Polenta Challenge!!

Last week Steve gave me the ingredient of polenta to use this week.  I think I've made this once or twice.  I knew it had cornmeal in it.....that's about it. LOL  So I searched online for some inspiration!  And I got it.  Since it was cornmeal, I first thought maybe a variation on a corn fritter, but I don't really like them to begin with, so I went a different direction.  After finding a yummy sounding polenta recipe (thank you Alton Brown!), I knew it was going to end up a creamy pot of scrumptious.  But what to do with it to make it creative and different, and still maintain that ooey gooey deliciousness??  What else is kind of the same consistency that could be adapted??  Hmmm....yes!  I got it!  Potato cakes.  Golden fried delicious crunchy outside, ooey gooey inside.  So then I found a potato cake recipe online to use as a guide.  Thus my inspiration was there....and just a side note, I could not find andouille sausage at my small town grocery store, so I bought this Hillshire Farms Gourmet Smoked Sausage with Jalapeno (see Steve, two ingredients AGAIN and you gave me that one too last week! hehehe).  I also think any spicy sausage will work with this pretty well.  Below is the recipe:

The sausage I used tonight

Sausage Polenta Cakes

Ingredients:

·         2 Tbsp olive oil

·         ¾ cup red onion, finely diced

·         1 stalk celery, finely diced

·         2 cloves garlic, minced

·         2 tsp diced jalapeno

·         4 cups water

·         4 cubes chicken bouillon

·         1 cup coarse ground cornmeal

·         1/2 lb andouille sausage, cooked, drained & cooled (or other spicy sausage/smoked sausage)

·         2 green onions, diced

·         ½ cup Mexican blend cheese

·         1 cup all purpose flour

·         Cajun seasoning

·         2 eggs

·         2 Tbsp milk

·         2 cups Panko bread crumbs

·         Olive oil for frying

·         Black bean & corn salsa

·         1 Roma tomato, diced

·         Sour cream

·         Parsley for garnish

Directions:

1.       In a large sauce pan, heat 2 Tbsp olive oil over medium high heat.  Add red onion, celery, and a dash of salt; sauté until onions are translucent, about 4-5 minutes.

2.      Reduce heat to low, add garlic and jalapenos; sauté 1-2 minutes being sure not to burn the garlic.

3.      Turn heat to high, add water and chicken bouillon cubes, bring to a boil.  Gradually add cornmeal while continuously stirring.  Reduce heat, cover and simmer 35-40 minutes, stirring about every 10 minutes to prevent clumps.

4.      Once creamy, transfer to a large mixing bowl, stir in sausage and green onions.  Let cool for a little bit before adding shredded cheese, mixing all ingredients well. 

Polenta before adding sausage and green onions

5.       Line a 9x13 dish with parchment paper and transfer mixture to dish.  Spread to an even thickness and refrigerate several hours until mixture is a semi-solid form.

6.      When ready to finish the dish, prepare three small bowls.  In the first, combine the flour and Cajun seasoning to taste.  In the second, combine the eggs and milk, mixing well.  In the third, combine Panko and Cajun seasoning to taste. 

All coated and ready to fry!

Three bowls ready to go!

   7.       Lift parchment paper from the dish entirely and cut into 12 equal sized squares.  With each square, dredge in seasoned flour, coating completely.  Next dip in egg wash, allowing excess to drip off.  Finally dredge in seasoned Panko, coating completely.

8.      In a large skillet, heat enough olive oil for frying over medium heat.  Fry cakes 3 at a time (or less if you have a smaller skillet) to avoid overcrowding.  Fry for 2-3 minutes on each side, or until a golden brown.  Remove from oil and drain on paper towels. 

Mmmm....frying deliciousness.

9.      To serve, place cakes on a plate, add a spoonful of black bean & corn salsa on top of each cake, along with diced tomatoes and sour cream in the center.  Finish with parsley on top.

Mmmm....yummy polenta cakes!

Reflections:

I admit, I was a bit worried about how this would turn out.  I don't make polenta hardly ever, and potato cakes just as often.  But to my sweet surprise, they turned out freaking awesome!  Fried just perfectly, the Panko added a very nice crisp, and when fried, the center becomes the ooey gooey deliciousness of the original state of the polenta.  Chris's reviews were 5 stars for creativity, and 5 for taste.  Woo perfect score!  We both agree....it was a nice balance of spice, creaminess, crunchiness, a tiny bit of sweetness from the cornmeal, and very filling.  I only had 2!  We also both agree, definitely a keeper for the family cookbook! :-)  We can't think of anything we'd like to add or change, but it's a very versatile recipe.  I'm sure you could do something similar with chicken and other ingredients.  The possibilities are endless!  Try it out, let me know how you like it!  Bon Appétit!

Tomato Paste Challenge!

Another challenge this week, and boy did it take me a while to figure out what I wanted to make.  Tomato paste is kind of a borderline ingredient...it is really hard to be a "star" of the dish without making it into a pasta sauce of some kind, which was way too easy.  Tomatoes are also very abundant in Mexican dishes, but it still kind of felt like a cop-out.  I also wanted to incorporate another ingredient we've had on hand for a while, but haven't used at all yet, and that is Black Cherry Balsamic Vinegar.  We got it in Prescott, AZ from this amazing store of flavored olive oils and balsamic vinegars.  We got this one but haven't had a good recipe to use it with, so I wanted to use that too (see Steve, TWO ingredients!)  Here's the bottle:

So after thinking about it a while, I searched online for a balsamic vinegar BBQ sauce recipe and found a pretty easy one to follow.  It had great reviews and one common suggestion so I adapted that as well, while using our balsamic vinegar.  Most BBQ recipes call for ketchup, but since I had tomato paste to use this time, I tweaked the BBQ sauce recipe to use that instead of ketchup.  I'm sure this will be just as tasty with regular balsamic as well, so you don't have to go buy special balsamic vinegar just for this. 

It would have been easy to just make some BBQ chicken with some side dishes to go with it, but we eat a lot of salads so it can get a little repetative with the same old same old and I wanted to create a new salad for us, using different ingredients and dressing.  So along with the balsamic vinegar BBQ sauce, I also made a homemade balsamic vinaigrette using the Black Cherry Balsamic as well to tie into the flavor in the BBQ sauce.  So here it is, a Black Cherry Balsamic Vinegar BBQ Chicken Salad!

BBQ Sauce Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup tomato paste
• 3/4 cup chicken broth
• 1 cup balsamic vinegar
• 1/3 cup packed light brown sugar
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 Tbsp Worchestershire sauce
• 1 Tbsp Dijon mustard
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper

BBQ Sauce Directions:

 

1. Prepare grill if using charcoal. 
2. If using boullion for chicken broth, make boullion first in a medium sauce pan.  Add tomato paste and whisk to combine until smooth.
3. Add the remaining ingredients and stir well to combine.  Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat and allow to gently simmer until reduced and consistency of BBQ sauce, about 30 minutes. 
4. Brush BBQ sauce on to chicken, and cook on grill.

My wonderful hubby, my Grill Master! :-)

Mmmmm....looks so good already!!

Balsamic Vinaigrette Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
• 3 tsp dark brown sugar
• 1 Tbsp minced garlic
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 3/4 cup olive oil

Balamic Vinaigrette Directions:

1. Combine balsamic, sugar, garlic, salt and pepper.  I used an immersion blender to thoroughly combine all ingredients. 
2. Slowly add olive oil and whisk to combine.  You can also combine in a closed jar and shake ingredients together. 

Prepare the salad now.  I used the following ingredients for the salad, but feel free to use whatever you want.  I used:

Tucson Herb infused olive oil, with Ciabatta bread in the background

• baby spinach
• bean sprouts
• sliced red onion
• sliced white mushrooms
• sliced tomatoes
• clementine pieces
• crumbled goat cheese

After the salad is prepared, pour balsamic vinaigrette over top.  Slice BBQ chicken and place on top.  We also added some grilled pieces of Ciabatta bread as a side in place of croutons.  We brushed some olive oil infused with tuscan herbs on the bread before grilling it.  It is also from the place in AZ.  And here is the final product!  Very tasty indeed! :-)

Reflections:
I think this turned out really well....I especially liked the BBQ sauce.  The flavored balsamic definitely added a twist to the flavor without being overpowering.  We have extra BBQ sauce and will grill up some more chicken with it later this week just to eat as BBQ chicken.  I think the dressing was okay....maybe because I'm used to store bought too much or something, but it took me a while to like it.  Maybe I didn't combine it quite right.  To me it wasn't as fabulous as the BBQ sauce, but it was still pretty good and definitely tied in nicely with the BBQ sauce to complete the salad.  My hubby gave it a 4 on creativity, for not using it in an italian style, and a 5 for taste.  He thought all the flavors worked really well together, including the BBQ sauce, vinaigrette, and salad ingredients like the clementines and goat cheese.  He really liked the BBQ sauce too. And he's my grill master so the chicken came out perfectly on the grill! Thank you babe for helping this week! :-) 

So that's it, give it a try, let me know if you like it.  A couple things you can do to make it easier is to use whatever balsamic you want....it doesn't have to be a special flavor.  You can also use 3/4 cup ketchup for the BBQ sauce instead of tomato paste and chicken broth.  Enjoy and bon appetit!

Pork Tenderloin Challenge!

My friend (and fellow Army Wife) Steve and his wife are doing a 30 day food creativity challenge (check out his blog HERE!!). While I do not wish to go to the store every day for a new ingredient, he helped out by giving me a main ingredient on Monday that I had to come up with a creative way to use on Tuesday (when I do go to the store).  He was making a pork tenderloin Tuesday, so that's what he gave me to use as well.

I knew it wouldn't be creative enough to just throw some spices or sauces on it and bake, broil or grill it, so I started thinking outside the oven-box.  Pulled pork BBQ sandwiches was also too easy.  So I thought perhaps I could combine the pulled pork aspect of BBQ with a taco.  And then another recipe I made a while ago popped into my head....it was a pork tenderloin with an onion and cranberry sauce on top.  My idea was created!  A pulled pork taco, with some kind of onion mixture and a cranberry sauce or chutney on corn tortillas.  And tacos need cheese, right?  Mmmm....goat cheese would be perfect!  So here is my creation yesterday.  I've decided to call it:

Pulled Pork Tacos with a Cranberry-Apple Chutney 

Pulled Pork Ingredients:

• 1 pork tenderloin
• 2 bottles beer of choice (I used Samuel Adams Blackberry Witbier)
• 1 vidalia onion
• 1 cup chicken broth
• olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste
• 50/50 corn/flour tortillas

Directions:

1. Salt and pepper the pork tenderloin to taste. 
2. Heat a cast iron skillet over medium heat.  Sear all sides of the pork tenderloin in the skillet.  Place in the bottom of a crock pot.  Cover pork with the beer.  Cover and cook on low 4-6 hours, or until pork will shred easily.

3. Roughly 45 minutes prior to pork being done, begin the last of the prep.  Slice the onion into long pieces.  Heat the cast iron skillet over medium-high heat.  Add about 2 tsp olive oil and add onions.  Salt and pepper to taste, cover and stir occasionally, cooking about 10 minutes or until onions are a nice golden brown.  Add the chicken broth and bring to a boil.  Cover and reduce heat; let simmer 30 minutes.

4. While the onions simmer, prepare the Cranberry-Apple Chutney (recipe below).  The chutney is nice served warm with this dish, however it can be cooled and kept for up to a month in the fridge.
5. While chutney is simmering, remove pork from crock pot and shred with forks.  Discard liquid.  Add onion mixture to the shredded pork and mix well in a large bowl. 
6. To prepare the tacos, spread desired amount of goat cheese on a corn tortilla, along with the chutney and pork on top.  Voila!  A pulled pork taco with cranberry-apple chutney. :-)

Cranberry-Apple Chutney Ingredients:

• 1 cup apple cider vinegar
• 1 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1/2 red onion, finely diced
• 1 apple, peeled and diced small
• 1 Tbsp minced fresh peeled ginger
• 10 whole cloves, crushed with the side of a knife
• 2 whole cinnamon sticks
• About 3 1/2 cups fresh or thawed cranberries **(I could not find either this time of year, so I used a bag of Ocean Spray dried cranberries instead.  I soaked them in water for about an hour, then rinsed them and let them dry to try to remove some of the extra sugar.  I'm sure this is even better with whole cranberries!)**

Directions:

1. In a medium saucepan, combine vinegar, sugar, onion, apple, ginger, cloves and cinnamon sticks.  Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat.  Cook, stirring until sugar dissolves, about 5 minutes.

2. Add the cranberries and reduce heat.  Simmer gently until most of the liquid is gone.  (If using whole cranberries, simmer until the cranberries are tender and start to burst.)  Using a potato masher, gently mash the chutney together to create more of a paste consistency.  Serve warm with this dish, but again, can be cooled and kept for up to a month in the fridge.

Reflections:  I was a little concerned this would turn out just awful.  Weird ingredients, flavored beer, corn tortillas and goat cheese?!?  Come on, doesn't sound like something you might normally think of.  But that was the point with this!  My first thought when coming up with this was something along the lines of "pulled pork BBQ meets Mexican tacos meets Thanksgiving cranberries." LOL  But I think it worked!!  The chutney was very sweet, and I think it is in part because I couldn't find whole cranberries.  If you have to use the dried, maybe decrease the amount of brown sugar to 3/4 cups or so to help reduce the sweetness a little.  (I can't wait to make this again in season with whole cranberries and Honeycrisp apples!!)  The pork cooked in Blackberry Witbier was kind of odd by itself....but it worked pretty well with this. 

Overall, I liked the recipe.  Chris agreed with me and gave it 5 out of 5 stars for creativity, and 4 out of 5 stars for taste.  And I agree with him on his reasoning for the lower taste score.  As it is presented above, it may be too sweet for some people.  The goat cheese helps balance it out a little bit, but he suggested adding some kind of spice to further balance out the sweetness.  But not another sauce...the pork needs to be cooked differently to add the spice, and I haven't quite figured out how to do that yet (suggestions welcomed!).  I think once we master the pork, it will become a family favorite! :-)

I enjoyed the challenge of coming up with something different for a pork tenderloin.  And since I like to cook and come up with new things, this really was a fun challenge!  And Steve has graciously agreed to give me further ingredients each week to work with as well.  Hopefully everything else turns out just as well as this did! :-)

Chicken with Crimini Cream Sauce

Another new recipe was tried yesterday...Chicken with Cremini Cream Sauce.  I got the recipe from The South Beach Diet Super Quick Cookbook.  For those wondering, it is a phase one recipe.  Anyway, this was a pretty simple recipe, and was very tasty!  I doubled the cream sauce ingredients, because these recipes NEVER make enough sauce for us when I follow them.  I also added some mashed red potatoes and a salad to balance out the meal.  So here is how I made it:

Ingredients:

• 4 (6 oz) boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• salt and pepper to taste
• 3 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 8 oz small cremini mushrooms, quartered
• 3 scallions, thinly sliced
• 1 cup chicken broth (made from bouillon)
• 4 oz reduced-fat cream cheese
• 1/2 tsp dried rosemary
• 1/4 tsp salt

Directions:

1. Season chicken with salt and pepper to taste.
2. In a large nonstick skillet, heat 2 tsp of olive oil over medium heat.  Add the chicken and cook until golden brown, about 3 minutes per side.  Transfer chicken to a plate and keep warm.
3. Add the mushrooms, scallions, and remaining 1 tsp of oil to the skillet.  Cook over medium heat, tossing frequently, until the mushrooms have wilted, about 3 minutes.
4. Add the broth, cream cheese, rosemary and 1/4 tsp salt.  Stir until the cream cheese melts thoroughly.
5. Return chicken to the pan and bring to a simmer.  Cover and cook until the chicken is cooked through and still juice.
6. Serve chicken topped with mushroom sauce.



Chicken and mashed potatoes






Entire dinner...chicken, mashed potatoes and salad

I really liked this recipe!  It was almost close to a creamy pasta sauce, and if I were to make even more I think it could easily be turned into one.  I also think next time I make this (because there will be a next time!), I will add a package of frozen chopped spinach (thawed beforehand of course).  I'll add it at the time the mushrooms and scallions are cooking, and maybe a little bit of garlic as well.  You can never go wrong with garlic in my opinion. :-)

Stay tuned tomorrow night or Wednesday for another new recipe!  A friend of mine (Steve) gave me one ingredient that I have to use creatively in a dish, and tomorrow night is when I'll make it.  I'm just not as good as him about posting as quickly. :-p  I think it's going to be very tasty...just hoping the commissary has all the ingredients I need for it!

DIY Painting Tip

Short and sweet....mostly because I want to pin this on Pinterest to share with the world.  I don't even care if it's already out there!  Because I thought of it without finding it on Pinterest first! Haha!  Okay, here's the tip....

When painting a room more than one color, rather than wash the paint tray each time or use multiple trays, simply line it with Glad Press N Seal wrap!  When you're done with that color, just peel off and throw away!  Quick and easy clean up....see????

P.S.  This is for our DIY bathrom paint job.  This picture does not accurately reflect the color of paint, as it is wet and not the same color as when it is dry.  But have no fear, our bathroom painting job will be posted when finished! :-D  Now go!  Enjoy my painting wisdom. :-p

Zesty Lime Shrimp and Avocado Salad

Well I sure suck at doing new blog posts! LOL  It's yet again been a while since the last one...seems to happen often lately.  Anyway, I have a new recipe I'd like to share tonight.  I originally got this from skinnytaste.com, but I added a couple things and subbed another, so now it's my recipe. :-)  It's nice and light for the hot summer months, and pretty tasty too.  The recipe as prepared tonight is below, however, next time, I think some pan seared scallops added to the mix would be delicious! 

Ingredients:

• 1 lb cooked jumbo shrimp, peeled, deveined, and chopped
• 1 medium tomato, diced
• 1 avocado, diced
• 1 tsp diced jalapeno
• 1/4 cup diced red onion
• 1/2 tsp minced garlic
• 2 limes, juice of
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1/2 Tbsp dried cilantro
• Salt/pepper to taste
• 4 oz fresh mozzarella cheese, cubed

Directions:

1. In a small bowl, combine red onion, lime juice, olive oil, garlic, and pinch of salt & pepper.  Let sit at least 5 minutes to mellow the flavor of the onion. 

2. In a large bowl, combine chopped shrimp, avocado, tomato, and jalapeno.  If you will eat all of this dish at one sitting, add mozzarella cheese as well.  If not, wait to add mozzarella on top of the prepared salad at the end, or it loses its consistency. 

3. Add in onion mixture and cilantro, and toss gently.  Adjust salt/pepper to taste.

4. Serve over shredded lettuce.  The finished product:

 Overall I think this dish was pretty good.  The commissary only had very ripe avocados yesterday, so I think this one was just almost on the verge of going bad.  (Good thing I used it tonight!)  It would have been a bit better with one that isn't quite so ripe, but eh, whatever.  It turned out pretty tasty I think! The hubby liked it too, so even better! :-)

P.S.  If you haven't done it yet, check out my sister's blog here!  Just be warned....it contains very adult content and vocabulary...if you are easily offended, don't read it!  But if you're friends with me, you'll probably enjoy her humor and insights on the female side of relationships, etc. :-)

Hopefully another blog sooner than later!