I've been eating toast and cheese, or cereal, for breakfast during my illness, and to be honest it probably made me worse. Today I finally had a good breakfast that left me feeling light and energetic, but had lots of fresh flavor.
If you don't like eggs, just make the same thing and add more zucchini or some mushrooms- and just know that I think you're a little weird.
Ingredients:
2 green zucchini, quartered lengthwise and then sliced
1/2 cup cherry or grape tomatoes, sliced in half
1 teaspoon savory
1/2 teaspoon (or more) garlic salt
several dashes of black pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 ounce of crumbled feta, or whatever sharp cheese you have
2 good quality organic eggs
salt
In a non-stick skillet heat your olive oil on high and add the zucchini and garlic salt. Cook for about 2 minutes then add the savory, a bit of pepper and the tomatoes. Continue to cook on high for another 3-5 minutes, depending on how much you like your veggies cooked, making sure you stir them around once in a while.
After the veggies are cooked, add the feta cheese evenly over the top, then crack your eggs over the top as well. Now COVER the pan with a lid or foil, and turn the heat down to low/med-low. On my stove the eggs were done to over medium-ish in four minutes, but you can lift your lid after 3 minutes and poke your yolks gently to see if they are the way you like them. This method is kind of nice because your eggs are basically steaming, so you don't have to flip them.
Salt and pepper the eggs and serve yourself right away, with good hot coffee of course, and if you're a bread person I would go with toasted sourdough.
Well it's been awhile. Between having two different flu viruses and a cold, plus moving, I've been too sick and tired to cook for the past six weeks. I've been eating a lot of street tacos from the little Mexican place down the street, and more Chipotle burritos than is good for anyone. I'm also heartily sick of In-n-Out, and tired of turkey sandwiches. It's about time for some REAL food.
It doesn't get any more "real" to me than beef stew.
Ingredients:
1 to 1 1/2 pounds of beef (or lamb) stew meat
1/4 cup of some kind of organic flour
1/4 cup of good olive oil or Irish butter
1 large sweet onion, chopped
2 medium carrots, chopped (don't peel them)
3 celery stalks, chopped
1/2 fennel bulb, chopped
1 clove of garlic, whole
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1 tablespoon dried or fresh thyme
1 tablespoon dried savory
1/2 teaspoon dried orange peel
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon A1 Sauce
1/2 cup tawny port
1-2 cups of warm water, just enough to cover the ingredients
Cut the stew meat into small even pieces and then toss them in the flour to coat. Heat the oil or butter up in a medium sized pot, and then brown the meat pieces over medium-high heat for a couple of minutes (you don't have to brown them evenly, just get some brown stickiness going on). Remove the meat from the pan and set it aside, and yes, you have to do that.
Now you can throw in all of the chopped veggies, I like to chop them pretty small so they sort of melt into the stew. Plus I've noticed kids and grown men who are weird about eating cooked vegetables like it better that way. Put the salt and pepper in with the veggies, and cook them, still on medium-high heat, stirring frequently. After about ten minutes, add the tawny port and then let it heat heat up before you add the stew meat and juices back in and turn the heat down to simmer.
Next, add the warm water, just enough to cover everything, and also add in all of the spices. Cook on a good simmer, on my stove it's about a 2, uncovered, stirring occasionally for at least one hour.
Use a wooden spoon to stir, I swear it makes it taste better.
You can cook the stew up to 1 1/2 hours, or even two, but if you go up to 2 hours, turn the heat down to a slow simmer after the first hour. More than two hours will dry the meat out, so don't leave it too long.
Serve over mashed sweet potatoes (not yams, that would be sort of redundant with all the carrots) or mashed sunchokes.
You're a fool if you don't at least consider drinking a big mug of porter or stout with it. Tonight we're drinking Samuel Smith's Imperial Stout
Last night I HAD to have steak. It just HAD to happen. No purveyors of fine steak were open late on a Sunday, so I made do with a Safeway steak- a nice double-thick rib eye. To further complicate my need for steak, I don't have anything that passes for a grill right now.
I persevered.
I gently rubbed the 1+ lb, bone-in rib eye cowboy steak with olive oil. I poured Himalayan salt on it with reckless abandon. I sprinkled it generously with pepper. I let it hang out on the counter, looking good. I cooked it on both sides for one minute each in very hot oil. I then put it under the broiler in the oven for 15-ish minutes, then let it rest for another 10 minutes, taking it to medium-rare heaven in the middle, and medium on the edges. All steaks are shaped differently, so if you're not good at judging the cooking times, there's no shame in using a meat thermometer.
Now in the old days (and by that I mean over a year ago) I would serve this with some sort of starchy goodness, like pasta. Instead, I used all of the good things I would put on pasta, and put them on summer squash instead:
4 yellow summer squash
1/2 a sweet onion, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, sliced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/3 cup white wine (or water or stock)
2 level tablespoons tomato paste
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon dried basil
1/2 cup chopped fresh arugula leaves
1 oz of your favorite cheese, shredded or crumbled (I use feta)
Saute the onions, summer squash and spices in ONE of the tablespoons of olive oil for about 3-4 minutes on high. Then add the tomato paste, garlic, and white wine and lower to medium and cook until wine is gone and tomato paste looks thick again, another 3-4 minutes at least, depending on your stove.
Lower the heat all the way down to the lowest setting, add the cheese, the other tablespoon of oil and the arugula leaves, stir it all in and let it hang out on the stove 'til your steak is done. Serve with sliced steak...and a nice big glass of Sangiovese.
Like most of my recipes, this meal will serve 2 people, or 1 person twice...
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the chopped kale, and everything else, EXCEPT the red onion and one of the tablespoons of oil.
Meanwhile you can either line a 9X13 inch pan with your favorite pie crust OR just leave it out entirely.
Pour your kale mixture in the pan. Then thinly slice your red onion and arrange it as nicely and evenly on top as you can, and sort of smoosh the slices down onto your kale mixture a bit. Drizzle the last tablespoon of oil on top of the onion slices and sprinkle them with a little salt and pepper.
Bake in the oven for 45 minutes to an hour. You want the onions to get crunchy on the edges. In fact, you might want it a bit more brown than it is in my photo, this is after cooking for only 45 minutes. This might be nice for a lunch, you can serve it warm or at room temperature (like pizza really). A little fresh squeezed lemon on top wouldn't be totally out of line, or even a side of marinara or pizza sauce to dip it in.
Eat your veggies!
*Sigh* Here's the deal. If you are giving up grains, don't try to make fake versions of things like pancakes, they're baaaaad. So, so bad. For example, I tried to make these sweet potato pancakes: a cup of mashed sweet potato, four eggs, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda, a teaspoon of cinnamon, a teaspoon of honey, and butter for frying. But seriously, don't make them, because they suck. They taste like a cross between warm pumpkin pie and cinnamon scrambled eggs. Bleh.
Anyway, here's a recipe for salmon instead.
First of all, get the really good wild salmon fillets, pour enough olive oil in a pan to cover the bottom, and over medium heat, toss in one garlic clove, sliced. Immediately place the salmon portions in the pan, skin side down. Sprinkle lightly with salt, pepper, thyme, and tarragon. Cover and cook for a few minutes, JUST until the color of the salmon turns light pink instead of dark pink. Squeeze a half of a lemon over the top, and when you serve it, just peel the skin off of the bottom first (I eat it, but you can give it to the dog) and spoon some of the oil and juices from the pan over the top.
The Salad Part
I like to keep boiled and salted potatoes ready to go in a plastic bag in the refrigerator, ready to turn into fried breakfast potatoes, or slice into salads like this one.
A small bag of good greens, baby kale, arugula, spring mix...whatever
3 small boiled Yukon Gold potatoes, sliced
1 avocado, sliced or cubed
1 cup cherry or grape tomatoes sliced in half
1 tablespoon finely chopped red onion
1 big pinch of salt
1 tablespoon of olive oil
Juice of one lemon
2 oz. crumbled feta or other good cheese
Toss all of the the ingredients- and for Pete's sake, don't be a baby, use your hands, they work the best. You can always wash them, and both the olive oil and lemon juice are good for your skin anyway. Serve the salmon on top of the salad. It's just delicious.
It's cloudy and chilly, and that means only one thing, I need to stuff myself with comfort food. Nothing is more comforting than roast chicken. Okay, maybe a grilled rib eye is...or bread pudding...or macaroni and cheese...never-mind. The POINT is that hot juicy chicken, and sweet melt-in-your-mouth yams are pretty damned comforting.
Le recipee eez as follows <---say that with le faux French accent, because it makes it fancier.
5 organic chicken drumsticks ( I say 5 because that's what comes in a vacuum sealed package from Costco, one or two more or less really doesn't matter)
4 large yams, or 5 medium sized ones (yams are orange inside, sweet potatoes look almost like regular potatoes inside, although they work fine too)
1/4 cup olive oil
1 cup fruity and/or sweet white wine like a moscato
1 heaping teaspoon dried lavender (I have purchased this at Target, believe it or not, and also Cost Plus)
1 teaspoon dried orange peel, or zest an orange (you can use the juice too, whatever)
1 heaping teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 heaping teaspoon lavender
1 heaping teaspoon marjoram
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 heaping teaspoon rosemary
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Wash the yams and cut them in half lengthwise. In a roasting pan (if you don't have one, your big lasagna pan will work fine) arrange your drumsticks and your yams in a single layer, don't stack anything, you want everything snugly laying side by side. You also want the skin side of your yams facing down. Pour the wine over everything, then pour the olive oil over. Next sprinkle all of your seasonings as evenly as possible, concentrating the garlic and rosemary on your chicken. The amounts on the seasonings are just a guideline, feel free to sprinkle on the seasonings right out of the bottle, and just go for it until everything has a nice even dusting!
Roast in the oven for 45 minutes at the 425 degree temperature, then add a 1/3 cup water and tilt the pan a bit so it runs around, then cook another 10 minutes on 300 degrees.
During cooking, the sugars from the yams will ooze out and get really dark colored, don't worry about it, it's not hurting anything. (Although you might have to soak the pan a bit before you wash it.)
When you serve your dish, pour a little of the syrupy glaze from the bottom of the pan over the chicken. You might want to serve a glass of that white wine that you used to cook it with, I mean what the hell are you going to do with that bottle of wine? You don't want to be one of those people who keeps open bottles of wine in their refrigerator for a year. That's just embarrassing. And it's insulting to the winemakers of the world.
P.S. Cost Plus World Market is a good place to get spices at a decent price, as is Trader Joe's and Target (it was weird buying spices at Target, but they have been pretty good so far for the price.)
Cereal, toast, pancakes...all delicious. The problem is, when I eat these carb-a-riffic breakfast foods I feel weak and hungry an hour or two after. So most of the time for breakfast I eat either Greek yogurt with honey, cinnamon and almonds, or eggs cooked in some way with vegetables or herbs. Today's omelette came out extra tasty, so here we go:
2 eggs
2 tablespoons of water or milk
2 teaspoons of olive oil
1 chopped green onion
1 big handful of baby kale (I got a bag of organic at Costco for next to nothing)
salt
black pepper
nutmeg (don't skip this, it's the best part)
1 slice sharp sharp Tillamook cheddar (or other sharp cheese)
(grape tomatoes on the side for acidity and color)
Easy peasy, start with a teaspoon of the olive oil in a small non-stick pan over medium heat. Toss in the green onion and kale, salt them ever so slightly, and cook just until the kale wilts down. Remove the kale and onion from the pan and put the other teaspoon of olive oil in. While this is heating, in a bowl whip the heck out of your eggs and water (or milk) and add a good pinch of salt and pepper and a WHISPER (a half-dash?) of nutmeg.
Pour into the pan and cook. I like to gently push the eggs toward the middle of the pan with my spatula and then tilt the pan around in a circular motion, letting the uncooked egg from the top layer of the omelette run to the sides of the pan and cook there. Once you have just a very thin sheen of uncooked egg on that top layer, place your kale, onion, and your slice of cheese on one half, then use your spatula to flip the other half of the circle to cover everything.
Turn the heat off and let it sit in the pan for a minute until the cheese melts inside, then serve immediately with an extra sprinkle of good black pepper over the top and some tomatoes on the side.
This actually kept me going until lunch, so it's eggs for the win.
