Frittata with Chipotle Onions

I've got to say it's interesting to get new products from Fooducopia to try, and it's always fun to try to come up with recipes using the products. This time, the product was J-Burger Chipotle & Onion Seasoning. Imagine well-caramelized onions with a healthy kick of smokey chipotle.

There's also a milder version without the chipotle, but I reached for the heat.

The label mentions using the onions as a condiment on burger and for sure it would be great on that. And it mentioned mixing the onions into meatloaf - that would be good, too. So of course I went in a different direction. No beef. No meat at all. I decided to use the onions in a frittata.

This recipe makes a small frittata - in an 8-inch skillet. If you prefer something larger, you can easily double or triple the recipe to fit into a larger pan.

Frittata with Chipotle & Onion

2 tablespoons butter
1 small potato, thinly sliced.
2 eggs
Pinch of salt
1/4 medium tomato, diced
1 tablespoon onion jam
1/2 cup cheddar cheese
Sour cream (for garnish, if desired)

Heat the oven to 350 degrees.

Heat an 8-inch cast iron skillet on medium heat. Add the butter and when it is melted, add the potatoes. Cook them for a minute or so, moving the pieces around and flipping them over so they begin cooking evenly.

Break the eggs into a small bowl, and beat with a fork until blended. Add the salt and diced tomato and stir to combine. Pour this mixture over the potatoes in the pan. Dot the chipotle onions on top distributing them evenly.

Put the pan in the oven and cook until the eggs are set - about 15 minutes. Top with the cheddar cheese and place back into the oven just until the cheese melts. You can switch the oven to broil if you want to speed up the process.

Since there's melted cheddar cheese on top, this isn't the sort of fritatta that you'd flip out of the pan. Instead, let it cool a few moments, then cut it in wedges and serve from the pan. Garnish with sour cream, if desired.

This is also good served at room temperature.

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This may be the best rye bread ever!

Over on Serious Eats, I have a column called Knead the Book, where I make five bread recipes from a cookbook, and I write about it.

One thing I learned pretty quickly is that there aren't a whole lot of bread-only books being published these days. I thought it would be easy to find a new book once a month. But no, there aren't that many of them being published.

Hmmmmm...

So when I don't have any bread-only books, I'm using other cookbooks that have a good number of bread recipes. And I'm also going back into history for some older bread books.

This is really a fun column to work on, and it's a blast pick to the bread recipes that will be published. I try for a good mix of varieties of breads, and I try to find at least one that people will think is unusual.

Rye bread isn't all that unusual, but this one has a few ingredients that you might not immediately think of. First, there's sauerkraut. Then, mustard seeds and dried onion. And finally, pickle juice. Yep, there's pickle juice in this bread. And it's one of the best rye bread recipes I've come across in a looooong time.

Oh! You want to know about the book? It's King Arthur Flour's Whole Grain Baking. Highly recommended.

Sauerkraut-Rye Bread
From King Arthur Flour's Whole Grain Baking. Used with permission. All rights reserved.

1 can (8 ounces) sauerkraut, drained and wrung dry, juice discarded (about 5 ounces sauerkraut, drained; about 1 1/3 cups, very lightly packed
2/3 cups (5 3/8 ounces) lukewarm water
1/4 cup (2 ounces) dill pickle juice or sour pickle juice
1/4 cup (1 3/4 ounces) vegetable oil
1 1/3 cups (5 ounces) whole rye (pumpernickel) flour
1 cup (4 ounces) traditional whole wheat flour
1 cup (4 1/4 ounces) unbleached bread flour
Heaping 1/2 cup (1 1/4 ounces) dried potato flakes or 3 tablespoons (1 1/4 ounces) potato flour
2 tablespoons (5/8 ounce) vital wheat gluten
1 tablespoon caraway seeds
1 tablespoon whole mustard seeds
1 tablespoon dried minced onion
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast

Lightly grease an 8 1/2 x 4 1/2-inch loaf pan.

Combine the sauerkraut, water, and pickle juice in a blender or food processor, and process until the kraut is finely chopped.

Combine the chopped sauerkraut and its liquid with the remaining ingredients, stirring vigorously to make a crumbly mixture; it won’t hold together.

Allow the mixture to rest, covered, for 45 minutes; this will give the flour a chance to absorb some of the sauerkraut’s liquid.

After the dough’s resting period, knead it – by hand, mixer or bread machine – until you have a cohesive, very stiff dough. This dough won’t be very elastic; that’s OK. Let the dough rise in a lightly greased bowl for 1 to 1 1/2 hours; it won’t rise much at all.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly oiled or lightly floured surface, and shape it into a log. Place the log in the prepared pan, cover the pan with a proof cover or greased plastic wrap, and allow the loaf to rise till it’s crested about 1 inch over the edge of the pan. This will take 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 hours.

Be aware that this bread has very little oven spring, so what you see when you put it in the oven is pretty much what you’ll get coming out of the oven.

During the last part of the rise, preheat the oven to 350˚F.

Uncover and bake the bread for 20 minutes. Tent it lightly with foil an bake until its internal temperature registers 190˚F on an instant-read thermometer, 25 minutes more.

Remove it from the oven, and after a minute or so turn it out onto a rack. Cool the bread for 30 minutes before slicing.

So.... have you ever had a bread made with sauerkraut and pickle juice?

This has been submitted to YeastSpotting.

Dilly Fish with Cheese Biscuits

Virtual Potluck is working with Savory Spice Shop this week, and I couldn't be more pleased. Besides the fact that I have a serious spice addiction, Savory is a local company. Or at least it started locally. Now, there are stores opening all over the country. And of course, you can also buy spices online from them.

Each of the Virtual Potluck bloggers is working with spices from a different section of the store.

When I looked at all of the sections, I realized that I had favorite products in every one, so it didn't really matter to me which section I'd end up with.

When all the choosing was over, I had the Dips and Dressings section and the Peppercorns section (I got two because there are more spice sections than VP bloggers.)

I browsed through the list of products in those sections, and picked a few of the dip and dressing mixes, and I also picked up some of my favorite items - the cheese powders.

Yep, cheese powder. Powdered cheese. It's cheese with all the liquid removed, so you get all the flavor in a shelf-stable and very convenient product.

And then I got a really interesting type of pepper.

Before I get to the recipes I made, let me entice you a little bit. As part of this promotion, I've got a gift set called Dips for Chips that includes some of the custom blends from Savory Spice Shop. It's a pretty sweet gift.

Instructions for entering to win that gift set is at the bottom of this post. And don't forget that all the other bloggers participating in this event also are giving away spices. Check the post here for the complete list of bloggers and a preview of what they're giving away.

Just because a spice mix says it's for dips and dressings, it doesn't mean that it has to stay that way. While these blends would be great on your salad or for a dip, they don't have any strange ingredients that would keep you from using them elsewhere. The dill dip, for example, would have worked really well added to mayonnaise to make a sauce for fish.

Instead, I skipped the middleman (bye-bye, mayo) and applied the mix directly to the fish. Not only did it add the great dill flavor to the fish, it also added color to an otherwise pale fish.

This Fish is a Dilly

4 cod fillets
1 tablespoon Dill Dip
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 lemon, cut in wedges, for serving

Sprinkle the Dill Dip on the fish - both sides. If your fillets are large or you prefer to use more Dill Dip, feel free to be as generous as you like.

Heat the butter and oil in a saute pan on medium heat. (If you prefer all oil or all butter, that's fine; I prefer the combination). When the butter has melted, add the fillets to the pan. Cook until the fish is cooked about halfway through. Flip the fish over and cook on the other side until the fish is just cooked through.

Serve hot with lemon wedges on the side.

I served it on top of shredded radicchio - I thought the color was spectacular. A little cabbage slaw with a lemony-vinegar dressing would be great as well.

And, hey, how about some biscuits to go with the fish?

Cheesed & Peppered Biscuits and Herbed Compound Butter

I used a Romano cheese powder in the biscuits, and added my new find - Tasmanian Pepper Berries - on top. I thought an herbed butter would make a nice companion for the biscuits.

3 cups (13 1/2 ounces) all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 tablespoons Romano cheese powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 1/2 sticks (12 tablespoons) unsalted butter, cold
1 1/4 cups cold milk
Tasmanian pepper berries, ground

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

Combine the flour, baking powder, cheese powder, salt, and sugar in a medium bowl.

Add the butter to the bowl and cut it in with a pastry cutter or two knives until the pieces are no larger than a pea.

Add the milk and stir gently until all the flour is moistened. The measuring cup will have a few drops of milk remaining - hang onto that cup - you'll use that remaining milk.

Flour your work surface and turn out the dough. Flour the top of the dough. Knead the dough briefly by folding it over itself and pressing down gently, until the dough comes together as a coherent mass. For the first few folds, it's easier to use a bench scraper to lift and fold the dough. Add more flour if the dough is too wet, but avoid adding so much that the dough becomes stiff - it should be soft dough.

Roll the dough to a thickness of about 3/4 inch. Cut out biscuits using a biscuit cutter. Place the biscuits on the baking sheet. If you want biscuits that are crisp all the way around, leave them separated. If you prefer soft sides, arrange the biscuits so their sides are just barely touching.

Re-roll any scraps remaining from cutting out the biscuits and cut more biscuits. I usually take the remaining scraps from second cutting, mash them into a lumpy biscuit, and bake that along with the rest. Somehow no one ever sees that biscuit. Hmmmm... I wonder why... I mean, really, you have to do some quality control tasting.

Brush the tops of the biscuits with the remaining milk. Sprinkle the top of the biscuits with some of the ground pepper berries.

Bake the biscuits at 450 degrees until they are nicely browned, about 12 minutes.

Compound Butter

I made just a little bit of this butter, but you can make as much as you need. This butter would also be great added to cooked rice or pasta, or on potatoes or vegetables.

1/2 stick (4 tablespoons) butter, softened
2 teaspoons Parmesan Pesto Sprinkle (or to taste)

Combine the butter and the Parmesan Pesto Sprinkle in a small bowl, mixing thoroughly to distribute the herbs throughout the butter.

Refrigerate it, if you won't be using it in an hour or so.

This is best if it's made at least an hour ahead, which gives the herbs a little time to hydrate and soften, so the texture is better and the flavor is a little more pronounced.

The Giveaway is OVER ... and the winner is 
Kristen from Pixelated Crumb!

I'm giving away the Dips for Chips gift set, just like the one in the photo below. You want it, right?  

The gift box includes the same dill dip I used for the fish, nacho cheese dip (ooh, I love the cheesy dips), Gran Paradiso Parmesan Cheese Sprinkle, and Mt. Elbert All-Purpose Seasoning (named after the highest peak in Colorado). 

Along with the spices in jars, you get a few little surprises, including a whole nutmeg and some cinnamon sticks. If you've never used fresh ground nutmeg, you're going to be surprised at how good it is!

• For the first entry, go to the Savory Spice Shop page on Facebook, and click the Virtual Potluck icon (you might need to like them first) to find a complete list of all the herbs, spices, and blends that Savory carries. Find the sections I worked on (Dips and Dressings / Peppercorns) and pick out any item you think you'd like to try from that list. Come back here and leave a comment here telling me what you picked. If you want to tell me how you'd use it, that's cool, too.
• For a second entry, follow me (@dbcurrie) and Savory Spice Shop (@SavorySpiceShop) on Twitter and tweet a link to this contest. Come back here and leave a comment telling me that you tweeted.
• For a third entry, pin a photo from this post on Pinterest. Come back here and leave a comment telling me that you pinned.
• For a fourth entry, stumble this post. Come back here and leave a comment telling me that you stumbled.
• For a fifth entry, go to this post, find another Virtual Potluck blogger whose recipe looks good to you, and come back here and tell me who it is.

There ya go. Five possible ways to enter for some really awesome spices. And a lot more blogs to go look at and try to win!

This is open to people with US mailing addresses only. Contest opens as soon as this posts, and ends on Friday, April 20 at midnight, mountain time.