Dessert time! A twist on pumpkin pie

Today I have a bit of a twist if you will, not really but hey its 2010 and people are throwing out phrases all over right? Anyway, today I am presently awaiting my last 30 minutes of baking while I start to write this bit about a lovely pie:

BUTTERSCOTCH PUMPKIN PIE!

It's really not hard to do, the magic is making sure when you melt the butterscotch you don't burn or over cook them prematurely during that melt.

The ingredients:

1 - pie crust, frozen, refrigerated or home made, doesn't matter.

1- can 15 oz of pumpkin pie filler (i use organic)

1 - can 12 oz of evaporated milk (not sweetened)

1 - cup butterscotch flavored chips (like the chocolate chips)

2 - eggs, slightly beaten, do not whip them

1/2 - cup sugar

3 - teaspoons pumpkin pie spice (i use McCormick)

1 - teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1/2 - teaspoon of salt

Preparing:

1: Preheat oven to 425 degrees, prepare pie crust as needed if packaged, place in 9 inch pie plate, deep style preferred

2: Put butterscotch chips in microwave and set for 1 minute on high in a bowl (microwave glass preferred), start, pause and stir every 15 seconds until completely melted.

3: Mix beaten eggs, sugar, pumpkin pie spice, vanilla and salt in a large bowl and wire whisk until well blended. Stir in the pumpkin filler, evap milk and the now melted chips until well blended and smooth smooth smooth!!!

4: Pour mix into pie crust covered pan

5: Bake in oven at 425 for 15 minutes, then reduce temp down to 350F for another 40-45 minutes. (the check: knife inserted 1 inch from crust comes out clean)

6: Cool on wire rack

7: ENJOY

Brown Banana Foster semi instant ice cream, or , cooking Ice Cream with liquid nitrogen

What I have for you this time is a wonderful hot weather friend of ice cream but using a group of flavors that most people are not used to. This recipe utilizes a cream base which also happens to be VEGAN, but there's a twist, the old time CHURN or home made ice cream maker will NOT be used, (i have a solution using such at the end of this article in case you don't or can't follow these steps), we will be using LIQUID NITROGEN to make the CREAMIEST of ice cream. It is the lack of LARGE crystals when freezing that makes Ice cream even creamier, AND since we are FLASH freezing with nitrogen the crystals will be BY FAR much smaller than using a standard churn idea, pretty much instant to boot.

THE FLAVOR: Brown Sugar Banana Foster with Coconut Milk (COCONUT MILK??? I see you raising your nose but stick with me)
Ripe bananas are quite sweet on their own but when mixed with a rich dark molasses based sugar instead of standard white granular sugar you will wonder why you never did this before. But, its what we do with it next is what puts in a WOW factor, we CARMAELIZE the mix. Betcha I have your attention now. Now if that didn't set your mouth watering the next bit will probably twist your head. Instead of the very fattening cows milk for the cream, which also isn't Vegan, we will be adding in another flavor that goes very well with bananas, COCONUT MILK. Coconut milk tones back on the bananas sweetness but the caramelizing sets it all together in a nice yummy stew. You can pick coconut milk up at most grocers today in a bottle etc.

The hard part may be to get the type of sugar used in this which is dark and unrefined, its called JAGGERY! It comes in blocks at my store but may be bagged and ground down as Ive seen over the internet http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaggery
What is Jaggery? Jaggery or Gur is a specific type of unrefined sugar popular in India. It is normally manufactured from either sugar cane or date palms, but recent trends in its manufacture have resulted in jaggery made from the sap of coconut and sago palms. While jaggery is useful in cooking, it is also an ancient part of Ayurvedic medicine and has spiritual significance in India too. The thicker dark molasses in the sugar adds a flavor you are probably not used to but trust me you will love it.
IF YOU CANNOT FIND JAGGERY, you can surely sub in some UNREFINED BROWN SUGAR.

As for the bananas, the ripeness needs to to be pretty high so look for the black specks on the outside before you prepare this.

So, what does this all mean? What I've done is take an old recipe and updated it using new techniques you most likely are not use to doing. Don't let it scare you. Its really fun and you can get everyone to watch it happen right before their eyes, and yours. (well the final phase anyway)

LIQUID NITROGEN COOKING
Yes its actually cooking as LN2 (liquid nitrogen) boils at under 300 below ZERO so in fact you are cooking but with COLD instead of heat. Boiling is just the transfer from liquid to gas state and does not mean HOT as we mostly associate with water boiling.

This is kind of a new fangled thing for many people and I must tell you that it can be dangerous when working with LN2 aka Liquid nitrogen. You're probably asking yourself, you're crazy to play with stuff that can freeze your finger(s) and cause it to shatter. While this is true it doesn't take much to be careful or really much in the way of hardware for handling it. Simple things like a basic small and cheap foam style coolers like what you can get in the quickstop or your local food store, even target and the ever evil walmart carry these for a few dollars in the fishing/camping equipment area.
LN2 (LIQUID NITROGEN SAFETY)
http://cookingissues.wordpress.com/primers/liquid-nitrogen-primer/

WHERE CAN I GET LN2?
you can obtain liquid nitrogen from compressed gas/welding suppliers.
HOW MUCH DO I NEED?
10 liters is enough to transport home with inherent losses and still have 3 or more liters left to cook with within a 24 hour period. LN2 evaporates in any open container, the better more efficient the container the less loss you will have.
REMEMBER, NEVER KEEP IN A SEALED CONTAINER. LN2 is always heating up thus expanding into gas and will cause a sealed container to EXPLODE.

A few other required items are:
A standard counter mixer (like a kitchen-aid etc) with a nice steel bowl and steel paddle mixing blade, do not use one with a plastic mix blade as the liquid nitrogen will destroy it as it freezes. DO NOT USE THE WHISK ATTACHMENT

The plain Styrofoam cooler (medium sized to make pouring easier from the corner)
A pair of Metal mixing bowls (medium to large to hold mix and possibly some LN2)
A metal hand held screen type strainer (to scoop stuff out of the nitrogen)
A metal flat spatula with holes in the blade (as above)
A few medium to large metal spoons (again one with holes like when spooning peas etc)
An oven mitt, not really needed unless the cold from the metal bowls bothers your hands as the metal bowls will get REALLY cold.

(MAKE YOUR OWN DOTS)
Just a simple note, you can make your own dipping dots type ice cream using ANY standard ice cream base, pour into a poultry baster, have a large steel bowl of LN2 ready and drip drops of the base into the LN2 and scoop out. DO NOT EAT THEM YET!!!
YOU MUST PUT THEM IN THE FREEZER TO WARM UP!!!
Yes i know that sounds odd but that's what you need to do or you can really be harmed with severe cold burns in your mouth.
Use a small cup to hold in the freezer over night.

OK enough science and on with the show!

This makes about 3/4 of a liter of ice cream
Since its not a standard cream base it will be a bit HARDER if left in the fridge, so you may want to pull it out a little before you want to eat some after putting in the freezer.

THE PARTS:
6-7 medium ripe bananas (1 1/4 cups of peeled and cut up)1/2 inch cuts
3/4 cup of Jaggery (or brown sugar)
2 cups of Coconut Milk
1/8 tsp of sea salt
1 tsp of dark rum
1/2 tsp of vanilla extract
(optional lemon juice or lemon zest) season to taste after cooking down the mix if you find the mix too sweet

In a broad skillet (wide sauce pan ok) heat the sugar with 1/4 of the coconut milk stirring it until it gets bubbly and smooth.

Add the bananas and the salt stirring occasionally until the bananas cook completely, they should be nice and soft and should take about 5 mins or so.

remove from heat and stir in the rest of the coconut milk, rum and vanilla. This is were you should taste it and see if its TOO sweet for your taste and add the lemon juice if you want. (a few drops is all) I don't add it but not everyone likes the same thing.

At this point you should have a steel bowl ready to receive the mix to cool it down just a bit more. Once its not steaming hot anymore pour into blender and liquefy the mixture, the smoother the better.

Ok, CAREFULLY pour your nitrogen into the cooler from whatever container it came in
Figure in that a chilled cream base of a liter in volume will use a liter of nitrogen to freeze, so since our base is actually kinda warm you will most likely use 2-3 liters of liquid nitrogen.
Take the mix from the blender and put into the table mixers bowl
turn mixer on to medium.
Slowly (and carefully) add in the liquid nitrogen, don't dump in too much as you will harden the mix too much too fast, the airation of the boiling nitrogen will add the air to the ice cream mix so it needs a little time to do its job or else it just freezes the top layer of mix, it WILL FOG UP. So pour a bit and then wait for the fox to lift and check it. Keep an eye on it as you keep adding more nitrogen!
You may want to use a standard stiff metal spatula at this point to scrape the sides of the bowl back into the middle.
Once smooth and creamy (unless you really like HARD ice cream)you can stop adding the nitrogen.
If you find you put too much nitrogen in and its lumpy or hard, stop adding the LN2 and turn up the speed of the mixer for a bit to blend and smooth back the texture a bit.

by the time you put down the cooler, stop the mixer and remove the bowl the nitrogen
will have evaporated and its safe to eat


ENJOY!!

Two notes/additions

1) Some people think it looks kinda UGLY, well, i will say its not a PRETTY color by any means, but most don't seem to care

2) A COOL addition to the mix is to use the nitrogen to flash freeze RASPBERRIES, grab a handful of them and place in a steel bowl of nitrogen for a few seconds. They will freeze harden. lift them out with the screen strainer or a flat metal spatula with the holes in the blade. place them in a paper towel or cheese cloth, cover with same. Then here's the fun part. WHACK THEM WITH A SMALL HAMMER!! or like object (rolling pin) but don't TOUCH them with any skin, it will burn(aka freeze burn). They will split into individual bits of the berries structure. You MUST now wait for them to thaw a bit, you don't want to eat them in this SOLID STATE, wait a few minutes and they will thaw a bit but you don't have to wait until they are completely melted again. put on top or mix in the last seconds of the ice cream chilling

Now one can surely do this with a standard ice cream churn, however changes must be made.
After using the blender to smooth out the base after cooking, place in a steel bowl to fully chill over night, THEN follow your directions for your churn. If you find it too thick when pulling from the fridge then whisk it briskly to loosen a bit before pouring into your ice cream maker.

Boulderdash Ballyhoo's Rantings: 2010 Devolution Resolution or What I did up to the end of the past year

Boulderdash Ballyhoo's Rantings: 2010 Devolution Resolution or What I did up to the end of the past year

2010 Devolution Resolution or What I did up to the end of the past year

Well here it is, another new year with plenty to look forward to such as more houses being reclaimed by banks, more people filing for bankruptcy from lost jobs, higher divorce rates, self included, and even more cars with donut wheels on the highway endangering everyone around them with certain death when it explodes from overheating because they can't afford a new regular tire, it's not looking good out there at all.

As for ole' Boulder, well I'm actually doing a bit better as of late. After a bit of falling down the stairs of life (you know me and stairs, never a good mix) I hit the bottom floor and after a bit of healing and rethinking of things I worked hard and got a few dollars in my pocket and paid a new immigrant to the US to carry me up those stairs on his back. Nothing says America like another white man riding atop the backs of immigrants. 

Boulder feels old:

I have finally reached old guy status, sure I've had the grey hair and the unfortunate typical over 40 gut growing, i do love food, but now i have to use reading glasses. I scoffed at the idea over a year ago when I had the horrible experience with the opto chick who plucked one of my contacts out of my eye without asking, yes, she just reached up to my eyeball and pulled it out, I'm pretty much scarred for life from that, i mean WTF? Anyway, not only did she do that, but she put me in the most damned expensive contacts which never worked correctly. Weekly wear for a discounted $90 per box with 4 lenses per box, min order of 4 boxes. That equates to $180 per month for lenses, more if one goes bad early, so screw that. So i gave up on contacts and went glasses for most of the year. Just recently I switched to a new Doc and he and I are like two peas in a pod on what I need. My sight is great for reading my car dash and pretty much have 15/10 so distance isn't an issue anymore. [Get this tho, the new lenses, are good for 1 to 2 weeks, and come 6 in a box for as little as $24, that's more like it vs the old Dr lens plucker's choice.] Up close now I HAVE to use reading glasses to see anything under arms length, such is the elderly project of life. I did find some frames I really liked and feel they look really good on me, foster grant sells them at Walgreens for $20, but here's were the ol' guy comes in, so i see them and like them, but as i walked through the store i find an end isle sale of the same glasses, minus the FG labels, for 2 for $6, of course the ones I want are not in the magnification I require. But now that I've seen them for so little, I will not pay the $20 for the FG versions. The model # is the same, FG just stamps them and marks them up. Bastards, I guess my frugal ol' man shopping phase has begun.

Lots of my friends from childhood are looking different to me now, most are in the 40 yr club now, a few are migrating into the 50's club this and next year. That hits you pretty hard when you used to know them before they could drink legally. A good part of them have kids and even my aged cousins have kids in college as well as my two year older bro who has 2 in college. A few have only just started families, i guess its a mix, but the ones who started really late, i dunno, its strange to see a kid grad from high school with parents in their 70's.

I lost a few over the past few years too, had my first: They didn't die from an accident or murder death. That was a bit shocking and quite a wake up call.

I become highly irritated by the things people do:

Like in the grocer, its easy to identify people who cant count, they're the ones in front of you in the express lanes, i'm not talking about the immigrants who abuse it and claim no can read, i mean the ones who you know for sure can read, ok well maybe not. 

Found that nothing is more annoying than arguing with someone who knows what he's talking about, damn'd specialized degrees

When your friend or family member eats some food and has that look on their face of, "DAMN that was awful!" then says, "here, try some". The same holds true with the sniff test. It's like, i saw you open the container and your head about ripped off from snapping back so hard and fast, and now you want me to take a wiff? Does this smell bad to you? WTF man?! I dont need direct stimulation like that, i just experienced it vicariously through you, no thanks.

When i use my tire gauge and i let half the air out just trying to get a reading. please someone invent something better, its the 21st century all ready!

And finally, here I was just barely coming to grips with being older than the new James Bond, of which had started me on the path to feeling older, but now, the new Doctor from Dr Who is almost HALF my age. Sumbitch...

Beware, thar be changes ahead arrr:

I am finding many things are changing for me, my job status and position within my clients mainly, I guess my push to be a more proactive partner in their companies is starting to pay off. I am more than just the IT Guru to call when the feces hits the fan, my more preventative plan is being put in place after many many meetings and requests for upgrades and solutions and that has kept me busy outside of my regular channels of [insert cellphone ring here] "hello?"  "HEEEEELLLPP US, ITS A MELTDOWN". I guess being in the OH SHIT end of emergency management for IT has its rewards, keeping busy and when I get paid. I now have fewer clients over all but yet I am busier than ever.  

So what else is new since the last installments: 

1) Younger brother has same type heart attack as Tim Russert, supposedly only 10% survive.. he was in that percentage, BTW he is only 36, life changing event for such a young man 

2) I negotiated some deals and came out smelling pretty good over all, quite happy about that

3) I had to put my A number one special girl down "pepper" after 13 years, man that was a big loss for me, part of my fall down the stairs of life to be sure, I was crushed.  More about this in another post to honor her life. 

4) Met new people, left behind some old ones

5) I treated myself to a nice super duper laptop, yup its really nice, best laptop under 16" LCD there is at the time. Quad Core I7 cpu, ok, maybe a bit too geeky, but i love that kinda crap. the screen is INCREDIBLE, and with blue ray, well,  porn never looked so good. haha, no really, no, hah! Yes thats the model in the pic, with the bag etc it comes with.

6) I really needed (5) after lightning hit my house and damaged the roof, my ham radios, and most of my PC and musical equipment that was plugged in, (another drop down the stairs of life), sucks to not be able to record anything and now I have to wear headphones all the time since it took out my recording studio monitor speakers. F'n lightning is quite the power, note the burned up metal on the cable modem, everything plugged into it and the router is all DEAD. It even burned up the network wires.

7) I was departnered in SL, at the time couldn't really get in due to loss of PC's so its no wonder it went down like it did. I had been a bit disenchanted with SL itself of late too. So much Drama and the economy is effecting the sims to explore so SL was kinda old hat on some levels. Kinda came outta left field when it happened. I was out of town at the time.

8)  Carrying on from above, I got to get out of town a few times, had a super great time there, 1st class flying rocks... learned quite a bit, experienced many new things, worked a lot of hours non the less via remote. Gotta love being able to bill for time away. 

9) Spent Xmas plus 2 weeks away from home, that was an awesome and incredible, even with the new boots I bought that scarred the back of my thighs, yes both of them were cut up from the top lip of the boots, still healing at this time. Again, 1st class ROCKS!!!

10) Rescued a puppy. YAY FOR ME and Mr broken heart from (3) 

OK so that was last week which is really 2010...

 Kai-Anne Samantha chili pepper

She's added quite a spring to my step, usually over the poo in the yard, and she makes me smile incredibly huge! BTW she is quite the chick magnet for you single guys, come to think of it, she even gets the guys too, so single ladies, pay attention.

that's pretty much the meat and potato parts of the later half of 2009

until next time y'all, 

DaBishop Boulder