Sweet and Spicy...

My mother-in-law handed me two ginormous sweet potatoes the other day.  Think football-sized potatoes. Think brick-sized spuds.  I'm not sure where she found these abnormally large potatoes but now they're mine, and I have to think of ways to use them.

Between me and the hubby, I am the only one that likes sweet potatoes.  I get excited over sweet potato fries, the sweet potato tortilla chips from Food Should Taste Good (they really do!), good 'ol fashioned baked sweet potatoes (with the skin), and anything sweet potato-related.  It's just that good.  But the problem is the hubby.  I know I needed his help with eating these huge sweet potatoes, but how would I "trick" him into eating something he doesn't like?  I set out to find a recipe that would pair sweet potatoes with other items that may overpower the potatoes, a flavorful dish, and something healthy so that he doesn't have eaters remorse afterwards.  Luckily, I found it.

Sweet and Spicy Turkey, Beef, and Sweet Potato Stew with Coconut Milk
from Kalyn's Kitchen

Tools
- crock pot

A few variations...
...I didn't have enough ground turkey so I grounded up a slab of sirloin beef in order to yield 1 pound of meat.
...I didn't have any green onions so I added green peas instead.  I know, not really a substitute but I thought the peas would be a great touch and color!

All the cooked and uncooked ingredients go into my favorite appliance in the kitchen - the crock pot.

Truly a sweet and spicy dish... first you are hit with a sweet yet salty taste, then the spiciness lingers in your mouth for a few minutes... until you take the next bite.

Fajita Fiesta

Sundays are usually the one day in the week that I am motivated to cook something new.  I spend the entire day looking through food blogs and recipe websites to get inspiration.  I usually have a set of ingredients in mind that I want to use or know I have and I start searching for that perfect recipe.  Although I may be doing this the wrong way (people usually decide what to make and then go out and buy the ingredients, right?), it has worked over and over again. 
This past Sunday's inspiration was steak fajitas.  My husband and I quickly scarfed down two fajitas during dinner, and we finished up the rest for lunch the next day.  That's success. 

Steak Fajitas
from Simply Recipes

Serves 4.

substituted flour tortilla with corn tortilla.  delicious!
also, the ceramic dish was an exciting purchase from Puerto Vallarta!

homemade guac and salsa :))



all wrapped up, yum!



Crock Pot Treat: Beef Chili

I may be a crock pot addict.  I have been waiting for an excuse to buy a crock pot for awhile, and a few months ago, it finally happened!  I actually didn't have much of a good excuse, but it was one of those days where we had nothing to do and ended up walking down the aisles of Target. I quickly grabbed the box and put it into our cart before my husband could open his mouth.  I gave him the "I really want it!!" look, and he returned a "sigh, of course..." look.  I excitedly purchased this piece of equipment and finally cracked it over this past week.  After making the below chili, I am totally hooked.  It is so easy to use and so relaxing for the cook.  All it took was a few chops of the ingredients, a little mixing, then turning on the crock pot and walking away. 

This chili is a bit different than the typical ones I make.  Chili usually contains ground meat, such as ground beef or turkey.  However, we haven't had a big juicy steak in a long while now, so on a recent Costco run, we purchased 3 big slabs of ribeye steaks.  On the same day, we fired up the grill and had grilled steaks for dinner (delish).  There was one slab left, so I decided to use it for chili because I believed the slow cooker would have made the steak cubes tender and soft, which turned out to be true.  You just wait, more crock pot treats to come!

Beef Chili

Ingredients
- 1 large ribeye steak, seared and cubed
- 1 Tbsp olive oil (for searing steak)
- salt and pepper (for searing steak)
- 1 green bell pepper, diced
- 1 large carrot, diced
- 1 medium yellow onion, diced
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1/2 box of sliced cremini mushrooms
- 2 small chilies, finely diced
- 1 15 oz can kidney beans
- 1 14 oz diced (or crushed) canned tomatoes
- 1 cup unsalted beef broth (can use chicken stock if that's all you have)
- 2 Tbsp chili powder
- 2 Tbsp ketchup
- 2 tsp salt
- 1 tsp black pepper

Tools
- crock pot

love this thing!

Steps
1. Heat a pan with 1 Tbsp of olive oil and place the ribeye steak in the pan.  Salt and pepper and steak and sear the steak for 5 minutes per side.  Remove from pan and let the steak sit, for about 20 minutes.  Cut the steak into small cubes and set aside.

2. Place the bell pepper, carrot, onion, garlic, mushrooms, chilies, kidney beans, canned tomatoes, beef stock, chili powder, ketchup, salt, and black pepper in the pot and mix. Add cubed steak and mix.

3. Turn on the crock pot to High and let it cook for 4 to 5 hours (yes, just walk away from the machine!).  Depending on how thick you like your chili, check the chili at the 3-hour time point and add more stock as desired.

Serves 6-8.

Phở (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup)

I love noodles.  Soup noodles, stir fried noodles, or pasta... yum yum yum!  A few months ago while "toy shopping" at Sur La Table, I found the cookbook Noodles Every Day by Corinne Trang.  It was even on sale, so I had to get it!

This cookbook contains noodle recipes from almost every region of Asia, from Chinese to Korean, Japanese to Vietnamese.  After quickly scanning the book, I knew the first recipe I wanted to try was Phở.

Phở (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup)
from Noodles Every Day, by Corinne Trang

Beef Stock
Ingredients
- 2 lbs raw meaty beef bones, such as oxtail or short ribs
- 3 quarts of water
- 1/2 large yellow onion
- 4 whole cloves
- 4 whole star anise
- 1 four-inch cinnamon stick
- 3 slices of ginger
- 4 scallions, trimmed and crushed
- 1 Tbsp fish sauce
- 2 tsp sugar
- 1/2 tsp white or black peppercorns
- salt to taste

Tools
- stockpot
- colander

Steps
1. Put beef bones in a large stockpot with enough water to cover.  Bring to boil over high heat and cook for 10 minutes to get rid of bone and blood particles.  Drain, reserve the meaty bones, and rinse the pot well.

2. Return the beef bones to the same stockpot, add 3 quarts of water, and bring to boil over high heat.  Reduce heat to low and add onions, cloves, star anise, cinnamon, ginger, scallions, fish sauce, sugar, and peppercorns.

3. Simmer, partially covered, for 4-5 hours, until reduced to about 1.5 to 2 quarts.  Ocassionally skim off any foam from the surface.  Salt broth to taste.  Strain and discard solids, reserving the meaty bones to pick on if desired.

Yields 1.5 to 2 quarts

Phở 
Ingredients
- 8 oz dried narrow flat rice sticks, soaked in water until pliable (I used the Three Ladies Brand, Rice Stick (S) - small)

- about 1 lb eye of round steak, thinly sliced (in my opinion Japanese supermarkets has a higher quality of meat, so I used shabu shabu meat in this case.  It was the best decision!  The quality of the meat and the spices of the soup was a wonderful combo.)
- 1.5 to 2 quarts of Beef Stock
- fish sauce or salt to taste
- 1/2 yellow onion, thinly sliced
- 1 cup mung bean sprouts
- 1 lime, quartered
- 1 bunch fresh Thai basil or cilantro
- Hoisin sauce for serving (optional)
- chili-garlic sauce (eg. Sriracha) for serving (optional)

Steps
1. Bring a large pot of water to boil and cook the noodles until tender yet firm, about 10 seconds.  Drain and divide among bowls.  Layer a few beef slices over the noodles.

2. Meanwhile, in another large pot, bring the beef stock to a gentle boil over medium heat.  About 5 minutes before serving, add the onions and adjust seasoning with fish sauce or salt, if necessary.  Right before serving, raise the heat to high and bring the broth to a full boil.

3. Place mung bean sprouts, lime, and Thai basil or cilantro in a plate.  Bring to table so that each person can add vegetables to their noodle soup as desired.

4. Ladle the boiling hot broth along with onion slices over the beef and noodles, making sure to cover beef and noodles.  Serve with hoisin sauce and chili-garlic sauce if desired.

Serves 4

Four Year Anniversary = Homemade Pizza

By putting up with me for 4 long years... your reward is homemade pizza.  And having made homemade pizza for about 2 years now,  I have to say I'm getting a little better each try!

I decided to celebrated our 4 years of togetherness (although two days later) by surprising the hubby with two of his favorite pizzas - (1) Onion & Italian Tuna and (2) Pepperoni & Mushroom.  Either he is a really good hubby (nah...) or he really enjoys my pizzas (yes!), he ate 5 huge slices and wanted more!  I ate 4 myself (hahaa), so I must love me a lot too.

I recommend making your pizza COMPLETELY from scratch... and yes, I mean the pizza dough too!  It just makes your pizza so much more special and incredibly yummy.  I've been using the same pizza dough even since I've started - Emeril Lagasse's Basic Pizza Dough.

I follow the recipe to the T and start with dissolving the yeast and sugar in warm water with the steady stirs of my spoon.  After 5 minutes of waiting, you should see foaming gunk water.  You should also smell the yeast (warning: not a pleasant smell).

Next comes the salt, olive oil, and half of the required flour (I put 2 cups of flour initially).

After stirring the two cups of flour in the wet mixture, your dough should be a gooey mess.  I then start putting a bit of flour each time and stir, until the dough turns into a soft ball that can be transferred to the counter for kneading.

I do the required kneading (about 5-7 minutes), adding a little bit of flour each time as needed.  You don't want the dough to be sticky to the touch, so flour this thing like crazy!  After kneading, coat a bowl with olive oil and put this big ball of flour in it.  Make sure to cover the dough with the olive oil in the bowl.  Put a damp towel (I cheat and use a wet paper towel... but hey it works!) and let the dough sit for at least an hour so that it can rise.  And yes... this dough will get bigger and bigger...

When ready, take out your dough and split it in two.  Unfortunately (or fortunately?), this recipe always calls for 2 pizzas.  Since it uses 1 package of yeast and it would be pretty hard to split the yeast, you have to make 2 pizzas each time. 

Roll out the divided dough with a rolling pin.  You can pick up the dough and try to stretch it or toss it at times, just like how those pizza guys on TV do it!  It helps with elongating the dough than the rolling pin can do.  Line your pizza pan (got this round pan at the Dollar Store, score!) with cornmeal or flour, and place the dough on the pan.  It's not the prettiest thing... but I say it builds the pizza's character...

The next step is placing the toppings (my favorite part, probably because I can delegate this to the hubby), which we have pepperoni, onions, mushrooms, Italian tuna, and tomato sauce.  A note on the Italian tuna: my hubby first fell in love with Onion & Tuna pizza while on vacation in Italy with his friends.  I konw, it sounds a little weird and gross (really? Tuna on pizza?!!), but after taking a bite of this in Italy earlier this year, I understand why he is a true fan.  Italian tuna has a very different taste than American tuna.  Somehow with the combination of the onions and cheese, it brings out the sweetness and unique taste of the Italian tuna, and man, it is Oh So Good!  I had actually tried to make this using American tuna a year ago (before I had the Italian version), and I thought my hubby's taste buds needed some changing (like chopping them off)... it wasn't that great.  But after having it in Italy, we were determined to find Italian tuna here in the States. Although we sacrificed our wallets for this Italian tuna ($3.29 at a North Beach deli), I do believe it was well worth it.

Onion & Tuna without the second layer of cheese.  This pizza is rectangular (only had one round pizza pan, so used a rectangular cookie sheet... you think I would of splurged for another dollar pan!).

Pepperoni & Mushroom with all the toppings, ready for the oven.

In the 500F oven and for about 15 minutes (make sure to put on a timer and check it when it dings!), your pizza should be ready:

It's been 3 hours and I am still stuffed.  What a great way to celebrate our anniversary... :)

Fish Stew One Night, Beef Stroganoff The Next

I try to make dinner every week night so that we don't waste money eating out all the time, although the thought of it is very tempting because I always have to endure a looooong commute home. Bleh :(

Monday night I made Fish Stew (from Simply Recipes again)

Elise says that the most important ingredient to the Fish Stew is clam juice... and when I read it, I was like, ehh, really?! Finding it at the supermaket was adventurous, and after circling the place twice, we finally asked someone. I thought it was a refrigerated item next to the fish counter, but it turned out to be with the tuna cans. OK, cool. When I opened it, I thought I was going to make my kitchen reek of clam juice, but there was practically no smell to it. I wasn't brave enough to try it on it's own though.

I also replaced parsley with cilantro because, for some weird reason, I couldn't find parsley at the Farmer's Market.

I used pinot grigio for the white wine. That was yummy... in the soup and to drink on the side (while cooking, hehe!)

For the fish, I used 7 pieces of dove sole fish. I'm not sure if it's because I left it in the freezer too long or this fish just smells, but the fish smelled. I would probably choose to use another white fish next time. I'm glad the ingredients in the soup covered up the fish stank.


I did exactly what the recipe asked for - cook the onions, garlic, and cilantro. Add clam juice, wine, then fish. So far so good!

I covered the pot and let it cook and boil for about 8 minutes.

Our dinner - fish stew, romaine lettus with kidney beans, cheese, and italian dressing, and drank the rest of the pinot grigio!






























Tuesday night I made Beef Stroganoff (also from Simply Recipes - love it!)


The first thing I realized is that this recipe asks for A LOT of butter (6 TBSP total), so always changing things on my own, I decided to use OO and just a little chunk of butter. Gotta add the butter for taste!

After cooking the meat in the OO and butter, use the pan drippings to cook the onions. Smells so good!



A few more ingredients waiting to go into the pot.

After the onions were sauteed, take it out of the pot and add it to the plate of beef, and add the mushrooms to the hot pot. The recipe asked for another 3 TBSP of butter, but I just added OO this time. Trying to cut down some fat! I sprinkled nutmeg and basil (substituted for tarrgon) to the cooking mushrooms. You can instantly smell the spices goodness.

I then turned the heat to low, and added the sour cream. I put the meat and onions back in the pot. At first when I tasted this concoction, I was like, ehhh, so sour. So I added salt... still sour... more salt... somewhat sour... more salt... then yum! I realized salt is very important to make this sauce taste right.

I couldn't wait to eat it! I've only had beef stroganoff as frozen dinners (sad eh?) so I was anxious to make a good fresh one! I used linguini and boiled some broccoli and green beans.

The husband and I loved it!

Chili on a Hot Summer Night

I made chili tonight since I forgot to grab meat out of the freezer this morning before I left for work. Since ground meat (turkey in this case) is one of the easier meat to defrost by microwave, it was decided that it's turkey chili night! My husband loves it when I make chili because I always add a bit of a kick. I like that too. :) This meal is also a good one if you're on a lesser carb diet. It's just full of turkey meat, beans (yay for more fulfilling proteins), and veggies!

I use Rachel Ray's Beef and Black Bean Chili but completely change things around to "make it my own". I figure it's chili, so anything I dump in there should taste good!

Turkey Chili with The Veggies You Love

Ingredients
- 3/4 lbs ground turkey
- 1 green pepper
- 1/4 red onion
- 2-3 cloves of garlic
- 1 can of diced tomatoes
- 3/4 can of kidney beans (I think any beans is fine, but I like kidney. Save the rest of 1/4 beans for a salad or something!)
- 8 oz tomato sauce
- 1/4 cup water
- 2 tsp worcestershire sauce
- 1 TBSP chili powder
- ~1/2 tsp hot sauce (add at your discretion!)
- 1 broccoli bunch (for garnish, another added healthiness to the meal)

Dice the green pepper and red onion into bite sizes. Cut the broccoli into pieces.

Not pictured here is the diced garlic.









These are other characters for the chili-goodness. Diced tomatoes, kidney beans, tomato sauce, worcestershire sauce, chili powder, and hot sauce (purchased in Texas!)

(Note: you see a can of corn in this picture but at the last minute, looking at the amount of chili made, I decided not to add corn.)

Another tip for making a fulfilling and healthy chili, add any kind of veggie you want. I've added mushroom, zucchini, and corn. Anything that can withstand boiling, go for it!!

So as I mentioned before, I used ground turkey for the chili... I chose turkey because it's pretty healthy. I used 3/4 lbs ground turkey (which is half of the 1.5 lbs turkey they sell at supermarkets).

To start making this meal, heat a deep pan with 1 TBSP olive oil. Add the turkey, a sprinkle of salt and pepper, and the worcestershire sauce. Break up the meat with your cooking utensil and brown the meat. When browned, turn the heat down to med-high and add the garlic, onion, and green pepper. Then add the chili powder. Saute this pretty colorful bunch! It smells fairly good by now!

When the veggies look like it's getting some cooking going, add 1/4 cup of water. By now it should seem pretty dry, since we're using turkey, so the water really helps.

Now it's time to add all the canned stuff - diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, and kidney beans. It's also time to add the hot sauce - don't go too crazy because as you let the chili boil, the spiciness comes out. Also taste the chili so that it's just right for you.

Once the mix comes to a boil, turn the heat down to medium. Cover the pot and let it boil for a good 4-5 minutes. Check on it... you don't want your veggies to become too mushy.

At the same time as the chili is boiling, cook the broccoli. Boil it in hot water in a separate pot and put it on top of the chili. To make it prettier for this blog, I added two dried snow peas as garnish also - a simple dipping fun.

Our dinner - turkey chili with pomegranate mint drink (POM Wonderful pomegranate mango juice, sparkling water, and chopped mint). The iced cold drink is a nice complement to this hot chili on a hot evening!