Sunday, March 30, 2014

Mexican Meatloaf

Mexican Meatloaf.  I didn't invent it worldwide but no one had heard of it in my apartment, meaning my two cats, Bill and Mona.  I never heard of it and I thought it sounded like something good to  make, so I created it.  ...and then I went on the internet and found a hunnerd recipes.
Instead of the ketchupy sauce on top, I blended tomato paste with Worcestershire sauce and Chili lime seasoning.
The meat mix had green pepper, onion, pinto and black beans along with garlic and ground turkey. Corn would have been great but I didn't have any.
For a side I had some unseasonably ripe and luscious vine ripe tomatoes so I did a baby spinach salad with red onions and capers.
This could be like a good home cook's spaghetti or chili where you could make it different every time and it would taste great each time.




Thursday, March 27, 2014

The Things You Think Are Useless I Can't Understand

P doesn't like festivities around his birthday.  Some people say that and then secretly want a big fanfare but not this one.  He is strong in his convictions.  He does not like to celebrate his birthday.  Proven fact. Okay.  Fine.  So without going to major trouble, I worked up a dinner that was not too showy, but required attention and would be enough out of the ordinary where I felt a bit of a party was going on in my stomach if no where else.
Roasted Beets with capers and pickles.  I thought it was odd too but it was really good together. www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/roasted-beet-salad-recipe.html.  Course grain corn meal masa with salsa and garlic.
This skinless chicken thighs were marinated in buttermilk and hot sauce overnight and then coated with corn meal and whole wheat flour and lots of Cajun Seasoning.  Then baked to a crunchy perfection that tasted like a high end Shake and Bake.



I roasted turnips, mushrooms and red onions until caramelized then topped with a few shakes of Balsalmic vinegar.

But the best part for me was the 3 giant slices of assorted flavored cake I picked up from A Piece of Velvet on Fulton Street.  So many flavors to choose from all displayed in a glass case, individually contained.  A solo employee behind the counter, no line, rows and rows of cake slices, one more incredible then the next.  Then it gets better.  He actually names me all the flavors and I feel this must be part of what heaven might feel like.  Cute young kid, and he advises me which to get.
This place has gotten a lot of bad press on Yelp.  I think these are some of Cake Man Raven's old employees.  I hated that place.  I worked for Cake Man in this very same location for a month and never got paid.  I walked off the job and ended up throwing money I had collected in his face in front of his shop.  Okay, throwing is stretching it, I handed it to him but with the disgust of handing off a big warm pile of poop.  He was not cool to me and by the way he didn't even refrigerate the slices overnight.  I was desperate for a job and wanted so much to join the food industry in an area where I might thrive.  I loved the idea of this African-American guy from the south making the best red velvet cake and starting a business in Fort Greene, which helped the neighborhood.  He hired mostly young males, which was also cool.  He ran some ridiculous Craigslist ad for a cattle call and I was the first one in a line of hundreds that morning.  They interviewed as if we were to join some amazing growing company with excitement and drive.  I still don't understand what the hell happened.  I think I was hired.  I never signed any paperwork but I was handed keys.  All I know is he was havin' none of me even after I sat in his non-heated shop that was temporarily closed for renovation for a month in order to hand out pre-ordered cakes....in January.  Every day I took in unrecorded amounts of cash and handed it off to some random ranking disciple of his at night.  I could have pocketed half of it.  I needed that money.   In hindsight, I don't know what I was looking for from him.  A way out of my personal recession.  A career path.  An opportunity to learn a start up business, I don't know.  Yeah, all of that actually and that S.O.B. just looked at me like I had three heads when I asked him to consider me for running his shop.  
Maybe I wasn't what he had in mind, being a woman and being non-African American but I showed up every morning and I was honest, could be trusted.  I was engaged in everything from how fast the cakes got to the shop from the bakery and how they were transported.  I only noticed one other candidate in the running. But Cakeman hated me.  Or actually it was worse, he never even noticed me or how hard I was trying to be a part of his little cake world.  Bastuhd went out of business and was sued by employees for not getting paid years later.
But when I read the bad press on this shop I somehow felt a switch.  It's weird that a shop isn't open when it says it is or when they don't have any cupcakes but all they sell is cupcakes and slices.  Or that the offers aren't clear on signage when you go in or marked with prices.  I don't know, in some way it felt refreshing.  I hope they succeed.

I got what I wanted and it was pretty fabulous.  Even P who doesn't eat sweets dug right in and stayed there in that gorgeous frosting for way longer than I've ever seen him with a dessert.

Years go by and stupid shit you put up with and did is now just a bad embarrassing memory.  I think birthdays should be celebrated and we need to jump at the chance to honor even our slightest evolution.


Sunday, March 23, 2014

You Took My Joy, I Want it Back





Cheese has been off limits for me.  Cheese was accused of triggering my migraines, along with nitrates, MSG, sugar, popcorn, chips, gum and assorted other random ingredients.  But when the cat's away....P left to help his brother with his mushroom farm in Indiana, Big Ed, you've heard of him, the pepper guy. Anyway, I pretty much have no will power so the first night of being alone I pretty much went feral.  I had a problem with my bank card and had no money except for a 20 so I panicked and ran to the corner store to get necessary provisions; cheese, chips, ground turkey, and seltzer.  I had made a big jar of my dad's fresh hot sauce so instead of pico and guacamole which would have made them prettier, I went for the flavor. I drowned them and saved the cash for lunch at work.  Lots of fresh cilantro would have been nice but when you're alone and you're eating exactly what you want visuals are not necessary.  Cheese never had a fair trial and I've always hoped it wasn't guilty of bringing on the deep throbbing pain in my head since it was capable of putting so much joy in my heart.  I'll never really know for sure if cheese was just another food I thought I loved then realized it never loved me back, like Kentucky Fried Chicken and Taco Bell.  But for me, it was better to have loved....
...and yes, afterwards I got a big honkin' headache.

Thursday, March 20, 2014

Roasted Chick Pea and Spinach Salad

Roasted Chick Pea and Spinach salad with toasted wheat and turkey bacon crumbles.


Spring called and said it was not feeling well. It would not be coming in today, tomorrow and will get back to us later. That it was sorry but it really had a bad bug and just couldn't make it.  It had a temperature of 37 degrees that didn't seem to show signs of improvement.  I said, maybe you could come out for half a day or so but spring said no, no it couldn't.  
Might be time to pull spring in for a performance evaluation whatchathink?







Friday, March 14, 2014

She's Got Style, She's Got Grace, She's A Winner

www.bhg.com/recipe/chicken/slow-cooker-coq-au-vin/
Coq Au Vin.  Just saying the name I get nervous and figure I'll screw the recipe up.  But this was a slow cooker recipe and those are usually dumbed down and so much easier to digest.  It's all about layering the ingredients.  I didn't have the time on this day to allow several hours of cooking so I actually did this in my heavy pot in the oven.
Same difference really.  Coat and brown the chicken, add the onions, garlic, mushrooms, carrots and if you don't have the wine then like me, you'll use stock.  To better mock the deep wine flavor, I added beef stock with Worcestershire sauce and lemon.
This was great and felt special.  I made a little dill lemon yogurt dressing for the steamed broccoli.  Hey Mexican's can be classy too!  Mexican-Americans that is, or whatever the heck it is that I am.  How can you relate to a hyphened title?  Its not natural.  However, you do need the divide.  I'm not full blown 100% Mexican like Anchorman 2. I'm the watered down, can't speaky Spanish type of Mexican that gets rash with too much sun and the kind who grew up in the Midwest.  The kind whose parents aren't from Mexico but some of their parents were.  I'm more like the song.  As a matter of fact they really did call my mom Chella and she really does have a son in law named Jeff!  You can't make that stuff up!
But other than that, I always felt like my mom was from sort of old money type family.  She never went to college and barely finished school but she seemed to have this incredible air of sophistication about her.  And you always felt like you should act properly in front of her or you'd feel like a shmuck.  I always hoped some of that rubbed off on me, but I'm not sure it did.  I did learn to give a real pointed evil eye that seems to really work though, even on tough New York bullies.  She was really good at that look.  Sometimes I knew she was giving it even when I wasn't facing her.  She also doles out one liners that rival Alexis Carrington.  At 90 she can give a read upon waking.  'Is that what you're wearing?'  She's so amazing and I love her so much.  I wish she were sitting next to me right now.
This dish is in honor of my mom and all her grace.  


Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Wish You Were Here

I've done several takes on taco salad before and I will again.  This was an especially good one as it was both hot and cold, and featured fresh blended hot sauce on top.

Seasoned ground turkey, celery, onion, garlic, green onions, black beans were plopped onto a big plate of crisp romaine lettuce, cilantro, onion, carrot and tomato.
This was like an offering to the god of spring.  I don't remember having to summon her before but just in case she needs some coaxing out of hiding, I wanted to be clear that we are ready out here in Brooklyn.  Yes, spring, you can come out whenever you're ready dear because we are definitely ready.

Sunday, March 9, 2014

And Life Ain't Nothing But a Funny, Funny Riddle

I've mentioned before this sort of cowboy food fantasy that I have.  I loved watching western movies and even the TV dramas like Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Big Valley and the High Chaparral as a kid. I often imagined waking up with my horse, getting out my tin cup for coffee and putting my cast iron pan on the fire to then rustle up some fine breakfast like the one I did today. I idolized those cowboys with their dusty shirts and boots, their calm demeanor and their skillset with guns, shooting only when necessary but not dwelling on it. I hoped to be a cowboy some day.  But I was a little girl in North-Eastern Indiana, not far from farms but no where near the west and real cowboys. Even though there were some depictions of female cattle hands, they just weren't the same.  I wanted the hat and the belt buckle, the nice boots and no stinking corset or skirt to fuss with when I'm mounting my black stallion.  People on TV like Dinah Shore said you could be anything when you grew up so I wanted to be a cowboy.  I didn't have to understand how, but I never heard any restrictions so I figured it could just work out.
Of course, I now live in Brooklyn and am still female and have never actually even camped out anywhere, however I did play in the woods quite a bit when I was little and I had a really great imagination.  As I got older I developed a love of big cities so I imagine if my fantasy did come true, I would've gone the Paladin route, with business cards and all, a satellite office in town.

So I took some of that roasted red pepper sauce and mixed it with pinto beans, green bell pepper, ground turkey and seasonings.On top of that I made an egg white scramble with onions over a lightning hot iron skillet.  That made the onions smoky and then I turned the fire down to finish off the soft eggs with cilantro.
On top of all that I put a heaping dollop of my dad's hot sauce all cool and fresh.  Yessiree, this is what I feel breakfast tasted like for all those cowboys waking up to the sunrise in the old West.