THE NEW ENGLAND ASTER KITCHEN

50. LITTLE SHORTY GETS A BONUS

My big Staub braising pot contains what’s left from the Big Shorty dinner from yesterday. I’m going to fish out the remaining beef ribs and the right amount of vegetables for a second round later this week.

  There will be a hefty portion of stuff in reserve which will be converted into another flavor blast in another form. I’m naming this session Little Shorty Gets a Bonus.

THE BONUS is what’s left over and will be the base for a soup/stew/etc., the ingredients of which, will include this and everything else that’s not nailed down in the fridge. A thorough cleaning, as it were.

I expect that this will be tasty, nutritious and a hell of a lot of fun to watch develop. We’ll eat off of it during the week and what doesn’t get used up will go into the freezer. Basically, we don’t want anything go to waste.

Here’s the BONUS ingredients list:

• What’s left of Big Shorty Beef Ribs

• Left-over Easy Reach Vegetables

• Wild rice

• Red cabbage

• Red onion wedge

• 1/2 head of radicchio

• 1/4 hunk of celery root

• Honey Crisp wedge

• Last of the white radish

• Last of the collard greens

• Mixture of chicken and bean stock

• Last of my salsa roja

• Generous gob of my easy garlic (not in photo)

• Generous gob of goat butter (not in photo)

I’m building LITTLE SHORTY first with the BONUS to follow

Beef rib fishing.

Can’t find anymore. Damn it!

Just scoop it up. It’s all the same by now. This is just about the right quantity for our second rib and vegetable meal.

Stealing some precious au jus for the “Little Shorty” Le Creuset.

It didn’t take long to use this new leaf trick again. I just happened to have four collards left and they are ready to go. Overlap like a jungle palm roof.

Stealing a little more au jus to moisten the collards.

On goes the lid and ready to go back into the fridge for temporary custody. It’ll go back into the oven when Carol Ann says so.

Okay. Now for the BONUS treatment. I’ve decided to add 6 or seven cups of a combination chicken and bean stock (mine).

Note: There are no rules here about using chicken, beef, lamb, veal or vegetable stock as long as it’s rich, flavorful and you make it. It’s very infrequently that I would use anything other than my own chicken stock no matter what the job. I’ve never been crazy for beef or veal stock. It always seems a little overbearing to me.

Degreasing. This I consider to be job number one. Getting the fat out of the stock so I can replace it (if I want to) with that of my choosing. I have already determined that when this BONUS is complete its’s going to get a generous gob of goat butter fused into it.

Now the braising pot is clean (greaseless). Take a close look at the fat and scum that I ladled off of the surface. Yuk.

I think my emersion blender is an antique by now. It’s suffered every abuse imaginable and keeps on giving. Great engineering.

I think my Williams-Sonoma immersion hand blender is an antique by now. It’s suffered every abuse imaginable and keeps on giving. Great engineering.

I’m punching it a little to create a kind of a slurry base for the BONUS soup/stew that’s coming.

The sequence that follows is about cleaning the fridge.

This is what’s left from this weeks “Easy Reach Vegetables” (Essay 6).

Last of the wild rice.

Last quarter wedge of red cabbage.

Last of the radish and radicchio.

Consistency is still great.

Red onion in the pot and a mincing of the celery root.

Even after folding this last stuff in, it has a very appealing rustic and hearty texture which is always the plan.

Nice big gob of garlic and the last of the salsa roja (this is 35K on the heat index) and should raise the temperature nicely. Maybe not as high as we might wish, but enough to know that it’s there. If I had more I would have used it. We do like the heat.

Okay. Almost there. A salt and pepper dance and it’s about ready for a return visit to the oven for a couple of hours.

Little Shorty on the right and heading to the fridge.  Little Shorty’s BONUS heading to the oven chamber.

I decided to add a couple of close-ups because both concoctions are so beautiful. This one’s going into the fridge.

This one’s going into the oven.

The BONUS after a couple of hours at 325º.

I told you that I wanted the fat out at the beginning so I could substitute my own. Now for the goat butter. It’s like tying the bow around the best Christmas present ever and it’s only October.

This is our mid-day snack and the justification for spelling BONUS in all caps. Really good! I think the Founder’s Centennial IPA must have been engineered with this BONUS in mind.

MORE NEW ENGLAND ASTER KITCHEN ESSAYS

45. complicated peppers

46. hubbard’s boat

47. chard pigmeat

48. hail, caesar!

49. big shorty

50. little shorty gets a bonus

Thanks for visiting with me.

Paul V’Soske

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