The Cooking from Scratch Challenge

[nomadicdragon]

For the last two years I've been participating in the day zero project: www.dayzeroproject.com/

One of the goals on my list was cooking from scratch for a week. One of my other goals was cooking some regency era recipes, which I'm going to include in the challenge to knock out two goals at once.

Next week I'm going to start:
The Eating from Scratch Challenge.

Start: August 1
End: August 9

Rules:
- Every meal eaten must be made from scratch.*

- Organic Foods where possible.

*exceptions: dairy products, drinks, sauces.

I'm still working on my meal plan. But I'm making the following for certain:
Regency Era Recipes: Baked Eggs, Macaroni Cheese**
Bread: Cheese Onion Bread, Cherry & Blueberry Bread


That's what I have so far.

**Recipes obtained from here: www.janeausten.co.uk/magazine/section.ihtml?id=10&step=2

[nomadicdragon]

Oh and I'm also going to try making Negus, from a recipe that I found in a Jane Austen Cookbook that I Have.

[nomadicdragon]

And my own butter..

How to Make Butter using an Electric Mixer

1. Purchase a container or more of heavy cream. Try to find plain cream without added sugar.You will want to buy a lot of heavy cream because the amount of butter is smaller than the amount of cream used. One gallon of cream will produce approximately three pounds of butter

2. Chill your bowl in the refrigerator prior to butter making.

3. Pour the cream into a bowl. Whip it using an electric mixer until it gets stiff. It won't be as stiff as a stick of butter yet.

4. It will go through different stages- the first two are pretty self-explanatory.

* Frothy Milk Stage.

* Whipped Cream Stage.

* Break Stage
(This is where the whipped cream appears very dry looking)

* Break Down Stage-Continuous whipping will cause the air cells to collapse into, BUTTER.


5. It might get stuck to the whisk. Drain some liquid and repeat. The liquid you drain off is buttermilk. Add back an equal amount of clean water to the forming butter

6. Chill the butter in the refrigerator for an hour. If it is not hard, drain more liquid out and refrigerate again. Taste the butter and if it doesn't taste like butter but like cream, whip it some more.



*http://www.janeausten.co.uk/magazine/page.ihtml?pid=643&step=4

[artemisiajolie]

What a great challenge! I hope it turns out well.

[Miss Catherine]

This sounds like it should be a great challenge. I think I'm going to have to try my hand at making butter it sounds really interesting. Thank you for sharing and the inspiration.

[nomadicdragon]

I'm looking forward to it. In fact, I'm going to a local Farmer's Market tomorrow, hopefully, in preparation for the challenge. I'm got a recipe for Bath Buns from the Regency era, and will combine that with the homemade butter and homemade Tropical Breeze freezer jam for a very delightful treat.

I'll be sure to keep you all up to date with the success or ...failure of the challenge. =)

Aside from Regency recipes, I'm going to try a bunch of French farmhouse style recipes.

[Mme de Beaufort]

That's funny you added this post... Saturday before last, my friend Steph II was over at my house making miniature cheesecakes for our picnic that Sunday. She ran out of butter, and I had no more.. but she had a huge thing of cream. She's like: "Should I use cream?"

I told her to beat the cream into butter, at which she balked, this pastry chef had yet to make her own butter... she wanted to use the straight cream, but what she needed was the fatty part of the cream, so, she threw some cream into my kitchenaid, and made butter. She was so proud she posted it a picture of it on Facebook. LOL. It's pretty simple. She did argue with me that buttermilk was not the biproduct.... I beg to differ! Anyway, it was cute to see her so excited about her butter.

[nomadicdragon]

I was so excited. I dragged my husband downstairs into the kitchen to see the various stages of the butter making process lol

[nomadicdragon]

Day 2 & 3

We've eaten so far:

I made a Lamb Roast from a French Cookbook that I have.

From that we've had:
Lamb Tacos(Crunchy and Soft)
Scrambled Eggs with Lamb
Lamb Sandwiches.



I made a yummy herbed balsamic vinegar bread on and there were also some thumbprint cookies made with some of the freezer jam(Blueberry & Peach) I made earlier.

Oh..then I made some Dark chocolate espresso ice cream.

I am exhausted.

[nomadicdragon]

Winding down my cooking from Scratch week. Today we finished up the cookies and Lamb. (not at the same time), I also made a very yummy Cuban flavored pork roast in the crockpot that was yummy over brown rice.

The roast was super simple, just put a 3 lb pork roast in the crock pot, in a bowl mixed a cup of OJ, 3 tbs of lime juice, 2 tbs of minced garlic, 2 tsps of salt and 3 tsps of crushed red pepper flakes. Poured the mixture over the pork and cooked it on high for four - five hours.

It was amazingly yummy.