KFC Coleslaw

Authentic, the formula is simpler than you think.

The internet is filled with copycat attempts at KFC coleslaw... though many of the recipes are good, they are not genuine. The dressing is relatively simple; it is not as complicated as adding milk, buttermilk, or lemon. The recipe is less expensive than the copycats; it uses fewer ingredients, making sense for a chain restaurant needing to control food costs.

What about that Heinz tarragon vinegar? I know this to be a factual ingredient from two sources. I have seen a copy of a Kentucky Fried Chicken 1960's chicken cooking processes and recipe manual. No, the chicken seasoning was not in the manual, but the salad recipes were. The type of vinegar is confirmed in a lawsuit initiated by Kentucky Fried Chicken Corp. against Famous Recipe Fried Chicken Inc. (better known as Lee's Famous Recipe Fried Chicken) in Toledo, Ohio's U.S. District Court, filed in 1966. Lee Cummings, the owner and founder, was the nephew of Harlan Sanders; he was a key person in his restaurant chain. http://news.google.com/newspapers? Colonel Wins in Court


Most of my friends and family members love KFC Coleslaw. It's crisp, sweet, and seemingly spicy... it has that bit of backbite taste that is hard to identify. The other element I found curious was the thin, liquid-like sauce the coleslaw was in. How was that produced? Did they add milk to it? There is oil, vinegar, and commercial dressing in the coleslaw. The vinegar in the slaw is part of that "heat-like bite"; the other part is a regular yellow onion.

1 ½ Heads of Cabbage
1/3 Cup Onion
½ Cup Carrot
½ Cup Salad Oil
½ Cup Heinz Tarragon Vinegar
1 3/4 Cup's Miracle Whip
1 Cup plus 1 Tablespoon Sugar (I actually cut this down to 3/4 cup)
1 1/2 Teaspoon Salt

A splash of water, just a little


You will want to use a food processor to chop the cabbage, carrot, and onion into confetti. Core and roughly chop the cabbage in a Cuisinart-style food processor, pulse it a few times until it reaches the correct size (do not over pulse). Peel and roughly chop cabbage, carrots, and onions separately. This is important, especially with the carrots, as the color will bleed and cause the cabbage and onions to turn orange.

Prepare the dressing separately - place all ingredients in a mixing bowl in their indicated measured proportions, saving the oil. Using a hand or a stand mixer, combine all of the ingredients. Add oil slowly and continue mixing for about a minute until thoroughly mixed. You can even mix the dressing in advance and refrigerate it. 

Pour the dressing over the coleslaw and combine till using a rubber spatula. You will need to allow the coleslaw to marinade overnight.

At this point, the coleslaw consistency differs from KFC; it will appear thicker and almost frothy. You will also note a strong scent of very offensively pungent vinegar. Ignore both the consistency of the coleslaw and the high aroma of vinegar. Both issues will resolve themselves during the marination process. Trust me, that vinegar scent dissipates, and the dressing will achieve that relatively thin consistency. This is the real McCoy.

Just a Really Good Potato Salad, Excellent Balanced Dressing.

(make 1st)

For the Dressing
1  Cups Dukes Mayonnaise
1 Cups Miracle Whip
2 Tbsp French's Mustard
2 Tbsp Cup Sugar
2 Tbsp Cup Heinz Tarragon Vinegar
1/4 Teaspoon Fine Ground Sea Salt
1/4 Teaspoon Ground White Pepper.

Place all ingredients in a mixing bowl and incorporate well using a rubber spatula... scraping the sides. Cover and place in the refrigerator to chill. This can be made a day ahead of time if you like.

For the Salad
Boil 3 Lg Eggs, peel and chill
5 Pounds Small Idaho Potatoes, Cut lengthwise and across (moon shaped)
1/2 Cup Lg. Fine Chopped Green Pepper
1/2 Cup Lg. Fine Chopped Sweet Red Bell Pepper
1/2 Cup Md. Fine Chopped Ylw. Onion
1/2 Cup Sweet Salad Cubed Pickles
3 Stalks Fine Chopped Celery.

Chop and place in a large bowl, celery, green pepper, onion. Add the salad cubes to the bowl as well. Peel, slice and boil potatoes to a soft al dente, pour into a strainer and then into an ice-water bath to stop cooking and cool. Once the potatoes are cooled, add them to the bowl with you chopped veggies. Fold in half the dressing mix, again using a rubber spatula. Rough chop eggs, add to bowl of salad. Fold in the remainder of the dressing and chill for a few hours. Sprinkle the top with paprika and parsley to garnish.

Note: What are salad cubes. Salad cubes are a large rough chopped pickle relish, they come in sweet and dill flavors. I have only seen these in the south. My suggestion is you rough chop sweet pickles as a replacement. The difference in a fine chopped pickle relish (like you put on a hot dog) and the rough chopped really does make a difference.  Several brands are Mt. Olive, Vlasic, Peter Piper, Shur Fine and the odd off brand.

This snap shows salad cubes v pickle relish -

Garnish ideas:  Sliced hard boiled eggs and paprika. Deviled eggs and paprika and or washed and trimmed green onion stalks. 

Russian Style Piroshki, Cheat Style!

I remember eating Piroshki when I worked at a Russian owned cafe in the De Baliviere area of St. Louis. Ironically it was called The American Cafe. I hate beets, but fell in love with Borscht. Another item served up was a delightful hand sized meal pastry called Piroshki. I thought about them the other week, read a few dough recipe's then thought about the big cresent rolls in my refrigerator. I had purchased a couple of packages on sale, simply because, who does not like crescent rolls. I decided to utilize them with a Piroshki recipe I had floating around up in my head. Instead of spending a few hours making a flaky pastry crust, I decided to make a shortcut and use the crescent roll dough to make my Peroshki's. Purchase the large or jumbo crescent rolls. One package of crescent makes eight Peroshki.

1 lb very lean ground beef 1 medium sized onion diced 3 palm sized potatoes diced 1 cup mixed vegetables 2/3 cup frozen seasoning blend aromatic veggies generous turns of fresh cracked pepper seasoning salt onion powder garlic powder 1 teaspoon better that bullion beef paste 1 pat butter about a 1/2 ounce of water Brown the ground beef chopping as you go. Remove beef to a mixing bowl. You should only have about a tablespoon or so of beef fat left (if the meat was quality). Add a little drizzle of oil or a tiny pat of butter, add and saute onions. Microwave the mixed vegetables with a paper towel at the bottom of the bowl to absorb any water from the veggies for 2 minutes only. Add to meat mix. Strain onions with a slotted spoon and add to meat mix. Add diced potatoes and cook till they begin to turn crispy add the seasoning blend and continue to saute. Season the potatoes with seasoning salt, pepper, onion powder and garlic powder. Strain potatoes and season blend adding it to the meat mixture bowl. Add one pat of butter, better than bullion to a skillet. Heat stirring with a whisk, add water and de-glaze the entire pan bringing the sauce to a bubble... it will thicken to the consistency of a glaze. Pour sauce over the meat mixture and mix it together very well distributing sauce.

Unroll the crescent rolls leaving the triangle together... you should have 4 pieces to work with. Lightly flour a board, rolling pin and the top of 1 sheet of crescent rolls. Using the pin roll the dough out side ways first to gain width, then roll long-wise, you are attempting to get the dough about 5-6 inches wide... Cut dough in half to create a square. Repeat with remaining dough. You should have eight squares. Using the same large spoon you cooked with, place a generous heap of mixture in the center of a dough square. Grab two corners of the dough and in a criss cross motion make a wrap, lift one of the two remaining corners and press in to the center of the little wrap, seal with the remaining corner forming a square envelope packet. Repeat with all dough square, be generous with the filling. Place all packets on an ungreased baking sheet using a floured plastic spatula. Brush the packets with egg wash. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes till golden brown. A few pointers. Use lean beef. Greasy beef will ruin your dough. The glaze from the pan amounts to only a few tables spoons and if it is mixed in well your filling should be most and not wet. Again a wet filling will ruin the dough squares and they will bake up soggy and not crisp. These little meal pastries are good cold as well.

Vegetable Beef Soup... Cooked Slow... All Day Long!

Cast Iron Skillet Corn Bread...

SHEPHERD'S PIE....

I always start this dish using leftover homemade mashed potatoes. That is what shepherds pie is or originally was... a dish using leftovers. Some people use chopped leftover roast, leftover sliced potatoes and peas. I usually just make it from an abundance of leftover mashed potatoes.

3-4 cups leftover mashed brought to room temp to make them spreadable,
2 pounds ground beef
1 medium onion
2 cups peas and carrots
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1/2 tablespoon onion powder
1 teaspoon fresh cracked black pepper
1 teaspoon better than bullion beef paste
1/2 cup hot water
(or substitute 1/2 cup ready beef stock for water and paste)
3 - 4 tablespoons pulverized croutons (put them in a baggy and beat them with a rolling pin)
1 tablespoon of butter
2 - 3 tablespoons deep red wine
(if you would prefer a more "saucey" type of filling, use 1/2 can Campbell's Golden Mushroom, don't confuse this with cream of mushroom... it is dark and rich and a whole different soup, more gravy like)You should not dilute it much, just about 1/8 cup. You do not want a brothey filling, it won't work.

Brown the ground beef, drain and set aside. Saute onions adding garlic for the 1 minute. Meanwhile, microwave frozen peas and carrots just until they are no longer cold but not hot. Add the peas and carrots to the onions and garlic, saute 1 more minute. Add wine and stir to de-glaze pan. If you are ommitting the wine, proceed to the beef broth. Pour in the beef stock and continue cooking till it bubbles. Add the saute mix to the ground beef, stir to incorporate. Melt your butter, transfer crouton crumbs to a bowl and stir in melted butter.

Assembly
Butter a casserole dish, add ground beef mixture. Top with mashed potatoes and spread them evenly over the ground beef forming a sealed topping. Sprinkle crouton crumb mixture over the potatoes. Cook in a 400 degree oven for 30 minutes.

Note: you can really play with this dish... use your leftover meat and whatever kind of veggies you have (just chop them small). Add cheese onto the top of the potatoes. Some people really prefer this to the crumb topping or put a combo of grated cheddar cheese topped with the crumbs. You will want to switch the oven heat to broil for a few minutes, watch it carefully if you do.

LOIN ROAST, RICE and GRAVY, CARROTS AND GREEN BEANS.

THIS WAS SUNDAY DINNER WITH A GUEST. WE Had loin roast, rice and gravy, green bean w/onion ham seasoning and black pepper and carrots made with the roast. A nice time in all. I did a little marinating before popping it in the oven.

Pork Fried Rice with Cabbage and Mixed Onions

Pepper and Garlic Encrusted Pork Loin with Red Wine and Vegetables

I personally think a good roast requires a glass of wine... poured over the roast, not in the glass. I am also real big on fresh ingredients, you will never see instant mashed potatoes on my table. Oddly though I like Kentucky Fried Chickens weird instant potatoes(but not their gravy),go figure? Sooo, start with a fresh pork-loin roast, about 4 1/2 pounds is good for about 5-6 people. A 3 pound bag of red potatoes, a bag of carrots, 4 or 5 washed and cut celery stalks and two fresh onions. I got up at about 5:30 A.M. and began my marination with a nice drizzle of kitchen bouquet right down the center top of the roast. This is a product that your mother or grandmother may have used and it is an absolute staple in my kitchen. If you are wondering what it is and what is in it... it is a browning sauce or a caramelizing sauce it has a vegetable base (water, carrots, onions, celery, parsnips, turnips, salt, parsley and spices. There are two types of preservatives in it, sodium benzoate and sulfiting agents. These are common preservatives found in everything from Soda to Wine or dried fruits. ( I then placed fresh chopped garlic, onion powder, freshly cracked pepper, a little better than bullion (I used beef, because that is what I had, they do have a neutral vegetable). I tucked all of the ingredients in a large glad-ware container with a tight lid and refrigerated it until about 4:00 P.M. I paid special attention to getting a good coating of onion powder (not salt), chopped garlic and cracked black pepper onto the top and sides of the roast... you will need some in the wine marinade as well. I cooked this at 350 degrees to 145 degrees internal... it then rested for about 25 minutes. You will want to drop your vegetables in for about the last hour of roasting. You can choose various vegetables, I like carrots, celery and onions... you can roast the potatoes with the roast however I am all about the mashed potatoes.

Simple, Classic Banana Bread...

Pre-heat oven to 350' Grease and Flour two 9 X 5 pans or play with 4 square pans or muffin pans. 2 Cups All Purpose Flour 1 tsp. Salt 2 tsps. Baking Powder 1 Cup Butter Softened 2 Cups Sugar 2 Extra Large Bananas (these need to be overripe and speckled) 2 Jumbo Eggs 1 Chopped Walnuts 1 tsp. Vanilla Extract 4 to 5 taps of nutmeg... or 4-5 grates of a fresh nutmeg Place all dry ingredients in a bowl and whisk together. In a separate bowl, cream together softened butter, sugar and vanilla. Move the butter mixture with a spatula to 1/2 side of the bowl, break up bananas and mash with a fork, crack two jumbo eggs over the sugar mixture and beat, incorporate all ingredients in the bowl.Pour moist ingredients into the dry ingredients, stir until blended. Bake for 60 or until a knife comes out clean.