Annie's Test Kitchen: Ranch Stroganoff

Stroganoff has been a major staple of my life. My mother made it all the time but refused to teach me her recipe (or any cooking skills at all), so I had to find out for myself through experimentation. This is how Annie's Test Kitchen got started. Anyway, any stroganoff has six necessary elements:

• meat
• mushrooms
• tomatoes
• another edible nightshade fruit, usually paprika or another mild pepper
• sour cream
• noodles or potatoes

I add onion to all meat dishes I prepare (well, okay, most dishes I prepare) to add a little extra zest. That and the sour cream led me to a delicious inspiration: Ranch Stroganoff. I was missing a few of the necessary ingredients above, so, as always, I substituted and came away with a wonderful meal.

12 oz. regular or lite sour cream

2 lbs. ground beef

1 lb. fresh mushrooms (any variety), sliced

1 medium yellow onion

1 banana pepper (or equivalent amount of your favorite pepper, or 2 tbsp. powdered paprika), chopped

¼ sweet Vidalia onion (they're big, so don't go nuts)

1 packet ranch dip seasoning

3 cloves garlic (substitute 2 tbsp. garlic powder)

2 tsp. cumin

Salt and black or white pepper

In a large skillet, sautee the onions until soft. Add the garlic, beef,  black or white pepper, and cumin, and brown until the beef is showing no pink; drain and set aside in a separate dish. Sautee the mushrooms in the same skillet until slightly brown and the skillet has a bit of water in it. Add back ther beef and onion along with the chopped pepper and ranch seasoning. Cover; simmer over low heat for at least 15 minutes, preferably longer, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and uncover; add sour cream and stir.

You can serve this over noodles, or, for those of us who are gluten intolerant, substitute potatoes, rice or leafy greens. I served it warm over shredded iceberg lettuce, and it was heavenly.

Now, you can substitute just about any kind of meat you want for the dish. Be aware, though, that if you use chicken or pork, you may have to increase the amount of seasonings, and definitely increase the simmering time to allow the meat to get properly done.

If you want to serve this over rice, a fun (but labor-intensive) variation is to prepare the dish like a risotto. Use medium-grain rice if you don't want to shell out for arborio (it works just fine, don't let those snooty TV chefs tell you otherwise).

Ingredients above plus
½ cup chopped celery
2 cups dry unwashed rice, medium-grain or arborio (basmati may work too, btu I haven't tried that)
1 cup soup stock (use whatever stock matches your meat, or you can use pickled peppers and substitute 1 cup of the brine from the jar)
Reduce sour cream to 8 oz.

In a large saucepan, sautee celery, onion and garlic in a bit of oil until soft. Add mushrooms; sautee until they begin to soften and release water. Add rice; stir. Keep stirring and add the stock or brine very gradually, allowing the liquid to be absorbed before adding more. Continue until all the liquid has been added. You may use a bit of grated parmesan cheese for added texture, adding it gradually along with the liquid. Remove from heat; stir in sour cream.

I haven't found a way to make these dishes vegan, but as a carnivore I haven't looked very hard. Because of the sour cream I doubt it's possible, but I welcome any comments from those who have succeeded. It's easy to make the dish vegetarian by substituting more mushrooms and a bit of hard vegetable, like celery, carrot  or bell pepper, for the meat.

Battle Stations!

[Image courtesy Wikipedia]

I'm watching the recent film based on the old anime series Space Battleship Yamato, released under the title Star Blazers in the US. When I was very little, I would rush home after school every day so I could catch it on one of the local TV stations. It seemed an epic adventure to my young mind, and over the years I have studied the concepts behind the series which have lent it tremendous significance.

Near the end of World War II, Japan found itself in desperate straits in the Pacific basin. She placed her hope in the Yamato-class of super-battleships, the largest seagoing craft ever constructed on Earth (displacement of over 70,000 tons). Every one of these ships, except Yamato herself, had been sunk in action around the Japanese islands. On April 7, 1945, Yamato and her escort group, bound for Okinawa, were set upon by a large squadron of US bomber and torpedo aircraft. Yamato's death was spectacular -- a magazine exploded, sending up a mushroom cloud nearly four miles high. With her sank Japan's last hope of holding onto the Pacific.

Later, in the year 2199, Earth was in similar straits. Bombarded by radioactive meteors sent by the Gamilon Empire, Earth had become a sere wasteland. Humanity was forced to move underground in order to survive. Earth Defense Forces (Star Force) engaged in skirmishes with the Gamilons in and around the Solar System, but the enemy craft proved too strong for their space battleships.

In the last space battle near Neptune, Captain Okita Juzo, commander of the Star Force, was forced to flee under heavy fire. Covering his escape was the missile ship Yukikaze, commanded by Capt. Kodai Mamoru. Despite Okita's objections, the Yukikaze remained and was completely destroyed. Okita returned to Earth haunted by Kodai's death and the death of his own son in battle years before.

Meanwhile, Earth received an unexpected boon -- a message of hope from a far-off planet. An alien spacecraft crash-landed on Mars, killing the beautiful pilot. The message cylinder she carried was picked up by the younger Kodai brother, Susumu, and his friend Shima Daisuke. The cylinder contained a message from Starsha of the planet Iskandar, providing plans for a warp engine and offering a machine which will clean the Earth of all radiation and make her viable again. Plans were immediately changed to send a ship to Iskandar and retrieve the machine.

In the barren desert which was the Sea of Japan, the Yamato was already going through a refit to evacuate the Earth. She was immediately repurposed to make the journey to Iskandar under the command of  Capt. Okita. Yamato, once the last desperate hope of Japan, has become the last hope for Earth. She faces a one-year journey 148,000 light-years to the Greater Magellanic Cloud and back, facing the forces of Gamilon and their calculating, single-minded leader Deslar.

Of course, this is all fantasy. We can only guess the level of technology which will exist two hundred years from now, and whether we are alone in the universe or not. Besides, the wreck of the Yamato was discovered in many pieces in 1984.

But this theme, the final, desperate, seemingly doomed effort of a small group of people upon which are placed the hopes of an entire culture, is a recurring theme in Japanese entertainment media and elsewhere. Even when all hope seems lost, there is always a small glimmer of human spirit which can carry one person or a group further than seems physically possible to achieve the wildly improbable. The same spirit which drove the Japanese Combined Fleet was present in the future Star Force, the past forces of the American Revolution, and countless revolutionary forces throughout time. The idea that a small group of rag-tag adventurers can bring down the military might of a giant empire is inspiring, and examples of their successes litter the pages of history.

When someone tells me there is no hope, that nothing will change, that one person cannot make a difference in the face of impossible odds, I laugh and tell them that nothing is impossible.

UPDATE: In the movie, Kodai gave a pre-battle speech which perfectly summed up in a few sentences exactly what I said above. I strongly suggest you watch the movie. =)