This is the greatest biscuits and gravy gravy recipe ever… until i make it further better.

Ingredients

• 1lb sausage
• 1 stick of chorizo
• 2 eggs
• flour
• milk

Process

1. Cook the sausage and chorizo.
2. Leave the grease in the pan.
3. Add four very rounded tablespoons of flour^*.  Maybe more.
4. Cook the meat and flour mixture a bit.
5. Slowly add milk and mix until you get the consistency you want.
6. Mix in the two eggs and let that cook.

^*the more flour you add the more gravy you’re going to get.  I like mine on the meatier side and for 1lb of sausage four rounded tablespoons was good.

You’re on your own for biscuits.  I would suggest something better than Grands, they always have a bad aftertaste to me.  I admit, there’s not much too it but I’ve never seen biscuits and gravy with chorizo in it.  I have tried just chorizo in the gravy but it’s just not as good.  Here is a picture.  Don’t let the look deceive you.

Most likely I will make this better by adding Bacon.

Ingredients

• 2 1/4 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• 2 cups crushed Oreos

Directions

1. Oven to 375.
2. Mix 2 1/4 cups flour, 1tsp baking soda, 1tsp salt in a bowl.
3. In a separate bowl (optional), beat the hell out of 2 sticks of butter, 3/4cup of granulated sugar, 1tsp of vanilla extract, and 2 eggs.
4. Gradually beat in the flour mix.
5. Put in the Oreos and then make some balls on a cookie sheet and cook 9-12 minutes.

Notes

To be honest, this is the NESTLE TOLLHOUSE recipe for chocolate chip cookies.  But these are Oreo Chip Cookies, so you don’t use chocolate chips.  If you ever forget, it’s also 50 other places on the web.  Also, they say to mix the flour and all that separate and slowly add but the first time I did this I just mixed everything in a bowl and it was fine.

If you’re not really an Oreo person, you could substitute something else but you’d be wrong in doing so.  Oreo Chip is really the best choice.  A friend of mine suggested Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and I would say that might be a close second.  Even if you don’t like Oreos you should give these a try.  You can’t really taste the Oreo factor.  It’s the taste of excellence in engineering.

Future Work

I’d like to incorporate Bacon into this at some point.

Ingredients

The Crust

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• I teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 6 tablespoons butter
• 6 tablespoons shortening
• 6 to 8 tablespoons ice water

The Rest

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup water
• 6 apples – peeled, cored and sliced

Instructions

The Crust

1. Put the 2 cups flour, 1 tsp salt, and 1 Tbsp sugar in a big mixing bowl.
2. Use a masher (potato or dough) and mix in the 6 Tbsp butter, 6 Tbsp shortening, and 6-7 Tbsp water.
3. Mash this up until it holds together but isn’t too goopy (7 Tbsp of water was good for me).
4. Wrap it in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for 20 min.
5. Peel and cut the apples.
6. Tell someone how you wonder what your upstairs neighbour is doing.

The Pie

1. After 20 min, remove the pie crust from the fridge.
2. Take about 10-15% of the crust and set it aside.
3. Roll the big component of crust and put it in your pie thing.
4. Put all the apples on the pie crust.  Mound them.
5. Take the 10-15% of pie crust you set aside and make it into long strings or flat slats that will go over the apples.  Think old-school apple pie and how it looks when it has the Kris-Kross (daddy mack!) thing going on.

The Sauce

1. Melt the 1/2 cup butter
2. Add in the 3 Tbsp flour.  Make it kinda a gel / goop.
3. Add 1/2 cup white sugar, 1/2 cup brown sugar, and 1/4 cup water.
4. Get this boiling.
5. Pour it over the pie.  Let it get good and covered.
6. Bake at 425 for 15 minutes.
7. Bake at 350 for 35-45 minutes.  Use your eyes here.
8. Optional: sprinkle some cinnamon on top after you pull it out.

GREAT WHITE NORTH GARLIC CHILI

Ingredients

• 1-2 lbs  hamburger
• 4 cloves  garlic
• 1 tsp  group black pepper
• pinch  red pepper flakes
• 1 tsp  ground red pepper
• 1 tsp  ground cumin
• 1 Tbsp  chili powder
• 2 cans  diced tomatoes with peppers and stuff (prefer hot!)
• 2 cans  chili hot beans
• 1 can  northern white beans (this is what makes the title!)

Instructions

1. Cook the hamburger and chop up the garlic and add it to the hamburger whenever.
2. In a crock-pot put in the cans of tomatoes and beans.  You can drain the tomatoes or not, but don’t drain the beans, just dump them in.  Save the chili hot beans cans for later.
3. When almost all the hamburger is browned, add the spices and cook for a while til the kitchen smells good.
4. Put the cooked hamburger and spices into the crock-pot, grease and all.  Recipes that tell you to drain the grease are foolish (not based on fact).
5. If it’s not soupy enough, rinse the chili hot bean cans with a bit of water and dump it in for more juice.

Thanks to Tara for accidentally buying white northern beans instead of garbanzo beans.  Without your purchase this chili would have been less beanie, less tasty, and less white.

Chunky Corn Chowder Recipe

Chunky Corn Chowder Recipe

• 1/2 pound bacon, diced
• 4 Tbsp butter
• 2 large yellow onions, diced
• 1 red pepper, seeded and diced
• 2 tsp thyme, ground
• 1 tsp cumin, ground
• 1/4 tsp turmeric, optional for color
• 2 pounds white potatoes, washed, skins on and cubed
• 6 cups chicken stock, homemade, chicken base with water, or 4-6 bouillon cubes with water to taste
• 6 Tbsp cornstarch
• 6 Tbsp cold water
• 2 cups heavy cream or half and half
• 4 cups corn kernels, fresh, frozen or canned and drained
• 1/2 tsp fresh black pepper, ground

Directions:

1. In large stockpot, fry bacon until cooked and crispy but not burned. Drain fat, reserving 2 Tbsp, and place bacon on paper towel to cool. Set aside.
2. Add butter to the reserved fat and cook onions, and peppers until crisp-tender.
3. Add the spices, potatoes and chicken stock. Cook on low until potatoes are almost cooked through.
4. In small glass, dissolve cornstarch in cold water.
5. Add mixture to hot soup a little at a time stirring constantly. This will thicken up very quickly. Keep stirring.
6. On low heat, add cream or half and half or milk to the chowder and stir. Simmer for 10-15 minutes until hot. Do not bring to a boil.
7. Add corn and black pepper, stir and remove from heat.

First off, I cut up four pounds of potatoes instead of the 2 that it tells me to. All that means is we have breakfast potatoes for tomorrow. Right now the potatoes are getting simmered until they’re almost cooked through. Although it says to cook on Low, I don’t think that’s right, cause the chicken stock was barely going.

I’m also not sure when i’m supposed to re-add the bacon in. I’m going to just do it when I add the corn. The fact that this recipe has bacon in it is just a coincidence. I saw “chunky” before I saw that it had bacon in it.

I think that Tara and I are going to just freeze this and then have it for lunches. I should probably be monitoring it more closely. I forgot to let the milk simmer for 15 min before adding the corn. But I ended up adding more corn than specified (it is corn chowder after all) so maybe that’ll make up for it. Although, the corn might get mushy.

Whatever. I’ll eat it.

And…. Done