GOOD MORNING MILWAUKEE

 Good morning Milwaukee .It's Wednesday morning and as I am writing this we are just making the dock to unload the salt which we brought from Windsor, Ontario. I looked out my window and saw the Milwaukee lights in the distance. I went to the galley to get my first cup of coffee. We were backing into the dock and after a bit when we were a little closer and I went to get my second cup of coffee I went outside and took a little video.  Once it downloads I will share it with you. It was a beautiful crisp morning. and the city lights against the dark morning sky twinkled brightly. 

First glimpse of Milwaukee when I went to the galley to get my first cup of coffee of the morning

By the time I was ready for my second cup of coffee we were making our way into tie up, stern first

Almost tied up! In the distance you can see the clock tower. It was 06h00, an hour behind our time.

The day before, Tuesday (my favorite day of the week) was beautiful as we made our way down Lake Michigan. That beautiful fresh smell of winter. It's hard to describe but it is invigorating. I don't often get on a ship that has a load that takes me onto Lake Michigan. I had hoped to go under the Mackinac bridge during the day but we passed under it in the quiet of the night. I hope to see it on the way back up. It was quite windy so we hung close to the shore line.  Early in the day I saw through the galley porthole  that we were making a turn. I stepped out onto the stern to take a picture of the turn. I was careful because this time of year, the decks can be slippery. I was excited to see snow on deck and snow on the shorelines. Being so close to shore I knew that we had taken the route closer to shore enroute to Milwaukee.  It takes a little longer but is a bit of a smoother ride.

You can see the turn we made in the path in the water

 I came back in and started my bread dough for the day. As I was mixing the dough by hand I was thinking how happy I am that there was no dough hook for the machine here which forced me to try making the yeast doughs by hand. I would have never tried making it by hand if not for the missing dough hook. Now, when I think of my next ship I don't have to wonder if they have a mixer for making bread because I have proof that I can make it without. Once the dough was resting in the large bowl beside the warm oven I started the soup. I had some mashed sweet potatoes leftover from the day before and thought they would be perfect to add to my carrot ginger soup. It calls for sweet potatoes and these mashed sweet potatoes are already peeled and cooked. I added them to the soup after the other vegetables had cooked. It came out really good. At the end of the day the big pot was empty.

I go through the crew’s list at the end of the day to see who didn’t come in for supper and I leave them a plate on the side. This was the last bowl of carrot ginger soup.

For lunch that day, I shaped my bread dough into long buns to accommodate the Italian sausages I was serving for lunch. I always like to serve some sort of pasta and chose cheese tortellini from the freezer and served that with my tomato sauce (Sue's tomato oil in the book, emulsified).

I shaped the bread dough two ways

Longer buns to accommodate the Italian sausages and dinner rolls for those who just wanted a bun with their lunch.

I like to serve pasta with homemade tomato sauce when I serve Italian sausages on a bun

For my third choice I tried an experiment for the next book. (I have been making different versions of cookies made with no sugar, no flour. I use maple syrup and almond flour. I love these cookies and I always bring a bag of almond flour on a ship with me. Imagine my delight when I found a huge pail of almond flour in the dry store of the Atlantic Huron. There was enough to try some different recipes.  When I made my last batch of almond flour cookies (I eat two for breakfast or lunch each day) I found myself nibbling the little cooked crumbs that lay beside each mound of cookie. It reminded me a bit of a crumble). I was putting together my spinach frittata for the day and thinking I should try something with it. I am also trying to use up my sauces and extras that I have in the fridge before I go. I had some homemade caesar dressing which originally I planned on making the parmesan crusted cauliflower to go with my lunch. I started thinking I would dip some tomatoes in the caesar dressing and then lay them on top of my spinach frittata. I decided that would be too messy and too time consuming. All of a sudden an idea popped into my head to take the caesar dressing and combine it with enough almond flour until it formed little crumbles. This is how I come up with recipes. I am always thinking about the food I am preparing and how I can make it better. The little crumbles baked beautifully on the frittata and it was a success. It was also eye appealing because a couple of the crew pointed to it sitting on the counter asking "what is that? It looks good '' This is definitely going into the next book. It went really well with the Italian sausages and tomato sauce. Lorraine (my sister, best friend and publisher) is going to love this new recipe. 

The experimental frittata with the parmesan almond flour crumble on top. It was a success!

The frittata with the crumble top went well with the sausage and tomato sauce.

For supper I was making one of the "we need to have this one more time before I go" meals. Beet meat Shepherd's pie. Not everyone will try this delicious recipe which I came up with and if I was ever on my favorite program Beat Bobby Flay on the Food Network, I would challenge him to Shepherd's pie and make my version. I listed the beet-meat shepherd's pie as my second choice on the crews menu board and the first choice was baked chicken legs with gravy mashed potatoes and green peas.

The beet-meat shepherds pie. One of my favorites and very popular with some of the crew.

Baked Chicken legs with gravy, mashed potatoes and peas

When I have something trendy or fun on the menu, I always offer something traditional

The topping for the beet-meat shepherds pie is mashed cauliflower

I loved the colors of the carrot ginger soup and the beet-meat mixture.

One of the guys came in later than usual and apologized for being late. I looked at the clock and said you're not late. I am here until 18h00 and if I don't see someone, I will put a plate on the side. I have been on some ships where the second cook wants to clean up at 17h30 but I always say, finish what you need to do and since I wash my own pots anyways I will leave the food warm a bit longer until everyone has a chance to come in. I always take a few minutes extra and don't want to rush putting away what I just spent hours preparing. When we had the restaurant for 24 years and got a new staff member it always took them a while to get used to the way that we chose to operate our business. We respected the hours that were posted on the "hours of operation" sign that hung outside the door. We would not close a minute before the time posted. I would also have to explain to the waitress/waiter that under no circumstance would we ever rush the customer. The waiter/waitress would often complain saying that their customers have been finished for an hour and they are still sitting there and I would always respond saying that they are enjoying the beautiful ambiance that we created and let them sit as long as they like. Our restaurant had a lot to look at with my collection of over 700 chef figurines displayed in every available space. Seeing the extensive collection would often spark a conversation and it would lead to the stories of when I was a sailor in the 80's and early 90's. We were at our first location for 20 years and then moved to our own building where we stayed for 4 years. When we moved to the new building it was a complete renovation of a sixplex (it had been our building for 15 years where we offered staff housing for our restaurant. We were in a tourist location and finding staff was difficult so we offered a place to stay with the job. It brought young people from all over Quebec and Ontario and included some travelers from Japan, France and Africa who were on work visas.) My strength is not in the design of the restaurant, more the functionality. Lorraine along with my older sister were in charge of picking out the design details. They both have great taste and ideas.  I remember when they came to me with three swatches of paint and asked "which do you like?" I thought they were pulling a prank and said, "They are all white". They explained that no, there are hues of blue, pink and yellow. I looked as hard as I could with my glasses, without my glasses and I still just saw white. I said I trusted whatever they chose. A year or so after we opened our beautiful restaurant, a customer came up to me as I was cooking the crepes in the open kitchen. They asked "What color did you paint your walls, I love the color" I smiled inside and confidently answered "it's Chantilly Lace" as if I had a hand in picking out the right white. We have so many fun memories from my years operating the restaurant but I am so happy to be sailing again. There are some things I miss about operating a restaurant, but managing the staff is not one of them. When I returned to sailing I used to always choose to work on ships that only had a chief cook so that I could work by myself. I liked planning the three meals making sure that they somehow complimented each other and I like to make desserts and salads that went with the meals. Last year I started having the conversation with Lorraine that I will only take ships that carry a second cook. I am having so much fun sharing my stories with you online and when I work by myself (12+ hours a day) there is no extra time for the things I love to do and no free time to daydream, every minute being consumed by the meal preparations. I have been really lucky with the second cooks that I have worked with and hope that the next job will be the same. I have been spending a lot of time the last few days wondering about my next job and who I will work with. It is now Thursday morning and before I go I will share the meals I made yesterday. We were in Milwaukee all day and it was a beautiful sunny day but too cold to leave the back door open.

looking out my bedroom window

just before we started unloading the salt

There were so many birds greeting us as we made our way to the dock in Milwaukee

I didn't realize that this was my first trip into the US since I joined the Atlantic Huron so I had to go down to the dock to meet with US Customs. I wish I knew in advance because I would have started my day earlier or planned to make something different. I was making cream of mushroom soup. The chicken breasts were defrosted and I was planning on making fried chicken schnitzel on a homemade bun. Since I didn't know exactly when customs were coming and how long it would take me to go down the ladder and back up, I decided to bake my chicken schnitzel instead of deep fried.  The results of the baked schnitzel was far superior to the deep fried. I will bake them from now on. They were crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. I tried a little trick and will share that with you in the next book. It really made a difference. (I have to work on my measurements before I share the tip). My homemade schnitzel buns were a little flatter than usual because the timing was a bit off for shaping the buns and letting them rise a second time because I was visiting the customs agents. The customs agents stay in the van and we go up to the car window and present our passports. I always see a little grin or smile when they read my last name "Schmuck"  I said "yes, I am a Schmuck, born and raised as one" This is the first time that the agent took my picture and I gave my best Catherine smile and pose.

We climbed down the ladder to meet with the two customs agents.

I hurried back to finish lunch which included my mom's potato salad, an egg salad sandwich or a roasted beet salad plate with homemade vinaigrette and feta cheese. A few went for the combo plate of a piece of schnitzel, potato salad, and salad with roasted beets. One crew member commented how well they went together. I smiled inside because that was my intention. To present a meal that goes well together.

Chicken schnitzel on a bun

The combo plate with my mom’s Germán potato salad

Salad with roasted beets, feta cheese and homemade vinaigrette

This fun crew member thought it would be fun to pop into the photo and say hi to his mom, who he knows will be surprised when she reads my post. Surprise!

My afternoon break went too fast and I checked several times to see if my "Good morning Milwaukee" video had come up on my laptop. I had a fairly easy supper planned but switched my idea after lunch, again trying to use up what I had. I am at the point where I can start using my emergency meals in the freezer. I took out some leftover turkey a la king that I had frozen and decided I would bake the rest of the chicken breasts that I did not use for my chicken schnitzel, add them to the a la king sauce, fix it up and make chicken pot pie. I still had a container of green Thai curry paste that I brought from home and decided it would be perfect to make Thai green chicken curry. I used the leftover chicken from the night before and baked a case of chicken drums to add. I decided to surprise my curry eaters and make it spicier than normal. It was a nice warming dish after they were working out in the cold all day. Like in Windsor the stern of the ship was facing the setting sun. It was a nice way to end our day sitting at the dock. We left Milwaukee around 19h30 and this morning we are enjoying a smooth ride on our way to Meldrum Bay to pick up a load of stone. It looks like it will be full circle for me because the load of stone from Meldrum Bay will be delivered to Windsor and I will be leaving this ship the same way I came onboard...by punt boat. 

Chicken pot pie, baked mashed potatoes and corn

Thai green curry chicken

I surprised my curry lovers and made it a little spicier than usual.

Lorraine asked me to remind you that today is the last day to order T-shirts, aprons, hoodies if you want to get them in time for Christmas(the items that are printed to order). You can still order them after today, we are just not sure that the printed items to order will be ready in time.  We have lots of books in stock and you can still order them in the coming weeks and still get them in time to put under the Christmas tree. Have a great day. 

Lorraine will be happy to mail you your copy of the books. They make great Christmas gifts.