Truffle Mutt

Sunnyside up Mexican Style

Alright, this picture might require something in the way of a description.  You can see that it's partially eaten, but just so you know I didn't intended to take a picture of it all messed up and devoured.  It's just that it really did looked a better at this point. 

And in case you're still stumped, my dinner wasn't really dinner either.  I'll give you a clue, it starts with huevos and ends with rancheros.  Yeah, you guess it!  It's huevos rancheros!

In about 15 minutes, Rick Bayless (via my copy of Authentic Mexican) helped me transform one very ripe tomato into a fiery Mexican classic.  Sure, it wasn't very dinner-ish, or photogenic, but it was sure yu-u-mmy.   

Huevos Rancheros:  

1 ripe tomato
1 canned chipotle chile
2 cloves of garlic
olive oil
2 corn tortillas
2 eggs
salt

Preheat the oven just to warm it and put your plate in there.

Chop the tomato and chipotle and add to a food processor.  In the skillet cook the whole garlic cloves until browned and then toss them into the food processor too.  Blend until the mixture until it is almost smooth and then set aside.

In the same skillet heat 2-3 tbsp of olive oil until very hot, but not quite smoking and pour in the tomato sauce mixture.  This fries the sauce and deepens the flavour, but be warned it also splatters hot sauce and oil all over the place.  Trust me it's worth it.  Fry the sauce until it thickens and then pour into a bowl and place in the warm oven. 

Next heat another tsp or so of olive oil in the pan and quickly fry the tortillas to warm them and then place them in the oven as well.  Lastly, fry two eggs sunny side up.  When the eggs are done slide them onto the warm tortillas and spoon over the tomato-chile sauce.  Enjoy.

*Adapted from Rick Bayless Authentic Mexican

It's Official

Woohoo!  I can finally make it official.

I'm trading in my job, my office and my production accounting certificate for a chef's knife and culinary school.  Here's to hoping I keep my fingers in tact in case I need to return to my calculator!  :) 

Sure it's a little bit crazy, but then again that's me.  From food crazy to food blogger and now this.  I'll be leaving an industry I've known for the last 12 years and moving myself squarely to the bottom of the pecking order.  And guess what, I can HARDLY wait.   Schools in on September 7, 2010.  Let the count down begin.

What's your Beef?

What could be better than a medium rare, succulent, perfectly seasoned piece of beef?  A medium rare, succulent, perfectly seasoned piece of bison - that's what.

I don't know for sure when we started eating bison, probably when we lived in the condo and shopped at the seedy 24 hour IGA in Lakeview (I think it's finally morphed into a Sobey's).  For some reason you could buy fresh bison there when no where else in Calgary seemed to carry it.  Who knew?

Now-a-days though, I buy my bison from Glengary Bison out in Airdrie.  Cynthia and Gary are great and you can buy direct at their farm, or have them deliver your order right into town.  The bison is naturally raised, which is as close to organic as you can get without the certification and the flavor is amazing.  Some of the other bison producers I've tried seem to have a gamier tasting product, but Glengary is right in the middle.  You can tell it's not beef, but the taste won't overwhelm you either.  The biggest difference between beef & bison for me is in the tenderloin.  With beef it can be hard to find a tenderloin with a lot of flavor.  It might be tender and melt in your mouth good, but at the same time leave your taste buds hoping for something more.  Here's where I think that bison saves the day.  It can have that same tenderness with a bolder meaty taste.

I pan seared this tenderloin roast and then finished it in the oven, served with a shallot and sherry reduction.

Opinionated eh?

Well here's some food for thought.  I was surfing the net today and on a whim decided to Goggle trufflemutt.  Little did I know that I would stumble upon this little nugget of goodness (heavy on the sarcasm).  

Sure, when you first land on this link you may not understand why I've sent you here, but look down a little further and you'll soon see what's got me in a tizzy.  Scroll down to Truffle Mutt and read the description for this blog.  Well, come on did you SEE it?

In Webster's dictionary terms this comment can be translated to:

–adjective obstinate or conceited with regard to the merit of one's own opinions; conceitedly dogmatic.

Really?!  Seriously?!  Fine, if that's how it's going to be, then in my less-than-humble opinion you're opinion is irrelevant. 

If you don't like what's posted here, I hope you find yourself a blog loaded with sugar plum fairies and skies filled with endless rainbows.  A virtual foodies paradise where where dinner is always on time, restaurants always provide perfect service, souffles never collapse, husbands are never picky and every single recipe, published or otherwise yields flawless results. 

And for anyone else that would rather read about what really goes on in my kitchen (which is incredibly far from the above), please you are welcome to keep reading.

Coriander & Cilantro

I love this recipe from Fine Cooking Magazine.  A think juicy pork chop, crusted in a pungent coriander spice mix, fried until crispy and drizzled with a citrus-y hoisin sauce and the sweet heat of peppadews.  Served with sesame sauteed cabbage. Yum.

And who knew I'd love coriander seed so much?  It's nothing like it's evil fresh relative - the dreaded cilantro.  The flavor is earthy, sweet and somewhat peppery.  As opposed to cilantro, which (at least to me) is akin to sucking liquid hand soap through a straw.  

Kale Chips

About a year ago I was putting on a dinner for Jason's vegan Aunt and Uncle and I found this gem of a recipe.  It's always a challenge to make dinner when they come into town, but it's a challenge I eagerly await.  It's fun looking for new and exciting things to turn vegan and as a result we've had lots of good vegan dishes, but these chips have to go down in the history books.  Believe it or not even Mr Meat & Cheese was grazing on these greens. 

I suppose you could make them with almost any spices you want.  I've made them with olive oil & sea salt and olive oil, chili powder & garlic.  I think a mix of cumin and coriander seed would be worth trying too, but my favorite is still plain sea salt and olive oil.  The recipe on Epicurious specifically calls for Tuscan kale, but I've used a few different kinds and they've all turned out well.  The only thing that might change is the baking time as one bunch of kale can be soggier than the next and may take longer to dry out.  Be warned - do not take it out too early, or you'll be chewing on a rubbery, grassy leaf.

Homemade Pasta Weekend

This last weekend I competed in self-induced marathon of pasta making, which was more of an Italian food marathon, since I embarked on Mario Batali's ragù bolognese too.  I started with hand mixing dough, then moved on to making dough with the food processor, I tried dough made with "00" flour and then tried a batch with semolina flour.  There was pappardelle, ravioli, linguine and orecchietta and a simmering a batch of ragù on the stove behind me.  

And to what do I owe this sudden burst of Italian adventure?  I'm reading HEAT and am totally inspired by the stories of this regular Joe, Bill who chronicles his experience working in the Babbo kitchen.  Which has translated into me making a LOT of Italian food.  Thankfully I haven't yet had the urge to bring home an entire pig to butcher in the kitchen (you'll understand where I'm going with this if you've read the book).  Jason doesn't know how lucky he is.

I decided to try my hand at making orecchietta, which according to the book is the easiest of the pastas to make.  But unlike Bill, I could not phone up my contacts in Italy and arrange a few weeks of instruction in an Italian kitchen.  So I turned instead to the power of the Internet and more specifically YouTube.  In a matter of minutes I found several gracious Nonna's that were willing to invite me into their kitchens for a lesson - albeit a lesson entirely in Italian.  I did a lot of watching - video upon video, for the better part of the day before making the dough and attempting the process myself. 

I started with the semolina flour and used my food processor to make the dough.  Having just made two successful batches using "00" flour I was feeling pretty confident in my pasta-dough-making abilities.  I mixed it, kneaded it and let it rest.  But as soon I took it out to roll, I could see my Nonna's shaking their heads and resting their floured hands on hips.  My dough was too dry.  I made my orecchietta anyway, but the little ears just kept closing up.  Back to Nonna's for more watching and learning.  Maybe I should take some Italian lessons too.
 

A little taste of Paris in Calgary

Some of you might recognize what's in this picture.  And if you do, you're likely a little bit excited about it.  Well, me too and three!  But if you don't, well, not to worry, I will not leave this mystery unsolved.  These colorful gems of crispy, creamy, chew-y-ness are the-one-and-only French Macaron.  And if you've never had one you seriously need to.  Right now.

Lucky for you, or at least me and all the other people in Calgary, they are now available here from Macaron at the Calgary Farmers Market.  It's a friend of a friend of mine that's opened the shop and I'd say she's giving Peirre Herme a real run for his money.  Personally, I'm struggling with an extreme addiction to the Salty Caramel flavour.  Can you say Intervention?

Head over to the Farmers Market and check them out.  The various different flavors are listed on their website.  Once you've tried one I can promise you'll never see that drizzled lump of gooey coconut at Tim Horton's quite the same. 

Pass the Salad

Meat and cheese can't be the only things you eat.  Or at least they shouldn't be.

Thanks to Yvonne, this is now one of my favorite salads.  It's a simple and sublime combination of creamy avocado, pungent onion and sweet tomato.  And since there's not much too it I make sure to buy the best possible ingredients and splurge on heirloom tomatoes if I can find them.

With a simple oil, champagne vinegar (or lemon juice) salt and pepper vinaigrette this salad is perfection.  Slice the tomatoes and avocado top with thin shavings of onion and drizzle on the dressing. 

Smoking out the neighbors

Santa was listening to me this year AND I guess I was good, because he gave me my very own Bradley Smoker.  :)  I'm off to smoke out the neighbors!

And what did I do on New Years Eve?  Well, my brother brought over a freshly caught Northern Pike and we set to filleting it with the help of a few back-woods YouTube videos.  It went surprisingly well (what would we do without YouTube) and all the bones were successfully removed.  Then the pike went into the brine for an overnight spa treatment.

The next morning my brother and I moved onto the smoker assembly.  Really there wasn't much to it, take it out of the package, attach the smoker box to the tower and plug in the cords.  So we did that and were rewarded with an E1 error message and a seriously annoying beep.  Fabio!  So we looked through the forums and followed all the recommended fixes but to no avail.  Armed with the receipt we went back to the store and returned it for a brand spanking new one.

Take two.  We went through all the same steps and breathed a sigh of relief when we didn't get the E1 error message.  But our celebration came to an abrupt halt when we noticed that the door seal seemed flawed.  Frig!  We figured that maybe it would improve once the rubber had a chance to warm up, so we took it outside and began the seasoning process. 

There were a few more bumps that we had to go through but eventually we did put the seasoning behind us and we could move onto the pike.  It had been air drying under a fan for a couple of hours and it was ready.  So in it went.  My brother went home and I was happy as a clam that everything was working.  Then I when I checked on it the temp wasn't climbing?!  It was staying at about 80.  What?!  I bundled up and went outside to discover that the door was open about an inch.  And it wouldn't stay closed.  Friggin' frig.  Okay fine.  I could deal with this - duct tape.  It worked like magic and although it took until midnight, the fish turned out great. 

Next time I'll change the brine 'cause it came out too salty for me, but the smoke was perfect and the texture was moist and not chewy.

Given my success from last night, this morning I moved onto spare ribs and a chicken that I rubbed and refrigerated overnight.  I smoked the ribs at 200-225 for 3 hours with 1 hour of heat and then I removed them, wrapped them in foil with a slathering of bbq sauce and put them in the oven at 250 for another 4 hours.   The chicken also hit the smoke and then finished in the oven.  The picture from above is the pulled chicken and a bit of bbq sauce. 

 

I didn't stop there though.  Right after the ribs and chicken I took advantage of the cold weather and cold smoked some white and medium cheddar cheese.  Whew what a day.  Anyone want dinner?