Category: Food & Wine

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the Humble Cracker

so many uses

Food of years gone by has always fascinated me … I have felt that tasting the food of other times is like sampling history…. the next best thing to actually being there. I fondly remember sampling a glass of Armagnac made before my grandfather was born, near a town in which he helped liberate in WWI. Whether it be the various Purees of the Roman’s or the Beer of the ancient Egyptians… it would transport me back to another time.

So it is with the humble cracker. This is an everyday food so commonplace in other centuries, but replaced with more fattening and sweeter alternatives. However, the humble cracker is making a comeback… be it in sometimes a more exotic form.

Chef Noriyuki Sugie has come up with an interesting twist with a cracker featuring nori (dried seaweed) and  various spices. Basically it is a simple yeast dough with the garnish that making the statement.

I have some very old yeast based cracker recipes… but they take 24-36 to let the yeast rise… but it is next on my list…. along with an Armenian Cracker /bread called  Lavash.

Roger Freberg

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Got Beer? No? Brew Your Own!

this here brew has earned the Captn Roger seal of approval!Well, I always wanted to know how one of my favorite sets of grains were treated when I wasn’t using them in bread and elsewhere? I have always had some fondness for beer and if the truth be known… I have enjoyed them everywhere … from the Hofbrauhaus to turning my ‘glass upside down’ in a Sidney bar.

All great fun. I have to confess to wondering what it would be like to brew my own.
Laura’s cousin Pam and her husband seemingly enjoy the effort required in home brewery and with a little prompting consented to provide a step by step look into the home brewery process!

Here’s how they do it!

Hopefully the hurricane will miss them in Houston or the storm is a bit merciful.

All I can say from the galley of Captn Rog, “Drink up me hardies!”

Roger Freberg

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Jaw Breaker Bread for Laura Ann

Grainy Bread for Laura!
When you cook, requests usually are to be expected. It is part of the fun.

I don’t know why people expect that ‘healthy food’ should taste bad and that ‘healthy bread’ should be unpleasant. It’s as if someone has taken a page out of the pharmaceutical recipe book that reminds us that “good medicine tastes awful!” My experience is that good, healthy and wonderful food… tastes… well… delicious.

However, I know the need for so-called ‘health enthusiasts’ to self flagellate themselves, wear bike helmets and eat bread that resembles a Brillo pad. So I set out to come up with a ‘healthy’ bread that offers some of the expected ‘crunch’ of the more nastier versions of choose your descriptor: natural, organic, healthy, or earth mothery.

So, what’s in this bread?

I’ve thrown just about everything you can imagine: whole wheat & bread flour, millet, flaxseed, whole oats, oat bran, soy, rice, corn, barley, wheat germ, sesame seeds, molasses, honey, eggs and gluten. Okay, the purest will have some problems with some of these ingredients… but I wanted it to taste good, too!

Anyway, toasted with cheese and with 2 oz. of meat it is very  Jenny Craig  compliant… and Laura likes it, too… so that’s cool.

Roger Freberg

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Soda Cracker Recipe from the 1800’s

1800 Era Soda Crackers

I know, we ALL think we know what Soda Crackers are! If fact there is possibly no one in America that can’t describe in excruciating detail the proper composition of a soda cracker. Unfortunately, they’d be a little off.

Now, I am not a fan of all old recipes, because many recipes have been improved over the years, decades and centuries… however, there is value in seeing how things were once made because we often can learn from them.

Besides, it became obvious to me that I needed to learn how soda crackers were made in America if I was ever going to be able to put together one of the oldest recipes I have found for Macaroni and Cheese. Soda Crackers are a major ingredient in this recipe.

Here’s the basic ingredients:

4 cups flour + 1 teaspoon of soda (sifted together)
1/2 tablespoon of lard + 1/2 tablespoon of butter (mixed together)

1 egg

salt to taste

1 1/2 – 2 cups buttermilk

Process:

Make a stiff dough with buttermilk

roll out on a greased cookie sheet

prick with holes to allow the steam to vent ( score dough in a grid )

and bake 400 degrees for 13-15 minutes until brown

set out to cool.

My Comments:

Obviously, some of the original directions were very general… such as the addition of buttermilk was a ‘guideline’ left for you to determine the amount… the temperature was a ‘guesstimate’ in those days… but this is approximately correct by today’s standards.

Generally, a nice snack, not much by those who crave sugar, frosting and chocolate… but a remembrance of by-gone days… plus I need it for my yea ol Macaroni and cheese recipe.

Besides, it was fun … and yummy!

Roger Freberg

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Great Recipes are Made or Stolen!

Karen & Laura's Blueberry Coffee Cake!I am very proud of my little band of chefs! Laura, Kristin and Karen all enjoy experimenting with new recipes, developing on old proven winners and when all else fails… they act like the pirates they are… and they “steal” one!

Actually, we don’t “borrow” from too many folks as their recipes usually suffer from various inadequacies: too many shortcuts, cheap ingredients, inadequate substitutions or they just stink. Was I ‘over the top here?’

Anyway, one of my family’s favorite items was prepared by a restaurant for whatever reasons left our little town of San Luis Obispo called ‘Hobbee’s’… and now can be found at least in one of my favorite places of my youth… Palo Alto. Forgiving it’s somewhat vegetarian cuisine for the moment, one of their nicer ‘treats’ was a blueberry coffee cake that was… delicious and always worth the trek.

For Some reason, my daughter Karen had never posted her mother’s and her adaptations to this recipe… they didn’t want to share it with ol dad who’s eyes always rolled at the mere hint of it’s baking! However, brought to you through excessive begging on my part… is their version of this great coffee cake!

Here’s the Recipe!

Karen loves to put  Amarula ( a south African Liquor that reminds me of a nicer Bailey’s Irish Cream) in everything… so I wasn’t surprised to see it in here too!

enjoy it with someone you love!

Roger Freberg

PS. Now you can see what we are doing when we are not on Jenny Craig!