Fic: Recipes from Pegasus pt6

[anyanka_eg]

Title: Recipes from Pegasus
Rating: PG
Pairing: Subtle McShep and obvious Teyla/Lorne
Spoilers: All 5 seasons
Summary: After the stargate program was de-classified in 2010 and the initial furore died down, the book that captured the zeitgeist of the entire planet, tapping in to the almost insatiable curiosity for all things related to the Stargate Program, was Recipes from Pegasus. It was an accessible way for everyone to understand a little bit more about the people who had spent the last eight years living in an alien galaxy, fighting to keep Earth safe. It's author, Grace Mallory, the head chef of the Atlantis mission became a household name even though she appeared on a very few TV shows during the publicity tour. More importantly her stories about the daily lives of the people of Atlantis made them appear much more human than all the high octane TV specials did.

Note: this is an unformatted version (i.e. without colours and pictures)


Dinner - continued

Aesc's Agrop

I used to think that many of the stories that Ronon told about Sateda were exaggerated somewhat, if not completely untrue, like the tall tales you hear in mess halls and bars the world over. He never spoke of the final destruction of his home, at least not to most of us, so all we heard of Sateda were a few stories of fearsome beasts and brave warriors. I thought they were as true as the stories of heroes slaying dragons in the Middle Ages. Then I met my first agrop and I realized that Ronon's stories were more than likely an understatement of just how tough the Satedans were.

Although the agrop takes the same place on the Satedan table as the chicken does on Earth, providing both eggs and meat, they are nothing like the good natured birds we Terrans are used to. The agrop's skin is covered scales instead of feathers and they stand a good six inches taller than chickens making, them look a little like a bonsaied pterodactyl. An angry, snappy pterodactyl with a poisonous bite and claws.

Ronon was baffled by Colonel Carter's refusal to round up the flock SGA-1 found on a survey mission to Sateda, especially after he'd taken the time to point out that they were a domesticated species so their bite probably wouldn't kill anyone. Needless to say Sam Carter stood firm, not allowing the live animals onto Atlantis or even New Athosia. She did concede to occasional hunting trips back to Sateda, volunteers only of course, when Ronon stood in her office and pouted.

McKay was in my kitchen, scavenging for cookies, when Ronon bounced in carrying twelve of the creatures, closely followed by Sheppard, Teyla and a couple of marines lugging a bunch more of them. Ronon ran through how to skin and butcher the agrops, carefully removing the poison sacks, in the longest continuous speech I'd heard from the man to that point. He explained how the ones they'd caught were the most prized breed, the wild Aesc's agrop, whose poisonous bite could kill a man and who were wily enough to mount surprise attacks on their hunters.

He then happily told us how his mother cooked the birds in milk to negate any left over poison and to keep the meat moist as they do dry out during cooking. McKay, departing the kitchen clutching a cookie and pretending not to be squeamish, said he was going to get Dr Keller to perform a grinectomy on Ronon. She arrived at a trot minutes later under the presence of checking for poison in the meat but I think it was mainly to see Ronon looking so happy.

Be careful about the milk catching at the bottom of the pan. If it does, and it probably will, don't stir it too much as the nasty burned taste could infuse into the chicken.

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Ingredients - serves 4 to 6

3.5lb (1.6kg) chicken, free range if possible or it could be flavorless

A big handful of fresh herbs, sage, parsley and thyme work well, but you can use anything you have

Enough milk to cover the chicken in a pan

Salt and pepper
 

Instructions

Truss the chicken and stuff the cavity with most of the herbs. Put the chicken into a pan of boiling milk and season with some salt, pepper and a remaining herbs, chopped.

When the chicken's cooked (it'll vary but about 1-1½ hours), remove from the milk and drain well. If you want to give the chicken some color, either griddle briefly on a barbecue, use a ribbed griddle pan or put the oven up to it's highest and roast it for 10 minutes. If you want a lower fat version just remove the skin and serve.

It's really good with broccoli or wilted Good King Henry (or spinach if you can't get this old fashioned leaf) and Aioli. It'll stand up to a good tomato sauce too and even, unusually for chicken, a little bit of Dijon or German mustard.

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Shrimp laksa

When Major Lorne's team dragged a cow sized, many legged but fortunately dead crustacean into the kitchen, Corporal Bud Martin voiced his amazement at the Pegasus galaxy's ability to surprise even Atlantis' veterans.* I couldn't help but agree with him.

After Evan had taken himself and his team off to get showered and try to rid themselves of the smell of fish (something that didn't happen for a couple of days) my team and I got on with working out what to do with it. After borrowing a small circular saw from the engineering team we managed to remove the shell and carve up the meat into manageable chunks. Corporal Martin got to take out his frustrations with the galaxy by smashing the shell into pot sized bits with a sledge hammer. He seemed much happier afterwards.

We carved steaks from the larger sections and served some of them that evening for dinner, grilled with a little garlic and chili butter, and we froze what we couldn't eat that night. The smaller pieces we made into this soup the next day. It proved to be a very popular dish, especially with Major Lorne, which almost compensates for the fact that the residents of MX-239, who farm the giant shrimps in their warm, shallow seas, will only trade with the Major's team. Those four guys spend a good portion of their lives smelling faintly of the fish mulch the crustaceans eat.

This is a fabulous dish, way less daunting than it looks, because even though there's a lot of ingredients you pretty much just whiz them up in a blender or processor. If you can't get all the ingredients you can buy ready-made laksa paste which is okay but fresh is better.

*What he actually said was 'F*ck me, it's a giant shrimp!' but we all knew what he meant.

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Ingredients - serves 4

For the paste

1 lemon grass stalk, inner leaves roughly chopped and outer leaves reserved for the broth

2-3 Thai chillies, to taste, halved and de-seeded

3 garlic cloves, crushed and roughly chopped

1 'thumb' of root ginger, peeled and roughly sliced

1 large shallot, roughly chopped

A large handful of fresh cilantro, leaves and stalks roughly chopped

1 tsp ground coriander seeds

2 pinches of ground turmeric

For the soupy bit

9oz (250g) medium egg noodles

1½ lb (750g) raw, shell-on large shrimp/prawns, peeled and all the bits saved

4 tbsp vegetable bouillon powder

2 pints (1.2 liters) hot water

1 tbsp toasted sesame oil

1 can (13.5oz/400ml) coconut milk

2 tbsp Thai fish sauce (nam pla)

7oz (200g) fresh beansprouts

3 bushy sprigs of fresh mint, bundled up and sliced thinly

a handful of fresh cilantro, leaves chopped and stalks discarded

4 lime wedges, to serve

 

Instructions

Put all the paste ingredients into a blender (or mini-food processor) with 4 tablespoons of water and whiz into a thick, slightly course paste (scrape down the sides to make sure it's all whizzed up). You can refrigerate this paste for up to 72 hours.

Cook the noodles according to the instructions on the packet, drain and rinse under cold water. Leave them to one side for later.

To make the broth, put all the shrimp debris (including heads) into a large saucepan with the reserved lemon grass leaves. Add the bouillon powder and hot water then bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, for 15-20 minutes. Strain the resulting broth through a damp, muslin-lined sieve, discarding all the debris.

Put a large saucepan over a low-medium heat and, when it's hot add the sesame oil. Scrape all the laksa paste into the saucepan and cook it for 1-2 minutes stirring almost constantly. Increase the heat to medium and then stir in the shrimp stock, coconut milk and Thai fish sauce.

Cover the pan and bring the contents to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer the broth for 15-20 minutes. Add the prawns and cook for 1 minute, uncovered, then throw in the noodles and beansprouts, and simmer for another 1-2 minutes, until everything is piping hot.

Divide the laksa among the serving bowls, making sure everyone gets a fair share of shrimp. Strew the chopped mint and cilantro over each bowl and perch a lime wedge on top (to be squeezed into the broth).

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Chuck mother's Cretan meat and small pasta

Chuck's mother is from Crete and she's a pretty fantastic lady. I was fairly sure of that before I even met her because Chuck had passed on many of her brilliant recipes to me, but having met her I'm sure of it. Once the Stargate program was made public, and once Atlantis was considered safe enough for some civilians to visit, she was one of the first through the gate.

The 'family day' weekend (a misnomer that made Richard Woolsey shudder every time he heard it) was carefully planned and organized by the IOC, the SGC, and various supporting governments. Most of the long serving Atlantis crew had someone visit them and it was amazing to see the wonder on people's faces as they saw where their loved ones were living and working. Two CNN camera crews were sent through along with the families and their constant intrusion into areas they shouldn't have been and into people's private reunions was the only down side to the weekend.

Chuck's mom found the kitchen almost immediately, trailed by a slightly sheepish Chuck, to make sure her son was being fed properly. I think we passed muster when she saw the preparations for the party that night and then she pitched right in to help out. It was pretty cool having Chuck and his mom helping out, just like the big family parties I remember from home with all the relatives rallying round to help. Chuck's a fairly good cook in his own right, but Adriana is phenomenal and I was sad to see her leave when the weekend was over. She did leave me a heap of recipes though.

This is one of the easiest dishes ever to make but it's tasty, filling and just what you need with a mess hall full of hungry marines. It's also one of those dishes that can be made from the less attractive cuts from the less appealing animals, as long as it's a red meat. Slow cooking makes the meat really tender and, despite a lack of any herbs or spices, it some how makes all but the oddest of animals taste good. It doesn't work for Targian batlanin. That still tastes ghastly.

You can serve this with a salad or some simple vegetables like steamed beans or wilted spinach. I like it with cooked beetroot, cooled and cubed and then stirred into yogurt. Of course, on Atlantis we're don't have that much beetroot but we trade with Zoran for something like it. They get M&Ms and we get yellow beetroot analogs. It seems fair.

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Ingredients - serves 6

2lb (1kg) meat, can be lamb, mutton or beef, cubed to inch squares

5 large tomatoes

½ cup olive oil

5 cups water

1lb (500g) very small pasta, like grains of rice

1 cup grated cheese, something sharp like cheddar

salt and pepper

 

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350°F/180°C

Pulp the tomatoes, pour over meat in an ovenproof dish with a lid, add salt and pepper, oil and 1 cup of water. Cover and bake in a moderate oven until the meat is cooked (about 2 hours).

15 minutes before you want to serve add 4 cups of hot water and the pasta, stir well and leave to cook with the lid on.

Sprinkle with grated cheese as soon as you take it out of the oven and then pop the lid back on again. Bring the whole dish to the table and by then the cheese will have melted.

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South Western Chili

Let me say straight away, this isn't the typical chili that most people are used to. It has no beans. It is beanless. Does that make it less of a chili than the stuff with beans? I don't think so, and neither did Colonel Marshall Sumner.

I didn't know the man for long, none of us who hadn't served with him before Atlantis did, but he made a lasting impression on all of us. He was our first casualty and that's not something you ever forget. But apart from that he picked all of the military personal on the expedition, apart from the then Major Sheppard, and that meant we got some of the finest soldiers I've ever served with.

He was doubtful about Elizabeth's insistence that I should be included in the personnel, even once she'd played what she considered her best card and revealed I was ex-military. I guess I could kind of see his point, after all what use was a chef, when he had marines who could do an adequate job and do other jobs too?

I happened to agree with Elizabeth's reasoning that people cut off from home didn't want to live on food cooked by people chosen for their skill as soldiers. I knew Sumner couldn't overrule Elizabeth's wishes but serving with someone who resents you is never fun, and if it's a senior officer it can be downright unpleasant. So, I decided to play my trump card. I cornered General O'Neill, on the advice of Daniel Jackson, and pestered him until he found out Sumner's favorite foods. I don't know how he did it but he reported back that the Colonel loved a really good chili.

I remembered this recipe that was given to me by a US Army Military Police Sergeant who was on protective detail for General visiting the UK Army base where I was stationed. I was head chef in the Officer's mess, and we got talking one evening when I was doing my post-prep walk round the outside of the building, frantically trying to get my nicotine levels to a point that would got me through the cooking. We hit it off and Yvonne and I have been in touch ever since. I've also long since quit smoking.

I cooked up a batch for Colonel Sumner and hand delivered a big bowl of it, with a side of corn bread slathered in butter, right to his office. He never said anything, other than 'good chili' the next day, but he didn't question my inclusion on the list of personnel again. In fact he even left all the decisions about food provisioning to me. Oh, and Jack O'Neill got a portion of that first batch for all his help too. He still tries to 'subtly' hint I should make him some more whenever we see each other.
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Ingredients - serves 4 to 6

3 lb (1.3kg) boneless chuck roast, cut into 1 inch cubes

2 tbsp vegetable oil

3 cloves garlic, chopped

3 tbsp freshly ground Chipotle chili powder

3 tbsp freshly ground Ancho chili powder (or, you could use 6 tbsp of standard chili powder)

2 tbsp freshly ground cumin

3 tbsp flour

1 tbsp dried leaf oregano (Mexican, preferably)

32 fl oz (950ml) beef broth

1 tsp salt

½ tsp freshly ground black pepper

2 or 3 roasted, peeled and cleaned Jalapeño chilies, chopped, or 1 or 2 roasted, cleaned and minced Habañero or Scotch Bonnet chilies (optional)

 

Instructions

Combine the flour, chili powders and cumin and set aside.

Heat oil in pot over medium heat in a large heavy bottomed pan. Add beef and stir frequently with a wooden spoon just until the beef turns color but does not brown. Lower heat and stir in garlic and then sprinkle flour/chili powder mixture and the oregano over meat to evenly coat it.

Add 22 fl oz (858 ml) of the beef broth and stir until the liquid is well blended. Add salt and pepper and bring ingredients to a boil, stirring occasionally. Lower heat to simmering and partially cover the pot and let cook over low heat for approximately 1.5 hours and stir occasionally.

Add remaining broth and cook 30 minutes longer, or until meat is almost falling apart. Remove pot from heat and let cool, then refrigerate over night to let flavors meld.

You can add beans to this chili, but it will make it milder. If you want hotter chili, add one (or more, if you REALLY like it hot) seeded and chopped Habañero or Scotch Bonnet chilies. Make certain to wear gloves when cleaning and seeding the chilies, they will burn your cuticles something fierce.

 Part 7