Soup is On

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This is a lengthy post, so click "read more" to continue.

THE New Family blog has some foodies in its viewership judging by the responses the New Family Dad has received. So Dad’ll expand the scope of the blog to include food he makes. After all, the kids will need to eat too and they aren’t doing something adorable every hour of every day. In fact, a lot of what they do is far from adorable, like right now. They are both tired and in need of a nap but are crying instead of sleeping. That video, if it were posted, would be persuasive enough to drive the unintended pregnancy rate to near zero.

By the way, did you know that Dad now knows why there is a plastic or rubber ring on back of pacifiers? It is there to prevent him from grinding his teeth when the Twins are screaming in chorus in his ears demanding food, attention, burping, diaper checking, and of course huggy-lovey. The ring side is for Dad, the bulbous side is for the kid(s).

Humor aside, it does actually help to hold it in your teeth while you change a fidgety child's diaper, just like Dad is doing going right now!* [Update see last paragraph]

http://www.justinbuzzard.net/2010/09/20/idolatry-is-like-a-pacifier/
This is not an endorsement of the link. Dad just borrowed the image.

Anyway, this post is about beef soup, not pains-in-the-neck. And they're only PINs when Dad fails to do his job. So enough blame shifting, let's move on to beef soup.

Cubed beef that is almost finished. Needs more sear.

Start with the beef. To get a really awesome sear you have got to get the meat dry. The Maillard reaction (browning) will not occur until all of the water boils off. Dad ages his meat in the fridge for a few days to get it dry enough. He wraps it in towels and changes them 1 ~ 2 times daily as necessary. You can’t get it dry enough just by patting it down after you have opened up the package. You can get the surface moisture off, but there is moisture just below ready to spoil your searing efforts.

Side Trip: Reader Shirley R. asks where Dad came across his knowledge of cooking. Most of it came from Alton Brown’s Good Eats. Though he’s not producing anymore episodes, Food Network still runs Brown’s reruns.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/good-eats/index.html

Cooks Illustrated contributed a lot too.
http://www.cooksillustrated.com/

Also, for those that are a fan but just need a reminder of Brown’s technique, the Good Eats Fan Page is the place to go. The Good Eats Fan Pages site catalogs and transcribes all of his episodes. It is a good resource for those that need a reminder of how to accomplish a certain technique.

http://www.goodeatsfanpage.com/

Cooking is much more than just following a recipe. It is an exploration. You might start by following a map (recipe). If you enjoyed that journey, you might do it again, and again, and again, to monotony, or you might go off the map. If you go off the map you might find something new and wonderful, or something heinous to be avoided and never repeated, or something middling comprising elements worth repeating and others worth avoiding. In any case, you need enthusiasm, desire, and a willingness to try. Recipes are just guidelines that you should tailor to your own tastes.

Cooking is also technique and that is why Brown’s series is so valuable. When you understand what is happening during cooking, i.e. if I do this, I get that, you can begin to imagine alternative possibilities, e.g. what if I do that? Do I get this?

Oh yeah, this post is about beef soup. So we'll push Dad off his soapbox and continue.

The real secret to beefy tasting beef stew is Better Than Bouillon beef base, tomato paste, and cheap red wine. The beef base is here:

http://www.soupsonline.com/m-48-better-than-bouillon.aspx?gclid=CM-Kn_-bwrICFexAMgod6HMAYg

The base doesn't need much justification other than to say that Dad doesn't bother with any ingredient that doesn't add value to the dish. Dad will discuss the other two later. And beef bouillon meets that criteria. He writes about the tomato paste and wine later.

Recipe run down:

1 lbs. cubed beef

1/2 can of tomato paste

1 can of diced tomatoes (or use fresh ones like in the photo)

2 small cans of mushrooms

beef base, follow directions

kosher salt

bay leaf

oregano

basil

2 ~ 3 stalks of celery chopped

1 large onion chopped

2 ~ 3 large carrots chopped

Dad salted the meat lightly with kosher salt, wrapped it in towels and let it dry out in the fridge for two days. He changed the towels twice. He then trimmed excess fat and browned it.

Then he pressure-cooked it for 45 minutes.

He chopped up a large yellow onion, three stalks of celery, and a proportionate amount of carrots.

He deglazed the fond. Careful, Dad is very experienced using his pressure cooker. He knows how much water to add to get a good glaze at the end without burning it.

He added water, the beef base, two cans of mushrooms, the veg, a half a can of tomato paste, the diced tomatoes, basil, oregano, and the bay leaf. This simmered for half an hour before he tasted it.

When the veg was tender, he slowly added the garlic powder and salt while tasting it frequently.

Beefy!

Then he and the New Family Mom enjoyed it!

Additional Notes:

Okay, let’s talk about the wine. There are some flavors in proteins that are only soluble in alcohol and the wine brings them out. Leave it out and you’ll have less complexity to enjoy. So why not white wine, beer or straight liquor? Red wine pairs better with beef than other alcohols. Why cheap red wine? Because Dad's tastes aren't that sophisticated to be able to tell the difference betwixt an expensive red and a cheap one for this purpose.

The tomato paste is essential. Diced canned or fresh tomatoes are inadequate to enhance the flavor. Dad wants the hearty flavor of the paste.

Develop your food palate. Leave the salt out until ready to serve and frequently taste the soup while it is simmering. If using canned goods, there will likely be salt in there anyway. And, when you do add the salt, add just enough to mask bitter flavors. It should not taste salty. Also, cook while you are hungry. You will actually experience each ingredient more fully if you have a slight hunger edge.

Garlic turns bitter if simmered for prolonged periods. Leave it out until the end.

The best technique to chop an onion without crying is to refrigerate it. Honestly, nothing else Dad has ever tried, save wearing a respirator and goggles.

Learn how much condensation your pressure cooker releases before you attempt to build a fond in one. There is about a minute’s difference between a good fond and a burnt, bitter mess that has to be scraped off. How? Measure out a quart of water and put it into the cooker. Let it get up to full steam. Dad's is a "jiggle top" weighted pressure relief valve type so that point is easy to know. Yours may vary. Cook for 15 minutes. Allow it to cool. Measure the water remaining. You now know your condensation loss you have per 15 minute period. Dad assumes this is linear. He hasn't used every pressure cooker on the market. Anyway, if you want fond, knowing that it take 45 minutes to cook beef, you can do the math as to how much water you need to add to sustain the cooking for that period with scorching the bottom.

*A reader might ask, "How are you changing a diaper right now when they are both crying when they should be a sleeping? Aren't they in their cribs?" Excellent question.  Getting anything accomplished while minding the Twins takes a long time. This post probably spanned two or more hours to compose. Dad may have only a minute or two to pound out a paragraph before he needs get back to the Twins. So he was indeed doing what he wrote at the time he wrote it, or at least that was his last activity within the last minute.