Fourth Quarter Cooking: Taking Stock

It's a beautiful morning, sunny with impending thunderstorms making the air heavy with moisture and the scent of the herb garden. A yard full of butterflies. I was planning to go out early and find a local chicken for afternoon stock-making. I decided to "take stock" instead. Forget the chicken right now. Plan a trip to the Growers' Market at Lake Ella this afternoon and ask about the local poultry there. 

Instead, I ordered Cooked and The Art of Fermentation each written by Michael Pollan. I also ordered Tartine Bread by Chad Robertson, even though I already own half a dozen bread cookbooks. As much as I adore my Kindle, hardcover will be best for what I am calling Fourth Quarter Cooking: A Year of Taking (and Making) Stock.

I have numerous stock recipes. I went through them all just now, narrowing them down to two. Although I rejected my (once) old - favorite Louisiana Brown Chicken Stock recipe from Terry Thompson's Cajun-Creole Cooking, I hung (the book is falling apart and all of the pages are unattached to the spine) her tips for preparing stock and making roux on the fridge.

I'll use my own recipe (it's just like all the others) for regular stock. For the Oriental cuisine dishes, I've chosen a recipe from the Thai cookbook, The Elements of Life, by Su-Mei Yu. I will cook the stocks ala Michael Pollan, however. Slowly. Perfectly. 

In my spare time, tonight, I need to inventory my freezing containers, gather up any packaged stocks and broths - there must be some - for the food pantry, and shuffle the freezer around to make room for two different stocks. I also want to keep two sauces on hand, frozen:  a supply of ragu and a simple tomato sauce.

And so it is that the Fourth Quarter Cooking experiment/experience is officially underway until August 14, 2014 and hopefully beyond.