I started off by browning some bacon and using the fat to cook some miripoix (onion, carrot, celery) along with oregano, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper. After all that had softened up nicely for 5-10 minutes, I added a few tablespoons of flour to make a roux of sorts and help thicken the eventual soup. I let the flour cook off for 5 minutes and then added the liquids. 'Twas about 1/2 a cup of white wine, a pint of whipping cream, about 1.5 cups of milk and two 8oz bottles of clam juice. Brought everything to a boil to let the flavors meld and added in 3 medium Yukon potatoes, cut up in medium dice. Cooked those on low heat till just soft, 15-20 minutes, and added about 2 cups of chopped up cooked clams. These were pre-cooked, though not canned, but you could replace with canned or fresh - depending on who you're trying to impress. Don't cook the clams too long though or theyll get tough and chewey. Add the bacon back in and that's about it. Now if only the Pats had held up their end of the bargain this would've felt much more successful. Oh well...
Showing posts with label seafood. Show all posts
Showing posts with label seafood. Show all posts
10/12 Chowdah
In anticipation of what turned out to be one of the worst Patriots game in quite some time I'd decided to make some clam chowder tonight. I forget when I had made some last, but I didn't quite remember the Garibaldi's recipe I had learned. I think this ended up being relatively close...
I started off by browning some bacon and using the fat to cook some miripoix (onion, carrot, celery) along with oregano, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper. After all that had softened up nicely for 5-10 minutes, I added a few tablespoons of flour to make a roux of sorts and help thicken the eventual soup. I let the flour cook off for 5 minutes and then added the liquids. 'Twas about 1/2 a cup of white wine, a pint of whipping cream, about 1.5 cups of milk and two 8oz bottles of clam juice. Brought everything to a boil to let the flavors meld and added in 3 medium Yukon potatoes, cut up in medium dice. Cooked those on low heat till just soft, 15-20 minutes, and added about 2 cups of chopped up cooked clams. These were pre-cooked, though not canned, but you could replace with canned or fresh - depending on who you're trying to impress. Don't cook the clams too long though or theyll get tough and chewey. Add the bacon back in and that's about it. Now if only the Pats had held up their end of the bargain this would've felt much more successful. Oh well...
I started off by browning some bacon and using the fat to cook some miripoix (onion, carrot, celery) along with oregano, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper. After all that had softened up nicely for 5-10 minutes, I added a few tablespoons of flour to make a roux of sorts and help thicken the eventual soup. I let the flour cook off for 5 minutes and then added the liquids. 'Twas about 1/2 a cup of white wine, a pint of whipping cream, about 1.5 cups of milk and two 8oz bottles of clam juice. Brought everything to a boil to let the flavors meld and added in 3 medium Yukon potatoes, cut up in medium dice. Cooked those on low heat till just soft, 15-20 minutes, and added about 2 cups of chopped up cooked clams. These were pre-cooked, though not canned, but you could replace with canned or fresh - depending on who you're trying to impress. Don't cook the clams too long though or theyll get tough and chewey. Add the bacon back in and that's about it. Now if only the Pats had held up their end of the bargain this would've felt much more successful. Oh well...
8/22 Cajun Shrimp&Bacon Ravioli
my fridge and pantry are still rather empty as i fill out the kitchen. however i did have some bacon and frozen shrimp on hand and so decided to make full use of the herbs and spices in the pantry. i made a quick tomato pasta dough (1 egg, 3/4 flour and a squirt of tomato paste per serving) and rolled it out to make some ravioli. i've determined fresh pasta is actually
easier to make for one person than for multiple people since the amount of time it takes to make is directly proportional to the size of the group. in any event, for the filling i cooked up a couple slices of bacon - not too crisp - and whizzed that together with some defrosted shrimp, cooked onions&celery, and what amounted to a cajun spice mix. this already looked and smelled delicious. then i just put the ravioli together using a little egg wash to bind the two sides of the pasta dough together. Nothing tricky here, you just need to avoid overfilling the raviolis.at this point i realized i had way too much of the filling and decided to mix in some of the egg wash and bread crumbs into it. this allowed me to make a small cajun shrimp and bacon cake of sorts. fried that up to golden crispy goodness and made a little chipotle-lemon mayo to serve along side. the pasta was topped simply with some good olive oil, fleur de sel and parseley.
5/5 Shrimp and Beet Tacos
So admittedly, I haven't posted nearly as much as I'd hoped I would. There always seems to be a good reason, but recently, it was because I was trying to kill off most of my pantry items before moving out of Davis Square. As a result, most of my dishes were pretty boring and not very inspired. I'll be traveling for a couple months now, so obviously it'll be quite hard to cook anything, though if I do - and I will seek out opportunities to cook whenever possible - I will post them up here. For now I made some pretty original tacos for Cinco de Mayo - I think so anyway! The main ingredient was roasted shrimps with cayenne, pineapple, onions, cilantro and oregano. I also made a raw beet and lime slaw, some guacamole and green tomatillo salsa - all to be wrapped in a nice soft shell corn tortilla. I guess the beets were really the only original item in this dish, but I thought it worked really well and the beets add an amazing color to the dish.
3/20 Clams and Chinese Sausage
I do like clams and these are no exception. Started this off by sauteeing an onion and some celery with some La Chang chinese sausage in olive oil. After a few minutes I added some clam juice I had left over from I dunno what. After that evaporated and the onions were nice and soft I threw in some garlic sambal (chili sauce) to balance off the sweetness from the sausage and a few large glugs of white wine. Brought everything to a boil and added the Mahogany Clams from Maine. I find these to be a great bargain at $5.99 for a whole bag at Whole Foods. Closed the lid and waited for them to start popping open. At that point, it's just like waiting for popcorn and I started drooling. As they opened i took them off the heat one at a time so they wouldn't get chewy. You've gotta love animals that have built in timers - brilliant!. Once they were all out, added a heaping tablespoon of creme fraiche and served it all up with some tasty bread. mmmm mmmm good!
2/25 Soy Poached Mackerel and Pickled Celery Root
I'm working a little outside my comfort zone on this one. Yesterday I bought a mackerel fillet at the Japanese grocery store. I decided to poach the mackerel in a soy/marin (japanese cooking wine) broth and made a very thinned out mayonnaise sauce with sambal (chili paste) and yuzu (asian lemony citrus). The fact that it didn't really ever thicken up was my fault, but in the end worked quite well with the fish and wasn't too heavy. According to my unhappy roommates the result was that the entire house smelled really bad (to me it just smelled like soy... but whatever).
Along with the fish I made some "pickled" celery root. It's really just celery root cooked in just a bit of slightly sweet lemon broth. Not really a pickle, but it cut through the fattiness of the fish nicely.
I also started some "real" brined pickles which should be ready in a weeks time or so... never made those before either, so we'll see how they turn out.
Along with the fish I made some "pickled" celery root. It's really just celery root cooked in just a bit of slightly sweet lemon broth. Not really a pickle, but it cut through the fattiness of the fish nicely.
10/08/07 smoked salmon with brown rice and a poached egg
This was a totally improvised recipe based on something similar (though not as good) I had at a tea house. I got the brown rice in my CSA box as a "substitute" because of their problems filling boxes with the normal mix of veg - all caused by a quarantine on tomatoes/peppers/similar fruits in the Dixon, CA area to contain a Mediterranean Fruit Fly infestation. Massa Organics grows rice in the Sacramento delta and is a friend/neighbor of Eatwell Farms.
What to do with brown rice? It takes forever to cook (a whole hour) and I personally believe it needs lots of soy sauce to make it worthwhile. Here I composed a dish of four parts:
- smoked salmon from the farmers' market
- brown rice seasoned with plenty of soy sauce
- carrots stir fried in sesame oil with a little bit of ginger and chile powder, plus sesame seeds
- a poached egg
10/02 Home Cured Salmon
I was gonna wax poetic about how awesome curing foods is, but if you're reading this you probably already know this. If not, this post should convince you. I've been eyeing a gravlax recipe from Rick Stein's Complete Seafood cookbook ever since I bought it a couple years ago. I highly recommend this book for anyone who really loves seafood btw. Gravlax is a Scandinavian dish consisting of salmon cured in salt, sugar and dill. This is not quite as refined as smoked salmon, but it's pretty damn good nonetheless - maybe a bit saltier. So what exactly is involved in making this? Well actually it's remarkably simple. Take your salmon (in this case wild pacific coho) and cover it in coarse sea salt, sugar and dill. Wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate it for 48 hours, flipping it every 12 hours. That's it. Seriously. It's dead easy. When you're done rinse off all the salt, slice and enjoy. This will keep in the fridge for a week, maybe longer.So thats all nice and well, but what are you gonna do with a pound of cured salmon now? Well here's a simple idea that brings me back to my childhood.
Take some tagliatelle - in this case the spinach varietal - add in some of that salmon, some creme fraiche (ok, lots of creme fraiche) and chives. Again, this is dead easy and yet so damn good. Over the winter I hope to explore this wonderful world of cured foods further, so stay tuned and try it out for yourself!
9/28 Scallop and Shrimp Burgers
Scallops were on sale today at Whole Foods, so I picked up a few. Unsure of what I would do with them I started browsing the internet. Inspired by several things, but without an actual recipe, I settled on cajun scallop and shrimp burgers. I basically modified the technique I'd used for crab cakes in the past. I threw a few of the shrimp and a scallop in my mini food-processor and made a paste of sorts. Cut up the remaining seafood into small chunks and added them to the paste along with some cajun seasoning, mayo and panko breadcrumbs. This held together reasonably well, but as you can tell came apart a bit during the cooking process. I served them as a open-face sandwich of sorts on some buttered bread with cajun mayo. Added a few slices 
of tomatoes and some mizuna greens along side and had myself quite a little meal. Next time, i'll have to make the whole thing hold together a bit better, but the flavors were definitely there.
of tomatoes and some mizuna greens along side and had myself quite a little meal. Next time, i'll have to make the whole thing hold together a bit better, but the flavors were definitely there.
9/25 smoked salmon quiche
I couldn't resist picking up some smoked salmon at the Temescal Farmers Market this Sunday. Originally, I had planned to add it to a potato salad, but upon perusing the cookbooks, I spotted a recipe for a smoked fish quiche that I couldn't resist.I made the shell in advance (on Sunday) and had it waiting in the freezer. This is a very simple quiche: just sauted scallions (in butter, of course), smoked salmon, and two eggs beat together with 1/2 cup creme fraiche, milk, and salt and pepper. I think I went a little heavy on the salmon, but that's because IT'S DELICIOUS. The side veg are quickly steamed baby green beans (known in pretentious circles as "hericots verts" - also from the farmers' market), halved cherry tomatoes, and slivered basil tossed with a couple tablespoons of butter, some lemon juice, a splash of balsamic vinegar, and salt and pepper.
p.s. The cats really got excited when I made this - uh, the quiche, not the veg.
9/22 Gone Camping
This weekend, I headed up to New Hampshire for a little camping trip. It was my friend Matt's Bachelor party, and so it was up to me to take care of the food. Sure enough, hamburgers and hot dogs were not had. Instead I picked up some European Sea Bass (also known as Branzino) before heading up to the mountains. There's not much else to tell other than that the fish were stuffed with lemon and thyme after being well salted and peppered. Each weighed approximately one pound, and so there was plenty for the 6 of us to go around :) 
They were served with some grilled corn and potato salad. Seemed like everyone really enjoyed themselves and I especially enjoyed cooking over a natural fire. As you can tell from the picture it was getting pretty dark when we started cooking, but everything worked out deliciously.
They were served with some grilled corn and potato salad. Seemed like everyone really enjoyed themselves and I especially enjoyed cooking over a natural fire. As you can tell from the picture it was getting pretty dark when we started cooking, but everything worked out deliciously.
9/12 Acadian Peppered Shrimp
I first made this dish at a Cajun cooking class at the California Culinary Academy and have been making it regularly ever since. It's essentially a dish you should be able to make with just what's in your pantry (assuming of course you always keep a bag of frozen shrimp around, like i do, and have a lemon on hand). Now, of course, this isn't the healthiest dish around, but it sure is good and quick to make. 
Basically you make a sauce with butter and LOTS of black pepper. We're not talking tablespoons here... get those measuring cups out and take the time to grind fresh pepper. To this you add oregeno, thyme, garlic, paprika, cayenne, salt, lemon juice, and a crushed bay leaf. (exact amounts vary based on taste, look up a recipe online to get an idea, but then adjust them as you see fit, but don't skimp in the black pepper!) Once the butter is melted and the garlic is softened a bit, you add your shrimp. cook them until just pink. AND FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T OVERCOOK THE SHRIMP!!!!! Serve this with some rice and veggies (mustard greens in this case) and you're good to go. If you're smart and not on a diet, go heavy on the butter and get some fresh bread to mop up the leftover "sauce". That's some tasty stuff right there. Oh and I almost forgot, keep the shells on the shrimp when you cook them. This means things get messy, but there's so much flavor in those shells it'd be a shame not to use them. Plus lickin' the butter off the shells and your fingers is half the fun.
Basically you make a sauce with butter and LOTS of black pepper. We're not talking tablespoons here... get those measuring cups out and take the time to grind fresh pepper. To this you add oregeno, thyme, garlic, paprika, cayenne, salt, lemon juice, and a crushed bay leaf. (exact amounts vary based on taste, look up a recipe online to get an idea, but then adjust them as you see fit, but don't skimp in the black pepper!) Once the butter is melted and the garlic is softened a bit, you add your shrimp. cook them until just pink. AND FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T OVERCOOK THE SHRIMP!!!!! Serve this with some rice and veggies (mustard greens in this case) and you're good to go. If you're smart and not on a diet, go heavy on the butter and get some fresh bread to mop up the leftover "sauce". That's some tasty stuff right there. Oh and I almost forgot, keep the shells on the shrimp when you cook them. This means things get messy, but there's so much flavor in those shells it'd be a shame not to use them. Plus lickin' the butter off the shells and your fingers is half the fun.
9/4 salmon w/ rutabaga puree and arugula
Oh, salmon season. Surely you are the most wondrous of the seasons. Nothing like a thick steak of California King to satiate a fishee craving. I knew that salmon was going to be the centerpiece of this meal - but what to pair with it? I had three little red potatoes from the CSA, which after much searching of the cookbooks led to a decision that maybe a nice rutabaga puree could round things out, with spicy arugula salad. The rutabaga and potatoes have been mashed with a generous amount of warm milk, butter, chives, parsley, and nutmeg.
I have just discovered the genius of horseradish. Is this bad? In any case, I'm making up for lost time. You'll notice a decent spoonful making itself known here.
8/29 happy fish
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