Grilled Portobello Sandwich

Aight. This one is a little tricky. I have made it twice so far, and of course no pictures - but I do have one portobello mushroom left so maybe I will remember to take pictures on the 3rd try. *Update - I finally took pictures on the 4th mushroom. Go me!* This tastes awesome and it is really filling. It is a great dinner idea for someone who is trying to go temporarily vegetarian (me). Dennis even ate one. Amazing.

Ingredients

1 red bell pepper

salt and black pepper to taste

1/2 cup olive oil

2 portobello mushroom caps, cleaned

2 slices onion

2 Kaiser rolls, split

4 tsp mayonnaise

1 tsp roasted garlic

2 ounces mozzarella, thinly sliced

2 slices tomato

First step - roast the red pepper. Put it on the grill and turn it until the whole thing is blackened. Should be around 15 minutes.

While your red pepper is roasting, mix the olive oil with the salt & pepper. Brush the mixture on top of the mushroom and then on the underside, including the...gills. *shudder* Man those creep me out.

 Gills are less freaky when you have a super helper dog in the kitchen.

The first time we made these sandwiches, we used the grill but it was kind of difficult and annoying, so the 2nd time I used the broiler. I put the portobello and onion on my pizza stone in the oven and put the broiler on low and let them sit for a few minutes. I flipped the portobello, left the onion alone, and let them sit for another few minutes on low. Then I flipped the mushroom again and placed a piece of mozzarella cheese on top, then put the broiler on HIGH. YEAAA!!

Onion and mushroom chillin on the pizza stone.

Ok so at this point, your mushroom and onions should be doing well. Also at this point, your red pepper should be blackened. Put it in a bowl and cover it with a lid, then leave it be for a few minutes. Now go put your kaiser rolls (open-faced) in the oven under the broiler so they can get nice and toasty. One more thing - real quick like, go mix up that mayo and garlic to make a sort of, what do you call it... oh right, garlic mayonnaise.

 My garlic mayo. Mmm.

Do you see how tough it is to juggle all of these ingredients!? Yikes. Check on the roll and the mozzarella. Don't let the roll get burnt, but wait until the mozzarella is melty or else it will be cold and taste weird. Once you have found that happy medium, take everything out. Spread the garlic mayo on the roll, then pile the rest of your ingredients on. Don't forget the tomato! Nomnomnom.

Here is the original link from Allrecipes.com.

Leftover tip: I roasted a whole red pepper and put the leftovers in the fridge, so the 2nd time I made this sandwich I tossed the red pepper on the pizza stone at the same time as the mushroom and onion to heat it up. Works like a charm!

"Cilantro Lime" Pork

Notice the quotes? Well I got this recipe because I thought it sounded awesome. I became obsessed with making salsa last summer, mostly the mango/pineapple variety, and 2 ingredients that were in all of the recipes were lime and cilantro. So I saw this recipe and I was all like, whaaaaat? Well it turns out, the pork is still really tasty (can't go wrong with a crock pot), but I did not really get the cilantro-y limey flavor I was looking for. Boo!

Ingredients

1/2 cup olive oil

2 garlic cloves minced

2 tablespoons lime juice

1 tablespoon white vinegar

1 1/2 teaspoon adobo seasoning with cumin

2 tablespoons chopped fresh (or 2 teaspoons dried) cilantro

1 (4 pound) bone in pork shoulder

1 medium onion, sliced

2 cups beef broth

Mix the first 6 ingredients together with a whisk. That will be your marinade. Easy peezy.

 

marinade + pork = mmmm

Get your pork shoulder out and make shallow cuts all over it, then put it in a big Ziploc bag with the marinade and shake it all up so the marinade covers the pork entirely. Then put it in the fridge for at least 6 hours. I left mine overnight. It made the fridge smell yummy (even though the bag was supposed to be completely airtight, what the hell?). When your pork is done marinating, put it in a big pan and sear it on all sides until it is brown. This is going to make your kitchen smell fantastic.

Now lay the sliced onion along the bottom of the crockpot and put the pork inside with the fat side up. Pour the beef broth and the rest of the marinade in the crockpot. I got 2 small cans of beef broth and just used all of that, without really measuring. I also poured the beef broth into the Ziploc bag first to dry to get all of the marinade out. Cover the crockpot and cook on low for 8 hours.

There are some other instructions after this but basically, once the 8 hours was up Dennis and I started eating it. We made sandwiches with Sweet Baby Ray's barbecue sauce and this awesome pepper vinegar my dad made and gave us. Basically it is like... jalapenos soaked in vinegar (not sure what type of vinegar). I always fish some jalapenos out and put them on my sandwiches and OMG they are the bomb.

I can't remember how I found this recipe. It may have been on foodgawker's most favorited recipes of all-time where I found the last 2 recipes (Nummy Mozzerella Sticks & High Class Mac & Cheese). Not sure. Anyway, I think this recipe was sort of a bust because it didn't have the exact taste I was looking for, but the taste it did have was still really good, so I dunno what to think about this one. The meat was awesome, it made the house smell terrific (can I talk about how good this pork smells a little more?), and I did it all by myself with no help from Dennis, so in my book it is a success!

I have no pictures of the finished product because I have not been on top of my game lately. Sorry dudes.

Thank you to Des at Life's Ambrosia for this recipe. It looks like she's got a ton of other cool recipes on her site so check it out sometime!

Tirokafteri - Spicy Feta Dip

When D & I went to visit my grandma (Meema!) for the weekend back in July, she took us to this little Greek/pizza place (I believe it was called Papas Pizza) that she had heard about but had never been to. We didn't get pizza, but I did get a calzone to share with Meema & it was off the hook! We also got a sort of appetizer platter that came with tzatziki sauce, hummus, and "tyrokafteri."

None of us had ever heard of the last one, which the menu described as a spicy feta dip, but we were willing to try it out. It was so tasty, especially combined with one or both of the other dips. D especially loved it and asked the waitress for a take-out menu just so we could look it up and make it when we got home.

Ingredients

8 oz package cream cheese

1 lb feta, crumbled

1 cup lemon juice

1/4 tsp ground White pepper

1/2 cup olive oil

1 cup half & half

4 roasted red peppers, diced (optional)

2 tsp. Tabasco sauce (optional)

This recipe is easy to make but be warned - it makes a LOT of dip!

Soften the cream cheese in large bowl with a mixer, then add the feta, lemon juice, and white pepper. Slowly add olive oil until it's evenly blended. Mix in half & half until the mixture is smooth and soft. Add the Tabasco sauce last - recipe says 2 tsp. but I could have used a little more.

Now add roasted peppers if you'd like to. Sadly this recipe doesn't tell you how to prepare roasted red peppers, but I will!

Heat up the oven to 450 degrees. Put the peppers in whole and turn every ten minutes until all the sides are slightly blackened. When it's time to remove the pepper, either place them in a brown paper bag and close up the end, or place them into a large bowl and cover the top. The steam released will help loosen the skin and make it easier to remove. Leave them to steam for 15 minutes or so.

Now it's time to pull the skin off & it should be incredibly easy. The next part is harder - removing the top and seeds. Actually, the top is easy to pull off, its just separating the rest of the pepper that is difficult. The website I used to help me with this process said to "pull or cut off the top of the pepper and squeeze gently to remove the seeds." It was really hard for me because the pepper gets so slippery after you take the skin off. I ended up tearing the pepper into strips and removing any seeds that might be on that particular tiny piece. It was somewhat time-consuming but, oh well!

The peppers are done once you've done all of the above. You could mix them in with the bulk of the dip or just save them to put in individual servings.

Anywho, here it is! It should be noted that this picture contains Naan which I did not make myself! I just put it in the toaster. :) Also the peppers are not in this picture.

If you're ever in the Virginia Beach area, make sure to check out Papas Pizza and get the dip platter with the Tirokafteri!

Here is the original recipe from Greek-Recipe.com.

Quick and Yummy Hummus

I stole that name from the actual page where I got the recipe, but it is a really good title because well... it is quick and it is yummy!

Ingredients

1 (15 ounce) can garbanzo beans, rinsed and drained

1/2 cup plain yogurt

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

3 cloves garlic, minced

2 teaspoons olive oil

1 tablespoon water

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

First of all, I felt really dumb when I read this recipe because I was like, "What the hell are garbanzo beans? Where's the recipe with chickpeas??" So for those of you who are challenged like I am, garbanzo beans = chickpeas. Oops.

So anywho, drain and rinse the garbanzo beans. I found a couple little stray pieces that didn't belong in there so it's worth sorting through the beans before you go to the next step.

Now, the next step! The recipe basically says to dump all of the ingredients into a food processor or a blender and mix them up. My food processor is a little small for my recipes lately, especially when it tells me to blend all the ingredients together (rather than just one ingredient at a time). Also, it doesn't really break them down as much as I'd like, so after my first attempt with the food processor, I poured the somewhat chunky chickpea paste into the blender and used that for the rest of the recipe.

So next I add the yogurt to the mixture. I got a single serving (6 oz) container of Dannon plain yogurt and it yielded just over 1/2 cup so go me! (I was eyeballing the amount and wasn't positive it was going to be enough).

Lemon juice, oh lemon juice. I love it but I never know how much one lemon will give me. I'll say have 1 lemon handy to get the 2 tbsp. The rest of the ingredients are easy enough & self explanatory. Just put them all in the blender and well... blend.

It should be smooth, creamy, and kind of beige colored when it's ready. Then just grab some carrot sticks, pita bread, or whatever else you want to dip and go nuts!!

Mango Avocado Tomato Salsa

Finally, the real reason behind the whole blog. The salsa. It came to us in a combination of ways.. there is a lovely restaurant in Salisbury, MD called Cactus Taverna that serves mango slices on top of their entrees and it really adds a great flavor to fish.

We decided that we wanted to try mango on our own fish. Dennis talked to my mom about mango/peach salsa and said he wanted to try to make some at home. So we planned on making the salsa to put on top of some tuna steaks that we got from Target. I know right? Target has a really great grocery section now, in case you didn't know.

Anywho, Dennis asked me to find a recipe for mango salsa, and this is the first one I found. The prep work is time consuming, but once you have finished you just toss all of the ingredients together and let them mellow.

Ingredients

1 mango - peeled, seeded and diced

1 avocado - peeled, pitted, and diced

4 medium tomatoes, diced

1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced

1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons fresh lime juice

1/4 cup chopped red onion

3 tablespoons olive oil

Combine the mango, avocado, tomatoes, jalapeno, cilantro, and garlic in a medium bowl. I have a slap-chop type device that I use to dice all of the ingredients. It seems to work well and it is a lot easier than cutting everything with a knife.

We bought 2 of everything so that we could try the recipe twice. The second batch was better because everything was a lot riper so I would recommend buying your ingredients a few days in advance.

We used jarred jalapenos & jarred minced garlic for the recipe but you could try to get them fresh. We just kind of eyeballed it as far as the amounts go, but it ended up being about 8-10 jalapeno slices and 2.5 teaspoons of minced garlic.

Stir in the salt, lime juice, red onion, and olive oil. Just FYI - one large lime will give you 2 tablespoons of juice, but if the limes are on the small side I would get 2. To blend the flavors, refrigerate for about 30 minutes before serving.

We grilled the tuna steaks and did some boil-in-a-bag white rice, then put a scoop of salsa on the plate. The meal was perfect.

This tastes amazing the day after you make it. We had it stored in a mixing bowl with a lid, but the lid isn't 100% airtight and when I opened the fridge the next morning, the amazing aroma hit me in the face like a 2x4. I was getting creamer for my coffee and I started wondering if salsa would be good for breakfast! I ate it later in the day with tortilla chips and it was excellent.

The second time we made the recipe, we doubled the mango and it was still amazing. I had salmon and Dennis had chicken, and they both went very well with the salsa.

Here is the original link from AllRecipes.com.

Broiled Striped Bass

Dennis came home from an after-work fishing trip with this bad boy back in December 2008. He cleaned it himself and gave me the meat to do with as I pleased! I decided to cook and eat it (as opposed to what, I don't know). Unfortunately, this was one of those times when I had already eaten right before he brought me/cooked me some food and I ate a few bites and said "I'm full!" If you would like to hear more of those stories, just ask Dennis... I'm sure he's dying to relate them.

So Dennis took care of the hard part and I did the easy part. Cooking fish (certain types of fish, I want to say white fish but I don't know enough about fish to confidently say it) can be really simple, quick, and easy to clean up. When I was in college my dad told me how to cook fish and it's so easy I still remember it. Here's what you need.

Ingredients

Olive oil, salt, & pepper (all amounts to taste)

Lemon wedge, if preferred

Yep! That's it. Oh and fish.

This can get a little messy so I like to use aluminum foil to keep it all contained. Make a little tray out of foil and put it on a cookie sheet. I use a cookie sheet with sides just in case the oil gets out. Lay the fish down in the foil tray and drizzle the oil over it, then salt & pepper it. Flip it over and repeat. Then turn the broiler on and put the cookie sheet on the top tray closest to the broiler. Leave it in for about 7 minutes, then take it out and flip the fish again. Wait another 7 minutes then check on it. At this point, the fish should be "flaky," meaning that if you jab it with a fork, the pieces flake off easily.

If you like tartar sauce or anything like that with your fish, you can try it out, but I just add more salt & pepper if needed. I usually pair fish with steamed broccoli & squirt the lemon wedge over both. Fantastic!