Where not to eat

Jim's Family Restaurant in Sandy, UT. Is a place not to spend your money at. We stopped there on the way home from our adventure. Its a clean place, and it seemed slower than the other area  restaurants. I now know why. The food. They had a wide variety on the menu. I recently discovering that I like Gyros, decided to try theirs. Wow, it was nothing like back home. I got a broken pita bread filled with onion and tomato chunks, four  burnt, dried out pieces of gyro meat and very little sauce. It had seemed like the meat sat on the spit all day. Nothing like what I would have expected. It took me 10 minutes to get extra sauce to try and cover the dried meat. My husband ordered a rib eye steak. It was okay. It was nothing special to really write home about. I would suggest that people try Iggy's across the street. It seemed a lot busier than this place. I  think next time we are in the area, we will try there.

Fettuccine Ragu

I found this recipe for a Ragu. It is what my aunt would call a southern Italian sauce because of the way its made. You almost puree the vegetables, they called it finely chopped. I used carrots, onions, celery, mushrooms. Saute them in evoo. ( extra virgin olive oil) then you can add ground turkey or veal. I added the turkey. Cook that until its no longer brown. then I added 28 oz of canned crushed tomatoes. I added about  1/2 cup of milk to the mixture. I cooked it down, with all the liquid from cooking the turkey and sweating the vegetables. I let it reduce and threw in about a tablespoon of flour to thicken it up. I cooked fettuccine noodle and served the ragu over it.  Simple quick night food. My husband says its better the second day.

Stuffed Cabbage

This dish is something I grew up with. There a Polish name for it but don't ask me to spell it. It's more commonly known as Stuffed Cabbage.
 1 lb of ground beef/turkey. To have a well rounded flavor
2 cups of cooked rice
This usually varies on the person I didn't measure this time . I will have to write down how much I put in next time, but I use:
oregano, thyme, garlic, basil, salt, pepper, and cilantro.
I par boil the cabbage til it is pliable. I let it cool and while that is cooling I am putting together the meat mixture. I then take about an ice cream scoop full  ( medium ones) and place it in the center of the cabbage leaf. I roll the leaf up and place them in a casserole dish. When I am done with that, I take any extra cabbage leaves I have and put them over the top of the rolls. To prevent burning. I then make a tomato mixture. Usually tomato sauce, crushed tomatoes and and more garlic, oregano, salt, rosemary, and basil. Mix it up and dump it over the cabbage. I cook it at 350 for about and hour.
It came out ok this time. Me personally wasn't happy, but the family loved it. So there were no left overs.

Midvale Mining Cafe

This was a place we visited when we first were moving into the house. Its up the street from us and crazy busy until about 2 pm. Its very close quarters. Midvale Mining Cafe did have a lot of the history of the mines in the area up on the walls and in display cases while you waited to be seated. For someone who is not native to to Utah, it was interesting. The place was clean and friendly. Our server was polite and attentive to us. My husband had the Steak and Egg dish and I had the Western Omelet. I have had a Western Omelet before and it was made a little differently than back home, but it was still good. My only complaint is that my hash browns were not crispy enough. That is a personal choice though. I would like to go back during dinner service to see how the food is. Their menu was short and to the point. Many of their signature dishes were named after some type of miner or something there in related to mining. The price was fair and not to expensive. I would suggest stopping in and eating something  there to any one who is passing through.

Orange Tea Bourbon Turkey

I got this off of a Food Network Mag. But it turned out great, so I am posting it.
This is a brine for the turkey that I did over night.
2 quarts of water
1 cup oj ( it calls for juice of 5 oranges)
1 zest ed orange
2 cups kosher salt
1 cup sugar
1 cup bourbon
12 pepper corns
6 whole cloves
12 black tea bags
and you bring this to a boil, then simmer for 10 min. Then add 4 more quarts of water. Submerge the turkey and let it sit for 8 hours or  over night

I then used a paprika butter.

Grind coriander, Cumin and paprika. Mix it together with 2 sticks of butter. I added a little garlic, because I like garlic. The picture below is how it turned out. Its got a little bit of an Asian taste to it. I can tell you that the turkey was very moist and did not dry out.

Gingerbread X mas Tree

This was a set of cookie cutters I had received as a gift. I thought I would try them out . I used a store bought bag of Gingerbread mix. I wanted to see how it would go over with the new elevation. The tree came out a little dry. I am going to  re attempt this again, only this time I will use sugar cookie dough. Most everyone likes sugar cookie dough.
In my steps to make this I did find 5 recipes for Royal Icing. I wound up using Wilton's recipe. In the future, I will try some of the others that I found.
Wilton's called for
3 tablespoons Moraine  powder
6 tablespoons of  warm water
1 lb of confectioner's sugar
and I added 1 teaspoon of vanilla. Its gives the icing a better taste.

So here is what it looks like. This was taken after I had already broken a branch and repaired it. The cookie cutters are displayed beneath it. For give the spelling tonight. My spell check does not want to work with me .

I'm Back!

Hey all ,
Sorry its been a crazy few months. I have moved cross country and I am now ready to start posting like mad again. Its definitely a new experience living in Salt Lake City. I swear these people do not like to cook. There are so many restaurants and fast food places its unbelievable. It is also a challenge cooking. So bear with me as I convert some of my recipes from home to here. We are around 6,000 ft above sea level so baking and boiling are different.
On the bright side those of you from home can understand when I say this place is like Schumberg on crack with out all the traffic problems. The nice thing is that everything is about 15 minutes away in either direction. I have yet to venture into Salt Lake City itself . I am in the subs. Its on my list of places I want to go. Right now I am trying to focus on Christmas and getting my baking going again. No need to worry. I start culinary school in January and I will be posting items from that as well.  So hang on and enjoy the ride as we experience Utah.