Double Tree Chocolate Chip Cookies

If you have stayed in a Double Tree Hotel or have had the chocolate chip cookies that I make, then you know what they are. If not, then you are missing out on quite possibly the best use of flour, butter, sugar, eggs and chocolate in the world. When you stay in a Double Tree, they give each guest a warm chocolate chip cookie upon check in. I first had one when I went to Chicago with Cas Smith and his parents for a blues festival. I forgot all about them until last year when me and Belinda went to a Jimmy Buffett concert in Indy and stayed at the Double Tree in Carmel, In. I like to try to duplicate recipes and this is one that I had to try to crack. Several dozen dozens of cookies later, I think that I have it about as close as you can get without paying a bill and a half per night at the hotel for a cookie.

You'll need
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup of oat flour (I grind up oatmeal in my magic bullett)
1 cup packed brown sugar (i make my own with plain granulated sugar and molasses)
1 cup white sugar
1 cup crushed walnuts
2 sticks of room temp butter
2 eggs
1.5 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1.5 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp cinnamon
2 cups MILK chocolate chips

Pre heat oven to 375

Cream butter, eggs, vanilla, cinnamon, lemon juice and sugars together. Add salt and soda and mix for about 30 seconds. Blend flours in 1/2 cup at a time. Stir nuts and chocolate in. Drop on a parchment line baking sheet and bake for 9 minutes, rotating pan half way through to ensure even cooking. Cool on pan for 2-3 minutes and transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling. Enjoy the hell outta them cookies!

Turkey and Noodles

I am a big fan of leftovers. As a matter of fact, everyone in the family is. I guess that is a good thing seeing how I always cook too much. Holidays where a big meal expected are no exception. There are 5 of us in my house. Me and Belinda and 3 kids, 9, 5 and 2. I count heads and cook for adults. It is a habit , maybe from my days as kitchen help in a small restaurant. The plus side is that there is always some extra. The down side is that I need a bigger fridge to stick the stuff in. We didn't have an exorbitant feast for thanksgiving this year but it was by no means, a meager meal. We made a whole turkey, instead of just a breast, for the first time in forever. That left us with quite the overabundance of poultry. I really am not a fan of turkey unless its thin sliced deli lunch meat so I have to figure out ways to use the leftovers. The first thing that came to mind is turkey and noodles. I know!Feakin turkey and noodles? Its good stuff though,and easy to make. If you choose to make it, here the deal This was made with the "That'll do" method... No exact measurements, just approximates. Dump in what you think will be enough because that'll do.

2 handfuls of left over turkey, chopped up
1 bag of egg noodles (I use the Amish kluski noodles)
2 large carrots, diced
2 ribs of celery, diced
1 leek, cut length ways and diced
1/2 stick of butter
1 can cream of chicken
1 can cream of celery
black pepper, salt and chicken bullion powder. however much you want, that'll do
1 packet of turkey gravy.

Saute' carrots, leek and celery in butter til it starts to soften up and set aside. Boil the noodles to Al Dente' and dump out some water. You need just enough that it covers the noodles. Add the rest of the stuff to the pot.



Simmer for about a half an hour, stirring every once in a while. Add a little bit of water if it is too thick for your liking.


Go ahead and put it on top of some of those left over mashed taters because everyone know that your carb intake is nowhere near the front of your mind during this time of the year.



Enjoy

Mandarin Orange Cranberry Sauce

I would bet that almost every blogger that posts about food has done a full spread on the meal that they prepared for Thanksgiving. I belong to a food smoking forum (although I haven't been active on there for a few months) and we post everything that we make on a smoker there. If you want to check it out it is http://www.smoked-meat.com and click on the forum tab. You'll have to join to post but you can lurk all day with no commitment. Anyhow, back to the original idea of the post. I am not going to subject you to the full menu of this years Turkey Day feast. For once in a good while, I did not steal the show and kick everyone else out of the kitchen... Mostly because I was 4 hours away. The day before Thanksgiving is usually my time to prepare for it. I try to make as much as I can ahead of time so that I can concentrate on the turkey on Thanksgiving. This year I was stuck in North Chicago at a paper mill for 8 hours the day before and didn't make it home until about 5AM Thanksgiving day. Belinda prepared all of the side dishes except for the cranberries the night before, while I was sitting in the loading dock. I am grateful! I got a few hours of sleep and started the bird. While I was waiting for the turkey I was bored out of my gourd so I started looking for something to do and I realized that we didn't have cranberries. Honestly, I can do without the turkey but I have to have the cranberries. I had Belinda pick some up while she was out running an errand. Here is how I do mine


1 bag (12oz) fresh cranberries
1 1/4 C white sugar
1 C water
1 chai tea bag
1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1-2 drops rum extract
1 large can of Mandarin oranges (drained)
1/2 C crushed walnuts

Put water, sugar, extract, and pumpkin pie spice in an medium sized sauce pan on medium heat. Stir just til the sugar melts and put the tea bag in. Continue to heat til boiling. Remove the tea bag and squeeze the liquid out of it into the pan. Put the cranberries in and cover. Let boil for 5 minutes and turn to low. Remove the lid and simmer for 15-20 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in oranges. Chill in the fridge til cold and top with walnuts and whipped cream. Also goes good on pumpkin pie

South Texas style Barbacoa

My buddy James posted on Facebook bout stopping for some barbacoa a while back. Since seeing it I have wanted some. I haven't been to Texas much in the last several years and the times that I have been there, I haven't been able to find a good barbacoa place. I searched the net for a recipe and this is the one I decided sounded best. http://bit.ly/uNzWBy I made it almost the same as in the link. My variation is as follows.

One of my smokers is broken, the other is a pain in the arse to use and burns up charcoal almost as fast as I can feed it so I used the indirect heat method my gas grill. One burner on low with a foil pack of hickory wood chips over it and the meat on the other end. The temperature stayed about 270 degrees on the cooking end of my grill. I let it go for about 2 hours so that it would get the smoke flavor. I took it in the house, cut it up into 4 big pieces and threw it in the crock pot with a can of Rotel tomatoes, set it to high and left it for about 6 hours. When the meat was done (I went to 200 degrees with it) I used a slotted spoon so remove it from the liquid and tomatoes. I then put the liquid and tomatoes in a sauce pot with the juice from one lime and about 2 tablespoons of chopped cilantro. I pureed this with my immersion blender and reduced it down to about half quantity and poured on the shredded meat just before serving.

Onion Rolls

So i was sitting there the other day thinking that I wanted hamburgers. That is about the best use of ground beef I know of. Plain hamburgers are great, fancy dressed up hamburgers are awesome too, but the best hamburger is any kind that you stuff in an onion roll. I had already been to the grocery store for the week and did not want to make another trip for a bag of onion rolls so I made some. Here's how...

6 1/2 C bread flour
1/3 C sugar
3 tsp (t) salt
3 packages active dry yeast
1/2 stick softened butter
2 cups hot tap water
2 Tablespoons onion powder
3 Tablespoons of dehydrated minced onion

Put minced onion in a bowl and cover with HOT water. Let set until the onion is re hydrated and drain.
Put 3 cups of flour, sugar, salt, onion powder, yeast and butter in a bowl. mix well. Make a well in the center and pour water in while stirring. add flour 1/2 cup at a time until it gets to hard to stir with a spoon. Turn onto a floured surface and work the rest of the flour into the dough. Knead for 10 minutes. Place in a greased bowl, spray the top of dough with Pam and cover with plastic wrap. Put in oven and turn to 400 degrees for 1 minute and shut off. Let rise til doubled in bulk. Punch dough and divide into 2.5 ounce portions. Shape dough into balls. Roll the tops of them in the re hydrated minced onion and put on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper about 3" apart. Let rise again til almost doubled in size. Bake in a 390 degree oven for 10-15 minutes. The most important step of this recipe is to enjoy them with gusto!

*If you have a sweet Kitchenaid mixer like I do, I assume that you know how to make dough in it... Use it!
** These rolls are quite dense and large so if you plan on using them for a sandwich I would suggest slicing them twice. Once near the top and once near the bottom. The middle piece can be enjoyed by its self or saved for bread crumbs or croutons

Trucking Ramblings...

It was quite an uneventful week. I was supposed to run from Paris to Jonesboro AR all week, delivering one Sunday, Tuesday, Friday and Saturday. I started early on Sunday with a water leak and an overloaded tank. I am legal for 80,000 pounds, just like all 5 axle class 8 combinations. With 3/4 of a tank of fuel I weighed 81,500. I had to blow some product back into the star 2 bin at the mill. I freakin hate the star bins. It is about a 300 for push and had several 90 degree elbows and lots of horizontal line. I asked a guy that has been working for us forever and he told be that that product should flow at 250-300 lbs per minute. So I hooked up to the pipe, cranked it to 15 psi and let er rip. We contract for 48,000 pounds so i was going to take off 3,000 and figured that would take 10 minutes. I ended up running about 500 pounds a minute putting my net at 46,200 and gross around 75,000. Cool, I get a light load. I delivered the first one and made it back to Mt Vernon IL before I was out of hours and cussing at my tracking device. I took off the next morning for home, fully prepared to turn and burn back to Arkansas. My goal was to try getting far enough ahead that I delivered my Saturday load on Friday. I got back to town and the mill was down for repairs. So much for getting ahead! I took Monday off and went down again on Tuesday, delivered it and got back to Mt Vernon. I was thinking that I could still get the Saturday load delivered on Friday... if everything worked out right and I kept that left door shut. I was doing 615 miles a day and stopping an hour short of my allotted driving time. It could be done. Wednesday, I got home and found that the rest of the Jonesboro loads had been canceled and I was going West, to Kearney, Nebraska. I haven't been on that run since my first week at PTI. Don't ask me how I remember this. I just do. The change of scenery was nice. I get to Cedar Rapids enough that I can tell you about where every bump is between here and Iowa City. West of I380 is a different story. I actually had to get out my truck stop directory to figure out where I was going to shut down on the way out. Anyone that says Iowa is flat apparently hasn't been there. West of Des Moines are some rolling hills that make the ol' Georgia Overdrive work quite well. I delivered Thursday in Kearney, Ne and picked up a load of seed corn in Waco, Ne, bound for Plainfield, In. I left Waco heading east and put Slimer's nose in the wind. Slimer is the name of my truck, by the way. I had to make good time if I wanted to hit my daily mileage goal. Coming through Omaha I saw something that I have somehow overlooked every time I have been through there, Kenefick Park. Something big and orange, lit up against the evening sky caught my eye. Its was a UP locomotive. Then I saw something gray and round. I twist my neck just a little bit farther... Is it a Challenger? HELL NO THATS A BIG BOY!! A 4-8-8-4 ALCO steamer, the biggest baddest coal burning hoss to run U.P. tracks. I almost broke my neck looking at it! Now what is that Diesel? It looked rather large. I googled it later and found that it is also a rare breed, what U.P. called a Centennial or a Big Jack. Its an EMD DDA40X, The longest and most powerful Diesel Locomotive ever built. I'm going to have to get up to that park some time and see if I can crawl around on those dudes!



I made it a little more than half way across Iowa for a total of 624 miles and beat my daily goal. Friday was my screw off day. The way I see it, I ran pretty good this week with the exception of Monday where I spent most of the day at the house. I ran over 600 miles every day this week at an average of between 62 and 64 miles an hour. Although nothing compared to what I used to do when I could run the way I wanted to with no consequences as long as I didn't crash, it's still pretty good. In a governed and satellite tracked truck you have to keep moving fairly consistantly if you want to make this kind of miles. Friday was boring except for my stop at the Walcott TA and Iowa 80 chrome shop. .



If I had a million dollars, I could walk in that place and probably come out broke. After a short (for me) visit there I headed home to think about what good stuff I was going to cook this weekend... Stay tuned for those recipes

A Close Call!

I like to drive at night more than in the day as a usual rule. As you may know, night driving is quite a bit different than day driving. It has its pros and cons. I like it because there are less people out and about, less law enforcing individuals, usually the scales, the places where they pull trucks in and try to find reasons to fine us drivers, are closed, most of the traffic is trucks and most of them are "good time" drivers. We get out there and stroll along talkin trucker trash on channel one nine and have a large time. I get more of a "lone wolf" feeling when I'm out there by my self, riding under the stars. On the other hand, every mile has something unseen, hiding in the dark, just waiting to take me by surprise. It could be a tight curve that I missed the warning sign for, a deer, a drunk hitch hiker stumbling down the shoulder of the road, a teenager waiting to throw a pumpkin off of an over pass. Yes, all of these have happened to me.

Wednesday morning, just before daylight, I was north bound on I39, heading for La Crosse, WI. I had just left Bloomington, IL with full fuel tanks and a thermos of hot coffee. I had The Doobie Brothers rocking on the radio, and the cb turned up loud enough that I could hear it over the stereo. There was a few drivers talking about this and that, chrome shops, truck stops, a waitress named Flo, how she wiggles when she walks and how fast them trucks can go. I wasn’t paying much attention to them as they were going south and fading out of radio range. I lit a smoke, checked my mirrors and set my gaze back at the end of my headlight beams. All is well so I pour a cup of coffee. Just as I am putting the lid back on my thermos I see something big and dark in the road. I instantly go into defense mode and throw my thermos in the floor, loose lid and all. The big object can't be more than 200 feet in front of me. I've driven somewhere around a million miles and never had an at fault accident and I'll be dammed if its going to happen tonight! Now what the hell is that in the road?! There is a pickup running door to door with me, I'm on the brakes but not slowing down fast enough. I can't stop 79,000 pounds on a dime. They are going to give me some room whether they want to or not. I move over to straddle the zipper (that’s the dotted line for you non truckin folks) and the pickup hits the shoulder. All the sudden I see hazard lights start flashing on the object and a man standing in front of it. ITS A CAR broke down, half on the shoulder, half in the right lane. Right about now, my heart is running wild and adrenaline is pumping at an unimaginable rate. I grip the wheel tighter and hold my breath as I prepare for impact. Im thinking "If I kill someone this morning because of their stupidity, it will be my fault because I'm a truck driver." It's always the truck driver’s fault. That’s just the way it works, we are guilty until proven innocent, the opposite of the general public. I think about all the things that they would try to bust me on. They have nothing on me. My equipment is in good repair, I haven’t sent any texts (that’s a fine of up to $2750 for a truck driver by the way) but I did receive one about 10 minutes ago... not close enough to present time to count. Good, nothing to bust me on! I'm right on top of the car and I see the man in front of it jump to the grass to the right. I watch the car disappear under the right side of my hood. I look in my mirror to see if it went sliding through the ditch. No, it is still there and the driver behind me said "Damn Paris, I don’t know how you missed that, but you done good!" It took a little bit for what he had said to register in my head. When it did, the most relaxed feeling seemed to start at my head and flow to my feet, followed by a soreness that I really don’t know how to explain. Then I realized that I have to do something that no one ahead of me did. I have to warn others behind me. I know I’ve passed at least a dozen trucks in the hour since I left Bloomington and a few of them had radios on, so I grab the CB mic. “North bound, ya got a broke down four wheeler in the granny lane about the 61 and a half.” Now, how about that coffee and another smoke?

I can’t help but wonder so many things about this. Why did nobody say anything about it before I got there? I know that there were trucks ahead of me. Did they even have a radio? Were they as overwhelmed with the situation as I was? What was the idiot thinking, stopping his car in the line of traffic, with NO lights on? How do you not know to get as far off the road as you can when your vehicle dies? What must the person driving the pick up that I forced to the shoulder be thinking about me? Did they see what was going on or just see me as the ass hat in the big truck? All I know for sure is that I avoided the accident and the rest of my day went off without a hitch. I delivered my load of corn meal safely, picked up a load of seed corn to bring back to IL and got to see a friend that I haven’t seen for ages when I stopped for my ten hour break in WI.

Chicken Cordon Bleu Mac and Cheese

A while back, the wife had a big get together with some of the people that she grew up with, and as usual, I got rooked into cooking for the shindig. I decided to make goulash because its cheap and easy. She was in Terre Haute one day and I suggested that she go to Sams club to get the stuff for it. She came home with 12 pounds of elbow noodles, because they were cheap . That's way more than what we needed. I thought "What the hell are we going to do with all of these freakin noodles?" Well, being the creative person that I am, I knew that it wouldn't take too long to figure out something to make with them. We had home made mac and cheese til it came out of our ears and so much goulash that I don't care if I ever see it again. We had chili mac and tuna noodle casserole and I even thought about making something with chocolate and noodles... I was sitting at the computer looking for a different idea for supper one night and I saw a chicken cordon bleu recipe, one of my favorite ways to have chicken. Then it hit me, chicken cordon bleu mac and cheese. It took a few times for me to get it how I want it and I enjoyed all of the R and D that I did. It is a winner with everyone in the house and a few of the guys I work with.

You'll need
2.5-3 cups elbow macaroni 3 large chicken breasts, cubed
12 ounces diced ham
16 ounces grated swiss cheese
10 ounces grated muenster cheese
2 cups heavy cream
2 egg yolks (save the whites to fry for a breakfast sandwich or a meringue pie)
1 tsp minced garlic
Panko bread crumbs
enough black pepper to suit your taste buds

Boil the macaroni noodles to al dente, strain and set aside.
In a large nonstick pot, saute chicken breast cubes in butter and set aside. Then saute diced ham til starting to brown, 3-5 minutes. Add cream and bring to a boil. As soon as the cream begins to boil, turn heat to medium and add 3/4 of the cheeses, minced garlic and beaten egg yolks and stir vigorously til the cheese is melted. Add the boiled macaroni noodles to the cheese sauce and stir well. Put in a large casserole dish. Cover with remaining grated cheeses. Put chicken cubes on top and cover with panko bread crumbs.





Bake at 375 til bread crumbs are golden brown, about 45 minutes




As tempting as it is to dig right in as soon as it's out of the oven.... DON'T! It will have the same effect as napalm on your face. ENJOY

Fried candy corn?!

A driver friend of mine posted this link on my facebook wall the other day.

http://www.southernliving.com/food/how-to/fun-deep-fried-food-00417000074648/?
iid=magazine-fry

I watched the video and thought "Hmmm, I can do that" and went to the kitchen
If you know me, you know that I can't leave any recipe alone. I modified this one minimally, only adding about a half of a teaspoon of cinnamon to the batter and a light drizzle of honey before hitting them with the powdered sugar.

I am not sure of the calorie count in this stuff. I imagine that it is freakin astronomical. But it is sooooo good. Kinda like the deep fried everything at the county fair, you know it is so bad for you but you have to have some. If you have a few spare minutes and aren't at all worried about your calorie intake or just want something to satisfy your sweet tooth, give it a whirl!

Give a man a loaf of bread, feed him for a day...

Let a man know you can bake bread and he'll show up any time you mention you have dough rising. When me, Mom and my little brother moved up here from Ga, we were pretty poor for a while. Mom worked as much as she could at a little gas station in Dana, In, making minimum wage and cleaned houses on the side. We didn't always have everything we wanted but never did without the things we needed. We always had food, shelter, clothing and more love than you could stuff in a 53' Trailmobile. Mom was and is still pretty thrifty. The old man says that she can squeeze a nickle and get 6 pennys and I believe every word of it. One of the things that she did to save a little bit of coin was making bread instead of buying it. That ruined me on store bought bread. After she got a better job, she had extra dough to spend but no time to make dough, so I had to settle for store bought. Nearly two decades later I have my own family and all the bills that go along with it and a pretty good job. I can afford to and usually do buy my bread from the store, but sometimes I sit there and think about how wonderful Mom's bread tasted and the smells that filled the house while it was rising and baking and I head to the kitchen. Today was one of those days. I decided on cinnamon raisin.




If you would like to try it for your self:
1/2 Cup of milk
4 Tbsp sugar,
2 Tsp salt
3 Tbsp butter (you can use margarine if you choose o_0)
2 packages of very active dry yeast
1 1/2 Cups warm water (105-110 degrees)
5-6 cups all purpose flour
1 cup raisins
2 Tbsp butter, melted
cinnamon and sugar to suit your tastebuds

Put first four ingredients in a small sauce pan and heat on medium, stirring with a whisk, just until the butter melts. Let cool to luke warm. Add Yeast and water to a warmed mixing bowl (I usually put a Tbsp of sugar in now, also) Stir to disolve and let sit for 3-5 minutes for yeast to activate. Add the milk mixture and raisins. Stir a few times. Add 1/2 C of flour and stir, repeating til it is too stiff to stir. Put the dough on a dusted counter and add remaining flour, 1/2C at a time til the dough a little sticky. You may not need all of the flour. Knead 8-10 minutes til smooth and stretchy and put it in a greased bowl, spray with pam and cover with plastic wrap. Let rise til doubled in bulk, about an hour. I'll put it in the oven, turn to 400 for 1 minute and shut it off. its almost as good as having a proofer. After rising, punch down and divide in half. On a floured counter, roll out into a rectangle. Brush with melted butter and sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Roll like a jelly roll, pinch seams on bottom and end and put in a loaf pan with the ends folded under.



Let rise again til doubled in bulk and the top of the loaf is starting to stick up over the sides of the loaf pan. Put in a 400 Degree oven for 30 minutes, cool immediately on a rack. Enjoy



PS, I use my kitchenaid stand mixed... Screw that hand kneading crap :-)

So, I have commitment issues? And a little bit about me...

Over two years ago, I started this blog. Shortly after that, i forgot about it. I posted one entry and had another saved as a draft. Neither one of them were worth reading and have been deleted and I am starting over. This time, I hope to keep myself interested in it. I'll start off by saying a little about myself. I am a Georgia native, born to a couple Yanks. Mom drug me to the Midwest when I was 5 and have been trying to get back south ever since. I currently live in east central Illinois. I have wanted to do two things for as long as i can remember. One being drive a truck. Two, become a chef. I'm not sure where my love for trucks came from. I just know I loved big trucks almost as much then as I do now. One of the few good things (maybe the only good thing) that I remember about my biological father is that he was a chef. Im guessing that's where my dream of becoming a culinary master came from. Being the oldest and raised mostly by a single mom, i took on a lot of responsibility at a young age. One of them was helping in the kitchen. Mostly just dumping in ingredients when I helped Mom and microwaving stuff for me and my little brother's snacks after school. It was enough to keep my interest in cooking. When i was 12, Mom remarried... a truck driver. Life goal one just became a lot easier to meet. I rode with him every chance I got and loved every minute of it. Fast forward a few years... I have my Drivers license and a pick up that I can't drive. I get a job in the kitchen of a local restaurant and worked there til I was old enough to get my intrastate CDL. This is what really got me interested in cooking and got me into playing with recipes and making my own. As soon as I graduated high school I started driving a dump truck and life was good. When I Turned 21, I went to work for a large interstate company with the goal of owning my own some day OR going to culinary school and pursuing the chef thing. I decided to scrap the both ideas when I found out I was going to become a father, at least for a few years. While it wasn't at the best time, I'm glad that it happened when it did. I didn't want to be one of those parents that was old enough to be a grandparent. I now have two of my own, Dustin (5) and Kelsey (2) and a stepson, Dallas(9). They all seem interested in trucks and food. Other than being Dad, cooking and trucking, I like to fish and ride my Harley, and will be trying to get into hunting this season also.