Stardew Valley #43: Super Meal

Ingredients: Bok Choy, Cranberries, Artichoke

Item Description: It's a really energizing meal.

I have no idea what a super meal is... but I thought it might be cool to do like a "power bowl" type salad with a grain base. We've got out Bok Choy/Pak Choi (same dif), cranberries, artichoke, and that leftover amaranth for the grain. Should be fine............?

I should start on these cranberries I guess, dont wanna have them raw after all.

Got the amaranth boiling away.

Defrosting some dragon fruit/pitaya on the side. This isnt in the recipe but I had some in my freezer and I thought it would be cool to go with, since "power bowls" often have stuff like this.

Oops the cranberries cooked faster than I expected! Ive put them to one side and im sauteeing the bok choy and the artichokes next. I couldn't get fresh artichokes so tinned will have to do. I don't know if these.. fry well..

I should add some seasoning. If its going to be all salady I thought maybe I should add some soy sauce and balsamic vinegar to the grain, and we've got salt and pepper too.

This grain is taking forever to expand... I forgot i might have had that issue last time with salmon dinner... I guess maybe they dont get that big either. Maybe i should have used bulgur or couscous... I guess its fine though?

Now for extra dressing im adding sesame oil, lime juice and coriander. I brought out some extra asian style dressing too but then I didnt think I needed it.

Eh it doesnt look as well cooked as I'd like, but it smells nice and flavourful.

Starting to wonder if I should have cooked these at all. Well, as a hot food fan these will go down easier.

It looks small and gritty, but itll have to do. The base doesnt matter anyway, its all about the veg!

*

It's super bad. The cranberries bring an obnoxious bitterness to the already bitter vegetables. I don't like the artichoke and it doesn't go with anything. The balsamic vinegar was overpowering. In retrospect it seems super obvious that I didn't have a good concept for this and I should have taken it in a way different direction, but I improvise dumb stuff all the time and the next 3 times it works out ill forget all about the times like this and I WILL NEVER LEARN ANYTHING.

Stardew Valley #42: Pumpkin Soup

Ingredients: Pumpkin, Milk

Item Description: A seasonal favorite.

WOOSH its February now. Pumpkins are out of season, but you know whats always in, and literally the same thing as a pumpkin? A squash. All pumpkins are squashes, and we just arbitrarily define some squashes as pumpkins based on vibes. Also I have leftover cream so im using that as "milk".

First, i remember/decide im going to do this recipe an hour before i finish work so I can shove it for a 1h cook in the oven while im on a tea break. Gave it a quick brush with olive oil too. Yes the pans dirty i used it to cook some mini kievs.

Thats done its job! smells good and you can just scoop the softened pumpkin out with a spoon.

Now, what else to go in? I've got some garlic and spring onions, and from my herb garden ive got sage and marjoram. Sage is good and distinct, marjoram sucks and i swear it tastes like NOTHING but it survived the winter and continues to flourish so its GOING IN

Roughly chopped all those herbs and stuff, added the pumpkin.. now, will it blend? Also my blender is kinda small so ill have to do it in multiple parts.

With a little help from H2O, looks like we've managed to blend it all. Its looking a little bit greeny-yellow from the spring onion, maybe we can tweak that slightly with...

More spices! Might as well, right? I'm picking celery salt, turmeric, coriander, black pepper, cayenne pepper, and garam masala for a slightly curry-inspired flavour. 

Did I go a bit hard? I should add more water too, we're making soup here not pumpkin concentrate!

And of course, we should add the cream! And I can just let that all cook on low for a bit, bring out the flavours from the garlic and onions.

****

I feel like i've accidentally made curry sauce... Its still very thick and the delicious blend of garlic, onion and spices have come out strong. Have i made a typical pumpkin soup or was I taking it in a weird direction? Whatever it is, its super nice and begging for some bread to dip in it! A naan perhaps?

Stardew Valley #41: Autumn's Bounty

 Ingredients: Yam, Pumpkin

Item Description: A taste of the season.

It's october as I write this, who knows when I'll post this, but I felt it would be right to do "a taste of autumn" right at the height of autumn. For the pumpkin i've picked a random seasonal pumpkin/squash, for the yams I figured pumpkins and sweet potato are kind of alike in look and flavour, so I thought it would be fun to get some red potatoes instead. And then some other very seasonal produced to round it out. We only seem to get fresh figs in a brief window round here, and brussels sprouts season has just started, though that'll continue for another 4 months or so.

Ah, this is... a lot less orange than I was expecting. Looks like we've gone from 2 typically orange ingredients to none, but oh well no matter. It will still taste like pumpkin.

Time to dress it up with some seasonal seasoning. I've gone for olive oil, fresh rosemary, ginger chilli & peppercorn mix, salt, and a drizzle of pomegranate molasses. Then the 2 halves are going in the oven.

While the pumpkin gets a headstart on cooking, we deal with the potatoes. I'm gonna make wedges with these. I heard somewhere you should rinse the extra starch off of potatoes before you bake them so I've done that and patted them dry.

Next im gonna add a slightly different seasoning to mix it up. Going for jamaican jerk and paprika salt, with more oil.

These can go in for a good half hour or so befor we bake the rest.

Oh, you know what I almost forgot about!? What's a variety of baked vegetables without some chunky garlic cloves?

Once everythings looking nice and soft and toasty, we can assemble it all onto a big plate. (not forgetting the figs!)

****

A little less classically orange than we had intended, but it still looks like a fun taste of the season. It's definitely a great gimmicky dish that would make a perfect sharing starter or something. Lots of variety of delicate flavours that all go together pretty well, though I think i should have bust out some sort of cranberry jam or onion chutney or something.

Stardew Valley #40: Blueberry Tart

 Ingredients: Blueberry, Wheat Flour, Sugar, Egg

Item Description: It's subtle and refreshing.

There's quite a few fruit pies in the stardew menu, so I hope to vary the recipes a fair bit to make them seem a bit different. This one will already be very different from the rhubarb pie on account of it being an open-face tart full of berries. I also thought, since blueberries are not so tart or sweet on their own, it might be fun to do this one with a frangipane (almond) layer below. Plus I managed to find a pre-made pastry case, so I might as well make SOMETHING myself!

Ah, as always, I forgot to leave the butter out... so we use some microwave magic to make it mixable.

Mixing it up with the sugar first... I dunno I looked at a recipe and it said to do this.

Then we add all the ground almonds, 2 eggs, and a squeeze of lemon juice to complement the blueberries. Blueberry and lemon is a classic combo.

This looks good! Its basically just a cake batter with nuts instead of flour.

Cool! Love it! Um... hang on... the pie crust is full now... where am I going to fit all the blueberries?

Has science gone too far? I'll put it in the oven for 45mins and find out.

*****

Man overboard! Hull has been breached! We may have overdid it a bit here with the frangipane, but unfortunately I have no regrets and will never learn anything, because this monstrous tart is delicious!

Looks pretty fine once its all in slices too.

Stardew Valley #39: Ice Cream

Ingredients: Milk, Sugar

Item Description: It's hard to find someone who doesn't like this.

Got some serious ambitions for this one. I have an ice cream maker, you see. And they want 3 different scoops, I want to try and make 3 different scoops.

Let's start with the most... normal one? Ive got some leftover strawberry essence, raspberry syrup, and then some double cream and sugar. 

In it all goes, the syrup will be slightly sweet already but i think this one will still need extra sugar.

It's also only gently pink, so ive got a little extra food colouring to top that up.

I thought it might need some extra heating to dissolve the sugar or something, but I dunno if that was really necessary. Well its done now.

Once its cooled it goes in the ice cream maker to churn. Gotta be quick!

That actually looks like its churned and cooled quite well. Now to pop it in the freezer and hope it doesnt go rock hard.

Next one! the ice cream maker needs cleaning, drying and re-freezing between rounds so im just doing one of these a day. This ideas a funky one, i thought itd be fun to make an avocado and lime flavour.

Im just shoving it all together in a blender, hey look the avocado has made a big air pocket! Not for long. The avocado will make up for some of the creamyness I guess, so we should need less cream..?

Another secret weapon! To enhance the green-ness im adding a touch of spirulina powder! Earthy! Im also going to try not cooking this one, surely the blender has mixed the sugar in enough?

This ones gone really well! it looks good to go already.. and tasting a little bit... it tastes so good! Hope it freezes ok.

And the last ones a white ice cream. But im too weird for vanilla, you can get that anywhere... i want to try making yogurt and honey ice cream.

At least this ones straightforward! Yogurt. honey. mix it up.

Well this ones not looking churned like the others. But it's not cream. Frogurt is still a thing so surely... itll just... work out...?

Alright moment of truth! Or rather, we'll make this work some way or another. The cream ones are a little stiff, and the yogurt one looks positively unscoopable. I'll leave them out for a few minutes and then we'll just hack our way through.

****

It was extremely annoying to get these 3 dry bitch scoops to stay stacked on a cheapass kiddy cone and balance them with 1 hand while unlocking my phone and taking a photo with the other. I'm annoyed, but at least I have ice cream. I wish I had a better sense of like, what temp to keep my freezer at, how to balance proportions with new flavours, good scoop technique, etc etc. I'd rather just buy ice cream if im gonna have to fit it in a cone instead of just eat it out of a tub same day. But damn look at it... now that its all done, it looks kinda good right?

Flavour wise its good! The pink and green are so creamy and fruity, and the white is quite sour, which complements the fruits very nicely. I think my favourite is the avocado lime. It's buttery, refreshing and adventurous. 

Next time... i should make this in summer and not the middle of winter. ._.