I kept trying to think of a topic to write about and was coming up blank. During all this scouring of my brain, I was in the process of cooking one of my favourite summer meals: Hodge Podge. And then it clicked! I”ll do a recipe post, I told myself, and give the P&P readers two of my favourites! Problem solved!
Except both of these recipes aren”t actually written down anywhere. I just add whatever amounts seem right. So bear with me – the good news is you really can”t screw either of these up if you get a little too much of anything.
The first one is for Hodge Podge, or what some people call Poor Man”s Stew (because it doesn”t have any meat). We always just called it Beans, Peas and Potatoes and we only had it when the garden was on. Creative bunch, our family. And you MUST have it with fresh bread. The nice, soft, white kind like your Grandmother used to make. Ready?
HODGE PODGE
Approx 4-6 cups green or yellow wax beans, FRESH, stemmed and cut into <1 inch pieces
Approx 3 cups shelled peas (again, FRESH)
Six good sized new potatoes
Butter
Milk AND cream
Salt and Pepper
Prepare beans, wash, then put to boil in a large pot. Make sure you have enough water to cook ALL ingredients, not just the beans.
After they come to a boil, cook approximately ten minutes, then add peas.
Cook another ten minutes and add potatoes. Cook until potatoes are tender. Drain.
Add: a knob of butter (you can use margarine, but real butter is AWESOME), and begin with 1 cup of milk (we drink 1%, so that”s what we use) and 1 cup of cream (we use 5% fat cream in our coffee, so we use that, but a richer 10% or so is better). Use as much milk/cream as it takes to make it as wet as a stew but not brothy like a soup. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve with that fab bread and butter, which is particularly good for sopping up the salty milk at the bottom of the bowl.
And my other go-to recipe in the summer, especially for feeding a crowd. Our favourite thing to serve it with is fresh coleslaw or a tossed salad.
EASY PULLED PORK
One 2-3 pound pork shoulder or butt (You can use a leaner loin roast but it won”t shred as easily)
Water
Steak spice
Garlic
Salt and pepper
1 bottle of your favourite barbecue sauce (we use one that is called Kansas City Barbeque, which is very dark and rich)
Put the roast in your crock pot, and add about 1 inch of water. Sprinkle roast with a little steak spice, 1 clove of fresh garlic (or equivalent of dried/minced), and a little salt and pepper. Let simmer 6 hours.
Remove roast to a large bowl (a bowl keeps the juices in) and drain most of the broth out of the crock pot (you don”t want this too watery!). Using 2 forks, shred the pork. Put back in the crock pot and pour in the sauce. Stir it in and then let cook another hour in the sauce.
Serve on your favourite bun – we like whole wheat kaiser rolls just lightly toasted. We”ve doubled this recipe and it fed nine hungry people (including teenagers, who eat like nematodes).
