Bierocks or Runzas: Meat Stuffed Bread

I was thumbing through old magazines as I was decluttering and came upon an Old Cooking Light magazine that had a section on Mennonite recipes. I’ve never eaten these bierocks anywhere else, but the recipe reminded me of the piroshkis we used to pick up sometimes for dinner in Sonoma, where I grew up.  These were a bit different somehow in flavor, and also that my dough here was thicker and there less filling.  They are good though and made a nice easy lunch to pack for my daughter, when combined with some fruit.

First start the dough:

• 1/4 cup sugar
• 2 1/2 tsp yeast
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 2 eggs, beaten lightly
• 4 cups flour

The recipe called for bread flour but I just used regular unbleached flour and increased the yeast by 1/4 tsp. Seemed to work great.

Whisk together the sugar, yeast and water. Let sit for 5 minutes to “proof” (meaning to check and make sure your yeast is active before you waste any more ingredients!)  (I keep my yeast in the freezer and just keep a small jar in the frig that I replenish from the freezer periodically. This greatly extends the life. And the price of a seemingly endless bag of yeast at the big box store versus buying individual packets makes it well worth trying! If you have a friend to split the bag with, even better!)  The yeast, sugar and water should start to bubble just a bit.

Stir in the milk, oil, 1/4 tsp salt and eggs. I use my KitchenAid mixer with a bread hook to mix up bread so I proofed everything in the mixing bowl, then added the other ingredients.  Put about 3 cups of the flour into the bowl and turn the mixer on to a low setting. (High settings cause lots of flour to explode all over your counters!)  Let the mixer incorporate most of the ingredients together then add the last cup of flour, about 1/4 cup at a time until it pulls away and makes a nice elastic-looking ball. Keep the mixer on for 5 more minutes or so. (You can of course do this by hand.)

Now you want to let the dough rise for about an hour. If your house is warm, you can do this on the counter. If your house is a bit cool, turn your oven onto warm for a few minutes, then turn it off.  Rub a bit of oil in the bottom of a bowl and turn the dough into that bowl, flipping it around and turning it so that all sides are coated very lightly with oil. Cover the bowl with a clean kitchen towel and let rise until doubled, about an hour.

In the meantime, make the filling.

• 1 tsp oil
• 1/4 cup diced onion
• 1/2 pound ground beef or turkey
• 2 cups thinly sliced cabbage
• salt and pepper to taste (1/4 tsp each does it for us)

In a skillet, heat the oil then add the onion and ground meat. Cook,stirring, until the onion is softened and the meat is no longer pink.  Add the cabbage and cook a few more minutes until the cabbage wilts. Salt and pepper the meat mix and set aside to cool, covered.

When the dough has been rising an hour or so, check that it is ready by poking two fingers into it. If the indentations from your fingers remain in the dough, it’s ready!  Punch the dough down, cover and let rest 5 minutes. Meanwhile, cover a cutting board or counter with a light dusting of flour.

Divide the dough in half and roll one half into a roughly 10 x 7 inch rectangle. Cut this into six squares and place about 1/4 cup of the meat and cabbage mix into the middle of each square. Pull two opposite corners together and pinch together, then do the same with the other two corners. Place seam side down onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.  Repeat with the other half of the dough.

Preheat the oven to 375 while you cover the bierocks again and let rise about 20 minutes.

Uncover and bake about 15 minutes. Cool a bit  on wire racks then serve.   Goes great with soup!

Folding the dough over the meat

If you want to freeze them, let them cool completely and wrap each bierock individually in foil, then drop them all into a freezer bag.

Bierock

Crunchy Garlic Chicken

Another fantastic recipe from Jamie’s Food Revolution: Rediscover How to Cook Simple, Delicious, Affordable Meals. I’ve already made half a dozen recipes from this book that have been great.

This came out really good but the crumb texture wasn’t quite what I expected, being a bit thick and globby because of the butter. I’m writing down what I did, as it is in the book, but I think next time I would just leave the butter out of the mix and maybe add a few more crackers. This was just enough for 4 chicken tenders, so served 2 of us plus lunch today for one of us.

• 1 clove of garlic, peeled
• zest of one lemon
• 6 (or more!) plain crackers or breadcrumbs or saltines, etc.
• 2 Tbs butter
• 4 sprigs fresh parsley (I used a bit more)
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2 large spoonfuls of flour
• 1 egg
• 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts or 4 chicken tenders
• olive oil

Use your food process to mix up the breadcrumb mix: crackers, garlic, lemon zest and butter (although I’d leave that out next time),  parsley, salt and pepper.  Run the processor until it’s all mixed up and the crumbs are fine.

Put the flour on one plate or pie pan.  Put the raw egg into another plate or pan and stir together with a fork. Add the breadcrumb mix to a third.

Pound the chicken out until thinned a bit. You can lay a sheet of plastic wrap on the chicken and pound with a plate or the flat side of a meat tenderizer.

Heat a few spoonfuls of olive oil in a skillet.

Coat each side of the chicken with flour, then egg, then breadcrumb mix. Fry about 4-5 minutes on each side. Alternately you can bake in a 475 F oven for about 15 minutes.

Squeeze a bit of lemon over the chicken, then cut the pieces into strips and serve.

Simple Salad with Vinaigrette

I served with a very simple salad of watercress, sliced radishes and sliced cucumbers, plus some boxed stuffing mix, which I rarely use but was quite good.  We also had some really good asparagus, also a recipe from this book. Usually I just barbecue it or roast it but we both really liked this simple vinaigrette he dressed it with.

That said, potatoes are on sale here: .99 for a 10 pound bag!  Haven’t seen them that low in …. maybe ever?    And I just made the most awesome roast potatoes, along with carrots, parsnips and butternut squash. I tried a new technique, essentially par boiling the veggies (other than the squash) for a bit before roasting. They came out fantastic!  Youngest took some for lunch along with some leftover roast chicken and said she wants that again tomorrow for lunch. You can just do potatoes, pictured here. Or combine them with other vegetables, like butternut squash, parsnips and carrots.

• potatoes, peeled and cut in 2-3″ chunks, or just in half
• carrots, scrubbed and ends trimmed off
• parsnips, peeled and cut into wedges at least 1″ thick
• butternut squash, halved, seeded, and cut in wedges

Roasting Vegetables

Bring a pot of water to boil while you preheat the oven to 400 F.  Simmer the potatoes and carrots for 5 minutes, then add the parsnips and cook another 4-5 minutes.

The squash doesn’t need to be parboiled.

Drain in a colander and let sit for a few minutes. Take everything but the potatoes out of the colander then shake the colander around a bit to shake up the potatoes.

Put the vegetables in a shallow pan, along with a few cloves of garlic and some sprigs of fresh parsley if you have some. (Grow some! )  Drizzle some olive oil and add salt and pepper to taste.  Sprinkle some paprika on the squash if you’d like.

Roast at 400 for 45 minutes to an hour, depending on the size of the vegetables.

This packs well for a school lunch the next day. My daughter took some vegetables, leftover roast chicken, some ketchup in a small container, and some sliced apples and pears and declared it one of the best lunches ever.

You could of course mix this into a loaf and bake it that way for about an hour, or form into muffin tin loaves and bake half an hour or so, but the fastest way to cook them up will be forming into patties and cooking in a skillet on the stove.  In the picture above, I have one packed for my daughter’s lunch tomorrow with some of the leftover cheesy mashed potatoes.

• 1 pound of ground beef or turkey (I actually just used 3/4 pound)
• 1/2 cup or so diced onion
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup dry bread crumbs *
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 Tbs chopped fresh parsley and a bit of dried
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan
• 1 Tbs Worcestershire sauce
• 1 Tbs Dijon mustard
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• ketchup or tomato sauce as needed

Mix everything but the ketchup together in a mixing bowl. Using your hands is best so you won’t overmix but you can also use a mixer if you don’t like touching the meat.

Form into 6 patties, no more than 1″ thick.

Cook in a medium hot skillet about 4-5 minutes per side, until cooked through. Put some ketchup or tomato sauce on top of each patty, cover the skillet and cook 1-2 minutes until the ketchup is heated through.

These were very moist and tasty. I really liked the flavor and having meatloaf taste on the table in 20 minutes or less is pretty fantastic.

* NOTE: Whenever I have leftover bread about to go stale (or already stale!) I grind it up into bread crumbs, bake them in a low oven on a cookie sheet until dried and store them in the freezer.

A simple sliced apple and a spoonful of peanut butter make a great after-school snack and has become my 15 year old’s newest favorite.

My eldest is suddenly taken with eating a sliced apple at breakfast, along with her Raisin Bran.  She skips the peanut butter though.

I like this for a late night snack/dessert. It would also make a good lunchbox addition. If you spritz the sliced apples with a bit of lemon juice and water they won’t turn brown so quickly.

Oh, and my pediatrician said the apples that do NOT turn brown are generally lacking in iron, among other things. So you actually WANT to eat the ones that do turn brown, but use the lemon juice spritzer trick to keep them from turning brown!

Pulled Pork Sandwiches

My youngest loves pulled pork sandwiches and asked that I add them to the menu this week. The pork shoulder was not on sale, but even so, it’s still very cheap per serving.

I’ve got a couple of different recipes for pulled pork. This had a less tomato-ey base than I’d hoped for so I’d love to hear your recipes!  Still, this was good! Especially so with the homemade hamburger buns I made.

• 1 T oil
• 2 chopped onions
• 6 minced garlic cloves
• 1 T chili powder
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 12 oz chili sauce (1 small bottle)
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup cider vinegar
• 1 T Worcestershire
• 3 lb. pork shoulder

Heat the oil in a skillet while you chop the onions. Add the garlic when it’s chopped and cook until the onions are soft, 5 minutes or so. Add the chili powder, black pepper, chili sauce, brown sugar, vinegar and Worcestershire sauce. Bring to a simmer, stirring. Turn off the heat.

There’s usually a large piece of fat covering the bottom of the pork shoulder. Cut that off and discard. There’s  plenty of other fat in the roast to keep it all moist!  Put the roast in the Crockpot.  Pour the sauce over the top and turn to either low or high, depending on how long you have.

High will take about  6 hours.

Low will take 6-12 hours depending on how new your slow cooker is! (New ones cook at a higher heat and will take less time.

I always turn my roast over about halfway through, just so it’s all getting cooked in the sauce.

When it’s done, use two forks to turn it into shreds, pulling the meat apart in the slow cooker or pulling chunks out onto a plate if that’s easier. Let the pulled pork simmer in the sauce until you’re ready to eat.

Serve atop homemade hamburger buns or some other split bread or bun.

Goes great with coleslaw. Here a few of my favorites:

• Corn and Cabbage Salad
• Coleslaw with Peppers but no Mayonnaise

I just realized I haven’t posted my standard mayonnaise based coleslaw recipe!

Tuna Melts

Bad picture but good tuna melts! A good friend sent me some English Muffins from Wolferman’s for Christmas. We started working together, whoa, something like 23 years ago I think and got along great.  Then  I quit work for a while to stay home with my kids and we drifted apart but still stayed in modest touch. Then she had her kids and quit work, but around that time  I was divorced and a single mom so the opportunities to get together were slim, although we still managed at least a yearly something I think. Just the past year or so, we’ve reconnected on a more regular basis for lunch and it’s been great.

And what a treat these muffins are! Big thick hearty fresh muffins.  We’ve been enjoying them from breakfast and I froze some for later. Tonight my youngest asked for tuna melts for dinner and I thought to use up the last of the “original” flavored muffins.

For 4 large English muffins, mix together:

• 12 ounces canned tuna, packed in water, drained
• enough mayonnaise to moisten
• capers if you like (my kids don’t, so I just add a few capers to mine

Toast the English muffins while you preheat your broiler and mix up the tuna.

Line a small baking sheet with foil for easy cleanup and put the toasted muffin halves on it, then divide the tuna among the muffins and spread out. (I had some leftover so you could easily do 6 halves. We only ate 1 each of these, along with some broccoli and cheese sauce.)

Top the adult portions with capers. Top each muffin half with a good slice of Cheddar cheese. If you added capers to any, add a caper or two to the top of the cheese so you can tell which have capers in them after they’re cooked!

Slide under the broiler for a few minutes, until the tuna is warmed and the cheese is melted.

We’ve got one leftover which one child has claimed for lunch tomorrow.

Brussels Sprouts and Potatoes Cooking

Okay, I really had a plan for using my freezer stash but then on the way home from an after-school thing tonight, my youngest reminded me we needed to swing by the grocery store for a key item. Once we were there she started riffing on various dinners we might have tonight. First it was chicken caesar salad, then it was this then it was that. Walking through the  produce section she spotted some Brussels sprouts and said “Oooh, put some of those in a pan with some red potatoes and olive oil and ’stuff” and cook them up. That would go great with steak!”

Do not shop when you are hungry!

Although really, this was not a total splurge. I picked up some Brussels spouts and small red potatoes, both in season, and the cheapest steaks that were on sale. I spent $1.50 on the Brussels Sprouts (and there are leftovers), $2 on the potatoes, and $8 on the steak (lots of leftovers which WILL get used up!).  We ate less than half the steak tonight so lots of leftovers for lunch!  So maybe$2/serving tonight. A bit high but for steak!

• 1/2 pound Brussels sprouts ($1.50 here, now), ends trimmed off and sliced in half or quarters
• 1/s pound petite red potatoes ($2/pound here now), cleaned and cut in sizes about equal to the Brussels sprouts
• 1-2 Tbs olive oil
• various seasonings, I think I used garlic salt, seasoned pepper, dried parsley….
• 1/4 cup chicken broth

I tossed the Brussels sprouts and chopped red potatoes  with olive oil, garlic salt, seasoned pepper, and dried parlsey.

Brussels Sprouts and Potatoes

Heat a heavy skillet with of olive oil and add the potatoes and Brussels sprouts. Cook a few minutes until browned on one side and then stir to get another side down onto the hot side of the pan. Sprinkle with the seasonings (or experiment with your own).

Brown a few more minutes. then add the chicken broth and stir, then cover and cook until the potatoes are s0ft (test with a fork). Then remove the lid and crisp up everything and serve.

This went great with some barbecued steak ( bought on sale and sprinkled with garlic salt and seasoned pepper and a simple green salad.)

• 1 Tbs oil
• 3-4 boneless skinless chicken thighs, cut in bite-sized pieces
• a smattering of taco seasoning
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/2 tsp dried oregano
• 2 green onions, chopped
• 6-7 flour tortillas
• 1 Tbs butter, melted
• 2 cups grated Cheddar cheese (or a Mexican blend)
• salsa verde or tomato salsa at the table
• sour cream at the table (optional)

Cooking chicken for chimchangas

Heat the oil in a cast iron or other heavy skillet and add half the chopped chicken. Brown a bit, and sprinkle with some taco seasoning. Cook until done. When it’s done, you can easily cut a piece in half with a wooden spoon. Remove to a bowl, then add the other half of the chicken, season again with the taco seasoning and cook through. Put the first batch of chicken back in the pan, sprinkle with the cumin, garlic powder, salt, pepper and oregano, stirring to heat through and distribute the spices. Turn the heat off.

Rolling chicken chimichangas

Heat the flour tortillas in a microwave or over a dry cast iron skillet to make them more flexible. (This tip was NOT in the book but is something I always do or the tortillas tend to tear.)

Place a  tortilla on a plate or cutting board. Add some chicken, green onions and cheese.  Fold the ends over, then roll up the tortilla and place it seam side down in a lightly oiled baking dish.

Chicken Chimichangas

Melt the butter, brush across the tops of the tortillas and bake at 350 for 25 minutes or so. In the meantime, you can heat up a can of refried beans.

Serve with extra grated cheese, any leftover chopped green onions, red or green salsa and/or sour cream at the table.

These are lightly crispy, not like the fried version (and so much more healthy!).  We ate just one each with a side of refried beans but heartier eaters will want to. You could extend the meal with some Mexican Rice as well and/or a salad.

I somehow neglected to take a picture after they were baked but both my girls liked them and one is looking forward to taking one for lunch tomorrow. I frozen the leftovers so I could pull one out at a time.  Family Feasts says put one in the microwave for 2 minutes to reheat.  Sounds like a good freezer stash to me!

NOTE: If you have already cooked chicken in the freezer, just heat it up with a bit of water and the seasonings. You could also leave out the taco seasoning OR the other spices for a plainer version. You could also put salsa into the chimichangas before rolling but my girls prefer to have the salsa outside and it’s easy enough for me to dump it on top so that’s how I made them.  You could also easily substitute ground beef for the chicken.

Each sandwich consisted of:

• one English muffin
• 1 slice of ham, folded over
• a few very thin slices of apple
• thin slices of Cheddar cheese
• a small puddle of maple syrup
• a few leaves of arugula

Layer all this in the English muffin while you’re preheating the grill. Butter the outsides of the English muffin and cook in the Panini grill until warmed through and the cheese is melted.

It came out quite nice! I really liked the crunch of the apple and the arugula kept it from being overly sweet somehow.