Sunday, September 20, 2009

Korean BBQ

Korean Style Bulgogi

Tonight on the menu was Korean-Style Bulgogi with ginger dipping sauce, Sesame Rice Vermicelli and Spicy Pickled Vegetables. In Korea, bulgogi (bul-GOH-gee), or "fire meat" is one of Korea's most popular dishes.

Ingredients (simmer; whisk in)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup rice vinegar
2 Tbsp soy sauce

2 Tbsp fresh ginger minced

1 Tbsp garlic minced
2 tsp toasted sesame oil

2 tsp sambal (asian hot sauce)
1 Tbsp water

1 tsp corn starch


Season and grill; garnish with;
3/4 lb. ribeye steak, cut into 1/4 thick strips
salt and pepper

sliced scallions
toasted sesame seeds

Simmer sugar, vineg
ar, soy sauce, ginger, garlic, sesame oil, and sambal together in small saucepan over high heat. Combine water and corn starch in a small bowl then whisk into sauce. Return mixture to boil and simmer 1 minute, remove from heat and set aside.

Season ribeye strips with salt and pepper; grill 2 minutes per side, then toss in dipping sauce. Arrange strips on plates and garnish with scallions and sesame seeds.

Sesame Rice Vermicelli
4 oz. dried rice vermicelli
2 Tbsp scallions, thinly sliced

1 Tbsp toasted sesame oil

1 Tbsp sesame seeds, toasted

Prepare vermicelli according to package and cool. Toss with remaining ingredients.

Spicy Pickled Vegetables

(I'll update this part later)



Sunday Appetizers

Enjoyable Appetizers

Today's menu started off with a few appetizers to go with some Sunday football games on the big screen.

We began with a Jalapeno Pepper Spread which was very good - I wish you could smell the photos..(if only the screen was scratch and sniff). This combination of cream cheese, green chili's, jalapeño peppers and Parmesan cheese was truly excellent, every bite was an incredible rush of flavors. I must also warn you, this is one of those foods that takes a lot of will power to stop eating because it tastes so darn good. I recommend eating the dip with tortilla chips or bread, but many different foods would go good with this spread/dip; vegetables, pita bread, doritos chips and more.

Ingredients
2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1 cup mayonnaise
1 (4 ounce) can chopped green chilies, drained
2 ounces canned diced jalapeno peppers, drained
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Directions
Stir together cream cheese and mayonnaise in a large bowl until smooth. Stir in green chiles and jalapeno peppers. Pour mixture into a microwave safe serving dish, and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.
Microwave on High until hot, about 3 minutes - or -
If you would like to brown the cheese, bake at 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) for about 30 minutes.


Next up on the menu was Bruschetta with White Beans and Walnuts.
This recipe had a surprising mixture of tastes and textures with the toasted walnuts, garlic, olive oil and sourdough, those flavors went together very well with the pureed white beans.

Ingredie
nts
1/3 cup walnuts
a 15- to 16-ounce can white beans

2 garlic cloves
1 1/2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

six 1/4-inch-thick slices rustic Italian bread

Garnish: chopped fresh flat-leafed parsley leaves

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Directions
In a shallow baking pan toast nuts in middle of oven until fragrant, about 10 minutes, and when cool coarsely chop. Rinse and drain beans. In a food processor mince garlic and purée with beans, lemon juice, and 1 tablespoon oil until smooth.

Toast bread and drizzle with 2 tablespoons oil. Divide purée among toasts and top with nuts. Drizzle remaining tablespoon oil over bruschetta and garnish with parsley.

Enjoy!

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Saturday Breakfast Out

Sutter Street Grill Review

We woke up this morning to a very nice sunrise and good weather and decided to hop on the motorcycle to go get some breakfast on Sutter Street in old town Folsom. We went to an old favorite of ours - The Sutter Street Grill which is located at 811 Sutter St. Folsom, CA (916) 985-4323

As described on the web, Sutter Street Grill is a shabby chic country–style diner where the waitress calls you “honey,” silverware is mismatched and breakfast is the main course. The Folsom favorite has an overwhelming breakfast menu with thick slabs of banana walnut French toast, blueberry flapjacks buried in whip cream or the jailhouse (six pieces of bacon, two sausage links, biscuits and gravy). On weekend mornings and summer days, expect a busy crowd with locals, bicyclist and tourists.


Today Ronda and I split the special which was a sausage, tomato and mushroom omelet that we had them add cheddar cheese too. It was fantastic and even a split plate was a lot to eat - the servings here are outstanding and everything tastes really fresh and really good.

To
go with the omelet we had one of their fresh baked cranberry orange muffins, home potatoes, hash browns and an english muffin. They also serve some really good coffee by Pete's Cofffees.

All that food for two (including leftovers and endless coffee refills) cost less then $20 dollars, you can't find a better deal - this is one breakfast place I will always highly recommend - two thumbs up

Go try them out someday soon

Friday Night Out

Mexican Restaurant Review

Friday night we went skipped the home menu and went out to dine at a place we've never been. This is my review of a nice Mexican restaurant in Roseville called "Mas". Located at 1563 Eureka Rd, Roseville (916) 773-3778 - www.masmexicanfood.com

When we arrived, I noticed that I had been to this building before when it was another restaurant, but after walking in, I could see they really improved the place. The ambiance was very nice and they even had a bar and huge outside covered patio area. We sat out on the patio with our good friends Larry and Suzanne and enjoyed a pitcher of very good Margarita's with some fantastic homemade tortilla chips and home made guacamole that was excellent. For dinner I ordered the mole enchilada's which were tasty and Ronda had some tostados. Suzanne had the same as Ronda and Larry tried the carnita's tacos.

The food was very good, the drinks great and the service excellent. But my favori
te part of the evening was the outstanding mariachi band that was playing and roaming around the restaurant. When they came out to our area they played a few songs, the singer was excellent and the players were spot on perfect. I think there were about 8 players in this band. Suzanne gave them a tip and they came over to our table and played a song just for us. The music was fantastic, I really enjoy Latin music (one of my favorites is the Buena Vista Social Club).


We capped off this nice evening out with a stop at Larry and Suzanne's house where Larry busted out a super fine wine from his vast collection (over 500 bottles)

It was a 1977 Fonseca Port and it was pure bliss! It's not often that we get to taste a 32 year old vino. This was on
e of the best wine's I've ever had and as a serious port wine connoisseur, out of a 1 to 10 rating, I give this one an 11!

Cheers!

Friday, September 18, 2009

Cleaning out the fridge for a nice lunch

Po' Boy Sandwich

On Today's Menu is a spur of the moment concoction of ingredients that came to mind while cleaning out our refrigerator. I hate it when food expires and goes to waste, that's good money down the drain. I really try to stay on top of items that are aging to make sure they get used up before they go bad. Today I found a few left overs from our previous dinners and we had a couple of hoagie rolls that were still fairly fresh, so I figured I'd try making my version of a shrimp po' boy sandwich for lunch today.

Here's the list of ingredients I used and how I made this spur of the moment lunch.
Hoagie roll; lightly butter the inside of the bun and lay it flat in a pre-heated pan on medium-high heat and just brown the bread (about 1-2 minutes depending on the heat of the pan). I used my panini pan for this, the trick is making sure the pan is hot enough and do
n't use too much butter.

I generously applied Ronda's home made roasted red pepper sauce to the roll and heated up a pan to medium-high heat with 1 tsp garlic oil and re-heated the shrimp and bacon. I laid that all down on top of a slice of swiss on the roll, let it melt and added some romaine lettuce to the top and voila, my po' boy sandwich. This was the first time I've made one of these and I rather liked it - good stuff!

Ingredients: Hoagie Roll, Cooked shrimp with garlic, Bacon, Swiss Cheese, Sauce (options: aoili, mayo, tobasco, mustard), Lettuce/Tomatos (optional)



Have a great weekend everyone!

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Jumbalaya Wraps Revisited

Fantastic Jambalaya

On Today's Menu we had Jumbalaya wraps. These tasty burrito's of sorts are fairly easy to make, just a bit of chopping prep then enjoy the aromas as you cook everything together - its real
ly really good, and good for you. Plus its a nice way to clean out the fridge heh

Ingredients

Makes 2-3 servings (actually it makes almost 3-4 if you throw in a few more shrimp)
Total Time 40 minutes (there is a lot of slicing and dicing)

1/4 cup dry converted rice
1/2 cup hot water
3 oz. andouille or kielbasa sausage, sliced thinly on the bias (this is good to do)
2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1/3 cup diced onion
1/3 cup diced celery
1/3 cup diced green bell pepper
8 large shrimp, peeled and deveined (add more if you like shrimp, I suggest cutting them in half - make 'em easier to eat in the burrito)
2 tsp. chopped garlic (or more if you're a garlic maniac like me)
1/2 cup shredded cooked chicken (boil the chicken, then shred with a fork)
1/3 cup quartered cherry tomatos (these taste great, we also have used heirlooms)
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley
1 tsp Tabasco sauce
kosher salt to taste
2 burrito-size flour tortillas (10 inch)

Cook rice in hot water according to method on package, keep rice warm
Brown andouille sausage in oil in a medium saute pan over medium-high heat about 3 minutes
Stir In onion, celery, and bell pepper; saute about 5 minutes. Add shrimp and garlic; cook, stirring constantly until shrimp turns opaque, about 3 minutes.
Add chicken, tomatoes, and rice; cook just to heat through, about 3 minutes. Stir in parsely and Tabasco; season to taste.
Divide jambalaya evenly between tortillas; roll to wrap

Tonite Ronda created a special sauce that we added that was really good: Blend in a food processor: Sour Cream, Cream Cheese, Cream Fraiche, Sun dried Tomatoes, Roasted Red Bell Pepper, and a few other things (I gotta ask her what she put in it again so I can list everything and add quantities)

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Lunch Time

Panini Sandwich

Wikipedia's description:

A panino (Italian pronunciation: [paˈniːno]) is a sandwich made from a small roll or loaf of bread, typically a ciabatta or a rosetta. The loaf is cut horizontally and filled with salami, ham, cheese, mortadella or other food, and sometimes served hot after having pressed in a grill.

A toasted panino, colloquially called "toast" by Italians, is made out of two vertical slices of pane in cassetta almost invariably filled with prosciutto and a few of slices of processed cheese, grilled in a sandwich press.

It is traditionally served without any kind of sauce or topping, although in some parts of the world it may be customary to do so in order to accommodate local taste.

The word "panino" [pa'ni:no] is Italian (literally meaning small bread roll), with the plural panini. "Panini" is often used in a singular sense by speakers of English and French, as for "salami" (Italian plural for salame), and pluralised solecistically into "paninis".

In Italian, panino refers properly to a bread roll and a "panino imbottito" (literally "stuffed panino") to a sandwich; so a paninoteca is a sandwich bar. In Central Italy, there is a popular version of panino which is filled with porchetta, i.e. slices of roasted pork.

I've enjoyed making these ever since I finally got a panini pan several years ago (that's mine pictured to the right).

Today's lunch menu was my favorite: turkey pesto panini sandwich with french onion sunchips and homemade chocolate brownie squares. (pictured above)

Ingredients:
Sliced Turkey (from the deli)
Sliced Swiss Cheese
Fresh Pesto (from your deli or homemade)
Brown Mustard (optional)
Lettuce & Tomatoes Sliced (optional)
Butter
Parmesan Cheese

Directions:
Butter outer sides of bread and sprinkle parmesan cheese and pat it down so it will stick to the butter (this is for the outside of the bread that is to be cooked)
Spread pesto on one slice of bread, mustard on the other slice
Pile on turkey and swiss (quantity is up to you)
Add lettuce and tomatoes (optional)
Assemble sandwich with both slices
Heat panini pan to med-hot and cook one side for approximately 2 minutes, then flip and cook the otherside with the lid on pressing the sandwich down for another 2 minutes.

Enjoy!

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Side Bar - BBQ Humor

Garfield's appetite for BBQ

Monday, September 14, 2009

A Good Bowl of Chili

Our version of Chili

This morning it was a bit rainy out and the perfect weather for making a big pot of home made chili or maybe chicken soup.

Tonite we made our version of chili

Ingredients
1 lb of ground beef
1/2 onion chopped/diced
3-4 cloves of garlic chopped
1 can of diced stewed tomatoes
1 can tomato sauce
1 can tomato paste
1 can chili beans
1 can black beans
1 can tamales
1 Tbsp cummin (or add to taste)
1 Tbsp chili powder (or add to taste)

Directions
Brown and chop up the ground beef, add onions and cook til softened, add garlic and cook about 2 minutes. Add all canned items except tamales and add all seasonings. Cook about 20 minutes, cut the tamales into 1" pieces and add and stir, be sure not to over stir and disintegrate the tamales. Server hot with shredded cheddar cheese and either crackers or corn bread

Enjoy!

Side Bar - Global Table Manners

Test out your knowledge of table manners around the globe
TABLE MANNERS
<--click here

Side Bar - Bottled Water

Occasionally I'll be posting what I call "Side Bars" - information about food related subjects, but not necessarily about cooking or recipes. Read on...

Interesting video about bottled water.
We've all had it, we all enjoy it, but is it worth it?

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Pizza Time

Believe it or not, Americans eat 75 acres of pizza a day!

The dinner menu for tonight was home made pizza. We made two different types;

The first pizza was what we call our "traditional" - it's tomato sauce with shredded mozzarella and fontina cheeses with sliced shallots, olives, green bell pepper, mushrooms and turkey pepperoni on top of fresh made pizza dough. (sometimes we add sausage too)

The second pizza was a funky new recipe for us - "pizza with smoked salmon" by Wolfgang Puck. Seriously, the guy's a millionaire, he's doing something right.... most of his recipes are pretty decent.

For this smoked salmon pizza I made the garlic chili oil (see recipe below) the night before by boiling 1 cup olive oil with 1-2 head(s) of garlic for about 15 minutes until they turned golden brown (be careful, don't burn them!), set the pot aside to cool for a while. After the oil has cooled add red pepper flakes to absorb into the oil for a few hours or overnight. Next pour the oil thru a strainer into a bottle. (that's the oil I made pictured to the left)

Our traditional version pizza came out great, the flavors mix together very well, it's no wonder its our favorite classic blend. (click on any photo to see a larger detailed view)

The smoked salmon pizza came out pretty good too but it was rich and a tad on the salty side (from the salmon) I think it would make for a better appetizer cut up into thinner slices, instead of as an entrée in larger slices... but don't get me wrong - it was very tasty.

Here's the recipe for the smoked salmon pizza:

Ingredients
- 6 oz of Pizza Dough (make your own or you can find ready to bake dough at your local grocer - we've found it at Trader Joes and WinCo)
- 1 Tbsp garlic - chili oil (prepare this as described above)
- 1/4 cup thinly sliced red onion
- 2 Tbsp dill cream (recipe below)
- 2 1/2 oz of smoked salmon
- 1 Tsp chipped fresh chives

Directions
  1. Place a pizza stone on the middle rack of the oven and preheat the oven to 500°F.
  2. On a lightly floured surface, stretch or roll out the dough into an 8- inch circle, with the outer edge a little thicker than the inner circle. Brush the dough with the oil and arrange the onions over the pizza. Slide a pizza paddle or rimless baking sheet under the pizza and then slide the pizza onto the pizza stone. Bake until the crust is golden brown, 6 to 8 minutes.
  3. With the pizza paddle or a large spatula, carefully remove the pizza from the oven and set it on a cutting board. Use a knife, an icing spatula, or the back of a spoon to spread the Dill Cream over the inner circle. Arrange the slices of salmon so that they cover the entire pizza, slightly overlapping the raised rim. Sprinkle the chopped chives over the salmon. Using a pizza cutter or a large sharp knife, cut the pizza into 4 or 6 slices. Serve immediately
Dill Cream
- 1 1/2 cups sour cream
- 3 Tbsp minced shallots
- 2 Tbsp fresh dill leaves, chopped
- 1 1/2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
- 1/4 fresh ground white pepper

mix well in medium bowl, cover with plastic wrap and refridgerate until ready to use.

Football Food Munchies

Are you ready for some football?

Sunday is traditionally NFL Football Day, generations of Americans have made this a past time at their houses for decades and today is that big day. Lots of folks fire up the grill, bust out the beers and chow down on munchies of all types, from chips to hot dogs to tacos.

In our household, we usually crank up the big screen and start with the football talk shows and we let those shows run while we work around the house and get a few things done. Then its game time.

To make this a nice easy relaxing day, we get lazy on the food prep and do what I call "cheating". We pick up a few frozen appetizers and we'll make those through out the day, just snacking here and there as we're watching the games. This is kind of a brunch of sorts for us.

Personally I don't recommend buying pre-packaged stuff like this often because there's usually a ton of calories in these things. Home made food is always the best and most times more nutritious. However, once in a while is not bad and there's something really nice about not having to spend time prepping food and cooking for at least one day a week.

Today's cooking chores will be easy... I just unwrap the appetizer, pop it in the oven (microwaving just isn't the as good as baking) and in about 15-20 minutes we have our food with easy clean up being a simple toss of the wrapper into the recycle can.

We've tried many different frozen appetizers over the years and I can tell you, we've had some bad ones, but once in a while we've had some really good ones.

We've found some really good appetizer selections at our local Trader Joe's Grocery store, they're one of our favorite places to shop for groceries in Folsom (in addition to WinCo, Raley's and The Nugget).

Our menu today is Mini Beef Tacos, Chicken Empanaditas, Pizza Rolls, Arancini and of course some ice cold beer to wash it all down .. a junk food junkies delight. (stay tuned for more later, I'm going to be making a salmon pizza).

We made an interesting find the other day at Grocery Outlet - some Wolfgang Puck appetizers, figured it can't be that bad if Wolfgang put his name on it.

Here's the description: Arancini, Italian risotto balls blended with shiitake
mushrooms and three cheeses. Included tomato-basil-garlic sauce. As I was hoping, this was really good. In fact everything we're having is pretty decent.

I'm surprised that "tv dinners" have evolved so well. They're nice for a good quick meal.

Have a great Sunday everyone and I hope your favorite teams win today!

Go 49er's!

Saturday, September 12, 2009

Breakfast of Champions

A Good Breakfast

Today we awoke to the sound of thunder and a bit of rain pitter pattering on our patio, it is really nice and cool out there right now with the clouds over head and nice breezes cooling down what is supposed to be a very warm day in the mid 90's

Both Ronda and I got up early this morning and we started making our favorite breakfast together...

We started off by boiling some tiny fingerling potatoes that we picked up at the Folsom Farmers Market last Sunday.

After boiling them just a bit, we cut them up and pan fried them with garlic and butter.

The only spice added besides the garlic was our favorite spice mix called Cavenders All Purpose Greek Seasonings

To accompany our breakfast today we made some bacon which also makes for some great left overs in BLT sandwiches later.

The main dish was scrambled eggs with sautéed diced onions, diced fresh picked green bell peppers from our garden, and my personal favorite - sautéed mushrooms.

After the vegi's were nicely cooked, I added the beaten eggs to the mix, cooked them all for a few minutes and viola, the breakfast of champions is ready to eat!

Final product is pictured at the top of this article.

Hope everyone has a great Saturday!

Friday, September 11, 2009

A Rainbow of Colors

Ever notice how colorful foods can be?

Foods come in a wide variety of different colors, they are like paint and cooking is the artistic creation with the plate being the artists canvas.

Culinary art means not only cooking right and mixing the right herbs, spices and ingredients to create a great meal, but its
also all about presentation - how the dish looks, is it appealing or does it look bad?


Every artist (chef) strives to create a dish that not only tastes great but looks appetizing - thats what keeps people coming back for more.

Food is an art form, finding a great artist can results in great gastronomic rewards!


Salmon and Bagels


Lox, Stock and Smoking Bagels

When I first heard of this combination of foods as a kid, I thought "what the heck? that sounds gnarly". It was years before I finally tried it as an adult and discovered that hey! this food combination goes pretty good together!

I smoked some salmon yesterday and this morning Ronda asked for lox on bagels for breakfast, so after slicing the salmon all up, I made a bagel each for her and I.

It's very easy to make (well except for the smoking the salmon yourself part).
I highly recommend you use some good salmon, you can buy your smoked salmon at your local deli or grocery store, or make your own at home like I did.


Ingredients & Directions

Toast 2 bagels
Spread cream cheese on bagel (how ever much you like)
Sprinkle dill over cream cheese
Put smoked salmon slices on top of cream cheese

ENJOY!

Smoking Salmon

BBQ, God's gift to Foodies since the cave man

I've been a bbq chef since I learned to play with matches and roasted my first hot dog over an open flame on my moms bbq in our backyard. I still remember that day, I burned the hot dog to a crisp, but for some strange reason I liked that crunchiness, it seemed to taste good, but heck, what did I know.. I was only a kid.. I've learned a lot since then...

I love to bbq, I think it's some kind of Neanderthal trait in my dna that makes me desire to cook meats over an open flame.... it's that lust for fire that seems to always mesmorize us so much when we're sitting around a campfire at night staring at the dancing flames.

As we all know there'a a lot more to bbq'ing then just slapping some meat on top of some burning coals. There's direct and indirect cooking, there's charcoal and propane and
then there's smoking...

Smoking meats is a different and very unique way to cook meats and create incredible flavors.

There's a saying that must always be followed when smoking meats - do it LOW and SLOW. That means cook on a very low heat (150-250 degrees at the most).

I have an electric smoker box (pictured to the left)

Today I made some smoked salmon using the following recipe for brining (which is a necessary process for good smoked fish)

Ingredients
1 cup kosher salt
½ cup sugar
½ cup dark brown sugar
1 Tbsp crushed black peppercorns
2 large salmon fillets (pin bones removed)

Directions
In a bowl, mix together salt, sugar, brown sugar and peppercorns. Spread extra-wide aluminum foil a little longer than the length of the fish and top with an equally long layer of plastic wrap. Sprinkle 1/3 of the rub onto the plastic. Lay 1 side of the fish skin down onto the rub. Sprinkle 1/3 of the rub onto the flesh of the salmon. Place second side of salmon, flesh down onto the first side. Use the remaining rub to cover the skin on the top piece. Fold plastic over to cover then close edges of foil together and crimp tightly around the fish.

Place wrapped fish onto a plank or sheet pan and top with another plank or pan. Weigh with a heavy phone book or a brick or two and refrigerate for 12 hours. Flip the fish over and refrigerate another 12 hours. Some juice will leak out during the process so make sure there's a place for the runoff to gather.

Unwrap fish and rinse off the cure with cold water. Pat salmon with paper towels then place in a cool, dry place (not the refrigerator) until the surface of the fish is dry and matte-like, 1 to 3 hours depending on humidity. A fan may be used to speed the process.

Smoke fish over smoldering hardwood chips or sawdust, keeping the temperature inside the smoker between 150 degrees F and 160 degrees F until the thickest part of the fish registers 150 degrees. Serve immediately or cool to room temperature, wrap tightly and refrigerate for up to 3 days.


ENJOY!

A mixed meal

Free form cooking (aka winging it)

This dinner menu was thrown together at the last minute but it worked out great. The combination of flavors blended with the many different food textures worked out better then we planned.

I don't have all the recipes for these items but will make sure I include those, along with photos to show what I'm writing about in the future. IMO, food is an art and sometimes it looks very good and photogenic (heh, did I just write that?)

Tonite it was grilled baja-citrus chicken breasts, made with a marinade that soaked into the chicken overnight. I grilled them for about 20 minutes. The marinade was by grill-mates purchased at the store, its a great mix of just the right spices, mix it with oil oil and some water, put it in a zip lock bag with the chicken overnight and voila, its fantastic. Grill-mates also has other flavor mixes too (I'll have to list them here in the future). Look for them at your local store. (hey can I get paid for these kind of endorsements? I wish)

For our appetizer of sorts, I sliced fresh zucchini from our garden, fresh heirloom tomatoes from the Folsom Farmers Market and a red onion and put them in a bowl with a mixture of white vinegar, balsamic vinegar, salt and garlic powder. I tossed it all and put it in the fridge to chill.

Ronda made the side dish which was spectacular, it was fried corn cakes made out of fresh cut corn on the cob that we picked up at last weekend's Folsom Farmers Market. (I'll have to find the recipe and post it)

The combination of the zucchini & tomato salad with the spicy chicken and crispy fresh corn cakes was fantastic - this was a dinner to be repeated.

Related subject - Ronda and I have gone out to dinner at many many places all over, over the years, and I dined all around the globe when I used to travel for work. I think we know our food (or I like to think so anyways) and for the most part we know how food should be priced. So sometimes we rate our dishes by putting a price on it - for example, tonite's dinner would be about a $14-18 dollar plate.

Stay tuned for more soon!

Let the good times roll

First post in my new "Today's Menu" blog

This blog is going to be about what my wife (Ronda) and I (Dave) are cooking on a given day. We both like to cook a lot, I myself (Dave) dream of being a chef, for now I enjoy working the culinary arts at home. Ronda and I are both very good cooks and we love trying out new recipes all the time. Sometimes we find some really good ones that are worth repeating... and sharing.

This post is about a new spin on jambalaya, taking it in a casual direction by rolling it all up in tortilla's for two. All the tastes and spices in a package that can be taken on the go or chowed down at the dinner table with a nice side of fried okra.


I've noticed there's been a new trend of using tortilla's in more dishes ever since NASA announced they use tortilla's instead of bread because they don't make messy crumbs.

With today's society always on the go, people wanting a convenient grub grab are eating more and more from drive thru's these days to help them keep up with their busy lives. IMO, that's not exactly healthy but it is happening more and more.

Enough rambling about drive thru's... .this recipe was found in August's "Cuisine at Home" issue, and like every recipe from this subscription, its a really good one.

This is my first post in my new "Today's Menu" blog so I don't have photos for the first few stories, but I will be sure to add lots of nice photos to my future blogs on food.

Jumbalaya Wraps
Makes 2 servings (actually it makes almost 3-4 if you throw in a few more shrimp)
Total Time 40 minutes (there is a lot of slicing and dicing)

1/4 cup dry converted rice
1/2 cup hot water
3 oz. andouille or kielbasa sausage, sliced thinly on the bias (this is good to do)
2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1/3 cup diced onion
1/3 cup diced celery
1/3 cup diced green bell pepper
8 large shrimp, peeled and deveined (add more if you like shrimp, I suggest cutting them in half - make 'em easier to eat in the burrito)
2 tsp. chopped garlic (or more if you're a garlic maniac like me)
1/2 cup shredded cooked chicken (boil the chicken, then shred with a fork)
1/3 cup quartered cherry tomatos (these taste great, we also have used heirlooms)
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley
1 tsp Tabasco sauce
kosher salt to taste
2 burrito-size flour tortillas (10 inch)

Cook rice in hot water according to method on package, keep rice warm
Brown andouille sausage in oil in a medium saute pan over medium-high heat about 3 minutes
Stir In onion, celery, and bell pepper; saute about 5 minutes. Add shrimp and garlic; cook, stirring constantly until shrimp turns opaque, about 3 minutes.
Add chicken, tomatoes, and rice; cook just to heat through, about 3 minutes. Stir in parsely and Tabasco; season to taste.
Divide jambalaya evenly between tortillas; roll to wrap

Enjoy these jumbalaya burrito's with a side of Fried Okra, read on for the recipe

Fried Okra
Fresh okra is best, but if you can't find any, frozen will work almost as well. Thaw and dry frozen okra before tossing it with cornmeal for frying

Combine 1/4 cup cornmeal, 1 Tbsp all-purpose flour, and 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper in a bowl. Add 1 1/2 cups of sliced okra and toss to coat
Pour vegetable oil into a saute pan to a depth of 1/2 inch; heat to 350 degrees. Add okra and fry until golden, about 5 minutes.
Remove okra with slotted spoon; drain on a paper-towel-lined pate. Season okra with kosher salt and black pepper to taste

ENJOY!