Monday, March 28, 2011

Chili



The last couple of batches of Chili have been terrible. There was something off about all of them. But last night, I went back to basics: roasted poblano and jalepeno chilies, Jim Beam, fresh tomatoes, fresh oregano and cilantro, garlic, onion, chili powder, cumin, corriander seed, salt and pepper. And it all tasted just fine.

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Sauce


I am convinced that you should keep certain things in your pantry. I always like to have cooking wine or sherry, Dijon and course grain mustard, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, chicken stock, Tabasco sauce, Worcestershire sauce, ketchup, tomato sauce, lemon juice, unsalted butter, eggs, garlic, shallot, salt, and pepper. With those ingredients I can make about 5 different salad dressings, hollindaise sauce, barbecue sauce, aioli, and a few different sauces for chicken or pork dishes. Today, we will start with my mustard sauce that I use for both chicken and pork and that is featured in the above photo.

Mustard Sauce

2 Garlic Cloves Minced
1/2 Cup Chicken Stock
1/4 Cup Sherry or White Wine
1 Tablespoon Butter
1 Tablespoon Course Mustard
1 Tablespoon Dijon Mustard
Salt and Pepper to taste

After pan frying either pork tenderloin chops or thin cut chicken breast, add the butter to the same pan, over medium heat. Let the butter melt and scrape up some of the brown bits from the meat. Next add the garlic and cook until fragrant and slightly browned.

Add the stock and wine, stirring constantly scraping up more of the brown bits from the meat. Add both mustard and stir until combined. You will want to watch over this and stir the sauce frequently. It will start reducing quickly and thicken up. Add the meat back to the pan and continuously spoon the sauce over the meat until the sauce is nearly evaporated and is mostly on the meat.

Remove the meat from the pan and plate it. Pour any remaining sauce on to meat. All done. And this whole cooking process takes about 15-20 minutes. This is a quick dinner, especially if you are using thin cut chops or cutlets.

Enjoy!

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Sharing is Caring II


I just got another newsletter from Gwenyth Paltrow's website. Anthony Bourdain hates on GP in one of his episodes. It's funny because they have a mutual friend in Mario Batali and Bourdain rants about how he doesn't understand how Mario Batali can be friends with her. Me... I like all 3 of them. If I was in the world of the famous, I would want to befriend each of them and then make them all eat dinner with me.

Anyway, I digress - I got another newsletter with several delicious recipes from Mario Batali's new cook book. And all of you should just subscribe to her newsletters. She sends some good info most of the time. Goop Newsletter

Enjoy!

Monday, March 21, 2011

Sharing is Caring

I like reading Gwenyth Paltrow's blog: Goop. She posts a lot of things that I deem relevant to my life style. I was just looking at a past newsletter and thought that I should share it. It's an easy recipe/instruction on how to make home made ricotta cheese! Yum! Goop Newsletter

Enjoy!

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Cupcakes!



Litte Miss Chloe Mae Murphy turned 1! So, instead of a cake - I made her some butterfly cup cakes! And yes, PHOTOS!

Neglect

My home computer/laptop, where I do all of this business, is...sick. The "White Screen of Death" showed up while I was in Montana and it could not be fixed. It is going to the doctor today, so I should be up and running in a few days. I made some good dishes while in Montana and I will be putting up a recipe for enchiladas, hollindaise sauce, and a pollo guisado. Stay tuned!