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 Angstwolf's
first memories as a whelp:
Brother and Sister are dressing
him in the back seat of a baby blue Pontiac. Breakfast at a
diner in Barstow. There is a toy for sale, a red fire
engine, close enough to Angstwolf that it catches his
eye.
Eyes-Pinned-Open and Sargent
are fighting over the fire engine.Sargent
returns to the car.Sister carries Angstwolf back to the car,
followed by Brother. Eyes-Pinned-Open trails behind, still
griping about the fire engine. Sargent has won this one.
Jewish Chicken Soup
This is the real thing, as best
as Angstwolf can remember it. Angstwolf does not recommend
that you make your chicken soup this way because it
just plain sucks. The vegetables are limp and the chicken is
tasteless. The matzo balls aren't bad, but they can
be improved upon (see next recipe). Angstwolf only
includes this so that you can see the roots of the
dish that follows. Also so that you may understand how he
suffered as a child (his mother never made matzo
balls, which are about the only redeeming feature of
this recipe). Two advantages of this recipe: it is
simpler and healthier (i.e. less fattening) than the
recipe that follows.
1 cut up fryer
carrots, celery and yellow
onion
salt and pepper
matzo meal
2 eggs
vegetable oil
Coarsely chop the vegetables
and throw them into a big pot. If you are cooking only for
two, add about 5 or 6 cups of water. For two people
you would use 1 medium onion, two or three celery
stalks and two or three carrots, depending on the
size of carrot. Rinse the chicken parts under cold water
and throw them into the pot. Bring to a boil and then reduce
the heat until the soup is barely simmering. Simmer until
the chicken is tender, which is about 1 to 1.5 hours.
Meanwhile,
make the matzo balls. Follow the recipe on the box
exactly, but with one crucial alteration. On the box it
says to boil the matzo balls separately in water, and
only after they are cooked do you throw them into the
chicken soup. Yuk! You will be cooking the matzo balls in the
chicken soup. Also: the box
recipe calls for
"melted fat or oil"; use margarine or
vegetable oil. For the "water or stock" use the
chicken soup (after it has been boiling for a while!)
Don't
worry, this is an easy recipe.
(Having a hard time grokking
matzo?See
Angstwolf's matzo FAQ, which includes the hated rubber
matzo ball recipe.)
After the matzo ball mix has
rested in the refrigerator for 15 minutes, use a
spoon to put dollops of the mix into the soup. If you are
feeling masochistic, you can roll the mix in your
hands to form balls.Small matzo balls (about one inch in
diameter) have a better texture than larger matzo
balls.Large
ones are rubbery, and they can end up raw in the
center. Moreover,
the matzo balls impart a very nice flavor to the
soup, so smaller balls means more balls means greater
matzo ball mix surface area means more flavor... Anyway, raise
the heat until the soup boils, reduce again to a
simmer, and simmer for another 30 or 40 minutes. Thus, the best
time to throw the matzo balls into the soup is after
the soup has been cooking 30 to 45 minutes. At this point,
you may adjust the flavor with salt and pepper. This is a
crappy recipe, but the carrots are especially vile.
Dining
room:
...common to living room,
southeast corner of the house; louvred windows, cheap
veneer dining room table, cheap chairs; worn, ugly
grey carpet which was replaced much later by an
uglier green shag.
Unfinished wood on the
undersurface of the table. The rough surface conveniently
held chewed boluses of food, which Angstwolf could
recover later and flush down the toilet or feed to
the dog.Dinners
were endless. Occasionally Angstwolf would leave the
table to spit the bolus into the toilet. He remembers
being fed in a steel high chair in the kitchen, being
fed well done steak in this chair and hating it. Well done
steak! The
only salvation was that it could be washed down with
milk.
Pacific Rim Fusion Jewish Chicken
Soup
Well, this
really isn't a Pacific rim fusion dish, but Angstwolf
likes the name. What it really is, is Jewish chicken soup
the way Julia Child might do it.
1 cut up fryer
parsley,
celery and yellow onion
salt and
pepper
butter
matzo meal
flour
2 eggs
vegetable oil
(preferably olive oil)
As you can
see, the ingredients are nearly identical. Angstwolf
likens stewed carrots to hairballs, and so has
omitted them. The parsley imparts a very nice flavor to
the soup. The
real difference, however, is in the preparation.
Rinse the
chicken parts in cold water and pat dry with a paper
towel. Lightly
salt and pepper the chicken. Make a flour/salt/pepper
mixture (for example: 1/2 cup of flour, 1 teaspoon of
salt and 1 teaspoon of pepper). Dust the pieces with the
mixture. The
"shake and bake" method works very well: put the
mixture into a paper bag (lunch bag size) or a
gallon-size plastic bag, add ONE piece of chicken,
seal and shake. Repeat with other chicken pieces.
Put about 2
tablespoons of oil into a nonstick frying pan. Turn the heat
up, not all the way, but to about 80 - 90% of the
maximum. When
the oil is hot, add the chicken pieces. Do not crowd
(i.e. the pieces should not touch one another). You may have
to do this in two or three batches, adding oil as
necessary. The object is to lightly brown the pieces
on all sides. The only way to mess this up is to burn
the pieces, so watch your heat; on the other hand, if
your heat is too low, this step will take forever. As each piece
becomes nicely browned (kind of a light gold color,
really), place it in your soup pot, off the heat.
By the way,
you can include things like necks and gizzards in the
soup, but DO NOT include the chicken liver. Cook it up
separately if you like, or throw it away. Chicken
liver has no business being in soup.
Add 5 or 6
cups of cold water to the chicken... enough to cover
the bird. Bring
to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. You will let
the chicken cook for about 40 minutes before adding
anything else. Do your other preparation during this
interval. First,
wash your vegetables and chop up the onion, parsley
and celery. Use about one medium onion, and two or
three stalks of celery. Chop up about one half to one
cup of parsley (depending on how much you like
parsley), and save about one tablespoon of the
chopped parsley for the matzo balls. Also chop up
the celery greens (the leafy bits)-- all of them. The parsley
should be coarsely chopped, but chop the tablespoon
(for the matzo balls) more finely.
Prepare the
matzo ball mix. Again, follow the proportions given in the
recipe on the box of matzo meal, but use melted
butter instead of vegetable oil. (Salted or
unsalted, doesn't make any difference. Use butter and
not margarine, though.) For the "soup stock or
water", use water, since your soup probably
hasn't been cooking long enough. Also, put
about 1/4 teaspoon of pepper into the mix. Add the
chopped parsley into the mix. Refrigerate for at least 15
minutes.
Wait until the
soup has been cooking for about 40 minutes before
doing the following: Dollop the matzo ball mix into the soup as
described above. Raise the heat, let the soup start to
boil, and reduce to a simmer. Let the soup cook for another
30 minutes.
Add 1 or 2
tablespoons of oil to the same frying pan (don't
bother cleaning the frying pan first). If you want to
get real fancy you can flour the vegetables just like
you floured the chicken, but this is not essential. Saute the
celery, celery greens and onions. You don't want
to brown the vegetables; you only want to cook them a
bit. The
celery, in particular, should still be crunchy. By the way,
this will sound a bit odd, but garlic works very well
in chicken soup. If you like garlic, throw a couple of
crushed cloves of garlic in with the vegetables when
you fry them.
Add the
sauteed vegetables and the parsley to the soup. Raise the heat
until the soup returns to a boil, then reduce heat to
a simmer. You
can now start adjusting the flavor with salt and
pepper. Cook
for about another 10 or 15 minutes. Ideally, the
celery and onions are still a little crispy, and
certainly not mushy.
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