From the ArcaMax Publishing, Recipes by Zola Newsletter:
http://www.arcamax.com/news/zola/s-311877-467013
Watch out for those spoiled onions...
The other day I had the wonderful privilege of touring Mullins Food
Products. Mullins is HUGE and is owned by 11 brothers and sisters in
the Mullins family. My friend Jeanne is the CEO.
Mullins makes several of the sauces and dressings you enjoy. Ever
visit a McDonald’s and crack into one of those pouches of sweet and
sour sauce to dip your nuggets? That’s from Mullins. Ever open a
pack of barbecue sauce at Arby’s? Mullins again. Even Newman’s
salad dressings are made at Mullins, and from what I hear, Paul Newman
is one picky, handsome customer.
The facility is mammoth. We toured about 280,000 square feet!
I’ll be talking more than once about my Mullins tour. I learned so
much. But there’s one very interesting related topic that came up
that I wanted to share today. It’s about food poisoning.
The guy who gave us our tour is named Ed. He’s one of the brothers.
Ed is a chemistry expert and is involved in developing most of the
sauce formulae. He’s even developed sauce formulae for McDonald’s
products that McDonald’s has then awarded to other companies to
manufacture. That’s okay. It’s all part of the process.
Anyway, keep in mind that Ed is a food chemistry whiz. During the
tour, someone asked if we really needed to worry about mayonnaise.
People are always worried that mayonnaise will spoil. Ed’s answer
will surprise you. Ed said that all commercially-made mayo is
completely safe. It doesn’t even have to be refrigerated. No harm in
refrigerating it, but it’s not really necessary. He explained that
the pH in mayonnaise is set at a point that bacteria could not survive
in that environment. He then talked about the quintessential picnic
with the bowl of potato salad sitting on the table and how everyone
blames the mayonnaise when someone gets sick.
Ed says that when food poisoning is reported, the first thing the
officials look for is when the “victim” last ate onions and where
those onions came from. Ed says it’s not the mayonnaise (as long as
it’s not homemade mayo) that spoils in the outdoors. It’s probably
the onions, and if not the onions, it’s the potatoes. He explained,
onions are a huge magnet for bacteria; especially uncooked onions. Ed
says you should never plan to keep a portion of a sliced onion. He
says it’s not even safe if you put it in a zip lock bag and put it
in your refrigerator. It’s already contaminated enough just by being
cut open and out for a bit that it can be a danger to you. (And doubly
watch out for onions at the baseball park!)
Ed says if you take the leftover onion and cook it like crazy you’ll
probably be okay, but if you slice that leftover onion and put in on
your sandwich you’re asking for trouble. Both the onions and the
moist potato in a potato salad will attract and grow bacteria faster
than any commercial mayonnaise will even begin to break down.
So, how’s that for news? Take it for what you will. I, going
forward, am going to be very careful about my onions. For some reason
I see a lot of credibility coming from a chemist and a company that
produces millions of pounds of mayonnaise every year.
Tempting Tilapia
Here’s one of my favorite fish dishes. And you guessed it. It
contains mayonnaise and onions. Green onions. This dish is adapted
from a very old cookbook I have. It’s called The Encyclopedia of
Creative Cooking, edited by Charlotte Turgeon. I checked in Amazon.com
and you can still buy used ones. They are from 1985. The original dish
was made with sole. I have adapted it to the readily available and
popular tilapia. I’ve added a few of my own twists just to
“Zola-fy” it.
Serves 4
4 fresh tilapia fillets
2 Tbl lemon juice
1/2 cup of
grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup of butter, softened. Do NOT use
margarine or canola-based spread. It won’t work.
3 Tbl of
mayonnaise or Miracle Whip salad dressing
5 chopped green
onions. White section and the tender, light green parts
1/4 tsp
of salt
3 dashes of Tobasco or your favorite hot sauce
Preheat oven broiler to 500 degrees
Put the tilapia fillets on a greased cookie sheet. Drizzle on the
lemon juice and let them sit for 15 minutes while the juice soaks in.
Meanwhile prep the other ingredients.
In a small bowl mix the cheese, butter, mayo and the green onions.
Stir. Add the salt and hot sauce and stir again.
Broil the fillets about 4” under the broiling element. 6 to 8
minutes. The time to cook is dependent on how thick your fillets are.
You can check them with a knife or fork. You want them cooked through
and flaky. Just be sure to check the thickest part.
When they are done, take them out from the broiler. Pile each piece of
fish with a portion of the sauce. It should be thick and mound on the
fish. About a quarter inch thick. Maybe a tad more. You can spread it
toward the edges but leave a border because as it heats it will
spread.
Put the fish, with the topping, back under the broiler and cook 2 to 3
minutes more until the tops are browning; sort of like browning a
meringue. Just edges and tips will be browned.
Carefully remove the pieces of fish with a large spatula to the
plates. If you are nervous about transferring a piece that large you
can cut it into sections and transfer each piece. Be careful not to go
to far or you might find it on the floor or your counter.
Enjoy!
Cheers,
Zola
Send email to Zola at dinnerwithzola@hotmail.com.