Navajo Tacos

January 31, 2017 / featherheadlady / 2 Comments

I hadn’t made these in a long time. What makes these tacos so very good is the fry bread. The dough is made from very basic ingredients…flour, shortening, baking powder and water. No yeast. The fry bread is rustic, flattened and shaped by hand and then fried in hot oil. Fry bread dates back to the mid 1800s and originated in Arizona. It reminds me of the sopaipillas we love in New Mexico. My daughter went to a restaurant in Denver Colorado a few years ago that specialized in tacos served on fry bread. And fry bread was named the official state bread of South Dakota in 2005. The fry bread. It’s what makes these tacos stand out.

Fry bread Ingredients:

2 cups of flour

2 tsp of baking powder

1 tsp salt

4 T lard or shortening

2/3 cup cold water

peanut oil for frying

Whisk together the dry ingredients. Cut in the shortening until the mixture looks like fine meal. I cheat and use my food processor…it works great! With the food processor on low slowly add the water until the dough comes together. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead a few times until the dough is smooth. Wrap the dough in Saran Wrap and set aside while you make the chili.

Chili Ingredients:

1 medium onion diced

3-4 cloves of garlic minced

1 T chili powder

2 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp dried oregano

3 T canola oil

1 pound ground pork (or beef)

3 T minced chipotle in adobo sauce

1 T tomato paste

1 can pinto beans

salt and pepper to taste

Measure out the spices and dice the onion and mince the garlic.

Heat the oil in a heavy skillet over medium heat and sweat the onions, garlic and spices together for a few minutes until the onions are tender.

Add the ground pork, chipotle and tomato paste. Cook until the pork is no longer pink.

Stir in the beans and season to taste with salt and pepper. Remove the pan from the heat. Cover and keep warm in the oven while you fry the bread rounds.

Heat the oil to 375. I use a wok for deep frying. The oil maintains a more consistent temperature, it’s less likely the oil will splash and it’s fairly easy to lift things out. This is a trick I learned reading “The Food Lab” by J. Kanji Lopez-Alt. An awesome book I highly recommend.

Cut your dough into six pieces. On a lightly floured surface use you hand to flatten and shape the dough into a disc. Keep the discs covered with a clean kitchen towel or Saran Wrap until you are ready to fry them.

Drop the discs, one at a time, into the hot oil. Cook a couple minutes on each side until the fry bread is golden brown.

I line a jelly roll pan with paper towel and put a rack on top of the paper towel. As the breads finish frying I put them on the rack and keep them in a warm oven until I am ready to assemble the tacos.

Get your favorite toppings ready so that you can assemble and serve the tacos. I used shredded sharp cheddar cheese, diced tomatoes, shredded lettuce, black olives, jalapeño and sour cream. Well, no jalapeños on mine. You could also use diced onion and salsa. Avocado is my favorite topping but I did not have any.

Put a generous serving of the chili on a fry bread and choose your toppings. Squeeze on some fresh lime juice.

If you have fry bread left over you can warm it and enjoy it with a little honey, jam or powdered sugar.

NOTE: You can increase or decrease the seasoning based on your personal taste. Mine were a little spicy tonight. Or use your own favorite recipe for tacos. Like I said, what makes these so special is the fry bread.

I usually open a couple cans of chipotles in adobo sauce at a time and run them through my small food processor. I put the purée in an ice cube tray and freeze it. Once the chipotle cubes are frozen I put them in zip lock snack bags and keep them in the freezer. Recipes typically call for one or two tablespoons and this ensures that the rest of the can doesn’t go to waste.

Risotto with Peas and Baby Spinach

January 30, 2017 / featherheadlady / 2 Comments

Risotto is a an Italian dish; a perfect comfort food. Like macaroni and cheese. In Italy it would be served as a first course. When prepared properly it has a rich creamy consistency. It makes a great side dish with shrimp or fish or chicken or you can add the protein to the risotto before serving. Tonight the risotto was the main course. Risotto is fairly easy to make and it is a very versatile dish. Almost anything in your refrigerator will work. Tonight I used fresh spinach and broccoli and frozen peas. I remember asking my Dad if he liked Chinese food. His response was, “I don’t care much for rice.” I don’t think this is a dish my Dad would appreciate. As an entree or as a side dish.

Ingredients:

1 T olive oil

2 T butter

2/3 cup dry white wine

5 cups chicken broth

1 1/2 cups arborio rice

1/4 cup shallot diced

1 cup broccoli flowerettes and stems sliced

1 cup peas

2 cups baby spinach

1 T lemon zest

3 T fresh squeezed lemon juice

1 cup fresh grated asiago or Parmesan cheese

salt and pepper to taste

Grate the cheese. Zest and juice the lemon.

Heat the oil and butter in a heavy skillet over medium heat and saute the shallot and broccoli for a couple minutes.

While you saute the vegetables put the chicken broth in a sauce pan and heat. You will be adding hot broth to the rice. The hot broth helps to release the starch from the rice so that the risotto cooks properly.

Add the rice to the skillet and stir to coat the rice with the oil and butter.

Add the white wine and simmer over low heat stirring constantly until almost all of the wine has been absorbed.

Add the chicken broth two ladles at a time stirring frequently. Wait for the broth to be absorbed before adding more. This entire process will take about 30 minutes.

About half way through the cooking process add the peas and the lemon zest.

When you add the last of the broth also add the spinach. Continue cooking and stirring until the broth is absorbed and the rice is tender.

Add the cheese and lemon juice stirring to combine. Add salt and pepper. Cover the skillet and remove the skillet from the heat for a few minutes.

Serve the risotto hot and sprinkle with more cheese.

Enjoy! Mangia!

NOTE: Feel free to use any combination of vegetables. Leeks, asparagus, fennel, squash, mushrooms. You can also substitute vegetable broth for the chicken broth. Add vegetables that take longer to cook earlier in the cooking process.

Dry reds are the wines of choice at our house so I purchase white wine in the small, single serving bottles. Perfect for cooking.

Cinnamon and Cardamom Bread

January 21, 2017 / featherheadlady / 4 Comments

This stuff is amazing! Love!

We just returned from a family vacation to New Orleans. The land of great food, really wonderful music everywhere, and a plentitude of adult beverages. And people watching. We enjoyed poboys, gumbo, oysters, shrimp, catfish and, of course, beignets. As good as our food was, whenever I get home from a vacation I actually kind of enjoy eating my own cooking again. Funny how that works.

I had some organic milk in the refrigerator that was going to go south in just a day or so and I wanted to put it to good use. I decided to make us some bread with my remaining milk and came across this recipe that I had clipped from a Saveur magazine early last year but had not tried. Until today. The recipe says the bread is Swedish. But since I’m Finnish, today it is Finnish Cinnamon Cardamom Bread. Whatever your ethnicity I think you will enjoy! The kitchen smelled wonderful while this was baking.

Ingredients for the Dough:

7 T unsalted butter

1 1/2 cups whole milk heated to 115

2 tsp active dry yeast

4 1/2 cups AP flour

1/4 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp cardamom seeds, lightly crushed

1/4 tsp kosher salt

Ingredients for Filling:

1/2 cup granulated sugar

7 T unsalted butter softened

1 T ground cinnamon

1 1/2 tsp cardamom seeds, finely crushed

To make the dough heat the milk to 115 degrees. Use a thermometer unless you’re a lot better than I am at estimating temperatures and you don’t want to kill your yeast. Melt the butter and add the butter and yeast to the warm milk. Stir and let it sit until foamy, about 10 minutes.

In a large bowl whisk together the flour, sugar, cardamom and salt. Stir in the yeast mixture until dough forms.

Transfer dough to a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 3 minutes. Or knead in your stand mixer. Transfer the dough to a lightly greased bowl, cover with a clean dish towel, and let sit in a warm place until the dough doubles in size. About an hour.

Prepare the filling stirring together the softened butter, sugar, cinnamon and cardamom seeds.

On a lightly floured surface roll out the dough into approximately a 11×17 rectangle, about 1/4 inch thick.

Spread the filling over the dough.

Working from one of the long sides, roll dough into a tight cylinder and transfer the dough to a parchment lined baking sheet. Cover with a dish towel and allow it to sit in a warm place until the dough has doubled in size. About 45-60 minutes.

Heat the oven to 375. Using kitchen shears and starting 1 inch from the ends of the dough, make crosswise cuts spaced 1 inch apart, three quarters of the way through the dough. Now this is where it got tricky for me and my bread looks a little crude. The recipe says to fan dough slices away from the center, alternating left to right. Huh? The center? Maybe I was supposed to make this into a circle? I don’t know for sure because I didn’t have a picture. But it doesn’t really matter. The fanning does not affect the taste at all.

Whisk an egg and brush the dough with the egg wash.

Bake for 20-25 minutes until golden brown. Allow the bread to cool before serving.

I made up a little icing with powdered sugar, heavy cream and lemon zest. Because we like icing.

Cut yourself a slice and enjoy. Great with a hot cup of coffee or tea.

NOTE: The recipe suggests that you use the egg wash and sprinkle with pearl sugar before baking. Since I was going to ice the bread I did not you the pearl sugar but you may prefer that. If any of you bake a more attractive loaf please comment with a picture.

Corn Pudding

January 10, 2017 / featherheadlady / Leave a comment

Growing up we had very basic meals. Meat and potatoes. Fish. Homemade bread. Baked beans. Simple food. Most of the vegetables we grew up eating came out of a can. Canned peas, green beans, corn. Creamed corn. This recipe is a little sophisticated creamed corn nostalgia. I came across this recipe some time ago and recently bought the ingredients to give it a try.

Ingredients:

1 can creamed corn

1 can corn, drained

1 box jiffy cornbread mix

2 large eggs

1 stick of butter melted

3 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1 cup sour cream

These ingredients reminded me a bit of making cheesy potatoes which everyone loves. Cheese, butter, sour cream. Sound familiar? I also noticed when I took my Jiffy Mix out of the pantry that is was “vegetarian” corn muffin mix. What’s in the non-vegetarian corn muffin mix I wonder??

Preheat the oven to 350.

In a large bowl whisk the eggs. Stir in the two cans of corn and the melted butter.

Stir in the sour cream and the Jiffy Mix. Stir in 2 cups of the cheese.

Grease a casserole dish and pour in the corn pudding.

Bake for 40 minutes. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with the remaining cup of cheese. Return it to the oven and bake for another 5-10 minutes.

I served this as a side with marinated flank steak and haricot vert. Haricot vert is a French name for slender, sweeter green beans with small seeds.

Its a really good thing that my husband liked the corn pudding because the steak was flavorful but extremely “chewy” and, as far as he’s concern, a green bean by any other name is still a green bean.

I have another recipe, which I’ll also include here, that I got from an aquaintence over 40 years ago. I have not made this recipe in years but I prefer it because it is less sweet, more savory. But you can try both and judge for yourself.

Scalloped Corn

Ingredients:

1 can creamed corn

1 cup crushed saltine crackers

1/2 cup diced celery

1/4 cup diced onion

1 cup sharp cheddar cheese

1 tsp salt

2 beaten eggs

2 T melted butter

1 cup whole milk

Combine all ingredients, pour into a greased casserole dish and bake at 325 for 40 minutes.

You must admit, this recipe sounds marginally healthier.

This will probably be my one and only creamed corn post. If any of your are feeling a little nostalgic try one of these recipes.

Paella In My Paella

January 8, 2017 / featherheadlady / Leave a comment

Paella is a Spanish dish made with rice, and a variety of meat (chicken or rabbit), seafood (shrimp, mussels or a firm fish like cod), and spicy sausage like andouille or chorizo. It also includes vegetables like green beans or peas and spices like paprika and saffron. This dish allows for countless variations. The rice is supposed to be cooked in such a way that it crisps up on the bottom and edges. It’s frequently prepared over an open fire or a very high burner. Every summer we attend a music festival in northern lower Michigan where huge iron paella pans are set over an open flame and enough paella is being prepared to feed dozens and dozens. It’s almost as much fun watching them make it as it is eating it. They make a vegetarian Paella as well making them a very popular stop. Paella cooked in this fashion allows for nicely crisped rice. Personally, I prefer my rice without the crisp so that’s the way I prepare it.

This post, however, is as much about my new pan as it is about the paella. Interestingly, the word “paella” derives from the Old French word paella for pan which in turn comes from the Latin word patella for pan. (I didn’t happen to know that off the top of my head but I do know how to access all things Wikipedia.) I frequently stop and browse in shops that sell Le Creuset cookware. Le Creuset is a French company that makes enameled cast iron cookware. I have several knock-off enameled cast iron pieces which I use all the time but have never purchased a Le Creuset. Until now. I am still excited! My husband gifted it to me so I promised to, appropriately, make paella my first dish in this beautiful 5 quart Braiser aka Paella or Patella.

A thing of beauty, no?!

This recipe makes a generous amount. Although the leftovers were great I probably will not make this again until we have guests.

Ingredients:

Herb Blend

1 cup chopped fresh parsley and cilantro

2 or 3 large cloves of garlic minced

juice of one lemon

1 T olive oil

Paella

1 cup water

1 tsp saffron threads

5 cups chicken broth

1/2 pound unpeeled jumbo shrimp

4 boneless, skinless chicken thighs

4 links andouille sausage

3-4 slices of thick bacon cut into 1 inch pieces

2 cups finely chopped onion

1 cup finely chopped red bell pepper

1 cup canned diced tomatoes undrained

1 tsp sweet paprika

3-4 cloves of garlic whole

3 cups Arborio rice

1 cup frozen peas

1 lemon juiced

Combine the first 4 ingredients and set aside. Combine the water, broth and saffron in a large saucepan and bring to a simmer. Do not boil. Keep warm over low heat.

Heat 1 T of olive oil in large heavy skillet over medium high heat. Add the chicken pieces and saute 2-3 minutes per side. Remove them from the skillet and set aside. Add the sausage and bacon to the skillet and saute 3-4 minutes. Remove them from the skillet.

Reduce the heat to medium low and add the onion and bell pepper. Saute for approximately 15 minutes stirring occasionally.

Add the tomatoes, paprika and garlic and cook for 5 more minutes.

Add the rice and cook for 1 minute stirring constantly. Stir in the herb blend and the peas.

Add the broth mixture, chicken, and sausage mixture and bring to a low boil. Cook 15 minutes, stirring frequently.

Once the meat is added this 5 quart pan is VERY full. Be careful.

Add the shrimp and cook 5 more minutes. Most of the liquid should be absorbed. Remove from the heat, sprinkle with the juice from one lemon, cover, and allow the paella to sit for 10 minutes. If your skillet doesn’t have a lid cover the paella with a clean dish towel.

Serve with lemon wedges.

NOTE: Like I mentioned earlier, this recipe is perfect for modifying based on personal tastes. I would love to use mussels but availability is an issue. I may try this next with strictly seafood and substitute seafood broth for the chicken broth. My husband likes foods kicked up and he added hot sauce to his.

Pierogi

January 7, 2017 / featherheadlady / 2 Comments

Some very special neighbors have, on several occasions, given us homemade pierogi which are amazing. They make them around the holidays and freeze them. We have also gotten pierogis and sausage from a Polish Market in Hamtramck, MI that have been excellent. And, of course, there are always frozen pierogis that you can pick up at most grocery stores in the freezer section. Eating the pierogi made by our friends and savoring every bite inspired me to take a stab at making my own. They were actually quite fun to make. The dough is easy to work with. Easier I think than pasta dough. And, like ravioli, the filling possibilities are only limited by your imagination. Sauerkraut, cheese and potato are pretty standard but you can make variations on those as well as stuffing the little dough rounds with fruit or meat. This year for our after Thanksgiving family get-together I decided to go Polish. We had Polish sausage with my homemade sauerkraut, cabbage rolls (golabki), buttery mashed potatoes, applesauce, pickles, and, of course, pierogi. A feast for sure. Nearly every bite was devoured. There were no leftovers to put away. Next year my Dad wants us to do Finnish. So stay tuned.

Dough Ingredients:

2 cups AP flour

1/2 tsp salt

1 large egg

1/2 cup sour cream

4 T butter at room temperature

Mix the salt and flour together in a bowl. Add the egg to the flour mixture and stir. The dough will be clumpy. Work in the sour cream and soft butter until the dough comes together in a slightly sticky ball.

Knead and fold the dough without adding additional flour until the dough is less sticky but still moist. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 60 minutes or so. While the dough is chilling prepare your filling.

Filling Ingredients:

1 cup warm mashed potatoes

1 cup sharp cheddar cheese

Stir the potatoes and cheese together until the cheese melts, season with salt and pepper and set aside until the filling is cool to the touch.

Now it’s time to roll out your dough. Divide the dough ball in half and roll out on a lightly floured surface to about 1/8th inch thickness. Cut rounds using a biscuit cutter or a glass dipped in flour.

Place a couple teaspoons of the potato cheese mixture on each round. Gently fold the dough over to form a pocket around the filling. Pinch the edges to seal and reinforce using the tines of a fork.

Now you’re ready to either freeze your pierogi or cook them in a large stockpot of boiling salted water. Only cook a few pierogi at a time so they aren’t crowded. When they float to the top they are done, about 10 minutes.

In a large heavy skillet melt a few tablespoons of butter and sauté onion or shallots just until they begin to brown. Add the drained pierogi and cook until they are browned on both sides.

Serve them hot with sour cream or applesauce. Enjoy!

Seriously. How can something made from butter, sour cream and flour, stuffed with cheesy mashed potatoes and fried in more butter possibly be bad????

NOTE: I also filled some with a sauerkraut, mushroom and sour cream mixture. Drain the sauerkraut and saute along with finely diced mushroom in a little butter. Remove from the heat, stir in a little sour cream and season with salt and pepper. Allow the mixture to cool before filling the pierogi.

I’m looking forward to making these again soon.