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Engaging stories of love, joy, comfort and friendship with proven scrumptious, healthy recipes, we celebrate LOVE as the secret ingredient for wonderful food!

Beef Klusky Soup

March 9, 2022 by Mary 10 Comments

Memories…

Smells of home, so comforting. Remembering my mother making this Beef Klusky Soup. The scent wafting through the apartment all day the other day I made it, of the beef cooking in salted water making the broth – well I was in a little bit of heaven. Lovely childhood memories were floating back. Mom standing at the stove, in her tie-around-the waist apron with 2 pockets in front, stirring this huge aluminum pot that was her mother’s. My dad clearing his throat and then proclaiming with absolute pleasure, “Mother, delicious as always!” 

We were six kids and he often called my mother “Mother” in front of us.

I remember some grease circles moving around on the top of the soup, not really knowing what they were, but I too, loved the soup and particularly the klusky! Klusky are Polish dumplings. And, when they are made correctly, they are divine. A Mother’s hug in your mouth and tummy, so warm and nourishing.

More recent memories

I had only made this Beef Klusky Soup one other time before, when I first went away to college and wanted a little bit of home. I was with Steve (my now late husband) but we were far from being married, just starting to date.

It was terrible.

The klusky were like rocks – definitely made of cement.

Steve, who was always gentle in his criticism of my cooking, even then couldn’t hold back. 

So I never attempted to make it again, until just now.

You see, my mother grew up during the Great Depression so she was always very careful with food, never wasting any and using only just enough. She really was a master at managing money, yet feeding all of us fine food. 

Too much meat – soaking in the salted water – notice the salt rings around the meat pieces – fascinating!

But, I always thought this trait was cheap. And perhaps indicated that we didn’t have much money? (We had a perfectly fine amount of money growing up, particularly with all eight of us living at home.) So in my younger days, every recipe I made from her, I generously upped all the ingredients. Including in this soup recipe, I upped the amount of meat but I’m not sure that played out right as the soup was thicker with all that meat and it was not really needed. 

Follow Mom’s directions

What I do most definitely know, is that this time, I followed her klusky instructions to a T, using only a half of a teaspoon of raw dough to make the dumplings, rather than a tablespoon or more as I had done in the past, thinking more is better and THIS was the key! Just a tiny bit of dough plumps up into the most beautiful light dumpling – just like Mom’s! NOT like concrete.

So do play close attention to that and be sure to use a very thin edged spoon to measure them out. The thin edge allows you to take just a little bit of dough – that proper one-half teaspoon.

I did use local beef soup meat from one of the farms upstate – Fat Apple Farm on Hill Hollow Road and it was divine, so do try to find some local meat. Always. So much better for you and tastier, being grass fed.

This does take nearly a day to make with all the hours of simmering but with many of us still working from home, it’s easy as it only requires time and not much attention. I wasn’t going to write about this, but when I showed the picture to my friend Marie at lunch on Monday, she was like, “OMG, THAT looks so delicious!”

So here is the original recipe. 

While winter is still here, make this Beef Klusky Soup to soothe your soul, make your own memory and spread some LOVE… and think of my wonderful Mom.

BEEF KLUSKY SOUP – serves 6 – 8

1-3 small beef soup bones with some meat on them – or Mom said, 1 small soup bone and 2 pieces of marrow soup meat.
12 cups of cold water
½ Tbs. coarse sea salt
1 bay leaf
12 whole black peppercorns
4 tomatoes, cored and coarsely chopped
2 tsp. tomato paste
2 large cloves of garlic, minced
1 medium onion coarsely chopped
5 carrots, peeled and cut into thirds
3 ribs of celery, cut into 2” pieces 
Some celery leaves
5 sprigs of parsley

THE KLUSKY (Egg Dumplings)

¼ tsp salt – fine sea salt
½ cup milk
1 egg beaten
1¼ cups of all purpose flour

METHOD

Rinse the meat bones with cold water and place in a large soup pot with the 12 cups of cold water and ½ tablespoon of salt. Let stand for about 30 minutes to draw out the juices.

Then put on high heat and bring to a boil. Skim the surface to remove the dirty foam and simmer.

Add 1 bay leaf, tomatoes, tomato paste, garlic and onion and simmer uncovered for 2 hours.

Then add the carrots, fat pieces cut in half lengthwise, celery, celery leaves and parsley and let this all simmer for another 1½ hours. In the last ½ hour of cooking, add the klusky.

MAKING THE KLUSKY

Add salt and milk to the beaten egg. Stir flour in to make a smooth batter.

Bring the soup a boil and add the klusky by scooping out just ½ teaspoon of batter and then dipping the spoon in the boiling soup and the batter will fall off and make the dumpling.

Stir every once in a while. 

Let them cook for about 20 minutes or so.

Then Mom wrote:

Any questions call me. Love, Mom

(Mom passed in 1995)

Filed Under: Dinner, Lunch, Meat, Soups Tagged With: beef, hearty soup, Klusky, Polish dumplings, soup

RawSpiceBar Winter Herbs on a Beef Rump Roast with Potatoes & Parsnips

January 3, 2016 by Mary 17 Comments

RawSpiceBar Winter Herb Rub on beef rump roast on platter and plated.Growing up in the Midwest, and from a large family with lots of boys (five brothers) Sunday dinner was often a big beef roast with mashed potatoes, green beans and some sort of homemade fruit pie. That roast and the pie said “Sunday” to me and my mom did a great job of making sure the beef was cooked to a beautiful medium-rare. Desserts in the Midwest were pretty mandatory and her pies were spectacular. My father always loved her flakey crusts.

RawSpiceBar Winter Herb Blend.This little packet from RawSpiceBar doesn’t look like much. However, cut it open and the fragrance released is like nothing I’ve ever experienced from a mixture of dried herbs. They say that they’re special and you know what, they are! Also, you don’t think there’s much in the packet but there’s more than you think! My rump roast was pretty sizable, 2.7+ lbs. and I applied the spice mixture liberally and still have a third of my spices left!

So use these now to take advantage of their freshness and don’t be stingy. They are a little rustic with some stems in the mixture, but that all adds to the aroma!

RawSpiceBar Winter Herb mix on raw beef rump roast.

Sprinkle Kosher salt all over your roast, then sprinkle on the herb mixture and press in. For the rounded sides of the roast, sprinkle the herb mixture and salt on a flat surface spread out about the same area you need to cover, and then roll your roast in it to cover completely. Neat trick, eh?!!

Do this as early in the morning as you can on the day you want to serve this. Do it the day before for even better results. Salting any meat ahead of time helps to tenderize it. While a rump roast is flavorful, it needs some help on the tender part.

RawSpiceBar WINTER HERBS ON A BEEF RUMP ROAST WITH POTATOES & PARSNIPS – serves 6

1 Tbs. Kosher salt
1.5 – 2 Tbs. RawSpiceBar Winter Herbs spice mix
2.7 lbs. beef rump roast, tied at 2-inch intervals
½ bunch marjoram
1.5 lbs. medium Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled
1.5 lbs. medium parsnips, peeled, cut in 3-inch lengths
4 Tbs. unsalted butter, melted
1 large bunch watercress

FOR THE HORSERADISH SAUCE:
½ cup crème fraîche
2- 3 Tbs. horseradish, drained
Small pinch cayenne
Salt and pepper

The day before or in the morning, evenly cover the roast with the Kosher salt and the RawSpiceBar Winter Mix herb mixture. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate. (If you don’t have time for this, even 2 hours at room temperature before you put it in the oven will do.)

Remove the seasoned roast from the refrigerator at least an hour before you plan on putting it in the oven.
Line a roasting pan with marjoram branches and set roast on top. Heat oven to 400 degrees.

Roast the beef, uncovered, for about 1 hour. Check with an instant-read thermometer after 45 minutes. For medium-rare, take the roast out of the oven when thermometer registers 120 degrees (residual heat will cause roast to continue cooking as it rests). Remove the roast, let it rest for 20 minutes; the temperature should rise to 125 degrees.

Meanwhile, while the roast is cooking, in a large pot of well-salted boiling water, cook potatoes until just done, about 15 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon and place in a baking dish. In the same water, simmer parsnips until just done, about 8 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon and add them to the potatoes in the baking dish. Pour melted butter over the potatoes and parsnips and use a brush to make sure they are all well coated.

Make the horseradish sauce: Whisk together crème fraîche, horseradish and cayenne in a small bowl. Season with salt and pepper and refrigerate.

After about 45 minutes after the roast goes into the oven, put in the baking dish of potatoes and parsnips, uncovered, and roast until beautifully golden brown, about 25 – 30 minutes.

RawSpice Bar Winter Herb Mix on Beef Rump Roast on platter with veggies.

Slice the beef into thin slices and arrange on a warmed platter, garnished with a big bunch of watercress and the roasted vegetables. Pass the horseradish sauce separately.

Serve with LOVE and enjoy!!

Filed Under: Dinner, Meat, Products for sale, Sides, Vegetables Tagged With: beef, RawSpiceBar, roast beef, Sunday dinner, winter herbs

Beef brisket

October 9, 2011 by Mary Frances 4 Comments

I always think of my good friend Susan who on 9/11, after the towers collapsed, was told to go home from work and was so distraught and didn’t know what to do, she chose to go to her butcher and bought a beef brisket; hoping to find solace in an enormous slab of beef. The very idea of brisket is comforting; it is a homey dish in my mind. However, every Jewish holiday I have attended, with accompanying brisket, has almost always fallen short of my juicy, tender beef idealization.

My husband was raised Jewish and brisket is a Rosh Hashanah staple. He did not want a New Year’s family dinner this year but I insisted we try to pull it together at the last minute, At 6:30 the night before, we decide to plunge in and purchase the meat – a six and a half pound brisket – for 5 of us! Yikes! Now we had to convince Zach to be home by 3:30 to put this baby in. After dinner on Tuesday night, I got to work on a marinade. Not liking the sound of any one recipe online, I proceeded to make up my own. So here we go. This was so delicious; I will make this again and again, even if it’s not a Jewish holiday. I wanted to drink the gravy and then put it on everything afterwards, it was that good.

passover-brisket-egg-noodles

MARINATED BEEF BRISKET

1 head of garlic, cloves peeled and minced
3 cups of chopped onions
1 1/2 cups red wine vinegar
1 1/2 cups dry red wine
3/4 cup Dijon mustard
1 can tomato paste
3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/4  cup soy sauce
2 tsp. Kosher salt
6 1/2 lb. beef brisket
3 – 4 plum tomatoes, cored and diced
4 carrots, peeled and cut into 1 1/4” pieces
3 medium red-skinned potatoes, cut in 1 1/4” chunks

Whisk together the garlic, onions, vinegar, red wine, mustard, tomato paste, brown sugar, soy sauce and salt in a very large bowl. Wash and dry the meat and submerge it in the marinade. Cover and refrigerate overnight. Turn it over in the morning.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Take meat out 45 minutes before putting in the oven. Place meat and 3/4 of the marinade in a covered pot or Dutch oven (Le Creuset is best). Discard the rest of the marinade. Roast for 3 hours Add carrots and potatoes. Cover again and at 3 1/2  hours, add tomatoes and cook for 45 minutes more. It should be fork tender.

Remove the meat to a platter. Take the vegetables out with a slotted spoon and surround the meat with them on the platter. Boil the marinade, skimming off all the grease that will form at the top as you rapidly boil for 20 minutes or so, until greaseless and slightly thickened.

Generously drizzle gravy over the meat and vegetables, garnish with parsley. Carve in 1/4” slices on an angle and serve. Pass extra gravy at the table.

You will be amazed.

Filed Under: Dinner, Meat Tagged With: 9/11, beef, brisket. Rosh Hashanah, comfort food, marinade, new Year's, red wine

End of summer

September 6, 2011 by Mary Frances Leave a Comment

Welcome to my blog about great food, cooking and sharing love. I love to eat. I love to cook. I love to feed people and share it all. I’d like to share some wonderful recipes and tips and stories that come from cooking and entertaining. We have a house in upstate New York and just this past weekend, it started raining leaves. : ( Summer is over. We had our friends Margaret and Wayne for dinner on Saturday night and I served my take on an “end of summer” meal. Watermelon salad with feta and Kalamata olives (the chopped olives look like watermelon seeds to fake you out!) and fresh mint leaves. grass-fed lamb and beef cheddar burgers with a caper remoulade sauce, served with tomato and thinly sliced English cucumber on toasted English muffins, wheatberry salad with dried cranberries (to introduce us to Fall) and roasted asparagus with lemon and olive oil. Our dessert was grilled peaches brushed with olive oil and fresh cracked black pepper with Ronnybrook Farms ice cream (chocolate chip and hazelnut crunch – yummy – the cows live down the street) and a chocolate biscotti. It was a hit!

End of summer.

Filed Under: Dinner, Meat Tagged With: beef, Dinner, kalamata olives, lamb, recipes, watermelon, wheatberries

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