Post-Thanksgiving

Well, my turkey-induced tryptophan coma has finally cleared. I know I'm 'way late this week, but it took awhile to recover from the Big T. I cooked for 13 guests most of Wednesday and half of Thursday, and then spent the weekend rushing around with other things...

I thought I'd pass on some of my new and old favorite holiday recipes.

Strawberry Grapefruit Pie

What a great tart-sweet counter to all the richness of typical Thanksgiving dishes!

This was my new discovery for Turkey Day 2016. We got a whole bag of yummy Texas Reds, and I went looking for other things to make besides fruit-inna-bowl. This pie is as simple as can be:

1-2 Ruby Red Grapefruit, peeled and sectioned

1 box Strawberry Jell-O tm

1 Graham Cracker Pie crust (store-bought or home-made)

Place the grapefruit pieces in the pie crust. Make up the Jell-O according to package directions. Pour the Jell-O over the grapefruit and put the pie in the fridge to chill for at least a few hours. Longer is better.

I made the mistake of keeping the grapefruit segments whole as you can see in the photo. It makes a pretty pie that way, but a pie that's hard to eat. Cut the sections into bite-sized pieces!!

Red Cooked Turkey

It's been a couple years since I posted my favorite way to make turkey (or other poultry for that matter. I swear I learned this from Martin Yan, of Yan Can Cook, back when Saturday morning PBS was the equivalent of Food Network, but I can't find the actual recipe anywhere.

If you're like us, you mostly go for turkey breast anyway. Legs and thighs are OK for Turkey curry or ragout or whatever else you do with those lesser leftovers. In the past that breast has oven been far too dry. Nevermore! As the Raven said.  The only thing you don't get in this recipe is crispy turkey skin.  That's OK... I can do without.

Just in time for Christmas, this recipe can be adapted from a 8-14 lb turkey breast to a whole chicken or two, or bags of chicken parts; and it's this simple:

1. Put the meat in a large stockpot n your stove top.
2. Fill the pot to cover the meat by 1 inch with half soy sauce and half water, plus one whole Star Anise. Yep soy sauce and licorice!! Have no fear.
3. Remove the meat from the pot, and bring the liquid to a hard rolling boil.
4. Return the meat to the pot and bring things back to a hard rolling boil.
5. Turn the heat off. Put a lid on the pot, and WALK AWAY FOR TWO HOURS!

That's it!! Now you're free to use the oven for all those other great holiday dishes we all love.

The heat from the boiling liquid, the pot and the stove top takes that flavor all the way to the bone! You have the most moist, juicy, flavor-filled turkey breast you can imagine. 

 IT DOES NOT TASTE OF SOY SAUCE OR LICORICE, it tastes of “please sir can I have some more?”. People who normally hate turkey (including my foodie friend Sara Peterson) ask for seconds and thirds!

This year I got a 13 lb boneless breast.  HUGE!!  When it came time to assemble, I "accidentally" used a lot more soy sauce than normal (I was trying to use up the jug of rich, dark, mushroom soy sauce I bought last year).  When it came time to serve I cut the meat into 1/2" and 3/4" slabs and let folks pick what they wanted.  The picture above shows a leftover slab which was stored in the fridge in some of the braising liquid -- hence the dark surface.  Still the inside is white and tender and juicy!

Update: I've been thinking that this technique can go far beyond Chinese. I made a ham this year to a recipe by my friend Sara, which called for simmering the meat in a large jug of Sangria with additional fruit. I used my slow cooker for 4 hours on High. But I'm thinking there's no reason you couldn't use the Red Cooking technique and half the time.  If  you like Coq au Vin, use chicken and cheap red wine.

And what about a Mojo infused Pork Roast..... Now where'd I put that stockpot....

My Green Bean Casserole

My take on this 1950s classic. Cook this in the oven while your Red Cooked Turkey is on the stove top. Using Alfredo sauce cuts out all the salt from the Cream of Mushroom soup. Minced crimini mushrooms ensure the quintessential mushroom flavor remains. I like my green beans al dente rather than squeaky so I only cooked them half an hour. If you like softer beans go for more time!

2 lbs fresh Green Beans, tipped and cut in half

2 cups Alfredo Sauce

1/2c cup Milk or Half & Half

1/4c cup minced Crimini mushrooms

1 Tbsp Soy Sauce

1/4t tsp Black Pepper

French Fried Onions to taste.

Preheat over to 350F.

Lay green beans and mushrooms in a suitable baking dish Combine Alfredo sauce, milk, pepper and soy sauce, and pour over the beans. Top with onions as desired. Bake 30 minutes. Remove from oven, top with more onions, and serve.

Banana Bars

Harvested and ripened another big bunch of bananas (20).

So it's time for another banana recipe. Here's a quick and easy (and pretty healthy) banana bar that I first posted back in 2014. No added sugar, for those of you watching such things in your diet. Gluten free too. Easily made lactose free. Diabetic friendly.. All that good marketing hype.

3 ripe Bananas, peeled

1/3 cup Applesauce (no sugar added variety)

2 cups Rolled Oats

¼ cup Almond or real Milk

½ cup Raisins or other dried fruit

1 tsp Vanilla extract

1 tsp ground Cinnamon

Mash everything together in a bowl until well mixed. Turn out into a 9x9 baking dish or 9x4 loaf pan. Bake at 350F for 20-30 minutes. Makes a dense, chewy 'bar' that would be a great lunch bag addition.

Cashew Chicken, Yams, Trifle and Black-eyed Peas

Cashew Chicken

Another great recipe from Guest Chef Fiona Barnes. An English take on a traditional Chinese dish with chicken and cashews in a light soy/ginger/garlic sauce.

Fiona usually does this in a slow cooker, but we used the electric skillet set down to 200F. Cooked in about two hours. Serves 4.

4 Chicken Breasts, boneless, skinless, cut into short strips and pieces

4oz. Cashews - unsalted

3 Tbsp Corn Starch

4 Tbsp Soy Sauce

2 Tbsp Brown Sugar

4 Tbsp Ketchup

4 Tbsp Rice Wine Vinegar

1” finger fresh Ginger, grated

2-3 cloves Garlic, minced

2 Tbsp Sweet Chili Sauce (I like Frank's Red Hot Sweet Chili Sauce tm)

1/4t tsp Red Pepper Flakes

Salt & Pepper to taste

Rice – we used Valencia because it was what we had on hand.

Cinnamon Baked Sweet Potatoes

Fiona served these as a tasty counterpoint alongside her Cashew Chicken. Our Thanksgiving guests will be having them alongside the turkey and ham. Just sweet and cinnamon-y enough! This recipe serves 4.

2 large Sweet Potatoes, peeled and sliced into 1/2” thick crescents

1/2s stick Butter

2 Tbsp Honey or Cane Syrup

1 tsp Cinnamon

Melt the butter, honey and cinnamon together in the microwave. Coat each slice of potato with the melted yummy. Stack in a 9x9 dish, 2 slices deep. Cover and bake at 400F for 30-45 minutes. Enjoy!

Traditional English Trifle

It seems no English dinner is complete without some form of dessert.    This is Fiona's take on a traditional favorite.

You need a large, deep glass bowl; called a Trifle Bowl. This is somewhat smaller in diameter but much deeper than a standard mixing bowl.

Start with Sponge Cake to cover the bottom of the bowl. Use store-bought cake like those strawberry shortcake things, or lady's fingers. If you can find lady's fingers, they are often stood up around the inside wall of the trifle, as well as to cover the bottom. Once the bottom is in place, some people add a layer of strawberry or raspberry jam on top or between two layers of thin spongecake. Sprinkle 1-3 tablespoons of Sherry on top the sponge.

Now add a layer of drained Fruit. Fiona used canned Mandarin Oranges, and reserved the juice for later. Here in Florida we could use any sort of tropical fruit to kick things up – kiwi, mango, banana, papaya, carambola, pineapple, etc.

Make up a batch of flavored Jello-O tm. Fiona used Orange, to go along with the mandarin fruit. She also used the reserved mandarin juice as part of the cold water added to the Jell-O. Gently pour the Jell-O over the layers in the bowl and put the bowl in the fridge to set up.

If you want a really big trifle, you can repeat all of the above for a second level of yumminess!!

Two last layers complete the trifle. First a layer of Custard. Brits usually use Birds tm brand powdered custard mix. Follow directions to make a pint of custard. 

 If you absolutely can't find Birds custard powder, you can, reluctantly, use a packet of vanilla pudding mix.

After the custard layer has set in the fridge, the last layer is real Whipped Cream – a 1/2 pint container of heavy cream whipped into stiff peaks and spread over all. You could wimp out with that imitation stuff from the freezer section, but it just would not be the same. Garnish the final result with a few bits of fruit, or sliced almonds, or shaved chocolate.

Blackeyed Peas Tex-Mex Style

Super simple. I created this as a side dish for watching the Gators beat the LSU Tigers in the last 3 seconds of a hotly contested game that was delayed from when Hurricane Matthew gave central and western Florida a close miss a month or so ago.

1 cup dry Blackeyed Peas

1 can Ro*Tel Chili Fixin's

Cook the peas about 1-1/2 hours on low, until tender. Drain. Toss with the Chili Fixin's and serve. The Fixin's adds a great smokiness from chiles en adobo and roasted tomatoes.  You can also mash this preparation, and make a great scoopable chip dip.

Chicken Leeks & Feta, Blood Orange Cake and more...

Sorry about the week's delay, but I had horrible muscle pain for a couple weeks, that have finally faded. Hurt so much I could not bend over, or lift my legs enough to put on socks, or tie my shoes! Migraine type headache for a week on top of it all. We think it was an interaction between the statin I take for high cholesterol and one or more other drugs I take for my diabetes, probably triggered by a couple months of gym workouts. As soon as your body starts getting better, it smacks you just to see if you're serious about getting healthier.

This week's post is a combination of things for your dining delight. Sally's oldest friend and her husband came to spend almost a month with us, in celebration of their 35^th wedding anniversary. Fiona and Sally grew up in Brighton, on the south coast. Today Fiona and her husband Toby Barnes live in Mablethorpe, on the northeast coast of England.

Fiona's Chicken with Leeks and Feta

Our Guest Chef this week, Fiona Barnes, has been friends for some 45 years! She's a great cook herself, and I sure don't mind sharing a few column inches to showcase her most excellent dish!

4 Chicken Breasts, boneless, skinless, and butterflied

2 large Leeks, sliced into thin rings just into the green ends

1 lbs New Potatoes, quartered - she used Dutch Yellow

7 oz block Feta, cubed and crumbled

1 stick unsalted Butter

1/2 cup chopped Mint leaves

Steam the potatoes. While they're working, cook the leeks over medium heat. Add half a stick of butter and a dash of salt & pepper to taste as they start to cook. Reserve the leeks when softened.

Lay the butterflied chicken out on a griddle pan, and dust with salt and pepper to taste. Fire the broiler to High, and cook about 5 minutes on the beauty side, then flip and cook the second side of the chicken 3-4 minutes. You want the meat done, but not browned.

Pull the pan from the oven, and top each breast with ¼ of the leeks and ¼ of the feta. Return the pan to the broiler for 3-5 minutes until the feta just gets a bit brown on the edges. Plate the finished breasts.

Put the hot potatoes in a bowl, top with a couple tablespoon sized dollops of butter, and the chopped mint. Stir with a large spoon of a minute or so until the butter is melted and the mint evenly distributed. The scent of the heated mint is intoxicating!! Serve alongside the plated chicken.

What great flavors!! The mint and feta play wonderful counterharmonies with each other. Simple but savory and oh, so good. You've gotta try this one folks!

Blood Orange Sponge Cake

It's been dog's years since I've made a cake from scratch. Knowing I'm a fan of The Great British Bake Off program, Fiona brought me a copy of the cookbook from Season 2, called How To Bake The Perfect Victoria Sponge and Other Baking Secrets. You'll be hearing about other recipes over the coming weeks/months, but while surfing through the delicacies, my eye was first caught by a Blood Orange Sponge Cake recipe. I love Blood Oranges, and earlier this year, as they were going out of season, I frozen about a dozen whole fruit. This recipe, I thought, would be a perfect use for these dark beauties.

One thing I learned the hard way is that what the Brits call “caster sugar” is not the same as our “confectioner's sugar” as I had always been led to believe. In the first step I used confectioner's sugar rather than granulated sugar, and the mixing took 4 times as long as it should have! You'll want to use an 8” non-stick Springform pan for this recipe, and line the bottom with parchment paper. A common 9” pan would make too thin a cake.

For the Sponge:

6 large Eggs, at room temp

6 oz. Granulated Sugar

3-1/2 oz. Almond Flour

3 oz Slivered Almonds

Zest of 2 Blood Oranges

For the Syrup:

4 oz Granulated Sugar

Juice of 4 Blood Oranges

Preheat the oven to 350F. Separate the eggs putting yolks and eggs in separate large bowls. Freeze one blood orange to make slicing it easier.

To the yolks add the 6 oz of sugar and the orange zest. Beat with an electric mixer for 3-5 minutes until the mixture is thick like a mousse. Fold in the almond flour.

Beat the egg whiles until you get very stiff peaks. Fold the eggwhites gently into the yolk mixture, in three additions, until well combined. Lastly fold in the slivered almonds.

Spoon the sponge into the springform pan and spread it evenly. Bake for 45 minutes or until the sponge is golden brown and springy when pressed lightly. During the baking the mix will swell up like a souffle and then gradually sink.

While the sponge is baking, make the syrup. Combine the sugar and blood orange juice in a pan, bring to a simmer, stirring often until the sugar is dissolved. Continue cooking for 2-3 minutes, then set aside to cool slightly. Makes about a cup of syrup.

When the sponge is done, remove it from the oven and set the pan on a large plate. Run a round-tipped knife around the inside of the pan to loosen it sponge. Stab the cake all over with a skewer or chopstick. Pour the warm syrup all over the top, reserving about a quarter cup.

When it's time to serve, slice the frozen orange into thin rounds and place them on top of the cake. Heat the remaining syrup in the microwave (30 seconds) and pour it all over the top of the cake. You can garnish with more slivered almonds if you choose. The cake won't keep long, but it is so tasty, it's not going to last more than 24 hours in the fridge.

This one is a "Show Stopper, folks!  You've gotta try this one!

Lemon-Basil Butter Salmon

Simple is as simple does. Juice of a lemon, quarter cup of chopped fresh basil, half a cup of melted butter. Stir together, brush over salmon or other filets while they cook on a bed of diced onion and tomato.

Simple No-Boil Lasagna

Our English guests got to try out my new, simpler version of Lasagna twice this week. As a main dish on Thursday, and again on Sunday as a “lite” dinner (smaller squares).

12 Lasagna Noodles

1-1/2 lb “meatloaf mix” (Beef, Veal, Pork)

2 cloves Garlic, chopped

1 tsp dried Oregano or Italian seasoning

Salt and ground Black Pepper to taste

16 ounce small curd Cottage Cheese

2 Eggs, beaten

1/2 cup grated Parmesan Cheese

1-1/2  jars tomato-basil pasta sauce (I used 1 jar red sauce, 1/2 jar Alfredo sauce)

12 oz box of sliced Crimini or White Mushrooms

2 cups shredded Mozzarella Cheese

Sauté meat with garlic, herbs and spices. In a separate bowl combine the sauces and beaten eggs. In a bowl, combine the cottage cheese and Parmesan. In a 9x13 baking dish lay down a splash of the sauce. Lay down three noodles length-wise and a shorter piece across the end,

Layer the sauce, then the cottage/Parmesan, and top with half of meat. Next lay down the entire package of mushrooms. Now repeat layering the sauce, meat and cottage/Parm. Top everything with the mozzarella. 

Cover with tinfoil and bake in a 350F pre-heated oven for 45 minutes. Remove the foil and cook for an additional 10 minutes or until the cheese gets brown and bubbly. Wait at least 15 minutes before serving.