Sandwichspace 6 & 7

Sammich #6

I took the "Day" out of the title because I skipped a day already, and it's possible to double up as well.

More work with the ciabatta rolls. For #6 I did a load of sauteed spinach in a mass of scrambled egg, slices of cheddar, and the debut of a fan favorite, bacon.

Not much truly new here. The ciabatta bun was only slightly warmed. It made me think, these should be toasted more, they seem almost a bit soggy. I did butter the bread a bit. I don't think that significantly soggied the sammich, but it certainly added some nice buttery flavor. Hard to pick it out in the midst of all that egg, but I think it gives it a boost. Still, the sogginess was a downer. 5/10 The bacon, as I said, was a bit hard to pick out in the whole deal. Two folded over thick cut bacon slices. One would assume that it would be a huge enhancement to the experience. Disappointing. I will circle back to bacon again soon, but for now 3/10. Yeah, I'm shocked, too. Maybe I need 4 slices of bacon to get the flavor across. But given the relative difficulty of cooking up bacon - I have to cook it the night before unless I get up the second the alarm rings, which is nigh inconceivable - bacon does not seem like it will be a winner in this experiment.

Appearance 5/10. Bun was burned (from the original bake). Cheese unmelted and unappealing looking. Admittedly it did look better After I got to work and the cheese melted a bit.

Flavor 6/10. Mostly because the bun was soggy and the bacon was a bit of a whiff. 

Sammich #7

Toasted the ciabatta bun. It was crunchy and brittle, so a bit too far. Although I consumed this one on the spot, so if I hard wrapped it up in foil and brought it to work it would likely have steamed/softened a bit. I will have to play with this element. 5/10 on the bun. I'm worrying a bit that getting ciabatta in the Goldilocks zone between soggy and crunchy and brittle may be a bit of a challenge. I do like that the bun itself is fairly small - I don't want to be eating a shitton of bread with my breakfast. Focaccia is a lot of bread (but so tasty).

Egg and sauteed spinach. I haven't been overpowered by the spinach the last two times. Maybe that was a fluke? Cheddar slices. Reliable. And a new arrival, thick cut frozen sausage. Not leathery! And so tasty, a real meaty bite. I feel like I want to toss out the old thin frozen sausage patties. They just can't compete. I'd say 7, but the ease of prep pushes them to an 8/10. Just toss in the microwave a bit, or if time is not a factor pan fry them until perfecto. Hard to mess up. Now, I have never seen this variety of sausage patty at the store before, so it may not be readily available. Some frozen sausage patties are pretty mediocre. And raw sausage tubes that you need to fully cook are a whole different category, I will investigate those as well down the road a bit.

Appearance 7/10. Maybe a smidge less for the egg overflowing and the cheese hanging out there out of nowhere.

Flavor 7/10. The brittleness of the bread was a big disappointment. But then the sausage was a real plus.  

Sandwichspace Day 5

 I whipped up a bunch of about a dozen ciabatta rolls. I'm thinking they will freeze well and be a nice backup. Was thinking of prepping up a few sandwiches and freezing them whole, see how that works.

        

First thought, wow, this was way prettier than the focaccia. More like a traditional breakfast sandwich. I was a bit worried that the bread would be a bit too chewy. It was great though. I buttered it and then heated it in the pan for a few minutes. Not browned, but definitely warmed up quite a bit. Then heated up a frozen breakfast sausage patty and some frozen spinach. When the spinach was hot, I added the scrambled eggs. I was very careful not to overcook the eggs, and they turned out perfect. For cheese I added thin slices of cheddar to the top of the bun/sausage. When they didn't instantly melt (was I expecting sorcery?), I put them in the microwave for 33 seconds. Perfect! All in all, the eggs were almost perfect, like a 9/10. I would happily have this sandwich every morning. This spinach was a nice addition, but honestly the flavor was a little, well, spinachy (what did I expect, ha!). I think I need kale. Sadly my kale patch is wiped out. I think I'll plant some more today. The bread was way better than I imagined, maybe 7/10. I liked that it was solid and not crumbly as focaccia gets sometimes.

Appearance - 7/10. Appearance is not critical, but it is nice if my sandwich is photogenic. I think a truly gorgeous sandwich will be hard to achieve without actively working toward that end. I may try to beautify things when I zero in a bit more on what I'm looking for in the flavorzone.

Flavor - 8/10. The spinach was good, but I think I wasn't really in a spinach mood today. The sausage patty was thin and a bit rubbery. Better than no sausage, but we need improvement in the meat area for sure. Cheese looked good and tasted good. Grating seems to leave an ultra-thin layer. I think I desire a bit more thickness. I call this category "Flavor" but texture is part of it too. The eggs were perfect today and the bread was not as chewy as I had feared. This was a great sandwich.

Sandwichspace Day 4

 Today's creation was focaccia (toasted slightly less), ground turkey patty with add-ins, thin slices of cheddar, and, mixing it up a bit, two sunnyside up eggs. Not much new ground broken here, but the eggs were pretty nice, but super messy. The yolk was still runny, and boy did it run.

 The sunnyside eggs were better than I thought they'd be, maybe 7/10.

Appearance - 5. That little bit of yolk dribbling down really added to the visual appeal

Taste - 7, it was good and I really enjoyed it. I think it might not be a fair comparison in a way, since it was hot and fresh. I don't think the sunnyside up eggs were the magic bullet. I think they may be _slightly_ yummier than scrambled, but I basically needed a shower after eating it, so not a great option for work. A jammier yolk might work, but I'm not sure that is an improvement over scrambled at all. I guess the one thing this tells me is that even with the same components, there can be a lot of variation in the end result.

Sandwichspace Day 2 and 3

Day 2 - A bit of a disappointment today. Focaccia, grated cheddar cheese, the same ground turkey mix as yesterday. Scrambled eggs with spinach and sauteed peppers. The peppers were not too tasty, perhaps burned a bit. Same with the turkey meat. Even the bread was a touch burned. I guess that is one of the dangers of cooking it on the stovetop especially when I am distracted by getting ready for work.

I won't re-grade the bits I graded yesterday. They would probably lose a point or two because they were a bit scorched. The cheese kind of got lost in the unpleasant flavors and was much less pronounced. I think grating is a decent way to go in general. Maybe 

Scrambled egg with sauteed peppers and spinach - Not great, 2/10. I think I could have used different peppers and cooked them better and gained maybe 4 or 5 points.

Appearance - 2/10. Yikes

Taste - 2/10.

Probably worth a comment or two on my ranking scale. I'm thinking:

0 - Completely terrible

1 - Bad

2 - Mediocre

3 - Ok

4 - Better than ok, but not quite up to good.

5 - Good. I think 5 is a decent sandwich, like, I would happily eat a 5 every day for breakfast

6 - Better than just good, a standout in some way.

7 - Very good, satisfying

8 - Great, a real standout.

9 - Exceptional

10 - Best I've ever had

Day 3 - Focaccia, sliced cheddar, scrambled eggs and sauteed onion, frozen sausage patty. This one was good, but it wasn't that well executed. The onions didn't taste too good, which was surprising. You'd think it would be hard to mess up onions sauteed in butter. The egg was well-cooked, but the onions detracted from them, 4/10. The cheese melted ok. The sausage patty was a bit think and leathery, which was disappointing, 3/10.

Appearance - 3/10

Taste - 5/10

Sandwichspace Day 1

 This morning's sandwich was a bit fancier than normal. I had some leftover cooked ground turkey from last night's attempted potstickers as well as some raw potsticker filling - ground turkey, minced onion, scallion, garlic, and cabbage. I made a sausage patty out of the filling. Sauteed onion, tossed in scrambled ground turkey, and two scrambled eggs. Topped it all with some shavings of cheddar. Served on toasted focaccia.

The focaccia is really nothing special to look at, but I love the taste and the texture. The cheese did not melt all that well. The turkey patty was pretty good for a turkey patty. I usually think of turkey as a healthier but not tastier option. But the add ins really boosted it. As for the eggs, I fried them in a pan on the stove. They were cooked on low heat and turned out well, I do not enjoy scrambled eggs when they get browned at all. I do like having add ins, they help give the egg a bit more structure and I feel like it makes them fluffier. Sauteed kale is a favorite for that purpose, but I don't currently have any kale.

I guess the question is how to rank it. Maybe the way to go is rank each piece, then maybe an overall rating for the sandwich on taste and appearance.

Bread - Focaccia - Love it. 8/10 maybe. Crispy crust, soft interior, cheesy bits on the crust

Cheese - Cheddar is great, 7/10. Poor execution here

Meat - Ground turkey patty. I'd say 5/10 here, maybe 4/10 if it didn't have the extra stuff

Eggs - Scrambled is the way to go for sure. Add ins boost the yummy. 8/10 for this attempt, but I think scrambled/omelet is going to be the definite winner here.

No sauce or toppings

Appearance, maybe 4/10. Not too pretty.

Taste 7/10. Very good, but turkey meat and cheese failures brought it down a smidge.

More focaccia tomorrow, I've got 3 more pieces to get through before I maybe try some other bread.

Breakfast Sandwiches

 Now for some subject change whiplash. Been enjoying breakfast sandwiches this year. But haven't experimented too much with them. So I thought it might be fun to wash the bad taste of a rough garden year out of my mouth with a fun little project. I'm thinking explore "sandwichspace" by trying as many combinations of meat/egg/bread/toppings as possible and rating them until I uncover the ideal sandwich to be my daily workhorse breakfast.

Bread

1. Focaccia - https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2023/03/02/small-batch-focaccia
2. Ciabatta - https://www.karenskitchenstories.com/2015/03/no-knead-ciabatta.html
3. Rolls - https://imgur.com/pull-apart-cheesy-pesto-bread-EbsZQd2
4. White Sandwich Loaf - https://www.abreaducation.com/content/lesson1-first-loaf
5. Tortilla
6. Pizza Dough to make like a breakfast calzone?
7. French bread - http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/easy-crusty-baguettes-recipe
8. Brioche

Meat

1. Bologna
2. Bacon - thick cut/thin
3. Ham
4. Sausage Patty - frozen/homemade
5. Italian Sausage/Bratwurst
6. Scrapple
7. Pork Roll
8. Pastrami
9. Mortadella
10. Spam
11. Pepperoni

Eggs

1. Scrambled
2. Over Easy
3. Poached
4. Sous vide
5. Omelet with add ins like spinach, kale, sliced lunchmeat, Chicken chunks

Cheese

1. Provolone
2. Cheddar
3. American
4. Cooper
5. Moz
6. Gorgonzola

Other stuff

1. Sliced Avocado
2. Hollandaise
3. Marinara
4. Ketchup
5. Mayo

Just tossing out some ideas to get started. I baked some focaccia today, so that will be the base for tomorrow's effort.

Just Terrible

 I planted like 30 tomato plants. Surely I should be awash in tomatoes, right? Nope. I've gotten tomatoes from like 2 plants. What went wrong? I think the problems are deer and chipmunks. Chipmunks chewed through the stems of three plants. Deer completely violated the plants out in the rock garden. But even with that issue, I should have gotten some tomatoes since they can't quite get at the whole plant thanks for the concrete reinforcing wire cages. But I have not see a red tomato. I think the culprits are chipmunks. I've definitely seen them scurrying away from the tomatoes. In the end, tomatoes were an utter disappointment. If I want to have some sort of tomato harvest next year I am going to need to come up with anti-deer/anti-chipmunk measures. I think I could put up some posts and wire to keep the deer at bay. But the chipmunks are going to be a bit tougher. Maybe some chicken wire around the cages?

Zucchini did pretty poorly this year as well. I got a few, but < 10. Out of like 7 plants. Only a couple of the plants did well getting started, and they're all completely gone now.

Cucumbers did poorly as well. I got basically one small harvest. They seemed to suffer from the heat and dried out way too fast even with religious daily watering.

Hot peppers did ok, I've picked a lot of them. Made some powder, froze some green chile and long hots. Probably the star of the garden this year.

Plans for next year:

• Deer proofing absolutely required 

•  Chipmunk proofing methods needed 

•  The peppers need bigger pots. Need to find a source of decent pots, maybe get a yard of compost or something to fill them. 

•  Better soil and mulching for everything in pots, especially cukes. Maybe a better location for cucumbers. 

•  A berry planter. The strawberries were good, though only got a few, and likely chipmunks ate a few. Maybe a shelter of some sort for them.

I didn't do anything with the planters out front along the driveway this year. Might plant some kale out there this weekend. 

Thinking a lot about maybe a hydroponic setup in the basement. I can afford decent lights and would be cool to get some basil, maybe strawberries or something.

As always, my battle cry is NEXT YEAR!