Or rather, this is not for those who cannot take spicy food because this is, well, pretty spicy! Stuffed with two types of cheese and wrapped with salty bacon, the chili halves act as a mini boat to catch all those delicious drippings
from the bacon. Can I say YUM?
Just a little warning though, a possible side effect might be hallucination of your tongue being set on fire. But what's the fun without a little kick, yes? Just make sure to have a glass of water on stand-by! ;)
This is a really easy and quick recipe with minimal ingredients needed!
Stuffed Red Chili Peppers With Bacon
6 red chiles
4 strips of bacon, cut into three parts
a handful of cheddar cheese
a handful of mozzarella cheese
toothpicks to skewer the chiles
Preheat the oven to 375F.
Cut the chiles in half and remove the seeds.
Then, stuff the chiles with equal parts of cheddar an mozzarella cheese. Wrap a bacon around it and fasten it with a toothpick.
Place the stuffed chiles on a rack with a tray underneath it and back it for 20 minutes. If the bacon is still not brown and crisp to your liking, you can set it under a broiler for a minute or less. Make sure to watch over the chiles in case they burn under the broiler.
Last month, while on vacation, I chanced upon The Pioneer Woman on television. If you don't know who she is, she is great blogger (and a very funny one) who writes extensively on food, recipes as well as snippets of her family and life on the ranch. I love her blog and her style of writing! :)
As I was saying, she was preparing a holiday feast for her family and one of the dishes she made was roasted brussels sprouts with balsamic glaze. She made it look so easy and delicious that before long, I bought myself a bag of brussels sprouts just to try it.
Roasted brussels sprouts by itself is already a lovely dish, with the vegetable caramelizing at the edges as it roasts. So, if you are looking for a shortcut, you can omit the glaze and the dried cranberries. But paired with the balsamic glaze, it does give it an extra oomph, making it a very suitable appetizer, with the right amount of acidity to further whet your appetite for the next course! :)
For this recipe, I used dried cherries because I don't have dried cranberries which was what the original recipe calls for. The cherries I had were quite tart so I would pair it with cranberries the next time instead because I believe that will lend itself a slightly sweeter flavor.
Roasted Brussels Sprouts With Balsamic Glaze (from The Pioneer Woman)
Ingredients 3 pounds Brussels Sprouts 1/2 cup Olive Oil Salt And Pepper 1 cup Balsamic Vinegar 1/2 cup Sugar 1 cup Dried Cranberries
Trim/clean Brussels sprouts, then cut them in half if desired (or
you can leave them whole). Arrange on two baking sheets and toss with
olive oil. Sprinkle with plenty of salt and pepper and roast at 375
degrees for 25 to 30 minutes, or until brown.
Combine balsamic vinegar and sugar in a saucepan. Bring to a boil,
then reduce heat to medium-low and reduce until very thick, about 15 to
20 minutes.
Drizzle the balsamic reduction over the roasted sprouts, then sprinkle on dried cranberries. Toss and serve immediately.
Recently, I fell in love with two vegetable snacks. One of them is roasted fennel (I will write about the second one real soon). While fennel is not a common ingredient in Singapore, it can be easily found in the States and I've come to love this veg. By roasting it, the fennel caramelizes to give a really nice sweet flavor and is lightly crisped around the edges. The longer you roast them in the oven, the more brown they will be. I don't like to roast it until it is brown all over as I like to still have a good bite of the vegetable, but feel free to alter the cooking time according to your preference! :)
Not only is this tasty, it is really easy to make too. Slice the fennel, coat it with some olive oil, sprinkle some salt and pepper, pop it into the oven and wala! Snack made healthy! :) Makes a great side dish too!
Roasted Fennel
Ingredients
2 large fennel bulbs
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon of pepper
Preheat the oven to 400F.
Cut off the stems of the fennel and slice the bulbs lengthwise, about 1/4-inch thick.
Using a roasting tray, place the sliced fennel on a sheet of aluminium foil. Drizzle the olive oil and sprinkle the salt and pepper over the fennel slices. Toss with your hands to coat well.
Roast the fennel in the oven for 20 minutes and then turn them over and roast for another 20 minutes, or until brown. Tweet
When I first saw this recipe in Jamie Oliver's cookbook, I was really excited. What drew me to this recipe was the use of as many different fresh wild mushrooms as you can find. I knew that the depth of flavor for this soup would really be one of a kind with such variety. So, the moment my new food processor arrived in the mail, I immediately dropped by my supermarket and bought my mushrooms! :D I was that excited! Haha!
Although I was not able to find all the mushrooms he mentioned, I was able to get a decent variety: dried porcini, crimini, white, shitake and oyster. The end result? Delicious! :)
The Real Mushroom Soup (adapted from Jamie's Dinners)
(serves 6)
Ingredients
a small handful of dried porcini (if you were to use a field of Portabello mushrooms to make a soup, just adding a tiny but of dried porcini into the base would make the whole thing more luxurious)
600g/1lb 6oz mixed fresh wild mushrooms (chanterelles, girolles, trompettes de la mort, shitake, oyster), cleaned and sliced
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely sliced
1 red onion, peeled and finely chopped
a knob of butter
a handful of fresh thyme, leaves picked
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 litre/1 3/4 pints chicken or vegetable stock
a handful of fresh flat-leaf parsley, leaves picked and roughly chopped
2 tablespoons of mascarpone cheese
1 lemon (I omitted this cos I didn't want any lemony taste in my mushroom soup)
optional: truffle oil
Place the porcini in a small dish, add boiling water just to cover, and leave to soak. Get a large casserole-type pan nice and hot, then add
a good couple of lugs of olive oil and your fresh mushrooms. Stir
around very quickly for a minute, then add your garlic, onion, butter
and thyme and a small amount of seasoning. After about a minute you'll
probably notice moisture cooking out of the mushrooms and at this point
add half of your porcini, chopped up, and the rest left whole. Strain
the soaking liquid to remove any grit, and add it to the pan. Carry on
cooking for about 20 minutes until most of the moisture disappears.
You can serve this
soup as you like, but there are a few things to remember when finishing
it off. Mix together a pinch of salt and pepper with the zest of one
lemon and the juice of half of it, then spoon a little of this into the
middle of the soup. When you go to eat it, stir it in and it gives a
wonderful flavour. Other things you can consider are little slices of
grilled crostini put into the bottom of the bowls before the soup is
poured over. Or you could even quickly fry some nice-looking mushrooms –
like girolles, chanterelles or oysters – and sprinkle these on top of
the soup. If I was going to use truffle oil, then I would use it on its
own – a few drips on the top just before serving.
I have been rather obsessed with curing salmon lately. Ever since I knew how to do it, I've been buying truckloads of fresh salmon to cure at home. I still cannot wrap my head around the simplicity of the whole process!
It is wonderfully easy, really. I'm going to share two different ways to cure your salmon today. The picture above is a recipe adapted from Jamie Oliver, which is rather elaborated with lots of condiments to cure the salmon with. You can watch the video here:
The second one (picture below) is the much simpler, standard version. It is also saltier than the above recipe.
Salmon cured in one of its simplest forms.
I've paired the salmon with a salad that I've been simply addicted to. My hubby and I have been chomping on those leaves for the past few days, and I still can't get enough of it!! The secret is in the dressing, that is both tangy and sweet at the same time. Love it!!
So yes, try curing your own salmon at home today! It's fun and it definitely beats store-bought ones!
Gravlax (simple version)
(serves 4)
Ingredients
1 pound of fresh salmon, with skin on
1/2 cup salt
1/2 cup brown sugar
zest of one lemon
Optional: 2 handfuls of dill, chopped finely
After washing the salmon, pat it dry and coat it with salt and brown sugar. Top it off with the lemon zest and dill. Place the salmon in a ziplock bag and refrigerate it for 24 hours to 48 hours (I actually like it better after just one day, as opposed to 48 hours because the salmon is less cured, but that's me, heh). Weigh some heavy items on the whole salmon (ie: big, heavy books or bricks) to aid in the absorption of the condiments.
When the salmon is ready, remove it from the ziplock bag and wash it under running water to remove the salt and sugar. Pat it dry with a paper towel. Then, skin the salmon by sliding your knife across it, between the skin and the flesh. (I love the fatty layer of fish just beneath the skin, so I'd really scrap my skin clean. But that's just me, heh.) Discard the skin.
Slice the salmon into thin strips. Serve with a little squeeze of lemon and a side salad.
Gravlax With The Works!
(serves 6)
Note: I've adapted Jamie Oliver's recipe in terms of the ingredients, but due to the different size of the fish and a little ambiguity in the instructions in his video, I've tweaked the measurements a little for this recipe.
Ingredients
1.5 pound of fresh salmon, with skin on
5 tablespoons of salt
2 tablespoons of brown sugar
1 beetroot, grated (get those baby beetroots, not the large mature ones, and not the canned ones)
1 heaping tablespoon of horse radish
3 handfuls of dill, chopped finely
1 shot of schnapps (or brandy)
zest of 1 lemon
Wash your salmon and pat it dry. On a large tray, place salmon skin down. Top it off with the salt, brown sugar, beetroot, horse radish, dill. lemon zest and schnapps. Massage the condiments in a little, and then wrap the tray with cling wrap. Put the salmon in the refrigerator for 48 hours, weighed down by heavy items such as books or bricks, etc.
When ready, use a paper towel to brush all the condiments away from the fish. Then, skin the salmon by sliding your knife across it, between the skin and the flesh. Discard the skin. Slice the salmon into thin strips.
To make the cream to go with the gravlax:
Mix 3 tablespoons of sour cream with 2 teaspoon of wholegrain mustard, 1 teaspoon of horseradish, a pinch of black pepper and 2 tablespoons of lemon juice.
Delicious Side Salad
(serves 4)
Ingredients for the salad: (actually, you can put anything you one inside, but this is one of my favorite combinations)
3-4 handfuls of mesclun salad
2 tomatoes, diced
1/2 zucchini, diced
12 black olives, each cut into 3 parts
a handful of salted pistachio nuts
1/2 handful of crumbled feta cheese
Ingredients for the dressing
3 tablespoons of balsamic vinaigrette (I like Trader Joe's one)
1/2 teaspoon of garlic, chopped finely
1 1/2 tablespoons of olive oil
1/2 teaspoon of honey, or to taste
1 pinch of salt and pepper
Mix the ingredients for the salad dressing in a small bowl until combined. Adjust according to taste. Toss the salad with the dressing and then top it off with the crumbled feta cheese.
Looking for a new spin on broccoli? Then try this! It is a simple two-step recipe, requiring you to just boil the broccoli first before sauteing it.The flavor definitely beats just boiling or steaming those veggies with a squeeze of lemon. Do note that if you don't like parsley, you may want to omit it because the end product has quite a distinct parsley taste.
Broccoli with Olive Oil & Garlic
Ingredients
a bunch of fresh broccoli, chopped
4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
2 tablespoons of chopped parsley
Salt to taste
Optional: a wedge of lemon
Boil chopped broccoli in pot of salted boiling water for about 5 minutes, or until the stem is easily pierced by a fork.
In a skillet (get one that is big enough to fit all the broccoli in comfortably), saute the garlic with the olive oil over medium heat. When the garlic turns light brown, add in the broccoli, a tiny pinch of salt and parsley. Coat the vegetables evenly for 2 minutes and then serve with a wedge of lemon. Tweet
If you've never made Chinese soup before, this recipe is a great way to start. It is easy, doesn't require double-boiling and is full of flavor. Cabbage is one of my favorite vegetables because not only is it packed with fiber and antioxidants, it is also pretty versatile! You can make slaw with it, fry it, steam it, boil it, etc. I especially enjoy cooked cabbage because the heat brings out its natural sweetness. Paired with wolfberries, this becomes one big, nutritious slurp! :D
My mother used to make this soup for me all the time, but I've tweaked it a bit, especially for the minced meat part, to make it tastier. Personally, I just can't get enough of the meatballs! Heh
Cabbage Soup With Meatballs & Wolfberries
(serves 4)
Ingredients
Bones of 3 chicken drumlets (or the equivalent weight of other chicken bones)
Half a head of cabbage, chopped
1 pound of minced pork
1 tablespoon of dried wolfberries
2 tablespoons of light soya sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons of shaoxing wine
1 tablespoon of sesame oil
1/2 cup chicken stock
white pepper
In a bowl, combine the light soya sauce, shaoxing wine, sesame oil, a generous amount of white pepper with the minced pork. Mix well.
Put a cling wrap over the bowl and refrigerate the minced pork.
In a large dutch oven/casserole, bring 3 quarts of water to a boil and put the chicken bones in. Remove any scum that floats to the surface of the pot. Boil for 10 minutes.
Turn the heat down to low-medium heat. Add the cabbage and chicken stock then simmer for 45 minutes.
Remove the minced pork from the refrigerator. I like to stand beside the stove, form the meatballs and drop them straight into the dutch oven/casserole instead of making all the meatballs at one go on a plate. Using a tablespoon with your right hand, scoop out 3/4 of a tablespoon of minced meat and put it into the middle of your left palm. To form the round, spherical meatball shape, simply rotate your left fingers in a circular motion. If you are left-handed, swop it the other way around.
Once done, drop the meatball into the soup. Do this for the rest of the minced meat. Be careful to give ample space between each meatball. Use your ladle to move the cabbage around to create space. When done, check if the water level is just above the cabbage and meatballs. If not, add a bit more water until just covered.
Simmer the soup for another hour to an hour and a half. 10 minutes before you off the stove, add in the wolfberries. Serve hot.
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