Ravioli :: No Recipe

I haven't posted anything in a while. I got sick with bronchitis, and pretty much took a month off from life. I'm still a little bit depressed, but things are starting to look up again.

I am thinking about making a ravioli for the trail, a nice protein rich packet of flavor wrapped in a high carbohydrate dumpling. My gut instinct says I want beef stew inside a chewy dumpling, with a gravy type of sauce. I'm still thinking about the best way to go about doing such a thing for the trail.

While I don't have a recipe to share yet, I do have some gratuitous photos, just keep scrolling till you find them. I'm still playing with the fake meats, here as a ravioli filling.

Enjoy, and Thank You,
Cayenne


Four egg yolks, some egg white, and a splash of oil are massaged into one cup of flour, wrapped in plastic and set out to rest for an hour at room temperature.


roll it thin, and cut out ravioli halves with metal shot glass


add some filling


put another circle of dough over the filling, and seal with a fork


repeat until you have enough to cook


cook and serve. I ate these with browned butter and a carrot chutney

Lassen VNP Solo trip II

After battling a job change, the flu, and travel for a wedding, I'm finally posting pictures from the Lassen volcanic national park return visit. This trip was a blast, and I used up a lot of my food that had been sitting around for a while.


I will once again be heading towards the lakes in the eastern section of the park


I enter the wilderness at summit lake around 4:00 and began making my way up to badger flat.


Little bear lake was running a little low on water


big bear lake was also low on water


I believe this critter to be an actual badger. I was about 2.6 miles outside of badger flat proper when I startled him. I watched him burrow under the log, and then moved on to my campsite.



This is a print from a California Mountain Lion. I believe it to be the right front paw. I believe a mom and cub[s?] made a kill very recently from the number of tracks in the area. This was taken about 50 yards from my campsite. I was hoping to catch them coming to the water at night.


Since this was an easy trip for me, I just carried wet tofu. I wasn't packing much water because the lakes were so plentiful in the area. This was dinner. I could have whipped it smooth, but I was feeling more hungry than I was concerned about presentation. I ate it and I liked it.


I laid out on the "beach", silently waiting for visitors to the water. I saw neither bear nor mt lions. I did see two deer, but was honestly hoping for something more interesting.


Morning came quickly and I took a photo before heading out on the PCT across the park.


I walked past several empty lake beds


view of Lassen peak from badger flat


PCT trail marker


I had a very quick lunch of grilled jambalaya I made this before I started the blog. It tastes a lot better than it looks, plus it is almost instant. Add hot water, wait three minutes and chow. Tomatoes, garlic, onions, bell peppers, jalapeno, basmati rice


I passed twin lake on my way to swan lake. It also was a little bit low on water this year.


I reach swan lake and setup camp near the animal highway coming to the lake, hoping to catch some large animals drinking in the evening. Here is a bear track I colored in to make the print more obvious.


Dinner was Dahl, black beluga lentils in spicy tomato sauce . . . and apparently some amaranth too. This is one of my favorite trail dishes, but I made this before I had started this blog.


Just before the sun breaks through the forest, whisps of fog float above the water
of Swan lake.


And then the sun breaks through and warmth hits my side of the lake immediately.


I hit the trails early, and was walking in awesome scenery


I made it to corral meadows before the good light was gone. Above was on the left side of the trail, and the shot below was on my right. Just fantastic.



After walking by one dry lake after another, I was surprised to come across a stream crossing that required me to take my boots off. Yes !


I went for a little swim in Summit lake


Clean and ready for the long ride home


Thank you for hosting me, again, I had a wonderful stay.

Yours,
Cayenne Redmonk

Masala Sauce, a picture show

I think I am mostly recovered from the labor day weekend. My friend canceled on me, so I went back to Lassen for more solo adventurer fun. Here are some pictures of the masala sauce preparation. Hopefully I get the photos from the trip logged soon

Enjoy,



I start with fresh organic tomatoes, and bake them


so they develop richer flavors, and the skin is easier to peel


After the tomatoes are cored and seeded, there is a lot of juice on the cutting board. I just strain it all into the pot.


My spice blend is blackpepper, paprika, coriander, cumin, cinnamon, and ginger.
I toast my seeds over med-high heat in a small skillet


Then grind to a powerder with the mortar and pestle


Cinnamon is grated fresh


Organic red fresno chili peppers provide the heat in this recipe.
I puree them with the tomatoes.


Tomato+chili puree is mixed with spices and simmered till thickened.
This is the finished sauce


I strain out bits of skin and seeds before drying.


Drying is done on baking sheets lined with parchment paper


I dried this one in the oven, lowest setting, door slightly propped open


The dried sauce is like a fruit leather, and lightweight.


I sample the sauce with a spoonful of heavy cream, in case I need to make any last minute adjustments.

A Masala Sauce (recipe)

Okay, so lets start with the masala sauce. This sauce forms the body and soul of the worlds most popular pseudo-indian dish. I'm working to bring it on the trail with me next weekend. Because heavy cream is not trail friendly, I've decided to substitute mori-nu tofu for the heavy cream. This dish, as prepared, is vegan and vegetarian.

I got distracted when cooks illustrated covered chicken tikka masala in their current issue. I made their recipe, and I didn't see what was so great about it. Honestly. I found it lacking in flavor, and color. It had great texture, but with heavy cream, texture isn't much to brag about.

I've tried to keep this recipe as trail friendly as possible. I didn't take pictures during the preparation because my battery was charging. I'll take pictures when I prepare it for this weekends adventure.

To make this dish backpacker friendly, I will prepare a simple spicy tomato sauce and dehydrate it at home. This will give me a fresh flavor tomato sauce without weight. It will also save me the need to carry an extensive spice rack with me.

On the trail, mori-nu tofu will be whipped into the sauce to add protein and thickness.

Masala Tomato Sauce
---------------------------

• 6-8 ripe tomatoes
• a slice of butter/veggie stuff (optional. I don't use fats in things I want to dry)
  
• 2tbls minced garlic
• one medium white onion, minced and optional
  
• 1-2 jalepeno or equivalent chillies
  
• 1-2 tsp Paprika
• 1-2 tbls fresh coriander
• "1/2 amount of coriander" cumin seed
• 1/2-1 tsp cinnamon
• 1-2tsp garam masala spice blend
• 1 inch minced ginger root

1. toast whole coriander and cumin seeds till fragrant and aromatic before grinding with mortar and pestle.
   
2. puree tomatoes with Jalepenos, seeds and ribs included
   
3. Cook onion in butter over medium -medium high heat 3-5 minutes
4. add spices (parika, coriander, cinnamon, cumin, garam masala blend ) and cook 45s-1:30, till fragrant
5. add tomato-jalepeno puree and minced ginger
6. cook 10 minutes
7. dehydrate on parchment paper till dry . I use my over on the lowest setting with the door propped open. I flip the sauce after 8 hours to dry the other side of the slap.

**NOTE: If you are making this at home, you could puree the tofu in with the tomatoes and jalepenos, or whip it in by hand during the cooking. **

On the trail, rehydrate the dried tomato sauce in boiling water, and add mori-nu silken soft tofu to cream up the sauce. I recommend mashing the tofu up right in the box with your knife or spoon before adding it to the sauce. This sauce is delicious with rice, noodles, dumplings, falafel balls, breads, and eaten plain with a spoon.

I'll be posting an update on my fake meat recipe soon . . . Thank you for reading my blog,
Cayenne


Tofu and Tomato sauce with masala spices (below)

teaser, recipes coming soon

Hello internets, I babble on and on in this one, just keep scrolling, there are pictures down there . . .

I have a shiny new hard drive, and I am glad to be online and posting again !

A little background information : I'm a few years old, and I work as a chromosome mechanic for a world class university in Berkeley California. I hold a degree in biochemistry, and I have 10+ years experience covering protein chemistry, molecular biology, fermentation science, DNA & RNA sequence manipulation & analysis, and computer programming.

I need to be honest with my eaters. I think I can make a better fake meat than the seitan I used in my amaranth soup recipe. I'm not vegan, and I was challenging myself to work without rice, lentils, and soy for the last trip too. I chose to do seitan because I thought it would be reasonably easy for the trail. I found it fussy. Without having control of the water termperature, and measurments, the recipe was hit or miss. I felt that without limiting my ingredients, I could I achieve a better texture, better chew, and better appearance than anything on the market. I was wrong. There are some incredible fake meats on the market today, but, I couldn't find anything particularly friendly to the lightweight backpacker.

So, I set out to develop a backpacker friendly recipe de novo. I've made a half dozen attempts, and I am near ready to share my progress with you. I have a short trip coming up this weekend, and I will be developing a new dinner recipe. My ambition is to develop a trail friendly tikka masala , using the fake meat. I will be releasing several versions of the fake meat to appeal to my vegatarian and vegan readers, as well as my backpacking audience in the next few weeks.

Anyways, I have myself back online, new recipes later this week !
Here are some pictures of fake meat development, enjoy.