Basil cups with Goat Cheese, Lemon and Pine Nuts

 

BASIL CUPS WITH GOAT CHEESE

We have a group of women here in Southern Arizona that get together the third Wednesday of each month for wine and hot and cold appetizers.  We bring our own wine glass and a bottle of wine or an app to local businesses that host the party or one of the women who volunteers their home for that month.  Most of the events happen in Tubac Arizona where I live and anywhere from 25 to 75 women show up.  It is called Women Who Wine and it has been going strong and growing larger all the time for about 5 years or so.  I always bring an appetizer and each month I try to bring something different.  I have fresh basil growing in my garden and a grape tomato plant as well and decided to use what I had on hand to do something special and beautiful.

• Basil cups with Goat Cheese and Pine nuts
• 30 or so medium sized basil leaves  (have more on hand in case you have extra of the filling)
• 8 cherry tomatoes or grape tomatoes diced or regular tomatoes - seeds removed and diced
• 6 to eight cherry or grape tomatoes for garnish - whole
• 4 oz. room temperatiure soft goat cheese
• 2 tablespoons heavy cream or crème fraiche
• Zest of small lemon – reserving some for garnish
• 1/8 teaspoon lemon juice
• ¼ cup or more of toasted pine nuts
• Generous drizzle of thick balsamic vinegar
• Olive oil for drizzle
• Salt and pepper

1. In a bowl – mix together room temperature goat cheese and cream or crème fraiche, lemon zest and lemon juice and s&p to taste. 
2. Pipe or spoon mixture into basil leaves and arrange on a plate with a large cluster of basil and whole tomatoes in the middle or off center
3. Loosely sprinkle chopped tomato and pine nuts all over the plate – sprinkle with lemon zest.
4. I use a plastic ketchup dispenser bottle with a pointed top and small opening to drizzle the balsamic vinegar because of the decorative effect on the plate.  I hold it over the platter and just gently drizzle a stream of the balsamic over the plate in a back and forth motion.  (See photo).   I do the same for the olive oil - use sparingly.

Turkey Enchiladas

 

         Turkey Leftovers

I was looking for a way to use my leftover Turkey from Thanksgiving in a more original way than the typical sandwich or Turkey Tetrazzini.   I thought of pasta with a cream sauce and parmigiana but when I opened my cheese drawer I realized I had a nice big package of flour tortilla's in there that needed to be used before they spoiled in a week or so.  We are lucky here in the southwest that our tortillas are often locally made by hand and are thinner and more flavorful than those on the east coast in commercial supermarkets but they will do just fine as well.  I made enchiladas with a sauce I would have used for the pasta and it was totally divine!  

Ingredients 

6 bacon strips – cooked and set aside – pan cleaned out for veggies

1/2 cup diced red or yellow bell pepper

3 diced roma tomatoes

1/2 cup diced onion

10 ounces thinly sliced cooked turkey, shredded

1 cup grated Swiss cheese

Cheese sauce – recipe follows

1/4 teaspoon pepper

6-8 Flour tortillas

Toppings –

A little over ½ cup shredded Swiss – or at least enough to lightly cover casserole.

2 cups shredded lettuce

2 diced roma tomatoes

Cheese Sauce:

5 tablespoons Unsalted butter
2 tablespoons  Crème Fraiche (diluted) or cream

½ cup heavy cream or more
1/2 Parmesan
1 /2 teaspoon Nutmeg
1 Pinch of pepper

Directions for Sauce:

Melt butter – add cream and crème Fraiche and stir – add in cheese. It needs to be somewhat thickened and you need to taste to make sure it is not too salty from the Parmesan.  Add more cream or cheese to desired consistency.  It should coat the spoon nicely when dipping the spoon in the sauce.  

Directions for The Turkey Casserole:

1. Sauté the yellow or red pepper and onion until soft – about 10 min.
2. Add the tomatoes – let cool to room temp or just slightly warm.
3. Mix together the turkey, Swiss cheese, onion/pepper/tomato mixture.
4. Pour all the sauce over the enchiladas.  Make sure all but the ends are wet – yet most of the sauce will pool under the enchiladas. 
5. Cover with foil or cover and bake at 350° for 25 minutes. Uncover and sprinkle with remaining cheese. Bake 5-10 minutes longer or until cheese is melted and ends are slightly crispy. Garnish with lettuce and tomatoes. 

NOTE:  If you plan on leftovers - I recommend doing a flour and butter roux and then adding the cheese and cream.  The above dish does not reheat well.   A butter, cream and cheese sauce separates with re-heating the next day.  

Macaroni Treasure - Ultimate Comfort food

MACARONI TREASURE 

This is a simple – delicious – old family recipe.  My Mom was not the greatest cook in the world, God bless her…  She had 6 kids to feed on a budget.  We did love this dish, though, as kids.  Following her recipe, I found it to be a bit bland so I pumped it up with the addition of Pablano Peppers and Spanish Olive juice and also used Baby Bella Mushrooms rather than button mushrooms.  This is so good for a comfort food meal – you will find yourself making it often.  Feel free to add whatever veggies you have on hand for variety.  Carrots – leeks – bell peppers all would work.

• 1 pound Elbow Macaroni - Feel free to use Bowtie or Penne but I find the Macaroni is the best for this.
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2 medium pablano peppers chopped
• 1 large package of Bella Mushrooms (Baby Portabella)
• 1 28 ounce can San Marzano crushed tomatoes
• 1 Tablespoon tomato paste
• About ½ of a 7 ounce jar of Spanish Olives with Pimento – Just make sure there are lots of olives studded throughout the pasta – you can do this to taste but it adds a very important flavor to this dish.
• 3-4 Tablespoons of the juice from the olives
• 2-3 cloves of garlic sliced
• About ½ lb or more of chopped meat
• Cheddar  Cheese – Enough to cover the top – mixed with a nice big handful of fresh breadcrumbs
• A few tablespoons butter to put on top or sprinkle cheese and breadcrumbs with olive oil for less fattening alternative.
• Pre heat oven to 350
• Bring plenty of water to a boil – add about 4-5 tablespoons salt.  Cook pasta until firm and almost done but still with a fair amount of bite.   It will finish cooking in the oven.
• Meanwhile – chop all the veggies.  I cut the mushrooms into quarters or eights depending on the size. 
• Cut the olives in half and set aside. 
• Sauté Meat until done – drain fat.
• Add onions, veggies and garlic and cook until soft.  Make a space in the pan and toast the tomato paste for 3-4 minutes.
• Add olives, olive juices and cook 3-4 minutes. 
• Add tomatoes. 
• Taste – add salt and pepper – or more olives or more tomato – or whatever you feel is needed.  It should taste very meaty – rich and moist with sauce – and a bit briny from the olives. 
• Put into a casserole – cover with cheese and breadcrumbs and bake until bubbly and browned on top. 

Oxtail Stew

OXTAIL STEW! 

I’ve been looking at many articles and have seen many TV shows about oxtail.. which is really beef tail. I decided to make some.

Here is what I used:

1 ½ lbs Oxtail

3 stalks of sliced celery (plus 2 for final stage)

2 peeled/sliced carrots (plus 2 more for final stage)

1 large onion or two small (plus one medium diced for final stage)

¼ cup diced scallions

3 cloves

1 teasp thyme

1 teasp fresh rosemary – chopped roughly

1 tabl soy sauce – for color

2 garlic cloves sliced

3 allspice berries – or you can use ¼ teasp dry – or to taste

¼ teaspoon Herbs de Provence

Dash of hot sauce

Salt

1/3 cup or enough to cover Oxtails for marinating brown sugar

Olive Oil for marinade

¼ cup or so of flour

Handful of golden raisins

¾ cup of San Marzano Tomatoes - diced

Few cups of a good stock – I used turkey stock from Thanksgiving and it was great

Red wine – about ½ cup

Scant amount canola oil for browning

Cut off some of the excess fat from the Oxtails

Rub the Oxtails with dry herbs, brown sugar, garlic and olive oil and place in a zip lock bag Squeeze out extra air and marinate for 4 hrs in the fridge.

..Let Oxtails sit out for about an hour to come to room temp.  ..Dry with paper towels. 

..Heat some Canola oil – nice and hot and add Oxtails to pan – brown on all sides – about 15 min.

…Remove to a side plate and discard all but 1 tablespoon of the oil

…Add celery, carrots, and onion to pan and scrape up the brown bits.

…Add wine and cook down until there is almost no liquid

…Add flour and cook for about 3 min.

…Add stock and soy sauce, diced tomatoes and add more of the herbs if needed  and hot sauce

 Simmer for 2 hours on low - add some more carrots and onion and celery so there are nicely cooked pieces in there and some golden raisins and once your meat is fall off the bone tender –Put in the scallions for the last 10 min.  …serve over mashed potatoes.

Lamb Breast

Wonderful succulent Lamb Breast 

 So - last month, I was looking at the meat section of Walmart and came across something called "Lamb Breast".  Lamb Breast?  What?  Never heard of it.  I took a gamble and put it in my cart.  It was cheap!  Not that I'm on a budget but I was intrigued. 

Went home and looked up about 2 dozen or so recipes.  Some called for Braising and some were Slow Cooker recipes and some were rolled and stuffed.  I'm not a fan of Slow Cookers and took a little of this and a little of that from what I read.  I like rosemary with my lamb for instance and white wine and I always brown my meat first so I created my own recipe and man was it good!  What a surprise. 

The meat itself is very odd.  Kind of like a cross between pork ribs and pork belly due to an immense amount of fat.
So I trimmed as much as I could from the cut and browned and rendered most of the fat out of the meat. 

Here is the recipe and trust me the flavor is outstanding!

2–3 lamb breasts – about 4 lbs

2 -3  medium onions, cut into chunks

2-3  carrots, peeled and cut into 2-inch portions

 1 1/2 pounds potatoes, peeled and cut in half or in quarters depending on size

6 garlic cloves minced  

1 cups chicken broth

1 cup white wine

1         Level Teaspoon KOSHER salt

2         1 teaspoon pepper

3/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon cumin

1 teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoon rosemary

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons of olive oil

1  ½ cup  frozen baby peas

Trim as much fat as possible from the lamb breasts.  Make slits between the rib bones.

Mix together the olive oil, garlic, cumin, rosemary and paprika and salt and pepper and spread all over the lamb breast until covered.  Get into those crevices where you made the slits between the rib bones.

Place the lamb, in one layer, in a big Dutch oven or high sided skillet - and sear on both sides on high heat until nicely browned.  Lower heat and continue cooking for 20 min until the fat has rendered out of the lamb.   

There will be lots of fat ;-)

Remove lamb and put on the side.  Drain off all but 2 tablespoons of fat.  Add Onions and sauté until soft.    Add wine and chicken broth and carrots and put the lamb back into the pot on top of the veggies. 

Cover with parchment or foil and the pan cover - and cook in the oven at 250 degrees for approx. 3 hours.  Check at 2 hrs and see if the meat is tender enough to almost fall off the bones.. when that occurs add the potatoes and cook for another 30 min.   

Uncover and raise the heat to 400.  Add potatoes at this point. 

Cook for an additional 15-20 minutes until the meat is browned and the potatoes are done.   Add the peas and cook for 5-6 minutes more.   

Drain the juices into a fat separator and let sit until the fat comes to the top.  Put 2 tablespoons of the fat  into the pan and add flour – cooking over low heat for about 3-4  min until caramel colored – add juices.   

Put meat and veggies on a plate and pour gravy over the dish.