Hoppin’ John and Johnny Cakes

I love it when a dish comes with a side plate of history.

Hoppin’ John is one of those dishes. In the Deep South, this stew made with black eyed peas is traditionally eaten on New Year’s Day because it is believed to bring good luck throughout the rest of the year.

There are all sorts of rituals that come with this practice, including leaving a coin under the bowl or even in the stew itself, or counting the number of peas to see how many lucky days you will have during the coming year, or leaving three peas in the bowl at the end of the meal — one for luck, one for money and one for love.

Whew! But that’s not all. Hoppin’ John is usually served with brasied collard, turnip or mustard greens because they are the color of money, and with corn bread because it is the color of gold.

Finally, leftover Hoppin’ John is eaten again the following day — only this time it is called Skippin’ Jenny — to show how frugal you are.

The name Hoppin’ John may refer to a legendary character, or it may simply come from the Creole French for black eye peas, “pois pigeons”. No one knows for sure.

Back in the northern states, our food rituals are not nearly as interesting. Johnny cakes are what people from New England used to call corn bread around the time of the Revolutionary War. Because they would stay edible even during a long day’s journey on horseback, with the flat, nasal Yankee accent “journey cakes” became ”johnny cakes.”

I may have been a couple of weeks late with this dish, but I hope it brings me luck for the rest of this year!

Hoppin’ John

4 TBS unsalted butter

1 white onion, medium dice

1 green pepper, ribs and seeds removed, medium dice

2 stalks of celery, ribs and leafs included, medium dice

3 cloves garlic, crushed

4 cups dried black eyed peas (soaked 6 hours)

32 oz chicken stock

1/2 lb sausage (any kind, your choice, I used chorizo)

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/4 tsp fresh cracked black pepper

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

2 TBS red wine vinegar

Rice or bulgur, cooked

1. Soak black eyed peas in cool water for at least 6 hours to soften. Rinse before using.

2. In pot, melt butter then add onions, pepper, and celery and cook until onions translucent, about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Remove sausage from casing, add to pot, break apart and cook until brown, about 7 minutes. Add garlic and cook another minute or two.

3. Add black eyed peas, chicken stock and seasonings and bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer. Cook until most of the liquid is absorbed, about 45 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Serve over rice with braised greens and corn bread on the side. Good luck!

What recipes do you make that come dripping with history? Share your story in the comments section below. And thanks for looking at my blog!

Meat Free Mondays — Three Bean Pizza

Perhaps my wife stated it best when I told her what I was making for dinner:

“Wait, what?”

That’s because you normally don’t associate beans and pizza. They don’t seem like two things that would go together. But the fact is, in this recipe they worked together very well because the protein in the three beans — black beans, chickpeas and red kidney beans — is the perfect low-fat low-cholesterol meat-free substitute for spicy pepperoni or greasy sausage.

I won’t go so far as to say that this tastes like traditional pizza. It doesn’t.

But it is delicious in its own right. With the salsa as the sauce and the pepper jack mixed into the cheese, it definitely has more of a Mexican flavor to it.

I frequently put beans in my quesadillas, so maybe that’s what this recipe reminds me of: A big, open-faced cheese quesadilla.

Normally, I would have used my homemade pizza dough. But frankly it has been so busy around here I just didn’t have time, so instead I bought one of those pre-made pizza doughs in the paper tube. I really wanted to hate it, but I have to admit it tasted really good.

BONUS: The recipe I found called for one can each of the beans, but that was WAY too much, so I only used half and made a three bean salad with the other half. Win/win!

Three Bean Pizza

1 TBS EVOO

1/2 white onion, small dice

2 cloves garlic, crushed.

1/2 15-oz can black beans

1/2 can chick peas

1/2 can red kidney beans

1/2 can cut corn

12 oz salsa

1 tube (10 oz) refrigerated pizza dough

4 oz mozzarella, shredded

4 oz pepper jack, shredded

1/2 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp chili powder

1. Preheat oven to 425. Roll out pizza dough onto a baking sheet, spray with pan spray and cook 6 minutes. This will result in a crisp, cracker-like crust. Meanwhile, pour all four cans into a colander, drain and toss together until fully mixed.

2. Put cast iron pan on fire. When hot, add oil. When smoking, add onions and cook until onions transclucent, about five minutes. Add garlic and cook another minute, then add half the bean/corn mixture and cook until heated through, about another five minutes.

3. Pour the salsa onto the pizza dough and spread it so the entire surface is covered, except the edges. Sprinkle the dough with half the cheese, then add the bean mixture in an even layer and sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Sprinkle the top with the cumin and chile powder

4. Bake for 10 minutes or until top is brown and bubbly. Remove from oven and cut into squares.

Have you ever come across a recipe that made you stop and ask what the …?! Share your story in the comments section below. And thanks for looking at my blog!

Shrimp Creole

I know a lot of people who are afraid of shrimp.

Maybe it is because when they are raw they look like little insects or perhaps because you have to peel and de-vein them before cooking them, but some people just opt out of shrimp altogether.

Which is a terrible shame because shrimp are one of the most affordable, delicious, healthy and versatile seafood you can find. Shrimp cocktail, shrimp shish-ka-bobs, shrimp with pasta, fried shrimp, popcorn shrimp, and peel and eat shrimp are all among my favorite menu items.

Unless you live on the Gulf Coast or in Thailand, the shrimp you buy at the market were almost certainly frozen at some point during their journey. That’s because fresh shrimp are highly perishable and unless you are cooking and consuming them right off the shrimping boat, they need to be frozen to maintain their quality.

Some shrimpers freeze and package the shrimp at sea on factory boats. Others process their haul at giant factories next to the docks. In the US, most shrimp come from the Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama coasts.

Fun fact: When you buy boxed shrimp that is frozen, it usually is the same as the shrimp displayed in your grocer’s seafood department. In most cases, they just took it out of the box and defrosted it first.

Shrimp is sold by its size, with the biggest shrimp costing the most. Shrimp are priced by the number of peices of shrimp it takes to make a pound — 41/50, for example, means it takes between 41 and 50 shrimp of that size to make a pound.

I usually use 16/20 shrimp which typically cost about $5 to $6/lb. But you can buy shrimp that go all the way up to U10 (under-10 shrimp to the pound), which at that point are basically like small lobsters.

This classic New Orleans recipe is delicious even for people who don’t usually like shrimp because the sweetness of the shrimp perfectly complements the tangy, slightly spicy flavor of the sauce.

Shrimp Creole

1 lb 16/20 shrimp, peeled and deveined

2 TBS unsalted butter

1 TBS EVOO

1 onion, medium dice

2 stalks celery, ribs and leaves included, medium dice

1 green bell pepper, ribs and seeds removed, medium dice

3 cloves garlic, crushed

3 TBS all-purpose flour

1 8-oz can of tomato sauce

1 cup water

Juice of one lemon

2 bay leaves

1/4 tsp granulated sugar

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1 TBS tomato paste

2 to 3 shakes of Worchestersire sauce

Sea salt to taste

1/2 cup green onions, sliced thin

1. Peel shrimp by tearing away the shell starting at the legs, then carefully tugging off the shell at the tail. De-vein shrimp by using a paring knife to make a shallow cut down the back, then use the knife to pull out the vein and discard. Rinse shrimp under cold water and refrigerate until ready to use.

2. Put pot on fire and add oil and butter. When butter melts, add onions, green pepper and celery and cook until onion translucent, about five minutes. Add garlic and bay leaf and cook another minute, then add flour and stir around, forming a kind of pot roux.

3. When flour begins to turn slightly brown, add the tomato sauce, water, lemon juice, sugar, and cayenne. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer. Stir in tomato paste and Worcestersire sauce. The Creole sauce should thicken to the consistency of creamed soup. If it gets too thick, thin it out with a little additional water. Simmer 30 minutes.

4. Add shrimp and stir so that all shrimp are completely coated with sauce, then simmer an additional 15 minutes, stirring once or twice. Season to taste with salt. Serve over brown rice or pasta and garnish with green onions.

Are you afraid of shrimp? Don’t be, but tell us why in the comments section below. And thanks for looking at my blog!

 

Pork Roast Pinwheels

In the restaurant business, recipes are only half the equation when it comes to making food people enjoy. The other half is presentation.

As the culinary school mantra goes, “People eat with their eyes before their mouths.” As a chef, you are always thinking of new and interesting ways to plate the food so that it will be unique.

For this recipe, I took an ordinary pork loin and dressing and combined them in a way that should delight your family. And it is really simple and fast to do.

All you need is a boneless pork loin, about 3 lb.

Using a chef’s knife, make a horizontal cut across the loin about 3/4 of the way down, leaving enough meat to act as a hinge, then open it up.

The make another horizontal cut across the top 1/2 of the loin, again leaving enough meat for a hinge, and open it up again. What you have now is one flat peice of pork loin.

Now simply take your pre-cooked stuffing (any kind will do) and add a layer on top of the pork loin, trying to stay about 1/2 inch away from the sides.

Then you roll it up like a Ho-Ho.

Use some kitchen twine to truss it.

Spray it with a little pan spray and season it all over with sea salt and fresh cracked black pepper.

Spray a casserole dish and place the roast in the dish.

And roast it off uncovered for one hour at 375F. Let it cool for about 10 minutes before cutting it.

Cut off the twine then cut vertical slices to get pinwheel disks. Stand these up on the plate on top of a small pile of remaining stuffing to emphasize the pinwheels, nap only the bottom with a pan gravy, add a little steamed broccoli, garnish with some chopped parsley and you are done.

What kind of food presentations do you like to use to make your plates look more impressive? Feel free to tell your story in the comments section below. And thanks for looking at my blog!

 

Wine on Wednesday – Best California Red Table Wine

I’ve had a lot of people tell me that Menage a Trois is their favorite California red table wine and I can see why. Maybe it’s because it offers a full-bodied flavor that stands up to strong flavors such as garlic or tomatoes without blowing the back of your head off with its jammy fruitiness.

Menage a Trois (French for “household for three” but also a euphanism for a three-way sexual encounter) is made from three grapes — zinfandel, merlot and cabernet sauvignon — that are blended together to make a wine that has the familiar jam-like flavor typical of table wines, but without the flavor getting the way of your enjoying the wine, the way most bottom shelf California reds do.

The flavor of Menage a Trois is no accident. The zinfandel is there to give it its distinctive peppery, vegetal flavor, the merlot mellows it out, and the cabernet balances everything out by giving the blend its structure.

The blending of differnet grapes to get a particular flavor profile is a very American way to make wine, or at least very un-European.

In France, for example, wines from a particular region by law have to be made from the grapes grow best in that region. That’s why all wines from Burgundy are made from pinot noir grapes, all wines from Champagne are made from champagne grapes, etc. These laws are hundreds of years old and violating them would be unthinkable to any good Frenchman.

Here in the US – as well as in Australia, South Africa and South America — we aren’t as uptight about what kind of grape goes in the bottle as long as we like what it tastes like. While the US has celebrated wine regions – such as Napa and Sonoma in California and the Willamette Valley in Oregon – each of those regions produce many different varieties of wines and many of them are excellent.

Menage a Trois is the top selling red wine product in the US. The brand also offers other wines – including a white table win, a rose and even a Moscato – but I’ve never tried them.

Menage a Trois is produced by Folie a Deux (French for “a madness or delusion shared by two”), a vineyard opened by two wine-loving ex-psychiatrists near Helena, in Sonoma Valley in 1981. It was sold in 2004 to Trinchero Family Estates, a vast wine house that produces a very wide variety of wines from super exclusive cabernets and merlots to the Sutter Home brand of mass produced low-end wines.

While I wouldn’t categorize Menage a Trois as low end, it is certainly not expensive. I bought it at my local discount liquor store recently for $6.70/bottle, which falls well below my self-imposed cost limit of $7.99/bottle.

At that price, if you are looking for an affordable California red table wine, you can afford to pick up a bottle of Menage a Trois and give it a try yourself!

Coq Au Vin

Coq au vin is a very old dish. I mean really old.

Purportedly, it was a favorite dish of Julius Caesar after his gladiators came across it while invading Gaul.

While I can’t confirm that, I can confirm that coq au vin (French for “poultry in wine”) is one of those dishes you would find on the menu of a French fine dining restaurant in the 1950s and ’60s. While it was celebrated by famous chefs of that era as the epitome of classically French cuisine, it actually is super easy to make, tastes great and is relatively inexpensive as well.

Traditionally, coq au vin is made with a rooster or capon, which is an older chicken with tougher meat. The long braising process breaks down the connective tissues between the bird’s muscles to make the tough meat tender. But for this version, I just use chicken.

Coq au vin also is traditionally made with wine from the Burgundy region of France, which are made from pinot noir grapes. Any pinot noir will do, or any red wine for that matter.

(An aside on cooking with wine: The rule of thumb is never to cook with a wine you wouldn’t drink. That makes sense to me because the only wine I have hanging around is wine I drink! Why would I keep wine I wouldn’t drink?)

Finally, the traditional coq au vin is made with pearl onions. I couldn’t find any pearl onions this time of year other than those little pickled cocktail onions you sometimes see in martinis. I opted to use diced white onion and it turned out just fine, although I’m sure the French would be outraged!

Coq Au Vin

2 TBS EVOO

2 slices of bacon cut into 1-inch peices

12 oz package of white button mushrooms

1 medium white onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1/2 tsp dry oregano

1/2 tsp dry thyme

1 whole chicken, about 3 lb

1 cup chicken stock

1 cup dry red wine

2 TBS tomato paste

1/2 tsp sea salt

Fresh cracked black pepper

2 TBS all-purpose flour

1. Use poultry shears to cut backbone out of chicken. Lay flat on cutting board skin side up and press down so the breastbone breaks and the chicken lies flat. Season both sides with sea salt and fresh cracked black pepper. Put cast iron pan on the fire. When hot, add oil. When smoking, carefull place chicken in pan skin side down, being careful not to splash yourself with hot oil. Cook until brown and crisp, about three minutes, then flip over and brown the other side.

2. Preheat oven to 350F. Put Dutch oven on the fire. When hot, add bacon and cook until bacon is crisp and all oils have been released, about 4 minutes, then add onions, carrots and celery and cook until onions translucent, about five minutes.  Add mushrooms and cook until browned, about three more minutes. Add garlic, oregano and thyme and cook about another minute, then put chicken on top, skin facing up.

3. Combine stock, wine and tomato pase in a small mixing bowl and whisk together, then pour mixture over the chicken. Bring to boil, then reduce to simmer. Cover and place the entire Dutch oven in oven and bake for one hour.

4. Remove from oven. Carefully remove the chicken and let rest on sheet pan. Use a ladle to remove about one cup of the liquid from the pot and whisk in flour. Return flour/liquid mixture to pot and put on flame until boiling. The sauce will thicken as it boils, so stir frequently. Remove from heat.

To plate, carefully separate breast/wing and leg/thigh peices from the chicken. They should be falling off the bone. Place onto bed of rice or potatoes and spoon the sauce/vegetable mixture over the top. Voila!

What classic French recipes do you like to make? Share your ideas in the comments section below. And thanks for looking at my blog!

Meat Free Mondays – Mushroom Barley Soup

One of the best side benefits of trying to eat more vegetarian foods is discovering things about food I never realized before, such as the versatility of barley.

Barley is a cereal grain that has been a part of my life since almost the very beginning, except I didn’t even know it. Many of the sickly sweet cereals I devoured as a kid were made from barley and other grains processed with a sugar glaze.

By the time I got to college, beer became a staple food. Beer is made from fermented barley, malt, hops and other grains.

Barley is the main cattle feed in parts of the country where corn doesn’t grow as well, such as Montana, North Dakota and northern Minnesota.

Today, pearled barley is the central ingredient in this Mushroom Barley Soup, a delicious variation on my standard Beef Barley Soup. In this version, the tough cuts of beef are replaced with white button mushrooms. While they obviously don’t provide the same amount of protein, the mushrooms were surprisingly effective in maintaining this soup’s hearty flavor.

Barley grains are like tiny sponges that soak up an amazing amount of liquid. I’m always surprised by how little barley is needed to create an entire pot of soup. It seems like no matter how much liquid is added, the barley grains continue to soak up all of it, leaving a lushly textured, highly flavorful soup.

Mushroom Barley Soup

2 TBS EVOO

1 white onion, medium dice

3 or 4 small carrots, medium dice

2 celery stalks, medium dice

1 garlic clove, crushed

12 oz package white button mushrooms, rough chop

3/4 cup dry pearled barley

1 TBS Italian seasoning

1 bay leaf

6 cups vegetable stock or water

1 10-oz can diced tomatoes

Sea salt and fresh cracked black pepper to taste

1. Put soup pot or Dutch oven on the fire. When hot, add oil. When smoking, add onion, celery and carrots and cook until onions translucent, about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add mushrooms and cook until brown, about another 3 minutes. Add garlic and cook about one minute. Add barley, Italian seasoning and bay leaf and toss so that each grain is covered with oil and let toast for about a minute. Add vegetable stock and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook 30 minutes, stirring once or twice.

2. Add entire can of tomatoes, including juice, and simmer an additional 30-45 minutes or until nearly all the liquid is absorbed. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

This soup goes best with a hearty bread. I ran out of time, so I bought a LaBrea Bakery whole wheat baguette, which was delicious. It could be made in the crock pot instead. Just cook on low about 8 hours.

Texas Black Bean Chili

Here in Chicago, we had been enjoying a mild winter up until this week. But the Arctic blast that has settled over the city is making us forget all about those warm temperatures and sunny days.

At least cold weather means it’s time for chili!

Our crock pot has been working overtime this month, with nearly four out of five meals being slow-cooked. It’s not only convenient — everything seems to be busier right now — but the enticing aroma wafting through the house all day makes the frigid weather easier to tolerate.

This time I decided to try something a little different. Texas black bean chili is similar to my standard chili recipe, but with a few twists. Besides using black beans instead of kidney beans, of course.

For this recipe, I substituted my barbeque dry rub for the standard chili powder/cumin flavoring. The barbeque dry rub contains a wide variety of different spices, but no cumin or chili powder. So the chili ends up tasting radically different, both sweeter and spicier.

If you have store-bought barbeque rub or dried barbeque seasoning, that works fine, too.

Texas black bean chili is also mas caliente than standard chili because of the addition of canned diced chile peppers. You can spice it up even more by including the seeds and ribs from the jalapeno, if you want. But be careful, once you add the heat, you can’t take it out. Another option would be to just let people add their own hot sauce if they prefer flaming hot chili.

Hope you’re staying warm where you are!

Texas Black Bean Chili

1 medium white onion, diced

1 green pepper, seeds and ribs removed, diced

2 jalapenos, seeds and ribs removed, diced

1 small can diced green chiles

2 cans black beans, drained

1 large can of whole peeled tomatoes

2 TBS EVOO

1 lb ground turkey (or ground beef)

2 TBS Barbeque Dry Rub

1/2 cup water

Sea salt and fresh cracked black pepper to taste

1 12-ounce can spicy V-8

1. Put cast iron pan on fire. When hot, add oil. When smoking, add half of the onions. Saute until soft, about five minutes, then add the turkey and cook until brown, stirring occasionally, about 10 minutes. Add barbeque dry rub and water and cook an additional minute.

2. In crock pot, combine beans, the other half of the diced onion, green pepper, jalapeno and chiles. Add the turkey and stir together. Add the juice from the whole peeled tomatoes, then hand crush the tomatoes into the pot. This is important to get the right texture for the tomatoes. Pour in spicy V-8 and stir.

3. Cook on low for 8 hours, stirring once or twice. When fully cooked, adjust the flavor by seasoning with salt and pepper to taste.

I usually serve my chili with oyster crackers, shredded Mexican cheese, cooked macaroni noodles, diced onions and fat free sour cream, but you can just use whatever condiments you like best.

What sort of meals do you like to make when the temperatures start to fall? Share your ideas in the comments section below. And thanks for looking at my blog.

Easy Tuna Tetrazzini with Spinach

The weeks between the end of the holidays and the beginning of Spring always seem like the busiest time of the whole year.

It’s as if life says, “Okay, now it’s really time to get down to business.” Somehow workdays get busier and evenings begin to fill up with events and responsibilities that weren’t there only a few weeks ago.

From a cooking perspective, this gets complicated. That’s why in winter I always simplify matters with casseroles and crock pots.

Casseroles and crock pots allow you to prepare ahead of time for times you know you’re going to be stressful. Two or three meals can be prepared at once, then stored in the refrigerator or even the freezer until they are needed.

My crock pot has certainly gotten a workout in the past couple of weeks, so it was time to focus on hearty and filling casseroles. But casseroles don’t have to be the same old familiar standards time and time again.

This recipe is a twist on the tuna casserole recipe we’ve all had thousands of times before. It takes familiar ingredients and mixes them up in a way that’s fresh, delicious and unexpected. The tuna could easily be replaced with leftover chicken, ground turkey or beef, or even pork.

Easy Tuna Tetrazzini with Spinach

8 oz dry whole wheat linguine, broken into thirds (half box)

1 10-1/2 oz can cream of celery soup

1 10-oz box frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained

1/2 cup milk

2 6-oz cans white chunk tuna in water, drained

1/4 cup oven roasted tomatoes (or jarred roasted red peppers), rough chop

1/2 tsp granulated garlic

1/2 tsp onion powder

1 tsp Italian seasoning

1/4 tsp hot sauce

Sea salt and fresh cracked black pepper to taste

1/4 cup Italian-style dry bread crumbs

2 TBS grated parmesan

1 TBS unsalted butter

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Spray 9-inch square casserole dish with pan spray. Cook linguine according to package instructions, drain and run under cold water to stop the cooking process.

2. In a mixing bowl, combine pasta, soup, tuna, milk and tomatoes. Season with granulated garlic, onion powder, hot sauce and Italian seasoning and mix. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Transfer to baking dish.

3. In a small bowl, combine bread crumbs, parmesan and butter. Use your fingers to mix the butter into the dry ingredients until the butter chunks are the size of small pebbles. Sprinkle evenly over casserole and bake in oven uncovered for 45 minutes or until golden brown and bubbly.

What kind of dishes do you like to cook to make busy days more manageable? Share your ideas in the comments section below. And thanks for looking at my blog!

Wine on Wednesdays — The Best Inexpensive Pinot Noir

Do you ever think about what course for your life would you select if you knew back in high school what you know now?

For me, if I had a time machine I would travel back in time and enroll at the University of California-Fresno and study oneology, the history and appreciation of wines, in the midst of the richest grape growing region in the country.

Then I would become a sommelier, or the person in fancy restaurants who walks around with the little cup on a chain around his neck and whose job is to recommend great wines.

While time machine research and development in this country has been sadly deficient, I can still recommend great wines. And one of my favorites is Mark West Pinot Noir. This is a special occasion wine for me because it just barely surpasses my self-imposed price limit of $7.99/bottle: I paid $8.06 for a bottle at my local discount liquor store recently.

But spending the extra 7 cents was worth it. Decent pinot noirs are generally more expensive than other wines, usually $20 and up. Part of that has to do with their skyrocketing popularity after the 2004 movie “Sideways” festishized pinot noirs.

Other than Mark West, any pinot noir I’ve found for less than $10 doesn’t taste the way pinot noirs should taste. Typically they have a distinctive black cherry flavor, which the Mark West definitely has. Pinot noir always reminds me of the black cherry soda I would drink when I was young.

Wines from the Burgundy region of France are made from pinot noir grapes. But back in the 1970s, California pinot noir enthusiasts Bob and Joan Ellis found an area next to the Mark West Creek in the Russian River Vally region os Sonoma Valley, California, that they felt perfectly reproduced the growing conditions of Burgundy. This wine is made from the grapes they planted.

In 1990, the Mark West Winery became the first to be certified organic by the California Certified Organic Farmers. Which is all very nice, but what’s even nicer is the flavor and the price of this wine. For my money, there aren’t many better values out there.

We have even frequently give this wine as holiday gifts because it tastes like it costs several times what we paid for it.

If you like pinot noirs and are tired of paying inflated prices because of some dumb movie, or sick of buying inexpensive pinot noirs only to be disappointed later when they don’t taste the way they are supposed to, do what I did: Spend the extra 7 cents and give Mark West Pinot Noir a try.