Sep 28 2010

Ginger Stir-Fried Vegetables

While I wasn’t impressed at all with the tempura chicken made during my stir-fry cooking class, I was very impressed with the Ginger Stir-Fried Vegetables. They were so simple and wow did they pack a tasty punch. I’m seeing lots of ginger stir-fried veggies in my future.

The Ingredients:

1/4 Cup Soy Sauce
1 Tablespoon Sesame Oil
1 Teaspoon Sugar
2 Tablespoons Vegetable Oil
3 Tablespoons Ginger – minced – Chef Cris used her microplane
1/2 Cup sliced carrots – cut on the bias – about 1/4 inch thick
1.5 Cup Snow Pea Pods – stringed and cut on a diagonal in 1/2
1/2 Cup Fresh Button Mushrooms – stemmed and thinly sliced
1/2 Cup Fresh Shitake Mushrooms – stemmed and thinly sliced – the stems are too woody
1/4 Cup Sliced Green Onions – cut on the bias, 1/4 inch thick

Directions:

In a bowl, combine the soy sauce, toasted sesame oil and sugar, and set aside.

In a large skillet or wok, heat the vegetable oil over high heat. Add the ginger and cook, stirring, until aromatic, about 30 seconds. I can’t even begin to explain how amazing the room smelled. Add the carrots and stir-fry until beginning to soften, 1 to 2 minutes. Add snow pea pods and mushrooms and stir-fry until beginning to soften, 1 to 1.5 minutes. Add the green onions and soy sauce mixture and stir to coat. Cook for another 45 seconds, stirring.

The tempura chicken in my photo was prepared using a cornstarch, egg, cold water, all-purpose flour and cajun seasoning. The best part about the chicken portion of the dish was the plum sauce. I could see myself skipping the peanut oil frying and putting the sauce on grilled chicken breasts or panko breaded/baked chicken tenders.

The Plum Sauce:

1 Cup Plum Preserves
4 Tablespoons Rice Wine Vinegar
1 Tablespoon Minced Shallots
1 Tablespoon Light Brown Sugar
1 Teaspoon Minced Garlic
1/2 Teaspoon Minced Fresh Garlic
1/4 Teaspoon Red Pepper Flakes
Pinch 5 Spice Powder (Cinnamon, Fennel, Cloves, Star Anise, White Pepper)

Combine all plum sauce ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Stir, reduce heat and simmer until thickened. 4-5 minutes.

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Thinking out loud…

No doubt I will have some major failures in the kitchen as this blog grows and as I continue to step out of my comfort zone in the kitchen. I promise to post the disasters as well as the successes. I think a lot of it has to do with learning about the ingredients and knowing what you like and don’t like. Figuring that out is the first step. Some people would rather die by fire than eat fake pasta made with zucchini or eggplant… I get that and having different likes and dislikes is what makes us who we are. How boring if we were all the same.

This whole adventure started because I wanted to put a stop to my frozen meal/processed food eating/calorie counting habits. I’m proud to say, it has been a total success. Food is no longer the enemy for me. I’m finding that if you don’t limit or restrict what it is you eat, the urge to overeat just isn’t there. When nothing is “bad” or “off limits” – there is no sense of urgency. You aren’t left feeling like it’s the only time you will ever get to have it. Eating real food leaves you feeling satisfied. Not sure if that makes sense, I know it will for some of  the readers from my old blog. Also not sure what exactly prompted these thoughts today, but apparently I felt this was important enough to share on a post about ginger stir-fried veggies. 😉

Permanent link to this article: http://foodiddy.com/?p=1645

Sep 26 2010

Fully Loaded Cheesy Potato Soup

The weather was in the 90’s this weekend and I desperately wanted to wave a magic wand to change that. I am ready for fall weather. I want to dig out my hoodies, blankets and soup recipes. I compromised by closing the shudders to make the house appear to be darker. I turned on the TV to clear the DVR of new fall shows while I got to making some yummy comfort soup. I came across a recipe for Fully Loaded Cheesy Potato Soup when I was looking on the Food Network website for something else. It was featured on Down Home with the Neelys. I don’t watch that show, but the recipe looked perfect for my pretend overcast/fall day.

The Ingredients:

4 Tablespoons Butter
1 Onion – finely chopped
1 Carrot – finely chopped
1 Rib Celery – finely chopped
2 Cloves Garlic – finely chopped
1/4 Cup All-Purpose Flour
Salt and Freshly Ground Black Pepper
3 Cups Chicken Stock
1 Cup Whole Milk – thankfully Dan uses this on his cereal, ewww…
1 (12-Ounce) bottle of light-bodied beer – we only had Sierra Nevada Pale Ale – definitely not light, more of a full-bodied beer –  it worked fine.
2 Large Russet Potatoes
2 Cups Grated Extra-Sharp Cheddar – had that leftover from the Cheesesteak Kabobs
Dash of Hot Sauce – Could not find the bottle for the life of me – skipped that
Dash Worcestershire Sauce
Sour Cream for Topping
4 Slices of Bacon – cooked crisp for topping
2 Tablespoons Chopped Fresh Chives – for topping

I got everything chopped and measured out.

My liquids were ready to go and the dutch oven was heating up on the stove.

I was supposed to melt the butter first – whoops. Melt the butter over medium heat, add the onion, carrot, celery, and garlic and saute until the vegetables begin to soften – mine took about 5 minutes.

Sprinkle (in my case, dump) the flour into the pan and continue to stir for 2 minutes to toast the flour. I dumped because I was holding the camera in one hand and trying to get a mid sprinkle shot . That was a bad idea, almost dropped the camera into the pot, hah! The consistency will become stuffing like. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Gradually whisk in the stock and milk…

…and then the beer. Mm-mm beer!

Stir in the potatoes and bring the soup to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer the soup until the potato is tender, about 20-30 minutes. Mine took 25 minutes.

Remove the pot from the heat and use your make believe immersion blender to puree the soup until smooth. I don’t have an immersion blender and I know what a pain it is to pour hot soup into a blender – I’ve done it and also seen Top Chef and Chopped catastrophes… so I chose to use my potato masher for a more rustic texture. I was afraid of scratching the enamel on my dutch oven, so I switched to mashing with a ladle.

Return the soup to a low heat and add the cheese a handful at a time, stirring until melted and smooth after each addition. Season the soup to taste with hot sauce, Worcestershire, salt and pepper. I chose to skip the hot sauce. I swirled some of the Worcestershire on top and then added my sour cream, crisp bacon and fresh chives.

The soup was amazing. The flavor was awesome and the combination of the sharp cheddar, potato and bacon…out of this world.

It really did look and taste like a fully loaded baked potato – super sinful and probably the reason I only ate a cup. The bowl in the photos is very small, it doesn’t even hold a full cup, but it was plenty.

I grabbed different placemats and had my little photo shoot and then made my way to the couch where I finished up clearing off the DVR. So far I’m already dumping Running Wilde, Hawaii 5.0 and Detroit 187 – might give Detroit 187 another chance. I did like Chase and I have a few more to go.

I portioned out 6 containers of soup and they are in the freezer waiting for the colder days. Hurry up fall, I need you!

Permanent link to this article: http://foodiddy.com/?p=1620

Sep 25 2010

Kung Pao Shrimp

I’m a huge fan of shrimp and shrimp with a kick is even better. When cooking shrimp stir fries in the past, I just added soy or teriyaki sauce to the wok or pan. I had no idea that soy and toasted sesame oil are to be used like salt as a finishing element. I never really ventured into Asian sauce land and now I have a few recipes that will be easy to use with multiple dishes. Kung Pao Chicken tops the list for my next attempt.

The Sauce:
3/4 Cup Low Sodium Chicken Broth
1 Tablespoon Oyster Sauce
1 Tablespoon Hoisin Sauce
2 Teaspoons Rice Vinegar
2 Teaspoons Toasted Sesame Oil
1.5 Teaspoons Cornstarch

Directions:
Whisk all of the sauce ingredients together and set aside.

Stir-Fry Ingredients:
1 Pound Extra Large Shrimp – peeled and deveined
2 Teaspoons Soy Sauce
2 Teaspoons Chinese Rice Wine
3 Garlic Cloves – minced
1 Teaspoon Ginger – grated fresh
2 Scallions – minced
2 Tablespoons plus 1 Teaspoon Canola Oil
6 Small Whole Dried Red Chiles – each about 2 inches long
1/2 Cup Roasted Unsalted Peanuts
1 Red Bell Pepper – stemmed, seeded, and cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1 Teaspoon Sichuan Peppercorns – crushed – adds another level of heat, has a fruity aroma w/a punch

Directions:
Toss the shrimp with the soy sauce and rice wine in a small bowl and let marinate up to an hour. In a separate bowl, mix together the garlic, ginger, scallions, and 1 teaspoon of canola oil and set aside. In a third bowl, crumble half of the chiles coarsely, then toss with the remaining whole chiles and peanuts; set aside.

Heat 1.5 teaspoons of the remaining oil in your wok or skillet pan over high heat until just smoking. Add only HALF of your shrimp and cook, without stirring, until the shrimp are browned at the edges, about 1 minute. Stir in the chiles and peanuts and cook until the shrimp are almost completely opaque and the peanuts have darkened slightly. Transfer the mixture to a medium bowl and repeat with 1.5 teaspoons more oil and the remaining shrimp. Transfer to the original shrimp bowl and set aside. (Lots of dishes to do after cooking this) The reason you cook the shrimp in 2 batches is because if they are all crammed in at once, too much moisture comes out of the shrimp and they steam, rather than brown.

Add the remaining 1 tablespoon oil to the pan and return to high heat until smoking. Add the bell pepper and Sichuan peppercorns and cook until the bell pepper is slightly softened and the peppercorns are fragrant – about 1 minute. Clear the center of the wok/pan, add the garlic mixture and cook – mashing the mixture into the pan. Cook for about 20-30 seconds and then add your shrimp back into the pan. Whisk the sauce to recombine, then add it to the pan and toss until the sauce thickens – takes about a minute.

The dish had great flavor. I honestly might double the sauce or at least make 1.5 x’s the amount. I really like my food with a lot of sauce… especially when served over sticky rice. I feel like you could easily adjust the level of heat by leaving out the peppers or peppercorns. You could then have shrimp without the “Pao”  – or if you aren’t a shrimp fan or have allergies, chicken with or without the extra kick. You make the call. The steps seem pretty involved, but the prep went by very quickly. Stir-fry cooking times are minimal and if you prepped ahead of time, this could be an easy mid-week dinner for sure.

I once again was the girl in cooking class snapping photos right and left as the tasting plates and dishes came around. I’m getting more and more comfortable talking about the blog with complete strangers and that’s been a fun thing.

Permanent link to this article: http://foodiddy.com/?p=1605