Arepas

Arepas are like a south american corn cake that you fill with whatever crazy stuff you want. In Orlando this place Q'Kenan made amazing Arepas and that's where i was turned on to their badassness. For the Arepa i followed this recipe i found online

http://www.whats4eats.com/breads/arepas-recipe

For the filling i slow cooked some pork overnight in various spices. Also i put some black beans in there with some shredded cheese. On top i put some homemade Crema which is like a south american sour cream. I was trying to emulate Q'Kenan awesome sauce but i dont know how they did it so i just did my own thing. Crema is basically this:

2 cups heavy cream and 1/4 cultured buttermilk. put that in a bowl and cover it and let it sit out on the counter over night. This turns it thick and tangy. Then add some salt and pepper, diced shallots, garlic, cilantro, and fresh papaya. Its very smooth and refreshing like sour cream, and easy to make so i recommend trying it if you're into sour cream.

Salmon Potato Chowder

This is a recipe we got out of the daily soup cookbook. it was good. Katrina also did her famous rosemary biscuits. She can post the recipe for that some other time cause i'm not sure where it is.

- Sweat 1 onion, 2 celery stalks, 1 fennel bulb in a large stockpot with butter
- Add 2 tsp thyme, 1tsp fennel seeds, 2 bay leaves, 2 tsp salt and stir
- Add 6 red bliss potatoes 1-inch cubed, 4 cups veg stock, 1 cup tomato juice and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 20 min.
- Add 2 large salmon fillets 1-inch cubed. Simmer 2 minutes
- Remove from heat and add 1.5 cups heavy cream and 2 tb chopped tarragon

We halved this recipe and it worked out good although we didn't have heavy cream so we used a dash of milk and i think it was a bad idea. It was still good though. I wonder if it's frowned upon to put recipes online from a book you have to actually buy. Luckily no one reads this.

Southwestern Eggrolls

So the filling for these consisted of the following:
-cooked chopped spinach
-frozen baby corn
-chopped red bell peppers
-black beans
-diced jalapeno
-chopped grilled chicken
-cumin
-chili powder
-cayenne pepper
-chopped green onion
-shredded Monterrey jack cheese
-salt/pepper

i don't remember the amounts, that's why the picture is there. memorize the way it looks.

so after simmering all this in the saucepan til its all cooked together, put a heaping spoonful onto an eggroll wrapper. i can't really explain the way you need to angle the wrapper and fold it in words, but it's really important so don't fuck it up. use a little eggwash to seal it up and give it a nice coat on top to crisp it up. we baked these at 450 for 10 min, but deep frying would be taste superior.

i hope you enjoy this final picture because i doubt you'll ever make them yourself.

also we dipped these in a ranch/hot sauce concoction. i suggest you come up with a delicious sauce yourself, dear reader, because experimentation is half the fun. and eating is 80% of the fun. and cooking is 43%. math.

Venison Meatloaf

For the beer pong tournament on Friday we had Venison Jack Burgers (thanks to Justin for the meat. and his friend Beetle or Scarab or something for killing an innocent deer) In those burgers there were black beans, fresh cilantro, crushed up doritos, and venison. They turned out good. The next day we had a bunch of that meat mix left over so... meatloaf time.

I added in a couple eggs, shallots, carrot, fresh garlic, thai chili peppers, and some chili powder

cooked it at 400deg for about 20 min then added a glaze of ketchup, Worcestershire, honey, and cumin.

bam. delicious.

Tamales

I made some delicious tamales. look.

I got Masa mix from Wegman's and found a recipe online. I've always wanted to make these and they turned out awesome. I slow roasted some left over pork shoulder and some dark meat chicken and did two different kinds. Slow cooking the meat took about 3 hours, and steaming the tamales took about 2, so it was a long process. When you consider how many i ended up with though, and how i've been eating them for a week and barely made a dent in the supply, it was worth it.


The pork ones were the best.

Grasshoppers

For the superbowl i decided to make the Morgan family's traditional grasshopper pie but do it in individual little cupcake things. So they're like mini pies. Its just heavy whipping cream, cream cheese, sugar, creme de menthe in an oreo crust with some homemade whipped cream on top.

success.

Sweet Potato Bison Burgers

Made these burgers the other night and thought to myself "I should photograph this and put it on that food blog i just started two days ago!" because I'm a genius. Anyway, the star of this dish was this sauce that i got back in birmingham during the holidays at the new Bass Pro Shop. Yeah that's right, I'm cooking with Bass Pro Shop ingredients, wanna fight about it?

So i cooked some bison patties with a little oil, onions, garlic (garlic powder, chili powder also) and this sauce, which is Mango Ginger Habanero if you can't see it on the label. After they were cooked i allow the onions to caramelize on their own in this sauce and it really made them taste good.

I also microved a couple sweet potatoes at this point, which i ended up throwing in the pan later to crisp up.

When it was all done the burgers consisted of the bison patty, slice of cooper cheese, a medallion of sweet potato, some chopped onions from the pan, and lettuce all on toasted whole wheat english muffins. Turned out pretty tasty. And yes i ate them both. The sweet potato idea was nothing short of culinary brilliance. Did i mention i came up with that? I'm a bastard.

The End.

Good Stuff Eatery

Location: 303 Pennsylvania Ave S.E., Washington, D.C. 20003

Best place I've found so far to get a delicious burger, with Ray's Hell Burger in Arlington coming in second place. It's run by Spike from Top Chef. He's been there working on the line every time I've been, which earns him a thumbs up from me.

I went with the Spike's 5 Napkin Burger this time. It has an egg on it. verdict: delicious.

The burger's aren't on the gigantic size, but somehow they are extremely filling and satifying. Also got a side of Village Fries, which are douched with a generous helping of rosemary and very greasy. That did not stop me from eating all of them.

Now it's time that i talk about the mayonnaises. There is a help-yourself mayo station downstairs that provides Old Bay Mayo, Chipotle Mayo, Sriracha Mayo (favorite), and Mango Mayo (also favorite). Ignore the neon yellow normal mustard cup in the foreground. (credit: brian miller) Along with all this i decided to get a.....

BAM. Toasted marshmallow hand-spun shake. This is the only shake i've ordered but it's pretty much their signature flavor, and for good reason. It's like drinking cold, frothy sex. Also they serve beer (with a few on tap) which is nice.

One gripe i have is the lack of choice in fry order sizes. For some reason they only serve the large. For a burger, fries, and shake i spent 17$, which i don't mind paying, but it makes it a very "once every few months" place. Typing this post made me want another Good Stuff burger, which is strange since i made burgers for dinner, but that's another tale, for another night. Sleep well, children.

The End.

Chile Relleno

Alright Katrina let's start making some food memories. I think this will be a good way for us to document all our delicious meals as well as the cool places we discover in Virginia, D.C., and Chicago. Tonight I did some chile rellenos.

I broiled three Poblano peppers in the oven at about 450 degrees until they got a little soft. While that was going I kicked off this filling in pan on the stove:

-filling ingredients-
1st - garlic, chopped 1/2 onion, chopped jalapeno
2nd - 1/2 lb ground bison, salt, pepper, chile powder, garlic powder, oregano
3rd - chopped mushrooms, fresh cilantro, splash of balsamic vinegar

Then when the peppers are done (i should have broiled mine longer so i could have peeled off the skin) chopped the tops off and took out the seeds. Then i jammed some of this delicious filling in them along with layers of refried beans and some Cooper cheese, which is very melty, and broiled them again until they were even softer and everything was all melted and sexual looking.

Now that those are looking fantastic I plated it with some brown rice and beans and ate it. Ate it like a man... because I'm a man and i make delicious food and i eat it. That's what i do.

The End.