Fajitas!!

We are big time Mexican food lovers in our house, so when I got the email from the Food Revolution to try this recipe, I went for it.  I paired it with some golden Spanish rice.

This took about ten minutes to make, and froze/reheated really well.  Give it a go!

Fajitas

Ingredients for the fajitas:

• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 medium red onion
• 8 ounces skinless, boneless chicken breast fillets
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
• A small pinch of ground cumin
• 2 limes
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/16 teaspoon sea salt
• freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 2 x 8-inch flour tortillas
• ½ cup plain yogurt
• 2 ounces Cheddar cheese

For the salsa:

• ½–1 fresh red chile, to your taste
• 15 ripe grape or cherry tomatoes
• about ½ cup a small bunch of fresh cilantro
• 1/16 teaspoon sea salt
• freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 1 lime

For the guacamole:

• a small handful of cherry tomatoes- about ¼ cup
• ½-1 fresh red chile
• a few sprigs of fresh cilantro
• ½ ripe avocado
• 1 lime

Jamie's Tips:
•This is a great meal to prepare ahead, like a stir-fry – the trick is to prepare all your ingredients before you start cooking because once you start things go pretty fast!
•Make sure your grill pan is nice and hot before you start cooking so that the chicken starts sizzling and grilling as soon as it hits the pan.

•The trick to sizzling hot, golden brown chicken and veggies is to not overcrowd the pan. If you’re making this for 4, just double the ingredients but cook them in two pans or in batches.

•You can make the guacamole a little bit ahead of time – to keep it nice and fresh, press a piece of plastic wrap right onto the surface of the guacamole – this will keep it from turning brown.

Method:

•Put your grill pan on a high heat. Halve and seed your bell pepper and cut it into thin strips. Peel, halve, and finely slice your onion. Slice your chicken lengthways into long strips roughly the same size as your bell pepper strips.
•Put the bell peppers, onion, and chicken into a bowl with the paprika and cumin. Squeeze over the juice of half a lime, drizzle over a lug of olive oil, season with the salt and pepper and mix well. Put to one side to marinate for 5 minutes or so while you make your salsa.

•Finely chop your chile. Roughly chop your tomatoes and the cilantro, stalks and all.

•Put the chile and tomatoes into a second bowl with the salt and pepper and the juice of 1 lime. Then stir in your chopped cilantro.

•Use a pair of tongs to put all the pieces of bell pepper, onion, and chicken into your preheated pan to cook for 6 to 8 minutes, until the chicken is golden and cooked through. As the pan will be really hot, keep turning the pieces of chicken and vegetables over so they don’t burn – you just want them to lightly chargrill to give you a lovely flavor. Give the pan a little love and attention and you'll be laughing.

•To make the guacamole squeeze a handful of cherry tomatoes on to a board. Finely chop up the flesh with ½ -1 red chile and a handful of cilantro leaves, including the top part of the stalks.

•Halve the avocado, leaving the side with the pit for another use. Then squeeze the one side of the avocado over a board so the flesh comes out of the skin. Discard the skin. Squeeze over the juice of 1 lime and chop everything together until fine. Taste and adjust the flavors if needed.

•Warm your tortillas up in a microwave or a warm dry frying pan. Divide your warmed tortillas between your serving plates.

•At the table, carefully help yourselves to the chicken and vegetables straight from the hot grill pan. Just be sure to put it down on top of something that won’t burn, like a chopping board.

•Halve your remaining lime and squeeze the juices over the sizzling pan. Serve with bowls of plain yogurt and guacamole alongside your Cheddar, a grater, and your lovely fresh salsa.


Spanish Rice:
This is one of my favorite dishes.  Follow the instructions on the box/bag.  Add 2 packets of Goya Sazon seasoning, 2 cloves of crushed garlic, a small pinch of paprika, and salt and pepper to taste.  You can add kidney beans, black beans and/or olives if you'd like.  I chose not to this time because I felt that a nice simple rice was the perfect addition to the fajitas!

I hope you enjoy this as much as we did!

Beef and Ale Stew

Oh Spring, supposedly you're here, and when I look outside, it really looks like it!  Then I go outside.  And have to scurry in for my coat.  And scarf.  And normal shoes.  Ugh.  I was so looking forward to rocking some flipflops and being able to play outside for longer than 20 minutes! 

Alas, nature is not on my side.  The one benefit is that we can still rock out some stew!  (We live in one of those houses where certain foods are considered seasonal.  Kyle refuses to allow for hamburgers in Winter or lasagna and stew in Spring.  Personally, I could eat anything anytime, but I've got to respect his quirks.  And go out for hamburgers when I want one in Winter!)

We've visited a recipe similar to this before when I shared my beef beerguinon recipe, but this one has a lot less steps and takes some seriously minimal effort.  I used one of my favorite chefs, Jamie Oliver, for this one (thank you Food Revolution!), and added my own little twist.

Beef and Ale Stew
serves 4-6

Ingredients:

• 2 stalks celery
• 2 medium onions
• 2 carrots
• olive oil
• 1 heaped tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 1 x 14-ounce can of diced tomatoes (or if you don't like chunky tomatoes, tomato puree)
• sea salt and freshly ground pepper
• 2 cups brown ale, Guinness or stout (I used Terrapin Brown IPA)
• 3 fresh or dried bay leaves
• optional:  1 cup diced tomatoes, 2 cups peas, 4 medium potatoes- red or yukon gold.

Instructions:

• If using the oven to cook your stew, preheat it to 350-degrees
• Trim the ends off your celery and roughly chop the stalks
• Peel and roughly chop the onions
• Peel the carrots (I was lazy and didn't do this), slice lengthways, and roughly chop
• Put a Dutch oven on a medium heat
• Put all the vegetables and your bay leaves into the pan with 2 lugs of olive oil and fry for 10 minutes
• Add your meat and flour
• Pour in the booze and canned tomatoes/puree
• Give it a good stir, then season with a teaspoon of sea salt (less if using table salt) and a few grinds of pepper
• Bring to a boil, put the lid on, and either simmer slowly on your cooktop or cook in an oven for three hours.
• Remove the lid for the final hour of simmering/cooking and add a splash of water if it looks a bit dry
• When done, your meat should be tender and delicious
• Remove bay leaves before serving and taste to see if it needs more salt and pepper.

Here's where I deviated from Jamie...

I cooked some quartered potatoes in olive oil, garlic and onion powder and stirred them in with the stew when there was an hour of cooking left.

Since Kyle hates chunky tomatoes, I put them at the bottom of Laela and my bowls so we'd have them, and just poured the stew on top.

I also added some peas to the bottom of Laela and my stew, because well, I always like something green, and I had a hankering for peas.

This meal is delicious, and it just gets better with each passing day!

Turkey Time is Coming!

I love Thanksgiving.  First of all, the food is always awesome (although I have to be honest, I always find myself wishing the Pilgrims and Indians had bonded over some steaks rather than turkeys), and I love having my family get together.  I'm super excited this year especially, since we're hosting Thanksgiving at our house!  Our menu consists of turkey, nicoise salad, cranberry sauce, sweet potato casserole, garlic mashed potatoes, roasted vegetables, green bean casserole, corn, peas, stuffing, honey glazed carrots, homemade corn bread, a hazelnut tart, and pumpkin pie.

I'm making the honey glazed carrots mainly because my Daddy doesn't like regular carrots.  He said something about liking sweet carrots, so hopefully he'll appreciate the effort!  Here is my honey glazed carrots recipe:

Ingredients:

• Salt
• 1 pound baby carrots
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• Freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley

Directions:
In a medium saucepan, bring water to a boil.  Add salt to the water.  Then add the carrots and cook until tender for 5 to 6 minutes.  Drain the carrots.  Toss the carrots back into the pan.  Add the butter, honey and lemon juice. Cook until a glaze coats the carrots (this should take about five minutes). Season with salt and pepper to taste and garnish with parsley.

Just as a side note, some easy ways to prepare for Thursday is to make things a few days ahead of time.  Today I made my onion dip, my pie crusts, and I organized all of my Thanksgiving ingredients and recipes.  I'm making my desserts on Tuesday, and almost all of my sides on Wednesday. Try to keep it simple so you don't make yourself crazy, and allow yourself to enjoy the day.

Wednesday, I'll share the pudding recipe I found in my Nigella Express cookbook.  My husband's exact words after his first bite were "Oh God."  After his second bite?  "This is NOT the Jello I grew up with!"
I'm planning on making this for my chocoholic mother-in-law when she comes in from the 'Burgh on Wednesday.

Lemony Bombay Potatoes

I don't know about you, but we eat a lot of potatoes in our house.  After a while, I start to get bored, and want to try something different.  I figured since Bombay Chicken is one of my favorite foods, I'd try just making the vegetables in the recipe and see what happened. 

For this recipe, I used purple and Yukon Gold potaoes.  You really can use any kind you like (although I prefer not to use Russet for this kind of cooking, since I like to leave the skins on).  I had found these purple potatoes at our local farm (http://www.mapleacresfarmmarket.com/) and thought it'd be fun to try some recipes with them.  They're incredibly smooth and soak up flavor like nobody's business.  Try them in mashed potatoes and I promise, you'll be pleasantly surprised!  Plus, how often do you get to put purple food on your plate?!

Bombay Potatoes

Ingredients:

(1) Lemon

(2) Medium Yukon Gold Potatoes

(2) Medium Purple Potatoes

1 inch piece of ginger (peeled)

5 sprigs fresh coriander (cilantro)

(1) Red Pepper

(1) Green Pepper

(1/2) Vidalia Onion

1 tsp cumin

Tumeric

Dash of salt and pepper

Olive Oil

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Wash and chop your potatoes.  Keep in mind that the more evenly you chop your potatoes, the more evenly they'll cook.  Put them in a medium sized baking pan (I used my corningware, but you can use a baking tray or a medium cake pan if you don't have one).  Zest your lemon over the potatoes.  Squeeze the lemon over the potatoes, being sure to not get any seeds on them.  Then slice your lemon into six slices and add them to the mix.  Sprinkle Olive Oil over the potatoes.  Chop the cilantro (you can make this easier by using scissors) and add it to the potatoes.  Add the remainder of the spices.  Dice the peppers and onion.  Add the peppers and onion to the pan, mix up the ingredients, and bake the dish off with a lid on for 30 minutes. 

If your potatoes seem to be a bit dry while they're cooking, add a bit of chicken or vegetable stock to the pan, and give it a few minutes to reduce the juices.



We ate this with some whole wheat couscous and it was delicious!  It's also even yummier the day after!

Yorkshire Pudding and Beef Beerguinon

I'm a big fan of beef bourguinon, so when I found myself craving it the other day, with no time to go to the store and get some red wine, I raided the fridge and found the following:

Beef Beerguinon

1lb Sirloin tip

2 Carrots (chopped)
2 Large Yukon gold potatoes (quartered)
1 Onion (diced) (I prefer red onons, but any will do)
4 pieces of quality, thick cut bacon

1 crushed clove of garlic

1 bottle of Guinness, Yards Brawler, Boulder Cold Hop or any deep flavored beer of your choice

1 1/2 cup beef broth

1 can of tomato paste

2 sprigs thyme
2 sprigs of finely diced rosemary

1 tsp salt (more or less to taste)

1 tsp pepper
1 tsp parsley

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.  Cut (I like to use scissors) the bacon into one inch pieces. Cook the bacon to medium (you don't want it too crispy, when you cook it with everything else, you want it to get all yummy and to almost dissolve into the stew).  Some recipes tell you to blanch the bacon for a few minutes, and while it is good to do this, sometimes you just don't have the time, and it really doesn't make that much of a difference in this recipe.  After the bacon is cooked, toss it into the heavy casserole pan/heavy bottomed dutch oven.  DON"T DUMP YOUR BACON GREASE!!  Keep it in the pan, and leave the pan on

med-low heat.

If you have the time, it really brings out the flavor of the meat if you can brown the sides of it in the already hot bacon fat.  ONLY brown them though, you're not trying to cook the meat, just get it a light outer cooking.

When the meat is browned, add it to the bacon.  If you don't have time to brown your meat, don't fret.  The stew will still taste great, and the world will not end.  I'm only suggesting it because it makes it taste just a smidge better.

Carmelize your onions.  Add them to the meat and bacon.  Then, quarter your potatoes and chop your carrots.  Give them a quick sautee in the bacon fat (if you're beginning to lose some fat, just add a bit of water and a Tb of butter.  You're not trying to cook them fully, you're just getting them some flavor, and a bit of crust.  This should only take about two minutes.  Add them to the bacon and meat.

Now pour your beer over the bacon, meat and veggies.  Next, pour the broth over the mixture.  You want the meat and veggies to be completely covered, but not entirely submerged.  Mix in the salt, pepper, garlic, thyme, rosemary and parsley.

Put the lid on and pop at the lowest rack in the oven for 3 hours.  You'll know it's done when the meat is fork tender.

This recipe only takes 15 minutes to prepare.  It's the waiting that makes me crazy!  The great thing about this is that you can make this the night before and it tastes even better reheated.

Something I love to make with these are Yorkshire Puddings.  I found them in my new Jamie Oliver cookbook and man oh man are they a great pairing for this stew!

Yorkshire Pudding
makes 12

3 eggs
1 cup all-purpose flour
a pinch of sea salt
1 1/4 cups milk
vegetable oil

To prepare your Yorkshires:
Whisk the eggs, flour, salt and milk together really well in a bowl to make your batter.
Pour the batter into a jug and put to one side to rest for 30 minutes before you use it- this will help to make it smoother, giving you wonderfully light and crispy puddings.

Cooking your Yorkshires:
Turn the oven up to 475 degrees and let it preheat fully.
As it's warming up, put a muffin pan onto a cookie sheat and place on the top shelf of the oven.  When the oven is up to full temp, carefully remove the pan and sheet, close the oven dor, and add a tablespoon of vegetable oil to each muffin hole in the muffin pan.
Pop the pan and sheet back into the oven for 5 minutes, until the oil is smoking hot.
Open the door and slide the shelf with the pan on the seet on it halfway out. 
Quickly fill each muffin hole with batter, then slide the shelf carefully back into the oven. 
Leave the door shut for at least 15 minutes, and don't open the door even once to check on them, otherwise they'll end up all sunken.
After 15 minutes, the Yorkshires will be crip and golden with a soft, fluffy center.

They pop out of the pan very easily, and taste delicious dipped in the stew (or gravy, or anything yummy you have on hand!)
Jamie recommends not washing the pan and using it just for your Yorkshires, as it'll just improve the
non-stick surface even more.

My family LOVED this!  I broke the Yorkshire pudding into pieces for Laela and sopped it in the broth and she loved her mushy, meaty, veggie goodness!  (and so did Kyle, he ate 4 puddings! haha)  Don't fear the long recipe, there's always fantastic leftovers, and it only gets better if it sits in the fridge for a day or two.