Meals out of a Ham

Since there are only two of us in our household, when we bake a ham, there is a lot of leftover meat.  Nancy doesn't like leftovers as a general rule, but she doesn't mind having leftover ham because we turn it into so many other very different dishes as we work to finish it.

The first thing she always asks for is a ham pot pie.  I've never heard of anyone else making one of these, so maybe they are a creation that is unique to us.  The process for making this pie is almost identical to what I do to make a chicken pot pie, which I have written about in this previous post.  I make gravy out of the drippings from the bottom of the roaster, adding some heavy cream and mixed vegetables.  Nancy cuts a few slices of ham into chunks, and everything goes into the meat pie pastry that I blogged in the other post.  The only real difference other than the type of meat and the color of the gravy is that we like to cover the top of the meat filling with Swiss cheese before adding the top crust.  Also, because of the salt that is already in the ham and the cheese, we add no additional seasoning to the gravy.

The Swiss cheese (two different kinds) on top of the
meat filling, waiting for the top crust to be added.

There is nothing quite like the feeling of taking a flaky
meat pie out of the oven of a woodburning cookstove. 
Loaves of golden brown bread and meat pies just make
a woodburning cookstove cook's heart sing.

The finished potpie removed from the oven to the
countertop for serving.

Ham pot pie.  Delectable!

The next meal might be something really fast.  One of the things I like is ham and sweet potatoes.  In the picture below, I had just used a can of sweet potatoes, some pecan syrup leftover from sweet rolls, and a couple of slices of ham placed on top.  I covered it and let it boil until all was hot. Some leftover green beans were warming in the small saucepan up next to the stovepipe.

Nancy's other usual request is ham and scalloped potatoes.  For years, I would occasionally attempt homemade ham and scalloped potatoes with no good results.  Then, a couple of years ago, I ran onto a video from Brenda Hall of the Youtube channel Appalachian Cooking with Brenda.  I now make scalloped potatoes and ham just the way she teaches in this video.    

If you've ever made scalloped potatoes, you know that they take a long time in the oven to get the potatoes cooked through.  Brenda starts her potatoes on the stovetop to shave some of that oven time.  This is a particularly efficient thing to do on a wood cookstove because while the oven is coming up to temperature, you can use the hot cooktop to get the meal jump started.

The pot of homegrown potatoes beginning to cook
in milk on top of the cookstove.  The secret here (as
Brenda continually reminds you in her video) is to 
keep them moving so they don't scorch.

You can see that this boiled over in the oven.  This was the first
time that I've had a really smoky boil-over in the oven of a
wood cookstove.  I shouldn't have filled the dish so full!  After
I saw what was happening, I added the foil and the pie tin to
catch any further spills.

After cutting the ham for the scalloped potatoes, there was not much meat left on the bone, so the hambone and its remains went into the soup kettle that was about half full of water.  I brought it to a good quick boil while the scalloped potatoes were in the oven.  Then, I let it simmer and reduce on the back of the range overnight.  This resulted in about an inch or so of some intense ham broth that was perfect for ham and bean soup--the final dish that came out of this particular ham.

The hambone boiling on the back of the range with the scalloped potatoes
resting on the open door to the warming oven.

Now, I don't know about the rest of the world, but in my particular area of Iowa, ham and bean soup is made with ham broth, Navy or Great Northern Beans, a paltry little bit of onion, carrot, and celery, and a whatever morsels of ham were left on the bone.  I've made that soup before, and I'm told that mine was pretty good, but to me it tastes like dirty water.  By that I mean that it has a distinct lack of flavor and doesn't do justice to the ham, the beans, or the vegetables.

You can see from the photo below, that my version of ham and bean soup is totally different.  I used all of the traditional ingredients, but my beans came in the form of two cans of Van Camp's Pork and Beans, some ketchup, some potatoes (sometime I'm going to try adding pasta instead of the potatoes), and pearl barley. This, for me, is much more satisfying and delicious!  Again, the ham and its broth along with the canned beans and ketchup are salty enough that I added no further seasoning of any kind.

Now, there is one other dish that we love to make with leftover ham, and that is ham balls.  These are a favorite dish in the southern two tiers of counties in Iowa, but an "immigrant" from Mount Ayr brought these up to our area fifty years ago, and they remain a family favorite.  They really deserve their own blog post, though, so you'll have to look for that in the future.

In these days of high food costs, I think a ham is money well spent because of the number of different meals that can be made from it--even the bone was a source of joy to our dog after we had picked it clean of the meat that we could use.  Further, each of these dishes is extremely easy to make on a wood cookstove since no specific times and temperatures are needed for any of them.

Please use the comments section below to let me know what you do with leftover ham.

May your kitchen cookstove fire be burning brightly!

Iowa State University's Minnesota Wild Rice Soup

When I was a student at Iowa State University back in the mid-1990s, the school's food service system in the dormitories was outstanding.  The food was truly excellent, and most of it was made onsite at the various dormitory complexes.  In retrospect, the variety available to us was amazing, too.

At that time, any student who ate at the dining hall could request any of the recipes for the foods we were served.  After eating this soup for two years and loving it from the start, I marched myself into the kitchen one day and asked for the recipe.  I'm so glad I did!  I have a niece and nephew who have been part of the dormitory system at ISU within the last two years, and they tell me that this soup is no longer served there.  I find that very sad because this is my favorite soup of all time.

The recipe that the food service people gave me was in huge quantities, of course, but I gave the recipe to my aunt Ellen, who is a fabulous cook, and she reduced it to proportions that are manageable in a home kitchen.  However, as always, I have altered the recipe since then to make it a little simpler and easier to make; however, the flavor is exactly the same as what we ate at ISU.  Here is what you need to do:

1. Bring four cups of chicken broth to a boil directly over the firebox.  I've used homemade broth, store-bought canned broth, and broth made from bouillon paste or cubes.  In the pictures below, you see four cups of water with four Herb Ox chicken bouillon cubes in them.

2. To the boiling broth, add 1/2 cup white rice and two or three tablespoons of wild rice.  I used three in this batch, and I prefer that amount.

3. Cover the broth and rice mixture with a tight-fitting lid.  

4. While the rice and broth are boiling over the firebox, chop a scant cup of onion, a stalk of celery, and a carrot into small pieces.

4. Add the onion, celery, and carrot to the rice and broth.  By this time, some of the liquid will have cooked off and been absorbed by the rice, and you need to begin watching the soup kettle carefully.  Keep your teakettle of boiling water handy because I have never made this soup but what I've had to supplement the liquid with water from the teakettle.  You can see in the picture below that I also had to move the kettle away from the fire.  Stir this occasionally, adding water as needed to keep it from sticking to the bottom of the soup kettle.

5. While the rice and vegetables are cooking, melt four tablespoons of butter over a cool part of the cooktop.

6. Sift six tablespoons of all-purpose flour (1/2 cup minus 2 tablespoons).

7. Move the melted butter directly over the firebox, add the flour to it, and cook it into a roux.

8. I didn't get any pictures of this, but once you have cooked the roux, remove it from the heat.  Measure 3 3/4 cups of milk.  Stir enough of this milk into the roux to make it into a white sauce.  When the carrots are soft, add the remaining milk and the white sauce to the rice, broth, and vegetable mixture.  

9. At this point, add two tablespoons of slivered almonds and 1 1/2 cups of cubed ham.  (I just add a whole one-pound package of ham because the few pieces of ham that are left always spoil in the refrigerator before I get them used.)  The ham and the almonds add a surprising amount of flavor, and the almonds add a nice crunch to the soup.

10. Move the soup kettle back over the firebox and return everything to a boil while stirring constantly to prevent it from scorching.

11. At this point, season the soup with a dash of pepper, a couple dashes of celery salt, and a couple dashes of garlic salt.  Be very careful about not over salting as there can be quite a bit of salt in the chicken broth depending on what kind you used, and the ham adds salt, too.

12. Once the completed soup comes to a full boil again, it will have thickened too, and it is ready to serve.

Since our stovetop was cluttered with our teakettle and another pot of water to add humidity to the air in the house, I put the soup kettle up on a trivet to keep it hot while I made some toast to serve with the soup.

You can see the finished soup in the picture below.  It is fantastic!  As you can tell from the description, the person cooking this soup is constantly occupied with the process for a good forty minutes or so, and with the ham, wild rice, and almonds, I wouldn't call this an economical dish, either.  Thus, I don't make it often, but when I do, it is worth every bit of time and money.  

Wood Cookstove Potato Soup

 

 

Since we are now past the holidays and into those long, dark, cold months of winter (don't let my word choice fool you; winter is my favorite season), now is the perfect time to be cooking those cold weather comfort foods like potato soup.  I suppose that there are as many methods of making potato soup as there are people who cook it, so I will merely share what I do.  I apologize from the beginning about the lack of exact measurements.  If you've been following this blog for any length of time, you know how I am sometimes.

First I start by peeling and dicing several potatoes.  A rough estimate of how many would be one medium size potato per person who will be enjoying the end product.  I don't get really fussy about how neatly the potatoes are diced.  I just quarter them and then begin slicing each quarter in roughly 1/2 inch cubes.  At this point, I would like to interject that I admire my sister-in-law.  When she cuts up her vegetables for her potato soup, she is maticulous, and they look beautiful.  You can see her version of potato soup here at her blog.  I think I should hire her to be my photographer, don't you?

Back to my soup.  I cut up two or three ribs of celery (depending on my mood), a couple of carrots, and a medium sized onion.  All of that goes into the soup kettle with the diced potatoes, a tablespoon or two of dried minced garlic, some salt, and just enough water to cover everything.  Bring this to a boil directly over the fire.

The beginnings of potato soup.

While that begins to cook, begin frying a few slices of bacon.  For this batch of soup, I used the oddly shaped end pieces of the bulk bacon that we had purchased on sale a while ago.

The vegetables coming to a boil over the firebox while bacon
cooks and bread rises.

After the vegetables have come to a good boil, you can move them from directly over the fire to medium heat.

The soup kettle has been moved over to less intense heat, and the bread
is now in the oven.  Hey, how do you like my new red Lodge kettle?  It
is porcelain on cast iron, and it was a Christmas gift from my in-laws.

When you are frying the bacon for this soup, be careful not to do it over heat that is too intense.  You want to fry the bacon until it is crisp, but don't try to hurry it along so much that it gets too hot and smokes.  You'll see why in a minute.  Once the bacon is cooked, remove it from the skillet to cool.  Remove the skillet from the stove, too.

Once the vegetables are tender, add milk to the water that they have been cooking in.  I added a good quart to this batch because I was making soup for six people.  Move the pot back over to the fire to bring it back to a boil after the cold milk cooled it off.  While it is heating, you'll want to stir it occasionally and begin to make your thickening.  I combined 2/3 c. flour with enough additional cold milk to make a fairly thin mixture.

The soup is heating over the firebox after the addition
of the cold milk while I mixed flour and cold milk for
thickening. 

Add the flour and milk mixture to the soup kettle, stirring it in thoroughly.  You'll need to stir frequently from this point on since you now have the flour in the soup.  You don't want it to stick on the bottom of the pot.

Now, about this next part . . . .

What do you say we make a deal?  I'll tell you how to make good potato soup as long as you promise not to tell my doctor my secrets.  Seems fair to me.

See, I wrote earlier that you don't want your bacon to cook so fast that it begins to smoke because you don't want your bacon drippings to take on any off flavors which result from them getting too hot.  This is important because you are going to pour your bacon drippings into the soup.  Just remember, we have a deal: no tattling!

Pouring the liquid gold into the soup.

I know that I should feel guilty about this, but other potato soup recipes call for cream, cream cheese or other cheeses, or canned soups--all of which are sources of fat.  This bacon grease and any fat still on the bacon are the only fat in this soup, so I'm not feeling too bad.

Crumble the bacon into little pieces and throw it into the soup.

Sorry this picture is on its side.  I'm having trouble with blogger
today.  It's making uploading pictures a difficult process.

At this point, you need to season the soup to your taste.  I add onion salt, celery salt, garlic salt, and ground pepper--with the emphasis on the garlic salt.  You do what you want, but don't be afraid of the garlic salt.  I think the potatoes need it.  Then, keep the soup over the firebox and stir pretty much constantly until the soup comes to a boil again.  This will ensure that the soup thickens and doesn't taste like raw flour--which is only a desirable flavor in cookie dough.

Unfortunately, this meal was taken immediately over to my in-laws' home to be eaten for supper, so I neglected to snap a photo of the finished product.  I mean, of course, that it is unfortunate that I didn't get the photo.  It is not unfortunate that we took it to my in-laws.  Food always tastes better when eaten with lots of people, and besides, I got compliments from my wife's grandmother about this recipe, and she is a fellow foodie.

Hope you enjoy this as much as we did!

"Pot-au-feu"

I've just finished eating one of the best suppers I've had in a very long time.  The quality of the supper was directly correlated to our use of a woodburning cookstove, so I feel it necessary to blog about it.

Since both of us are gone during the winter days, and since we had never had an airtight cookstove that would hold a fire all day or all night, we've never tried using a stock pot to make pot-au-feu.  Literally translated, "pot-au-feu" means "pot on the fire."  This traditional French dish usually involves cheaper cuts of beef, which need long cooking times to become tender, and vegetables cooked together.  The pot would be left on the fire at all times, vegetable and meat scraps would be added as they became available, the grease skimmed from the top occasionally, and a quick supper of a once-in-a-lifetime soup could be had when desired.

Now that it has gotten colder and the stove is being fired daily, I decided to try my hand at this interesting dish.  About two weeks ago, I had grilled T-bone steaks (the last from our home-grown steer).  The bones from these steaks had a little bit of meat left on them, and they formed the base of our first pot-au-feu.  I put them in the eight quart stock pot and filled it about half full of water.  We had a half of an onion in the refrigerator that was beginning to look a little tired around the edges, so I cut it up and put it into the kettle with the beef bones.

Over the course of the next several days, all manner of leftovers were put into the kettle: pieces of tomato left from chicken veggie wraps, bones from pork steaks, an odd scrap of bacon that escaped repackaging when we were dividing up the pile of it which we purchased on a bulk meat sale, and even the bones left from fried chicken. 

During the first week, we were experiencing chilly weather, so the pot stayed on the stove all of the time.  I had read somewhere that as long as the pot was brought to a brisk boil each day, the broth wouldn't spoil, and so that is what I did.  The weather last week was a bit warmer, so we were not banking the fire to last throughout the day.  I removed the kettle from the stove and refrigerated it.  This gave me the opportunity to skim the small amount of fat which congealed on the top.  I put the pot back on the stove yesterday morning, knowing that the stove would be fired all day for other cooking purposes.  In fact, that is when I put the chicken bones in.  I was a bit nervous about that, by the way.  It seemed rather strange to be putting fried chicken remains into a pot of boiling water, and I had read that you should be careful about putting poultry pieces into pot-au-feu because of the very small bones that can present a hazard.  However, I did it anyway, and you cannot imagine what a delicious aroma issued forth from the stockpot after that!

All of this brings us to this afternoon.  I strained the broth, picked the meat off the bones and returned it and the tomato and onion chunks to the broth.  The broth was horribly bland, so I seasoned it with salt and pepper, garlic salt, dried parsley, a couple of bay leaves, and a handful of dried onion flakes.  I cocked the lid of the kettle so that it could reduce for awhile.  It simmered for a about an hour, and then I emptied a baggie of leftover homemade angel hair pasta into it.

While that cooked, I whipped up some buttermilk biscuits, using a new mixing method that a friend sent to me over a year ago via e-mail.  Instead of cutting the shortening into the flour, you melt the shortening and then beat it into the cold buttermilk or milk.  The result is that the shortening is evenly distributed.  It worked splendidly.

At any rate, by the time the biscuits were done, the soup had reduced to about half of its original volume of liquid, and it was wonderful.  As I see it, the best part of the whole thing was that we had an amazing soup which cost us nothing more than a tiny bit of seasoning, and the making of the soup actually reduced our food waste.  Pot-au-feu is definitely not a dish that one would attempt with a modern stove, but it is ideally suited to the wood cookstove, and I have a hunch that we will be enjoying quite a few of these over the next few months.

Our first bowl of "pot-au-feu."