Tomatoes Full of Love..eerr Goodness.

o, it has been a while...3 months to be exact. Things have been a bit hectic lately so I apologize.

On to the latest and greatest creation!

We had some massive tomatoes left over after a part we had thrown and I figured it would be a huge waste to just cut them up and put them in a salad or slice them for burgers. Being a fan of stuffed peppers, I decided to stuff them.

Here's what you'll need.

Food Processor

Spatula

Sheet Pan

Parchment Paper

Aluminum Foil
Oven @ 400 degrees

Seal able plastic storage bag

Scissors

grapefruit spoon

sharp paring knife

3 Large Tomatoes

Sausage meat (sweet or spicy your pick)

Red Pepper

Green Pepper

Celery

Breadcrumbs

olive oil

Black Pepper

Flat leaf parsley

First, fire up the food processor with the sausage meat. Then add the peppers and celery till they have been chopped to bits! You may need to cut the celery down so the blades can catch them and do their thing. Next add 1/4 cup of salt free bread crumbs, then continue processing until everything is combined. Add the olive oil and black pepper here, and pulse the machine now 3 times to combine.

This is crucial.

You must now carve out the tops and the insides of the tomatoes. Think Halloween pumpkin carving here. Once you get a sizable hole cut in the top, you need to be gentle, while still being firm with the tomato. Grab the grapefruit spoon and start digging away. You want to get all of the seeds and the gooey stuff that they are attached to. If you don't, when you bake this stuff it will make the walls of the tomato soft and it will fall apart.

Take HALF of the guts of the tomato, and put it in the food processor; pulse it a few times and your done with the stuffing.

Load it into the seal able bag, get the air out and push everything to one of the corners. Then, cut one of those corners and you have an instant piping bag :)

Use the bag and the stuffing like a pastery chef (come on, you have seen them on TV), and fill each of the now hollow tomatoes. You may want to overfill them a bit, and top them with some bread crumbs, black pepper, and parsley.

Toss them on the sheet pan lined with parchment. See the picture below, I used the aluminum foil to make little ring stands so they don't burn on the sheet pan; then put them in the 400 degree oven.

They will go for 40 minutes, or until the stuffing hits ~160-165 degrees in the center (use a digital instant read thermomiter please)

When your done, it should look like this.

Enjoy!

Roasted Corn and Ham Salsa

***UPDATE SEE END FOR DETAILS***
It's that time again. I got bored and needed to use up some of the produce we had lying around the house before it became fodder for the compost heap or the garbage bin. To that end I had 2 ears of corn left over from the week as well as a ham steak. So for whatever reason, corn/ham salsa came into my head. And so I began.

Here is what you'll need:

1 Ham Steak
10 Plum Tomatoes (smaller the better)
1 Green Bell Pepper
1 Large yellow onion (though I'm sure the type dosen't matter much)
2 Jalapeno Peppers
2 Ears of Corn
Prep on this is very easy. Chop the onion into a few discs and try to leave them intact. Take out the seeds of the pepper and cut off the bottom, then cut down one side to get a long piece. Remove the white pulpy part (it does not add any flavor here so why bother cooking it?)

Rub the corn with cold butter, then grind on a LOT of black pepper, wrap in aluminum foil.

Take all of this out to the grill. To prep the grilling device of your choice (I use gas because its easy and I don't have to bother with a chimney starter etc...) add aluminum foil to one half of the grilling surface and let it heat on high.

Then add the tomatoes, green pepper, onion and corn. Don't forget to add the jalapenos...

After you get some nice grill marks (5 minutes) turn them every 2 thereafter to keep them from burning. At 15 minutes in to the event you can put the ham steak on the grill to get a nice sear and grill marks on both sides.

If you want restaurant style grill marks, put aluminum foil on the side you are going do sear the ham steak (or any grill fodder for that matter) It heats the grates up hotter than by leaving them open as above. After a 3-4 minute heat up, remove the foil and slap on the food; don't forget to turn it 90 degrees after 2 minutes and then flip and repeat.

Once you get the ham steak done, remove everything from the grill. Now this next part is messy. You'll want to peel the skins off of the tomatoes and slice them up and toss them into a bowl. Dice up the onions and green peppers and add them in. Now you have a significant choice here. You can:

A) Dice the jalapenos up and toss them into the bowl
B) Peel the skins off the jalapenos, then cut off the ends, split down the middle and remove the seeds and the membranes, then chop and put into the bowl.

Option A yields a much hotter salsa while option B yields a mild creeping heat, but you get to taste the very light and almost fruit like flesh of the pepper without decimating taste buds before they can get the details. The call is yours.

Next remove the kernels from the corn and place into the bowl, then dice the ham and do the same, try not to add much of the fat from the steak, it's not needed here.

Lastly I added some Indian Cumin, roasted and ground, as well as some black pepper (ground) and cilantro. Stir it up with your hands (best tools we have) and serve any way you like.

**Try adding the zest of 1 orange and half an orange worth of juice to this!**

Feel free to post comments on this or any of the dishes on the blog. I'm looking to take on one ingredient suggestions to build a meal around, so if you have a common one, or an odd one, please feel free to leave a comment and I'll do my best to come up with a tasty dish that utilizes it.

Bacon Wrapped Chicken & Kraut

So, here is my first attempt at adding pictures to this to be a bit more descriptive so please bear with me...

I was sitting on the floor playing with my dogs when I looked at the food processor and thought..."I want relish." Odd I know but I did! I began to inventory the kitchen for things that could be made into a relish, and I thought I had a small head of red cabbage and a small head of savoy cabbage, some zucchini that I could not for the life of me think what to do with earlier in the week, some various condiments, and flavorful liquids. Hitting the venerable wall, I thought what would go well with a relish, and I though back to a wonderful mango pepper relish that went well with bacon wrapped scallops. Not having scallops or mangoes in the house, I figured I could do a relish/sauerkraut like side with bacon (which I had in the house) wrapped chicken.

Normally when I wrap chicken in bacon I add a very powerful cheese to roll up in the chicken and bacon, but I did not have any cheese like that today. What follows is a description and a how to guide to make Bacon Wrapped Chicken & Kraut.

You'll need:

1 small head of savoy and red cabbage
1 small onion (diced)
2oz. butter
rosemary - fresh is better
black pepper - fresh ground
apple cider vinegar
honey
a tall pot

Chop the cabbages fine and then cut in half, then dice the onions. Next melt the 2Oz. of butter in the pot over LOW heat for 2-3 minutes or until the butter starts smelling a bit nutty.


Now add the cabbage and onions to the hot butter and stir to combine. Let this cook on medium low for 15 minutes. After time has elapsed, add 1/4 cup of apple cider vinegar (or to your liking, the more you add naturally the stronger it'll be.) Also add the pepper and rosemary, 1 tablespoon or so of each. Now you get to stir this occasionally for another 15 minutes on low.

The next portion of the meal is the bacon wrapped chicken. Here is what you are going to need.

1/4 Cup of bread crumbs (I go with low sodium)
1 tablespoon of fresh pepper
1/4 Cup of Parmesan cheese.
1/2 tablespoon of thyme
drops of milk (whole) or even cream if you DARE :)
sour cream
4 fillets of chicken breast
8 rashers of bacon (again I went with low sodium)



Add the bread crumbs, herbage into a small bowl, then start adding drops of milk to this mixture to make it the consistency of a topping for a coffee cake, or barely moist but clumpy. Next take your chicken and on one side smear a very small amount of sour cream on each fillet.
Now you get to play with your hands and sprinkle the crumbs n' stuff on the sour creamed chicken. Let this rest for a few minutes in the fridge. If you did not try to use all of the crumbs (if you did you have mammoth chickens) you should have a fair amount left.


After a few minutes, line up 2 rashers of bacon, fold over one edge of the two, then roll up the chicken. Do this for all the pieces.


Then roll them in the remaining crumbs and place into a glass baking dish that was liberally covered with no stick spray. (Ignore the horseradish in the background, I thought it would work with the kraut, but thought against it at the last minute.)

Put this in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes.



Lastly you are going to need:

4 small zucchini
olive oil
pepper

Cut the zucchini down the middle, coat with olive oil and feel free to go medieval on them with pepper. Put them to the grill for 6 minutes to get those oh so necessary grill marks, then remove and bring them in.

If you time it right everything should be done at the same time; so plate and enjoy!

Chilliiiiiiii

So, I've made this a few different ways and I've finally settled on the way I like it best. Which does not necessarily mean it is the way you are going to like it, so take this for what it is, and alter it in any way you like.

Chili is in my book, meant to be created/crafted WITH OUT BEANS! Now that I've gotten that out of the way, lets get to chili makin'.

Meat is the first, and main ingredient in this chord-like bowl of goodness. I have played with the available options and here is what I find works best. 2 lbs of beef cubes for stewing and 1lb of ground pork. The cubes are for the base flavors and well, meatyness; and the pork is for texture. Next your going to need 4 onions, 4 celery stalks and 1lb of carrots, and a full head of garlic (don't be frightened about the garlic, it works trust me). You'll also need some Ale..not "beer from a 30 pack", if you put an 'American' Beer in here you will be very very disappointed. Ale brings a sharp flavor and body when cooked that stands up well to the loud expressive flavors from the rest of the ingredients.

Chop up the vegetation as fine or as roughly as you like (I do suggest that you do mince the garlic though) and set it aside.

Take the 2lbs of beef cubes in a bowl, coat with vegetable oil, toss some pepper in and toss the meat to coat and set aside. Take out your biggest dutch oven and get it on some medium heat with some more vegetable oil and get it nice and hot. We are going to brown the beef cubes here in batches to ensure a proper browning and to get a good amount fond on the bottom of the pot. Once you get all of the cubes browned, turn the heat up to medium high and throw in the chopped vegetation, and then pour in 1 and a half 12oz bottles of the ale and stir the vegetation and ale until you get the bottom of the pot as clean looking as possible. Congratulations, you just deglazed the pan! Once you get the onions wilted a bit, add the ground pork, the beef cubes, back in. Also add a few handfuls of crushed blue or white corn chips to thicken things up.

Here are where your options can become quite daunting in terms of spices and combinations of other ingredients. Here is what I do.

Add 1/2 container of store bought *shudder* or 1.25 oz of home made chili powder
Add 1 Tablespoon of fresh ground pepper
1 32oz jar of store bought salsa...the cheap stuff works here... (Mild will play well with all of those who do not have a great affinity for capsicum, while medium or hot will really get you lit up).
and a pinch of red pepper flake.

The other alternative at this juncture is to dice a jalopeno or add some other hot chile(fresh, dried, in sauce, its your chili after all) for a heat and flavor adjustment.

make sure everything is well mixed and integrated. Put the lid on it and let it simmer on LOW for 30 minutes. Now would be a good time to pre heat the oven to 200 degrees F.

After 30 minutes, you can transport the pot to the oven and let it sit there in the middle of the oven for a few hours (5-6-9-12-20 your choice. The longer it cooks on low, the more vegetation breaks down and the more time the flavor and textures have time to mingle) Do try to stir everything every hour or hour and a half to prevent burning.

To serve, transport to a crock pot and use the keep warm setting if yours has it.

Summary of Ingredients:

2lbs Beef Cubes for Stew
1lb of Ground Pork
4 Onions
4 stalks of celery
1lb of carrots
1 whole bulb of garlic
2 12oz bottles of an Ale of your choice
Blue Corn Chips/White Corn Chips
Chili Powder
Pepper
1 32oz Jar of Salsa
"Extras"

Chicken & Mushrooms

Okay wow.... It has been seriously too long since I posted here and too many good things I've made. So let me get into it.

So I guess the easiest place to get started is with tonight's dinner. I spent a good amount of time today thinking about what to do with the four chicken legs I had defrosted in the fridge over night.

I ran though some cook books for inspiration; alas none came. So I opened up the fridge to see what we had.

White Sliced Mushrooms /2 Garlic bulbs still whole / a lemon / half an onion /

So what can you do with these items you ask? You can do a braise!

So with out further haste, here is what I did. I took all of the garlic whole, and peeled the paper off and threw them in a large saute pan. (If you leave garlic whole or in larger pieces, the flavor is not as intense, it has a very mild aroma after being cooked) I then dropped in the chicken legs, and the mushrooms and doused everything with olive oil. I then swirled everything in the pan around to coat. You may have to manually turn the legs. I then sprayed everything with some lemon juice and then searched for a liquid that is tasty, but different, and is in the spirit of what I am making....chicken, mushrooms, onions, its a very 'rustic' dish so I reached for some whiskey. I diluted it in 8oz of cold water, added it to the pan and finally a few cracks of pepper and some fresh (or in my case frozen) Russian Sage. 350 degrees in the oven for an hour, or until the chicken is thoroughly cooked (use a thermometer instead of time really to ensure that the chicken legs are thoroughly cooked.)

I'm serving this over risotto and fresh steamed broccoli.

Tell me what you think!

Frickin Open Range Fricassee

So I've been a bit tardy at updating this. I'm sorry. Really I am, for the 1 or two folks that read it.

I've had a run in with my town that has been consuming a lot of my time lately. Apparently you are not allowed to have someone *sister-in-law* sleep in your basement. Sure safety is a factor, but I grew up sleeping and practically living in my basement. WTF gives?! An annonymous caller tipped off the town, which I can only assume is a nosy neighbor. Next house...middle of the woods.

Any way. So this is back a few nights ago. I had some chicken drum sticks, legs, whatever you want to call them, defrosting, and the prospect of grilling them with some pre-processed sauce did not seem too appealing. So I went hunting though the pantry rack and found the following.

1 Jar of medium heat salsa
Russet Potatoes
Onions
Garlic
Celery (found them in the fridge)
Wild Rice
Pepper
Smoked Paprika
Cumin

So I do know a fricassee is generally poultry in a light sauce or a reduction of a light liquid, but I'll call my creations what I want to darn it :)

So here is what you do.

Bust out your largest cast iron skillet, put some butter or oil in the bottom and let it get nice and hot.
Pre-heat your oven to 325 now too.

While that thermo reaction is happening, chop very roughly the onions, celery, and mash and chop the garlic. Also cut the potatoes length wise, and then lengthwise again to get long quarters, and then slice them on the bias to get two small slices of potato. I used 4 potatos.

Drop all of this into the cast iron skillet. If you don't have a spalsh/spatter guard, I highly suggest you go down to Ikea and get one on the cheap. Let the saute for 2-3 minutes or until the onions get nice and carmelized. Nows a good time to hit this with some pepper and paprika. While your doing this, coat the chicken in a LIGHT dusting of flour. Then remove everything from the skillet and brown your chicken on all sides. (hit each side with a dash or so of cumin and a few healthy grinds of pepper) Figure 1 minute worth with the heat on high for each side. Then when the legs are browned, toss everything back into the pan, and let it cook a 2-3 more minutes to let the vegitation mingle with the fat of the chicken.

Now crack open the salsa, add it in, let everyone get nice and comfortable in there, feel free to add some wine here if you want. You don't want to. But I did. You should too. =)

Now, cover with aluminum foil, and put it in the middle of your oven for 30-45 minutes or until the chicken isn't bleeding anymore near the bone, or the temp of the meat hits 170 ish.

I served this with the wild rice, (follow the directions on the package!) and some frenched string beans with butter.

Swiss The Steak!

Swiss Steak...mmm.

Have you ever walked past the beef section in the grocery store and came across a small section of Styrofoam trays with a slab of meat on it that looked like Freddie Kruger went to town on it? I'm sure you have, and for those of you who haven't, here is what it looks like.

So what do you do to make delicious tasty, melty (is that a word) swiss steak? It's easy:

Dredge the meat in flour. Then in a heavy (dutch oven preferably) pot, brown the meat on both sides. Remove them after browned to rest. Preheat your oven to 325. Then toss in one onion sliced, 2-3 celery stalks roughly chopped, 1-3 cloves of garlic (depends on how garlicy you want the sauce), season with pepper, and let them cook for a bit.

Now crack open a can of peeled, or diced tomatoes, a small can of tomato sauce and after 4-5 minutes of cooking, toss them into the pot (carefully, don't wanna get tomato sauce all over the place). Next add a cup and a half of any liquid that is flavorful. Just do yourself a favor and don't use water. There isn't a point to it. It brings nothing but dilutes the sauce. In this instance I used a Scandinavian red wine and augmented it with 1/4 cup of red wine vinegar. Stir this up. Then put in the meat that is resting, cover, and put in your 325 degree oven for 2 hours....yes 2 hours.

I served this over garlic and sage mashed potatoes, and some corn.