Dry Beans ?

[satx78247]

Understood. While my mother, my two aunts & my governess (who actually raised me) were ALL good cooks, my Great-Aunt Martha was so bad of a cook that Mother used to threaten to "whip you (us) when we get home, if you don't eat your supper", there, when we went to visit them.
(Aunt Martha always INSISTED that we stay for supper & everything that she cooked was the same: It tasted/looked like slop.)

Sure wish that I could make coffee at home that tastes as just downright WONDERFUL as the coffee does out on the creek-bank, "early on a frosty morn".

yours, satx

 

[coloradoclyde]

I made grits for the first time from a box of quaker quick grits. it had the taste and texture of moist sand. Any suggestions to cooking it up, or does it get its' name from "gritty"? thank you

:rotf: Yep! that's how they taste if you haven't eaten them from birth....It's basically hog feed......

 

[satx78247]

Well, at least we Rebs don't eat pork & beans on toast.
(CHUCKLE).

As Professor Janet Kaye Weems-Enochs, PhD (nutritionist) says of things like grits, "Those things are 'cradle food' & most people like them because their Mother or Grandmother made them & they remind us of home."
(The professor just may be RIGHT.)

Btw, all my girlfriends & my wife (for nearly 50 years) "made fun of me" about how I cook. As "Duckie" says, "Hun, it's 2016, not 1936. You don't have to put spaghetti & macaroni or rice in everything, as we have the money for better things."
(All of the women who raised me grew up during The Depression & NETX folks DO cook with a LOT of cheap things. One of the "inside jokes" up there is that if you stab us, that pea juice & pot likker will run from the wound, as all of us NE Texicans eat a LOT of peas, beans, greens & cornbread.)

yours, satx

 

[Obi-Wan Cannoli]

One of my fondest memories as a child was this restaurant my family would go to on special occasions. They served baskets of cornbread instead of dinner rolls, and if you came in wearing a tie: one of the waitresses would come by and cut it off and staple it to the ceiling. My First Communion tie would still be hanging from that ceiling if the place hadn't of burned down. I think a part of me died in that fire...I still haven't tasted cornbread anything like it.

 

[BullRunBear]

This is just anecdotal. My grandparents came to the states as newlyweds just before WW I. They were the end of a 300 year line of Quebec farmers and lumberjacks. To judge by the way grandma cooked, breakfast was a BIG DEAL. Baked beans, pies of various kinds, buckwheat pancakes, and oatmeal, eggs and home made bread of course were always available. (And maple syrup, which is proof that God loves us.) :grin:

There's no one left to ask but some reading indicates those farmers went for crops easy to grow and preserve which definitely includes beans and various legumes. (She made great split pea soup.) There was also a long tradition of baked bean meals in Normandy where most of the early Quebec settlers came from. I would think this would apply to northern New England areas with Canuck influence.

For what it's worth, I modify the Frugal Gourmet recipe for baked beans (no ketchup) but cook them slower. I use navy or northern beans. Dad told me the recipe tasted similar to what his mom made. The big difference was I used molasses which was more affordable than maple syrup.

Well, now I now what I'm cooking this weekend.

Jeff

 

[Obi-Wan Cannoli]

I love the quaker apples and cinnamon instant oatmeal. I add less water than what is recommended so that it comes out really thick and tastes like an apple fritter


Gobs are also crazy delicious as long as you can find somebody who knows how to make them, a lot can go seriously wrong for something so simple and throw it all off

 

[satx78247]

Pardon my ignorance but WHAT are "Gobs", aside from a slang expression for "lots & lots"??

yours,satx

 

[Obi-Wan Cannoli]

Pardon my ignorance but WHAT are "Gobs"

essentially they are about a handful in size, two disks of cake with cream in the center. not sure where they originated from, but the Amish (Mennonites?) in PA make them. And there is a huge difference between a good gob and a bad gob. cake is cake, but gobs run the spectrum...kind of weird how that works out
and yes, they are labelled as "gobs".

also, the restaurant: the waitresses used scissors, and I would defy anybody to tell them "no" :v

 

[coloradoclyde]

I love the quaker apples and cinnamon instant oatmeal.

:shocked2: Seriously.....That fake stuff is nasty... :barf:

I decided not to make maple syrup this year and I am regretting it.... I tried to make beans the other day using pancake syrup instead if the real stuff.....There is no substitute or comparison for the real stuff.....

 

[Obi-Wan Cannoli]

I love the quaker apples and cinnamon instant oatmeal.

:shocked2: Seriously.....That fake stuff is nasty... :barf:

yes, I love it. I have to premise by saying that I just got hip to oatmeal about 6 months ago. I couldn't stomach it prior, been trying to acquire a taste for it for decades, then I found that stuff and I go bonkers over it. I ran out of it one day and only had some older experimental plain oatmeal to which I added a chopped up apple that I mixed cinnamon and sugar to and it came out revolting

 

[BullRunBear]

Sorry you don't like the traditional oats. I use steel cut oats which take about 30 minutes to cook and I definitely prefer them to the quick oats: creamier texture and more flavor. To each serving I add fresh grated nutmeg, a touch of cinnamon and a teaspoon of honey or maple syrup. In season, I put in some fresh blueberries. I could eat the stuff by the gallon but have mild diabetes so have to watch the carbs. (SIGH!) Also, I make enough for several portions and reheat a serving each morning.

With a glass of cold milk and some good hot coffee it is great.

Jeff

PS: I have tried the slow cooker method and it never worked. I cook it in the stove top.

 

[satx78247]

AGREED on "fake oatmeal" 100%.

Make mine the "old-school" steel-cut oats that cook slowly & taste great.=====> When we are having oatmeal for breakfast, I put the oatmeal on at the same time that I turn on the coffee pot. By the time that the rest of the breakfast is done, so is the oatmeal.

I feel the same about cornmeal. = Make mine the "old-school" stone ground kind with NOTHING added. = I use INDIAN HEAD meal for cornbread, stuffing & just about everything else that takes meal.

yours, satx

 

[satx78247]

To successfully do the old-school oatmeal in a crockpot, you need a pot with a Low, Medium, High & Warm setting. = The 2-speed pots don't get hot enough for making good oatmeal.

yours, satx

 

[BullRunBear]

Satx, Thanks for the heads up about the slow cooker. Ours has only the two settings which has worked for everything except oatmeal. The stove top will do for now. And since the Mrs. and I are retired, I take the time to make a proper breakfast. Beats shoving a piece of toast in my mouth and slurping coffee in commuter traffic like the last 40 years. :haha:

Jeff

 

[tenngun]

My daughter introduced me to steel cut oats about 7 years ago. I had made s lot of regular and liked it all my life. I didn't think the steel cut would be any different , I was wrong! Now it's the only oatmeal I eat,
I grew up in New Mexico, my dad grew up in Wisconsin and my mother in Rhode Island. The town I grew up in was mostly Hispanic and Navajo. I never had grits as a kid but had s lot of home made corn totillias and corn based Indian breads. We had a big stone in school and the Navajo girls used to make fresh pika bread from blue corn. It's a thin cornmeal pancake. Didn't stay eating grits till I moved to Arkansas when I was 25. My dad grew up with lots of German and Norwegian influences in his cooking. So at Christmas we would have ulencoggan, ate lots of saurkrute, enchiladas and tamale pies and big baskets of sopapillias and fry bread at every community pot luck. Then was introduced to ozark cooking. My belly will tell you I love I all. You do like what you get used to, but all the reginal foods are eaten because there good... Lutkafisch any one?

 

[coloradoclyde]

:thumbsup:

 

[Obi-Wan Cannoli]

I used to work with an older gentleman who was addicted to watching cooking shows all the time. I busted his chops over it once, to which he replied: "don't you like the way food tastes?", it got me thinking how everything he brought in to share with people tasted really amazing...on a side note, Julia Child used to say that "you can not define it in a recipe, you can only know it by how it tastes", funny how that works, but it's true...

 

[Obi-Wan Cannoli]

Sorry you don't like the traditional oats.

I would not call what I have traditional by a long shot. it was the same stuff, just in a generic brand with no fun bits added.

 

[tenngun]

Try steel cut oats, the best one I think are from the health food and bulk food stores. 1/4 cup of oats to a cup of water and simmer for about 20-30 min. Salt and butter are fine for me, butter and cinnamon or a little maple sugar is good. The flavor is rich and nutty, raisins or currents are good. Berries are good with it but other fresh fruits may not do as well. Dried apples cut up and simmered with it are good. Use butter, life is too short to eat "I cant tell it from butter" cause yes you can unless you lost your sense of taste.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Read the ingredients.....

It's not any harder to cook old fashioned rolled oats than it is to cook a microwave mystery packet... :haha:

I don't eat oats that often...but if I did I'd probably start growing my own.... :grin: