hibernation and full bellies

this is the time of year i like to hibernate.
if i can, i find a warm, sunny spot in a window
and curl up, sometimes with a book, sometimes
with a movie, often with a blanket for a little nap.
it's always good to have a full belly before settling
into a winter's hibernation of any duration.
here's what works for me...

Split Pea Soup with Chorizo
Makes enough for 6

Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter/olive oil mix
1 onion, vidalia would be great, diced
a few cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 lb chorizo sausage
1 lb split peas
some white wine
6 cups chicken stock
fresh thyme sprigs
S.P.

Make the Soup: Sweat the mirepoix of onions and garlic in the butter/oil mixture. Meanwhile, peel the chorizo of it's skin and pulse it in a cuisinart until crumbly. Add to sweated mirepoix. Saute for a couple of minutes until some of the chorizo fat starts to render. Add the peas, wine, stock and fresh thyme sprigs. Bring to a boil, then lower to a simmer. Cook for about an hour, stirring occassionally, until peas are soft. You may need to add water or stock during the cooking process as the peas soak up the broth. I personally prefer a slightly looser consistancy to my split pea soup, but the choice is yours. Season with S.P. at the finish.

Note: Croutons are an essential piece to this soup. Seriously. And, they are super easy to make.
Take a nice loaf of something yummy...think pumpernickel or a great chewy sour dough...
cut some perfect medium sized dice, gently toss with melted butter, S.P. and bake at 350 or so until golden and croutony. Sprinkle liberally on your soup.

Another Note: Any kind of sausage works in a split pea soup. I chose chorizo because I am deeply involved in a love affair with the stuff (a year and counting) and many other things Spanish including the mother country herself.


Some people might say that lightly dressed (I'm thinking white balsamic and evoo) salad greens would round out this simple meal. Who am I to quibble? It's just that salads are so NOT rugged hibernation foods.

But Brownies certainly are...

Serendiptious Brownies
Makes a half sheet pan which sounds like a whole lot, but they freeze REALLY well, if they last that long.

A little story before recipe revelation.
I co-teach culinary arts at our local high school with my friend Brian.
The kids are great but sometimes a little dopey.
A few years ago, we asked a couple of them to find a recipe for brownies and bake some, which they did.
But in typical fashion, they didn't read the recipe through. They prepared the batter properly, but used the wrong sized pan...a half sheet pan rather than an 8 inch square...a huge difference!
But, they were surprisingly good. Chewy and flavorful, but a bit too thin. So, we played with the recipe a bit and serendipitously, created a really amazing brownie, which we now sell everyday from our class kitchen. The brownies have continued to evolve. More on that below.


Ingredients:

3 sticks of butter
12 oz semi sweet chocolate, by weight
1 7/8 cup flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
1 T real vanilla

Make the Brownie Batter: Melt the butter and chocolate in a medium sized bowl over a double boiler. Meanwhile, Measure out the dry ingredients into a smallish bowl. Whisk eggs, sugar and vanilla in separate but large-ish bowl. Add melted chocolate mixture to egg mixture. Add flour mixture last. Spread into prepped half sheet pan (spray the sides lightly! with Pam and place a half sheet of parchment in the bottom of the pan). Bake for approximately 17 minutes in a 350 oven or until edges pull away from side. Center should feel firm to the touch.

More on the brownie evolution revolution. This recipe is really tweakable. You can tweak the batter by adding cinnamon, instant espresso, ginger, etc. OR you can play with toppings. For example, a little more than midway through the baking process, you can press chopped candy bars...at school, we've used kit kats, twix, butterfingers, peanut M&M's...onto the top of the partially baked brownies. We have plans to use reese's peanut butter cups, baby ruth's, marshmallow and graham crackers for a s'more variation, cheesecake batter for a marbled effect. Follow your gut (which won't be hard to do if you eat as many of these as you will be tempted to!).