Recipes
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Today Normita prepared a “Quick” version of he great “Pozole Rojo de Jalisco”. We will have enough food with this for today and tomorrow and the boyz, our huge Bouvier de Flanders dogs Uriel (Normita’s boy, ~80Kg) and Bacchus (my boy, ~70 Kg), should have enough leftover broth to enjoy some with their dry food tomorrow night.
Since our regular pozole recipe is our all time favorite recipe based on the number of visits here on the site, we documented this quick version that we normally enjoy at least once or twice a month. It is simplified version made with only chicken and it easy to prepare and stunningly tasty. It is one of Normita’s best recipes. We will post the full pictorial and recipe of this version in the coming days, so lookout pozole fans.
Lucito
Last weekend when we went food shopping we found on sales some huge shrimps at a price so low to make a ham and cheese sandwich look expensive. Strangely enough they were actually fresh, or at least freshly thawed, and they did smell like proper shrimps.
The nice fresh shrimps we unexpectedly found!
In the last year in the area where we now live, due to the financial crisis, the availability of any decent produce has been marginal at best and normally leaves us wondering about what to eat. A lot of times even the dogs do not want to eat what they sell around here. It is one of the main reasons we want to move back closer to civilization as the local stores do not stock anything decently edible as it does not sell at all. Besides chicken which is somewhat edible when you are lucky, normally any meat or fish is a luxury as nothing of quality or that is actually safe to eat is on sale. Judging from the smell in the stores, most of it just rots away, and we are talking major supermarket chains like Wal-Mart or others.
Some of the ingredients.
In any case we were pleasantly surprised to find very nice large shrimps at a very low price and we bought some for our Sunday meal. I had planned to do some brochettes or something similar on the grill, but the weather did not cooperate. I ended up inventing a recipe on the spur of the moment with whatever leftover ingredients I encountered in the larder.
The cooked meal.
With what I found it ended up to become a nice pasta in an Mexican-Oriental style that turned out extremely good and satisfying. It was a long time that we had not enjoyed something so good at home, just due to the unavailability of good products at the supermarket.
Ingredients
¾ to 1 pound cleaned and deveined large shrimps
1 medium échalotte chopped fine
3 chiles guajillos seeded, deveined, and cut into thin strips
3 pieces of candied ginger finely chopped
3 garlic cloves
3 sundried tomatoes in oil
A small handful of shelled walnuts
½ tsp Sambal Oelek chili paste
2 tbs of a mixture of dried citrus peels, salt, pepper, and sesame seeds
Tequila reposado
Olive oil
½ pound dried pasta of your choice
Salt and pepper to taste
Preparation
1. Cook the dried pasta until al dente in plenty of boiling salted water.
2. Once cooked strain the pasta, return it to the pot, and fill with cold water to stop the cooking.
3. After a minute or so strain the pasta again and return to the pot. Put a tablespoon or two of olive oil on the pasta and mix well with a spoon. Cover and set aside for now.
4. About 10-15 minutes before cooking the meal, place the cleaned and deveined shrimps in a bowl, sprinkle the mixture of citrus peels and sesame seeds, and add a few tablespoons of the tequila.
5. In a very hot wok sauté the shrimps in a little olive oil. When they start to be opaque carefully add some tequila to the wok and flambé them. Return them to the bowl.
6. Add a bit more olive oil to the wok and briefly sauté the échalotte, guajillos, and garlic.
7. Add the reserved pasta, the sundried tomatoes, the walnuts, the candied ginger, and the Sambal Oelek. Sauté until warm.
8. Add the shrimp and warm them up in the mix and add a splash of tequila, and some sesame oil to finish them.
Lucito
We are currently trying to clean up the freezer from assorted stuff we had accumulated over the past year or so. Like everybody we tend to accumulate a bunch of frozen stuff and before it gets too old and needs to be thrown out, we recently decided it was time to use everything so that we can slowly restock it with things we are using more regularly.
Yesterday we took out a piece of beef tenderloin that had been frozen for a while. It was of local origin, and like most local meats it tends to be much lower in fat content, thus it has a tendency to be a lot dryer and harder than imported beef. Last week I had prepared a nice piece of the filet I had removed from a big imported T-Bone roast that we did last summer for Normita’s birthday and it was stunning as a small roast. I stir-fried half of the tenderloin I had defrosted yesterday, and it turned out a bit dry and chewy. I did not want to repeat the experience and today I decided to marinate it all day to see if we could salvage the meat.
We had not been out food shopping since last week, so I improvised something with what I had at hand in the kitchen. The tenderloins turned out very tender and juicy this time. We ate them with steamed chayotes and a carrot salad Normita made.
Ingredients
1 pound beef tenderloin cut in 4 1 ½” thick slices
1 tbs desiccated onions
1 tbs desiccated garlic
1 tbs vegetal meat tenderizer
1 tbs crushed peppercorns
1 tbs finely diced fresh ginger
1 tbs sesame seeds
1 tbs sesame oil
1 tbs Worcestershire sauce
2 tbs soy sauce
½ bottle red wine
Preparation
1. In a large bowl place the wine, soy sauce, Worcestershire, sesame oil and seeds, ginger, peppercorns, tenderizer, garlic, and onions and mix them well.
2. With the flat part of a meat hammer flatten the tenderloin slices until they are reduced to ¾” and then with the toothed part of the hammer down to a bit over ¼”.
3. Place the flattened tenderloins in the marinade and cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for at least 3-4 hours.
4. Take the bowl out of the refrigerator about 30 minutes before cooking the meal and grill over high coals, or on the stove in a grill pan.
Lucito
We’re back from a very long period away from the blog that happened for a lot of personal reasons that kept me away from the kitchen on a regular basis. I will try to start posting regularly again as I have a backlog of new recipes to post as well as some articles from myself and others that have been sitting around here for way too long.
This morning the Padrino asked me about a recipe for Irish Stew, to better celebrate St-Patrick’s day, and I decided to post it here instead of sending it to him directly. Traditionally Irish cooking is very similar to French Canadian cooking from Quebec, one of the reason is that a lot of the French families there have some Irish blood since there was a lot of Irish immigrants coming into Quebec in the old days. The traditions mixed and many of the old style recipes are very similar. It is also true that some of the traditional stew recipes have common roots across Northern Europe and especially with peasant-style cooking from rural France.
Irish Stew was traditionally a root vegetable stew made with mutton, but these days mutton is rarely available at most butcher’s shops, so it is normally made with lamb. A nice deboned shoulder of lamb works well, especially if you keep the bones to make a nice lamb stock first. I like those kinds of stews to be rich and thick so I normally prefer prepare a strong stock the day before, and then cooking the stew after the stock has cooled overnight and the fat is removed. If the stew is still a little on the clear side after cooking, I might thicken it a bit with a bit of cornstarch or flour diluted in some Guinness, just to give it a little bit of texture of course…
Ingredients
Stock
2 tbs butter
3 pounds lamb bones
6 quarts water
1 branch celery
1 large carrot, peeled
1 large clove of garlic
1 medium onion cut in half
2 large branches of parsley
Stew
2 tbs butter
4 tbs flour
3 quarts lamb stock
3 pounds deboned lamb shoulder with the fat removed, cubed
1 bottle Guinness
1 glass of tannic red wine
1 pound carrots, sliced
2 pounds potatoes, diced
1 pound turnip, diced
1/2 pound small pearl onions
1 pound button mushrooms, sliced
1 large branch of parsley
2 tsp thyme, crushed
2 bay leaves
4 cloves
3/4 tsp nutmeg
3/4 tsp ground dry ginger
2 tsp corn starch dissolved in some Guinness
Salt and pepper to taste
Preparation
Stock
1. In a large stock pot brown the bones in the melted butter for a few minutes over high heat.
2. Add the water and the other ingredients and bring to boil.
3. Reduce the fire and simmer from 4 to 6 hours until the water is reduced by half while skimming the foam regularly.
4. Cool down the stock and filter using a metal colander.
5. Refrigerate overnight and skim the fat off the surface the next day.
Stew
1. Coat the lamb cubes well with the flour.
2. In a large stock pot brown the meat well in melted butter over high heat.
3. Add the Guinness and the wine and bring to boil.
4. Add the lamb stock as well as the herbs and spices and bring to a boil.
5. Reduce the heat and simmer gently for an hour.
6. Add the root vegetables and simmer for thirty minutes.
7. Add the mushrooms and pearl onions and simmer for another thirty minutes.
8. If the stew is still a little bit clear thicken with the cornstarch dilute in Guinness and simmer for 10-15 minutes more.
9. Adjust the salt and pepper, and remove the cloves, bay leaves and parsley.
10. Serve in a wide soup bowl accompanied with some crusty country bread and lots of fresh farm butter and a few Guinnesses.
Lucito
This was a nice finish to the buffet and the kids were very impressed by it and were very reluctant to eat it at first.
Ingredients
1 package of pineapple dessert gelatin
1 envelope clear powdered gelatin
1 plastic spider
8 jelly eyeball candies
Preparation
1. Mix the pineapple gelatin as directed on the package and add the envelope of clear gelatin.
2. In a jelly mold place a thin layer of the prepared mix in the bottom and float the spider on it.
3. Refrigerate until set.
4. Place the candy eyeballs at the periphery of the mold and pour enough of the mix to cover them a bit more than halfway.
5. Refrigerate until set.
6. Pour the rest of the mix filling the mold.
7. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
8. Unmold prior to serving and present on a platter.
Lucito
This recipe was the quickest one to prepare and used some of the leftover hard boiled yolks of the eggs used for the Vampire’s Eyes.
Ingredients
8 ounce tube of pork liver paté
2 hard boiled egg yolks
Drops of red, yellow, green, and blue food coloring
Preparation
1. Mix all the ingredients together.
This was one of the fun recipes to prepare. It was relaxing to form them and paint the veins on the eyeballs.
Ingredients
6 hard boiled eggs
4 ounces cream cheese at room temperature
12 stuffed olives
Red food coloring
Preparation
1. Shell the hard boiled eggs.
2. Cut in half and remove the yolks.
3. Fill the hole left by the yolk with the softened cream cheese.
4. Stick an olive in the cream cheese and smooth the cheese around it.
5. Using a tooth pick dipped in red food coloring draw veins in the cream cheese
Lucito
The easiest of the recipes of the evening and one that had the most success, as they disappeared entirely in only a few minutes.
Ingredients
1 small package of cream cheese at room temperature
1 container of oven-baked potato sticks (straight pretzels can also be used)
2 tbs chopped salted peanuts
8 drops green food coloring
4 drops yellow food coloring
4 drops red food coloring
Preparation
1. Mix the softened cream cheese, the peanuts, and the green food coloring.
2. Add the yellow and red food coloring and mix leaving streaks.
3. Form into small balls and stick a potato stick in them.
4. Place on a wax paper sheet on a plate and refrigerate to firm up.
Lucito
Here is another simple recipe for Halloween. A simple baked sandwich decorated like a huge caterpillar. It is essentially a short baguette cut almost through in slices with some cheese and cold cuts stuck in it with a mayonnaise sauce. They are extremely tasty and look kind of great on the platter.
Dressing
Ingredients
3 tbs mayonnaise
1 tbs ketchup
1/2 tsp dried mustard
1/2 tsp dried chives
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp onion salt
1/4 tsp ground pepper
4 drops blue food coloring
Preparation
1. Mix all the ingredients together.
Caterpillar
Ingredients
1 short baguette
6 slices yellow American cheese
6 slices cold cuts
2 thin celery sticks
2 olives
3 thin baby carrots
Preparation
1. Make 12 cuts in the bread almost all the way through.
2. In each alternate cuts place a tsp of the dressing and a slice of cold cut in a folded slice of cheese.
3. Wrap the baguette in aluminum foil and heat in a 375F oven for 10 minutes until the cheese melts and the bread is nice and crisp.
4. Unwrap the baguette and spread the remaining dressing on top of the baguette.
5. Punch 2 holes in the front and insert the celery sticks to act as antennas.
6. Place the two olives on toothpicks and place in front of the antennas.
7. Make 3 small holes in the back and place the small carrots in them.
8. Serve by cutting the bread in the slices where there is not stuffing.
Lucito
One of the Witches’ Hands well cooked.
The Padrino wrote to me tonight that I should put the recipes for the silly Halloween food I prepared for the party last Saturday, as there was still time to do so before Halloween. So here it goes. The first recipe is simply made with some flattened chicken breast cut in the shapes of hands with a pair of scissors, then breaded and deep fried. They are simple to make and looks very realistic. The pus sauce is simply some mayonnaise mixed with ketchup and a few drops of yellow food coloring. If you mix it unevenly leaving some streaks of red and yellow the effect is pretty realistic
A flattened ‘bistec’ of chicken breast. Each breast half yields 2 ‘bistecs’
The ‘bistec’ cut into a hand shape.
Dredging the chicken in flour.
Ready to do the breading.
Cooking one of the hands.
Witches’ Hands
Ingredients
4 ‘bistecs’ of chicken breast
4 heaping tbs flour
1 heaping tsp onion powder
1 heaping tsp dried herbes de Provence, finely ground
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper, freshly ground
2 eggs
1 tbs extra virgin olive oil
1 tbs heavy cream
1 1/2 cups finely crushed Corn Flakes cereal
Enough vegetable oil to pan fry the ‘bistecs’
Preparation
1. Prepare 3 bowls wide enough to be able to dip the ‘bistecs’ in them.
2. In the first bowl place flour, onion powder, herbes de Provence, garlic powder, salt and peppers, and mix with spoon until well combined.
3. In the second bowl break the 2 eggs, the tbs of olive oil, and the tbs of heavy cream.
4. With a fork whisk the eggs gently until you have a smooth homogeneous mixture.
5. In the third bowl place the crushed Corn Flakes.
6. Take the ‘bistecs’ and cut them with a pair of scissors to look like hands.
7. Take a ‘bistec’ and place in the flour bowl until well coated on both sides.
8. Pass the ‘bistec’ through the egg mixture until well coated on both sides, then let drip the excess.
9. Place the egg-coated ‘bistec’ in the crushed Corn Flakes until both sides are coated well.
10. Place on a wire rack to dry.
11. Rinse your fingers and repeat with the other ‘bistecs’.
12. Place the wire rack in the refrigerator for 20-30 minutes for the breading to dry.
13. In a large frying pan, place about 1/4" of extra virgin olive oil and heat up on a medium fire.
14. Place the breaded ‘bistecs’ in the oil and cook about 3-4 minutes per side, until well browned.
15. Put on a plate lined with paper towels to drain, and then keep warm in a low oven until all the ‘bistecs’ are cooked.
Pus Sauce
Ingredients
3 tbs mayonnaise
2 tbs ketchup
3 drops yellow food coloring
Preparation
1. Mix ingredient together unevenly leaving red and yellow streaks in the mayonnaise.
2. Use as a dipping sauce for the hands…
Lucito