Nachos!

I was not going to post this meal because it is embarrassingly simple. My wife loves nachos and she usually makes them, but I had some time on my hands before she came home from work so I prepared some for her for when she got home (hold the jokes please). We didn't have any chips in the house, but we had white corn tortillas which i cut and fried. There were two things that made this dish and it had everything to do with their freshness. The chips and avocado are proof that simple and fresh can make anything work.










Awhile back I purchased a giant spice container labeled taco seasoning which I used in the taco meat, but it is a little bland so in addition I spiced it up with garlic, red pepper flakes, and chili powder. I've made my own taco seasoning before and it turned out very well but I had taco seasoning on hand so I used it. To make your own add your favorite spices with a kick (mainly paprika) and the secret is to add a little flour which helps thicken up the meat and helps the seasoning stick. I threw in some black beans with the meat and called it a day. All other ingredients are pictured.

Big Boi: Belgian Golden(ish) Strong Ale

I set out to do something I've never done before on a few fronts. I wanted to make a pseudo hybrid between a Victory: Golden Monkey,  Stone: Old Guardian Belgo Barley Wine, and Bells: Hopslam. These are big beers and absolutely remarkable ones too. I was shooting for the distinct Belgian Strong Ale yeast from Golden Monkey, the candy delivery and punch from Old Guardian Belgo, and the hop profile and honey flair from Hopslam (which is surprisingly only around 60 IBUs).

I've helped out on all-grain beers before, but I've never made one that I could call my own. So forever away with extract! It is a hell of a lot more work than brewing extract, but it is also way more satisfying and you definitely have more control over your final product. All that said, I don't really have the proper equipment to brew all-grain, but I made do with what I have and I got a little inventive. Because I do not have a false bottom on my brew pot, I had to sock my grains which prevented me from getting their full sugar potential. I only received about 62% mash efficiency vs the standard 75% mash efficiency. This is not a deal breaker, but it will take away from some of the punch I was going for from the Old Guardian Belgo. I was shooting for a starting gravity of 1.11+ but I ended up with a starting gravity of 1.088 which is respectable and well within the boundaries of a Belgian Golden Strong Ale.

During the sparging process, I had to modify my spout with a cheese cloth filter so I could get more sugars out of the grain. I couldn't believe how wonderfully it worked! If I had not done that and allowed the grains to be freed from the sock, I would of ended up with much less than 62% mash efficiency.

I don't want to say too much more about it because I still have a long road ahead of me in the fermenter. I'm sure I'll check back in with progress reports and finished product details and photos. I'm not sold on Big Boi being the name of the beer, but at least for now it is the project name.

Jambalaya

Jambalaya is one of those dishes where just about anything works. I hate the use of "comfort food" but it is a dish that easily fills me up to satisfaction. I'd say this dish has evolved over the years for me, but it simply depends on what I have around. When I first started making Jambalaya I used a Red Beans and Rice package. I added a sausage and called it a day. It has a smokey taste and it was great.

However, with a little more experience and time I have a more complex dish. I start with white rice and dirty it up with spices I like (paprika, chili powder, garlic, and/or any Cajun mix). I find that for one cup of white rice just a little bit more than 1 1/2cups of water is needed. Additionally, I add a beef bouillon cube to the rice. Cook as normal.

I love shrimp and I normally have it in this dish with crayfish, but I didn't have any in the house (I'll have to post this one at a later time). Pictured is sausage and chicken (chicken prepared the day before). Do not use chicken breast. Use a whole chicken, or in my case I used 3 Little Dragon Roasted Chickens, skin removed. My wife prefers chorizo sausage, but pictured is 2 hot Italian links. With the chicken and sausage is diced tomatoes, black beans and a bit of water and good ole' spiciness. I didn't have any tomato paste, but sometimes a throw a couple of scoops in for added thickness and taste. I also throw the other half of the bouillon cube in.  Reduce the water a bit on the stove and serve with rice.

Banana Walnut Pancakes with Plum Grapefruit syrup

1 tbsp    baking powder
1/2 tsp   baking soda
1/2 tsp   salt
5 tbsp    sugar
1 c         flour
2 tbsp    olive oil
1            egg




Add chopped bananas and crumpled walnuts to pancake immediately after forming in pan. Serves 2-4.

Plum Grapefruit syrup. Blend 4 plums and 1 grapefruit (no skin just pulp and juice) and add simple syrup (see previous post) and a few pinches of brown sugar to taste. Chill and serve.

Little Dragon Roasted Chicken

Tarragon is probably the herb I like to cook with most. It smells so wonderful and adds such a unique taste. Most famously (within my small family) it is used in our favorite dish: Little Dragon Roasted Chicken. The word tarragon (according to the internet) means dragon or little dragon. While I believe tarragon to be a powerful herb, I would associate spicy foods with dragons, but I didn't make it up so I just go with it and call the dish Little Dragon Roasted Chicken. I love the herb so much that I even use it when brewing beer! If you're not overly familiar with the herb, give it a whirl. It is great.

Pictured is Little Dragon Roasted Chicken with Garlic Mashed Rustic Potatoes. Preheat the oven to 425 and pat down the chicken so that it is very dry. The reason why this dish is a family favorite is because the skin of the chicken is so crispy. So patting it down with a paper towel until it is dry is very important. Additionally, I have noticed that this cut of chicken is often cut a bit too big, leaving in organ remnants near the long end of the chicken. This is due to either a careless butcher or a machine. I either cut the unpleasantries off or I just pull out whatever is not wanted. I proceed with a small bit of ground pepper and garlic. Then I use a good amount of salt and tarragon. Roast the chicken for 1 hour (or longer) at 425. Due to a hungry family, I pulled this one out of the oven an hour in (the chicken was cooked, but looks and tastes a bit different when pulled out as pictured). Ideally, I like to wait until the skin starts to pull away from the bone, showing the tip of the bone (not pictured). 


Potatoes are simple enough. Chop and boil potatoes and garlic (1 clove for each potato). Strain and mash with butter, salt, pepper. Mashed potatoes are easy and make for a great addition to many of my dishes (and yours?).

Bears Win & Pasta!

I drove in few miles in to meet up with a good friend to watch the Bears home opener against Atlanta. What a game. I cannot recall the Bears ever winning so decisively. They usually play up or down to their opponent's level, always making for a close game. That being said, a 30-12 Bears win was nothing but cause for celebration. We celebrated and the group I was with went out to celebrate more, but I'm an old married man these days and I called it. I went home to cook a meal for my wife and I.


I needed to use some ingredients from the pizza post before they went bad so I combined most everything into a pasta sauce. The pasta sauce had stewed tomatoes, clams, mushrooms, oil, and meatballs. I have to say that sauce was hella tasty and it helped soak up a few beers.

Additionally, I rolled out (without the help of flour) the rest of the pizza dough and fried them up with a little bit of oil and tossed a pinch of salt on top. That was surprisingly good too. It tasted like a cross between flat bread you might get at Flat Top Grill and Naan, an Indian bread. Great win, Great weekend.

Chicago Thinner Crust Pizza

 

There is a lot of good pizza in Chicago. I'm not trying to compete with those guys. In fact, when I have a craving for a good pie, I usually order it. However, I have found that while I love the thin crust pizza we can get around here, I always feel like it could be thinner. Ergo today's post.

Thinner Crust:
3 cups flour
1/3 cup olive oil
2 pinches of salt
1 cup of warm water




It makes enough for two big pies (plus left over dough for tomorrow's use). Use a rolling pin with plenty of flour and roll that bad boy out into whatever thin shape your heart desires.

Red Sauce Pizza: Some like to buy pizza sauce or make it, but I find it too thin. I prefer the sweetness and texture of tomato paste as the base sauce. I throw down a thin layer of garlic powder and pasta sprinkle over it and proceed with toppings. Pictured is half of a hamburger from the Bad Ass Burger recipe, pulled apart into small sausages with stewed tomatoes and extra sharp cheddar cheese.

White Sauce Pizza: Homemade white sauce (small amount of roux, mixed with milk, parmesan cheese, garlic, and salt). The toppings are mushrooms, clams, and mozzarella cheese.

The pies are baked at 425 until they are done. Use your eyeball to tell when they are done.

The same crust can be made on a grill for an Italian style pizza. I didn't believe you could simply throw an uncooked crust on the grill (no stone) until I visited a friend of mine. He took me to a dinner party where the host prepared pizzas on the grill. They came out tasting like the pizza I had in Italy. Whenever I make pizzas now, I tend to make them on the grill. However, this time around I was wanting more of a Chicago thin crust pizza. Perhaps the grilled pizzas will be featured in a future post.

Bad Ass Burgers and Grilled Fries. Don't be shy.

There are a lot of burgers out there that suck, and I'm pretty sure I know why too. They are trying to please everyone and by trying to please everyone, they please no one. My wife and I are fans of extreme, bold, pungent, and spicy flavors. Anything that is not such, probably could of been done better.


As for Bad Ass Burgers. First things first, if you want the best possible tasting burger, you are going to want to get around 75% lean beef. I am well aware that it is not very healthy, but it provides a dripping "to die for" burger. Unload the usual suspects on the counter and throw everything you have in the bowl. Don't be shy either. If you are not sure if you added enough spices to the bowl, you probably didn't. You can literally use just about everything on your spice rack. The only dish I can think of that I use more ingredients in, is chili. The only way I could really see this going wrong is if you over salt it -so use at your own discretion. The spices pictured and used in the burgers are garlic, paprika, red pepper, salt, pepper, pasta herbs, and chili powder. I actually added more to the bowl than what is pictured, so seriously don't be shy.

To get continuity out of all the burgers, I take measuring cup (1/2 cup) and separate the meat (I had enough for 9 burgers). I freeze what I do not plan to cook that night in individual baggies for quick meals (must be defrosted before use). By measuring out each burger, when one is done, they all are. There are no guessing games.

I never would of thought potatoes would cook up well on the grill, let alone quickly. I tried it as an experiment and it went so well I rarely ever use the fryer anymore. Slice potatoes as pictured, combine in a bowl with olive oil, salt, pepper, and whatever else you want and grill on high heat until they look done or as pictured.

Leftovers be gone. Baked Tomato Chicken and Baked Shells and Cheese.

There are days when I forget to defrost something from the freezer for dinner and we must scramble for dinner that night. A piece of grilled chicken was left over from a previous glazed chicken post. Refrigerated grilled chicken quite honestly does not look appetizing. Instead of throwing the chicken in the microwave simply for substance for our stomachs, I livened it up a bit with some canned tomatoes and spices (mainly garlic, salt, pepper, and a bit of chilies). I pre-sliced the chicken for easy serving. It turned out looking and most importantly tasting better than microwaved chicken.

Additionally, a side dish was needed. I found some shells and cheese in the cabinet, and cooked them as the label instructed, then I mixed in some extra Parmesan cheese and topped it off with Parmesan and bread crumb crust. Voila!

Feeling Fall? Apple Cider Martini.

The other night I stepped outside and the trees were swaying with a bite in the air.  Fall is finally here and it is time to warm up inside. My wife suggested we try a fall cocktail and the Apple Cider Martini is what we came up with. I'm still tinkering with this recipe because it is a bit boozy, but I think it has potential to be a hit this fall.

3 ounces of vodka
1 ounce of apple cider
1 ounce of cinnamon simple syrup

Cinnamon simple syrup: 1 part sugar, 1 part hot water, a few dashes of cinnamon, mix and let sugar dissolve, and chill before adding to the cocktail.

Easy as Pie. Labor(less) Day Weekend Pies!

 

Time seems short these days -even on long holiday weekends. We needed to bring some desserts to the holiday BBQ so I grabbed some canned pie cherries and a ready-made pie crust. I didn't feel I could just walk to the party with store bought items so I did something I have not done in a long time, I made a pie crust for the top. I'm not much of a baker so I grabbed this recipe courtesy of Emeril but used it for the top of the pie. The only thing different I did (aside for use it as the top crust) was add a butter glaze with sugar on top. Hindsight, I just about had enough dough left over to make a homemade base crust, but I do not own a pie pan (no more ready-made crusts for me in the future, this was too easy and too good not to make again).




Additionally, my wife made a cheesecake that was extremely tasty and easily made thanks to Kraft. I believe the only thing different she used was whipped cream cheese (which really lightened up the cheesecake in a very good way).



The holiday was a refreshing day off work, and I really think my in-laws are great! They are fine hosts and great cooks! My sister-in-law brought over a pie too, but it was not a dessert; she made an amazing tomato and cheese pie that even had non-tomato eaters digging in. I wasn't able to grab a photo of it because everyone was busy throwing it on their plates, but with her permission I'd like to recreate it and feature it here in the near future. Hope your holiday was as enjoyable as mine.

It's all about the lettuce. The art of the simple sandwich.

Like many of you, my wife and I have recently tightened our belts, and to be honest I don't miss eating out (for lunch anyway). Because of this, I have rediscovered the simple sandwich. Eating something similar everyday for lunch is never a good thing, but when you can make it taste better by adding texture, you will get more mileage out of it. Iceberg lettuce cut in such a way provides what I need.

For reasons unknown to me, I stopped buying iceberg lettuce and opted for spinach, romaine, or mixed greens. It wasn't until my wife and I walked into a grocery store with only $19 and needed groceries for a week, that I came crawling back to the iceberg. With a little prep time I had big crunch for the rest of the week.

I have only seen sandwich shops take lettuce off by the layer or dice it up so much that it looks like confetti. Sandwich shop lettuce just felt like a filler, but it does not have to be!

The last thing I want to do is sound pretentious, especially about something as simple as cutting a head of lettuce, but previous to the last few weeks, I didn't take much thought or care into lettuce preparation. First things first, cut off the unpleasantries. 

Halve then quarter the head and store in an air tight container for future use.

For the sandwich, cut about a half inch of the quartered lettuce and keep it in tact as this is what provides the crunch. Add it to your favorite sandwich for a serious upgrade in texture. I would recommend cutting off the sandwich piece of lettuce only before consumption because the lettuce seems to last longer while in tact.

Garlic-Grapefruit Chicken, Cilantro-Lime-Corn Rice

Chicken is marinated in the glaze, pre stove-top (minus garlic and oil) for 20 minutes.

Glaze:

1 very thin layer of olive oil in a sauce pan.

3 cloves of garlic, pressed.

3 large grapefruits squeezed with lots of pulp (remove any hard skin).

5-7 pinches of brown sugar.

4 tsp of corn syrup. 

4 dashes of balsamic vinegar. 

Combine grapefruit juice and pulp with brown sugar, corn syrup, and balsamic vinegar in a bowl. Make a thin layer of olive oil in a saucepan and add garlic. Saute garlic for a few minutes (do not over cook or burn), then add bowl. Place on low heat for at least 20 mins. Serve on top of grilled chicken.

Rice:

Cooked white rice. Add corn, cilantro and lime to taste.