It's only kinda tacos this time ...

This post is a little delayed, it was actually Wednesday night's dinner, however a family emergency has taken a bit of precedence over posting to the blog.  As I mentioned in my last post, tortillas provide a great mid-week bread option, so tonight I made some flour quesadillas to eat with the meal.

I marinated a nice piece of flank steak for the main part of the meal.  I was out of Maggi sauce, so I went with a close substitute, soy sauce and liberally sprinkled black pepper on the beef as well.  I didn't plan ahead as well this week, so the marinade was only on the beef for about an hour ... for best results shoot for overnight.

In a fun twist for a side item I decided to make a cheesy black bean "sauce" to go over the top of some oven roasted potatoes.

Roasted potatoes w/ cheesy black beans

1 14.5 oz can Goya black beans

1 can (small) chopped green chiles

1/4 cup chicken stock

1/2 cup shredded cheese (feel free to use more or less depending on your cheese tastes)

2 tbsp milk

Seasoning to taste (I mixed garlic pepper, Lawry's & some Buffalo Wild Wings Desert Heat seasoning)

3 small potatoes (cut in to quarters) per person

Roast the potatoes in a 425F oven for about 25 minutes (or until well browned) flipping once or twice with a spatula.  Put the first three ingredients (including the water in the black beans can) in a pot over medium high heat and bring to a boil ... reduce to a simmer (low heat) and stir in your seasoning.  Cook the beans for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.  If the liquid almost completely evaporates add chicken stock a little at a time to keep beans wet.  Reduce heat to the lowest setting possible, stir in the cheese and milk so that the consistancy is thick and sauce like.

Plate the potatoes and spoon the mixture over them as shown in the picture above, enjoy!

Due to the above mentioned family emergency, Shells and I will be traveling the next few days so posts will be delayed until our return ...

Tired of me posting taco pictures on Wednesdays?

I know it seems that we eat tacos pretty much every Wednesday ... I got no argument with you ... we do!  I find that tortillas are a great bread substitute for the mid part of the week because they get stale much more slowly (and crisp up much more nicely on a cast iron) than the bread we bought on Sunday.  If I was able to (ok, fine ... chose to go out of my way to) get bread more often in the middle of the week I would potentially use tortillas less, but they taste so good (especially with cheese melted inside) that I don't go out of my way that often.

This week I decided to go play soccer with some folks from work so I didn't get home until about 7.30 ... as such I had to pull out a quick dinner.  I whipped up a batch of small corn quesadillas on the cast iron and stuffed them with a chipotle chicken sausage (another Whole Foods invention), black bean & chili pepper mixture.  I topped them off with some fresh avocado salsa (link here) and served with broccoli and salad.  This dinner was about 20 minutes from fridge to plate ... a great dinner for a busy mid week night .. try it and enjoy!

Sometimes it's just a crabby night ...

It's spring time in VA and that means one thing SOFT SHELL CRABS!  Unfortunately Shells doesn't like them (the only type of crab she doesn't like) which means I had to come up with something a little different for her.

The base for tonight's dinner was Avotatoes, sauteed kale & salad.  For Shells I got a couple of crab cakes from Whole Foods and I sauteed them.

For myself I got a couple of fresh, cleaned, soft shell crabs.  At this time of year in the states around the Chesapeake you can find these at any fish market and even a number of grocery stores with fish counters!  Be sure to check that they are cleaned when you buy them, the fishmonger should be able to tell you for sure if they are.

I prefer to sautee the crabs when I cook them, but a deep fryer will work too.  Depending on how hungry you are (and what you're serving them with) you'll want between 2 & 3 crabs per person.

Spicy Soft Shell Crabs (for 2)
4-6 Soft Shell Crabs (cleaned)
1 cup flour
1 egg
1 tbsp garlic pepper
1 tbsp Lawry's seasoning
1 tsp Cayenne pepper
4 tbsp canola oil (or other high heat cooking oil)

Beat the egg in a bowl and put the flour and seasoning on a large plate (mix well with a whisk).  Heat the oil in a large heavy bottom pan until it moves freely around the pan.  One at a time ... coat each crab with flour, bathe in the egg wash & then drag through the flour mixture again, ensuring an even coating.  Depending on the size of your pan cook between 2 & 4 crabs at a time, flipping about 5 minutes in to ensure a crispy fry on both sides.  Once the first set has been flipped, perform the flour coating on the next set to ensure they don't sit in the flour mixture for too long before cooking.

Enjoy!

Easter dinner

I know that the traditional Easter dinner includes roasted lamb or ham, hot cross buns & probably some left over eggs from the morning's hunt but that is not what I wanted to have for dinner last night.

Instead we indulged in a host of favorites ... we started with oysters & clams on the half-shell ... I served them with a clamato & horseradish mignonette and we had an ice cold martini.

For the next course we broke out some Marques de Gelida Cava and enjoyed it with a cheese & meat plate and a soft pretzel twist.  For cheeses we had black pepper cheddar and Cowgirl Creamery Mt. Tam triple creme.  For the salame we had Olli calabrese.

For the second wine of the night we cracked open a bottle that had been in the cellar for a while ... 2007 Ladera Howell Mountain Napa Cabernet Sauvignon.  This is a great big cab that went very well with our food choice of the evening.

For dinner we had Whole Foods dry-aged NY Strip served with beans and greens.  The strip I cooked on the grill and then sliced to serve.  I cooked the greens with a little vinegar and hot sauce.  The beans were cannellini beans that I cooked down shiitake mushrooms and a little chicken stock.

I topped off the plates with a salad and some Portuguese bread for a great easter dinner that didn't feel too over the top!

It's a Bloody Mary Sunday

Being that it is Easter and the gym was closed, today just felt like a Bloody Mary sort of day ... I like serving mine with all sorts of garnishes depending on my mood.  Today I went with a pickle spear and a lime wedge (as pictured above) but have been known to add blue cheese stuffed olives, bacon, shrimp & other goodies as well.

There are all sorts of ways to compose a bloody mary but they all start with vodka, I like Tito's as a good value to quality tradeoff.  I prefer using Clamato as my tomato base, and have been informed that because of this I am actually making Bloody Susan's (but it's just easier to call it a Bloody Mary), as the mix of tomato and clam juice makes for a nice light base to the drink.

I use a cocktail shaker to mix it all up so I start with 4 oz of vodka and 12 oz of Clamato.  I then add a couple of dashes of Worsestershire sauce and a bit of Sriracha.  Fresh horseradish is the secret to a nice spicy Bloody Mary, and depending on how spicy you like it you should not be afraid to use a bunch (I use about 1 1/2 tbsp for Shell's and 1 tbsp for my own.  I then squeeze in 1/2 a lime and a bit of black pepper then add ice and shake well (both to mix it up and chill it down).  Pour the contents into a glass (adding more ice if needed) and top with the garnish of your choice.  Enjoy!

Breakfast of champions ...

Today Shell's and I had most of our meals out ... all of them in fact.  It started with a smoothie for breakfast, snacks & cocktails at Amuse and then dinner was Chinese takeout.  Before all of that began though I started my day with my pre-workout wake up juice ... cold brew coffee!

Shells & I first had cold brew coffee in Charleston, SC last year, and we've been obsessed with it ever since.  Cold brew coffee is about 3x more caffeinated than standard coffee.  While you can possibly buy it pre-mixed in your home location, here in Richmond we have only been able to find concentrate so far ... the benefit to that is that you can mix it any way you'd like.  The picture below is the brand we can purchase at Whole Foods in Richmond.

The way I like to make it is to start with a healthy shot of the concentrate (about 3 oz) and then I add 3 oz of milk, 3 oz of water and a good splash of Hershey's chocolate syrup ... stir and top off with a bit of ice and you've got a good cup of wake up juice.  (If you're in a pinch you can mix the 3 oz of concentrate with an 8oz bottle of Nesquik for a not quite as good, but adequate substitute)

Whether you find this brand or another, I just hope you find and try some cold brew coffee ... it'll quite literally wake you up.

High heat ... it's what makes dinner better.

Tonight's post is less about the food and more about the how to cook it.  While eating out in NYC with my buddy Ross the other night I asked him what he thought of the blog and he told me that I needed to focus as much on the non-food aspects of the how as I do the ingredients.  "Make sure your readers know there are only two temperatures, low & hot."

One of the tricks that I use regularly is my 12" Cuisinart countertop convection oven.  Don't get me wrong, I love my nice big GE oven for cooking big pizzas and a major roast; however, for every night dinners for 2 I don't need anything bigger than my countertop oven.  One major benefit of the countertop oven is that I can preheat it to 425F degrees in under 5 minutes ... my nice big oven takes a lot longer (and I'll bet yours does too!!).

When I cook in the oven there are only a couple of settings that I use: 325F for slow roasting meats like pork, Broiler for cooking fish & 425F for cooking everything else.  My "little oven" cooks all of these temperatures perfectly for almost every meal I cook for Shells and I ... and it preheats and cooks it faster than my big oven would, allowing me to cook many of these meals I make on a weeknight without having to wait and eat at 9pm.

Tonight I made stuffed peppers and roasted them in the oven at ... you probably guessed it ... 425F turning every 10 minutes or so for 40 minutes (this makes sure the sausage stuffing has cooked through).

Chicken sausage, habanero bacon, black beans, rice & cheese

I pulled out the rack and added some shredded cheese to the top of the peppers and threw them back in for another 5 minutes until it was nice and crispy.

I served the peppers with salad, avocado slices, tortillas & some steamed artichokes w/ spicy SW butter.

Look Mom, I'm eating my avocados!

NOTE: While the title may have you believe that tonight's dinner was an avocado fest ... there were only 1.5 avocados harmed in the making of this dinner.

When I was growing up I would often grimace every time my mother put down a salad ... I didn't mind the lettuce, the carrots, the tomatoes or even the mushrooms (well, no one under the age of 10 likes those, but I'm talking about 10 - 18) but the avocados were a whole different story.  Don't get me wrong, guacamole on taco night was fine (just not enough that it wasn't drowned out by the meat & cheese) but the avocado that you could actually taste?  No thanks!

But a few years into college, while I was working the line in a restaurant, I realized how lucky I was to have had unrestricted access to avocados growing up.  If only I had taken more advantage of it!!!

Fast forward to today, and I can't get enough avocados in my daily diet ... we put them in basically every dinner, and occasionally other meals too.

Tonight was a pretty basic Tuesday for us ... I started by making a pot of my yellow rice & black beans and then firing up the grill (yes, even though it's raining).  Once the grill was hot I tossed on the soy & pepper marinated buffalo flank steak.  While the meat was cooking I warmed up the cast iron and started cooking tortillas.

Once the buffalo was cooked, I sliced it thinly and served it over the rice with sauteed avocado (first half avocado that was harmed in the making of this dinner), salad w/ avocado (second half avocado that was harmed in the making of this dinner) & some leftover avocado salsa (last half avocado that was harmed in the making of this dinner) from last night.

Insert witty title here (because I'm not seeing one tonight)

Tonight was a pretty standard dinner in our household ... fish, mashed potatoes, sugar snap peas & salad.

I cooked the peas in a basic saute (very hot pan, oil that's nearly smoking) with a little bit of garlic pepper until browned on both sides.

The fish I broiled with a little bit of garlic pepper & some Buffalo Wild Wings SW Seasoning.  The potatoes were mini poppers that I roasted for about 25 minutes at 425 before mashing them on the plate with a little Frank's Redhot and cheese.  I topped the fish with an avocado salsa I whipped up and served with a salad and bread.

Bon Appetit!

Sunday night dinner

While fish is great for Saturday or Monday nights there's something about Sunday night dinner that makes you want comfort food ... and Shells and I are no exception.

After a rough soccer game today (85F) I was feeling a bit peckish and probably should have eaten something before going to the store ... however the nice folks who compute the bottom line for Whole Foods & Martin's will be ok with it.

We started the night with a couple of starters (to go with our Martinis): Whole Foods crab & wasabi balls and a cheese & bacon plate.  I used a couple of pieces of Whole Foods Habanero & Green Chili bacon and served it with Cowgirl Creamery's St. Pat cheese & black pepper cheddar.

For dinner I went with grilled Dry Aged NY Strip, roasted Brussels sprouts, white beans & salad.

One of the important things about cooking steaks is not trying to get cute with a whole bunch of seasonings but instead just putting on the tuxedo.  By that I mean white and black ... salt and pepper.  Don't be afraid ... go ahead and get a good bit on there, it will crisp up a bit while cooking and help give you a little crunch on the steaks.

For the white beans, I made a derivative of one of Shell's favorites ...

Great Northern Beans with bacon & shiitake mushrooms
1 14.5 oz can Great Northern Beans (Bush's brand)
1 piece habanero & green chili bacon
8 medium/large Shiitake mushrooms (rough chopped)
4 oz Chicken stock (Kitchen Basics, no salt)

I started by pouring the beans (juice included) into a saucepan and putting on medium heat.  At the same time I put the bacon in a saute pan on medium heat.  Once the bacon began to cook and let off some grease, I added the mushrooms.  At the same time, I added the Chicken Stock to the beans.

Once the mushrooms were cooked, I added to the beans and reduced the heat to medium low.  Continue cooking and stirring until the beans have cooked off all of the juice and created a thick sauce.  Enjoy.

Oysters & Tilefish

I'm finally back home and enjoying the fact that I can cook my own meal again.  Tonight was not a complex meal, nor was it something that I would serve if a CEO came to dinner; however for us normal people I think that you'll all find this a great dinner idea.

Before I get to dinner, we did decide to grill some oysters ... because, why not?

I grilled these guys with a drop of Kim Kim & some cheese.  As much as I bag on living in Virginia I have to admit that the oysters make it worth it!

Dinner was a fairly simple idea ... super fresh fish, fresh veggies and some fun potatoes.  For the fish, I went with Tilefish ... for the veggies I went with broccolini & asparagus.  The potatoes I had some fun with those.  I roasted 2 red potatoes (quartered) in foil with a little olive oil until cooked through.  I added the potatoes to some shredded cheese & Frank's Red Hot ... mixed together they made for a spicy base to the fish and veg.

I'll be back in town for a bit, so more food and recipes to come soon!

Plans change....Frozen chicken to the rescue!

So tonight I had originally had plans to go out for dinner this evening.  Around 1pm today they were cancelled.  When shopping this week I didn't plan to cook at home tonight so I had the afternoon to think about what I did have to make a decent meal.

Frozen chicken comes to the rescue yet again.  We usually always have boneless chicken breasts in the freezer...the ones that are individually wrapped.  This makes for a last minute protein emergency a breeze!

So tonight I went with sautéed chicken cut up in slices, sautéed veggies (asparagus, green & yellow squash) and black beans and rice (yes you guessed it - not I get to use for stuffed peppers this week).  As I didn't buy enough rolls to for the this meal I went into Tom's stash of flour tortillas and made cheese quesadillas to go with the meal (not necessary but I love my carbs!).

Basic Sautéed Chicken
1 boneless chicken breast (sliced, cubed or keep together)
dash of garlic pepper (or any seasoning you prefer)

Heat a non stick skillet with medium high heat.  Place chicken in skilled and cook.  I tend to move around in the pan throughout cooking rather than sticking to time on each side.  Cook time will be dependent on size and cut of your chicken.  Anticipate at least 3-5 minutes a side.  Prior to leaving heat feel free to cut into chicken and ensure there is no pink or red.

Accompany with sautéed vegetables, rice & beans and you have a quick and easy meal!