October 30, 2015 by Liz @ spades, spatulas, and spoons

October – Yum or Odd Flavor Sauce

Have you heard of Lucky Peach? It’s a quarterly journal of food and writing. Each issue focuses on a single theme, and explores that theme through essays, art photography, and recipes. They are scheduled to release their first cookbook on October 27th.

The cookbook Lucky Peach Presents 101 Easy Asian Recipes contains a lot of tempting and unusual recipes (such as miso clam chowder and fish sauce spareribs), I found one of the most intriguing a sauce they call Odd Flavor Sauce. I’ve renamed it Yum Sauce because it is delicious and I don’t think the flavors are odd at all. I wanted a savory sauce for a simple bowl of rice with roast vegetables and a rice porridge. Yum sauce looked like the perfect counterpoint to jazz things up. The ingredients aren’t really that odd: soy sauce, tahini or peanut butter, black or regular red wine vinegar, sesame oil, sugar and salt. A few other ingredients—chopped scallion, ginger, garlic, chili flakes, and Sichuan peppercorns—briefly hit a hot skillet before mixing it all together.

There is a lot of flavor packed into a spoonful of this sauce. There is heat from the chiles, punch from the peppercorns, tartness from the vinegar, umami from the soy sauce, and nuttiness from the peanut butter and sesame oil. The combination is perfect!

Yum Sauce

Yum Sauce (makes about 1/2 cup)

3 tablespoons of soy sauce
2 tablespoons of tahini, almond butter, or peanut butter
1 tablespoon black Chinese vinegar or red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon of sesame oil (dark, roasted)
2 teaspoons of sugar (1 teaspoon if using nut butter with sugar)
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
3 tablespoons neutral oil (canola or other vegetable)
1 small scallion, finely chopped
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
1 large garlic clove, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon red chili flakes
1/2 teaspoon crushed Sichuan peppercorns

Combine the soy sauce, tahini or other nut butter, vinegar, sesame oil, sugar, and salt in a small heatproof bowl and mix until emulsified and the sugar is dissolved.
Heat a small skillet over medium heat, add the oil. When shimmering add the scallions, garlic, ginger, chili flakes, and crushed peppercorns.
Remove from the heat and stir for 10 seconds. Pour the contents of the skillet into the bowl with the liquid seasonings and whisk until blended.
Once cool, refrigerate. It will keep in the fridge for about two days.

Use to add flavor to a rice bowl, soup, or any other bland dish.

Jook with Yum Sauce

Rice bowl with a fried egg and Yum sauce

This sauce has many uses, I recently purchased some baby lobster tails at Costco, it made a wonderful sauce to brush on them before roasting. Brush the lobster tails with about 1 tablespoon of sauce, wrap in heavy duty aluminum foil, bake at 450 degeees for 22 minutes.

September 30, 2015 by Liz @ spades, spatulas, and spoons

September in the Kitchen – Carrot Habanero Sauce

‘Tis the season for peppers…sweet peppers, hot peppers, small peppers, large ones, and all colors…green, red, yellow, purple and orange.

Sweet peppers

But the season is short, much too short here in Northern California. This bright orange hot sauce using habaneros will bring back the taste (and heat) of summer on a dull winter day. What’s the best part? You can save a bit of summer in a jar and it is easy to make even for a beginner.

Habaneros

Use the sauce on grilled cheese sandwiches, tacos, or scrambled eggs…anywhere you need a touch of spicy heat. The carrots add sweetness and a lovely orange color. Plus it’s a wonderful hostess or Christmas gift.

I recommend using small (4-ounce) jars. This sauce is potent and a little goes a long way. If you prefer less heat, use more Serrano chilies or jalapeños and less habaneros. The habaneros are one of the hottest of the chilies.

Use a hot water canner if you have one, or a large pot if you don’t. Please refer to a good book on canning for more detailed instructions if you are not familiar with the basic techniques.

Carrot Habanero Sauce

1 1/2 pounds of carrots (orange), peeled and sliced into 1/4-inch rounds. A food processor will make short work of this.
Carrots
1 large white onion
1 1/2 cups water
2 tablespoons of lemon juice
2 tablespoons of kosher salt
3 tablespoons minced garlic
2 tablespoons finely grated fresh ginger
4 habanero peppers, seeded and chopped
2 jalapeño peppers (red if you can find them), seeded and chopped
5 cups white vinegar
Grated zest and juice of 1 lime

Combine the carrots, onion, water, lemon juice, salt, garlic and ginger in a medium non-reactive pot over medium high heat. Bring to a boil, turn down the heat, and simmer until the carrots are very soft. This could take 30 minutes. If the mixture seems dry, add a tablespoon or two of water.
Once the carrots are soft, add the peppers and simmer for another 10 minutes. Add the vinegar, lime juice and zest.
Either blend the mixture with an immersion blender or transfer in batches to a standing blender or food processor. (I prefer the smoother texture you get with a blender, you might like more texture.) Blend until smooth.
Optional (I don’t do this as I prefer the color and texture of the unstrained sauce. Your yield will also be higher): Strain the sauce through a strainer, using a rubber spatula to press the liquid through. Discard any chunky bits.
Pour into a large container and refrigerate overnight to let the flavors blend.
The following day, blend the sauce again. Return it to the pot and bring it to a simmer, cook for about 25-30 minutes until it is thick and glossy.
Ladle the sauce into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Check for air bubbles, wipe the rim, and seal. Process for 10 minutes.

This recipe makes approximately 6 pints of sauce. I use 4 oz. jars, so you will have plenty for both your own use and gift giving.

Carrot Habanero Sauce

Recipe adapted from Tart and Sweet by Kelly Geary and Jessie Knadler.

And what is my personal favorite way to use it? Grilled cheese with a sharp Canadian white cheddar. I was recently in Seattle where grilled cheese is big business, here you see a food truck parked in from of Tesla. “Gourmet Grilled Cheese”… I think this could hang in there with their offerings.

Grilled Cheese is Big Business

Grilled cheese on Focaccia with Carrot Habanero

February 27, 2015 by Liz @ spades, spatulas, and spoons

February in the Kitchen – Avocado Sauce

This avocado sauce is not quite a guacamole and not quite a salsa verde; but somewhere in the middle. A dollop is delicious on a burger, stirred into hummus, as a sauce for plain grilled chicken, or with a cauliflower croquette. It is easy and quick to make and will keep for a few days in the fridge. I think you will find lots of uses. I pinned and adapted this recipe from the blog Laylita’s Recipes.

1 bunch of cilantro, leaves roughly chopped
½ to 1 Serrano or Jalapeno pepper, stemmed and seeded and coarsely chopped
2 limes – grated zest and juice
2 garlic cloves, chopped roughly
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 ripe avocado, halved and seeded
½ cup of olive or avocado oil

Put the first 6 ingredients in the container of a food processor and process until roughly chopped.
Add the avocado and turn the processor on and off a few times to mix.
Add the olive oil and process until smooth.

Avocado Sauce

I used the sauce to top cauliflower croquettes. Great flavor combination!

Cauliflower Croquettes with Avocado Sauce

I am taking this sauce to Fiesta Friday to celebrate the end of the week with Angie and the gang at the Novice Gardener.

February 1, 2015 by Liz @ spades, spatulas, and spoons

February in the Kitchen – Crispy, Crunchy Flour Tortilla Chips

Have you ever had chips made from flour tortillas? If not, you are in for a treat. You won’t find these in a store because they are too fragile (read crispy, crunchy) for commercial interest. But, they are easy to make and once you do…you will be hooked. Good bye regular corn tortilla chips. A favorite Berkeley Mexican restaurant serves them only on request. That’s the only place outside my kitchen I have ever seen them. Who needs Mexican food when you can have flour tortilla chips and bean dip!

Bean dip with Crisp Flour Tortillas

These are even better with stale flour tortillas that have been in your fridge for ? (maybe I’d better not ask it your fridge is like mine).

The chips bubble up not unlike pastry when it is fried. And, these are much easier than making pastry. Use the chips with dips, salsa, or as nachos.

There isn’t much of a recipe; here is the basic method.

Flour Tortilla Chips

1 package of flour tortillas (stale is good)
1/2 inch of oil in a pot suitable for frying

Flour Tortilla

Cut into wedges

Heat the oil over medium to medium-hot heat.
Cut the tortillas into triangle shapes, or any shape which strikes your fancy.
Drop the tortillas into the hot oil a few at a time. They will cook quickly so do this in batches. Turn them after a few seconds to brown the other side.
Drain on paper towels or newspaper.

Fried Flour Tortilla Chips

These will keep for a day in an airtight container (once cool), you can reheat and crisp them in a warm oven.

The trick is to cook them in oil that is hot, but not so hot that they brown before crisping all the way to the center.

If you are still searching for something different for Super Bowl, gives these a try.

December 7, 2014 by Liz @ spades, spatulas, and spoons

December in the kitchen – Skirt steak with chimichurri sauce

Ok, I give up; the red wine pickle brine has won! Inspired by Mr. Fitz’s hanger steak and the beet pickle brine that was tossed down the sink, I purchased skirt steak at the butchers.

Then I got curious about the difference between skirt steak and hanger steak, were they the same? I thought so, but I was wrong. A little searching turned up the answer. There are four cuts which are very similar in looks but come from different places on the cow; the skirt, flatiron, hanger, and flank steaks. Isn’t the Internet amazing? You can find out anything with just a few clicks. Following is a quick map of where you will those various steaks:

Skirt steak, it turns out, is actually the cow’s diaphragm muscle, it’s chewy but tender if cooked quickly and left quite rare. It has quite a lot of marbling and is very flavorful. It’s a long and narrow piece of meat, as much as a few feet in length. It takes well to marinades or dry rubs. It’s one of my favorite cuts and has been discovered in recent years. At my butchers it was more expensive per pound than a T-bone steak!

Flank steak comes from the belly area near a cow’s back legs. It’s much leaner than the skirt steak and takes well to marinades and grilling. Flank should be sliced against the grain for serving.

Hanger steak comes from deep inside the loin, encircled by the rib cake. It’s relatively tender compared to skirt and flank steaks (and more expensive since there is only one per cow). The French call this cut an onglet; it’s frequently seen on menus in bistros accompanied by pomme frites.

A flatiron steak comes from the front shoulder of the cow; it’s sometimes called a top blade or petite tender.

I’d recommend cooking all of them to rare to medium rare.

This post should probably be titled “Skirt steak marinated in red wine pickle brine with chimichurri sauce”, but that’s a bit of a mouthful! Chimichurri sauce is a green herb sauce originally from Argentina; there it’s commonly paired with steak.

Red wine pickling brine and marinade

Red wine and vinegar marinade

2 cups of red wine vinegar
1 cup of red wine
½ cup of water
¼ cup of honey
1/3 cup of packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon Kosher salt
2 teaspoons of black peppercorns
16 sprigs of fresh thyme (8 for heating with marinade)
8 sprigs of fresh rosemary (4 for heating with marinade)

Combine the red wine vinegar, red wine, water, honey, brown sugar, salt, peppercorns, 8 sprigs of fresh thyme, and 4 sprigs of rosemary in a saucepan and slowly bring to a simmer. Turn off the heat and allow the herbs to infuse the marinade as it cools.
Once cool remove the thyme and rosemary.
Pour the marinade over the steaks, adding the other fresh herbs.
Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours, overnight would be ok.
Pat dry before grilling (we used the BBQ) or cooking on a stove top grill. Since a single steak will vary in thickness you will have a range of “rareness”. We cooked on fairly high heat for 3 minutes a side.

Skirt steak

Marinating skirt steak

Chimichurri sauce

Chimichurri sauce

1 cup of fresh parsley leaves, stalks removed
¼ cup of fresh oregano
¼ cup of fresh mint
3-5 cloves of garlic
3 tablespoons of red wine vinegar
3 tablespoons of lemon juice
2 tablespoons of shallots
1 teaspoon of kosher salt
1 teaspoon of freshly ground pepper
½ teaspoon of chili flakes (less if you do not want spicy)
¾ cup of olive oil

Combine all the ingredients except the olive oil in a food processor. Process until finely chopped by turning off and on, scrape down the sides as needed.
With the machine running, slowly add the olive oil until an emulsion is formed. Scrape down the sides as needed.
Pour into a container and refrigerate. This will keep for 3 days in the fridge.

Skirt steak with chimichurri sauce

I served this with an adaptation of the spiced cauliflower “couscous” recipe from Giramuk’s Kitchen. It was a big hit!

spades, spatulas & spoons

Adventures in gardening, cooking, and eating

dips and spreads

October – Yum or Odd Flavor Sauce

Like this:

September in the Kitchen – Carrot Habanero Sauce

Like this:

February in the Kitchen – Avocado Sauce

Like this:

February in the Kitchen – Crispy, Crunchy Flour Tortilla Chips

Like this:

December in the kitchen – Skirt steak with chimichurri sauce

Like this:

If you like this post, please share:

Like this:

Like this:

If you like this post, please share:

Like this:

If you like this post, please share:

Like this:

If you like this post, please share:

Like this: