Kaybray's Cooking

What we threw on the plate today

Thursday, July 20, 2006

Fun Computer Problems




Very thrilling computer problems have kept me from posting about lots of cooking I have done in the last week. Early in the weekend I made a pseudo-Mexican dish to use up a lot of food we had hiding in the fridge. Drew's reaction: It's like a fiesta in my mouth! I thought it was tasty, hearty and filling - just the kind of thing you want to eat on a cool fall night. Of course, its 95 degrees outside.



Here's the recipe:

INGREDIENTS
One rotisserie chicken, with all meat pulled off and shredded to bite-size pieces
2 carrots cut into 1-inch pieces
10 small red potatoes cut diced
cumin
cayenne
salt
pepper
1 red onion diced
1 medium can black beans (drained)
10 soft tortillas
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 cup half and half
taco sauce
1 diced tomato or dozen diced cherry tomatoes

Preheat the oven to 375F. Seperately, mix the carrots and potatoes with a half teaspoon each of the cumin, cayenne, salt and pepper. Put each in separate oven-proof dishes with a little vegetable oil, and bake for 20-25 minutes, until they are done and the potatoes are a little crispy - may need to cook the potatoes a little longer than the carrots.

While carrot and potato are cooking, saute the red onion until soft.

Once all three are cooked and have cooled, place in a large bowl with the shredded chicken and the black beans. Mix, and taste to see if it needs any more of the spices.

Turn oven up to 400F.

Spray a casserole dish with non-stick spray.

Place about 3/4 cup filling in each tortilla, and put each snugly in the casserole dish. (may have some filling left over. Do fun and crazy things with it unrelated to the dish.)

In a food processor or blender, blend 3/4 cup cheddar with half and half and couple of dashes of taco sauce. Pour mixture over casserole. Sprinkle diced tomatoes on top, and top with rest of cheddar.

Bake for 20 minutes.

FRIEND IN TOWN

Sure, most people would want to show off where they live by taking their friend out to dinner in the city's hippest neighborhood. We're not like that. We force them to stay inside and eat my food.

Saturday night I made an herb-roasted chicken to celebrate the visit of my friend Uri. Also, my mom had brought by earlier in the week green beans from their garden and some country ham to cook with it. I used both in a green bean country ham risotto. Also, I roasted some roma tomatoes for a little tang.



Here are the recipes:

Roast Chicken

INGREDIENTS

3 lb chicken (remove plastic bags inside cavity and use for something else)
1/2 cup fresh minced herbs (I used rosemary, sage, thyme, basil)
salt and pepper
3 minced garlic cloves
1 lemon or small orange cut in half
1 small red onion cut in half
Olive oil

Preheat oven to 425. Wash chicken inside and out, and sprinkle all over with salt and pepper, and rub olive oil on it, too. In a small bowl, mix herbs with garlic and salt and pepper. Place lemon and onion halves in cavity of bird. Lift skin above breasts up just slightly and push herb mix under skin, carefully, so as not to tear skin. Rub any extra herbs on the outside. Tie legs up.

Place bird in roasting pan breast-side down, and roast for 5 minutes. Next, turn it to one of its sides and roast for 5 minutes. Then roast for 5 minutes on the other side. Finally roast breast-side up for an hour. I got this method from Jamie Oliver and its a good way of getting color all over the bird. After an hour, cut into the thigh area to see if the bird is done. If not, cook some more!

Risotto

INGREDIENTS

Olive oil
2 shallots, minced
1.5 cups risotto
3 cups chicken or vegetable stock
3/4 cup chopped country ham
1 cup white wine
1.5 cups green beans, chopped

Saute shallots in olive oil. Once soft, add risotto. Stir for one minute. Add chicken broth, 1/4 cup at a time, and country ham, and just keep on stirring. Yup, that's what you have to do with risotto. Once I had used up all the broth, and still needed more liquid, I started adding with wine. I stirred and added until it was done.

While it was cooking, i cooked the green beans in boiling water for about 3 minutes. Then I put them in an ice bath.

Stir the green beans into the risotto.

FINALLY, the last night Uri was in town Drew broiled a beautiful piece of steak, and I made a fried green tomato salad. This was much more successful than the last time I tried to make fried green tomatoes. The key is getting the oil hot enough. If you don't it just turns to mush in the oil.

Here's the recipe:

INGREDIENTS

5 medium green tomatoes, cut in 1/2 inch slices
2 cups cornmeal
pinch each of cayenne, salt and pepper
1 egg, beaten
About 1 cup vegetable oil
4 strips bacon, cooked, broken into 1-inch pieces
blue cheese salad dressing
pickled red onions
4 cups arugula
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
1 lemon
1/4 tspn pepper
1/4 tspn dry mustard
1/2 cup olive oil

Heat oil in nonstick pan until hot but not smoking. Combine cornmeal, cayenne and salt and pepper in a small bowl. Dip tomato slices in egg and then cornmeal mix, and then place in pan. Continue with rest of slices. Do not crowd pan. You should only have to flip each slice. Once golden brown place on a paper towel-lined plate.

Make lemon dressing. Whisk the juice of one lemon, vinegar, pepper and mustard. Slowly whisk in olive oil. Toss arugula with dressing. Place fried green tomatoes on top of greens. Sprinkle crumbled bacon and pickled red onions on top and drizzle blue cheese dressing over the top. I never said it was healthy.

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Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Salmon + bruschetta - bread = dinner

We had a fabulous long weekend in New York/Connecticut where I sampled sushi at Tomoe, pasta at Lupa, bellinis at Cipriani, and lobster rolls at Lennys. In other words, time to go back to a few less calories.

I bought a salmon filet, a little under a pound, along with some arugula. When I got home, I put together what I usually make for bruschetta: diced tomato, minced garlic, minced basil, salt, pepper and olive oil. For the tomatoes I used a big yellow tomato we had and about 10 cherry tomatoes (quartered). Also, I added a thinly sliced shallot. I mixed all this together and let it sit for an hour or so.

I made a simple vinaigrette (balsamic, dry mustard, sugar, pepper, olive oil) which I tossed with about 1.5 cups of arugula.

I sprinkled salt and pepper on the salmon and put it under the broiler for about 10 minutes, without turning it.

Once the salmon was done (it was a little crispy on top), I put it on top of the bed of arugula, and spooned the bruschetta mix on top. Delicioso!

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Tuesday, July 11, 2006

1st try on a spinach experiment


Two days ago I cooked a pork shoulder that had been deboned, butterflied, rubbed with onions, garlic, fennel, salt, pepper, rolled up and tied with string. After a few hours in the oven it was crispy on the outside and delicious on the inside. I sliced it and put it on ciabatta bread. On the side I served pickled red onions: sliced a large red onion, put it in a jar, sprinkled some peppercorns over the top, and filled the jar with apple cider vinegar.

Also, my spinach experiment. I wanted to make some sort of spinach cakes. I sauteed some minced onion and garlic, then added some thawed chopped frozen spinach, and cooked it for just a few minutes. In a bowl I mixed mascarpone cheese with the juice of one lemon, salt and pepper. I mixed this with the spnach and formed little patties out of the mixture. I coated the patties in homemade bread crumbs. Then I put them in the fridge to solidify a little. A couple of hours later, I pulled them out and fried them in vegetable oil. Unfortunately, they fell apart a little in the oil. However, they did taste pretty good. Couple of thoughts about next time: Instead of just doing breadcrumbs, I could try a flour, egg, breadcrumbs thing. Also, I could try freezing them before frying them, or refrigerating or freezing them before coating them in the breadcrumbs. Anyway, if anyone has any suggestions I would love to hear them, because I am going to try this concept again.

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Addictive


Last night we had dinner at my parents and I was asked to bring an appetizer. I made one of my favorites - gougeres. They are addictive sort of cheese puffs, usually about the size of ping pong balls. Tonight they were a little bigger but still just as tasty. Usually I use gruyere, but tonight I used a sharp dry manchego. Just delicious.

Here's the recipe:

In a large pot, bring 1 cup water, one stick butter and one teaspoon salt to a boil. Add one cup flour and stir until it all comes together in one mass ( A wooden spoon definitely works best here). Take it off the heat, and transfer the batter to a large bowl. One at a time, beat in four eggs with an electric mixer. Then add 3/4 cup of whatever sharp firm cheese you want (gruyere is the traditional thing to use). Once it is all mixed together, transfer the batter to a plastic sandwich bag. Cut off a corner and pipe out (of course you can use a patry bag here) tablespoon size dollops onto a greased cookie sheet (Silpat works even better, if you have one). Sprinkle another 1/4 cup of cheese on top. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until they are just golden. Golden gougeres.

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Monday, July 10, 2006

Chowder in the Summer


Last night I made a corn and fish chowder that was particularly tasty. Some may think its weird to make a warm soup in the middle of the warm Kentucky summer, but I think its the perfect time to cook the season's sweet sweet corn and fresh seafood.

I started by cooking some strips of pancetta in a large pot. When they were cooked and crispy, I removed them from the pot and left them sitting on a paper towel. I added a diced onion and a couple of minced shallots to the pot with the pancetta fat. Once they softened, I added about a cup and a half to two cups of chicken stock (I would have used seafood stock, but didn't have any on hand), about a cup and a half to two cups of white wine, 7-8 small red potatoes diced into 1/2 inch pieces, and the corn from two ears. This cooked for about 20 minutes. I stirred it occassionally, scraping the bottom to get any brown bits from the pancetta. Next, with the potatoes almost done, I added the fish - 1 lb of cod filets cut into 1-inch pieces. I also salted it just to taste. About 5 minutes later, I stirred in 1/3 cup cream. This cooked for another 2-3 minutes. Then I added about an 1/8 a teaspoon of black pepper and a dash of cayenne. After spooning this into our bowls, I spinkled the pancetta bits and a little fresh parsley on top of each serving. We ate this with some leftover crusty bread to dip into the soup. Even I thought it tasted delicious!

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Friday, July 07, 2006

Yummy Pork, Yucky Rice



So, the past couple of days have had some cooking successes and some cooking duds. The successes were the dishes I made for our Fourth of July get-together. I made a grilled pork loin with a peach chutney (still trying to use up those peaches) and a tomato tart. First, we put the marinated loin on the grill. It got pretty black and crispy on the outside, and after 25 minutes and after taking its temp repeately we thought it was done. Then we cut into it and it was clearly not, so we stuck it in the oven. Took another 45 minutes there, but when it came it was perfectly cooked. The chutney was our really ripe peaches with lots of Indian spices - a great compliment to the pork.

The tomato tart was a homemade pastry crust that, just before serving, I layered with sliced red and yellow tomatoes, homemade arugula pesto, and fresh mozzarella. Well, it wasn't quite as good as it has been before and I cite two problems: One, I LOVE garlic, don't get me wrong, but there was an insane amount of garlic in my arugula pesto - sadly overwhelming. Two, I should have had more cheese, for another layer. But, all in all, the Fourth was a success, and I was very thankful for the delectable dishes my friends brought.

And now to my complete failure the next night. Obviously I tweak recipes I get from cookbooks or the Internet or cookbooks all the time based on what I can find, afford, and personal tastes. But I guess when a recipe specifically says not to substitute something I should listen to that. I made a dish from Nigella Lawson's Forever Summer - Shrimp and Black Rice Salad with Vietnamese Dressing. She clearly states not to substitute wild rice for the black rice, but I couldn't find black rice, and I thought, 'oh, I'm sure it'll be fine.' Nope. It sucked. You shouldn't have to work this hard to eat. The dressing was yummy, the shrimp was fine, the rice was crappy. Chew, chew, chew. chew. chew. Pretty miserable.

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Tuesday, July 04, 2006

Happy Day Off!



Yay for days off, when I can get some cooking done and still lie around on the couch watching the Tour de France. Feeling energetic, yesterday morning I got up early and made blueberry muffins for my sweetheart. and well, myself. I used what I hoped was the Fannie Farmer recipe, but since we are missing that exact page from our Fannie Farmer cookbook, it was a little guesswork. I know I used too many blueberries, but I wanted to use up what we had, and they surely can't hurt. They turned out pretty yummy, and since I started a diet the other day I was good and had them without any butter or anything. Still yummy.

For dinner I cooked Nigella Lawson's Vinegar Chicken, along with some roasted potatoes and steamed broccoli. I thought the chicken was good, but not great, though Drew loved it. I think maybe if I used a higher quality vinegar it might turn out a little more flavorful. Also, instead of using a whole chicken I used some chicken drumsticks, sans skin. My roasted potatoes were nothing to get excited about, as roasted potatoes should be. The best part of the meal was the sauce the chicken was in. Next time I will skip the potatoes and just have some good bread to soak up the sauce.

In between muffins and chicken, I worked on a marinade and a chutney for the pork loin we are having today for the big holiday. I'll write more about that once its been cooked and devoured. Off to tennis in the 95 degree heat!

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Monday, July 03, 2006

There just aren't enough meats on sticks


So I finally got to meet my friend Elizabeth's fiance Garrett when they came over for dinner the other night. For the special occasion, I made the kefta and zucchini kebabs from the Epicurious website. I also added a couple of cherry tomato kebabs, which were marinated in the zucchini marinade (lemon, salt, pepper, olive oil, sugar). The lamb was really outstanding - ground lamb mixed with cayenne, cinnamon, minced parsley & cilantro, allspice, minced onion, salt and pepper. And a tasty yogurt dip, for which I doubled the amount of garlic. Really tasty meatballs. The zucchini and tomato were good to have on the side, but I didn't think the marinade added a lot of flavor. Also had a good loaf of crusty bread and a bowl of calamata olives. For dessert, since we are swimming in peaches right now, we had the Peach Tatin from the Food and Wine website. Now, I love this recipe, which I've made several times before, but it didn't turn out as well as it has before - primarily because of the time delusion I was suffering from. I didn't cook it for close to the time needed, so the puff pastry just didn't get a chance to really do its thing. Oh well. Also, the corn syrup got a little too dark, though I don't think that really affected its taste. Still, it was a wonderful night. And it took me a while to recover and write about it in part because of the three bottles of hearty red wine we had with the meal. Yum. (that may have played a role in the time delusion.) And we liked Garrett too!

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