EllenFork

Jumbalaya, y'all!

I spent my college years fattening up in the beautiful city of New Orleans. The ultimate triumvirate of food, booze and good times make this one of the best places on earth seriously. So this past weekend I brought that triumvirate together again, in my teeny tiny apartment in Washington, DC!

The recipe I am going to share with you is not your traditional jumbalaya necessarily, but it tasted damn good so lay off, ok?! The reason I used this recipe in the first place is due to a series of events that began the fall of 2007, when my roommate moved away. I was very sad, but excited to find out that she left me one very decrepit, but working crock pot! There is nothing easier or more homey than a meal ladled steamily out of a crock pot. I used to visit my grandparent's house for Sunday Lunch, a meal that never wavered from pot roast with potatoes, onions, celery and carrots that had been simmering since before church in the morning.

Thus, I found myself scouring the interwebs for delicious slow cooker recipes. I finally found one, from Robin Miller on the Food Network. With recipe in hand, I invited a bunch of friends over for a feast of jumbalaya, corn bread and copious amounts of wine! A friend contributed some choco chip pumpkin pancakes for dessert and we had a fantastic time! That was Jumbalaya Feast #1.

So due to popular demand and the falling leaves outside, Jumbalaya Feast #2 came to fruition last weekend. This time I used some chicken stock I made and froze the week before (another potential post that is waiting in the wings), which made an incredible difference in the flavor. Homeade stock takes jumbalaya to the max(imum flavor capacity!). I whipped up some cornbread,  ladled the Jumbalaya over rice, and splashed with tobasco. It was devoured at lightning fast speed, leaving only a little room for the many bottles of wine to fill any remaining stomach space.

Here are a few of the people who consumed it, who all happen to be men (my lady compatriot Kelsey had already moved on to another location). Sorry the pic is so blurry, but I didn't have time to adjust the exposure for fear that this perfect tableau might be disturbed.

Because I know you all want your dinner guests reduced to slavering, ravenous beasts (no offense to those guests who might read this) I recommend you follow this recipe:

Slow Cooker Jambalaya

1 pound boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch cubes
1/2 pound andouille sausage, diced
1 (28-ounce) can diced tomatoes
1 medium onion, chopped
1 green bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
1 cup reduced-sodium chicken broth
2 teaspoons dried oregano
2 teaspoons Cajun or Creole seasoning
1 teaspoon hot sauce
2 bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1 pound frozen peeled and cooked shrimp, thawed
2 cups cooked rice

In a slow cooker, combine chicken, sausage, tomatoes, onion, green pepper, celery, and chicken broth. Stir in oregano, Cajun seasoning (I use Tony Cachere's), hot sauce (I used Tobasco), bay leaves, and thyme. Naturally (because I DO WHAT I WANT), I did not measure any of these ingredients but guesstimated. (I also doubled it to feed the masses. If you do this, one 28 oz can of diced tomatoes will suffice, as will 1 lb of shrimp...otherwise you might overflow your crockpot! Mine was pushing the limit...)

Cover, and cook on LOW for 7 hours or on HIGH for 3 hours. Stir in the thawed shrimp, cover and cook until the shrimp is heated through, about 5 minutes. Discard bay leaves and spoon mixture over cooked rice.

So that's that. All in all, a lovely fall night!

Fall Food For Real

Sometimes the food you scrounge out of your pantry creates the most brilliant, creative dishes (I made this recipe up using tidbits of ingredients from the fridge and hidden pantry treasures). That is not to say the dish I am about to share with you was in in any way brilliant, but it WAS surprisingly tasty and chock full of fall flavor!

The dish I'd like to share with you is:

Apple Risotto with Cheddar and Bacon

Ingredients:
1 cup arborio rice
2 tblsp butter
1 tblsp olive oil
2 1/2 cups chicken broth (good quality or homeade works best, or veggie if you are veggie)
3 slices of bacon (more if you like, that just happened to be what I had sitting around)
1 medium apple, chopped (I used one I found at the farmer's market...a jonemac or some such nonsense)
1 1/2 cups finely shredded extra sharp cheddar
1/2 cup whipping cream
1  shallot, minced
1 medium onion, diced
2 tblsp apple cider vinegar
Splash of apple cider
salt and pepper to taste

SOOoooo...first get yourself a nice, heavy bottomed pan of medium size.

Heat butter and oil over a medium flame, adding shallot and onion as it melts. Let onion become a bit translucent, then add the cup of arborio rice.

Make sure the rice toasts up nicely in there for at least 2 minutes (according to most recipes,until the kernels themselves become transclucent- however, I have never actually seen that happen. Just don't burn it). Now, throw in the apple cider vinegar with the apple cider. Let that soak up into the rice. Make sure you are stirring enough so that the rice does not stick to the bottom of the pan (that is horrifying to scrub off of pans, trust me).

Now begins the broth ritual. Add a big ladleful of broth to the rice and stir it in. Once this has been absorbed, repeat until the broth is gone. Depending on your preference, you can make the risotto soupier by adding (duh) more broth. I like mine creamy and fluffy though.

While you've been doing all this other nonsense, you should soak the chopped apples in the cream. Not sure why or how, but this adds a major delicious factor. My theory is that the cream helps deacidify the apples. Plus, heavy whipping cream is incredibly indulgent and seriously when do you EVER eat it? Enjoy life a little, gees! Oh, and now is a good time to cook your bacon, however you like to do it. I microwaved it (because I felt lazy, but sometimes I bake it).

When most of the broth is in the rice, add the apples and cream. When its in there, finish up the broth. Get that all stirred up nice and add bacon and cheese. Mix it up, salt and pep it up, and eat it up!!!

So obviously since I made this up as I went along (with a few tips from the internetz), there are probably better ways to do it... maybe adding bacon during the onion/shallot melting session would give it some of that delicious bacony grease that I am clearly so fond of...

Do what you wish, but as is, this was a hit! The sweetness of the apples with salty bacon and creamy rice is the perfect meal for an October evening. Drink an Oktoberfest beer alongside it. Perfect!

Bundles of Joy

SOOOoooo....

The other weekend I found myself in Brooklyn, NY, at my twin sister's abode. I was headed over for dinner with friends, as Alice's mother-in-law was in town and staying with her and her husband. Naturally, I heard there was free mom-cooked food in the neighborhood so I hoofed it cross town as fast as my stumps could stir.

Judy (the MIL) is world renowned for her lasagna. It's simple meat lasagna, but there is something soo delicious about it...maybe the 234 lbs of ricotta and mozzarella? Anyway, it's damn good and she makes about 10 gallons of it at a time. I was prepared for that. What I was not prepared for was the plate full of sweaty, glistening hors d'ouerves that greeted me...

These might be the best things EVER MADE with THREE INGREDIENTS. SERIOUSLY. They don't even have a name. From here on out, they shall be referred to as Bundles of Joy.

Find the recipe below:

Ingredients:
Jalapeño peppers, halved lengthwise and seeded
Cream Cheese
Pepper Bacon

Yeah, that's IT. Now preheat oven to 375 degrees. Ok so, once you have a little jalapeño boat, fill it with cream cheese. Fill it nice and full, but not overflowing, as the cream cheese tends to puff up in the oven. Now, here is the hard part. Take a piece of bacon and wrap it around the pepper. Right around the middle like an ultimate fighter championship belt. You can stick a toothpick in it if you'd like, but usually it is not required.

Set all of these bundles on a baking sheet and pop into the oven til done. By done, I mean when the bacon is nice and cooked through, sizzling. I'd say at least 10 min, but check frequently. Cool, and eat. Make sure you cool them because I KNOW you're going to want to pop a flaming hot jalapeno bundle covered with bacon grease in your mouth, but I caution against this.

Seriously- the warm cream cheese and bacon mixing with the spiciness of the pepper...insano!!!

Enjoy!

Welcome.

Hi.

This is this inauspicious beginning of my recorded journey through food, and life. Welcome.

There is no easy way to start a blog, so I'll jump right in. I want to record the stuff that goes on in my frenetic brain, day after day. I want to explain the journey we all take through food, through life, through the interactions these things cause. I want to coax out the interactions between food and people. I want to emphasize that it's not just about what's for dinner, it's about a rich tapestry of things that make humans unique among all other living beings, all of which must consume food to survive. Our relationships with food are deeper than most.

On multiple occasions, my father has remarked "eat to live, don't live to eat", as my mother, sister and I plot our next culinary adventure with glee. As a child I wondered what was so wrong with living to eat...I'm pretty sure I still don't know what is wrong with that. I now believe I know the answer to that question...nothing! (and as the beneficiary of my mother's cooking, I'm sure Dad really agrees).

I want to find ways to live and eat better. Recipes, my personal kitchen adventures, new places to eat, new ways to eat, I want to do it all. Hopefully as I find things to share, you will too.

Together, we make the world a better place to live and eat.

~Ellen