Category: Snack like you mean it

A pirates life for me!, Crew Favorites, Eat your veggies, Fruit you need to eat, Put it in your mouth, Snack like you mean it, Southern as fuck

Fridge Pickles!

Cassandra D'Kay

Everyone loves a good pickling!!! Right? Well, if you don’t, you’re a strange brew indeed. I’ve been in love with pickles for as long as I can remember.  From the days of sucking the middle out and then eating the shell, slicing them in half long ways and making pickle boats with mac and cheese or cream cheese or laughing cow….. (it’s good) or slicing them super thin and sprinkling salt on them (like they aren’t salty enough)… I have been eating pickles every which way my whole life. BUT… I had not ever made my own, until now! I even got the little scurv to get in on the action.. he said it was so easy even he could do it.  I remember my grandmother making them.. but that was before I gave a shit about making my own shit. Everyone else was pretending to be Suzy Fukn Homemaker or playing house with dolls, but then there was me.. playing fort in the trees or demolishing the barbies and melting their limbs… or playing office. Anyhow, i’ve morphed into an irregular Suzy Fukn Homemaker now and I love to make shit my self. So here is my very first few Pickle recipes: it’s too easy to fuck up I promise. 

…….Factoids & Graboids:

  • About 26 billion (insert Dr. Evil pinky here) pickles are packed yearly in the United States. 
  • Though everyone still argues about it like assholes… the pickle is both a fruit and a vegetable.
  • Pickles have a shit ton of vitanin C, vitamin A, magnesium, potassium, and zinc.
  • Muricans eat about 9 pounds of pickles per person each year.
  • During World War II, 40 percent of all pickles made were sent to the mutha fuckn ranks, to save the world.
  • Julius Caesar thought pickles made men more virile and manly so he made his army eat them daily.
  • Queen Elizabeth I, also loved the pickles!
  • As far back as 850 B.C., Aristotle rambled about the amazing healing effects of “cured” cucumbers.
  • Because the wax coating prevents cucumbers from absorbing the pickling liquid well, look for cukes with dull skins.
  • At least one person you know has snuck a giant juicy pickle into the movies in their purse or jacket. 
  • Pirates always kept pickles or pickled veggies on board to help keep away the scurvy! 

…….in-greed-ients:

  • 6 Ball Jars
  • large brine making pot
  • about 10 “pickling” cucumbers
  • a shit ton of garlic cloves
  • about 6 tblspoons of whole mustard seeds
  • about 6 tblspoons black peppercorns (I used smoked pepper…it’s badass)
  • about 6 tblspoons of whole corriander seeds
  • Fresh dill weed – a whole package 
  • a few sprigs of thyme (we all need more of this)
  • Red pepper flakes
  • ginger paste or fresh sliced ginger
  • sriracha
  • Concentrated lemon essential oil (Doterra)
  • red jalepenos (red peppers of any kind) – sliced in rings but leave the seeds in if you want them to even be mild at all. 
  • 9 cups of water 
  • 3 cups of apple cider vinegar
  • 1 (solids) cup of pickling (kosher) salt

……..Pickle Magic:

  1. Scrub and wash cukes
  2. scrub and wash jars… cause you don’t know who’s booger pickers have been on them in factories
  3. chop cukes in slices or quarters
  4. boil water and vinegar 
  5. add salt and allow to completely disolve like the brine in the sweet mother ocean
  6. cool the liquid for a little bit
  7. fill all 6 of the jars with a few sprigs (like 4) of dill,  a tbspoon of each: peppercorns, mustard seeds, corriander, 4 or 5 garlic cloves each, & the pepper flakes (this does not make them hot)
  8. put some sliced hot peppers in 2
  9. put some sriracha & ginger in 2
  10. put some (2 drops each) lemon oil & thyme in 2 
  11. stick about 6 quartered pickle spears in each jar
  12. pour brine over each jar until filled to the very top
  13. put lid on and let them sit out on the counter until room temp 
  14. fridge em! Let them sit for 3 days… then you can eat them.. .but they are better as they sit.  
  15. good for up to 2 or 3 weeks in the fridge. 

Every one lusted after the lemon garlic dill thyme ones.. but the sriracha ginger were really good too. I wished my hot pepper ones were hotter! Next time gadget… next time. Either way, they are all gone now.  You really could put anything in there with the cucumbers.. Next time I want to make cilantro lime ones, or black pepper oil and rosemary, I might even shove some shrooms in there. Alas,  I have to wait for more gold coins to make more treasure!  So until then here is a weird  PICKLE SURPRISE for you dirty pickle suckers….savy?!!

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A pirates life for me!, Party People, Put it in your mouth, Snack like you mean it, Stuffing stuff in stuff

GOING HAM ROLLS!

Cassandra D'Kay

This fourth of July I made several things (I will post next). One of which was my “goin HAM rolls”. These rolls aren’t magic but they are pretty damned tasty… enough to be requested every year. I scoured the internet for a recipe just like it but apparently it’s pretty original. Everyone makes these with just pickles and cream cheese or rolled in tortilla to make pinwheels…ok. What ever floats your schooner.  I usually alter my recipes over time…this one is from my late momma and I don’t have to change it at all.  Mother effing Perfection rolled up and swallowed.  The key to a great “party appetizer” is simple first, then tasty… don’t try to be too fancy when it just needs to be a counter top finger food item.  From the Master at Arms down to the powder monkeys and swabbers alike, they will ALL have their dirty nose pickers all over these sons a bitches. So get out the biggest cutting board you’ve got in the scullery and go crazy! AAAAAaahhhhhhh!

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…….in-greed-ients:

  • 2 packs of rectangle ham. Comes with about 20 or so pieces of ham.
  • 2 packs of 8 0z cream cheese -the softer the better
  • 1 yellow bell sliced long ways very thin
  • 2-3 roma tomatoes sliced in long strips
  • 2 giant dill pickles – sliced thin strips but slice out soft seedy middles and eat them now.. you probably need a snack… and no one likes soggy pickle spears in their ham rolls.
  • several slices of red onion – use the outside long pieces not the small round center pieces
  • 7-9 pieces of pre cooked bacon (I like the spicy jalepeno bacon for this)
  • 5-6 slices of sharp cheddar cheese -sliced in 1/4 inch thin strips
  • flavorgod, spicy everything seasoning –Spicy Everything
  • Himalayan salt & cracked pepper
  • garlic powder

……. ROLL magic:

  1. cut everything to fit the size of the ham rolls, nothing should stick out on the sides.
  2. lay out them slices of ham all over the board
  3. take about a whole finger sized chunk of cream cheese and slap it on one side of the ham slice, continue this for all slices.. put cream cheese finger on the same side on all.
  4. use a butter knife to spread the cream cheese across the ham… not the entire slice should be covered…just leave a half inch not slathered.
  5. place a piece of bacon on the blank spaces
  6. place a slice of bell
  7. slice of pickle
  8. slice of onion
  9. slice of tomato
  10. slice of thin cheese
  11. sprinkle all with seasonings
  12. start roll with food side and roll towards thick cream cheese side. The cream cheese will be like glue.
  13. eat the rest of the stuffs… my favorite part.

AVAST YE! You’ve done it. Now try not to eat them all before the party. Here is some wacky ass shit. Watch it….and GO HAM!

A pirates life for me!, Eat your veggies, Snack like you mean it

Roasted Truffle Cauliflower & Cabbage

Cassandra D'Kay

Holy vegetables batman! We just can’t seem to get enough of this shit. I know some of you don’t “enjoy” cabbage or think cauliflower is blah… well… you sir/ ma’am are fucking lame. Wake up and smell the truffle oil spray y’all!  Go getchu some  if you cant find it. order it.  Its that awesome.  http://www.amazon.com/Mantova-Spray-Virgin-Truffle-8-Ounce/dp/B005HFZ0RG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1434144005&sr=8-1&keywords=mantova+truffle+spray Some say it has a weird smell or flavor… well, yeah, if you eat it out of the spray can. Anyhow, Its good for fries, veggies, whatevs. Spray that shit on the poop deck for all I care and watch em all fall down. The spray isn’t that cheap, but that’s still cheap entertainment.

PS.  This particular snack does not stay crunchy in the fridge as well as we wish it would … so for parties its magical!  Good thing it doesn’t last on the table anyway, I barely even got any… its that fucking good.

.….in-greed-ients

  • whole cauliflower
  • whole purple cabbage
  • can of black truffle oil spray
  • 1/2 cup parmesan cheese
  • foil and an oven that doesn’t suck (like mine)

The magic:

  1. Preheat oven to 425*
  2. Slice veggies into discs / slices abou1/4-1/2 half an inch thick depending on how savy you are with a blade.
  3. lay them straight… on a few foil lined cookie sheets or baking pans
  4. spray the shit out of them and salt and pepper and cheese coat them to your hearts content
  5. bake like crazy.. no, just for about 35-40 min.  I like to broil for a few at the end for a crunch.
  6. that’s it… why are you still reading this.. go make it now!

I am a land lubber too.. and a lubber of nature.  I am so glad it’s magnolia season again.  My kitchen smells like my grandmas house and its AAARRGG-some!