Mustard and How to Make Homemade Hot Mustard

On Sunday I shared a little about the "Faith of a Mustard Seed".  I wanted to kick off Herb and Spice Week with a sweet tutorial! What do you think? Should we make mustard for the Easter Ham?

First, let's talk about the medicinal benefits of this common culinary spice. Remember a spice is a seed or bark of an edible plant.  Not only does it make your hot dog taste good, but mustard has been revered for many thousands of years as a healer and purifier in natural medicine. I remember my grandmother talking about mustard poultices they would use to put on the chest of a very congested and sick person, only to see the sickness soon leave. Mustard has been used for years as a dietary aid to ease digestion and metabolize fat. Yeah...I should eat a lot more mustard dude. Give it to me straight. Do you think if I poultice it on my thighs it will help? Maybe? I imagine it will just make them look more bumpy.

 I  read here that  the Greek physician, Dioscorides, used Mustard as an emetic, and Pliny the Elder (23-79) noted in his Historia Naturalis that Mustard grew everywhere in Italy and was not only a great boon to cuisine, but he also listed forty medical remedies with Mustard as the chief ingredient.  At one time in  history mustard seed was believed to have strong aphrodisiac powers. 

I don't know about that...but Ace nearly fell over dead with amorous when he found out I knew how to make homemade mustard. 

Chef Tess Homemade Mustard

1/4 cup brown mustard seed

1/2 cup dry mustard power (1/4 cup if you don't want your mustard as hot)

1 tsp kosher salt

1/2 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp smoked paprika

1 clove pressed garlic

1/2 tsp crushed dill seed (optional)

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup Braggs Organic Apple cider Vinegar

4 droppers of liquid Stevia (or 10 packets of Splenda brand sweetener)

2T UltraGel  modified food starch (optional)

1T fresh minced tarragon (optional)

1/2 tsp dry tarragon (optional)

Place mustard seeds (and dill seed if you use it) in a spice mill or coffee grinder and mill until a fine powder.

I found this cool organic yellow mustard seed powder for 8$ a pound! That's a smokin' deal eh? It so happens that a pound of mustard powder is 4 cups.

It fit perfectly into a quart size mason jar.

You need to combine the dry ingredients. So...ya know. I don't want to get to tech-no-rocket-chef here, but the two mustards, the salt, the turmeric, the paprika and Ultra gel....

In a separate container combine the vinegar, water, stevia and minced garlic.

I used a fancy jar. 

Whisk the dry ingredients together and then add the wet ingredients and mix well.  

Add herbs if desired or enjoy plain. Keep in a glass jar or non-metal container in the fridge up to one month.

Do you prefer whole grain mustard?

Here's my recipe for that too.

Chef Tess' Homemade Whole Grain Mustard

1/4 cup yellow mustard seeds

2 Tablespoons brown mustard seeds

1/3 cup grape juice (or wine if you use wine in your cooking)

1/3 cup apple cider vinegar or high grade balsamic vinegar
2 cloves garlic, minced
Pinch ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 tsp dill seed

Directions

In a non-reactive bowl, combine all ingredients and refrigerate overnight, covered.

Transfer the mustard mixture to a food food processor and process until mustard has obtained the desired texture and thickness. Store in an airtight, non-reactive container in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.

I first read about homemade mustard with Alton Brown and severely adapted it for sugar free organic uses--obviously if you use Splenda it would not be organic. However, if you don't need all that...Get Alton Brown's Recipe from Food Network's blog and the printable pdf  here.

There you go!

Homemade Tomatillo Salsa...Yes we Can!

One of the all time favorites at my house is Salsa Verde. AKA Tomatillo salsa. Oddly enough, I realized today that I had never added it to my blog. This is a great human tragedy soon to be remedied by my stealthy fingers typing frantically.  I know everyone needs to know how to make it.  Okay, maybe not everyone per say, but everyone who has ever longed for a truely luscious green salsa recipe.  My husband Ace will literally crack open the bottles and drink them. Falling off the wagon...

 Note:  If you roast the peppers first, you'll have a slightly smoky depth to your sauce that will make your friends and family cry with joy and happiness...In Arizona we have markets that literally flame roast pounds and pounds of green chiles right in front of us. It's quite a nice perk to living in on the surface of the sun...I mean the valley of the sun.  

Tess' Green Tomatillo Salsa

  

5 1/2 cups chopped, cored husked tomatillos, pureed in food processor
1 cup onion, pureed in food processor
1 cup minced sorano green chili peppers (or for less hot, use mild roasted Hatch green chiles)
6 cloves garlic, minced
1 bunch minced cilantro
1 teaspoons cumin
2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoon oregano, dried

1 cup vinegar (5% acidity or higher)
1/4 cup fresh lime juice

1/2 cup sugar

Combine all ingredients in a large sauce pot. Bring mixture to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes. Ladle hot salsa into hot jars, leaving 1/2 inch head-space. Adjust two-piece caps. Process 15 minutes in a boiling water canner.  Remove from canner and place on dry kitchen towel.  Allow to cool 12 hours.  Check the seals.  If properly sealed, store for up to a year.  If it didn't seal, it may be refrigerated up to 2 months. Yield: 5 1/2 pint jars (5 cups)

If you've never home canned before, see my handy post: 

Home Canning Safety 101

There you go! 
Always My Very Best,
Your Friend Chef Tess

Homemade Maple Worcestershire Sauce Tutorial

Worcestershire sauce has become one of those "must have" condiments people keep in their pantry. I don't think I know a single person in America who doesn't like it. However, there are a few vegans out there who would love to see it made without any anchovy. There are a lot of moms who care if their kids have high fructose corn syrup or anything close. So, today I wanted to show the process I use to make homemade Worcestershire sauce. It's actually quite simple and it makes about half a gallon of sauce. So, I make a large batch. It will last several months easily. On the down side, it does have a very distinct odor, and therefore is one of those things that it's probably good I only make once in a long stretch. The smell in the house is rather...pungent. Similar to the smell I get on Sweet and Hot Corn Relish Day. I'm just saying...if I didn't like the stuff so much, I'd probably just buy the jars from the store.

Chef Tess Homemade Maple Worcestershire Sauce

6 oz peeled chopped horseradish root (or one 4 oz jar prepared horseradish--no mayo!)

2 medium red onions

1/4 cup minced garlic

1/4 cup minced jalapeno

2T crushed black pepper

3 cups water

4 cups sweet balsamic vinegar

1/2 cup molasses

2 cups maple syrup

12 whole cloves

2T sea salt

zest of one lemon

3 juniper berries, crushed

I employ a very elite labor force.

Red onions are my favorite in this. I love how sweet they are. You can however use white onions.

I do keep the seeds with the jalapeno...the added heat makes for a very nice sauce later.
Yes...the seed is where a great amount of the heat is found in a chile pepper.

My favorite part of the sauce is adding the crushed juniper berries. These are ones we picked in the mountains by our cabin. You mean I put Baby Pine Cones in my dinner? Yes...and more.
I add some cloves as well.

Combine all the ingredients in a large one gallon pot and simmer one hour on low heat. It seems like it should be harder to make Worcestershire sauce huh?

I use a fine cotton cloth to strain the sauce placed over another strainer.

Pour the sauce into the strainer.

Drain. It takes about 20 minutes to strain.

If one is not careful, it would be easy to get impatient and squeeze that bag...perhaps losing a few juniper berries into the strainer. Thus...the second strainer. I may have been a little bit overzealous in my mesh squeezing.

The sauce will look like this:

Transfer to pint jars. This recipe yields 4 pints or two quarts. Feel free to make more or less as needed. Put sealed jars in a boiling water bath caner and process 10 minutes. Allow to cool on a kitchen towel lined counter top for 12 hours. Sauce is best after one month or longer to mature. I've seen it done where the sauce is put in a wooden barrel and aged like wine. I don't do that...I don't have the right facility. I suppose it could be done that way though...if you want to get all technical-fancy. I just know, even like it is...it's a pretty tasty sauce.

There you go. Make some Worcestershire sauce.

Homemade Ketchup

Several years ago I stumbled upon the idea of making my own ketchup. I don't make it every year, but sometimes I feel like I just want a nice cross between my dear Great Grandma's Chile Sauce and ketchup for dipping. I also am in the middle of a lower glycemic diet program and my focus has been to cut sugar and added chemicals out of my diet. So...homemade ketchup it is. Not to be confused with the high fructose corn syrup, salt and vinegar mono-dimensional sauce used in most American food. Baked Lowfat French Fries...Homemade Perfect are amazing dipped in this sauce. This has good depth and a lot of flavor. I think you'll be pleasantly pleased with it's result.

Chef Tess' Homemade Ketchup
2 # 10 cans organic tomato puree (those are the big ones found at warehouse stores)
3 large onions, 1 1/2 lb puree (in blender)
1/2 cup minced garlic, puree (in blender)
1 tsp cinnamon
1T black pepper
1 tsp ground clove
1 tsp ground allspice
2 tsp ground celery seed
1 cup brown sugar or 1/2 cup honey or stevia to taste (after cooking)
1 cup Braggs Apple cider vinegar
2 T sea salt
2T smoked paprika
1 tsp Cayenne

In a two gallon pot, combine and simmer over a very low heat for 2-3 hours until very thick. May puree and strain until desired consistency. Yield 6-8 pints, depending on how thick you like it. Put in sterile jars. Seal the jars. Put in a boiling water bath 10 minutes. If this is your first time home canning, please see: Home Canning Safety 101 for more details.

There you go.

Always My Very Best,
Your Friend Chef Tess

Sundried Tomato Pesto from the solar oven

We've been pulling a lot of tomatoes out of our garden lately. Is there anything more earthy and wonderful than to bite into a fresh juicy tomato right out of the garden? I could stay there all day and let the juice run down my elbows. Aside from saying ,"Mmmm" for hours on end...I don't see anything horrible about it. Wait...a tomato seed mustache isn't necessarily the prettiest fashion statement. ( Note to self...wipe face before returning to society.) I miss The Organic Tomato Farm simply for the fact that at least there, I was in a greenhouse out of the sun. There...it's official. I miss the farm. It hasn't stopped me from growing these babies organic, but it has made me appreciate a controlled environment.

It's summer in Arizona. I can't even go into how hot it is...because I start cursing. Well...maybe just grumbling. My tomatoes are having a hard time with the heat...but my solar oven is loving these long smoldering days. There is a bright happy joy-joy good side of living in the dessert heat. I get a lot done in the hours I have the large capacity solar baker out. Those of you just joining me don't know I built a solar baker out of a dresser drawer. I did. I'm a solar dork. With it we've been sun-drying our tomatoes. Turning them into Sun dried tomato pesto has been a wonderful thing. When we where living in the condominium I couldn't do so much with this outdoor baking, though I still used my regular Solar Oven almost every day on the patio. Most of my "sun-dry" was done by dehydrator. Not now. Today we're making tomato pesto. Thursday I will be on NBC channel 12 here in Phoenix making Pizza Chicken Bacon Wraps for Valley Dish. I'm really excited to be there. It will be a competition show for the best brown bag lunch. Though honestly, I think the chef I'm competing with is one of the most amazing chef's I've seen. It will be an honor just to be in the same studio with her. Which brings me to the pesto.

I use:

1 cup packed fresh basil, 1/2 cup packed fresh oregano, and 1/4 cup packed fresh rosemary(off the stem) and 4 sprigs of thyme and 1 cup extra virgin olive oil. I pack them in a jar like this...

On top of 3 Kalamata olives, zest of half an orange and half a lemon, 3 shallots and 2 garlic cloves and 1T fresh cracked pepper. I'm honestly weird, but I think it tastes better if I let the oil and herbs sit together a few days in the fridge before I make it into pesto. You don't have to do this step. It's okay just to skip ahead into making the pesto.

The tomatoes have been cut in half and placed on a wire rack inside the large capacity solar oven. They dry at the same time we cook beans in the pot. When they are mostly dry and still pliable like a prune, I take them out. It takes about a pound of tomatoes to make two ounces of sun dried tomatoes. We used 8 oz of sun dried tomatoes to make the pesto. Yes...you can just buy the sun dried tomatoes at the store. I know I've said this a hundred times before, but please remember my simple rule: I'm not checking your cupboard. Do what you want.

It's okay at this point to just pack them in oil and keep them in the fridge for longer storage.

To make them into pesto, simply cover tomatoes in juice, wine or water for about 20 minutes. They rehydrate quickly. Add the tomatoes to the pesto ingredients in a large food processor and grind with the chopper blade 3-4 minutes until a smooth paste is achieved. You may add a cup of Parmesan cheese if desired.

For those who don't have access to a solar oven I thought I'd share what you do if you start with a dehydrator. I posted it once before, but it's nice to have all the information in one post, right? As for the tomatoes, honestly you can't call them sun dried if you don't use the sun. Like I say,I used "electric dried" most of the time I was in the condo, simply because I didn't want the onslaught of ants that usually accompanies the outdoor production of dried tomatoes. I think they still taste just as wonderful. I cut the tomatoes in quarters and dehydrate 8-10 hours.

Place the tomatoes, cut side up, directly onto the dehydrator trays. Set dehydrator temperature to about 140 F. After 4 or 5 hours, turn the tomatoes over and press flat with your hand or a spatula. After a few hours, turn the tomatoes again and flatten gently. Continue drying until done.

8 lbs of tomatoes will yield about a pint. You read that right. I know that it sounds like a lot of tomatoes and it is...that is the point. It's a huge flavor in a small jar.

Behold...the jar of sun...

To pack in oil:
Cover them in high quality extra virgin olive oil. Make sure they are completely immersed in the oil. The oil will solidify at refrigerator temperatures (it quickly liquefies at room temperature however). As tomatoes are removed from the jar, add more olive oil as necessary to keep the remaining tomatoes covered. They can be frozen for up to 12 months without a problem as well!

I use a garlic infused oil and then add a sprig of clean rosemary...
which looks like Christmas. Don't you agree?

It is also a wonderful flavor to add 1T fresh cracked pepper,2T fresh basil, 3T fresh oregano, and 2 cloves of garlic to the packing oil. Sun dried tomatoes can be stored out of oil too. I just like having infused oil on hand.It's amazing.
Cap tightly. Keeps well over 3 months in the fridge. Like bottles of sunshine.

I use sun dried tomatoes in Sundried tomato blush sauce and pasta.

Pizza Chicken Bacon Wraps I usually use the sun dried tomato pesto.

There you go. Make some pesto.

Peach Mango Jalapeno Jam

It's time for me to bring to light one of my favorite jams. It's sweet and slightly hot with a good well rounded finish. I use it a lot of places...but most often on meats and slathered on a cracker. I've had friends tell me it's good on breakfast burritos. I've had it on savory cornbread waffles and cried tears of proverbial joy. I might add...I am a little over the top. I remember as a kid asking my mom why she would eat a food like a jalapeno that made her nose sweat. I couldn't wrap my head around the idea of putting myself through that kind of pain for food. I promise, that without the seeds, this jam is actually quite mild. You taste the flavor of the pepper, but not much heat. I think,however, you may agree once you've tasted the jam yourself, that it is one in a million for amazing flavor.

Tess' Peach Mango Jalapeno Jam
1 lb peaches
1lb mangoes (after peeling and pitting weight)
4 jalapenos, seeded and minced
3/4 cup lemon juice
7 1/2 cups sugar
1 tsp salt
2 pouches liquid pectin

Mash mangoes and peaches over low heat in a large one gallon heavy bottom pot. A note on jalapenos will now follow.

I use gloves when I seed and cut jalapeno...because I tried it without them once and made the mistake of rubbing my eye. I looked like I'd been in a brawl, my eye was so swollen. Then it started tearing and got all bloodshot. No, I'm not just being dramatic. It happened...in front of a cooking class I might add. I will never make that mistake again. So...it gives a blue glove a chance to be part of a real happy life. I think it's really nice to keep them around. Thanks gloves.

Add all remaining ingredients except the pectin. Boil 5 minutes in a large one gallon pot. Add pectin, boil 1 minute more.Put in sterile canning jars (makes 8 1 cup jars). Seal lids. Boiling water process 10 minutes sea level.

You know...if there's any left in the jam pan after I fill the jars I shamelessly dunk my head in there and lick it off the bottom. Okay...maybe I don't. That would get mango jam junk in my hair and then I would look crazy. Yes. Only then would I look crazy.
Wonderful on a bagel with cream cheese. Amazing on ribs and grilled chicken. I've used it to replace the jam and pepper in the Jalapeno pepper pecan baked brie I adore. Alas, it is by far my favorite topping for a cracker.


There you go.

Always My Very Best,
Chef Tess