Cooking Archives - Page 16 of 34 - Pechluck's Food Adventures

Sweet Coconut Sticky Rice with Mango Recipe

May 26, 2014 by Pechluck 7 Comments

I know this is totally not a Memorial Day recipe in any way. But, I’ve been seeing that mangos are starting to appear at some of the grocery stores, and a weekend or so ago, my friends and I decided to have an Asian themed potluck for our Game of Thrones night. The mains included Do It Yourself Vietnamese rolls (very easy- just prep the filling options and everyone else just will select, wrap, and eat, and it’s even pretty healthy!), and there was also an Asian Salad with optional steak. Now that the weather is heating up, this is a great idea for a potluck theme. The two wraps below use the rice paper, but you can also use lettuce wraps as well. It is easy to accommodate for vegetarians since it’s up to everyone whether to add the bbq pork (and alternately you can offer fresh tofu as an option).
Do It Yourself Vietnamese rolls

I contributed a dessert of sticky rice with mango, known in Thai as ข้าวเหนียวมะม่วง.
Sweet Coconut Sticky Rice with Mango Recipe

The key to making sweet sticky rice is to make sure you use the right rice- specifically, glutinous rice. You can find these at an Asian grocery store. This is the same sticky rice that you often see served with satay/meat skewers – but in that preparation you don’t use coconut milk.

Speaking of, while you are there at the Asian grocery store, pick up a can of coconut milk too.

When you buy your mangos, make sure they are slightly softer to the touch- similar to when you check avocados. If not, when you peel/cut the mango it will still be a little green and sour, which is fine for some other Thai dishes I know but not for a dessert dish like this.
Mangos

In order to help ripen your mango, you can try a few tricks such as putting it in a paper bag and leaving it on the counter at room temperature. I hear that putting an apple or banana might also help with the ripening process. If you want to slow the ripening because it is already ready but you’re making it fresh the next day, put it in the refrigerator. A ripe mango put in the fridge might last a handful of days, so don’t wait long.

Sweet Coconut Sticky Rice with Mango Recipe

Yields enough for 2, with usually each person getting 1/2 a mango.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup of glutinous rice
1 can of coconut milk
3 tbsp of sugar (adjust to taste)
1/2 tsp of salt
1 sweet, ripe mango (preferably Thai honey mango)
2 tsp of sesame seeds for garnish (optional)

Directions:

Take 1/2 cup of the coconut milk and add it to 1/2 cup of water. Now add the 1/2 cup of glutinous rice and let the rice soak for about 30 minutes. The rice should get fatter as it absorbs the coconut water.
After the soaking, do not drain the water. Pour the rice into a pot and simmer on low heat on the stovetop until the rice is cooked and soft. You may need to add a cup or so of water if the rice gets too dry.
In another pot, mix the 1/2 cup of coconut milk with the sugar and salt on simmer until it begins to bubble/is on the verge of boiling. At this point, add it to your cooked glutinous rice and stir to mix. Cover, and let sit on the simmering heat until the rice has absorbed all the coconut milk mixture, about 30 minutes. Taste and see if you’d like to add more sugar for sweetness, or a pinch of salt to balance the sweet.
Remove from heat and let the rice cool so it is still warm but no longer hot. This is usually the time I cut the mango to place on top, and garnish with sesame seeds.

Sooo….

It turns out despite what I wrote before about making sure your mango is ripe, with everything that was going on that weekend I spaced on putting it in the paper bag when I got home, and I didn’t know F put it in the refrigerator. So when the cutting happened, the mango was still a little green. What to do?

I tried to recover my dessert by turning to the fact that green mangoes are often used in Thai cooking and in those cases, there is a spicier take on it. Particularly, Mango Salads are pretty popular. So I decided to make slightly spicy diced mango- I tried to dial back the spice as I knew I had guests who are not lovers of the spicy heat like F and I are.

Sweet Coconut Sticky Rice with Mango Recipe

Spicy Diced Mango

Ingredients:

3 firm mangos, diced
3 small chilies, minced. If you want to dial back the heat, deseed it. Alternately, as I did, since I didn’t have any chilies I used 3 teaspoons of chili powder, or to your taste.
2 tablespoons of chopped fresh basil
3 teaspoons honey
3 teaspoons of soy sauce
Juice of 1 lime
Salt to taste

Directions:

Toss together all the ingredients. Adjust seasonings to taste.
Let the flavors marinate/mingle for about 30 minutes before serving – if you’d like, chill it in the refrigerator

Honey Walnut Baked Brie Recipe

May 19, 2014 by Pechluck 7 Comments

There is never a wrong time for some warm, melty cheese that you scoop and put on top of bread. Especially when your freezer stops being frozen, so the Fressen half loaf of bread needs to be immediately used. Specifically, what you see below is their Vollkornbrot bread, made with Dark Rye and Whole Wheat flour with cracked rye, Sunflower, Flax and Sesame Seeds, and Salt which I picked up at one of the various Farmers Markets they have a booth at, though they are also available at a few stores.

Honey Walnut Brie Recipe Honey Walnut Brie Recipe.

This serves 4… or 2 if you really just want a lot of cheese. I don’t mind eating the rind (you want to get a young, fresh brie. Older brie may have a tougher rind). If the rind bothers you, try wrapping it with crescent or puff pastry dough so you don’t see it. Ha ha.

Or if you’d really really like (though there is cheese loss this way!), you can cut the very top off, slice very thinly so you don’t lose too much cheese. Leave the rest of the rind at the bottom and sides so it can act sorta like a bowl.

Ingredients:

1/4 cup chopped walnuts. Even though I didn’t chop mine, so you don’t necessarily have to if you really like walnuts
pinch of salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons of honey plus 1/4 cup honey – I used Bee Local Honey.
1 wheel of brie (8-9 ounce package)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Mix your 1/4 cup of walnuts with the 2 tablespoons of honey, 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon, and pinch of salt. Stir well to coat. Alternately, instead of honey and cinnamon you could use maple syrup. I used 1 1/2 cups walnuts with 1/4 cup maple syrup, which is why you see so many nuts. Between the two, I like the cinnamon honey version better… though at that time I also increased the recipe because I eat these walnuts by themselves like candy.
Arrange walnuts on a baking sheet in a single layer- you want them all to be flat so they all get fully toasted on the side. Bake 8 to 10 minutes, checking frequently to watch them brown and they should smell toasted. Be careful in watching them as they can very easily burn. Alternatively, you can do the same in a large dry pan on the stovetop at medium high heat, but make sure you watch them constantly and stir them. After removing them from the stovetop, lay them flat in a single layer to cool.
Unwrap your brie cheese and place your cheese in a baking dish. I recommend putting some sort of parchment paper underneath because it’s about to get sticky messy. Drizzle the honey over the top. Alternately, rather then drizzling your cheese goodness with honey goodness, there are so many kinds of fruit compotes and preserves you could use as well! YUM!
Place in the oven at 350 degrees F and bake for 10-15 minutes.
Top with the toasted walnuts and serve with sliced bread. Other options would be to include sliced apples, grapes or other fruit, toasted crostini or crackers, roasted garlic…!

Super simple, but so worth it. Perfect for a rainy day when watching a movie or doing a TV show marathon with a few glasses of wine! Indulgent rich warm cheese on good bread with good honey. There is no way to go wrong with this.

Honey Walnut Brie Recipe

Filed Under: Cheese, Cooking, Food and Drink Tagged With: baked brie, cheese, Fressen bread, Honey Walnut Baked Brie Recipe, recipe, vegetarian

Roasted Vegetable Lasagna Rollup Recipe

May 12, 2014 by Pechluck 2 Comments

Rather than laying out lasagna the traditional way across a casserole dish and then having to cut pieces, I like the idea of individual rolled pieces that this Roasted Vegetable Lasagna Rollups Recipe calls for. it’s a great to portion out servings for a group. They are easy to make, and by roasting the vegetables it adds more flavor and is a great alternative to meat lasagna. A little red pepper adds a subtle little additional kick.

It may look like this has a lot of ingredients, but it’s really based on you

Ingredients:

12 long lasagna noodles- you want them to be longer and not the short ones that you put two across in a dish in order to have enough to roll them. You can use regular or whole wheat pasta if you want these healthier – I used regular.
3 tablespoons of olive oil, divided with 2 tablespoons for the roasted vegetables
4 cups finely chopped vegetables- you can just use spinach, but since I knew some guests I was sharing this with were not a fan of cooked spinach I used a mix of frozen vegetables I had in the freezer that I had to use as my freezer was no longer freezing- carrots, peas, carrots, asparagus tips, squash… your choice! Fresh vegetables are better than frozen, but frozen is easy. Your call here too.
1 teaspoon of chopped sage
1 teaspoon of cumin
15 oz part-skim ricotta cheese (1 container)
1 egg
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1/2 tablespoon chopped oregano
1 teaspoon garlic powder (or you can use a close of minced garlic to up the garlic level!)
3 1/4 cups shredded Italian cheese, such as mozzarella, Parmesan, Romano, or a blend, divided into 3 cups for the filling and 1/2 cup for topping. I like using a blend as the various cheeses rather than one cheese adds more depth but just using low fat mozzarella is healthier
Salt ( to taste)
Freshly ground black pepper
At least approximately 3 1/2 cups of your favorite marinara sauce
1 teaspoon of red pepper
Optional- Parmesan for topping

Directions:

Heat oven to 400 degrees F. In a aluminum foil lined 13×9 pan, spread the vegetables and then spread the 2 tablespoon of olive oil so all the vegetables are coated. Now season with the salt, pepper, 1 teaspoon of chopped sage, 1 teaspoon of cumin, and roast for about 40 minutes. Remove and let cool. Now I decided to roast with those seasonings but you can get away with simple salt and pepper, especially if using fresh vegetables.
While the veggies are roasting, boil the water and then place the lasagna noodles in until al dente. Strain out the hot water and run cool water over it for 20 seconds or so until you can handle the noodles. Drain the water and distribute 1 tablespoon of olive oil among the noodles so they don’t stick together
While the noodles were cooking, I made the mixture by combining the ricotta cheese, 2 cups cheese, 1 egg, parsley, and oregano in a bowl. Stir all together until well combined.
Spray the 13×9 baking dish with cooking spray. Line bottom with a little bit of the marinara sauce so that nothing will be sticking to it- this might be about 1/2 to 3/4 cup. I admit I used two baking dishes, so I did this twice to lay out 6 Noodle rolls on each.
Lay out a work space- I did this with wax paper. Lay the lasagna noodles flat on this surface. Take 2 1/2 tablespoons of the ricotta filling and spread evenly over noodle. Now spread on top of the ricotta some of of the roasted vegetables and then top with 1 tablespoon of the marinara sauce. Carefully loosely roll and place seam side down into the baking dish. Repeat with remaining noodles.
Top rolled noodles with remaining sauce- make sure you cover all the lasagna noodle edges so it doesn’t dry out. Sprinkle the 1 teaspoon of red pepper over everything and then top with the remaining cheese. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes.
Remove foil and bake for additional 10 minutes, or until cheese is melted on the top.
Remove from oven let cool for 10 minutes before serving. Optionally, serve with Parmesan cheese and a grater that your guests can grate what amount they desire!

This was a great potluck dish to make for one of our Game of Thrones nights, and is a main dish that gets your vegetables in too! I had the idea to print out the various sigils of the houses, cut them out and put them on toothpicks to perhaps mark each of the various roll-ups, but never did do it but thought it could be a fun extra touch.

Roasted Vegetable Lasagna Rollups Recipe

Have you made lasagna in these roll form before? What vegetables would you try?

Filed Under: Cooking, Food and Drink Tagged With: meatless monday, potluck dish, recipe, Roasted Vegetable Lasagna, Roasted Vegetable Lasagna Rollups, Vegetable Lasagna Rollups, vegetarian, Vegetarian Lasagna, Vegetarian Lasagna Rollups

Cinco de Mayo- 3 Guacamole Recipes

April 30, 2014 by Pechluck 8 Comments

In celebration of the upcoming Cinco de Mayo, on a previous weekend I decided to have a Guacamole Bar at my home. I made 3 guacamole recipes – one recipe from Alton Brown, one recipe from Bobby Flay, and one from Rick Bayless. At the time, I had just finished reading From Scratch: Inside the Food Network so this was also a call-out to that (my review on the book here).

The Alton Brown guacamole was the most mild, thanks to using only 1/2 a jalapeno that was seeded, and also 2 Roma tomatoes, but had great complexity of flavors in terms of seasoning. With it’s more reddish colors from tomato and cumin, it could look great in a guacamole bar as an alternative to muliple bowls of green.

Guacamole from Food Network chefs: The Alton Brown Recipe- a tomato guacamole, and The Bobby Flay Recipe- a spicy guacamole

Bobby Flay’s spicy guacamole uses jalapeno peppers that are not seeded and is also the easiest (put everything together and mash with fork) and I liked how it was chunky and uses red onion rather then white onion.
Guacamole from Food Network chefs: The Rick Bayless Recipe- Sundried Tomato Guacamole

Finally, the Rick Bayless contender was great whenever you get a chewy bright bite of the sun dried tomato- I upped the amount of the sun dried tomato from his original recipe because I wanted more of those surprises in bites and I liked the addition of the queso fresco topping.

Using 3 avocados, each of these recipes yields approximately 3 cups (depending on the sizes of the avocados).

The Alton Brown Recipe- a tomato guacamole

The Alton Brown Recipe- a tomato guacamole
Ingredients:

3 Haas avocados
1 lime, juiced
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon cayenne
1/2 medium onion, diced
1/2 jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced
2 Roma tomatoes, seeded and diced
1 tablespoon chopped cilantro
1 clove garlic, minced

Directions:

In a large bowl place the scooped avocado pulp and lime juice, toss to coat. Drain, and reserve the lime juice.
After all of the avocados have been coated, add the salt, cumin, and cayenne and mash with a potato masher.
Fold in the diced onions, jalapeno, tomatoes, cilantro, and garlic. Add 1 tablespoon of the reserved lime juice. Let sit at room temperature for 1 hour and then serve.

Guacamole from Food Network chefs: The Alton Brown Recipe- a tomato guacamole, and The Bobby Flay Recipe- a spicy guacamole

The Bobby Flay Recipe- a spicy guacamole

Ingredients:

1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
3 tablespoons finely diced red onion
3 ripe Hass avocados
2 limes, juiced
1 or 2 jalapenos, finely diced but seeds still there
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

Mash the cilantro, onions, avocados, lime juice and jalapenos together in a bowl, using a fork; guacamole should be chunky. Season with salt and pepper

Guacamole from Food Network chefs: The Bobby Flay Recipe- a spicy guacamole and in the back The Alton Brown Recipe- a tomato guacamole

Rick Bayless Recipe- Sundried Tomato Guacamole

Guacamole from Food Network chefs: The Rick Bayless Recipe- Sundried Tomato Guacamole
Ingredients:

3 ripe Hass avocados
1/2 medium white onion, chopped into 1/4-inch pieces (about 1/3 cup)
Fresh hot green chiles to taste (usually 2 serranos or 1 jalapeno) finely chopped
1/2 cup soft sun dried tomatoes, chopped into 1/4-inch pieces (patted dry on paper towels if oil-packed)
1/4 cup (loosely packed) chopped fresh cilantro (thick bottom stems cut off), plus a little extra for garnish
Salt to taste
1 or 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice/to taste
1/4 cup of Mexican queso fresco or other fresh garnishing cheese like feta or salted farmers cheese, for garnish

Directions:

Scoop the avocado flesh into a bowl. Using a potato masher or a large fork or spoon, mash the avocados into a coarse puree.
Scoop the onion into a small strainer and rinse under cold water. Shake off the excess water and mix into the avocado, along with the chiles, tomatoes and cilantro. Taste and season with salt and lime juice–the guacamole usually takes about 1 teaspoon of salt; lime juice is a matter of personal preference.
Cover with plastic wrap directly on the surface of the guacamole and refrigerate until you’re ready to serve (for best results, this needs to be within a couple of hours).
Scoop the guacamole into a serving dish, sprinkle with queso fresco (if you’re using it) and you’re ready to serve.

Thanks to A and H who brought additional stuffs for our potluck, including salsas (including a yummy roasted pepper one) and also making chicken and separately tofu and vegetable enchiladas!
Roasted peppers salsa

It was fun trying 3 different guacamoles. One nice touch you probably noticed is that besides the variety of guacamoles, we also had a variety of tortilla chip types as well! I think I will try this idea of “Variations of a Dish” at another potluck, but this time have each person bring in a different take of something, say macaroni and cheese or fried chicken or some other dish.

If you had such a theme, what would you pick as the dish you ask everyone to try variations on?

Guacamole from Food Network chefs: The Bobby Flay Recipe- a spicy guacamole and in the back The Alton Brown Recipe- a tomato guacamole

Filed Under: Cooking Tagged With: Alton Brown, Alton Brown guacamole, Bobby Flay, Bobby Flay spicy guacamole, Cinco de Mayo recipe, Guacamole, Rick Bayless, Rick Bayless guacamole, tomato guacamole

Breakfast Casserole Recipe

April 21, 2014 by Pechluck 5 Comments

This Breakfast Casserole is a perfect way to whip up something hearty and savory for a brunch potluck, and this came to mind immediately when I wondered what to make for Easter, besides corn niblets in butter and mashed potatoes to go with some ham guests were bringing. This recipe has sausage in it so is not vegetarian, but you could substitute for it as long as it is something seasoned well.
Breakfast Casserole Recipe - cooked celery, onion, Aidell's chicken bacon pineapple sausage, a layer of Emmenthel swiss, and then roasted broccoli before adding the 3 eggs/1 cup milk.

I’m sad to report that my refrigerator/freezer seems to be dying a slow death. We hope that maybe we might be able to repair it, but since this came with the house when we purchased it, who knows how old it is and maybe it’s time to replace it.

One of the great things about this breakfast casserole recipe is that it’s really more of a guideline than rule. You can throw all sorts of things into it and it will still be great- which is useful when you have things chilled instead of frozen in your freezer and you want to start using everything you have before it goes bad.
Breakfast Casserole Recipe - cooked celery, onion, Aidell's chicken bacon pineapple sausage, a layer of Emmenthel swiss, and then roasted broccoli before adding the 3 eggs/1 cup milk.

When I did the inventory of my freezer, I knew that by doing a breakfast casserole besides using the eggs, cheese, and milk in my refrigerator section, I’d be able to get rid of one of the frozen half loaves of bread I tend to squirrel away because I can never eat a whole loaf. I added in some frozen Aidell’s chicken bacon pineapple sausage (yes, egg AND chicken together!) and a partially used bag of frozen broccoli. I also used some leftover parsley and celery from a DIY 3 day juice cleanse from last week, and the other half of onions and a jalapeño from a guacamole recipe (I’ll be sharing that at the end of the month in anticipation of Cinco de Mayo post on a guacamole bar!).

Topped with green onions and parsley, this hodge podge of getting rid of misc things was still really tasty and all came together! You can use any combination of vegetables and meats you’d like (such as ground meat or bacon).

Ingredients:

1/4 loaf of old bread (a few days old so it is a bit harder), chopped into 1 inch cube pieces
1 cup diced onions
1 cup diced celery
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 diced large chicken sausages or 1 pound ground sausage or seasoned meat
1 diced jalapeño
3 stalks of green onions, chopped
2 cups chopped broccoli, cooked. I roasted mine in the oven with simple salt and pepper at 400F for 40 minutes
2 cups shredded cheese of your choice, divided in half. I often use cheddar or pepper jack but this time I used Emmentaler Swiss
6 eggs
1 cup milk (I used low fat)
1/4 cup chopped parsley

Directions:

Grease a 9×13 casserole dish and distribute the cubed bread.
In a large sauté pan, sweat the onions and celery in the olive oil until the onions brown slightly. add in your meat and finish until the meat is cooked and browned. Pour the contents of the pan over the bread and let absorb the flavors. This is when I roasted my broccoli and chopped the green onions and jalapeño and shredded cheese…
Top the dish with the jalapeño and a big handful of the green onion. Then add in a layer of 1 cup of the cheese, followed by the broccoli. You can fold everything together, but I left it in layers.
In a mixing bowl whisk the eggs and milk together and then pour into your casserole dish. Cover and let refrigerate overnight (or at least as many hours as you can) so all the flavors have a chance to marry.
When it’s time to bake, preheat the oven to 375 F. Top with the remaining 1 cup cheese and bake for 30-40 minutes until the egg has risen and a skewer through should come out clean.
Remove the dish from oven and top with the parsley. Let cool for 15 minutes at least for it to firm up before cutting to serve.

I love that the breakfast casserole has your breakfast egg, but is also packed with lots of veggies here.

Breakfast Casserole Recipe - cooked celery, onion, Aidell's chicken bacon pineapple sausage, a layer of Emmenthel swiss, and then roasted broccoli before adding the 3 eggs/1 cup milk

You can add color by using red and orange bell peppers, squash, your call. You could use spinach or kale or cauliflower or any number of vegetables. Depending on how many veggies you put in, you might adjust your egg/milk ratio- this had a lot of veggies so I used 6 eggs, but other versions have called for 8 or even 12, which also means that this is easy to scale up for a big group.

I used sliced up sausages, but you could easily used browned ground meat instead, or even a lot of crumbled bacon! As I said, this is a great, very adaptable recipe once you know the basics of the bread (and you can use any kind of bread you’d like- including croissant bread!), eggs, milk, and then meat and vegetable additions per your taste.

For instance, below I made it with some leftover Easter ham with some leftover cauliflower and broccoli and bread I had- just threw it all together because I had old bread, aging meat and veggies… ok, buy some eggs, casserole time!
Ham and Cheese and Broccoli and Cauliflower Egg Casserole