month of immersion in the politically conservative culture.

The full title of the book is Conservatize Me: How I Tried to Become a Righty with the Help of Richard Nixon, Sean Hannity, Toby Keith, and Beef Jerky, so from the outset I knew that I would be making jerky. Since I am vegan, it would wind up being tofu jerky. I had planned on making a couple of different kinds of jerky – one out of tofu and one out of seitan, but I had already been cooking a couple of other things and fell back on what would be easier.

I usually buy jerky, whether it is Primal Strips or Tofurky Jurky, but on occasion I will make my own, inspired by Susan Voisin’s Baked Tofu. This time I decided I wanted a little more flavor, so I added some spices to the marinade.

Conservative Jerky

• 1 lb. extra firm tofu, drained, then cut into thin strips
• 1/4 cup soy sauce or Bragg’s Liquid Aminos (I used a little bit of both; also be sure to find a gluten-free soy sauce if you want to make this allergy-free)
• Black pepper, garlic powder, and Garlic Gourmay’s Killer Cajun to taste
• 1 tsp. light cooking oil

After cutting the tofu into strips, place them into a plastic or glass container. Mix the soy sauce and spices together and then pour over the tofu strips (don’t worry if the liquid does not cover the strips). Cover the container with a lid and place in the refrigerator for a few hours (I let mine sit for about four or five hours).

Preheat the oven to 200 – 250 degrees F. To reduce clean up time, cover the top of a cookie sheet with tin foil then brush the foil with the light cooking oil. Place the tofu strips on the sheet in a single layer, and then place in the oven.

Check the strips in about 30 minutes. Take them out of the oven and turn over all of the strips, and then put them back in the oven for another 20 to 30 minutes. The time in the oven is really dependent upon how tough you like your jerky. It also varies depending on how thick the slices are. The thicker the slices, the less tough they will be.

If you don’t eat the jerky right away, you can use the same foil that you used to cover the cookie sheet to store the jerky in the refrigerator.

My initial reaction to this batch was that it was too salty. I should have just used Bragg’s or used a lesser amount of regular soy sauce. The Killer Cajun spice also had salt in it, so it might have been better if I had used cayenne or chili pepper. It was still pretty good, though, and my husband declared it good. Next time maybe I’ll try making seitan jerky.