My friend, Virginia Taylor is an AWESOME self taught chef (whereas I am a self taught cook, there is a difference!). Last night she hosted a fundraising dinner at her cottage on Martin's Beach in Half Moon Bay to benefit HIP Housing. She did a cooking demonstration for each of her courses so we learned a little, drank a little, laughed a little and ate a LOT! Here is what she served, hoping to teach my daughters a few of her recipes and techniques. This tasty appetizer is a Moroccan inspired Charmoula Ahi Tuna Tartare, served on both a homemade waffle potato chip and a wonton cup. Delicious flavors! I will have to make this when my daughter returns from Morocco this ... read more
Dinner at the Beach with Virginia
Greek Style Meatball Bites
I am SO excited that my very first entry into the Pillsbury Bake-off earned a spot in the FINALS of the 47th Pillsbury Bake-Off in Nashville, November 2014! These are SO good and VERY easy to make. Greek-Style Meatball Bites Prep Time: 30 Min Start to Finish: 50 Min Ingredients: 1 box (9 oz) Green Giant™Steamers™ frozen chopped spinach 3/4 lb ground lamb 2 teaspoons Watkins™ Italian Seasoning 1 teaspoon Watkins™ Onion Powder 1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese (2 oz) 1 can Pillsbury™ refrigerated classic pizza crust 1/3 cup tzatziki sauce (from 12-oz container) 1. Heat oven to 400°F. Spray 36 mini muffin cups with ... read more
Indiana Sweet Corn Salsa
I was visiting Indiana during the summer which is peak Sweet Corn season. Always a favorite is Sweet Corn Charlie's, a local farm stand near our lake cottage. I had some extra ears and wanted to put them to good use. My daughter was moving into a new house, so I put this together for her pantry. We had some red and green tomatoes from the vine along with yellow from the stand so I combined them all to make some SWEET corn salsa. Sweet Corn Salsa 4 ears of sweet corn, cut off the cob 2 Tablespoons olive oil 1/2 onion, small dice 2 cloves of garlic, minced 1-2 Jalapeño pepper, seeds removed and finely diced 1 Poblano pepper, diced 1 red or yellow pepper, ... read more
Easy Vegetarian Black Bean Soup
Easy to make, great for Lent or Vegetarians! Feel free to get creative with whatever vegetable are in season or you have lying around the house. This is a great recipe to sneak in lots of veggies or even fake meat, because the flavor of the spices and green chilis will make anything taste good! Ingredients: 2 Tbsp. Olive Oil 1/2 Onion, diced 1/2 tsp Salt 2 cloves Garlic 1 tsp. ground Cumin 1/2 tsp. paprika (if you have it) 2 cans Black Beans, rinsed under cold water 2 cups Chicken Stock (or Vegetable stock if you really want it vegetarian) 1 can diced Tomatoes 1 small can Green Chilis (whole or diced) Health tip: if you ever want to sneak some more ... read more
Lime Crunch Parfait
My mom made these for us when we were growing up as a special treat. She had pretty parfait glasses. I don't so I usually make a sundae with them, but these were made for friends so I made them in canning jars, put on the lids and froze them until it was time to take them over. Great lime taste mixed with the smooth vanilla ice cream and then the surprising crunchiness make this a perfect dessert for special dinners. Lime Crunch Parfait Lime Crunch Topping Ingredients 2 Tbls. Butter, melted 2 tsp. grated Lime peel 2 cups Rice Chex 1/4 cup Sugar Lime Syrup Ingredients 1/2 cup Sugar 1/8 tsp. Salt 4 tsp. Cornstarch 3/4 cup Water 1/4 cup fresh Lime juice 3-4 ... read more
Cabernet Poached Pears 2 Ways
I went to a farmers market at the end of their day and found a big bag of small pears for a dollar, so what to do with them? I also had a cheap bottle of Aussie red wine from Trader Joe's (cheap even for a college student) so I tried poaching. Here's what's happened...so far. (PS: You do need to plan ahead as they need to cool in the poaching liquid for at least 3 hours.) Cabernet Poached Pears Ingredients: 2 Cups of Cabernet Sauvignon 1 Orange (or a little less than a cup if using OJ) 1/4 Cup Sugar 1 Cinnamon Stick 3-4 Whole Cloves 4-5 Pears Steps: Mix the wine, juice from orange, strips of orange peels (or not if using OJ), cinnamon stick and ... read more
Totally Amazing Brisket (+Bo Ssam Style)
This recipe was published as a traditional Thanksgiving alternative but I didn't want to use all of the garnishes they used. The basics of cooking a Brisket indoors worked REALLY well, so it's one I need to post here so I won't forget. I changed parts of the recipe to work with what I had and used beer instead of water, just because I didn't really want to drink the Budweiser that we had and thought this was a much better use for it. It helped make a good au jus. PS: If using a smaller brisket, use less rub and cook shorter amount of time. Brisket ingredients: Black Pepper (to Taste) 1 6-8 pound Beef Brisket 1/2 Cup Sugar 1/2 Cup Sea Salt 6 pack of beer (some ... read more
Easy Chicken Recipes
Someone just asked me to do a little cooking demonstration for a sorority. They have a small house but great kitchen so I put together some quick and easy recipes to teach them some basics and show them how to change it up a little to make a healthy dinner for the eight of them. Easy Chicken Parmesan Ingredients: Flour, Salt and PepperBoneless Chicken Breasts Olive Oil or Vegetable Oil Pasta Sauce (your favorite jarred sauce) Mozzarella and Parmesan shredded cheese mixture Steps: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Cut the chicken in half lengthwise to make a thinner piece of chicken to cook. That way it won’t take so long to prepare. Lightly salt and ... read more
Zucchini Fritters!
It's summer time, which means lots of veggies and finding new ways to eat them. Fritters aren't really new, we just haven't eaten them very often. Easy to make, they taste great and are pretty healthy. First one... Ingredients: 2 medium Zucchini salt 1/4 cup finely chopped onion 1/2 cup finely chopped mushrooms (optional) Olive oil 1 cup flour 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese 2 tsp Emeril's Essence (you can make your own), more if you like spicy 1/2 tsp salt 1 egg 1/4 cup milk (maybe a little more) 1/4 cup feta cheese, crumbled Steps: Grate the zucchini, sprinkle with a teaspoon of salt and let drain for about a half hour. Rinse off the salt, then ... read more
Cookies, Cookies and more Cookies
I'm not that talented decorating cutout cookies...maybe I don't have the right recipe for the cutouts to begin with, but I LOVE lots of flavor in my cookies. Here are a few of the cookies that I made for Christmas this year: I love spicy ginger cookies so I made I LOVE SPICY GINGERS! that have not three but FOUR types of ginger in them. I also made Chocolate Crinkles and then chopped up some Ghirardelli peppermint bark and stirred them in for Choco-Mint Crinkles.SnickerDoodles are my other favorite and they are perfect in every way, so I just added some green to half the batter and red to the other half to make them even more Christmas like. I spend an afternoon making the dough, ... read more