Curryish Seafood Soup in a Dutch Oven

It was Mother’s Day, and I wanted to cook something both unique and exciting. It had to be low in Weight Watcher’s points (my wife and I are both on that program, now), and it had to be made with what we had on hand (I don’t like to go shopping on Sundays).

So, that’s all a pretty tall order. I looked through the fridge and freezer, and found some proteins (the seafood), a lot of seemingly random veggies in the fridge, and of course, our own pretty well stocked spice cabinet and pantry. I started to get an idea in my head. I would make a tomato-based soup, combining all of the seafood and veggies, and using curry spices. I don’t know that it’s really an “authentic” curry, but it ended up tasting GREAT!  Maybe you could call it “Indian Fusion”... Whatever that means.

Mark's Curryish Seafood Soup

12” shallow Dutch oven
20 + coals below to sautee
14-16 coals below to simmer

1 Tbsp olive oil
2 Medium Onions, diced or sliced
3-4 Stalks Celery, diced
4 Cloves Garlic, minced
1/4 Peanuts, shelled, roasted or not
Salt

4 Cups Poultry stock
1 lb Shrimp, peeled, deveined
1-2 lbs of other seafood, like Salmon and/or tilapia filets
1 6oz Can Tomato paste
1 8oz Can Tomato sauce
1 14oz Can Coconut milk
1-2 8oz Cans Water chestnuts, drained
Cauliflower

Curry powder
Chili powder
Lemon juice
Salt
Pepper
Oregano
Parsley
Tomato powder (optional)

Start out by thawing everything. I keep my homemade stock frozen in old drinking water bottles, so I have to let it melt. The seafood was also frozen.

Once those were thawed, I got some coals on. While they were getting hot, I diced the veggies.  I put the Dutch oven on the coals listed for the saute, and drizzled in the oil. Once that was nice and hot, I tossed in the veggies, stirring them frequently.  The salt helps with the flavor, and it also draws out the moisture. I had read that indian spices are more flavorful if you “activate” them in hot oil for a few minutes first. Next time I do this, I’ll shake in the curry powder as the oil is heating. I’ll see if that makes any difference.

Once the onions are translucent, and the celery is getting a little softer, I added in the the second set of ingredients. I adjusted the coals for the simmering phase. Really, I just let the coals keep burning down, and I don’t replenish them quite as much. If it gets boiling too vigorously, I’ll pull some coals out, or just wait a while before adding any fresh coals.

Also, when I start the simmering phase, I keep the lid on. This traps the heat and helps it get up to boiling a little quicker. After it’s simmering, I take the lid off. I stirred it every 15 minutes or so, breaking up the fish filets, and making sure that the bottom isn’t burning.

After about 45 minutes or so, I added in the flavorings in the final set of ingredients. I went pretty liberal with the spices, etc.  I added a little of each one, then after 10 minutes or so, tasted it, and added any that I thought were lacking. Go easy on the hot pepper/chili powder at first, because you can always add more heat, but you can’t take it out.

I want to explain the tomato powder! About a year ago, I wanted to make some dried tomatoes, like the ones that get packaged in small jars of olive oil. They’re almost fully dried, but not quite. So, I cut up some tomatoes and put them on bread cooling racks in my oven. I set the oven to the lowest possible setting, propped the door slightly open, and went on about my business. Well, I let it go too long, and the poor tomatoes ended up almost burned. But a moment of inspiration hit me, and I ground them up in my blender, and made it into a powder. It has a delicious, smoky tomato flavor!  I like using it a lot, and, in fact, I’m almost out, so I think it’s time to make more!

When the cauliflower is soft, and the flavors are all well-stewed together, you can call it done! Serve it up with some fresh-baked bread!



Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Dutch Oven Shrimp Bisque

Once we went to a really fancy italian restaurant, and my sons both tried the lobster bisque. They had heard some comedian talking about it, so they had to try it. Well, of course, they loved it.

I tasted it, too, and I was really impressed. Naturally, when I’m impressed, I want to try to make it. So, I did some research and found some good recipes. Unfortunately, lobster if quite expensive. I decided to do it with shrimp, which, of course, isn’t cheap, either, but at least it’s not as pricey as lobster.

It has a lot of steps, but it’s very flavorful, because of the shrimp stock you make!

2x 12” Dutch oven

each with 20+ coals below

2-3 lbs shrimp
6-8 cups water
1 14 oz can tomato paste

1 1/2 medium onion
3-4 stalks celery, including leaves
3-4 carrots

fresh parsley
salt
pepper
chili powder
lemon juice

6 cups heavy cream
1/4 cup cornstarch


There are a few ways you could approach this bisque. One way is to use uncooked, unshelled shrimp. Another is to use shrimp that are uncooked, deveined (but still in the shell). A third is to use whole shrimp, complete with the heads. The more stuff that comes with the shrimp, the more flavor you’ll have in your stock. It’s more work, but I’d recommend the whole shrimp. It doesn’t really make a lot of difference how big the shrimp is, either. For this instance, I used uncooked, unshelled shrimp (no heads) that are about the size you normally see in shrimp platters.

I started out with one of my 12" shallow Dutch ovens, covered, with the water.  Once the water was boiling, I tossed in the shrimp and watched them turn that sweet pink\orange shade and curl. If you cook the shrimp too long, they get all rubbery. Once they were done, I pulled them out of the water, but left the Dutch oven on the coals.

Then, I doused them in cold water while I peeled the shells, tails, and deveined them. I threw away the veins, of course, but the shells and tails (and heads if you’ve got them) all went back into the stock to boil some more.  I set aside the shrimp meat, reserving it for later. Once all the shrimp shells and parts were happily boiling away, I added the tomato paste.

I put the lid on and let that boil for a long time. How long? Well, that kinda depends on how much time you have. The longer it boils, the more flavorful the stock. I let it go for about an hour.

As that time was nearing an end, I got a second dutch oven on some coals, with just a bit of oil in the bottom, and I started dicing up the veggies in the second set of ingredients. I tossed those in the second Dutch oven and cooked them until they were quite soft. Then, I took them off the coals and mashed them with the back of a slotted spoon. It will be a coarse mash, and that’s OK.

Then, I strained out all of the garbage out of the stock, and added the smooshed veggies. Then I added in all of the seasonings in the third set of ingredients. Finally, I added in the cream and let it heat and simmer for about another half hour. As it was simmering, I made a slurry of the cornstarch and water, enough to make it very loose and runny (no clumps). I added that in, about a tablespoon at a time, to thicken the bisque. A hint: give some time in between each dose of starch for it to effect the soup, otherwise, you’ll add too much.

Finally, just before serving, I stirred the shrimp meat back into the soup so that it could come back up to serving temperature, and started ladeling out the bowls! It was delicious! I think it would also be great to serve in a bread bowl...



Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Dutch oven Salmon and Asparagus Hollandaise

The other day, as I was planning out my month of Dutch oven dishes, I had a very clear idea in mind as to what I was going to cook this last Sunday. Very clear, that is, until my wife spoke up.

“I want salmon!”  She said with a finality that unlaid my best laid plans. “Salmon with asparagus and a hollandaise sauce! With poofy rolls.”

Well, I was more mouse than man.  It was an easy choice, really, especially since I was intrigued with the idea, especially of the sauce.  I’d never done a Hollandaise.  I wasn’t even certain if I’d tasted one before.  I wondered about that out loud.

“It shouldn’t be too difficult.”

Yeah?  How do you do it?

“Just buy one of those little packets.”

Oh, no.  Nonono.  No.  This is my chance to learn learn something new and test myself.  I’m not going to just “buy a little packet”.

It worked out quite well.  I did learn a lot about the sauce. One very important thing I learned was that it’s crazy to do a Hollandaise sauce outdoors in a dutch oven in the middle of winter.

But, as I said, it all turned out well.

Dutch oven Salmon and Asparagus Hollandaise


The Salmon and Asparagus

12” Shallow Dutch oven
22+ coals below
10-12  coals above, later in the recipe

1 large filet of fresh salmon, cut into 2-3” wide chunks
Juice of 4-5 limes
1/2 cup fresh cilantro
1/2 cup fresh parsley
Salt
Pepper
Paprika
Chili powder

3-4 fresh asparagus spears per guest
olive oil
kosher salt


The Rice

10” Dutch oven
14-16 coals below, maybe more

1 1/2 Cups rice
3 cups water or stock
1/2 cup fresh cilantro
1/2 cup fresh parsley
2 2 oz packages of sliced almonds
Juice of two limes


The Hollandaise Sauce

8” Dutch oven
12+ coals below
glass or metal bowl, slightly larger than the Dutch oven

Water

4 egg yolks
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted (1 stick)
Pinch cayenne
Pinch salt


I cut the salmon into chunks and put them into a ziptop baggie, along with all the flavorings in the first set of the list.  I shook that all up to coat the salmon evenly, and let it sit in the fridge for an hour or so, while I did other things, like making the biscuits.  I used just an ordinary biscuit recipe, and added shredded cheddar and minced garlic to the dough.  I’ll write it up someday, but for now, my focus is on the other parts of the main dish.

I prepared the rice next.  I put all of those ingredients into the 10” Dutch oven and put that on the proper number of coals.    I watched it while I cooked the salmon and other things, and marked when it boiled.  About 10-15  minutes after, I pulled it off the coals, without opening the lid, and let it steep and steam while the other parts of the dish finished.

The salmon was the third part to go on.  I put a little olive oil in the bottom of my 12” shallow Dutch oven, and set it on the coals.  I wanted it to get VERY hot.  When I laid the salmon pieces in it, the sizzling and the immediate aroma let me know how good it was going to taste!

After a few minutes, when the down side of the fish had a little browning going on, I turned the pieces over with some tongs, and closed up the lid.  I had a lot of salmon in the pot, so it wasn’t cooking too fast, even though it was initially quite hot.  With the lid on, I put some coals on top just to let it bake a bit.

I shook the asparagus in a baggie with the seasonings in its list, and laid them across the top of the salmon pieces, then replaced the lid.

Finally, to turn my attention to the Hollandaise.

I started by separating the eggs, and putting the yolks in a glass bowl I had pre-fitted to my 8” Dutch oven.  I’ll show you how they match up in a minute.  Before I began, I put about a cup of water in the Dutch oven and put it on the coals with the lid on.  I juiced in the lemon, and I began whisking. I had to whisk for quite a while.  It blends, but for a long time it doesn’t really change much, but then suddenly, it goes from a very runny, almost orange, liquid, to a light yellow, thick creamy texture.

By then, the water was boiling outside.  Here’s where there is a lot of compromise going on. On the one hand, you don’t want it to be too hot, and a vigorous rolling boil is too hot.  On the other hand, it’s freezing cold out, and I’ll have to overcome that.  I took off the lid and set the glass bowl over the Dutch oven.  I had chosen the bowl to cover the dutch oven like a lid, but to not have the bottom rest in the boiling (or simmering) water.  I knew that the bowl wouldn’t seal completely, so the boiling water would cool very quickly.

With the bowl on the Dutch oven, over the simmering water, I continued whisking, constantly whisking.  The idea is to “temper” the egg, that is, to raise the temperature slowly, so that it cooks, but it doesn’t scramble.  I poured in the melted butter, gradually, while still whisking.  I had no idea how hot it should be, or how it would look.  Eventually, however, it did heat up, and it went from a smooth, creamy texture, to a slightly thicker, creamier texture.  Along the way I added in the pinch of salt, paprika, and cayenne.

By the time I was done with that, the salmon and asparagus were done, and the rice was waiting for us as well.  I spooned out a serving of the rice, and laid the salmon pieces on top of that.  The asparagus went to the side, but also still on the rice.  Then across it all, I drizzled the Sauce.  Finally, the biscuit made the meal complete.

Did it work?  My wife said that it was better than any restaurant.  I love it when she says that!

Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

The Seafood Feast Part II- Dutch Oven Mussels

For a long time, now, my family have frequented a certain Chinese/Asian buffet house.  They have great food, and the people who run it are wonderful.  We love their more traditional Chinese dishes, and we also love their sushi. Brendon particularly likes their unagi.

They have one dish that I love, that I had vowed to attempt. I don’t know just how authentically Chinese it is, but I love the taste!  I also vowed that when I attempted it, I would not duplicate it, but would rather explore it on my own!

It is a mussel, cooked in its own half-shell, with a layering of cream cheese and a sprinkling of cheddar on top.  I did some research, and found out a lot about cooking and working with mussels.  I cooked this the same day as the smoked salmon of the previous blog entry. It was a bit tricky working both dishes at the same time, but in the end they really complemented each other. Here is my experience:

Dutch Oven Three-Cheese Baked Mussels

12” Dutch oven

Steaming: 22+ coals below
Baking: 8-10 coals below, 18-20 coals above

• 2x 8 oz bricks cream cheese 
• 2-3 Tablespoons sun dried tomato 
• Parmesan cheese 
• herbs (I used thyme and rosemary)
• chives
• salt 
• lemon zest 
• chili powder 
• grated cheddar cheese

• 3-4 lb live mussels
• 1 cup water
• ½ cup apple cider vinegar

The Rice

8” Dutch oven

10-12 coals below

• 1 cup long-grain rice
• 2 cups liquid (from the mussels - add water as needed)
• Juice of 1 lemon

Because there would be relatively little time once the cooking got started, the first step was to prepare the cheese topping. I just added all the items on the list together and mixed it upwith a fork.  Because of the ingredients I chose, it really ended up being much more Mediterranean in flavor, rather than Chinese.  Still, I think it tasted great!

I don’t really remember the exact amounts of each flavoring item.  I added things at the top of the list in slightly greater quantities than the things at the bottom (chili powder being the least of all), but really, I just mixed it all and tasted it as I went.  While I did add some Cheddar to the overall mix, I didn’t add much, as I knew that more would be sprinkled on top later.

The coals were already started for the salmon, so I didn’t have to get anything set aside special for this dish.  I just had to make sure that there were enough getting white to accommodate.  While that was happening, I started to clean the mussels. I got them into my sink, and scrubbed each one down, on both sides of the shell, with a plastic brush.  Many of them had a little stringy substance dangling out between the two shell halves.  This is called the “beard”, and I scraped that off with a knife.

I’d read to remove those that were opened. The instructions said that those were dead already.  That’s a little tricky to say, because there were quite a few that were slightly opened, that would close up again after we had separated them out.  I guess those ones weren’t so dead.  There were many, however, that were quite clearly open, and quite clearly dead.  I removed those.

There were a lot of them to clean.  About half-way through the process, I got the water and the cider in the bottom of the 12” Dutch oven, and I got that started on the coals, covered.  I wanted to get it boiling.

By the time I was completely finished cleaning all the mussels, it was boiling.  I just unceremoniously dumped them all in, stirred them up a bit, and closed the lid.  It didn’t take long, maybe ten minutes, to steam them open.  I’d read that you shouldn’t overcook them, especially at this stage.

I brought them in, off the coals, and drained them in a colander, retaining all the liquid for the rice.

I began the process of assembling the final half shells.  Here’s how it went:

• First, I pulled the shells open.  Usually, one of the shells (the “top”) was free of meat, and the other (the “bottom”) held the mussel.  I broke them apart, and discarded the top.
• Then, I took an knife and ran it under the meat, cutting the attachment between it and the shell.  There’s one spot where it clings pretty tight, and it makes it much easier to eat if that’s severed. Still, I kept the meat in the shell bottom.
• Next, I spread a bit of the cheese mix onto the shell and over the meat.  Not too much, it’s not there to smother, but to complement the meat.
• Finally, I placed the shell into the bottom of the 12” Dutch oven. I kept repeating this whole process until they were all done. There were a lot of shells, so I had to pack them in pretty tight.
• Finally, finally, I sprinkled on a layer of grated cheddar.

I put on the lid, and set it on some coals to bake.

Now, keep in mind that while I’m doing all of this, I’m constantly checking on the coals and the chips for the smoking salmon, and making sure that there are plenty of coals in the replenishing fire for the mussels.

I also took some time during the prep time to set the rice.  I measured the liquid I had drained off the mussels after the steaming.  I had read that the mussels would release a lot of their own liquid as they cooked, and that would be a good flavoring broth.  That, combined with the water, and the cider, and I had just under 2 cups. A little more water topped it right off.  This, along with 1 cup of rice, went onto the coals to cook.

A little bit after I had set the mussels on to bake, I could see the steam venting from under the lid of the 8” Dutch oven.  I let it go for about 5 more minutes, and then pulled it off the coals to finish steaming in its own residual heat.  Don’t take off the lid to check it!

The mussels in the 12” Dutch oven didn’t bake long.  You don’t want to overcook the meat.  You just want to heat up the cheese mixture, and melt the cheddar on top. I let it go about 10-20 minutes from the time I put it on.

I served it up with a few mussels on the plate, next to a bed of the rice, with a big cut of smoked salmon atop the bed.  It looked and tasted delicious, and I felt like I had really accomplished something.  I had done two dishes, one with a new technique, and another with a new main ingredient, neither of which I had ever tried before, and they were both successes.  That’s a good, good feeling!





Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Dutch Oven Seafood Feast, Part 1 - Smoking Salmon

A long time ago, I was surfin’ the ‘net, looking for some Dutch oven ideas, and I came across one called outdoorcooking.com.  One of the blog postings was all about smoking salmon in a Dutch oven.  When I first saw that I had one of those Sit-Back-And-Slap-Your-Forehead moments.  I knew that someday, I would try it.

This last weekend, I did.  In fact, I tried a couple of seafood dishes that had been stacking up in my queue.  Even though I cooked them simultaneously, I’ll write about them separately.

Now, not only was I trying out two dishes that I had never before tried, I was also trying a technique I had never even seen before.  Add to that the other dish was mussels, which I had no experience with, either, and my confusion and stress levels were high enough.

Then, to make matters worse, I invited my neighbors over!  What was I thinking? Didn’t I say, “Never cook a first time dish for friends”?  Yeah, well, I don’t take my advice, either.

So, I liked this guy’s idea for putting the chips under aluminum foil and a grill. But what if, I thought, you need to add more chips?  This was my idea:  Inside a larger Dutch oven, put a smaller Dutch oven lid, inverted, on a lid stand.  Chips go below, salmon on the lid, larger lid on top, propped open...   Boom.  Dutch oven smoker.

...But I had no idea if it would work.  Would it get hot enough to smolder the chips?  Would it be too hot so as to fast cook the salmon? I had no idea.


Dutch Oven Smoked Salmon

14” Deep Dutch oven
10” Dutch oven lid, with a lid stand

40 + coals below

• 1 Salmon piece (~8 oz) per serving (I did about 7)
• Salt
• Pepper
• Any herbs you like (I used Thyme)
• 1 Lemon

• Smoking chips

I started by lighting up some coals.  I wanted to try out the setup, before I actually put the salmon on, to see if it would smoke.  I put the 14” on a monster boatload of coals.  I gave a rough count, and it was about 45.  I scattered a layer of dry smoking chips  (I used applewood) on the bottom.  On top of that, I put an oven thermometer.  I wanted to be able to monitor things.

I have a bent piece of wire, about ⅛ of an inch in diameter. I hooked that over the edge, and put the lid on. That raised the lid enough to vent.  I set that aside, and checked the temperature from time to time.

In the meantime, I prepared the salmon.  I trimmed off the skin, and shook some salt, pepper and herbs on each piece, both sides.  I left that to sit.

It took a while to heat up the Dutch oven, but once it did, I was very pleased to see smoke pouring out when I went to check it. The interior temperature was about 250, so that was also perfect for smoking. I put the lid stand in the middle of the Dutch oven, and put the lid on the stand, inverted.  I put the salmon on the resultant platform, and set the lid back on. Just to be sure I did it right, I put a short-stemmed meat thermometer in one of the thicker parts of salmon. I also left the oven thermometer in.

From that point on, I just checked the smoke, the temperatures, and the salmon every 30-40 minutes. It fluctuated as high as 350 and as low as 200. I tried to keep it lower. I did add coals, but after a while, I found it wasn’t as necessary to keep as many on to maintain good temperatures or smoke.  I did add some chips at one point because I saw it not smoking as much.  I just sprinkled them in through the gap between the lid and the wall of the 14”.

Finally, after about 2 hours, the meat temperature read about 170.  It was done!  And I served it up on the rice in part 2 of this writeup.

It was really, really, really delicious.






Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Dutch Oven Crayfish Boil

Recently, we had one of the most amazing, fun, and delicious family experiences in a long time.  We went Crawdad catching, and then had a Cajun crayfish boil and feast.

Let me interject here, that I don’t really know what to call them:  Crawdads?  Crawfish?  Crayfish?  Mud bugs? Lil’ Lobster Mini-me’s?  I think Crayfish sounds more “dignified” and “crawdad” sounds more bayou.  My kids liked the sound of “crawdad” better, so that’s what we ended up calling them.

Then I faced another difficult problem. Not only did I not know what to call them, I also didn't know how to cook them!  I surfed all over the ‘net looking for advice and recipes.  There was plenty.  Too much, in fact.  Too much contradiction, to be exact.  Everyone said that their way of doing it was the only way of doing it.

Normally, when I encounter that, I just brush it all off as folklore, and do a kind of hybrid of everyone’s recipes.  But the contradictory information was more of the type that scared me.  If you do it this way, then your crawdads will die, and you don’t EVER eat crawdads that died before you killed them!  Don’t do this, don’t do that!  It was all quite frustrating and confusing.

In the end, it all worked out.

Dutch Oven Cajun Crawdad Boil

2x 14” Deep Dutch ovens

A whopping LOT of coals underneath each one.

• A whole lot (15-20 lbs) live crayfish
• 1 carton salt
• A lot of water

• 1 Tbsp black pepper
• 1 Tbsp coriander
• 1 ½ Tbsp cloves
• 1 ½ Tbsp allspice
• ¼ lb kosher salt
• 3 Tbsp cayenne pepper
• 2 Tbsp garlic powder
• 1 Tbsp thyme
• 1 Tbsp oregano
• 1 Tbsp dry mustard
• 6 bay leaves, crushed
• A lot more water

• 4 onions, sliced
• 2 heads garlic, broken apart, not peeled
• 3 jalapenos, sliced

• 3 lbs potatoes, in 1” sections
• 8 ears corn, broken in half
• 1 lb sausage (andouille, or smoked), cut into ½” pieces

I won’t go into the catching, here.  That will go for another time.  In this place, we’ll just talk about the cooking.

I started with the crawdads.  The first thing I did was to “purge” them.  The idea is to make them sick so they purge out their guts before you try to eat them.  I filled up the cooler where I had them stored with water, and shook in about a half of one of those cylindrical cardboard cartons of salt.  Right away, the crawdads reacted, swimming and thrashing around in the water.

I drained it, and then repeated the process.  At the time, I was nervous about killing them, but it turns out that you have to try REALLY HARD to kill them.  Like, dropping them in seasoned, boiling water.  Salt may freak them out, but it doesn’t kill them.  Yet.

Then, I filled it up again, and drained it again, without salt.  I repeated that clean rinsing process again.  Next time, I’m going to do that many, many more times, to clean them more thoroughly.

While, I was doing the “salt, rinse, repeat” thing, I also got out the Dutch ovens, and started up the coals.  Once the coals were basically hot, I put the dutch ovens on and filled them about ¾ of the way with water.  I put the lids on, because water boils better in Dutch ovens with the lids on.  I also knew that it was going to take a long time to boil that much water.

I mixed up the spices, and began cutting the veggies while I waited for the water to boil.  The spices I split into half, and put half in each dutch oven.  I put one head of garlic (broken up) into each pot, and I put two sliced onions in one of the pots.  I suppose i could have done the whole thing with just one Dutch oven, but one of our friends that we had invited over is allergic to onions.  So, my thought was to make one pot without onions, and one with.  The recipe listed above says 4 onions, though, 2 in each pot.  You do it how you want to.

I kept the coals replenished, and as hot as could be.  Before long, the water was simmering, and then boiling.  Once the boil was going, I put in the potatoes, sausage, and corn.  As soon as I did that, of course, it stopped boiling.  I put the lids back on and let it come back up to a good stead boil.  I let it cook until the potatoes were soft enough to eat, and the corn looked bring yellow.

Finally came the moment we’d all been waiting for.  Using my food tongs (not my coal tongs), I started grabbing the crawdads and dropping them into the boiling pots.  I tried to keep them even between the two.  I don’t know that it mattered a whole lot, though.  They turned this rich red/brown almost immediately.  I put the lids back on and let them come back up to a boil for a little bit, mostly to give the spices time to infuse in the meat.  Finally, I used a strainer to scoop out the crawdads, and the corn, potatoes, and sausage.

Traditionally, you serve crawdads poured directly on to a newspaper-covered tabletop.  We actually used dishes.

After only a few, I got the hang of eating them.  I would grab the crawdad tightly between the tail and the shell, and twist the tail off.  I would pinch pretty hard, so as to not get so much of the guts in the body.  Then, I’d crack off the first one or two segments of shell on the tail.  Gripping the end of the tail between my thumb and forefinger, I squeezed while tugging the meat out with my teeth.  I never built up the courage to suck out the head, like some real cajuns do. There’s not much meat in the tail.  Fortunately, that’s why you cook up so many of them!

After every few crawdads, I’d pause and eat a few potatoes, onions, or corn cobs.  Oh, and the sausage.  Those were all delicious.  It was the first time I’d tasted corn that sweet and spicy!

Even though it all tasted delicious, at the end of it all, this was not so much a dish to cook, as it was a whole experience for the family to savor.  It was one that we’ll remember for a very long time!







Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

A Big Dutch Oven Steak and Crab Feast

I wanted to do something really, amazingly, phenomenally over-the-top special for our anniversary this year.  It marked 24 years that she hasn’t kicked my sorry butt out on the curb.  That’s cause for celebrations.

I’d seen some videos on how to pan fry steak, and I was really interested in that.  I started to form an idea in my mind about doing the pan fry on steaks with a spice rub.  I figured I would steam some corn on cob, too.  Then, I started thinking, and I figured I could do some of those garlic sliced, sesame seed baked potatoes.  To top it all off, we had some crab’s legs in the freezer, so that would make it great, too!

My wife loves T-bone steaks, so I shopped around, looking for some good, thick, porterhouses.  I did find some, but they weren’t really as thick as I like.

The challenge for me was to cook it all in a limited time frame.  I would be coming home from work by about five, and I would want to have it done when it was still light out.  That only gave me a 2-3 hour window to cook an serve the whole meal.

In my planning, I started out by figuring out how the ovens would work.  I would do the corn and the crab together in the 12” deep dutch oven, and the potatoes and the steaks each in their own 12” shallow dutch oven.  When planning the time, I started from the end, and went through the steps of each dish in my mind, to see when I’d have to start each one.

Dutch Oven Pan-Fry T-Bone Steaks

12” dutch oven
26-30 coals below (pack ‘em in!)

• 1 Tbsp cumin
• 1 Tbsp crushed coriander
• 1 Tbsp garlic powder
• 1 Tbsp coarse ground black pepper
• 1 Tbsp thyme
• 2 Tbsp paprika
• 2 Tbsp salt
• 1 tsp oregano

• 2-3 T-bone steaks
• 2-3 cloves minced garlic
• A little olive oil

• 1 Cup Cranberry/grape juice (100% juice) at room temperature
• 1-2 tablespoons flour dissolved in water.

The Potatoes

12” Dutch oven

8-10 coals below
16-18 coals above

• 4-5 medium to large potatoes
• 4-5 cloves garlic
• olive oil
• Kosher salt
• sesame seeds

Steamed Crab and Corn on the Cob

12” deep dutch oven

~20 coals below

• 3-4 cobs of corn, chucked, broken in half
• 2-3 racks of crab’s legs
• 3-4 cups Water
• ½ cup lemon juice

Butter Dip/spread for the Crab/Corn

8” dutch oven

10-12 coals below

• 2 cubes butter
• extra spice rub

I started out with the thawed steaks.  Actually, I never froze them.  I brought them home a day or so before and put them straight into the fridge.  I mixed up the spices in a zip-top baggie, and then added each steak, one at a time.  I shook the spices all over the steak, and then shook off the excess when I pulled it out.  I did the same with the other two steaks.  By the way, this is the same spice mix that I used for my blackened salmon many years ago.

I set the steaks aside in the fridge, covered in plastic.  It would be about another hour before they’d be cooked.  That gave the flavorings plenty of time to set into the meat.

Then, I started on the potatoes.  Step one was to peel the garlic and slice it into thin slivers.  Then I took the potatoes, and I washed and rinsed them  I cut them almost all the way through in narrow strips, so that it could fan open a little bit.  Then, in every other slice or so, I inserted a sliver of garlic,  I alternated between the middle and the right and left sides, so that it would separate in different and unique ways.  Really, it’s tough to describe this process.  It’s better to look at the picture.  As each potato was sliced and garlic’ed, I put it in the dutch oven.

Once all the potatoes were prepped, I drizzled each one with a bit of olive oil, then sprinkled over them with kosher salt and sesame seeds.  It really makes for an impressive display.  I put that on the coals to bake.

Next to go was the corn and the crab.  I chucked, cleaned, and broke the cobs, and put them on one of those butterfly-ing steamers in the 12” deep dutch oven.  I added the crab on top.  I poured in enough water to reach the bottom of the steamer, and poured in the lemon juice.  I put the lid on, and put it on the coals.

The last step was the steaks.

I began by putting the 12” dutch oven, with just a little oil, on a lot of coals.  I wanted this thing to be seriously hot.  Have lots of coals on the side handy, too, because keeping it hot with the steaks on will also be a challenge.

After heating the dutch oven pan up for a while, I put the steaks on.  The aroma and the sizzle was almost unbearably good.  At first, I kept the lid off.  In retrospect, I would keep the lid on, however, because it took a long time to get the meat up to temperature.  After 6-7 minutes, I flipped the steaks over, and at that point, stuck in the thermometer.  Like I said, it took a while to get them up to even rare, so I ended up putting the lid on, without coals.

When it read just a little under 140, I pulled them off, and put them on a plate, tented under aluminum foil.  Always let meat rest before serving.  By the time we were dining, it came up to a nice medium done-ness.

In the meantime, I poured the cranberry juice into the same dutch oven that the steaks had been in.  While it sizzled, I used a wooden flipper to scrape up all the fond, the bits of cooked steak and carmelized stuff on the bottom.  I had pulled the juice from the fridge, so I think it took a little longer to boil and to start reducing.  I added the flour/water mix a little bit at a time to thicken it up.

While I was doing that, I put the butter and some of the remaining spice mix into the 8” dutch oven over coals to melt and blend.

Finally, it was all done.  We brought it all in, and served it up.  The pan sauce, of course, spread on the steak. It gave sweetness and tang, and blended well with the seasonings and the flavor of the meat. The seasoned butter was spread on the corn as well as used to dip the crab meat.  It was a major, four-star feast!




Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Dutch Oven Salmon with Potatoes and Asparagus

OK, I did it. I cooked asparagus, and I even liked it. Yes, there I admitted it. I even called my Mom and told her and Dad about it. They thought that was pretty funny. Dad said I was finally growing up.

I also learned something about my "dry-roasting" cooking technique. I first tried it when I did the jerk chicken , and again when I did the pseudo-Indian chicken. The basic idea is that a dutch oven cooks by trapping the steam and the heat. The heavy lid traps all the moisture in. That's great with almost everything you cook, but once in a while, you want to cook something that's a bit dryer, something that sets seasonings in a glaze or something like that. You don't want to trap the moisture. I don't know what to call it, so I'm calling it "dry-roasting".

To make it work, you put something under the lid to lift it up. I found a thin metal grill that I could place under the lid. It lifted the lid, but not much. That way, the moisture escaped. I found, however, that a lot of the heat did, too. I'm sure that the fact that it was a windy and cold day today didn't help much, either.

But in order to make it work, you have to up the coals SIGNIFICANTLY. I put a thermometer in the bottom of the dutch oven while I was cooking the potatoes, and found that I needed to almost double the coals in order to get the kind of heat needed. I liked the results of cooking that way. It does lose a lot of heat that would have normally been trapped, however.

Dutch Oven Salmon with Potatoes and Asparagus

12" dutch oven

In the dry-roasting phase: 25 + coals each above and below
In the final baking phase: 10-12 coals below, 18-20 coals above.

• 4-5 medium to large potatoes
• Olive oil
• parsley
• salt
• Pepper
• 1-2 cloves of garlic, minced

• Fresh Asparagus, about 4-5 sprigs per serving
• Olive Oil
• Salt
• Lemon pepper or lemon zest and pepper

• 1 fresh Salmon fillet
• 1 bundle green onions, chopped
• dill
• 1 lemon, sliced

I started out by lighting up the fire. That was a bit of a challenge as windy as it was, but eventually I had coals getting white. While those got ready, I got to cleaning the potatoes. The original recipe I drew this from called for baby potatoes. That would have been yummy. But I didn't have any. So, I used regular potatoes, quartered and then sliced in the cube-like chunks.

I put them in a bowl, and dashed over some olive oil, then all of the other seasonings and flavorings. I shook it in the bowl and mixed them all up.

Then I went out and put the oven on the coals to pre-heat some. I spritzed a little extra oil in the bottom. I don't know that I needed to, but I did. Once the oven was a bit hot, I put in the potatoes. I let those cook for a while, using the dry-roasting technique described above, until they got good and seared on all sides, and the seasonings were clinging to them. Since I was playing with the temperature, it took a little longer, but I think in normal conditions, it should take about 30 minutes or so, with a couple of stirrings.

While that was happening, I was preparing the asparagus and the salmon.

The asparagus was easy enough. I cut off about the bottom third of the asparagus, 'cause I remembered the bottom being the nastiest part when I was a kid. I put the sprigs into a bag with just a splash of oil and the salt and lemon stuff. I didn't have any lemons today, so I just used lemon pepper. I shook it up to coat the asparagus sprigs.

Then, I cut the salmon fillet into four big pieces (that's how many would be eating). I sprinkled on the dill, scattered over the chopped green onions, and put a lemon slice on each one. Actually, today I used lime slices, 'cause that's what I had handy instead.

I took all that out to the ovens. I took off the lid and the grill separator, and added the asparagus to the now delicious looking potatoes. and stirred them together. I laid the salmon fillet pieces in on top of those, and put the lid on solid. I readjusted the coals as above, and began baking the salmon and asparagus with the potatoes.

Because it's still quite hot, it didn't take long to cook the salmon, maybe only about 15-20 more minutes or so. At that point the asparagus was "al dente", as my Dad said. It was definitely cooked, but it wasn't wilted. It was still a bit cruncy, resisting your teeth a bit. The oil had kept the seasonings tight to the stalks, and tight to the potatoes, so those were quite yummy, and the salmon was delicious, too.

This meal really turned out four-star, if I do say so myself.

Dutch Oven Seafood Chowder - Without a Net

Today, I made Seafood Chowder. It would have been clam chowder, but we were out of those little cans of clams, and instead we had the little cans of crab and shrimp (about the size of tuna cans, you know. Same stuff).

What made it very interesting was that I made it without a recipe. With only my brainz as my guide. It was very exciting to fly without a net, so to speak, and to have it turn out so well.

I used the Roux base that Steven had shown me a few weeks ago, and just treated it a little bit differently, since I wasn't making a cheese sauce. I know, I know... Once I get a hold of something hot, I don't let up, do I?

Anyway, since I didn't have a recipe, I'm just going to talk you through it.

The first thing I did, after lighting up some coals, was get out one of my smaller dutch ovens and get it on top of about 15 coals or so, so it was getting good and hot. Into it, I put a half of a one-pound package of bacon, cut and separated into little squares. That started cooking.

Once that was going, I got out my 12" dutch oven, which was the one that I was going to do the actual chowder in, and got it on some coals, probably closer to 20. I had diced up some onions, and minced up some garlic (a couple of cloves) and I got that browning in that 12 dutch oven. At this point, there were no lids on, and, obviously, no coals on top.

While that was cooking, I was in the kitchen, quartering and slicing the potatoes, and slicing some celery. I did about four potatoes, and three or four stalks of celery.

Pretty soon, the bacon was nice and crisp, and the onions were starting to brown. It was a pretty cheap grade of bacon, so there was lots of grease left in the smaller dutch oven. I pulled the bacon out and put it in with the onions, and left the drippings. To that, I added some flour. You don't want to add it too quickly, because you could easily add too much. I added until it was a little runnier than cookie dough. I just let it cook.

I wanted to see what happened as you cook a roux longer and longer, so I let it go for a while. It gradually got more and more brown. Finally, I saw that it was getting nice and tanned, so I pulled that dutch oven off the coals.

In the meantime, the onions, garlic, and bacon were still browning nicely in the other dutch oven. I added a pint carton of cream, and about half that much of milk, maybe less. To help it to boil, I put the lid on.

Once it was boiling, I added the potatoes, the celery, and three little cans of seafood, with the liquid. I figured the seafood stock in the cans would enhance the flavor. Once it was boiling again, I added some of the roux, about a tablespoon at a time, stirring vigorously to break it up in the soup. I watched carefully after each tablespoonful of roux for a minute to check the thickness before adding more. If it goes too thick, I guess you can always just add more milk, but I don't want to catch myself adding and adding to catch up with myself over and over again.

Pretty soon, it's nice and thick, but still more of a soup than a sauce. You can make it how you like it.

At that point, I added some parsley, some salt and pepper (to taste on all three), and also some lemon juice. Then I pulled some of the coals out from under so that it would go from boil to simmer, and put the lid back on.

I would check it about every 15 minutes, just to check the taste and the done-ness of the potatoes. It didn't take long, maybe 45 minutes to be done.

While that was happening, I made some homemade bisquick and then some Red Lobster-style garlic cheese biscuits in another 12" dutch oven. I'll write about those tomorrow or Tuesday.

Dutch Oven Mongolian Stir Fry

There are some local Chinese restaurants here in Salt Lake City that do something called “Mongolian Stir Fry" (sometimes: "Barbecue”). You get a bowl and you go through this line like a buffet. First you pass the meats. There’s all these meats that are sliced really thin, almost like potato chips. Beef, pork, chicken, and others are all there. Then you go past noodles and vegetables. You get to choose what you want, and you put it all in your bowl. Then you get to pour in all kinds of sauces, and add garlic and hot sauce if you like.

Then you hand it off to a chef (who, in Salt Lake City, is usually Mexican, it seems. Go figure…), and they put it on this big round metal disc like a table, heated with gas from below. They flip it and toss it. If you’re lucky, you get a chef who’s a bit showy about it. Finally, in a whoosh, they scrap the cooked food off the cooking table and onto your plate and hand it to you, ready to eat.

I love it. It’s great food, and fun to watch. One thing I love about it is, like wokked stir fry, the veggies are cooked, but still crisp.

So, I got to thinking that I could do that, too, in my dutch oven. And today, I tried it.

Dutch Oven Mongolian Stir Fry

8” Dutch Oven
12” Dutch Oven

8-10 coals each above and below 8” dutch oven
20+ coals below 12” dutch oven

In the 8”

• 2 cups chicken Broth
• 1 cup rice
• salt

The Mongolian Stir Fry line

• Chicken, sliced thin
• Beef, sliced thin
• Pork, sliced thin
• Shrimp
• Mushrooms, sliced
• Celery, sliced
• Onions, sliced
• Bean sprouts
• Snow peas
• And any other veggie you care to add

The Sauces

• Minced garlic
• Soy sauce
• Vineagar
• Teriyaki
• Hot Sauce
• Salt
• Pepper
• Other herbs and spices
• Any other oriental market sauces you care to add

I started out by lighting and heating up the coals for the 8” dutch oven. Light extras, because you’ll be using more for the 12” and you’ll need them to keep the fires going. While those were getting hot and white, I sliced up the meat and the veggies.

I put the rice and the stock into the small dutch oven and put it on the coals. The way I cook rice is to simply watch it for steam venting. That tells me that it’s been boiling for a bit at that point, and I just keep it on for about another 10 minutes. Then I pull the coals off, and just let it sit for a while longer with the lid on. The less you remove the lid, the better. If you can cook it completely without ever lifting the lid, you’ve perfected the art of cooking rice in a dutch oven!

Once the rice is on the coals, I set up the side fire with more coals. By the time the rice is almost done, those coals are ready. I put those coals on the little dutch oven table and put the 12” dutch oven on them, no lid, with a couple of shakes of olive oil on the bottom. Then I called the family dinner!

They picked up bowls in the kitchen, and filled them with the ingredients they wanted in their stir fries, and poured on the sauces they wanted, as well as the spices they wanted. They brought these to me, the chef!

By this time, the dutch oven and the oil was heated, and I just took the first bowl and poured it in. I had a couple of wooden spoons and I used them to stir the food as it was cooking. At first, I just did a quick stir to make sure it all got coated with the oil, then kept it cooking, stirring and tossing it every few minutes.

While it was cooking, I put rice in the bottom of their bowl, and when it was all done (I might have added a little salt, pepper, and garlic occasionally), I scooped it out with the spoons and put it onto the rice. Maybe 3-5 minutes tops, dinner DONE!

This would be a great way to host a party. You'd just have to make sure that you had enough ingredients and rice for everyone. You could even have 2-3 dutch ovens going, each cooking the stir fry.

Bonus note!

This morning, before church, Brendon was going to make his famous Pizza for his visiting grandpa. He asked me if he could do it in the dutch ovens. Duh! Of course!

So, this turned into a full dutch oven weekend. Three whole meals cooked in the black pots!

Dutch Oven Basics: Salmon and Rice

When you’re cooking in your dutch oven, and especially when you’re just learning, you do a lot of really simple recipes, and cook a lot of easy stuff, like cobblers and biscuits from a can. These are great. They taste yummy.

But for me, I wanted to learn to cook some dishes that also carried a lot of “Wow!” factor, both in the look and in the taste. I wanted to also make some things that, when I set it down in front of people, they would really be dazzled.

I guess if you wanted to, you could look at something like that and say that I have a deep-seated need for approval and I need therapy. And you probably wouldn’t be too far off!

This dish is very simple. Like the stew from last week, it is a one-step, one-pot meal. It’s not really a “dump” meal, however, it’s more of a “layered” meal. Still, it’s very simple to prepare, and very easy to cook, too. And, when it’s all done, and you put it on people’s plates, it really wow’s them.

This, for me, is also a landmark dish. It’s one of the first ones I created myself. I took it to forth place at the Eagle Mountain Pony Express Days Cookoff one year. You’ll notice that I altered this recipe slightly from the one back then.

Baked Salmon and Rice

12” dutch oven
8-9 coals below
16-18 coals above

• 1 1/2 Cups Rice
• 3 Cups chicken broth
• 2 cans Cream of Something Soup1 can tiny shrimp
• 1 tsp minced garlic

• 2 medium onions, sliced
• 2 stalks celery, sliced
• 1 small can water chestnuts
• Chopped parsley
• Chopped thyme
• black pepper (preferably coarse ground, or, better, fresh ground)
• Salt

• 3-5 Good sized portions of salmon (1 for each person eating) It can be frozen or fresh
• Butter
• 2 lemons, sliced

I started by lighting up a bunch of coals. By the time all of the food was prepared and in the dutch oven, the coals were white and ready, too.

This dish is created in the dutch oven, but it’s not dumped in. It’s built up in layers. Once it’s cooking, you won’t want to stir it. The bottom layer is the rice, the broth (or water), the garlic, and the cans of soup and shrimp. I mixed those up fairly thoroughly.

Once that layer is done, I sliced up the onions and the celery. I added the water chestnuts, and stirred those together. Then, I gently laid those three veggies on top of the first layer. I sprinkled a generous amount of the parsley and the thyme over the top, as well as the salt and the pepper.

Then I covered the veggies with a layer of the salmon filets. I dusted each piece of salmon with more salt and pepper, then put a small pat of butter on top of each one. On top of that, I added two slices of lemon. The dish was ready for the fire!

While it was cooking, I turned it often. I would turn the lid about a quarter turn, then pick up the oven and turn it back the other way a quarter turn. That way, the coals were in different positions relative to the food, and it cooks more evenly. I cooked it for about an hour and only opened the lid a few times. You want to keep the steam in to cook the fish and the rice. While it’s cooking, the cells of the lemon burst and the lemon juice runs down with the melted butter onto the fish and into the rice. It’s an incredible flavor.

You have to keep heat on it. After about 30 to 40 minutes the coals will start to burn down, and so you’ll need to replenish them. About 15 to 20 minutes after I put the first batch of coals on the oven, I’ll add fresh coals to the “side fire”, where there are still a few leftover coals burning. These coals will catch the fresh ones, and once the coals on the dutch oven are dwindling, they’ll be ready to add.

Not only is it delicious, but it’s really easy to fix. And it really impresses people!

Dutch Oven Yogurt and Herb Fish

Last weekend, my family got to go fishing.

I mention that for a couple of reasons. One is that we are not really a fishing family. We go fishing pretty much once a year. There’s a program called C.A.S.T. (Catch A Special Thrill), which sets up a day where volunteer boaters take handicapped and special needs kids and their families out on a lake and everybody fishes all morning. We’ve done it three years running, and it’s always a lot of fun. I’m always impressed at the hard work of those volunteers, as well as the organizers. It’s a really impressive day.

Another reason I mention it is because this year was a very special year. It is the year that my curse was broken!

See, every time I would go fishing, nobody caught anything. I don’t just mean me. I mean, nobody. Nobody in our group, nobody in our boat, nobody. I started to get this emotional, gut-level complex. I began to think I was cursed.

But this time, I caught some, Brendon and Jacob caught some, the Pursells (our friends) caught some, EVERYBODY caught some! And since the Pursells don’t really like to eat fish, I got to bring it all home. And, today, I got to cook them!

Now, since I don’t usually catch ‘em, I sure don’t know how to fillet them. But after literally butchering the first one, I kinda got the hang of it, and the rest turned out pretty well. They were all bass. Most were smallish, with not much meat, but there were a few pretty sizable ones.

I’d found, in a cookbook I have, a recipe for a yogurt and dill sauce for chicken. I thought it would taste good on fish, so I looked at it again, and modded it with some additional herbs, and put the whole thing on potatoes. Here it is:

Dutch Oven Yogurt and Herb Fish

12” Dutch Oven
8 coals below, 16-17 above in the baking stage

• A lot of white fish filets. I think there were probably about 10 fish we kept, most of which were 10 to 12” before filleting, and a few were as long as 14”

• 2 small tubs of plain yogurt
• Juice from 2 limes
• Very liberal applications of:
• Dill weed
• Oregano
• Cilantro
• Parsley
• Salt
• Pepper (coarse ground)
• Any other herb or spice you want

• 1 medium to large onion, quartered and separated
• 1 lb bacon, cut into 1” squares
• 1 tbsp garlic
• Salt, pepper
• 2 large potatoes, quartered and sliced

I started by Filleting the fish, and putting them all in a big mixing bowl. Then, in another bowl, I mixed all of the sauce ingredients. I poured that over the fish, and stirred it up to coat them all thick. I put that in the fridge to marinade.

I continued by sautéing the bacon, the onion, and the garlic until they were all pretty brown. I had the oven over a lot of coals at the time, probably around 25-27 or so. I added the salt and pepper, then the potatoes. I stirred it all up to coat the potatoes in the bacon grease. At that point, I pulled the dutch oven off the coals, and set it up for the baking, with the above listed coals on top and below.

Since fish cooks pretty quick, I baked the potatoes for about 20-30 minutes before adding the fish on top. Then, about a half hour later, it was all done.

I was kinda surprised by how much liquid there was at the bottom. It was almost like a soup. But the yogurt and the herbs on the fish tasted great! Fish and yogurt are not very strong flavors, so make sure that you really let go with the herbs!

Food, Art, Service, and Dutch Ovens

Dutch Oven Salmon and Potatoes

My friend loaned me a really cool book called “Culinary Artistry”. He said it was basically a textbook that he used when he was first employed as a cook. It’s seriously cool. The first part has a lot of articles about the author’s philosophy about the nature of food and art, and about how he grew up around it, and how he learned to love to experiment. He talked about how we all grow up wanting to try things, but we keep being told "Don't play with your FOOD!"

So, now that I'm a grown-up, I can play with my food!

Anyway, a large part of this book is basically a reference book. You can look up any primary ingredient, and it will tell you a list of other ingredients and spices and flavorings that "go with it". Some of them go together so well, that they're considered "classic combinations", and they put those in the list in bold face.

I had some frozen salmon left over from the cookoff, so I decided to try something. Rather than find a salmon recipe that spells out exactly how much of everything to put in, I was going to look at this list of compatible ingredients, see what things I already had in my pantry and fridge, and combine them in amounts that made sense!

So, I looked over the list. A few things jumped out at me from the beginning. Potatoes, onions, even bacon. I thought of one of the early dishes I had made with just those three, adding in chicken and cheese. An idea was taking shape.

So, here was my final list:

• Bacon
• potatoes
• Onions
• garlic
• mushrooms (fresh)
• Green onions
• Lemon (zest and juice)
• Parsley (fresh, if you've got it)
• vineagar
• red pepper
• black pepper
• salt
• And, for fun, some commercial salmon seasoning I had

I started off with the bacon. I cut about a half a pack of it into some small pieces and put them in a 12" dutch oven over about 20 or so coals. Once they were pretty brown and crisp, I drained off most of the grease and added some sliced and separated onions, the sliced mushrooms, and the garlic. I let the onions cook until they were getting clear and a little brown.

Then I quartered and sliced a few potatoes, really thin. Not potatoe-chip thin, but thinner than I usually slice them. Why? I dunno. Just trying something different. They went into the dutch oven. I also added in the parseley, the sliced green onions, the lemon zest (and the juice). Then I added in the salmon. I put all that on top of about 8-9 coals, and put about 17 on the top. I was going for the basic baking temperature of about 350 degrees.

Then, as it was cooking, I added the seasonings. I also added a little bit of water to help steam the potatoes.

I figured it would cook about 40 minutes or so. I had to keep adding coals because there was a pretty strong and steady breeze blowing and it kept stoking up my coals. Also, I ended up going almost an hour before the potatoes were fully cooked. I stirred it occasionally, to distribute the seasonings. That broke up the salmon, too.

For those of you that understand Utah Mormon culture, my wife is the Relief Society Compassionate Service director for the ward. What that means is that if someone's family has a crisis, she gets to step up and coordinate some help. Sometimes that means cooking some meals while the wife is recovering from an illness, or watching the kids while the mom and dad are at the hospital with another child. It's a cool calling for Jodi, because frankly, that's the kind of stuff she does even when it's not her gig.

Well, I got to help out today. Part of the reason I cooked was to make enough not only for my family, but also for a family down the street that had just had a miscarriage. We've been there, and it's not fun, believe me. So, I got to use my dutch ovening to help lighten someone else's load.

And where was Jodi during all this? Well, like I said, that's the kind of person she is. She spent the afternoon and evening with another good friend up at the hospital. My wife is amazing.

Dutch Oven Penne Rustica and Parmesan Seasoned Breadsticks

My good friend John is partly responsible for the existence of Mark’s Black Pot. He and I have been really good friends for a very long, very long time. Currently we also work together, and our offices are right next to each other. We get together in our downtime at work (mostly at lunch) and talk religion, politics, and food. He’s the one that taught me how to make a killer omelet.

So, when he started his Mormon Foodie blog, it wasn’t long before that inspired me to start writing my recipes and stories here at the black pot. It’s been almost a year, now.

So, when he started writing a month-long series on pasta, I couldn’t help but join in. There are a number of pastas I’d like to make in my dutch oven. I’ve already done lasagna and spaghetti. I’d like to try Tortellini and a few others. Stay tuned, because I’d also like to try making some pasta from scratch.

But not this week.

This week, I had found a chain restaurant knock-off recipe for Macaroni Grille’s Penne Rustica. I love eating at the restaurant, and when we go there, we always get the Penne Rustica. So, I was eager to give this a try. As it turned out, it was some of the most delicious pasta I’ve ever tasted, and certainly the best I have ever cooked myself. I don’t really know that it’s a good knockoff of the original, but it was really good. I think some of that was because I had to do a couple of ingredient substitutions. Also, because I think that knock-offs are rarely exact. Think about the Niemann-Marcus or the Mrs Fields cookie recipe circulating around the ‘net and you’ll see what I mean.

Dutch Oven Penne Rustica

12” Deep Dutch Oven

11 coals below, 20 coals above

10” Dutch Oven

lots of coals below and above

• 1 lb penne rigate, cooked
• 1 lb medium shrimp, peeled and deveined
• 1 lb skinless chicken breasts or tenderloin
• 4 ounces prosciutto, chopped
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 3 tablespoons marsala wine (I used white grape juice)
• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1 cup grated parmesan cheese
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch
• 1 tablespoon Dijon Mustard
• healthy shakes of rosemary, salt, thyme, ground cayenne pepper
• healthy shakes of Oregano, paprika
• 16 oz grated mozzarella and asiago cheeses

So, I came home from church and started up some coals right away. As soon as the coals were ready, I put some water on to boil in the 10” dutch oven. As soon as that was boiling, I put in the penne.

In the meantime, I worked on the other parts. It was really quite hectic to prepare, rushing here and there to get all the steps done. I also didn’t have it very well planned out. Next time I do this it’ll be a lot easier.

The next step was to get the chicken and the shrimp ready. This is where I kinda cheated, but the results tasted great. I took the chicken (I used tenderloins), and the shrimp and put it in a big bowl. I shook in some olive oil, salt and pepper, and stirred it up. Then I put the shrimp and chicken on skewers and fired up the grill. That’s kinda cheating, because in cookoffs you have to do all the cooking in dutch ovens. But I loved the grilled flavor on the chicken and the shrimp.

Then, I got out the 12” deep oven and put some coals under it. I put in some olive oil, then the garlic, the grape juice, and the proscuitto, and just stirred it and cooked it a bit.

While that was going on, I mixed up the sauce ingredients (everything else) in a bowl. By this time, the penne was cooked (partly boiled, partly steamed in the dutch oven), so I added it to the deep dutch oven, and poured in the sauce mix. Then I put in some of the cheese and stirred it all up to get it well mixed. Finally, I covered the top with the rest of the chesses, and put it in the heat with the coals listed above. I cooked it for about 25-35 minutes, turning it once.

While that was cooking, my wife had suggested I make some breadsticks with seasonings and parmesan cheese. She showed me this recipe in an old Relief Society Ward cookbook. I admit I was a bit skeptical. It was a yeast bread recipe, but the rise time was really short and the instructions were really strange. But I decided to give it a shot.

Parmesan Seasoned Bread Sticks in the Dutch Oven

12” Dutch Oven

12 coals below, 22 above

• 1 Tbsp Yeast
• 1 ½ cup warm water
• 1 Tbsp honey
• 1 tsp salt
• ~4 Cups flour
• ¼ cup butter, melted
• liberal shakes of parmesan cheese and other seasonings

First, in a bowl, I put the water, the yeast, and the honey together and let the yeast activate. Then I added the salt and the flour. Don’t add the flour all in at once, because then you can gauge the moistness and the density of the dough. I kneaded it for 10 minutes. Then I poured the melted butter in the bottom of the 12” oven, and spread the dough out over it. I cut the dough into strips, then sprinkled the parmesan and the seasonings (I used this really great salad seasoning combo). This is where I was really skeptical. At that point, I set it aside for about 20 to 30 minutes to rise. That’s it. No long raise or proofing.

Finally, once it had risen some, I put it on the coals. In about 20 minutes to a half hour, they were done. And they were delicious!

And, the penne was incredible. It was really filling and wow, what a dinner!

Dutch Oven Steamed Crab with Shrimp and Veggie Rice

When my wife and I first got married, one of the things she fixed for me on our honeymoon was crab with a butter sauce. Ever since then, whenever we eat crab, whether at home or in a restaurant, she and I always wink at each other and remember that time twenty years ago, now. It’s really a romantic thing for us.

Add to that the fact that my now deceased mother in law used to love to take our boys out to Red Lobster to eat, and we’ve got a family that loves seafood. It’s funny. Ask most kids what their favorite food is, and they’ll probably say, “peanut butter and jelly”, or “Pizza”. Ask mine, and they’ll say, “Shrimp scampi!” or “Crab’s legs!”

Before that adventure with my new wife, I didn’t like crab very much. It seemed like so much work for so little meat. But over the years, my perspective has changed, and now breaking it out of the shells is just part of the fun.

So, for the last three weeks, I’ve wanted to do a steamed crab plate in my dutch ovens, but for this reason or that reason, I’ve not been able to make time to cook it. But tonight I did! I even managed to find some good frozen crab legs at a supermarket near me for only $6 a pound. Not the best, but not too bad…

Dutch Oven Steamed Crab with Shrimp and Veggie Rice

8 coals below, 16 above (in moderate weather. However, in freezing snow, like I had today: 12 coals below, 22 above, with windbreaks or a hood.)

• 2 cups rice
• 2 ¼ cups water or broth/stock (see below)
• ½ lb medium to large uncooked shrimp, peeled and deveined
• 2-3 lbs king crab legs, thawed
• 1 medium to large onion
• 2-3 stalks celery
• 1 cup sliced fresh mushrooms
• 2 tsp minced garlic
• 1 lemon (or splashes of lemon juice)
• shakes of cilantro
• shakes of parsley
• liberal shakings of coarse ground black pepper
• liberal shakings of salt

• ½ cup butter
• 1 heaping tsp minced garlic
• ½ tsp prepared Cajun spices
• ½ tsp salt

I started by lighting up a lot of coals. I had some trouble getting them lit in the snow, but lighter fluid overcomes all!

I noticed that as the shrimp and the crabs legs had been thawing in plastic bags in my sink, the bags were filled with water from the melting ice, and it was thick with juices from the shellfish. It was like a broth, so I drained it into a measuring cup. Not quite enough came out though, only about 1 ¼ cups, so I filled the remaining space to 2 ¼ cups with water. That went in the bottom of the dutch oven with the rice. Then I peeled the shrimp (it came from the market deveined – I hate doing that…) and arranged those on top.

I sliced up the onion, the celery, and the mushrooms, and layered those in. On top of that I poured or shook on the remaining seasonings (listed in the first set). I prefer to slice lemons and layer those on top, but I had no lemons, so I used lemon juice instead.

Finally, took a heavy object (I wanted to use a meat tenderizing hammer, but could only find my rolling pin) and smacked the crab shells, to pre-crack them a bit. Then, I arranged the crab legs on top of it all. The theory was that the cooking rice would steam the crab, and the flavors would penetrate into the crab meat better if there were some cracks in the shells.

I took this out and set it on the coals. Since it was practically a blizzard, it took a long time and some extra coals to get the oven up to boiling/rice cooking temperature. But once it did, it only took about 20-25 minutes of actual cooking for the whole thing to be done.

Once I saw that the rice was, indeed, cooking and not freezing, I got out my 8” dutch oven and added all the ingredients of the second set. I put that dutch oven on top of the 12”, and added a few coals on top of it. This became the buttery dipping sauce for the crab.

This ended up being one of the most delicious crab meals I’ve ever eaten. Some of the flavor did, in fact, seep up into the crab meat, and I could taste it even if I didn’t dip it.