ST VINCENT & THE GRENADINES: THE FOOD

Well, we made it through another week. We survived Easter, and a bunch of other stupid snow this week, too. Doesn’t the weather know it’s spring? It can really stop with the snow already. Oh, and there’s snow predicted for tonight and tomorrow night. Lame. 

If it's roughly the same color as goat, does it count?

One thing that’ll warm me up is Caribbean food from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. I mixed things up a little bit by making the bread last this time. Today I started with Curried Goat, except I used stew beef because I couldn’t find goat or lamb. I seasoned my meat with a couple cloves of garlic, some salt, a little red wine vinegar, and a little bit of hot sauce (I used a Mexican hot sauce). I let it marinate for about an hour. Then I heated some oil in a skillet and stirred in my garam masala (in lieu of curry powder because I forgot I used the last of mine a while back). After it became fragrant, I added in my meat and browned it. When the meat was browned, I added in some diced onions, some ketchup, a little red wine (I used merlot), a little grated ginger and turmeric, and a few tablespoons of a coconut curry sauce (instead of the curry powder and chutney). I let this simmer for about 5-10 minutes until the sauce began to thicken, and I served this on rice. I thought this was fantastic. The kids didn’t like it as much, but it was really great. Even though I used beef, I bet it would be great with lamb.

My favorite kind of boat -- one filled with tasty food.

The next thing I made was a dish called Stuffed Sweet Potatoes. I scrubbed the potatoes and coated them with oil before putting them in a 400ºF oven for an hour and a half. When they were done, I cut them in half long ways and scraped out the middle and put it in a bowl. In a skillet, I fried up four pieces of bacon along with some diced onion and some diced ham. I also added in 1 Tbsp of butter, a little bit of frozen corn and some salt and pepper. Once I stirred everything up, I took it off the heat and added to my bowl of sweet potato guts. I mixed everything well and scooped it back into the sweet potato shells. Then I put it in the oven for another 10 minutes or so. This was so, so good. It reminded me of a dish I had when we lived in Chicago. I would definitely make this again. 

I'm glad I made two of these. One to share, and one all for me.

I found this version of Stuffed Cucumbers that I don’t think I had made before. I took 4 oz of cream cheese and mixed it with 2 oz of grated Colby jack. I added in a little bit of minced onion and a touch of pepper. Then I cut the ends of my cucumbers off and scooped out the middle. I took the cream cheese mixture and used my fingers to help lay it down the middle. When both sides were done, I put them together and wrapped them in plastic wrap. I kept it chilled in the fridge until it was time to eat. To serve this, I cut them in slices like sushi, although it was a little harder to eat that way. However, I really liked this. I’ll jus have to figure out a better way to cut them, but that’s neither here nor there.

Perhaps I should've taken a picture of it cut open. You can barely see the bloody coconut. Well, it's the same color.

And finally, I made Red Belly Bread. It’s getting harder to find recipes that aren’t too similar to something I’ve already made. I started out proofing my yeast by combining 1 package of yeast with 1 tsp of sugar and pouring in ½ c of warm water, letting it sit for about 10-15 minutes. In the meantime, I scalded 1 c of milk. Then I turned off the heat and added in ¼ c of sugar, 2 tsp of salt, and 1 ½ Tbsp of shortening, stirring until everything was melted. In a large bowl, I mixed my milk mixture with my yeast mixture and added in 5 c of flour. I added about ¾ c of water to it, working it to make a smooth dough. I turned it out on my pastry mat and had to use a little more flour to get it to that point. But then I covered it with a napkin and let it rest for an hour. While it was resting, I made the filling by mixing together 2 c of sugar, 4 c of water, 2 c of shredded coconut, and enough red food coloring to make it red. I let this boil until the water had all evaporated. After this, I kneaded it for a couple of minutes before dividing it into 8 balls (the recipe calls for 4, but I made smaller ones). Rolling out each ball so that it’s about a ¼” thick, I spread my coconut mixture in the middle and rolled it up. I thought I made sure my seams were pressed and sides tucked under, but apparently not. Some of them leaked out and looked like it bled all over my baking sheet. And the candied coconut was hella hard to clean up since it quickly became concrete. I put it in a 350ºF oven for 40 minutes. These were actually kind of good. Definitely sweet, but some of the coconut mixture got really hard and clumpy, and I could tell when I didn’t break it up before rolling the dough. I think they’d be good with some strong coffee.

Overall, I'd say it was pretty good. I probably annoyed my coworkers by bringing in curry for lunch, though.

The last three countries I’ve done have been from the Caribbean (St Kitts & Nevis, St Lucia, and St Vincent & the Grenadines). While there are a few Caribbean countries I’ve yet to cover, I feel like I just want to start in Cuba and just island hop my way all the way to the southernmost island. I don’t think that plan will happen any time soon. But maybe one day. And I definitely wouldn’t need to worry about snow.

Up next: Samoa

GEORGIA: THE FOOD

Sweet Georgia Brown, I’ve been waiting for this meal for quite some time. I was supposed to cook last weekend, but it was my daughter’s 9^th birthday, and we were invited to a cookout. And I’m still on the search for a job – who knew having a bachelor’s degree would be such a liability? Apparently, I’m “not qualified” for anything, except corporate jobs I don’t want, which may be something I have to seriously think about doing. So, if something doesn’t happen soon, then I’ll have to put my blog on hold until I either get a job somewhere, someone gives me proofreading work to do with the business I started, or I can get the money together to get published. But, let’s forget about all that for a just minute while we indulge in some fabulous food!

It's a pyroclastic cheese flow!!

The first food I made today is khachapuri, or Georgian cheese bread. I started with mixing my yeast in warm water and adding a tablespoon of flour. While that was setting up, I poured more flour, salt, and an egg in a bowl, and then added the yeast mixture.  Once I made the dough and kneaded it, I formed it into a ball and covered it in plastic wrap, letting it rest for about an hour. At that time, I kneaded it again for a couple minutes before re-wrapping it for another hour’s rest. During this time, I coarsely grated 4 oz each of havarti and mozzarella, forming the shavings into a compact ball. Once the dough was ready, I spread the dough out to about an 8” circle and placed the cheese ball in the middle. Carefully, I pulled the edges of the dough up and over the cheese ball, making a topknot on top of it. Then I smashed the whole thing down with the palm of my hand, making another 8” disk.  I then look my cheese knife and cut an X into the top of the dough, so that way the cheese is exposed. The recipe calls to put this on a floured pizza pan, but for some reason, we lost ours in the move five years ago, and I never bought another one. So, I put mine on a cookie sheet instead and placed it into a 500ºF oven for 10 minutes. At that time, I brushed it with melted butter and sprinkled the top with a little bit of mild cheddar, putting it back in the oven for about three minutes in order to brown the top and melt the cheese.  This bread was so incredible good. It’s definitely a comfort food. It was a little oily, but it didn’t stop me from getting seconds.

A little nutty, a little crunchy, a little savory.

I made this next dish purely because it intrigued me.  I’ve had stuffed mushrooms, stuffed tomatoes, stuffed peppers, stuffed celery, stuffed potatoes, and even stuffed chicken. But I’ve never had stuffed cucumbers. This recipe called to take about ¾ cup of walnuts and some garlic and smash them up with a mortar and pestle. Then I added some fenugreek, turmeric (in lieu of marigold), coriander, crushed red pepper, parsley, green onions, and a little white wine vinegar.  I cut my cucumbers lengthwise (after cutting off the ends), and then routed out the middle and placed the spiced walnut paste in the middle of the cucumber. I kind of liked it. I think I should’ve ground up my fenugreek seeds in my coffee grinder though. But otherwise, it was pretty good. I may play around with the recipe. My son liked it, and he doesn’t normally like anything. 

Do you need anything else?

The fried potatoes with dill were probably the best part of this meal. The recipe actually called for new potatoes, but I didn’t find them at the grocery store where I was, so I bought red potatoes and cut them into bite-sized pieces. I fried them in some vegetable oil, then I just added salt and pepper. The dill I had was starting to go bad; I was luckily able to get enough to top the potatoes with. The flavor was definitely not as pronounced as it was when it was fresh. But it was still good. 

Little packages of perfection.

And finally, we arrive at khinkali, or Georgian dumplings.  I didn’t realize I was running low on all-purpose flour, so I cut the recipe in half, and then I had to use half white flour and half whole wheat flour, so I knew the dough wasn’t going to be the same from the beginning. After I put the flour in a bowl, I added some salt, and some water and made the dough. I kneaded it then wrapped it in plastic and put it in the refrigerator for about a half-hour.  In the meantime, I made the filling: combining ground beef (the recipe calls for half-beef, half-pork, but I used all beef), chopped onions, cilantro, salt, pepper, and crushed red pepper in a bowl. Once the dough was done, I rolled the dough out and used a biscuit cutter to make round circles (I was only able to make eight).  Spooning in a little bit of the filling into the middle of the dough circle, I then folded it up and pinched it altogether at the top, making a topknot.  I dropped them into a pan of boiling water, and when they floated, they were finished.  I really liked these, but I think I would’ve liked them more if they were made from only all-purpose flour.  They reminded me a little of pierogis.

A culmination of comfort.

Overall, the meal meshed. It all came together in a perfect balance of comfort foods. It’s too bad I didn’t have any Georgian wine to go with it. I guess I’ll have to depend on my $2.87 pinot grigio from Aldi’s. So, even though things are über-stressful right now, we at least got to sit down and share a meal together, full of comfort foods. They were mostly made from a few simple ingredients and generally didn’t take that long to make.  Yet, they were full of flavor and filled you up.  I’ll definitely have these recipes handy again. This was one of those meals that went over well with the whole family, even my youngest and most picky of eaters. 

Up next:  Germany

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