Chili (Paleo)

In a large pot, heat up olive oil.  Add:
1 large chopped onion.  Cook until starting to turn translucent.
Then add 1 lb. ground beef.  Cook until not pink.  Add a little bit of minced, dried garlic.
Then add 1 chopped bell pepper, and 1 chopped yellow squash.  Cook for a few minutes.
Add 1 can fire-roasted diced tomatoes, 1 can tomato sauce, a few shakes of cumin, and a few shakes of chili powder.

Simmer for 20 minutes.

Scooter

Road Trip Food - Meatballs and Beef Jerky

Meatballs as a dinner on part of a road trip:

20 oz. ground turkey
a couple handfuls of fresh spinach chopped finely
some powdered garlic
some dried basil
some dried thyme

Mush it all together, form into ~1" balls, drop onto a cookie sheet, tuck in any spinach ends that are sticking out excessively, and bake at 350 for about 22 minutes.  I put them on parchment paper to help minimize the mess on the cookie sheet.  But they do kind of end up sitting in a pile of their own fat, which is fine, but un-appetizing looking.  I've been wondering about baking these on racks above cookie sheets.  Maybe next time.

Dry-Rub Beef Jerky:

I was mildly worried about how long it would take - so I opted for a dry rub, which helps the meat dry faster than a marinade.

3 lb. of rump roast, sliced thinly, large patches of visible fat trimmed away.  (How thin?  Actually this batch was sandwich-meat thin - thanks to the awesome butcher counter at Harmons.)

Layer into a bowl, sprinklying salt, pepper, garlic, and cumin onto each layer.  Cover with plastic wrap to minimize contact with air, let sit overnight.

Put in dehydrator according to dehydrator instructions.  This took me three batches at about 10 hours each.  But, again, the meat was really, really thin.  I'm storing this in the fridge with a few paper towels in the bag to help pick up any fat or condensation.

Awesome!
Scooter

Mustard Beef and Veggies

This was based off a recipe in Sarah Fragaso's Everyday Paleo book.  Excellent book, by the way.

Chop onion, garlic, and ginger.  Start sauteing in olive oil.
Add sirloin steak, cut into bite-size pieces.  When the meat has browned, add 1/2 cup chicken stock, 1 Tbl dijon mustard, and 1 tsp of thyme that have already been combined.
Add a 1/2 bunch of kale leaves, torn off the stalks, and about 1/3 head of red cabbage.  Simmer everything together until the latest veggie entrants are wilted to your satisfaction.

This was really, really good!

Scooter

I've got some beef jerky spinning in the dehydrator right now, I'll let you know how it comes out!

Curry Beef Soup

I've almost decided there should be a weekly (maybe bi-monthly, realistically, on average) curry recipe on the blog.  Yum, curry.  It could be like an homage to Bridget Jones - a blog version of a turkey curry buffet.  With other meats.  This one is based on this recipe from Everyday Paleo.

Shop:
1 white onion
1/2 red onion
thumb-sized piece of ginger
8 cloves garlic (yes, I love garlic.  I recommend scaling for many people.)

Start this all sauteeing with a slug of sesame oil, mongolian fire oil, and about a tablespoon of curry paste on the low end of medium-low.
After about 5 minutes, add 1 lb ground beef.  Add the following spices:
bunch of shakes curry powder
couple+ shakes turmeric
couple+ shakes cumin
couple shakes saigon cinnamon  (I've never added cinnamon to a curry, and the smell was divine!)

Continue chopping some broccoli into small florets, and add when the beef is pretty done.  After a few minutes, add a can of coconut milk, and enough broth, water, or more coconut milk to cover.  (I added water and some of my paprika surprise! chicken broth cubes.  What do you know, I found a use for them quickly.)

Chop:
1/2 bell pepper
1 zucchini

Add these to the mix.  Bring to a boil, turn down to a simmer, and let simmer for 10 minutes.  I ate it as was, and didn't serve it over cauliflower or anything like that.

Reflections:  One might wonder why this is called a soup, when it's basically very similar to any other curry I've made.  The answer:  I usually make curries in my large, deep saute pan, and this time I made it in a soup pot.  It's a geography is destiny kind of thing.

Plans for the weekend:  I'd like to muck around with some old/some new kitchen toys.  The new: a food processor.  I'm thinking pesto to break the thing in.  The old: a mandoline slicer and a food dehydrator.  I'm thinking zucchini chips.  The old/new:  paleo muffins in my silicon muffin pan.  If I finally remember to bring the pan home from work, where it is currently acting as a block to anyone trying to put anything else on my desk.

Gherkin on a stick,
scooter

Curry with Chicken

I love curry, and it's been at least a week and a half since I've had some.  Tsk tsk.

In mongolian fire oil or other oil, saute chopped onion, garlic, and a good sized hunk of ginger.
Add some curry paste (I used the green curry paste from Thai Kitchen).  Add some spices - curry, coriander, cumin, turmeric, and chipotle. Add some cut up chicken pieces.  Cook until the chicken is done.
Add some vegetables like chopped bell pepper, zucchini, and bok choy.  Cook for a few minutes.  Add a can of coconut milk.  I also added another canful of water to cover.  Simmer for around 10 minutes.  Add a large bunch of torn up spinach.  Simmer until wilted.  Serve over steamed cauliflower:

Pre-spinach simmer phase

This took a while to cook, probably around 35-40 minutes.  It was, however, delicious.  I think adding the chipotle spice helped with the flavor, as I've never added it before.  I also used a type of coconut milk I had gotten at an asian store, but had never tried before.  Good price, good flavor:

Yeah, that brand.

Happy munching!
Scooter

Egg Bites

So, this is something I've been making for a while.  They are like Egg muffins or mini-crustless quiches, or whatever.  I originally got the idea from Kalyns Kitchen Blog, but there are a bunch of similar-ish type recipes out there.

Cooled down, apres smush egg muffins

What I do:
The filling: saute up some vegetables.  I always try to put in onions and peppers, but also will throw in whatever I have: spinach, asparagus, zucchini, broccoli, left over bok choy in this version, green onions, cabbage (warning: red cabbage will turn the things blue-ish), etc.  Bacon or something would also be delicious.

The egg mixture:  It will probably take somewhere between 6-12 eggs.  Depending on what I want as far as the protein content, I might use some whole eggs and some just whites, all whole eggs, or if I'm feeling especially lazy, those egg white beater carton things you can buy (these work just fine, but will be a bit moister at the end.  Moister could also be read as mushier, or more-easily-fall-apart-er).  Crack into a bowl and beat, you can add spices like cumin, salt, and pepper, or curry and cardamom, or cayenne, or nothing.

I have a silicon muffin tin (flexible and easy to pop out) that I use, but it still needs some non-stick spray.  Metal would also work, but definitely be liberal with some non-stick spray.  I don't know how well those muffin paper cups would do, I've never tried it.

Fill up the tins 1/2-3/4 full of the veggie mix.  Fill with egg mixture, to cover the veggies, or also around 3/4 full.  Give them a little stir to make sure everything is mixed together.  Bake in a 375 degree oven for around 35 minutes.  They will puff up while cooking, then smush down after they are cool.  Let them cool all the way before putting them into any tupperware type thing, else you'll get some condensation and more mushiness.

How to eat: warm, cold, for breakfast, on the go, after workouts, quick snack, etc.  You can smother them in salsa and avocado.  Or bruschetta is also good, I learned tonight.  Apparently they are supposed to freeze well.  I can attest that they do, in fact, freeze, but I don't know how well they taste when they un-freeze yet.

Scooter

Update 1/20/11:  I made another batch of these, and with some of them I put a slice of deli ham in the muffin tin first, then put veggies inside the ham slice, filled with egg.  DELICIOUS!

Fast Chicken Soup

Usually soups for me are somewhat protracted affairs.....a bunch of ingredients and chopping, simmering for many minutes, etc.  Didn't have the time or patience for that today.  Super fast soup:

Heat olive oil in a pot on med.  Chop an onion and a few cloves of garlic.  Saute in the olive oil for like 5-7 minutes.  Add a can of diced tomatoes, a can of chicken (Costco-sized), broth or water to cover, and some italian spices (like basil, oregano, marjoram, sage, or any blend you like).  I also added some dried garlic.  Stir everything together, turn up the heat, and start to bring it to a boil.  Grab some greens (like kale or spinach), tear 'em up, and throw them in.   

There's some sort of adage that says "A soup boiled is a soup spoiled."  Not in this case!  If the soup comes to a rolling boil, you can turn it down some, but I just let roll away until the greens were wilted and all the ingredients were definitely hot.  

Prep-start-time to blowing-on-food-trying-to-get-it-in-mouth time: 20 min.

Review:  I'd probably add two cans of chicken next time to up the protein content.  This is definitely not high gourmet, but it was good and easy.

Easy Lunch

I'm finally out of leftovers for lunch, so something simple, good, easy, and available:

Deli turkey, some spinach, red pepper, cucumber, and avocado.  I like to roll the other ingredients into the turkey.  Sometimes I'll roll it all up in lettuce or nori sheets (the stuff used for sushi).  Another thing to purchase at an asian grocery store.  It adds an interesting depth to all the flavors.

Other somewhat common easy lunch things I do:
Pouched salmon or tuna, lettuce, and tomatoes.
Hard boiled eggs, already cooked sausages, and sweet potatoes*.
Previously frozen, then thawed single serving of soup.

*How I cook sweet potatoes at work:  I have a "potato bag" (it's kind of a fleecey-lined fabric sack).  It works really well for sweet potatoes, yams, and pieces of winter squash.  Take a few paper towels, get them a little damp, wrap the sweet potato, put in the bag.  Hit the potato button on the microwave.  You might have to run it through two cycles.  Yummm.

Scooter

Bok Choy Recipe-Off Competition. It's ON!!!!

Triangle Girl and I are going to have a recipe-off with bok choy.  We'll both submit a recipe, and Flash (the requester) gets to judge.

Bok Choy:  It looks like a combo of cabbage and chard.  The stalks are edible without cooking, with a celery-like aspect (crunchy and refreshing), sans the stringiness.  I heard it's good with almond butter (or pb), but I haven't tried that yet.  It comes in the baby version (1/3 the size, 4x the price), but I went with the big boy version.  If you're buying it, make sure to shake out all the water before it gets weighed - these things can store some water in them.

I'm calling this thing: Bok FIRE.

Aesthetic note: I like to slice or julienne (cut into longer, thinner strips) veggies for stir frys.

Slice an onion, chop up a bunch of garlic and ginger, to taste.  My taste runs to a LOT of garlic and ginger.

Get some sesame oil down from the cupboard.  Realize that the measly couple teaspoons-ish left in the container will hardly suffice.  Ponder the other oils you have that could go in combination with the sesame.  Olive oil, definitely not.  Almond Oil, hmmmm.  Mongolian Fire Oil, winner winner bok fire dinner!

Heat up oils in a large frying pan (wish I had a wok)!   I used the high side of medium.  Toss in the onion, garlic, and ginger when the oil is hot.  I then pondered the order to add the rest of the ingredients using some sort of logic about the relative cooking times of the vegetables, and as I sliced everything, I just added it in.

Slice a handful of baby carrots.  Add.  De-leaf the bok choy (save the greens!) and slice the white stalks.  Add.  Since the bunch of bok choy I had picked up was pretty substantial, I used about half of it.

Add 1 lb. ground beef.  Strips of beef would also work swimmingly.  Let the meat and veggies cook for a little bit (5ish minutes), stirring occasionally.

Slice a red pepper.  Add when the ground beef is no longer pinkish.  Realize that once again, you're putting in way too much food for the pan size.  Oh, well.  Slice up 0.5 of a zucchini.  Add.  Saute everything until the newest vegetable entrants are tender-crisp.  Then add the bok choy greens, cook until they are wilted.  Broccoli was on deck, but I left it riding the pine due to lack of field space.  It looked like:

Action shot of the crowded pan.

Garnish the whole thing with some sesame seeds for serving.  If you're going to get sesame seeds, go to one of the Asian markets to get them - it's an unbelievably better deal there.

I considered sprinkling some red pepper flakes on top, but decided that the mongolian fire oil had probably spiced it enough for me.  I was right.

Prep-start to food-in-mouth time: 25 minutes.  This has definitely made enough to share with Flash and TG at lunch tomorrow, plus some extra for leftovers for me alone!

Random note: Favorite knife for chopping things like garlic and ginger:

Well, favorite knife all around.  A gift from TG.

You just semi-rotate your wrist back and forth quickly, and chop-chop-chop.  V. fun.  If chopping things can be considered fun.

Although I dislike it when the news does this, I'll go ahead and do it on the blog.  Coming-up-soon recipes: Paleo Pizza; soup involving cranberries and the leftovers from the chicken; and something-kale-something.

Scooter

Breakfast - Eggs and Leftovers

Common themes:

What I eat in general: Leftovers, incorporated however I can.

What I eat for breakfast: Eggs + veggies (usually sauteed onion and pepper) scrambled together. 

This can definitely make my meals look random.  Today, I went for something of a combo.  I have leftover chicken that I shredded from the whole chicken yesterday, and leftover broccoli slaw from the fish tacos Saturday.

I poached up two eggs and served them on a bed of chicken, slaw, and some spinach, and cracked some pepper on top.

How my awesome dad taught me to quick-and-easy poach two eggs:

In a small frying pan (with a fitting lid), spray some non-stick, crack two eggs in, then pour enough water in to cover the egg white.  I don't completely submerge the yolks, for no real reason.  I think in my case, this was only about 6 oz of water, an un-measured wild guess.  Cover, and cook on the high range of med-high for a few minutes, until your yolks reach your desired state of done-ness.

Who keeps the metric system down.  We do.  We do.

My review: Surprisingly good.  I liked the crunchy texture-egg combo more than I thought I would.

Lunch yesterday and today was/will be fish tacos.  And, what do you know, we have a request:  "Some sort of recipe with that bok something vegetable."  Bok something, look for it in a few days.

Scooter

Roasted Whole Chicken and Brussel Sprouts

With racks on bottom two levels of oven, preheat oven to 450:
Put a rinsed, dried (with paper towels), and devoid of giblets whole chicken in a roasting pan, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle generously with freshly ground salt, pepper, and I threw on some thyme.  Place on the upper rack.  Turn oven down to 400 after 15-20 minutes.  Take dog on a walk and enjoy the actual sunshine happening.  I'm going to let it roast for like 1.5+ hours, since it's a big chicken (6 lbs).  I think smaller chickens would take about an hour.

The kitchen now smells delicious, this might make it smell decidedly less so, but will taste delicious:
Triangle Girl taught me this one: put whole brussel sprouts on a cookie sheet.  (Take off yellow or brown-ish leaves, a few of the really large ones I cut a slit into.)  Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle generously with salt and pepper.  Put on the bottom rack of the oven for like 35-45 minutes, until they seem done.  Stir them around occasionally. Some leaves will fall off and get caramelized and rather crispy.  These ones are especially delicious.   I'm trying to time it such that the brussel sprouts and chicken will be ready at the same time.

The whole chicken will give me plenty for several meals/snacks this week, maybe some to freeze.  I haven't tried it yet, and I'm not going to today, but my next chicken, I will take the carcass and make some chicken broth with it.

Scooter

Update 1/16/11:  I should warn you, this can make a MESS of your oven.  Maybe put a cookie sheet on the rack below to try to catch spatters?  You could also cover it, but the skin won't come out as crispy and delicious.  Weigh the options....

Fish Tacos on Lettuce Leaves

Been thinking about Fish Tacos for a solid week.  Or two.  This recipe is based on Mark Bittman's Fish Tacos in his Kitchen Express book.

On stove:
Heat some olive oil, add a red onion and a few cloves of garlic, finely chopped.
Realize that the pan you've chosen is waaaay too small.  Change everything to a larger pan mid-saute.
Chop a bell pepper (my favorite is red) and add it to the pan.  Add some spices, I added a few shakes of: cumin; coriander; chili powder; salt; and ground pepper.  When the vegetables are closer to being done, add the fish.  I used three tilapia fillets that were thawed from an package of individually-wrapped frozen pieces.  Stir and break up fish until it turns white (where it is not covered in spices), looks done, and flakes easily.  Then cook a little longer if you're like me and irrationally squeamish about making certain something is cooked all the way through.

On (romaine) lettuce leaves:
Spoon up the some fish mixture, add broccoli slaw (from a bag), cut-in-half grape tomatoes (will quarter them next time), and a lot of cilantro.  Squeeze lime juice over the whole thing.  Realize that just like regular tortillas, it is indeed very possible to over-fill a lettuce leaf.

This should have included avocado, but the avocados need a little more time in the paper bag with their apple friend to get ripe enough to use.  I'd also recommend using either more spices (and some cayenne) during the cooking portion, or actual salsa on top for more of an added kick.

Prep-start-time to food-in-mouth time: 30 min.  This would have been 25 min. had I not felt it necessary to put A LOT of cilantro on each taco, and spent a few minutes plucking leaves.

Looks like this made enough for 2+ more meals.  (For a single person.)
Scooter

Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express book on Amazon.

Leftover sirloin + leftover curried cauliflower + eggs = Breakfast!

Welcome!  We are two friends who, among many other things, enjoy food and recipes.  Many of Scooter's recipes will be paleo friendly or paleo-ish, many of Triangle Girl's recipes will not.  But there will likely never be any tofu.

Breakfast today:
Leftover sirloin strips (pan-seared in own juices a few days ago)
Leftover curried cauliflower (will revisit this recipe soon, with some tweaks)
2 eggs (backyard fresh from TG's family)

Skillet, med-high, cook until eggs are done.

Much to my surprise, my point-and-shoot camera has a "cuisine" mode.  I'm not sure it made any difference.  It is also drop and waterproof, in case I get too involved taking a picture of soup.  Or send it through the washer and dryer.  Again.

The "before" picture.  The "after" picture basically looked identical to the curried cauliflower, but with some brown intrusions.

We welcome your thoughts and comments!
Scooter