Elegant Home-Made Tortilla Chips

MAKE YOUR OWN ELEGANT TORTILLA CHIPS  Posted at 12:16 PM on November 27, 2009

MAKE YOUR OWN ELEGANT TORTILLA CHIPS You don’t have to throw out your tortillas if they are past their prime. Make them into tortilla chips, which will be very popular with your family and guests, as they are pleasingly different from those bought in the store. Take a stack of tortillas and dust between the layers with salt, pressing it into them. Then, pressing into it with a large knife, cut the stack of tortillas into quarters. Lower a handful-at-a-time of the uncooked chips into bubbling hot oil. For this light and crispy batch, I used a combination of soy oil, which is now sold as “vegetable oil”, and lard. Peanut or corn oil are also good for deep-frying tortillas.

When the chips themselves have developed bubbles and are slightly brown, it’s time to remove them from the pot with a runsible or slotted spoon. Drain them on paper towels, and dust with more salt if desired. The cooking oil may be strained, refrigerated and re-used for French fries, yams or potato chips. My recipe for Elegant Guacamole goes very well with these tortilla chips. So do sour cream or crème fraîche, and a mixture of sliced jalapeños with melted Cheddar cheese, baked on top of the chips for a few minutes in a hot oven.

 ©M-J de Mesterton 2009

 M-J de Mesterton’s Elegant Guacamole Dip: Find the Recipe on Elegant Cuisine and Elegant Cook.

M-J’s Elegant Burger Canapés

See Elegant Cook for M-J’s Recipe

M-J’s Sauce Velouté Recipe for Elegant Chicken

Sauce Velouté for an Elegant Dinner Dish Made with Poached Chicken Breasts

M-J’s Sauce Velouté Recipe

Save the broth from poaching chicken breasts as shown in a previous post, and make elegant sauce velouté, a classic feature of French cuisine. For this recipe, I would prefer the chicken poaching liquid to contain just salt, white wine, water, and a spoonful of lemon juice.

Make a roux with about two tablespoons each of butter and flour. Stir it until light tan and bubbly.
Add about two cups of chicken broth or poaching liquid, stirring it in quickly.

Cook the ingredients until smooth.
When the sauce is very thick, slowly add a half-cup of cream and incorporate it well, cooking on low heat for another minute. I like to use bamboo tools, because they do not scratch my cookware.

Elegant Sauce Velouté, a French Classic with Many Applications

If you don’t plan to use it right away, it is perfectly acceptable to store your sauce velouté in a jar, and refrigerate or freeze until needed. Thaw the sauce slowly in a covered pan or pot, and add some white wine or champagne to taste. Cream may also be stirred-in until the sauce is at the consistency that you prefer. Dress your chicken in this elegant French sauce velouté. It is very good to have at hand for impromptu gatherings, together with some poached and sliced chicken breasts. These two ingredients guarantee you a quickly-prepared, elegant dinner party offering.
©M-J de Mesterton 2010

M-J’s Golden Potatoes

High Praise for the Lowly Potato

Potatoes: the much-maligned tubers aren’t guilty of fattening us. The added fats in potato-preparation are the culprits. Spuds contain a “resistant starch” that aids in burning body-fat. This humble vegetable that grows low on the ground is high in nutrients. 

A potato supplies more potassium per ounce than a banana. Potassium helps to regulate blood-pressure and blood-sugar. Potatoes also contain vitamin C, B-6 and about 60 anti-oxidants.

M-J’s Recipe for Golden Brown Potatoes

M-J's Golden Potatoes

Peel and cut into quarters or eighths, as many potatoes as you think you need for dinner. The cut potatoes should resemble chunks or nuggets. One potato per person is a safe bet; the leftovers can be re-heated and eaten the next day.

Boil water in a pot, with saffron, salt and/or chicken bouillon to your taste. Add the potato chunks and boil them for twenty minutes. For a more orange appearance, some paprika may also be added. Drain potatoes and then sauté them in butter or the fat of your choice until brown. Alternatively, you may coat the potatoes in melted butter and salt, then bake them on a cookie sheet until brown. A good way to evenly distribute the coating is to put the potatoes, oil and seasoning in a Zip-Lock bag and shake gently, being careful not to break the potato chunks.
Baked or sautéed, these potatoes are soft on the inside, and crispy on the outside.
~~Copyright M-J de Mesterton, 2008

Making an Elegant Salad

Elegant Salad Design, Ready to Be Tossed by Your Dinner Guest (Photo Copyright M-J de Mesterton 2009)

When preparing a salad…

~~M-J de Mesterton Copyright 2009

Composed Salad with Lettuce, Cucumber, Avocado, Grated Gruyère Cheese, Tomatoes and Chile-Roasted Pecans (Photo Copyright Elegant Survival 2009) Elegant Salad Design, Ready to Be Tossed by Your Dinner Guest (Photo Copyright M-J de Mesterton 2009)

Keep Your Salad Covered before Serving to Prevent Fruit-Flies (Photo Copyright M-J de Mesterton)

Elegant Salad Composition

Photo Copyright M-J de Mesterton: Greek Cypriot Village Salad “Horiatikí”

M-J’s Low-Carbohydrate Celery Soup

M-J de Mesterton’s Potage de Celeri (Cream of Celery Soup), a Perfect Dish for an Elegant Luncheon

M-J’s Green Bean and Almond Sauté

(M-J’s recipe is on the Elegant Survival.net Cuisine page). Empty a bag of frozen or fresh green beans into the hot oil. The thinner the beans, the better. Crush some roasted chile almonds (M-J’s recipe is on the Cuisine page at Elegant Survival.net) inside of a bag with a mallet or potato masher. Empty them into the pan with the green beans after they have begun to look a bit browned. Toss this together while sautéeing it all for a while longer. Serve alongside chicken or beef, or as a high-protein, high-fiber meal if you don’t eat meat.

~~Copyright M-J de Mesterton, 2009

U.S. and U.K. Equivalents in Cooking (Cookery) Terminology

By Guest Author, Gwydion (Dyfed Lloyd Evans)

US and UK Cookery Terms

In designing, writing and constructing a recipe website I have come across a large number of differences in terms of language uses between British and American cookery terms.

Of course, the units are different (whether in terms of cups, imperial units or metric) but the terms used for certain foods and for many cookery terms and ingredients also differ. This can make interpreting American recipes (if you’re British) or interpreting British recipes (if you’re American) difficult. This glossary provides a conversion for these terms (going from UK to US in this instance).

UK Term	US Term
aubergine	eggplant
bap	hamburger bun
baking sheet/baking tray	cooking sheet
barbecue	grill or outdoor grill
beetroot	beet
biscuit (sweet)	cookie
biscuit (savoury)	cracker
broad bean	fava/lima bean
cake mixture	cake batter
cake tin	tube pan
casserole	dutch oven/casserole
caster sugar	superfine granulated
chicory	endive
chickpeas	garbanzo beans
chilli	chili
chips	french fries
chocolate/sweets	candy
chocolate, plain	semisweet/bittersweet/unsweetened
cling film	plastic wrap
cooker	stove
cornflour	cornstarch
corn on the cob	ears sweetcorn
courgette	zucchini
cream, double	heavy or whipping cream
cream, single	light cream or half-and-half
crisps	potato chips
filo pastry	phyllo
fish slice	spatula
flaked almonds	slivered almonds
flour, light plain	cake flour
flour, plain	all-purpose flour
fool	creamy fruit dessert
French bean	green bean
frying pan	skillet
glacé	candied
golden syrup	use light corn syrup or 50% molasses, 50% water
grated	shredded
green pepper	bell pepper/sweet pepper
grill (verb)	broil
hob	range
ice/icing	frost/frosting
icing sugar	confectioners sugar, powdered sugar
jam	jelly
jelly (in the UK, a jelly is also a strained set jam that does not have fruit bits in it)	jello
Jerusalem artichokes	sunchokes
joint (of meat)	roast
ketchup	catchup
kitchen towels	kitchen paper, paper towels
kipper	smoked herring
lettuce (loose-leaved)	Boston lettuce
mangetout	snow peas
mince/minced meat	ground (meat) or hamburger meat
milk (skimmed)	skim milk
milk, semi-skimmed	2% milkfat
pear, conference	bosc pear
pine kernels	pine nuts
pips	seeds
pitta	pita
prawns	shrimp
pudding	dessert
rasher (of bacon)	slice
rind	peel
rocket	arugula
semolina	cream of wheat
sieve	sift
sorbet	sherbet
spring onion	scallion
stock	broth, stock
stock cube	bouillon cube
stoned	seeded or pitted
sultanas	golden raisins
swede	turnip/rutabaga
Swiss roll	jelly roll
Tabasco sauce	hot-pepper sauce
tea towel	kitchen towel
tin (baking/roasting/loaf/cake)	pan
treacle	molasses
tomato passata	tomato sauce (slightly thicker than passata)
tomato puree	tomato paste
vanilla pod	vanilla bean
wholemeal	whole-wheat
yellow courgette	yellow straight neck squash

Whichever side of the Atlantic you’re from, this guide should, hopefully, make it easier for you to understand recipes from across the waters.

About the Author

Dyfed Lloyd Evans runs the Celtnet Recipes site as well as the Celtnet Articles Repository. His quest for recipes has led him all over the world and he has redacted and converted recipes from many languages and cultures, both ancient and modern.

Article Source: Celtnet Articles Author: gwydion

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M-J’s Elegant Walnut Shortbread Cookies

M-J’s Elegant Walnut Shortbread Cookies

M-J's Walnut Shortbread Cookies

Ingredients

One half-pound of butter (two sticks)

Two and a half cups of flour

One cup of powdered sugar

One third-cup of granulated sugar

One half-teaspoon of salt

One third cup of buttermilk or regular milk

One teaspoon of vanilla (imitation vanilla is just as good as the real thing)

One cup of ground walnuts (I use a food-processor)

Method

Soften butter till just before melting point. Add and incorporate rest of ingredients. Form small balls of dough, set them on a cookie sheet, and flatten with a fork, or any tool you prefer which will put a texture on top of the cookies. A metal cookie- baller, much like a meat or melon-baller, could be useful for forming the cookies. Bake at 350* Fahrenheit for  half an hour.

~~Copyright M-J de  Mesterton, Elegant Survival~~

Transporting Cookies as a Gift

M-J Makes a Waxed-Paper Gift Bag for Cookies and Biscuits, Using an Old Iron and Pinking Shears

Walnuts