Risotto with White Fish and Orange, a family favorite meal

I am over at Keeper of the Home today with one of my family's favorite meals. It's a great way to use homemade fish stock which is filled with excellent nutrients for the body.

http://www.keeperofthehome.org/2012/02/risotto-with-white-fish-and-orange.html

Check out the recipe and if you aren't familiar with Keeper of the Home, check out Stephanie's site. It has quickly turned into one of my more favorite sites to follow.

Enjoy!

Chicken Tikka Masala from the cookbook Curry Cuisine and Check out Artistta on Cheeseslave!

Wow, life has been incredibly busy as of late. Every time I think I might have a moment to write a blog post, a new things gets piled on and I'm once again off and distracted. I'm not particularly a fan of things being this busy, but alas there is not much I can do about it, except trust the Lord and know that He'll provide if I just take things one step at a time.

We are quickly moving towards the end of our rental lease at our town home (it's up at the end of Sept.) Yesterday there were three showings and thankfully one of the people decided to rent our place. Hurray! No more cleaning for showings. Don't get me wrong I love a clean house, but with two toddlers who's sole mission in life is to pull as much stuff out as possible and better yet bring the outdoors indoors (like dumping sand all over themselves and the carpet), trying to keep a place clean and tidy for showings is exhausting. We have also been looking at homes and researching like crazy. Because we are looking to move out of the cities and have more land to start living a more self sustained lifestyle, the house hunting has lead to many late nights. The driving alone has taken close to an hour one way to get to an area we can come close to affording while still allowing my husband to work in town (this area would be about 40 min. from his job). Hopefully this week, perhaps even today, we are going to put an offer in on a foreclosed home that has 7 beautiful acres with it. It's all in God's hands, as we hope that the bank will come down in price and accept our offer.

In the coming weeks I'll fill you all in on some of the other activities that have been going on, including some things about the movie Farmageddon. Stay tuned because it's exciting!

Today my blog is being featured on Cheeseslave! So cool! Well, at least for me. ;-) Check out the post and take a tour of my kitchen with Ann Marie. In the post I mention one of my families new favorite dishes in Chicken Tikka Masala. This recipe comes from the cookbook Curry Cuisine I picked up at the library and frankly I love the cookbook so much I keep renewing it. I think I am going to have to add it to my permanent cookbook collection.

What You'll Need

Serves 4

6 boned chicken thighs (1½lb or 675g)

Juice from 2 limes

1 tsp paprika

1½ tsp cumin seeds

½ tsp coriander seeds

2 shallots, roughly chopped

4 large garlic cloves, peeled, smashed and chopped

1½" (4-cm) piece of fresh ginger root, roughly chopped

2 green chilies, seeds removed and roughly chopped

4½ oz (125 g) plain yogurt 

(the recipe calls for Greek yogurt, but I used my homemade stuff)

½ tsp ground garam masala 

1 tbsp vegetable oil 

(I used coconut oil) 

For the Sauce

14 oz (400 g) canned chopped tomatoes

1 rounded tsp tomato paste

handful of coriander leaves, roughly chopped 

(I didn't have this and can say the recipe was still excellent) 

1¼" (3-cm) piece of fresh ginger root, grated

1 tsp lime juice

1/2 tsp  cane sugar

3 tbsp unsalted butter

1/2 cup heavy cream

Note: I always use organic ingredients and free-range/grass fed meat for all my recipes.

Getting Started

1. Slice your chicken thighs into 1" chunks, then in a large bowl, combine with lime juice and paprika. 

2. In a small pan, roast the cumin seeds over medium-high heat for about 1 minute. Shake the pan or stir the seeds to keep them from burning. Allow the seeds to cool on a plate, then grind them into a fine powder using a pestle, spice mill or coffee grinder.

3. Place shallots, garlic, ginger and chilies into a food processor. Drain any juice from the chicken mixture you made above and add it to the shallot mixture. Process until smooth.

4. Pour mixture into a bowl and add the yogurt, garam masala and half of the ground coriander seeds and cumin powder. Pour this mixture over top of the chicken pieces, making sure each piece gets well coated.

5. Cover the chicken mixture with a plate or plastic wrap and allow it to marinade overnight. If possible, try and stir it a couple of times to redistribute the marinade.

6. Place a broiler pan under your oven broiler and preheat (I placed my pan about 3/4 of the way up from the bottom of the oven), then arrange chicken pieces on the hot pan. Drizzle with the 1 tbsp of oil and broil the chicken for about 5 minutes on each side.

7. Once chicken is cooked, pour any excess cooking juices into a bowl. Skim off any fat that floats to the top. Place chicken pieces into a bowl and cover to keep warm while you make the sauce.

8. In a blender or food processor, combine tomatoes, tomato paste, coriander leaves, ginger, lime juice, sugar and remaining cumin and coriander powder. Blend until smooth.

9. In a pan, melt the butter, then add the tomato mixture you just blended and the cream. Bring to a simmer then add (straining if necessary) the reserved cooking juices from the chicken. Add the chicken pieces and reheat to piping hot!

Serve immediately with with Indian flat bread and enjoy!

New Belgium Beer Day on Artistta! Fajitas and Tortillas

I have had the fun opportunity to sample some of New Belgium Brewing Company's beer as a part of the Foodbuzz Tastemaker's program. I received $50 from New Belgium to create a dish using their beer. Seeing as how New Belgium makes some of my husband's favorite beer, I certainly couldn't pass on this opportunity and we both had an enjoyable time pairing beer with different recipes, as well as, experimenting in the kitchen.

I decided to start my New Belgium experience by purchasing their Spring Folly Pack; which included, Fat Tire, Ranger IPA, Mighty Arrow and 1554 Black Ale. Then I headed home and enjoyed a mini beer tasting with dinner that night. Fresh homemade pizza was on the menu and since it wasn't planned ahead of time, I didn't have all the ingredients for the standard red sauce pizza, so it was time to experiment and improvise. Oh how glad I am we went this route because the pizza turned out fabulous and just might be a new favorite in our house and one beer in particular was a perfect accompaniment. What did we have? Well, first I made a white sauce with onion, cream, salt, a bit of flour and about a cup of random cheeses we had in the cheese drawer. We slathered that all over the unbaked pizza crust, then topped it with small pieces of fresh cauliflower and a sprinkling of oregano and thyme. We slid our pizza onto our pizza stone in our preheated 550° oven (key here, preheat your oven & pizza stone for at least an hour before trying to bake a pizza). While the pizza baked, we boiled 4 eggs to slice on top of the pizza, table side. As we sat down to enjoy our meal, took a bite of pizza and tasted some of the beers we knew that first we made an excellent meal choice and second the perfect beer to accompany each delectable bite was the smooth Fat Tire Amber Ale.

Sweet Potato Roulade - perfect for brunch or as a special treat with dinner (grain free)

 

Once in awhile you need something special and elegant to accompany your dinner and a roulade is an easy way to accomplish this. They aren't overly difficult to make, yet looked nice and taste great. They can easily be made ahead of time and can also travel well.

This roulade recipe comes from the cookbook The Best-Ever Vegetarian Cookbook by Nicola Graimes. It's slightly sweet from the sweet potato and the allspice berries add a wonderful extra flavor. We enjoyed this so much with dinner last night we practically ate the whole thing. Even my 12 month old daughter and 3 year old son each had two slices.

What's For Dinner: Vietnamese hot pot with beef, prawns & Squid

 
I love seafood, but for the most I don't eat it too often anymore. Tear... With the oceans becoming contaminated it's difficult to find affordable and healthy choices for seafood. I personally try to avoid most large fish like tuna, swordfish and so forth because of the potential mercury contamination. I also watch where the seafood is coming from. If it's from China or even Mexico it's not high on my "I want to eat this" list.

Chicken Casserole w/ Cilantro Dumplings from Gordon Ramsay Makes It Easy Cookbook

For this past Christmas, my husband gave me Gordon Ramsay Makes It Easy cookbook. I find Gordon Ramsay to be a very curious man. He has a temper to boot and a mouth that my children should never be around for fear of what they may repeat, but his dishes always look superb and mouth watering. I'm pretty sure I'd never want to have to work for him. Either my own sometimes sassiness would get me in trouble or I'd simply feel terrible every time I'd make a mistake. With that being said (or written in this case) I've enjoyed perusing through my new cookbook and there are plenty of recipes I hope to share, however the first one I was drawn to was his Chicken Casserole, mostly because, as I mentioned in my Roasted Beef Stew post, I've been on a one pot meal kick. Especially the ones that leave me with leftovers for dinner on another night and this dish did just that.

I've made this recipe several times now and there's only one thing I'd change. I don't believe the dumplings are necessary. My husband and I both preferred a couple slices of fresh baked sourdough bread for sopping up the liquid, the dumplings were just a bit too much and don't store well if you want to have leftovers.

Roasted Vegetable Beef Stew

It's January, it's freezing cold here and we have a lot of snow, no really A LOT. Snow count is about 55" now. So, it's only natural to be wanting some rich, hearty food. That is exactly what this full flavor stew is. Instead of simply throwing the fresh vegetables in to the pot along with the meat, I decided to roast them in the oven first, to add an extra depth of flavor and I'm glad I did. This stew was wonderful.

Jarlsberg Swiss Cheese Souffle

Recently, Jarlsberg sent me a beautiful wedge of their Swiss cheese to use in a recipe. My mind began wheeling with ideas of what I could do with it. The recipes I could create are endless, like my favorite grilled cheese sandwich, a cheese fondue, perhaps a creamy cheese soup, or better yet, a delicious breakfast quiche! To be honest one of my favorite ways to eat cheese is simply sliced up with some fresh bread and fruit. It's an easy lunch or snack and this Swiss cheese has such a lovely flavor it doesn't need to be overly embellished. As I thought through my recipes, I decided to try something I've been wanting to do for a long time, but never seem to get around to – a souffle! They are always so beautiful to look at and are perfect for just about any meal and especially for brunch. With the holidays just around the corner, it's time to start figuring out what you'll be serving your guests or what special treats you'll want to make your family. To me, a souffle is certainly a special treat and they always taste wonderful!

Pizza 4 Ways and How to Make Pizza Sauce, Mozzarella & Italian Sausage

Pizzas range from Chicago-style deep-dish to the authentic Italian Neapolitan thin-crusts. Depending on what part of the country you're from you can find every topping and style imaginable, including sauce on the bottom, on the top and no sauce at all. Without a doubt though, the best pizzas around, no matter the style, are the ones made by hand using only the freshest ingredients. Below I've included four of my favorite styles of pizzas. Of course I can't stop at just sharing recipes for making your own crusts, so I've also included how to make your own whole-milk mozzarella, red pizza sauce and sweet Italian sausage. 

Homemade Mushroom Ravioli in a Mushroom Broth

I think if there is one food that you are going to make from scratch in the kitchen that's flavor and texture will far exceed that of a store bought food, it's going to be pasta. Some of you might think I'm nuts here, but fresh made pasta is absolutely wonderful tasting. There is a delicacy to it that no factory made pasta can mimic and unless you shop at a gourmet grocer, you'll likely not be able to enjoy this without making it yourself.
Last week I shared my post for hosting an elegant dinner party and one of the dishes I made for my guests was homemade ravioli in mushroom broth. The broth is filled with flavors of fall and the delicate ravioli are a perfect accompaniment.  This seemed like the ideal dish to use for this challenge, especially because I've been wanting to share how to make homemade pasta.

Vietnamese Beef Pho - Phở Bò

There is a pleasant aroma floating through the air, filling my home with the enticing feeling of warmth and comfort often enjoyed as the days grow shorter and cooler, as fall knocks at the front door. It's a wonderful soup, slowly cooking, allowing all the flavors of each ingredient to mingle together... 

Peppered Crusted Ribeye with Creamy Blue Cheese Sauce

Last Wednesday I shared my the first recipe, leek soup with a hint of blue cheese, from my husband's and my cook-off we did on our anniversary. Here's recipe number two and you can read the following post for recipe 3 - Oven Baked Potato Chips. This dish is easy to make and wonderful tasting.

The steak only takes about 6 minutes to cook, however before you can cook it, it needs to sit out on the counter for about an hour to come to room temperature. Have all your sides ready to go before you throw the steak into the skillet. Depending on what type of peppercorn you use and fresh ground is a must here, your steak can be very spicy. The first time I made it I used tellicherry peppercorns, which had wonderful flavor, but were not overly spicy. The second time I used black peppercorns and wow my mouth was a flaming, but they were good. The blue cheese sauce helps cut down the heat and goes perfectly with this type of steak.

I was able to get some awesome blue cheese at the co-op. It was from a local farm and was made with raw milk from grass-fed cows! If you don't have blue cheese, gorgonzola would work too.  For this meal I was able to get everything, but the sea salt, pepper and olive oil, from local sources!

Oven Baked Potato Chips

What You'll Need 

 - serves 2-3

1 lbs of organic potatoes

4 tbsp. olive oil

1 tsp. fresh ground pepper

1 tsp. sea salt

Getting Started

1.  Pre-heat oven to 450º. Slice your potatoes 1/8" thick. Leave the skin on for the extra nutrients and great flavor. Do your best to make sure they are all sliced to the same thickness so they bake more evenly. 

Easy and Declicious Pesto - Italian Style

Harvesting time is here and I have an overwhelming abundance of basil!This awesome herb is easily one of my favorites I always grow a healthy amount of it each year. The only problem I have with basil is it can't be dried. I know you see the dried stuff at the grocery store, but in reality basil is one herb that is much, much better fresh. Such a pity. So how do I preserve my basil harvest for use in the winter? I either freeze it by itself (chop it and mix it with either olive oil or water) or I make some large batches of pesto.

Pesto can be super easy to make, but I do think it's helpful to have a good recipe for it. I've tried numerous recipes, including making my own and have had plenty of disappointments in the process. Most basil pestos use the same ingredients; basil, olive oil, garlic, salt and parmesan cheese. However the proportion of each ingredient can make a real difference in your end flavor.


Below I've shared with you my favorite pesto recipe. It's from the fabulous cookbook Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan (recipe is on page 176). If you love Italian food, this is a wonderful cookbook to have on your shelf. She shares authentic Italian recipes, not the America Italian dishes we've become accustomed to in the US. There hasn't been a recipe I've tried in this cookbook that I haven't loved.


Ideally for the best flavor and most authentic Italian style pesto, you'd make this recipe with a mortar and pestle, but most of us don't have the time or the tools to do this, so instead I used my food processor.


What You'll Need: for 6 servings
2 cups tightly packed fresh basis leaves - washed and thoroughly dry
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
3 tbsp. pine nuts
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
sea salt
1/2 cup freshly grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese
2 tbsp. freshly grated romano cheese
3 tbsp. softened, room temperature butter


Getting Started:
1.  Place basil, olive oil, pine nuts, garlic and a large pinch of salt in your food processor. Process until you have a creamy, uniformed consistency.

2. Transfer basil mixture to a medium size bowl and by hand, mix in your parmigiano-reggiano and romano cheeses. Marcella writes, "It is worth the slight effort to do it by hand to obtain the notably superior texture it produces."


3. Last step is to mix in the softened butter.

Like many, my favorite way to enjoy pesto is on pasta with shrimp. For this recipe you'd use about 1 1/2 pounds of pasta and as much shrimp as you want. I like around 2 lbs. If you aren't accustomed to cooking shrimp, I think the biggest mistake people make is over cooking it. Smaller shrimp only take about 2 minutes to cook, so have your pasta and pesto ready before cooking them. For this recipe, I heated in my cast iron skillet a couple tablespoons of olive oil over medium-high heat. I tossed in my shelled and deveined shrimp and cooked them on one side until they began to turn pink about half way up the sides. I flipped them over and cooked then cooked them until they were all pink. This only took about another minute. If you overcook shrimp, you end up with a rubbery texture, which is not so enjoyable.

Toss you shrimp in with your hot pasta and pesto and enjoy! 

Oh, one note, if you are freezing your pesto you don't want to add your butter or cheese until you thaw it and are ready to eat it, so just do step one. I like to freeze my pesto in ice cube trays, then once frozen, transfer it to freezer storage bags. 

 

Coconut Flour Pizza Crust

With my last post I mentioned that I tried two new gluten and grain free pizza recipes. Here's number two. This one takes advantage of coconut flour. Are you familiar with this great flour? It's much higher in fiber than traditional flour with gluten and it "contains over 19% non-gluten protein." If you have grain issues this may be a great alternative flour for you. I use Tropical Traditions coconut flour. I also usually buy my organic coconut oil from them too. Their Gold Label Virgin Coconut Oil has wonderful flavor and is excellent for cooking and baking with.

This gluten free pizza crust cooks up very similarly to a regular wheat/white flour crust, which is surprising when you look at the list of ingredients and see only 2 tbsp. of flour in it. The main difference in my opinion is it doesn't get quite as crispy as a traditional pizza crust and it will absorb some of  the pizza sauce you put on it.  It reheats very well or in our house we've been eating leftovers cold because of it being so hot out. Either way it tastes great! This recipe is from Tropical Traditions, they also have a video demonstration of how to make it, you can check it out here: http://www.freecoconutrecipes.com/recipe_Gluten-Free_Pizza_Crust.htm


What You'll Need: for 1 small to medium pizza, serves 2-3
For the crust

• 2 cups organic, whole milk mozzarella cheese, shredded
• 2 large organic eggs
• 2 tablespoons flax meal
• 2 tablespoons coconut flour
• ½ teaspoon baking powder 

For the pizza sauce  - This is the same sauce I used for the recipe I posted Tuesday.

• 15 oz. can of crushed tomatoes
• 1 small onion diced
• Olive oil
• Oregano - around a 1/4 - 1/2 tsp. 
• 3 cloves garlic smashed and chopped
• 1+ tbsp. sugar - optional
• Sea salt

For the topping 

• 3/4 - 1lb shredded, whole milk mozzarella
• ~1lb sweet Italian sausage
• Dried oregano to sprinkle on top of the pizza

Getting Started:
For the crust
1.  First preheat your oven to 350º, then put all of your crust ingredients into a medium size bowl and mix until you have a sticky dough. It works well to start by mixing with a spoon and then your hands. A small note, I didn't have flax meal on hand when I made this recipe, so instead I used an extra 2 tbsp. of coconut flour and it worked great.

2. Spread or roll the dough out on a parchment lined cookie sheet to about 1/4" thick. 

3. Bake in your preheated 350º oven for 15 minutes, then pull the crust from the oven and flip it to it's other side. You can either use a spatula to do this or pick-up the parchment paper and flip the crust onto another piece of parchment.

4. Put crust back into the oven and bake for another 15 minutes. 

5. Pull the crust from the oven and allow to cool before putting your toppings on it. This only takes about 15 min. or so. 

For the Sauce:
1. To make your pizza sauce, first cook your onion until softened in a little bit of olive oil in a medium pot.

2. Add your crushed tomatoes, chopped garlic, oregano (start with 1/4 tsp. and add more later if it needs it, sorry I never measure and just go my taste) and a pinch of sea salt. Simmer for 15+ minutes, occasionally stirring.

3. Blend your sauce with a submersion blender until smooth, then do a taste test. Add more oregano, salt and/or a bit of sugar if it needs it.  I use sugar if my tomatoes don't have any sweetness. I think it adds a nice bit of extra flavor to a pizza sauce, but by no means do you need it. After adding extra seasoning, allow to simmer for an additional 5 - 10 minutes, then set aside

For the toppings
1.  Slice, or form into small chunks, your Italian sausage and cook it in a medium size pan. The pizza will only be placed under a broiler for a couple of minutes once assembled and not baked, so cook your sausage a step further then just simply browning it. Once it's done, drain any extra fat off of it by placing the sausage on some paper towel.

2. Spread your pizza sauce on your crust and then top with your toppings. I always like to sprinkle a little dried oregano on the pizza once it's assembled, makes the pizza just that much more tasty! 

3. Place pizza (on a cookie sheet of course) under your oven's broiler until cheese has melted. This won't take long so don't get distracted and forget it's in there. I"m terrible about forgetting things under the broiler, it's one of those mistakes that happens when I try to multitask in the kitchen! :-)

Serve the pizza immediately. Enjoy!!!

Zucchini Crust "Pizza" - A must try, it's so good!!!!!

Over the last several months we've been slowly removing gluten and/or wheat from our family's diet. Our son has shown some issues with it. It's seems that every time or at least more often then not he becomes hyper, more aggressive and won't sleep when he's eaten wheat or other glutenous foods. One of the foods we miss eating as of late is pizza. It's easily my husbands favorite food and my son is always thrilled to have it. So what do you do when you can't have wheat... Well this last weekend I tried two new grain free pizza recipes and both where wonderful. The first was the zucchini crust pizza and the second was a coconut flour crust one. Today I'll share with you the zucchini recipe. I found this recipe on Nourishing Days website. If you aren't familiar with this site, it's a must to check out. Shannon (the site owner) always has wonderful recipes that incorporate traditional, organic, made from scratch dishes. Plus lots of great useful information.

I did make a couple tweaks to the recipe she shared going off of one of her readers comments. The reader suggested grating the zucchini instead of slicing and cooking it and then putting it in a towel and squeezing all of it's liquid out. This worked great.  I baked my pizza in a spring form pan that I placed on top of pan with a rack on it. This allowed any extra liquid from the zucchini to run out. You could also cook it in a pie pan, it would just be a little thicker or on a rimmed pizza sheet. The only other thing I did was make a pizza sauce versus seasoning my zucchini with oregano, hot pepper flakes, garlic powder and sea salt. This was mostly because I was making pizza sauce for another pizza so I used it for both. Do check out how Shannon does her recipe if you'd rather nix the red sauce and instead top with crushed tomatoes.

I topped my pizza with homemade red sauce, mozzarella cheese, pine nuts and pancetta. Yum, yum, yum, yum!!!!! That's all I can say! : D If you are vegetarian you could easily omit the meat and add another veggie or just leave it as a cheese pizza.


What You'll Need: for 1 medium pizza
For the "crust"

• 3 medium zucchini shredded - for me this was around 3 cups. I'd recommend shredding it by hand vs. using a food processor. I think it will be a finer shred and you'll be able to squeeze more of the zucchini's liquid out.
• 3 tbsp. coconut or olive oil
• 1 egg
• Sea salt

For the pizza sauce 

• 15 oz. can of crushed tomatoes
• 1 small onion diced
• Olive oil
• Oregano - around a 1/4 - 1/2 tsp. 
• 3 cloves garlic smashed and chopped
• 1+ tbsp. sugar - optional
• Sea salt

For the topping 

• 3/4 - 1lb shredded, whole milk mozzarella
• 4 oz. of pancetta
• A couple tbsp. pine nuts

Getting Started
For the Sauce:
1. First make your pizza sauce by cooking your onion in a little bit of olive oil in a medium pot. Cook until onion begins to soften.

2. Add your crushed tomatoes, chopped garlic, oregano (start with 1/4 tsp. and add more later if it needs it, sorry I never measure and just go my taste) and a pinch of sea salt. Simmer for 15+ minutes, occasionally stirring.

3. Blend your sauce with a submersion blender until smooth, then do a taste test. Add more oregano, salt and/or a bit of sugar if it needs it.  I use sugar if my tomatoes don't have any sweetness. I think it adds a nice bit of extra flavor to a pizza sauce, but by no means do you need it. After adding extra seasoning, allow to simmer for an additional 5 - 10 minutes, then set aside

For the zucchini crust: 

1. Place shredded zucchini into a clean towel and squeeze out as much liquid as you can. I think I squeeze out close to 5-6 tbsp. 
 

2. In a medium bowl combine your zucchini, oil, egg and a couple pinches of sea salt. Mix well.

3. Spread a small amount of oil in your pizza pan, spring form pan or pie dish and then press your zucchini crust into it.

Note: If you use a spring form pan you must put a pan under it to catch any liquid that may run out of the zucchini!

3. Spread your sauce over your crust, then top with your shredded mozzarella, pancetta and pine nuts.

4. Bake in a preheated 400º oven for around 25 - 30 minutes or until your cheese is melted and bubbly.

5. Remove pizza from the oven and let sit for 5-10 minutes before serving.

 If you have leftovers, this pizza does reheats very well. Perfect for lunch the next day!