Corn Sticks - Playing with a Kitchen Gadget

I had made a chicken stew with a Mexican flair:  chunks of chicken thighs with diced tomatoes, carrots, onions, black olives, black beans, chicken broth, and garlic, which was spiced with cumin, oregano, coriander, salt, and pepper.  It was all cooked in one big pan over a very slow fire and the flavors came together into a fragrant blend.

For one breakfast it was heated and put in a burrito-size flour tortilla with scrambled eggs, salsa (mild, because I am a wimp), and shredded Jack cheese.  But for this particular dinner I offered up a bowl full of hot stew topped with shredded Cheddar cheese.  I wanted something like corn bread to go with it.

One of the lovely parts of cornbread is the crispy crust.  I realized that there was no better way to maximize that crust than to make corn sticks in my old, cast iron corn stick pan.

My inherited beauty

It is lovely.  The individual sticks look like ears of corn and, because you put the batter into the cups when the pan is very hot, even the part touching the pan turns out crispy.

My old friend, Betty Crocker's Picture Cookbook, came in handy for the right recipe.

In the section called "Quick Breads" I found a recipe called "Canary Corn Sticks"  (page 70).

Canary Corn Sticks
from Ohio

Beat 1 egg.

Beat in 1 1/2 cups buttermilk
             1/2 tsp soda
             1/2 cup sifted Gold Medal flour
             1 1/2 cups corn meal
             1 tsp. sugar
             3 tsp. baking powder
             1 tsp. salt
             1/4 cup soft shortening



Pour or spoon into buttered hot square pan, muffin cups, or corn stick pans (see Betty's notes, below).  Bake just until set.  Serve piping hot with butter.  

Temperature:  450 degrees F (hot oven).

Time: Bake 10 to 15 minutes for corn sticks.  

Betty's Notes

Beat egg.  Beat in with rotary beater milk, dry ingredients, soft shortening (bacon fat is good). Beat just until smooth.

Generously butter 12 corn stick pans ... Heat in oven while mixing batter.

Pour batter into hot pans until almost full.

My Notes

I keep dried, sweet cream buttermilk around so I reconstituted it with water and mixed it into the beaten egg in a big bowl.  Then I mixed the dry ingredients together in another bowl until they were well mixed.

Once the dry and wet ingredients were put into the same bowl, I used a vegetable shortening and cut it through the mixture while stirring.  This still left small bits of shortening in the batter.



The corn stick pan was oiled (not buttered) and, when removed from the oven, was very hot and the oil was smoking a little.  The batter sizzled when I spooned it in.

First batch cooked.

After 10 minutes they were ready.  I made a second batch, too, which looked better than the first.

Second batch, overfilled.

But they turned out to be beautiful!

The Verdict

The first batch wasn't as fluffy as the second and had holes in it.  I think the oil on the pan fried the batter whereas in the second batch, it just kept the pan from being sticky.  But still they were both tasty!

I love the color assortment.

They were an excellent accompaniment to the stew in both flavor and having a crispy crust.  Some were soaked and dunked in the stew, others were buttered and eaten without the stew on them.  The corn taste made up for the lack of corn kernels I wanted to put in the stew but didn't have handy.

Success!

I ate more than this one stick.

Aebelskivers -- Swedish Pancakes and a Kitchen Gadget!

A long time ago I had a friend named Joe K.  One neat thing about Joe was how much he admired his mother and her talents.  When he found out I liked to cook, he got me some of her favorite recipes, among which was aebelskivers, AKA Swedish pancakes.

The recipe is written in her hand and I cherish it and the others with it.  I have made them and loved them; the recipe cards are yellowed with age and stained with food splatters.

Page 1.  I think her name was Betty.

My house was filled with family and I wanted to make a fun breakfast for them all.  Then I realized my blog goal to use some interesting kitchen gadgets would be perfect for this:  to make aebelskivers, you need an aebelskiver pan.

Mine is cast iron.  I don't know how old it is; I probably got it from one of my grandparents and I recall that aebelskivers were a bit of a fad in the 1960s and 1970s, so that could be when they purchased it.

Aebelskivers are tasty like American pancakes but they are lighter and ball-shaped.  The pan allows that shape to happen.  They are good served with a dusting of powdered sugar, or syrup, or jam, and a little bit of soft butter.  A great start to a fun breakfast.

Aebelskivers
(makes 56 cakes)

6 eggs, separated
1 3/4 cup buttermilk
2 1/2 cup sifted flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 tablespoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking powder

Separate eggs.  Add cream of tartar to whites and best until stiff but not dry-looking.  

Sift flour (pre-measured), sugar, salt, and baking powder together.  

Beat egg yolks, buttermilk, and vanilla together.

Add liquid ingredients to flour mixture and beat until smooth.  Fold in egg whites carefully.

Heat aebelskiver pan over burner until drop of water dances on bottom of cup.  Brush cups with salad oil.  Spoon 1/2 full with batter.

Turn once, using fork and paring knife (some people use knitting needles).

When brown on both sides, remove to hold in oven at approximately 250 degrees F.  

Frequently refold batter, as whites tend to rise to top.

Batter's up!

My Notes

The directions are straight-forward and easy to follow.  That being said, it has been a long time since I made aebelskivers so I made some mistakes when cooking them:

• I put too much oil in the cups.  Just brush them lightly.  You don't want oil puddles.

Do not do this at home.

• I beat the egg whites too much -- they got dry-looking and that made keeping the aebelskivers in their ball shape difficult when turning them.  They kept deflating!  

Stop before this stage

or they will be too flat!

• I had some issues getting the pan to heat evenly, which I don't recall ever happening before.  I'm not sure why.  What I did was put the aebelskiver pan over an inverted cast iron skillet so that the skillet evened out the heat.

This burned off all the seasoning on the skillet

The Verdict

Success!  Oh yes, they were tasty!  We all enjoyed them despite my blunders and I would do them again any time I had the opportunity to feed a crowd.

Just some of the batch

We did discuss what could be done if you wanted the aebelskivers but didn't have the special pan. We tried baking them in mini-muffin pans at 350 degrees F but the texture was not the same.  They were certainly edible and tasty but they weren't pancake-like.  I think they would make good quick breads, especially with a spoonful of jam in the middle.

We also tried cooking them like regular pancakes, and had good results.  The flavor and the texture were right; the only thing missing was the cute and interesting ball shape.  So this is how I would recommend cooking them if you want to give them a try but you don't have or want to buy the pan.

By the way, the other recipes in the set are Apple Pfankuchen, Pfeffernüsse, and Lebkuchen.  All quite yummy!

Seasoning Cast Iron -- An eBook Review

I have a lot of cast iron pans.

The five frying pans are the ones I use in the kitchen most often; I also have a griddle, a fajitas pan, and a variety of cast iron pots and Dutch ovens I use in my demonstration cooking.

Caring for them is a bit of work but also a joy as I love to cook in them.  I learn more about them every time I use them.

One big kettle was purchased for nearly nothing because it was very rusty and ugly.  However some time spent scrubbing it with white vinegar and a wire brush cleaned it up well and made it completely useable.  Since then, its maintenance has been minimal.

We all know that cast iron does best when it is seasoned.  So how do you season it well?  I've always cleaned the pan and rubbed it with a bit of cooking oil once it was dry.  I used to dry it quickly on the stove, but this lead to rust issues.  Now I let it air dry and that works for me.

I knew that sometimes you want to remove the old seasoning, especially if you buy a used pan and want to clean it up before using it yourself.  The two good options are baking it in a self-cleaning oven cycle (Two for one!  A clean pan and a clean oven!) or burying the pan in a bonfire and digging it back out once it is cool.

Sometimes my seasoning attempts resulted in a gummy coating that smelled funny if the pan wasn't used for a while.  Something needs to change here.

So I found this eBook, Seasoning Cast Iron by L. R. LaBella.

ISBN 978-1-4658-8895-2

It is free although sometimes you have to search around to find out who is currently publishing it.  Today I found it here:  http://www.yumpu.com/en/document/view/4538680/seasoning-cast-iron-by-l-r-labella-isbn-978-1-4658-8895-2

It is short and to-the-point, with pictures that show exactly what you need to do.

The key is to have flaxseed oil, purchased in health food stores, because "What we're after is a hard, slick, durable finish.  The best way to get that is with a 'drying oil'.  The only edible drying oil is flaxseed."  The author notes that "Other oils can be used, but the finish won't be as durable."

I had to look around in my local store because the flaxseed oil was not stored on the same shelves as the other oils.  They kept it in a refrigerated area to keep it from going rancid too quickly.  After I bought it, I stored it in the refrigerator, too.

Mr. LaBella's steps are this (some steps paraphrased; some are quoted):

1.  Strip the pan to bare metal.  This is not needed if your pan is new.

My Note:  Bare metal means it looks gray instead of black or brown.  

2.  "Put a bit of oil into the pan.  A teaspoonful will be more than enough.  Rub it into the pan, inside and out including the handle.  I use a paper towel."

3.  "Use another paper towel and wipe out as much oil as you can.  You want a shiny pan, with no puddles of oil. ... thin coats are much better than thick ones."

4.  Bake it at 450 degrees Fahrenheit for 60 - 90 minutes; expect some smoking.

5.  Let the pan cool for about 10 minutes.  "Put in another dab of oil, rub it around as before, wipe it off as before, and bake it as before."

6.  "For a really good, durable finish", do five coats.

He also points out that "You still need to use a bit of oil or butter when cooking.  The pan's cooking qualities will keep improving as you use it and the seasoning continues to develop."

To clean your pans after this seasoning process, "you can use soap (not detergent) and a brush or Dobie pad (nylon mesh over a sponge) to clean the pan. ... If a quick soak doesn't loosen something burnt on, use salt mixed with a bit of oil as the abrasive."  I use one of those nylon scrapers that comes with stoneware cooking items and that works well.

He then recommends you towel dry the pan and heat it for a few seconds to evaporate any remaining moisture.  He found that air drying leads to rust.

Then he says to "oil the pan very lightly with cooking oil, wiping out excess oil as before."

He gives the pan a flaxseed oil seasoning coat once a year, just one.

***

I tried this with all five of my frying pans.  They all had been through the self-cleaning cycle of my oven, then washed and scrubbed with the wire brush and scouring powder.  I won't say they were down to just bare metal everywhere, but there was definitely less seasoning on them than before they were baked.  The inside bottoms looked gray.

Bare metal where it is gray

I used a paper towel to distribute the oil; keep refolding it so one side doesn't get so worn that it leaves behind bits of towel on the pan.  Two towels were good for five pans; I put oil in the two biggest and spread it around to all of the pans.

IMPORTANT:  Baking oil at 450 degrees F can get a little smelly, so do this task on a day when you can open up the windows and let fresh air in!  I had my stovetop fan running at the highest speed while the pans were in the oven, too.  At the end of the day, air in the house was still pretty "seasoned" with a cooked oil smell.   This is not for sissies!

I did 60 minutes per coat; when I had to leave right after a cycle was done, I turned off the oven and left the pans to cool in it.  When I was able to stay after a cycle, I pulled the pans out, let them cool but left the oven on, then started the process over again.

IMPORTANT:  The pans coming out of the oven are HOT!  Use a tough hot pad to protect your hand and arm and know before you pick them up where the pans are to be set on the counter -- have a trivet ready. 

When the pans have cooled for 10 minutes, as instructed, they are still pretty warm so use protection.  I stopped putting oil on the handles when this happened so not to soil my hot pads.

After one coat

The Verdict

Success!  The process works well.  I could tell that the oil was polymerizing because between each coat because the pan went from shiny to matte and the new application of oil didn't really want to stick to the previous layer.

At the end, each pan was dark brown or blackish.  The seasoning was dry.  One pan looked like I had made the coats thicker than the others but it doesn't seem like a problem.

Five coats.  Brown, not rusty.

I tested one pan by cooking eggs (using a little butter) and they didn't stick.  Also they cleaned up easily.

The downside is the smell of baked oil from five fry pans getting coated five times over the length of an entire day.  Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if it was only one or two pans or just one coat.  Knowing this inspires me to maintain the seasoning properly so I don't have to do it again.  I'm not sure I would do this for my other cast iron pans -- maybe just the inside and rims and maybe just a few coats.

One issue I've had with my Dutch ovens is that the seasoning melts off when I make a stew.  Perhaps flaxseed oil won't do that.  If I continue with the process or have any other observations in the future, I'll post updates.