Category: Main Ingredient

Crispy Brussels Sprouts with Honey and Sriracha

Posted By under Main Ingredient, Recipes, Side Dishes, Vegetable

Apparently there is a restaurant called The Vanderbilt in Brooklyn, NY that specializes in various appetizers, including fried brussels sprouts.  We say “apparently” because we haven’t been there (yet!), so we don’t feel qualified to offer a personal opinion as to their specialties.  But, when researching brussels sprouts recipes (this one is our usual go-to, but we get bored with it), we found an entry on the Food 52 recipe/cooking website from a woman who loves the “undisputed star” brussels sprouts appetizer from The Vanderbilt so much that she recreated the recipe at home.  (After a quick perusal of The Vanderbilt’s menu, it doesn’t look like they currently offer the sprouts; all the more reason to try the homemade version.)  Peeling the brussels sprouts is rather time-consuming (if you have kids — put them to work!) but worthwhile to get a nice mix of crispy individual leaves and tender cores.  We think it’s the sauce that really makes this an outstanding side dish:  spicy sriracha combined with sweet honey, sour lime juice and just a touch of savory sesame oil.  Frying the sprout leaves can be a bit tricky (they pop and splatter a lot) and of course isn’t the most healthy way to get your veggies, so we tried roasting them in the oven instead.  Although the roasted ones weren’t quite as crispy, they were still really good, and we could eat just about anything tossed in that flavorful sauce.

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Boston Baked Fish

Posted By under Main Courses, Main Ingredient, Recipes, Seafood

Food memories can be powerful, in terms of a certain dish conjuring thoughts of a place or event associated with that meal, and vice versa.  The strength of food memories is no surprise, given the fact that eating has the potential to engage all five senses:  taste and smell (obviously); sight (think of a dessert almost too pretty to eat); hearing (just try and resist the urge to watch a movie when you hear popcorn popping) and touch (ever been to a crawfish boil in the spring time?)  For Dan, there is a certain fish dish that will always make him think of the time he spent working at an old-school seafood restaurant called Poli’s in Pittsburgh, while attending law school.  One of the menu staples at Poli’s — and one of Dan’s favorite things to eat there — was “Boston Scrod,” a white fish (cod or haddock usually) prepared simply with breadcrumbs and butter.  While not particularly fond of his time waiting tables at Poli’s, he loved the Boston Scrod and recently found a recipe that is close enough to Poli’s version to conjure images of the unfriendly, elderly clientele who refused to leave a tip one penny over five percent.  The dish is ridiculously easy to prepare — melt some butter, add crushed Ritz crackers, top the fish with the butter mixture and bake for about 20 minutes — and is so buttery delicious that even I (a serial fish-avoider) loved it.  Although Poli’s shut down before Dan could make it back there for a nostalgic helping of Boston Scrod, now he can take the same trip down memory lane with this homemade version, without ever having to leave the house.

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Cabbage-Carrot Casserole

Posted By under Main Ingredient, Recipes, Side Dishes, Vegetable

File this one under “Interesting.”  One of the cool things about having a food blog is that it’s a natural conversation-starter.  Nearly everyone has an intriguing food anecdote, experience or recipe to share, once they find out we are passionate enough about food to blog about it.  When talking to one of Dan’s colleagues at a work event a little while ago, she told me how her niece is currently living in Russia and has had to adjust quite a bit to cooking and eating over there, especially in terms of food availability.  Apparently meat is very expensive (and quality can be somewhat sketchy), so they cook and eat a lot of vegetables.  In particular, cabbage is abundant and inexpensive there, and they cook with it often.  When I heard that one of their favorite dishes is a casserole made with cabbage and carrots, I was intrigued enough to ask for the recipe, especially since I don’t prefer the boiled cabbage that Dan insists I eat serves with corned beef every St. Patrick’s Day.  The dish sounds a bit strange — and I would definitely call it interesting — but we liked it.  The cabbage has a mild flavor, the carrots add a bit of sweetness to contrast with the spice from the paprika, and the sauce made with butter, flour, chicken broth, milk and cheese ties it all together well.  It may not be the best side dish we’ve ever had, but the fact that there’s a story behind it makes us appreciate this casserole even more.  (And it’s a heck of a lot better than plain old boiled cabbage.)

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Beef & Broccoli Stir-Fry

Posted By under Main Courses, Main Ingredient, Recipes, Red Meat

Back in the fall, after our summer garden bounty ended, we went to our local plant nursery in search of a vegetable that might do well during the fall/winter season in our area.  We planted a couple of broccoli plants, and were quite pleased to see them thrive and yield several harvests in February and March.  Because I have the palate of a child when it comes to veggies (a child who hates vegetables), I don’t like cooked broccoli when it has a strong vegetable flavor.  For that reason, we usually cook broccolini (when we can find it) instead of broccoli — broccolini has a more mild, sweet flavor than broccoli.  It also has thinner stalks and smaller florets and looks like it could be young (early harvested) broccoli, but it’s actually a hybrid of broccoli and Chinese kale.  (And neither should be confused with broccoli rabe, which is a leafy green from the same subspecies as the turnip, and isn’t related to broccoli at all.  Thus concludes our “The More You Know” PSA, Vegetable Edition.)  Upon realizing that our home-grown broccoli was actually broccoli, and that we couldn’t turn it into broccolini simply by picking it early, we decided to use our first harvest in a dish incorporating a sauce, just in case the broccoli had too strong of a veggie taste for me.  So we adapted this recipe for “broccoli beef,” stir-fried with an Asian sauce.  Turns out that home-grown broccoli has a pretty mild flavor (or at least ours did) that works equally well in a stir-fry as it does simply sauteed with olive oil, white wine, red pepper flakes, garlic and a bit of lemon juice.  But stir frying the broccoli with thinly sliced, marinated sirloin in the spicy, tangy Asian sauce was probably our favorite use of our broccoli crop.  It was so good that we plan to grow twice as many broccoli plants this coming fall.

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Baked Asparagus w/ Parmesan

Posted By under Main Ingredient, Recipes, Side Dishes, Vegetable

Although it may be available year-round in some places, Spring is the official season for asparagus.  So now is the time to spend less money on fresh, better quality, possibly even locally-grown, bunches of this delicately thin, slightly bitter vegetable.  Our go-to method for cooking asparagus usually involves tossing it with a little olive oil and salt & pepper, then grilling it for a few minutes until it is barely tender.  As with most cooked veggies, we prefer asparagus al dente or “crisp tender” — cooked through but retaining a bit of crunch.  For the times we don’t feel like grilling (or more likely, the (many) occasions when our propane tank is empty and we’ve forgotten (again) to replace it), this recipe is a good alternative for cooking the asparagus in the oven and achieving that crisp tender texture we prefer.  Adding melted Parmesan cheese and a drizzle of good balsamic vinegar elevates the flavors even more, for an elegantly savory Spring-time side dish.

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Guinness-Glazed Lamb Chops

Posted By under Main Courses, Main Ingredient, Recipes, Red Meat

Every once in a while, we have a meal or even just a bite of something at a restaurant that is so good, we are compelled to try to recreate it at home.  I was at a wine tasting recently, and had one of the best bites of lamb I’ve ever had.  It was an appetizer of tiny lamb chops that had been cooked in some sort of savory glaze.  Usually, the first place we start when attempting a restaurant dish at home is the restaurant menu, which hopefully lists at least some of the ingredients in the description of the food.  But, unfortunately, the lamb I had that night is not on the menu from the restaurant that hosted the tasting.  Despite that, and the fact that he wasn’t there and didn’t taste it himself, Dan managed to come up with a deliciously similar version, based solely on my feeble description of the dish and his excellent grilling skillz.  The best part about these lamb chops that taste fancy enough to be served at an upscale wine tasting?  They are ridiculously easy to make at home.

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Unfried Chicken

Posted By under Main Courses, Main Ingredient, Poultry, Recipes

It’s no secret that we love fried chicken (and who doesn’t??), but it’s certainly not the most healthy thing to eat (which is probably why it’s so delicious!)  In addition to being decadently unhealthy, our favorite fried chicken recipe involves quite a bit more time and effort than the average weeknight meal, further distinguishing it as a special-occasion-only dish in our repertoire.  So when we came across this recipe by Chef Art Smith that promised “a healthy spin on a classic dish,” and discovered that it also seemed pretty easy to make, we couldn’t wait to try it.  We adapted the recipe by using chicken tenders instead of chicken breasts, and next time might cut down the spice amounts a little, but otherwise we really enjoyed it and loved how much more healthy it is than the traditional version of fried chicken.  (Bonus — while doing research for this post, I found another Chef Smith recipe for unfried chicken that appears to be even more healthy — it replaces the buttermilk with Greek yogurt and uses multi-grain cereal instead of panko.)  Traditional fried chicken will always be our favorite, but until someone declares the third Tuesday of each month to be a holiday or otherwise noteworthy occasion, unfried chicken will be our regular go-to when we’re craving that crispy outside, moist and flavorful inside, poultry goodness.

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Skillet Baked Ziti w/ Turkey Sausage

Posted By under Main Courses, Main Ingredient, Poultry, Recipes

Until now, we didn’t have a signature or go-to recipe for baked ziti, and didn’t really eat it all that often.  But we like that it has similar components as one of the all-time most comforting of comfort foods — lasagne — with red sauce, cheese and pasta; but without the time and effort commitment of its layered comfort cousin.  We recently picked up a copy of one of Cook’s Illustrated’s special-issue magazines “Skillet Dinners,” and were pleased to find a recipe for baked ziti among its pages of one-pot wonders.  We also appreciate that the dish is easy enough to make on a week night, with simple ingredients:  a 28 ounce can of whole, peeled tomatoes; a pound of Italian sausage;  5-6 cloves of minced garlic; 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes; 3 cups water; 3 3/4 cups ziti or penne pasta; 1/2 cup heavy cream; 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese; 1/4 cup chopped fresh basil (or 2 tablespoons dried basil) and 1 cup shredded whole-milk mozzarella cheese.  We used Italian turkey sausage instead of the pork variety and loved that the resulting dish still had all of the comfort, but less of the calories and fat.

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Homemade Hummus

Posted By under Main Ingredient, Recipes, Side Dishes, Vegetable

Whenever we go to visit Dan’s younger brother and his family in New York, our sweet sister-in-law always makes it a point to stock up on hummus from the Middle Eastern specialty food shop in their neighborhood, because she knows how much we love it.  It’s the best we’ve ever had, and we’ve never been able to find anything that comes anywhere close here in Dallas.  So Dan finally decided to look no further than our very own kitchen, and researched a bunch of recipes for us to make hummus at home.  He chose and adapted this recipe, mainly because it divulges the secret to “ethereally smooth hummus” (so smooth that it’s the clever name of the recipe), the likes of which we’ve only ever encountered on our family visits to Brooklyn.  It may sound strange and unnecessary, but the key to getting butter-smooth consistency in homemade hummus is to peel the chickpeas before putting them through the food processor.  Now that we know this trick for getting foolproof smooth texture, the only challenging aspect of making homemade hummus is experimenting with flavors and varieties.  But that’s also the fun part.  We started with a very basic version flavored with garlic, tahini, lemon juice, salt, olive oil and cumin.  This will be our go-to favorite, but we look forward to trying other versions and flavor combinations — maybe a spicy one with jalapeno, or a peppery one with roasted garlic and red bell pepper.

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Chicken with Forty Cloves of Garlic

Posted By under Main Courses, Main Ingredient, Poultry, Recipes

Actually, we should probably call this dish “chicken with 20 cloves of garlic,” since we used chicken thighs instead of a whole chicken and cut the recipe in half.  Either way, it’s a lot of garlic.  But don’t worry — you won’t need to make a dessert out of gum, breath mints and mouthwash after eating it — the garlic becomes sweet and much less pungent when you cook it for a long time.  Although it takes time to make (browning time for the chicken and the garlic, then about 30 minutes simmer time for both, plus several minutes to finish the creamy sauce), this dish is well worth the effort.  The sweet garlic adds flavor to both the chicken and the rich sauce, which elevates this dish to the level of dinner party fare.  And it provides a built-in party trick when your guests are shocked by how much garlic they’re eating, without any overwhelming garlicky flavor (or post-dinner garlic breath.)

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