Deconstructing the Hamburger!

OK, it’s time for our next deconstruction challenge, to see if anyone is up to the task.  A few weeks ago, we did the beloved PBJ.  This week, we’ll tackle another traditional american dish:  The hamburger!


So, how do you do this?  How do you tear it apart?  How do you put it back together?  What could you possibly do with this that hasn't already been done a million times before?

Well, first of all, let’s look at the basic ingredients of a traditional hamburger:

• Ground beef
• Ketchup
• Mustard
• Cheddar (or plastic) cheese
• Onions
• Pickles
• lettuce
• Mayonnaise
• And, of course, the bun

Now, imagine that you were on an episode of “Chopped” or “Iron Chef” and you were just given a basket full of those ingredients and told to cook something with them.  What would you do?  I suppose that not all of these are required, and you might think of even more to add to the mix.

What will your deconstructed burger taste like?  Look like?  Your time begins...

...NOW!




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




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

Salmon Dietary Challenge

I had a very interesting Dutch oven cooking challenge this last week. My family and I have been traveling cross-country to visit my parents in Indiana. My folks are getting a bit "on in years" and we came out to visit and help out.

 

Mom, especially, has been quite thrilled by the book, and so, Jodi encouraged me to bring a Dutch oven out with us so I could cook for them one night. We all decided it would be great to do it in celebration of my dad's birthday. The tricky part is, both Mom and Dad have some quite specialized dietary needs. Mom gets sores in her mouth, so she can't eat things that are too acidic, or even too salty. Neither of them can have foods that are too fatty, and Dad can't have too much sodium (the salt thing again).

For his birthday, Dad chose salmon.

 

So, here are my parameters:

• 1 - a salmon dish, with small portions.
• 2 - Little or no salt
• 3 - for Mom, little or no acidic flavors
• 4 - Little oil or fats.
• 5 - Still have it be flavorful and visually appealing.
• 6 - Do it all in only one Dutch oven

That all added up to quite a challenge. I tackled the challenge and came through nicely.  I baked a loaf of swirled bread. Then I roasted some potato chunks and finally cooked the salmon pieces atop the potatoes. The fish was served topped with a salad of fresh sweet peppers and other veggies.

As I cooked it, however, and as I thought about it afterward, I thought of how I could have made it even more flavorful and robust, and have stayed better in the parameters. Here's that plan:

 

Dietary Challenge Dutch Oven Salmon

12" shallow Dutch oven

15-18 coals below

• 1 medium yellow onion
• 3-4 cloves fresh garlic
• 2 sweet peppers, different colors
• 2 Roma tomatoes
• 2 stalks celery
• Dash of salt
• 1 Tbsp butter

22-24 coals below

• 4-5 portions salmon
• 1 Tbsp butter
• Liberal shakes of thyme, sage, cilantro
• Dash of salt
• Dash of pepper

10-12 coals below
16-18 coals above

• 6-8 small red potatoes 
• Dash of salt
• Dash of pepper 
• Dash of paprika
• 1 Tbsp butter

The first step is to light up the coals and get the Dutch oven ready to sauté the veggies.  Get the dutch oven really hot. While that is heating up and readying, dice up the veggies and mince the garlic.  My idea is to sweeten the onions and tame and enrich the flavors of the veggies by sautéing them in butter.  Start with the onions and the garlic.  Once they're translucent, add the peppers. Finally, add the celery and tomatoes. Once the veggies are done (and I'd go until there is some carmelization on the onions), pull them out of the Dutch oven and set them aside.

 

While the veggies are cooking, season the salmon with the flavorings, and quarter the potatoes (I leave the skin on). 

Then, refresh the coals, and get the Dutch oven really hot again, still using just bottom heat. Really turn up the heat. Melt the butter on the bottom of the Dutch oven, then put the salmon filets on. It should sizzle and sear instantly. After a minute or two, turn them over and let the other side sear. Let each side get a good brown going on.  Since you won't have a lot of salt to carry the flavor, you'll use the sear and the herbs instead.

When the salmon is nicely brown, but not necessarily cooked all the way through, pull it off. Melt the last of the butter and toss in the potatoes, with their seasonings. Stir it all up, to evenly coat everything. Adjust the coals for a 350 degree bake, and set the oven on the heat.

After about ten minutes, the potatoes will be starting to cook through, but not done yet. Layer the salmon pieces on top of them, and the sautéed veggies on top of the salmon. Bake it for another 10-15 minutes.

And there you'll have it! A delicious, flavorful meal, with relatively little fat and sodium, and little acidic flavors, all cooked in a single Dutch oven.

 

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 Deconstructed PBJ

The challenge before us, as put forth in the last post, is to deconstruct a classic Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich.  The idea is to take the ingredients of that well-known comfort dish, and recreate something new with them.

When I first approached this challenge, I was a bit at a loss.  I did have some ideas, but they weren’t really coming together.  I talked with my wife about a few of them, and none of them seemed to impress, either.

Part of my dilemma was to decide what part of the meal it would be.  My ideas didn’t seem to be substantial enough to make it a main dish, and it was too weird to be a side dish.  I mean, what sort of main dish would a PBJ go with?  It’s not like picking a good wine for your meal.  There are no rules, here.

I finally settled on the idea of it being a dessert.  That felt right.  It would work.  But then, how to do it?  Nothing I thought of really worked in my head, and nothing seemed to appeal to my wife, either.  Then she mentioned something about peanut butter cookies.  I ran through those ingredients in my head (like peanut butter, of course, and flour and egg for the bread), and it started to snap into place.  A dessert, based on the cookie, with a glaze of the jelly on top!

Then I started thinking about chocolate.  I don’t usually add chocolate to my PBJ’s.  But, I thought, it’s my dish, I can add to it as I please.  I decided to do some sort of chocolate crumb crust below the cookie.  Jodi suggested a chocolate sauce on top, which I, initially, resisted.  But, who can resist a chocolate sauce for long?  I mean, get real!  It really turned out to be the perfect topper.

In the end, it really did taste great, and evoked the flavors of the original, while taking it to a new place.  That’s the goal of deconstruction, isn’t it?  A success!

Plus, I learned to pay more attention to my wife!

Here it all is:

Mark and Jodi’s Dutch Oven PBJ Deconstruction Dessert

10” Dutch Oven
8-10 coals below, 12-14 coals above

8” Dutch Oven
8-10 coals below


Crust:

• 1 wrapped package Graham Crackers
• ¼ cup brown sugar
• 1 small brick bakers chocolate
• 2 Tbsp cocoa powder
• 6 Tbsp melted butter

Cookie center:

• 1/2 cup shortening
• 3/4 cup Peanut Butter (Crunchy or Smooth)
• 1/3 cup granulated sugar
• 1/3 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Jelly Topping:

• 1 cup grape jelly
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp nutmeg
• 1 tsp mint leaves
• 1/2 tsp ground fennel seeds

Drizzle:

• 8 oz Chocolate Chips
• 1/2 cup Heavy Whipping Cream

I started out by lighting up the coals.  Once they were getting a little white, I put some on the Dutch oven lid to begin preheating it.  Actually, I did that part somewhere in between working on the ingredients.

The next step is to chop up the graham crackers.  I actually used a blender.  Jodi mocked me, because I usually try not to use electrical appliances when I dutch oven.  She thinks that’s silly, but since they are not allowed in cookoffs, I try not to use them at home as much as possible.  But this time, I was going to be using a table mixer for the cookie anyway, so I figured I use a blender for the crackers, too.  I mixed in the other ingredients and pressed the resulting mud into the bottom of the 10” Dutch oven.

Then, I mixed all of the other ingredients in the table mixer, whipping it up nicely.  I spread that over the crumbs, being careful not to disturb that level as I did.

Finally, I mixed the topping ingredients, and spread that in a thin layer over the top.  By this time, the lid was pretty hot, so I went out and adjusted the coals, top and bottom, and began baking it.

I didn’t know what to expect, so I checked it about every 10 to 15 minutes.  It ended up baking for about a half hour to 45 minutes.  The center was the last part to cook, and it was pretty jiggly right up to the end.  When that was pretty solid, I took it off the coals and brought it inside.  Then I went on cooking the rest of the meal, which was a basic chicken and potatoes pot with biscuits on the side.

When it became close to time to serve the dessert part of the meal, I still hadn’t decided on the chocolate sauce.  Jodi made the choice for me and cooked it up.  If I had done it in the Dutch ovens, I would have used pretty much the same process she did, but simply done it in my 8” Dutch oven.  I would have added the two ingredients and stirred them until the chips melted and it all blended with the cream.  Easy, quick, and delicious.

As I said, it turned out to be the perfect topping!  Really, the dessert was great.  It really was a perfect combination of the flavors of the traditional peanut butter and jelly sandwich, while adding the chocolate and the other flavors to take it in a new direction.

So-- That's my entry in the challenge!  I hope some others are up to it as well, and I'm eager to see what comes out of it all!  A new challenge will be coming soon!



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