Classic Buttermilk Waffles

By Iron Chef Leftovers

I don’t normally do breakfast, but when I do, I tend to gravitate more toward pancakes and French toast. On occasion, I will get a waffle, but generally it is something I may eat once a year. On a recent trip back to the Iron Chef homeland, my mom purchased a waffle iron. Well, she needed a recipe; I knew a good one from Cooks Illustrated, so here you go:

The secret to great waffles is a thick batter, so don’t expect to pour this one. Make toaster waffles out of leftover batter—undercook the waffles a bit, cool them on a wire rack, wrap them in plastic wrap and freeze. Pop them into the toaster for a quick breakfast.

The Software

  • 1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
  • 1 tablespoon cornmeal (optional)
  • ½ teaspoon table salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 egg, separated
  • 7/8 cup buttermilk
  • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

The Recipe

1. Heat waffle iron. Whisk dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. Whisk yolk with buttermilk and butter.

2. Beat egg white until it just holds a 2-inch peak.

3. Add liquid ingredients to dry ingredients in a thin steady stream while gently mixing with a rubber spatula; be careful not to add liquid faster than you can incorporate it. Toward end of mixing, use a folding motion to incorporate ingredients; gently fold egg white into batter.

4. Spread appropriate amount of batter onto waffle iron. Following manufacturer’s instructions, cook waffle until golden brown, 2 to 5 minutes. Serve immediately. (You can keep waffles warm on a wire rack in a 200-degree oven for up to 5 minutes.)

NOTES

That is it. Serve with syrup, butter, whipped cream, fruit, fried chicken or whatever you like.

 

Beer of the Week: NW Peaks Cascadia Shale Ale

By Iron Chef Leftovers

untitle8dIn 2012, NW Peaks made a dark version of their Eldorado Pale Ale which was outstanding.  In 2013, they made a hoppy dark beer called Cascadia Shale Ale. The beer was a bit big at 6.5% ABV and was available on tap at the tasting room.

The beer pours very dark brown in color with a light tan head, showing lots on malt on the nose with hints of chocolate and hops supporting the malt. On the palate, the beer is hop forward; mild bitterness with hints of pleasant and not overpowering citrus followed by malt with hints of chocolate before finally yielding back to hops with more light bitterness and a hint of alcohol and resin on the very end of the beer. I would have liked a slightly smoother finish (the beer did come off as slightly hot) but it was still outstanding and complex with multiple layers of flavor. This was a somewhat malty version of a CDA, perfect for an overcast Northwest evening in the fall.

NW Peaks Cascadia Shale Ale rumbles in with 4 subduction quakes out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Epic Ales Desert Rye Farmhouse Ale

By Iron Chef Leftovers

untsaditledThere are two breweries that drive me nuts because their names are almost identical. There is Epic Brewing out of Utah which makes some fantastic Belgian style beers and there is Epic Ales out of Seattle who tend to do some off the wall farmhouse style beers. I have seen more than one occasion where a tap last has listed the wrong brewery. In the case of the Desert Rye Farmhouse Ale, I originally just wrote Epic on my noted. In going back over them, I realized that I had no idea which Epic it was. After doing a bit of digging, I realized that it was the Seattle Epic that put out this beer. Given that it was a farmhouse beer with rye, I needed to give it a shot.

The beer pours cloudy with the color of peach/apricot jam and has an interesting nose – notes of grain and yeast dominate, supported by light notes of rye and hints of sugar. The beer is really complex on the palate, starting off with heavy rye notes before moving into a grassy farmhouse funk with lots of Belgian yeast and grain helped by very light citrus, finishing with light hops and more funk. The rye lingers thought the entire progression and is a bit harsh at the beginning, but it smooths out by the end of the sip and enhances the other flavors. The farmhouse component becomes more pronounced as the beer warms making for a very different beer by the end of the pint.

This is a beer that is really not for everyone, but is well balanced and complex to the point of being very different than most everything else out there.

Epic Ales Desert Rye Farmhouse Ale comes in out of the field with a heavy load of 4 hay bales out of 5.

The Road to the Super Bowl Runs Through…

By Blaidd Drwg

You hear all about home field advantage in the NFL, and there is definitely an advantage to playing at home, in the regular season. Come playoff time, momentum seems to be more important than playing in your front. I think it becomes exaggerated because the #1 and #2 seeds end up sitting around, doing nothing for a week and lose some of their competitive edge. I decided to take a look at just what kind of impact the bye week had on the top 2 seeds since the NFL went to the 8 team playoff in 2002.

#1 Seed

Game Wins Losses
Divisional Playoff 13 9
Conference Championship 9 4
Super Bowl 2 7

 

#2 Seed

Game Wins Losses
Divisional Playoff 15 7
Conference Championship 5 10
Super Bowl 3 2

 

The results are definitely surprising. The #1 seed has won just 59% of the time in the Divisional Playoff game. Considering that is a team that generally has won better than 75% of its games at home during the season, I would have expected better. The #2 seed wins about 68% of it Divisional Playoff games, which seems about right considering that they get the highest remaining seed for that game (usually the 3 or 4 seed). I suspect that the #1 seed ends up getting the tougher team for their matchup since it seems, especially over the last few seasons, that there is at least one Wild Card team who ends up with a better record than a couple of the division winners.

When you get to the Conference Championship game, it gets a bit interesting. There have been 8 times in the 22 instances that #1 and #2 have squared off in that game, with the #1 seed holding a 5-3 advantage in those games. That makes the results look a bit weird against the other seeds:

  #1 Seed #2 Seed
Vs. 1 or 2 seed 5-3 3-5 (On The Road)
Vs. any other seed 4-1 2-5 (At Home)

 

Basically, if you are the #1 seed and you survive the Divisional Playoff game, you really would rather face anyone other than the #2 seed.

Either way, I would almost be willing to bet that you won’t be seeing a Seattle – Denver (this year’s #1 seeds from their respective conferences) Super Bowl matchup. A battle of #1’s has only happened once in the last 10 seasons – in 2009 when Indy and New Orleans squared off.

Beer of the Week: Populuxe Gingersnap Amber

By Iron Chef Leftovers

imagesCAAR87MMI know I have said this before, but I don’t really like ginger in my beer. Don’t get me wrong, I love ginger, I use it frequently in my cooking, but I feel like it tends to overpower the subtle flavors of beer to the point where it is all you end up tasting. Populuxe put on tap their Gingersnap Amber recently, and I decided that I needed to try it with some reluctance. The beer clocks in at just 5.5% ABV.

The beer pours amber in color with notes of toffee, malt and gingerbread on the nose. Gingersnap drinks heavier than it smells, starting off with a mild yeastiness before moving into light toffee and caramel notes which pleasantly linger for a long time before moving into a delicious cookie like flavor with hints of sugar and very light ginger coupled with light molasses and toffee. The finish is extremely long and pleasant, reminding me of a really nice gingerbread cookie without the crumbs. Well balanced and easy drinking, this beer manages to draw some big flavors into the picture without having to empty the spice rack or overpowering the palate.

Populuxe Gingersnap Amber preps for the holidays with 4 warm cookies out of 5.

An Inexpensive EarthBox Hoop House

by A.J. Coltrane

SeattleAuthor brought over Mâche seeds the other day, so it seemed like a good time to make a hoop house to keep the rain off of the seedlings. The hoop house was intended for the front yard, so it had to look decent. I was also targeting the minimum cost that would still allow for a “sound” end result. The finished cost was about $4.

140714 hoop house

Bill of Materials

~8 feet of 1/2″ pvc (black, flexible). Cut into two 4′ pieces. (Of a 100′ roll @ $16. An 8′ length should be comparable in price.)

5′ x 5′  of 4 mil clear plastic sheeting (Of a larger roll. It won’t last forever anyway.)

4 pvc clamps (sold as a bag of 5 for ~$1.60, similar to these)

7/16″ dowel x 4′, cut into 2 @ 10″ and 2 @ 14″. (The EarthBox is shallower on the watering tube side.)

2 clothespins

Assembly

1.  Cut the dowel into four pieces. Cut two ~4′ sections of pvc pipe.

2.  Insert the dowels into each corner of the EarthBox. Slide the pvc lengths over the dowels.

3.  Cover with the plastic sheet and clamp. Pin the extra plastic on the ends with a clothespin. The clothespins can also be used to hold the plastic doors on the ends open.

Done!

—–

The postmortem and assorted thoughts:

I think that there must be a better answer for the clamps, though I didn’t want to spend ~$1 each for good spring clamps. I want something that can easily be moved around, so something like spring clamps would be desirable. Still working on the right answer.

The cost could have been lower — My first thought was to build a wooden frame and attach the pvc to it using clamps. That’s the “normal” way to do it. But then I thought, hey, I can just push the pvc into the soil in each corner of the EarthBox. *Then* I did some looking around online — it appears that toxins from the pvc could potentially (likely?) release into the soil. How to deal with that?

I chose to do something similar to the buried rebar — I purchased some 3/8″ dowels, cut them to 1′ length, and buried the dowels in the corners of the box. I then slid the pvc over the dowels, leaving the pvc above the soil. In retrospect that was a no-brainer, but I was so fixated on the wooden frame/external support idea that it never occurred to me use the area within the EarthBox to anchor the pvc tubing.

I think it’s interesting that if you were to stick wagon wheels on the sides of the hoop house would look a lot like a covered wagon.

covered wagon

That may mean that it was the right way to do it — form follows function, and both the EarthBox and covered wagon have a similar functions.

Or it’s just a coincidence.

———–

I learned something new. The french “a” thingy is alt and numpad 0226.

The Idiot Auburn Fan

by A.J. Coltrane

There was an Auburn fan who stood to make $50,000 last night had they won the national championship.

Rather than hedge his bet he chose to ride it out, even though Auburn was about a 10 point (or 3-1) underdog.

He got zero dollars.

What he could have done would have been to place a $16,500 on Florida State at -330.

Had Florida State won he would end up with $21,500.

Had Auburn won he still would have had $33,500.

Hedging his bet still would have left him with his home-team rooting interest. He didn’t want to “jinx it”. What an idiot.

Mark Your Calendars, Hop Heads of Seattle

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Twelve Breweries, all doing triple IPA’s, all being served at once.

The breweries:

The venues:

I will most likely make at least one of them, you know, just because I don’t do enough to support my local breweries.

More info here.

Beer of the Week: Unita Sea Legs Baltic Porter

By Iron Chef Leftovers

ssdsadweI am always surprised that breweries coming out of Utah are able to make anything resembling good beer, considering the draconian laws they have around alcohol in that state. Breweries like Unita and Epic have really shown that a brewery can both survive and thrive in that environment. Unita does distribute to Seattle and has some pretty good beers, so a trip to Chuck’s where there was one on tap that I had never seen before – Sea Legs Baltic Porter, was a nice surprise.

From the Unita website:

December 18, 2012 SALT LAKE CITY– Uinta Brewing Company introduces the newest addition to their Crooked Line of beers, Sea Legs Baltic Porter. Sea Legs is a limited release, only 1,500 cases were produced.

Complex and drinkable, Sea Legs delivers flavors of roasted malt and chocolate. Sea Legs was aged in Bourbon Barrels for nearly 12 months adding toasted vanilla and bourbon notes to the flavor profile. This Medium-bodied Baltic Porter has a complex malt profile and mild hop bitterness. With a hidden ABV of 8%, Sea Legs is a siren of a beer.

The beer pours jet black with lots of chocolate, licorice and vanilla dominating the nose with roasted barley hiding in the background. The initial sip yields notes of vanilla with hints of roast before moving into a slightly woody/licorice middle and finally finishing with a long chocolate finish with strong notes of licorice. The wood is somewhat unexpected (and wood I mean like pine rather than oak barrel, which is odd since it is aged in bourbon barrels) and the licorice seems slightly out of balance with the other flavors in terms of dominating them, making this somewhat off-putting. It is an interesting beer and might give it another shot, but it definitely wasn’t one that I would run out to try again.

Unita’s Sea Legs Baltic Porter stumbles into port with 2 broken rudders out of 5.

 

A Quick And Simple Cracker Recipe

by A.J. Coltrane

For future reference and before the notes evaporate — the cracker recipe for Iron Chef Leftovers’ big dinner party.

These crackers were served with three cheeses and three chocolates selected by ICL. I wanted to go for a cracker that would have good initial crispness but would have a small amount of chewiness as well. They also needed to taste good on their own but not compete with the cheese and chocolate. I think that overall the crackers fulfilled those goals.

This particular recipe is an amalgam of a bunch of different recipes that I looked through online. I ended up choosing this Alton Brown recipe as a loose template, though they’re still very different:

Ingredient This Recipe Alton Brown
AP Flour 8 oz 4-3/4 oz
Wheat Flour 1-1/2 oz 5 oz
Semolina Flour ½ oz
Table Salt 1-1/2 tsp
Kosher Salt 1-1/2 tsp
Aluminum Free Baking Powder 1-1/2 tsp 1-1/2 tsp
Olive Oil 3 TBP 3 TBP
Water 6 oz 6-1/2 oz
Poppy Seeds 1/3 cup
Sesame Seeds 1/3 cup

Instructions –

1. Knead until the dough *just* comes together and the flour is incorporated. (AB calls for kneading “4-5 times”.) Do NOT knead any further — the goal is develop as little gluten as possible. (More gluten = a chewy cracker, and not in a good way.)

2.  Rest 15 minutes. (So that the flour has a chance to hydrate.) Preheat oven to 450 F.

3.  Cut off 1/8 of the dough. Lightly dust the back of a sheet tray with semolina flour. Roll out the dough as thin as you can. Poke the dough all over with a fork. (So that it doesn’t puff up very much when baked.) Using a pizza wheel, cut the dough into cracker-sized pieces.

4.  Bake for 6 minutes on the first side. Rotate the pan and flip the crackers over. (Work quickly.) Bake 4-6 minutes on the 2nd side. Spread the crackers on a cooling rack to cool. Note that they’ll get crispier as they cool.

—

When we did these we used three sheet trays — one would be baking on the first side, one would be baking on the 2nd side, and one we’d vigorously wave around to cool it off, then prep the next dough to go into the oven.

Tips:

Don’t overwork the dough.

Roll it out super duper thin.

Keep practicing. The recipe makes many batches. By the time you’re on the 5th batch some things will start making more sense and you’ll likely have an “aha!” moment. And then you’ll be done.

Even the less than ideal ones will still taste good.

Feel free to add sesame seeds or poppy seeds or cheese or coarse salt or spices or whatever to make them more interesting. Lightly sprinkle the “topping” over the dough when it’s rolled out and pat it in a little bit. Again, these crackers were intended to be complimentary and not try to hog attention from ICL’s dinner, they’d be somewhat “plain” as-is if eaten solo.

Have fun!