Foodgeek Blog

I’ve started making dinner for my brother, sister-in-law, niece, and myself on Monday nights.  I’ve tried to vary the menu up from week to week, and last Monday my brother gave me an easy opportunity to continue to do so.  We were sitting, eating a fairly rockin’ pork roast I had made, even if I say so myself, and he said, “Next Sunday I’m going to give you four random ingredients, like they do on Chopped.”

I was thrilled, as this was what I’d been trying to get them to do all along.  It’s fun for me, because I’m an improviser, and it works out because I don’t do great with giving them ingredient lists far enough in advance for the shopping to be convenient for them.  Anyway, Sunday night I got my ingredients:

• Tomatillos
• Duck sauce
• Rice pudding
• Cinnamon pita chips

I crushed the pita chips, seasoned them with cumin, garlic powder, and black pepper, and used them to make a crusted chicken breast dish.  It came out pretty well, although if I make it again I’ll use a food processor to crush the chips rather than a meat mallet.  The large chunks didn’t stick extremely well. I’ll also use less cumin, and move the oven rack upward a notch halfway through the baking to get a crunchier crust.

I made some garlic mashed potatoes.  No magic there, other than simmering the garlic in the milk and butter before adding it to the taters.

I used the rice pudding to make some drop biscuits.  I found a basic drop biscuit recipe and used a combination of the pudding and milk to make the batter.  They were ok, but if I make them again I’ll add some sugar.  I left it out because the pudding itself was sweet, but the biscuits came out a little salty tasting.

I had been going to use the duck sauce and tomatillos to make a sort of tapenade for the mashed potatoes.  I chopped the tomatillos and simmered them in the duck sauce, and found it to be a little too tart.  Once I added brown sugar, though, it swung to the other end of the flavor spectrum and became too sweet for the potatoes.  Instead I used it as a glaze for some carrots I cooked in the microwave.

All in all, I’d say it came out pretty well.

This one ended somewhere entirely different than I intended it to go, but it was tasty nonetheless.

I just some sauteed veggies (zucchini, mushroom, tomato, onion, garlic), and then simmered them in a cream sauce (roux, half and half, garlic powder, and a little cumin), and I served the whole shebang over rice.

The rice thing was a miscalculation on my part.  Cream sauce is white, white rice is white.  It made for a boring-looking (albeit good-tasting) meal.  In retrospect I should have used some green linguine or one of the more colorful rices.

For Valentine’s Day I surprised my girlfriend with a picnic lunch at the Winery at Wolf Creek. It was still rather cold that day, so we ate indoors, but the lunch itself was picnicky enough.

Menu:

Portobello mushrooms, tomato, carmelized onions, and monterey jack cheese sandwiches on ciabatta.

I marinated the the portobello slices in a mixture of grape juice, grape jam, hot sauce, italian dressing, and lemon juice <—Sounds weird, but it came out really well. Then I sauteed them with onions and garlic.

Brie and crackers.

A bottle of White Lies, a delicious, sweet, grapey wine that they make at Wolf Creek. Hands down, my favorite wine.

For dessert, something I bought at the grocery store called a “Devil’s Delight Parfait.” Basically, it’s chunks of chocolate cake with whipped cream and a ridiculous amount of hot fudge sauce, with a cherry on top. <—-Delicious, but would have been better with more cake and less fudge sauce.

The atmosphere of the place is absolutely wonderful. The winery has both an indoor dining room (with plenty of windows, of course) and a patio which overlooks a beautiful lake at the bottom of a hill.

All in all, a very successful date. Travel was efficient, and everything went off without a hitch. Very romantic.

One of our Thursday night gatherings (which have now moved to Fridays) was a mac ‘n cheese themed evening.  Not one of the healthiest of our gatherings, but certainly one of the most delicious.  There were of course traditional mac ‘n cheeses, but other such fun options as Havarti ‘n Ham, Chicken ‘n Broccoli, Asparagus ‘n Pasta, and others that are escaping me at the moment.

My contribution was a Bacon Cheddar Mac ‘n Cheese.  Shredded cheddar cheese, milk, sour cream, and butter made up the cheese sauce.  (I didn’t measure, sorry. )  The pasta I used was medium shells.

What gave me trouble was the question of what to put on top to get all brown and wonderful. Inspiration came from a close friend and fellow foodie:  Hash browns.

In general I’m not one to give myself too hearty a pat on the back when it comes to my culinary creations.  That said:   Holy.  Freaking.  Crap.

I can’t really take credit for it’s deliciousness, though, as I don’t see how any combination of pasta, cheese, sour cream, butter, bacon, and potatoes could possibly be bad.

Ok, this had to be addressed eventually. You’ve read the tagline of the blog. “Because good food is really, really good.” The thing I left out is that not-so-good food can be pretty good, too. I recently blogged about Aldi-brand instant mac and cheese. Don’t misunderstand. I love a good, homemade mac and cheese, but sometimes the bar is just lower. You’re hungry, you’re hungry now, and dammit, you just want something processed and bad for you.

This brings me to White Castle.

Oh, White Castle. Your steam grilled (And what the hell is steam grilling?  Don’t ask me!) delights have satisfied many a craving. Yes, I love White Castle. (There! I said it!) And no, I still won’t give up my Foodie Card. I give you truth here: White Castle can be delicious, as long as you know and follow the rules.

In no particular order:

• Don’t go in expecting a burger.

This may sound strange and worrisome, but never enter a White Castle with the intention of eating a cheeseburger (or a hamburger, or any other kind of burger.) If you do, you will be severely disappointed, and probably a little grossed out. White Castle’s strength has never been making burgers. White Castle’s strength lies in making insanely cheap snack foods that are vaguely burgerlike. If you go in expecting Sliders, you’ll be much happier.

• Never go before midnight.

I violated this rule once, and it was a very unpleasant experience. The closer you go to 3 a.m., the better. I don’t know why, but 3 a.m. is the absolute perfect time for eating White Castle. There’s a witching hour joke there somewhere, but I’m not brave enough to find it.

• The fries are disappointing.

This one’s not so much a rule as a piece of advice. They’re the crinkle cut, frozen,  dump the bag onto a cookie sheet and bake kind of fries.  Less than stellar.

• Don’t split a “Crave Case” between fewer than three people.

Please, please  just trust me.

• If you’re really, really hungry, all bets are off.

There comes a point where the rules just stop mattering.  9 pm, 9 am, noon, if you’re that hungry then just hang the rules and go nuts.

Just stick to the rules, and everything will be alright.  On a side note, the clam strips are really good.  And I don’t mean “White Castle good,” I mean normal food good.

This was super fun and super easy.

1 can each of black, navy, pinto, and kidney beans (drained of liquid)

1 can corn (drained of liquid)

1 jar mild salsa

1 large can diced tomatoes

chili powder and cayenne pepper to taste

Throw it in a crock pot.

Seriously, that’s it.  Put it on low for like six hours.

The other cool thing is that I was going to a party the following day at which there were no vegetarians.  I got the same chili (as in, the same pot I’d made the previous day), added another can of diced tomatoes, two cans of off-brand Rotel, more corn, more cayenne and chili powder, several handfuls of crushed tortilla chips, and some ground meats of various types (sausage, turkey, beef), put it in a crock pot on high for four hours, and had a darn tasty traditional chili.

Before we begin:  Stuffing poblano peppers is a bad idea.  A very bad idea.  Nice flavor, but WAY too spicy.  I did two poblanos and two green bells, but when I make it again, I’ll dice a poblano, add it to the stuffing, and stuff bells with it.

green bell peppers, tops cut off, ribs and seeds removed

2 cups rice

1 or two cans black beans

1  or two cans corn

2 cans diced tomatoes and chili peppers (Rotel or equivalent)

1 Mexican sweet onion, diced

salsa

cheese

Cook the rice, add the beans, corn, and Rotel.  Stuff it inside the peppers.  I used the salsa in the same way one would use tomato sauce if one were making stuffed peppers with meat.  I put some in the bottom of the dish and poured the rest over the peppers.  Sprinkle cheese on top.  Bake covered for 30ish minutes on 375-400, and an additional 5-10 uncovered to melt the cheese.

The times are approximate, check the firmness of the pepper.  Really, it’s a matter of taste because the pepper and the onion are the only things that aren’t already cooked.

Like I said.  DON’T STUFF A POBLANO.

Otherwise very good.

P.S. – This makes a crap ton of filling, so either reduce the quantities, have plenty of peppers, or be ready to eat Mexican everything for a week.

Hey err’body.  I’ve recently decided to learn to cook vegetarian.  (I’m not a vegetarian myself, but my girlfriend is, and I figured it’d be nice to be able to make her dinner.)

My first attempt was a sort of Italian eggplant dish that I named “Eggplant a la Megan.”  Bet you can’t guess why…

Bear with me, I didn’t use a recipe, and I didn’t measure.

1 eggplant, sliced thinly

1 green bell pepper, sliced thinly

1 red bell pepper, sliced thinly

1 vidalia onion, diced

1 container of sliced mushrooms

1 jar marinara sauce

shredded cheese (I used an italian six cheese blend)

linguine

Not rocket science.  The plan had been to layer everything, bake it, and serve it over the linguine, but we ended up having to transfer it into a larger pan which destroyed the layering scheme.  Really, just mix it up and throw it into a casserole dish.  Eggplant is a soft vegetable and doesn’t require much time to cook.  Bake it for 20-30 minutes at around 375, put more cheese on top toward the end.  Serve over linguine.  Enjoy.

It came out really well, but in retrospect I’d have used more sauce and more cheese.  Also, the layering thing would have been nice if it had worked out.  This could be done as a lasagna fairly easily as well.

From the Drawing Board, I’ve got a Morel Dilemma below.

There’s also another recipe in the works: Having become the Unofficial Cold Soup Guru at our Thursday night gatherings, I’m in the process of coming up with a completely original soup recipe. I’m thinking a fruit puree, maybe tropical. More to come…

Going back to the drawing board (he he), I’m in research to create the perfect recipe for a margarita.  (Not to be confused with the Perfect Margarita recipe.)