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Home > 234
KitchenKatalog: Blog 234
Tuesday, May 26, 2015, 11:30 PM
I had this idea when we were in New Orleans. I made Jambalaya with cauliflower rice. I based it on Emril's recipe (linked below) but made a few changes. First of all, I didn't make my own seasoning and just used the premade version of his. The biggest change is that I used less shrimp, skipped the chicken, used chicken Andouille sausage (Trader Joes), and finally, the cauliflower rice.
I initially planned to cut the broth since I wasn't using rice but there was way too much cauliflower rice that I had to add the liquid (and let it all steam to cook the shrimp).
I also adjusted the seasonings to taste. It all ended up pretty good. Meredith didn't like the sausage but I thought it was fine. The whole thing was probably not as good as the real thing with real rice, but it wasn't too bad. And pretty low in points (the sausage was the worst). We would do it again with a different type of sausage.
It made 4 servings.
Cajun Jambalaya (from Food Network/Emril Lagasse)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 9944, 2015-05-26_233022
Saturday, May 23, 2015, 10:30 PM
We made Green Eggs and Lobster again (as we've done before). We made the paste from the Cilantro Soup recipe but used jalapeños for the peppers.
We again started the lobster tails by butterflying them and cooking on the grill pan in the shell. After about 7 minutes, we took it out of the shell and finished them right on the pan (I think the shell adds flavor but who knows)
The real difference is that we made corn tortillas. We used the linked recipe from The Santa Fe School of Cooking book. I followed the recipe pretty exactly. I thought that using wax paper would be better than plastic bags but it didn't work as well. Also, the food processor really didn't make anything easier when it came to combining. I think I may have cooked the tortillas a little bit longer since they were thicker but other than that, there isn't too much to change anyway.
The tortillas came out ok. I think she should have been thinner and with more salt. Also, more round would have helped.
Also, we fried the eggs instead of poaching since it was faster. And had lightly roasted asparagus with smoked salt.
Corn Tortillas (from Santa Fe School of Cooking: Celebrating the Foods of New Mexico [book] )
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 9937, 2015-05-23_223017
Thursday, May 21, 2015, 10:15 PM
Meredith made this Spring Roll Salad off of the below recipe but with a few different changes. For the shrimp, we found pretty nice sized shrimp frozen at Trader Joes. We steamed 8oz from frozen for about 4 min, 30 seconds and it was pretty nicely cooked. We tossed them with curry powder.
The Spring Roll salad had some of the following changes:
For the dressing, we used the thin almond milk instead of the thick coconut milk. We also replaced half of the peanut butter with PB2 (powdered peanut butter). We also didn't thin the dressing. Actually, we added some Xanthan gum to thicken it. Added a very small drop of coconut extract to get some of that flavor back.
We also ended up making a second batch of dressing since we had tons of salad and the dressing wasn't too many points.
Spring Roll Salad with Spicy Peanut Dressing (from A Beautiful Mess)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 9929, 2015-05-21_221515
Tuesday, May 19, 2015, 10:35 PM
We made crab, corn and tomato salad (recipe) using the same basic changes (not much). Basically just mixed it all and didn't plate it like the recipe called for. And we used extra tomatoes. We served it on baby kale and "power mix"
We also had a broccoli salad that Meredith made from the below recipe. I really liked it and it is pretty healthy.
Creamy Broccoli Salad (from Our Lady of Second Helpings)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 9921, 2015-05-19_223529
Monday, May 18, 2015, 10:30 PM
This was a pretty simple and thrown together meal. Not too much cooking. We used the grill pan on chicken sauce with eggs and toast. And Meredith sautéed baby kale with cherry tomatoes and some adobo seasoning. We also had boiled artichokes and a dip made by combing some Trader Joes eggplant spread and greek yogurt.
Everything was very good. It was a nice weeknight meal with the only real time intensive prep being the artichokes. The dip was good but oily. I would have it again but not often.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 9917, 2015-05-18_223026
Sunday, May 17, 2015, 10:10 PM
This was out first time "cooking" in the new kitchen... if you would call this cooking. We wanted to play with the new Vitamix and decided to try the tortilla soup. We used their recipe but went very heavy on the veggies and used baby kale instead of cabbage. Also, at the end, we added some corn and a can of beans plus some older tortilla chips.
Well, maybe it was the extra veggies, the kale, or something but it tasted like warm veggie baby food. Too strong of a vegetable flavor and the kale reminded us of our smoothies.
I do want to make this again but I will be nearly exact on the recipe since this just wasn't very good. I was impressed with heating in the Vitamix. That's pretty cool!
Vitamix Tortilla Soup (from Vitamix)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 9908, 2015-05-17_221058
Sunday, April 19, 2015, 10:00 AM
I made Belgium Waffles for our guests. I just used the same recipe as last time. I also made the same changes except I used agave nectar instead of syrup in the recipe. I let it sit for a but then in the fridge overnight. It seemed to separate a little bit but worked otherwise (though again, you can see the issues with the iron and that it may not have been enough batter).
I also made whipped cream with the leftover cream. I just kind of winged it by whipping heavy (but not "whipping") cream and added powdered sugar, vanilla and almond extract. I just played around. Thankfully, it didn't turn to butter!
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 9903, 2015-04-19_100004
Saturday, April 18, 2015, 09:45 PM
I made ice cream for friends. We made two flavors: chocolate and honey-lavender. We used the recipes linked below to make the batter. We basically followed the recipe and instructions exactly. The only note is that the last step with reheating, we went to 170-175°F based on Alton Brown's recipe (more exact then "sticks to a spoon"). We also topped the chocolate with maldon salt.
To actually make the ice cream we did the dry ice trick. The first batch got kind of messed up. I added too much too quickly and next thing I knew, ice cream was being thrown around the kitchen...literally. For the second one, I figured out some tips and tricks as follows:
The idea is to get the dry ice as powdered as possible. But it is important to not try to get it all at once. You'll waste time and heat up the dry ice too much.
The technique worked pretty well. We certainly had ice cream at the end. The second batch done better was more carbonated than the first but the first was better (though that may have been the actual ice cream). What I do not know is how to control overrun (ie, the air mixed into the batter). It came out super rich.
Rich Chocolate Ice Cream (from Chow)
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Honey Lavender Ice Cream (from Martha Stewart)
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Original WP Post ID: 9893
Original WP Pub Date: 2015-04-18_214506