GACHP?! What is that?

I recently received an invite luncheon to a local chapter of GACHP, what? I honestly wasn't familiar with the group and had to Google it! GACHP stands for the Global Association of Christian Hospitality Professionals.

I met President Marcus White, Vice President Paul Sofka, and Dennis Seastrom of Navigator Group Purchasing Inc. along with a number of local and out-of-state hospitality professionals.

Marcus and Paul both come from large churches that see many events each month(First Baptist Orlando also has a school). Marcus is at First Baptist in Orlando where he is the Food Service Ministry Director and Paul at Houston's First Baptist Church where he is the Culinary Service Director. Marcus says they call it Baptist World because its close to Disney World and you may recognize Paul's church as Beth Moore's place of teaching for 29 years! They did an excellent job hosting with Mary Lou who is the Food Service Director in the kitchen here locally at Whitesburg Baptist where the luncheon was held. Sounds like a "baptist only" gathering doesn't it? Nah, its not.

Although several other churches/organizations were represented basically this is a group that would be good for any Christian in foodservice. They are here to help with ideas, resources, materials, conferences, classes, certifications...anything to help further your ministry/career in hospitality.

Dennis GPO, Navigator, represents retirement homes and faith-based organizations with over a billion dollars buying power, yes, BILLION! What's a GPO? ANSWER HERE!

It was a good time to meet new people and make connections.

* I am a long-standing member of CCI (Christian Chefs International) and will be attending their annual conference this year(more on that later). But sometimes people are members of several groups. GACHP is one of those groups where their passion and ministry overlap with CCI.

Tytus Birthday Cake!

 Last Sunday my oldest son Tytus turned four years old. The theme of his party was Jake and The Neverland Pirates. Pictured here is Bucky the pirate ship that sails around Jake, Izzy, Cubby, and Skully. Made of chocolate cake, various candies, a peanut butter cup crows nest, and a few unedible parts like poster board sails and a dowel rod mast. Yeah, he was super excited about it!

[no, I don't do this every year...next year will probably be store bought, or my wife will make it! LOL - then again, who knows? Kids can be very persuasive.] 

Below is the Dinosaur Train cake I made for Tytus 2nd Birthday. This one is unique in that I made my own fondant out of a marshmallow recipe.  This wasn't the first Train cake I made though, the first was on a ship in Liberia, West Africa for some Brazilian friends of mine at this link: Train Birthday Cake (Estevam turns ONE!)

Chicken Chalet! (For the urban chicken!)

[It's been awhile since I posted so I wanted to kick it off with something intriguing I found today!]

That's right folks! Chicken Chalet! Available at participating SAMs clubs. $300!!! Holds 4-6 hens, fresh eggs daily, easy access door, pull out tray for easy cleaning...

I am not sure whether to laugh, be amazed, or both! Which leads me to ask, which of you within city limits raise 'urban' chickens? And/or what is the law for keeping them inside city limits and your neighborhood?

The SEASON is here!

Ahhhh, all the things that keep me busy during this season are here: Men's Retreat, boys getting sick, Thanksgiving Fundraiser, Pancake Breakfast, Teachers Christmas Banquet, Church Christmas Banquet.... You get the picture.

Its hard to find the time to post during this Fall/Winter season, so I don't. No reason to feel guilty, real life is happening!

Have any of you thought about deactivating your Facebook account? I have. Recently I have been seriously contemplating shutting it down till the beginning of the new year. For several reasons: one less distraction, no need to update, waste less time keeping up with others lives, less commenting and/or ranting on things I (8 years ago) would have never paid attention to...and to see how it might change my life.

Don't get me wrong, I like to stay connected but not at the expense of my time and my families time. And then maybe in January I can re-evaluate and activate it again and discipline myself to use a set amount of time on it. I will make my mind up by end of week.

Anyone who really needs to contact me I am still available by twitter or thru comments on this website. Most of you who stay in contact with me on a regular basis already have my information.

Who knows, I may have more time for posting on my website!

I'm PACKIN' and it's LOADED!

I pack my boys lunches for several reasons but mainly because they eat a lot! And they love a variety of things. This topic comes up a lot with other friends of mine both parent and non parent when chatting socially on twitter or Facebook.

[ You can catch me on twitter @tyronebcookin or Instagram @tyronebcookn. Without the "i".]

My boys lunches have a lot of small portions and they are based off things we know they will eat. In the pictures/diagrams listed in this post it doesn't say but the apple sauce is no sugar added, the peanut butter granola bar and mini pumpkin muffins are home made(made by my wife, she also is an excellent cook). The fruit snacks are all natural with no corn syrup or high fructose corn syrup. Sometimes we even make the apple sauce when we get a good price on some tasty apples. 

Most of our food is purchased through Aldi's which is the parent company for Trader Joes (which is not in our area yet) and we recognize a lot of the food as the same products and quality. 

We interchange the food components as stuff goes on sale or is available. On the weekends I usually make big batches of waffles and pancakes that we eat then freeze for use all during the week. Lunch meat can be changed, restaurant take home and supper leftovers can be used...sometimes we just throw a couple of pieces of pepperoni pizza in there!

Tytus' Lunch - 3 1/2 years old:

Ezra's Lunch - 15 months old:

Soaking wood chips for smoker

Quick tip: A long time ago I figured out it was easier to soak all your wood chips, pieces, and/or small blocks of wood all at one time. Then you strain them with a colander and freeze them in a ziplock bag for the future. Why? Because most instructions on smoking with these size wood pieces tell you to pre-soak them up to an hour or more! And who wants to suddenly be slowed down by this last minute realization? No one ever!

My Thoughts on Wine

Not everyone has a taste for wine and even if they did, not everyone partakes in drinking. Nor should they just for the sake of appearing "cultured". But as a person steeped in the personal and professional development of a culinary education I have been called on to pick wines and/or pair them with food.

In the past I have been asked about my favorite wines for drinking, pairing, cooking, and how to tell the best! Repeatedly I would say "the wines YOU like the most!" because taste is subjective with wine as well as food and the pairing of both. 

Do you remember Two Buck Chuck? Sold only at Trader Joes? Those cheap wines that a lot of people just loved and raved about? According to The House of Mondavi it was surplus wine bought by the barrels at a discount from the Mondavi winery back in the day! The funny part is Robert Mondavi made fun of the guy but didn't realize the wine came from the over abundant harvest of his own grapes!

On a wine tasting tour in Napa Valley I partook in a class that was part of the tour experience at the Mondavi wineries. There is a technique, science, and steps to really "taste" a wine BUT the outcome of that experience is purely yours and not a "review" that everyone has to accept just because someone published it.

Robert Hodgson, a winemaker from California, conducted an eight year experiment at the California State Fair’s wine competition. Hodgson had this to say about the results..."The results are disturbing. Only about 10% of judges are consistent and those judges who were consistent one year were ordinary the next year. Chance has a great deal to do with the awards that wines win." ~ Wine-tasting: its junk science  

If your just looking to cook with wine, take the advice of your friends favorites or the flavor notes on the back of the bottle. Please don't use or buy "cooking wine" because they have salt in them and it will make it hard for you to balance the taste when you can't control the salt in the wine.

Leave wine snobbery to the "experts" if your just looking for a "take home" bottle suite your own tastes! If you want to wine taste and/or food pair wine, do what the experts do, "SPIT!". Wine tasting and/or judging was not developed for you to swallow every sample...but to narrow it down to the best! And then maybe enjoy a glass with dinner or special occasion.

by madelinep.
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Grilling with Cooling Racks

Here's a quick tip about grilling vegetables, small pieces of meat, fish, and anything you are afraid will fall thru the grill 'grates' or cracks. Use a cooling rack.

I like to grill thick slices of red onion rubbed with garlic, salted, and coated with olive oil. But if you ever have a problem flipping them...they fall thru the cracks easily. Small pieces of marinated salmon is another grilled item I like because not everyone wants a whole filet or they want 'just a taste'. And of course, another great grill item is hot-dogs.

You can buy some fancy special made high price 'gadgets' to use on your grill for these things or maybe you just need to order one or two cooling racks for around $15 to $20? (and sometimes you can find a 2 pack of nonstick cooling racks for around $10 at Walmart or Target).

My hot-dogs always come out great and they don't run away or get burnt! Unless of course, you leave them unattended for a long time as with anything over a fire.

**UPDATE - I bought two non-stick racks at the Jeff Road Kroger grocery store last week for $7.99 on sale. August 2020**

Small Bits

If your in the Huntsville Alabama area my church, Valley Fellowship, is having a picnic this Sunday and everyone is welcome! Service starts at 10am and the picnic is immediately afterword. 3616 Holmes Avenue NW, 35816. It's like potluck but we make sure enough meat is available: pulled pork, burgers, hotdogs...

I received my second 99 score from the health department! They just can't give me that last point! LOL! So far we have stayed 95 and above. I am NOT complaining!

Here's a picture of the small kids (preschool) lunch below. It's an Italian flat-bread sandwich with salami, pepperoni, ham, herb infuse extra virgin olive oil, and I bake the bread myself...But really it's probably the chips and cookie that sells it! We put it in a small to-go container because they feed them in the class room instead of trying to get them all in the cafeteria. Smart thinking. 

Pizza, Aluminum Foil, and Parchment Paper

*UPDATE: I went back to parchment paper. 2 reasons: 1, because it is more forgiving than foil, and 2, because I now own a pizza steel as well! And its cool!

I am not going to revisit how I do pizza at home, but you can find all the posts that are involved here: Pizza. Rather, how I might switch over to foil from parchment paper.

Last Saturday night I was out of parchment paper, so I did the next best thing I could think of...foil? For years I used parchment paper for sliding my pizzas from the peel to the stone but now I think I might be switching to foil.

My original concern was that the dough would stick to the foil, but after several pizzas and breadsticks Saturday night I realized that was not the case. 

The whole reason I use parchment paper in the first place is because the heat from the stone goes straight thru (unlike a pan) and because (besides the dough) I use a no-mess no-flour *technique and the parchment lets the prepared pizza dough slide from peel to stone with no semolina, flour, or cornmeal. 

After using the foil shiny side up and spraying with cooking spray before putting the dough on it, the pizza crust came out of the oven even better than before and I could pull the foil out from under (like the magic trick where you quickly swipe a table cloth out from under dishes on the table without breaking them) the pizza and quickly cut the pizza still on the peel before sliding it off on a rack. 

* As stated in other posts, I wait till the dough has rested enough to use my hands or a rolling pin to shape the dough using just (non stick) cooking spray. It avoids hard rolling with a rolling pin and using lots of flour. No mess, no fuss. 

Oven Potatoes or Hash Browns?

Really the 'hash browns' I am talking about are the kind you get at chick-fil-a. Round and flatter than a tator-tot these hash browns complete a breakfast plate we offer for lunch at VFCA. The picture is an elementary grade plate of scrambled eggs, hash browns, biscuit, and sausage gravy!

Today I decided to use real potatoes to do some oven 'fried' potatoes to go with breakfast for lunch. I have some tough critics! They wanted the processed hash browns more than the potatoes! I said, 'Look, these are REAL potatoes!'. Unfortunately they were not impressed...Sigh.

It reminds me of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution where the kids could not identify a real potato but they knew a crinkle cut fry was a 'potato'.

Marshmallow Crispy Rice Treats

I wanted to make crispy rice treats using up some odd and end pantry supplies but I had things to do! So I was thinking...how can I get these treats made without having to keep a steady eye on them?

Why not use the chafing dish warmer on high? Melt a little butter, add the marshmallows, slowly stir into a smooth creamy mess of melted marshmallow and then add the crispies...since the warmer works like a double boiler or baine-marie the temperature is around  boiling or 212* Fahrenheit.  I even put a lid on the pan and when I got busy an came back to it later. 

I used a standard recipe x2 which yielded a half-sheet pan of crispy treats. 

6Tb of butter (3oz)

20oz of small marshmallows (two 10oz bags from grocery store - about 4 cups)

12 Cups of crispy rice cereal (3 quarts)

Melt the butter down, add marshmallows, melt/stir till smooth (you can take your time on this part), fold in crispy rice cereal, use non-stick food spray to cover half-sheet pan and then smash down mixture to fill in the shape of the pan. Probably will also need to spray hands to keep mixture from sticking to them. If needed, spray the bottom of another pan and put on top to smash down evenly. 

Tytus 1st movie @ theater!

I took Tytus to see the movie "Planes" by Disney. Along the same lines as "Cars" which he loved!

I was still surprised at how many previews ran before the movie! (5 or 6) Next time I think I would show up about 10 or 15 minutes past starting time and it would be about right.

Tytus is 3 and he did well! There was a point in the movie where I thought he was not going to make it but then the excitement of the race towards the finish captured his attention once more and reeled him in till the end!

Bring something to drink and plenty of snacks if your child eats like mine! And a small jacket or long sleeve shirt, the theater gets cold for small kids and old people! (Yes, I brought a hoodie) LOL I brought a small backpack to store all the 'possibilities'. Coats, snacks, pull-up, water...

Oh, by the way, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and had an excellent time just father and son!

* Tip - sit far enough back so your child can see everything on the screen without hurting his neck or making him dizzy trying to keep up with the action.