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Archive for the ‘recipes’ Category
Thursday, December 16th, 2010
It’s gotten cold and rainy. When that happens, I start making more pasta and soup. More comfort foods. More warming, cozy foods. One of the easiest is usually pasta with red sauce.
2 onions, chopped
3 oz pancetta, diced (optional for vegetarians…not optional otherwise!)
Cook down until onions are soft and starting to brown.
Add 1c. white wine and 2 cloves minced garlic. Cook off almost all the wine.
Add 3 cans of tomatoes (not sauce).
Rehydrate some porcinis. I put as many into my 2 cup measuring cup as I could comfortably do. It’s not 2 cups of dried porcini per se because they aren’t packed in but they add great flavor so if you have them, use them! We have a few.
Chop up the porcinis once they’re soft and add them to the sauce. Let that reduce for, oh, awhile. You want to cook off most of the water bit of the tomatoes so you have a good thick sauce. When almost all of the liquid is cooked off add a huge handful of minced herbs. I use thyme and marjoram.
When the sauce is saucy and not watery, dump it into a food processor and zap it until its perfect.
Once again, I ate before I snapped a final picture. I wish I had smell-o-vision. This is one of my favorite smells in my house: garlicky goodness.
Posted in amateur, pasta, porcinis, recipe, recipes, self pleasuring, tomatoes | No Comments »
Tuesday, October 26th, 2010
What do you do when your dad has 7 acres of pomegranate trees? Make pomegranate juice of course. Then reduce it into a simple syrup for use on a million things!
I seeded 6 pomegranates and put the seeds into the blender. Then pressed the blended mush through a fine mesh strainer.
3 cups pomegranate juice
1 1/2 cups sugar
Reduce until it’s the consistency you want. I think it reduced it down to about 2 cups. We put it on apple crisp (our apple tree went NUTS this year).
Tags: pomegranates
Posted in recipe, recipes, self pleasuring | No Comments »
Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010
Oh so easy, oh so amazing. On the advice of the wonderful Rebecca from TLC Ranch (where I get my pork and eggs) I thawed the pork loin chops I bought in brine. I put about, I’d say, 1 c. of salt to about 1 gallon of water.
 In the brine I added a bay leaf and about a dozen peppercorns.
I had 2 pork chops, 1/2 lb each. I let them sit in the brine at room temperature for about 3 hours. This could sit in the fridge overnight instead but I forgot to do the prep the day before so there ya go.
I took them out of the brine, rinsed and patted them dry. I brushed them with olive oil, ground a little pepper on them and grilled them for about 8 minutes on each side.
Perfection I’m telling you!
Before I grilled the chops, I roasted some tomatillos. I left them on the grill until they started to burst. So juicy! I put those in the food processor with a clove of garlic, a jalapeno, juice of 1 lemon, some salt and pepper and that’s it! Zap that until it’s salsa-y, then spoon over anything and everything.
Tags: pork chops, tomatillo
Posted in recipe, recipes, self pleasuring | No Comments »
Tuesday, August 17th, 2010
4 medium cucumbers (mine were actually pickling cukes)
2 small zucchini
2 cloves garlic
3T lemon juice
A small handful of basil
5-6 mint leaves
salt and pepper
Put all that in a blender or food processor and zap it until it’s soup!
I garnished with some chopped chives, a couple of quartered cherry tomatoes and some diced cucumber.
Summer at it’s best!
Along with the gazpacho, I served a grilled piece of lingcod. Any hearty white fish will do. All I did to it was sprinkle it with salt and pepper, a little olive oil drizzle and grilled it to perfection.
When it was done I put it atop a blob (that isn’t the most appetizing word is it?) of eggplant-walnut puree, a squeeze of lemon and put a little parsley on top for color.
Tags: cucumber, eggplant, lingcod
Posted in amateur, dinner, food, gazpacho, recipe, recipes, seasonal menu, self pleasuring | No Comments »
Wednesday, July 21st, 2010
I didn’t get a picture of this soup. I was so hungry I forgot!
1/2 a yellow onion, chopped
2 oz diced pancetta
1 small fennel bulb, thinly sliced
Add to pot and saute in olive oil until beginning to brown.
Add:
1/2 cup white wine.
2 small carrots, sliced into half moons
Simmer until carrots are soft and wine is reduced.
Add:
1 1/2 cups summer squash, sliced into half moons. This time I used crookneck squash.
2 cups chicken stock
Simmer until squash is soft. Turn off heat and puree with stick blender or in blender or food processor. Return to the pot (if you didn’t use the stick blender) and add 2 cups french green lentils and 4 cups of chicken stock. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat and simmer until lentils are cooked (about 20 minutes).
Stir in salt and juice of 1-2 lemons. Ladle into bowls and top with a generous pile of chiffonaded basil.
TASTY!
Posted in dinner, food, lentils, recipe, recipes, seasonal menu, self pleasuring | No Comments »
Friday, July 16th, 2010
Rub snapper fillets with grated ginger and garlic. I grate them on my microplane grater right over the fish…works pretty well. Pour juice of 2 limes over the fish. I let it sit for about 30 minutes. Not long enough to cure the fish but long enough to get a good flavor. Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and grill.
For the pesto:
1 clove garlic
1/2 cup almonds
1 – 1 1/2 cups or so cilantro leaves
Juice of 1 lime
salt, pepper
Blend all that in the food processor then add enough olive oil, with blade going, to reach the consistency you like. I like drier pesto so I stop when it’s a paste.
For the slaw, well, it wasn’t my recipe…*gasp!* I got it from Epicurious and it was really good. Highly recommend that one.
Posted in pesto, recipe, recipes, self pleasuring, snapper | No Comments »
Tuesday, July 13th, 2010
Simple and delicious.
Grill salmon with just some salt, pepper and olive oil. In a grill basket, toss some broccoli florets and chopped summer squash. Cook all that until it’s done.
Meanwhile (on the stove not the BBQ) sauté up some chard with garlic and chili flakes. When the grilled veggies are done, mix those into the cooked chard. When the salmon is done, separate it into small pieces and mix that into the veggies. When that’s all tossed together, put it on top of some pasta…penne or something else short works best.
Chiffonade some basil–I had this gorgeous purple basil from my CSA–and top the pasta with a generous amount of it.
Yum.
Tags: basil, broccoli, chard, squash
Posted in pasta, recipe, recipes, self pleasuring | No Comments »
Wednesday, May 12th, 2010
Exhausted from vacation…aren’t they tiring? I had a chicken, I had leeks from my CSA, I have sage in the garden. That’s a meal right there!
1 whole chicken
3 leeks, chopped
1/4 cup butter (sliced into pats)
10-12 sage leaves (4 leaves chopped, leave the rest whole)
1-2 T chopped fresh thyme
Salt, pepper, olive oil
Place chopped leeks in the bottom of a 9×12 baking dish. Drop 6 pats of butter somewhat evenly around leeks. Place 6-8 sage leaves around on top of the leeks.
Put the chopped thyme and sage under the skin of the chicken breasts along with 2 pats of butter per breast. Salt the chicken inside and out, generously. Drizzle with olive oil. Place the whole chicken, breast side up, on top of the leeks.
Put in a 375° oven until internal temperature of the chicken (inserted into the thigh, not touching a bone) is 165°
Some of the leeks should get crunchy-crispy, some just soft and buttery.
Alongside the chicken I served bruschetta with a fava bean puree.
1 1/2 lbs fava beans (in-shell weight)
1 clove garlic
2T pecans
salt, pepper, olive oil
Good, hearty bread
Shuck those beans. Shuck? That’s what you do to beans right? Not just corn? Anyway, take the beans out of their pods. Blanch them for 2 minutes and then plunge them into ice water. Once they’re cool enough to handle, squeeze the favas out of their skins (if there is a split in the skin, they’ll pop right out). Add the beans, garlic, salt and nuts to a food processor. Puree. Add olive oil while it’s running until it’s the texture of pesto.
Spread on toasted, hearty, yummy bread. Grind a little pepper on top.
Tags: fava beans
Posted in amateur, chicken, dinner, leeks, recipe, recipes, sage, self pleasuring | No Comments »
Wednesday, April 28th, 2010
Before:
2 leeks, chopped
2 green garlics, white and pale green parts, chopped
3 small carrots, diced
Saute all that in some butter until everything is soft.
Add 1 cup white wine and cook most of it off.
4 medium potatoes, peeled and chopped
4 c. chicken stock
Add to pot, bring almost to a boil. Simmer, covered, until potatoes are soft.
Meanwhile, slice and grill some king trumpets…the closest thing you can get to porcinis off-season. Just brush them with olive oil and grill until they become fungus-bacon.
Puree the soup, add salt, pepper and lemon juice to taste.
Ladle up, top with the mushrooms and a few parsley leaves.
After:
Tags: soup
Posted in amateur, dinner, leeks, mushrooms, potato, recipe, recipes, seasonal menu, self pleasuring | No Comments »
Tuesday, April 13th, 2010
Mixed spring greens salad:
Mixed spring greens (duh!)
1/2 grapefruit per dish (segmented and sliced)
3 radishes per dish
Parmigiano-Reggiano slices
Dressing:
1 shallot
Juice from 1 lemon
1 T orange juice
1 T grapefruit juice
1 T parsley
salt & pepper
~1/4c olive oil (I never measure this, just whisk until it looks and tastes right)
This is a scaled down version of the New York Strip Loin I made in December…you know, if you’re not cooking for 20 people!!
Chop enough herbs to moderately cover your steaks. For 2 ribeyes, I had about 1/2-3/4c herbs total. I use marjoram and thyme with a clove of garlic minced in. I’d say 1 clove for every 2 steaks. Rub the steaks w/ the herbs, pour olive oil over them to coat, cover them and set aside. If you have a lot of time, put them in the fridge. But you want the steaks at room temperature when you cook them.
Time to cook?! Heat a large skillet (large enough for you steaks and oven proof!) to really hot. Put your steaks in…you don’t need oil in the pan because your steaks are covered in it. Sear them until they have a nice brown on each side. Put them in a 425° oven until it reaches your desired doneness. I like rare meat so I cooked them until the internal temp was 125°. Remove from oven, place on a cutting board and loosely cover with foil. Leave them alone for at least 10 minutes.
If you want this to look purty, trim and thinly slice the steak and place over some greens. If you just want to chow down, gnaw on the cow-piece whole ;-)
Enjoy!
Tags: grapefruit, radishes, ribeye
Posted in beef, dinner, organic, photos, recipe, recipes, seasonal menu, self pleasuring | 1 Comment »
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