Doc's Cookbook

By Richard W. Soderberg

I came from a Scandinavian culture in Northwestern Wisconsin. My mother was a lousy cook. Seems that the only thing she ever made was "hot dish"—which was a casserole based on cream of mushroom soup. Mom's usually featured celery and ground moose. Dad's annual male-bonding vacation was always to Northern Ontario in September. By the time the dead moose made it back home, hot dish was about all they could do with it. Mom once sent me a box containing index cards of all her hot-dish recipes. It was a joke. She was a funny lady. None of those recipes made it to this book. I still detest cooked celery. Grandma, on the other hand, who lived just down the road, knew how to feed a family and kept us from starving until we started school and were introduced to the delights of Mrs. Hendrickson's gourmet school lunch. I'd never seen, much less experienced, the goodness of such items as broccoli and cauliflower. Growing up in a culinary-deprived culture contributed to my interest in cooking. Another is my love for the outdoors and the joys of preparing and consuming priceless gifts from nature. I collected and perfected the recipes provided here over many years of experimentation. I am pleased to share them with you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Sep 16, 2019
• ISBN: 9781645444466

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Doc’s Cookbook

Richard W. Soderberg

Copyright © 2019 Richard W. Soderberg

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc. 2019

ISBN 978-1-64544-445-9 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64544-446-6 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

For Margaret and Alison, my kitchen pals

About Food

This is not a wild-game cookbook, but since many of the best things to eat are not products of agriculture or animal husbandry, I have included some of my favorite recipes made from foraged ingredients. One of the best things about food gathered from nature is that you are fairly certain that it is safe and wholesome to eat. I endeavor to avoid processed food (except Stove Top stuffing—that shit’s delicious), and the recipes here reflect that effort to the extent possible and practical.

I hope that the readers of this book are not frustrated by my failure to provide exact measurements for ingredients, except when necessary. Food should be seasoned and ingredients added according to taste and desire. You may have to experiment a little, but that’s a big part of the fun in cooking.

About Wine

Milk and butter come from female mammals, not nuts. Wine comes from grapes, not cherries, blueberries, dandelions, etc. Wine doesn’t come from all grapes. It only comes from varieties of the European grape species, Vitis vinifera, the common wine grape. I apply this rather narrow definition of wine because you are reading a cookbook and wine is food, or more specifically, wine enhances food.

There are thousands of varieties of the common wine grape that are roughly divided by their origins in France, either Burgundy or Bordeaux. Red burgundies include pinot noir and white Burgundies include Pinot gris (Pinot grigio if grown in Italy), Chardonnay, Chablis, and Pinot blanc. Red Bordeaux include Cabernet Sauvignon, Malbec and Merlot. Sauvignon blanc is a white Bordeaux.

These varieties are now grown all around the world where ever climate and soils are suitable. Indeed, some of the world’s finest wines now come from areas other than Europe.

Much has been written about proper pairings of wine and food. Pinot noir is lighter and fruitier than Cabernet Sauvignon and therefore is often paired with earthy dishes containing mushrooms. Cabernet sauvignon is more appropriate for juicy red meat. Chardonnay is fermented in oak and, therefore, has a grassy (oaky) flavor and is better suited for fatty fish and rich white sauces than subtler white wines like Chablis, Pinot grigio, and Pinot blanc which are better suited to lighter dishes of fish or white birds. If you ever get a chance to eat Asado (whole lamb grilled on a campfire), be sure to consume vast quantities of fine Argentine Malbec.

I don’t pay as much attention to correct pairing as most wine snobs. I don’t see any problem with drinking the wine you like if its white with red meat or red with fish, so suit yourself. Excellent wine doesn’t have to be expensive. I used to belong to a wine club where we took turns presenting blind tastings. It became humorously and embarrassingly evident to the wine snobs that one looks at the label was worth a thousand tastes as the inexpensive wines were usually selected by the group. My mantra for wine selection is good, yet cheap.

About Foraging

Foraging is great fun. You can eat just about everything that grows, walks, swims, or flies outdoors. Note that I said just about everything, so get a good book on edible plants and fungi before you get too serious about consuming Nature’s bounty. All animals are edible, some more so than others. I get a lot of pleasure from preparing wild meats with plants and fungi that come from the same habitat.

The first forageable plants that come up in my neighborhood are ramps. They occur in vast plots in shaded woodlands and have a wide edible leaf. The bulbs taste something like a cross between onion and garlic. I freeze the bulbs for off-season use.

Wild fungi are the usual targets of foragers and the morel mushroom is the queen of them all. They pop up in the Spring in certain secret locations.