Sweet Potato & Black Bean Hash

Came across an intriguing website, and decided to start off with a twist on one of my favorites: sweet potato hash with black beans.

Recipe

1 sweet potato, cubed
1 onion, diced
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
2 tbsp butter
3 tbsp brown sugar (or maple syrup)
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tsp cumin
2 tsp chili powder
2 tbsp olive oil
salt & pepper

Heat the butter over medium with the onions and brown sugar until caramelized and deep brown.  Add the garlic, cumin, and chili for another couple minutes, then remove.  Next, heat the olive oil and tenderize/brown the sweet potatoes, five-ish minutes?  Lower the heat, stir the onions back in, and add the black beans.  Cook together until warm, some five minutes.  Season with salt & pepper, and serve!

Notes

The usual sweet potato hash gets a lot of its goodness from bacon grease.  No pork fat this time, but lots of seasonings to make up for it.  It's nice that you use cubed sweet potato (instead of grated) so the pieces brown nicely - it didn't take much longer to cook.  The full can of beans gave me a much less balanced final product than the pictures on the website - more like a black bean dish with some chunks of sweet potato.  And my gooey beans made the picture less appealing than theirs, but still a very rich, delicious breakfast (with some leftovers - so no need to add eggs like they recommend).

Addendum: I don't know why I didn't think of this immediately, but what about combining the hash recipes - starting this one with bacon?  Yes, do it.

Sausage & Mushroom Pasta Skillet

Well, it wasn't the most productive summer for the blog, between travel and other stuffs.  I did get excited about one dutch oven chicken recipe, but it was a bit of a letdown.  So July was a washout...  Getting back in the groove, this Serious Eats recipe looked pretty serious...

Recipe

1/2 lb Italian sausage (hot or mild (but go with hot)), removed from casings
1/2 lb pasta, rotini or similar ridged
1 lb mushrooms, chopped (they recommend mixed but Portabellos were great on their own)
1 c Panko bread crumbs
6 oz Parmesan cheese, grated
2 small shallots, minced (or just an onion)
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 parsley leaves, chopped
2 tbsp chives, minced
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp lemon juice
2 1/2 tbsp flour
2 c broth (they say chicken, I used veggie)
1 c heavy cream
salt & pepper

Combine the bread crumbs, 1/3 of the cheese, half the parsley & chives, 1/4 shallot, 1/4 garlic, and the olive oil, and mix together with some salt & pepper.

Melt the butter in a large cast iron skillet over medium high, and brown the sausage, breaking it up.  Set aside, leaving fat in the skillet.

Next you cook the mushrooms in the skillet until well browned.  Probably a little after that starts, put in your pasta.  OK back to the skillet.  Stir in the garlic and shallot for a minute, then stir in the soy sauce and lemon juice, then the flour.  Next, add the broth and simmer a couple minutes until it starts to thicken.  Stir in the cheese, parsley, chives, and sausage, and season with some salt and pepper.  Your pasta should be done and drained by now.  Add it too.

Top your skillet mixture with the bread crumbs.  Pop it in the oven about 10" under the broiler until golden brown, probably just a few minutes with some rotating.  Remove and eat.

Notes

That's a lot of ingredients...  I about halved everything, and left out some of the green herbs.
If that missed some flavors, I made up for it with a lot of cheese and generous (by my standards) salting and peppering.  It's a delicious, super-rich pasta.  In addition to the cheese, you've also got the butter/olive oil/other fats going - and cooked into those mushrooms.  Really good.  It's a bit extravagant for a pasta dish, but worth it when the occasion arises.  It proved to be championship-caliber carb loading for me :)

Skillet Crispy-Skin Chicken Thighs

"Oh jeez!" you sigh. "If ONLY I knew how to PERFECTLY cook bone-in chicken thighs in such a way that would keep them moist but crisp the skin up to high heaven!"

WELL SIGH NO MORE!

INGREDIENTS:

-however many bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs you want

-canola oil or bacon grease, whatever your oil of choice is

-seasonings you like! Maybe some leeks or onions...

DIRECTIONS:

-IF YOU WANT, marinate your chicken thighs in oil and spices...I did canola oil, salt, pepper, garlic, red pepper, and leeks...

-PREHEAT OVEN to 475 degrees.

-Heat a good amount of oil in the skillet over high heat until oil is hot but not smoking.

-Plop them chicken pieces SKIN DOWN onto the skillet. Leave alone for about 2 minutes.

-LOWER HEAT to MEDIUM and occasionally rearrange chicken until fat renders and the skin is a GOLDEN BROWN, about 12 minutes. 

-TRANSFER SKILLET TO OVEN, about 13 minutes. 

-FLIP CHICKEN and leave in for another 5 minutes.

-Let sit for a bit.

DONE!

NOTES:

-The pieces just look SO FANCY when they're done, but it is really quite a simple process.  

-It takes a little bit of practice to make sure you don't rip off any of the skin or leave it on the skillet...I find the first two minutes at high heat are crucial--DON'T MOVE THEM THEN! A good spatula is a must.

-Obviously, you can throw any veggies you want in to cook with the chicken...sweet potatoes come out INSANELY good...all crispy and soaked in chicken fat.

Spicy Black Beans with Feta, Avocado & Stuff

Gordon Ramsay may be quite the character on Hells Kitchen etc., but within the mellow confines of his own YouTube channel, he's a totally different and nicer person.  Case in point:

Recipe

1 onion, chopped
a few cloves of garlic, minced
a chili pepper or two, minced
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp cinnamon
1 large can black beans, drained & rinsed
1-2 avocados
feta cheese, crumbled
coriander (or cilantro), chopped
crispy tortillas
rice

Heat some olive oil in a skillet, then saute the onion until soft.  Add the garlic and chili, then the spices, then the beans.  Cook until soft, stirring and mashing a bit.  Serve with avocado, feta, and greens, with tortillas and/or rice if desired.

Notes

This dish was appropriate for certain sisters for its vegetarianism; however, we did have to leave out the chilis to keep things mild.  It was still delicious and surprisingly filling.  The cinnamon is a very nice touch with the beans.  I was also skeptical of the feta (rather than something more ethnically-accurate like queso fresco) but it made for a very interesting taste.  Overall it was easy, filling, not to expensive, and probably healthy, so a good vegetarian option.

photo courtesy of other sister

Short Rib Tacos

Another rather extravagant recipe from America's Test Kitchen - totally worth the weekly email, followed by a password reset to get into their website...  This one came from a Mexican-themed set of recipes:

Recipe

Beef

1 1/2 c beer
1/2 c cider vinegar
2 oz dried ancho chiles, stemmed, seeded & torn into 1" pieces
6 garlic cloves, crushed
2 tbsp tomato paste
3 bay leaves
2 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
salt & pepper
1 large onion, sliced into 1/2" rounds
3 lb boneless beef short ribs, cut into 2" cubes

Slaw

1/2 c cider vinegar
1/2 c water
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 head cabbage, cored and sliced thin
1 onion, sliced thin
1 carrot, grated
1 jalapeno, minced
1 tsp dried oregano
1 c cilantro, chopped

tortillas
queso fresco
avocado
lime

Start with the slaw a day ahead of time.  Whisk together the vinegar, water, sugar, and salt.  Add the cabbage, onion, carrot, jalapeno, and oregano, and toss together.  Cover and refrigerate for up to 24 hours.  Drain and add the cilantro before serving.

So now it's a day later and you're hungry for meat (but not too hungry, still a couple hours to go).  Heat oven to 325.  Combine the beer, vinegar, chiles, garlic, tomato paste, and spices in a dutch oven.  Lay out a later of onion rounds, then place the meat on top.  Cover and cook 2 1/2 to 3 hours.

Now it's 2 1/2 to 3 hours later and you're really hungry!  Once the meat is browned and tender, remove the dutch oven from the, um, regular oven.  Move the meat to a bowl.  Here, ATK recommends you strain out the liquid, discard the onion and bay leaves, add water so you have 1 cup of liquid, blend the solids back in, simmer, and stir in the shredded beef.  I didn't have the patience or a blender, so I shredded the beef, mashed the broth, and scooped a few cups in until the beef had a nice flavory sauce.

Serve the tacos with beef, slaw, crumbled queso fresco, avocado (my addition), and lime wedges.

Notes

It's a pretty long list of ingredients, but somehow the effort required doesn't seem to be proportional.  It helps that you can take care of the slaw in advance, but even the next day, most of the ingredients just get mixed into the pot before adding onion and beef.

The final product is amazing.  As promised, the onions keep the beef mostly out of the liquid so it browns nicely.  The cubes were soft and almost bouncy when I pulled them out at the end!  The slaw is super tasty, and the queso adds a nice salty flavor (I didn't know exactly what to expect from either element, but the first nibble of each made me grin).  It's definitely different from what you think of for beef tacos - ground meat, lettuce, salsa, etc.  But in a good way!

Sjomansbiff

I assume that translates from the Norwegian roughly to "sea-man's beef"; according to the newly-inherited 70's-vintage Scandinavian cookbook, it's Norwegian sailor's stew.

Recipe

1 1/2 lb round steak, cut into 8 thin slices
3 tbsp butter
3 medium onions, sliced
6-8 medium potatoes, sliced
1 pint light ale
salt & pepper

Heat a skillet with the butter and brown the steak slices.  Remove, then saute the onions, sprinkling with some salt and pepper.  In a larger saucepan, layer the meat, onions, and potatoes.  Pour over any pan drippings and the ale.  Cover and simmer until the potatoes are tender, about an hour and a half.

Notes

From skimming through the Scandinavian recipes, I conclude that (perhaps outside of fish, which I didn't check as closely at first) the cuisine is less about distinctive seasonings and flavors, and more about hearty, Viking-approved meat and potato-type meals.

This one fits right into that category.  Beef, onions, potatoes, ale, and butter - not even playing around with any veggies.  In a way, it's a little frustrating to have the meat and onions close to done, and then put it all in a pot to sit for over an hour.  I'd recommend a tasty ale, since the potatoes especially pick up the flavor.  Not sure the exact way to slice the meat either - a slanted cut would make thinner slices but take up more space to brown...  I'll definitely play around with more of these recipes - and get a little more adventurous - but for now a simple start.

Sesame-Soy Udon with Crispy Tilapia

This recipe continues (concludes?) a few recent Cannibal Stew trends: tilapia and Plated...

Recipe

10 oz tilapia (Plated seems to like this amount of protein)
3 scallions
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tbsp cornstarch
2 tbsp tapioca (?) flour
3 tbsp sesame oil
8 oz udon noodles
3 packets (maybe a tbsp?) soy sauce
1 packet (however much you want!) sriracha
salt & pepper


Slice the scallions, separating the dark green from the rest.  Mix the cornstarch and flour.  Season the tilapia with salt & pepper, and dredge through the flour.  Heat a tbsp of oil and cook the tilapia until lightly browned, a couple minutes per side.  Remove the fish and cut into bite-size pieces.  Add another tbsp of oil and cook the tilapia until crisp and brown, a couple more minutes.  Heat the last tbsp oil in a separate pan, and cook the udon and garlic until the noodles are warmed through.  Add the soy sauce, sriracha, and light scallion parts, stir to coat, and cook a couple minutes.  Noodles then fish and scallion greens on your plate and eat.

Notes

I'd been on a good tilapia kick recently, having just pan-fried a few fillets nicely.  This recipe made me re-think that old standard.  Do I need to flour the fish every time?  Because it was deliciously crisp and brown.

The udon noodles were good too.  I'm not familiar though - are they usually pre-cooked and just need to be warmed?  It surprised me a little that we didn't have to boil up some water and stuff.  Will just have to factor that in for next time...

fancy tableware huh? at B&H's