NAKED NOODLES!

Good Wednesday evening everyone! Welcome back to Out Of The Culinary. I told you last Saturday, on Maggie's birthday, you were going to see a recipe from one of her new cookbooks very soon. I could see it in her eyes. The way she was studying those books, excitedly marking pages and pointing out dishes she wanted to try - I knew it wouldn't be long before we saw one of them make their debut on the blog. Tonight, the first night Maggie has had to cook since here birthday, we see one of those recipes.

Tonight's recipe is a complete 180 degree shift from yesterday's. Yesterday, I tackled a recipe that appeared to be challenging, was fairly complicated and took a long time to cook. (Delaying the blog post until after 9 PM! Sorry about that one...) Tonight, Maggie's recipe is simple, straight forward and was on the table when I walked in the door. However, this quick concoction didn't end up tasting like a 'quick-fix' when it was all said in done. I'll turn the keyboard over to Maggie and let her share her experiences.

The Recipe: Giada's Carbonara
Original Recipe Found In: Giada's Kitchen: New Italian Favorites

What You'll Need

For the Basil Aioli:

1 Clove of Garlic, Minced
2 Large Egg Yolks
2 Tbs. Dijon Mustard
1 Tsp. Lemon Juice
1/4 Cup Finely Chopped Basil Leaves
1/8 Teaspoon Cayenne Pepper
1/2 Cup Vegetable Oil
1/2 Cup EVOO

For The Pasta:

1 Lb. Linguine
1 Cup Shaved Pecorino Romano Cheese

Hello everyone!!  I swear sometimes that Tyler reads my mind...not sometimes, MOST of the time.  As soon as I get done cooking one week, I immediately go to the next week, wondering what kind of dish to make.  This was the case last week - I ran all my possible sources dry, wondering if there was something I could cook this week.  Lo and behold, on Saturday, Tyler gets me, not only one, but THREE cookbooks...well, technically two, since the Flavor Bible isn't really a cookbook, just a pairing guide.  But the other two were from my two favorite celebrity chefs (my number 1 chef being my incredible fiancee) :)


I've always admired Giada de Laurentiis - I would come home from school and catch her show on the Food Network.  She always made cooking fun and easy and I wanted to have that much fun when I cooked.  I already have a cookbook of hers and most of the pots and pans we have in our kitchen are from her Target line.  So, to say I'm a fan, is a bit of an understatement.  Nevertheless, I went to her cookbook first to start my fresh batch of recipes.


I started with a pound of linguine pasta - the bag we purchased of pasta was 2 pounds, so I cut it in half and cooked that half.  Meanwhile, when the water was warming up, I sliced up four slices of fresh Italian bread, just as a nice little side to the main dish.  I love the smell and feel of fresh Italian bread - it makes my mouth water just thinking about it.  I also fixed up a little dish of oil and seasoning, something we found as a ready-made container (only needing to add oil), just to go along with our Italian bread.

4 slices of tasty! 

After placing the pasta in the now boiling water, I fixed up the Basil Aioli (try saying it, you'll find yourself tripping over your tongue. EYE-OH-LEE) I dumped all the ingredients in our new food processor, one at a time.  Now, when it came to the dijon mustard, I, for some reason, thought it said two tablespoons.  After I went to my cookbook to put in the next ingredient, I read "two TEASpoons."  I muttered angrily to myself and tried to rescue some of the now submerged mustard, but to no avail.  I kept it in, hoping it wouldn't botch the recipe too badly. Once everything was added, I blended the ingredients in the food processor for three 15 second bursts. 

Before...

After!

As of today, I hadn't "played" with our food processor.  Let me tell you, that was a treat!  Seeing all those ingredients get mixed in together in a whirlwind of speed....pretty darn cool.


After the pasta cooked for ten minutes, I thoroughly drained said pasta and transferred to a separate dish.  I topped with the Basil Aioli still sitting in the food processor (it has a spout! that makes life easy!) and added the pecorino romano cheese, threw a little salt and pepper in the mix, and tossed the whole dish together with a pair of tongs - which, happen to also be from Giada's Target line. 


The End Result:

After I took my first bite, I threw my hands up in the air and exclaimed "I DID IT!"  Not that I just cooked, but cooked a decent recipe that nothing went terrible awry or something went wrong.  The pasta and the Basil Aioli was a good combination, not too heavy of a sauce, and it coated all the noodles just perfectly.  The cheese made a great addition to these recipe, coating and sticking to the noodles.


Now, I don't know if it was the extra mustard or the strong flavor of the cheese, but there was a bit of a tartness, or bite, to this dish.  I really don't know what it is, and maybe as my tastes mature, I'll be able to pick out what it was, but it was a little too strong for both our tastes.  But overall, this recipe turned out well, and it's very simple to make and throw together.  I was hoping at the end of this recipe, I could rename this recipe Maggie's Carbonara...but I think I'll let Giada take the fame on this one.


Thank you Maggie. Tonight was a very interesting dish. I've always come from the school of thought that pasta had to have a good sauce to make it edible. Without some alfredo, marinara or other thick (preferably meaty) sauce covering it - I didn't see the purpose of pasta. However, since we've started cooking for ourselves, Maggie has tried a few 'sauceless' or near sauceless (I.E. NAKED) recipes and I've found myself enjoying them. Tonight's recipe was no different. The basil aioli mixes so well with the pasta that it is nearly invisible. The flavor combination is a surprise, given the low key presentation. There is nothing low key about the flavor. It hits your taste buds with a BAM and sticks around until the last bite.

Maggie mentioned the bite. There was a strong bite to this dish, one that I feel comes from the pecion romano cheese. That cheese is a stronger version of parmesan cheese and it can override a dish if used in large quantities. Since tonight's dish had a full cup's worth, I point my finger at the cheese when identifying the culprit for the 'bite'. (Although 2 tablespoons of dijon mustard probably didn't help matters any!)

That's all we have for you tonight. I'm back tomorrow night with my own 'simple' recipe. I have 2 ingredients and the cooking time is 15 minutes. However, they aren't 'simple' ingredients - and one of them I have never eaten before...EVER. Stop by tomorrow to see how everything turns out. Until then,

~Cheers

Eye Of The (Culinary) Tiger

Tonight's blog is a watershed moment. (In more ways then one) Tonight we achieved a very nice milestone, and I took on a great challenge. Let's start with the great challenge. When I first picked up Jamie Oliver's cookbook (Jamie's Food Revolution - Which, by the way is currently backordered on most online retailers!) I was browsing a few of the recipes and came across one that looked fantastic. This, I decided, was something I had to make. There was one small problem with this, however, this particular recipe looked rather...well...difficult. So, I made myself a promise. I would return to this recipe after I have some more experience under my belt. When I felt I was ready for that challenge. Marking the page with a large orange post-it note. I went on my blogging way.

Well, it's been over a month. We've shared close to 35 recipes with you now and have had ONE THOUSAND page views (no lie!) and have learned quite a bit about cooking. So, this week when I was browsing my cookbooks for ideas, I came across the marked page. Now was the time. I was ready for this particular challenge. Tonight I tackled the recipe that had been haunting - NO! - mocking me since day one.

Bring it on.

The Recipe: Ground Beef Wellington
Original Recipe Found In: Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution (The link that I usually post is dead tonight, hopefully due to too many people buying the book!)

What You'll Need:

1 X Medium Onion
1 X Carrot
1 X Potato
2 X Cloves Of Garlic
4 X Sprigs Fresh Rosemary
1 Handful Of Frozen Peas
1 X Large Egg
2 X Sheets Puff Pastry
1 Lb. Ground Beef

The Recipe: Honey Roasted Carrots
Original Recipe Found In: Jamie Magazine, June/July 2010 Issue

What You'll Need:

1 Lb Large Carrots or 1 Bag Baby Carrots
3 Tbs. Butter
2 Tbs. Honey
1.5 Oz. Water

Begin by preheating your oven to 350 degrees. Peel and chop the carrots, onion and potatoes. Make sure to chop everything into as small of pieces as possible. This will help you out a lot later on. Next, place your veggies in a large frying pan and add two 'lugs' of olive oil. Add your rosemary now as well. Cook the veggies for about 8 to 10 minutes, then add a handful of frozen peas.

I tossed in an extra carrot at the last moment 

Fryin' the veggies

I mentioned yesterday that I've never liked peas. I don't like the flavor, I don't like the texture and frankly, I'm not fond of the color either. They are, in my opinion, an all around terrible vegetable (and I'm convinced they may be poisonous) While looking over the ingredients for the beef wellington, I noticed 'frozen peas' and immediately thought "omit". Then I started thinking. Since Maggie and I have started this new way of cooking, things have changed. We can no longer eat any kind of fast food - our bodies just 'reject' things that are too poor in quality or overly greasy. We now can taste the preservatives in other foods as well. Things that have been prepackaged and frozen have a very different (read: gross) flavor in comparison to something we've made fresh. Lastly, our taste buds' preferences have changed. Foods (mainly veggies) that I never used to care for, I'm finding myself enjoying. The best example of this was last week - with my fruit salad recipe. I included fresh grapes, something that I never really enjoyed growing up. However, after returning to them last week I've found that I now LOVE grapes. They were absolutely fantastic and - honestly, I wish I had some right now...

My (long and drawn out) point is this - if my taste preferences are changing, maybe I SHOULD put peas in this recipe. Maybe, just maybe, I'll find I actually like the little green beasts. So, after much deliberation, peas have been included in my beef wellington recipe.

You better not be deadly...

Once all of your veggies are starting to brown up - pour them into a large bowl and set aside to cool. While that is cooling, you can begin to prepare your dough. Take the two sheets of puff pastry and lay them on top of each other. Lightly dust the countertop and the rolling pin with flour and squish the sheets down into a 12 X16 rectangle. (I didn't really measure here - I just rolled until it the pastry became thin and said 'eh, close enough!')

A pinch of flour on the countertop 

And on the rolling pin make your life a lot easier 

Next, crack your egg into a bowl and mix well with a fork. By now, your veggies should have cooled to the point where you can handle them safely without burning your hands. Add your ground beef into the bowl with the veggies. Pour in 1/2 of the egg as well. Now, using your hands, mix everything up really well in the large bowl. This is very similar to the cracking burger recipe. Get in there and get messy (and you WILL get very, very messy) the better mixed up everything is, the better your end result will be.

Mixing in all up 

(Here is where chopping your veggies into smaller pieces will help you. To help me this evening, Maggie chopped the potatoes, carrot and onion before I got off of work. However, we found out that they weren't chopped small enough when I started mixing everything by hand. The potatoes were large enough that they were interfering with everything mixing together. This adds extra time and effort into mixing everything together. Learn from our experience and avoid the hassle by chopping everything up into tiny bits)

When everything is mixed, turn your attention to the (now flattened) puff pastry. With the longer edge facing you, spread out the mixture (as pictured below) along the dough. Once everything is dispersed, begin to roll everything up like a large taco shell. This part is a little tricky - just work slowly and make sure everything stays together and you will be alright. Crimp the ends of the pastry once your finished rolling and rejoice - you've just made a wellington.

One wellington

Take the remaining portion of your beaten egg and brush it across the top and sides of the wellington. This will help the outer crust become nice and golden brown while cooking. We don't have a pastry brush, so I improvised and used the next best thing. A paper towel. Turns out, the end of a paper towel saturated in egg works very well as a brush! Once the entire wellington is covered - stick the little guy in the oven and set the timer for 40 minutes.

When in a pinch, a paper towel works just like a pastry brush

Once that timer goes off, you can begin making your honey roasted carrots. Roasted is a bit of a misnomer here - they are actually cooked on a stovetop. Must have been one of those "sounds better this way" naming scenarios.

Add your water, carrots, honey and butter into a large pot and bring everything to a boil. Allow the butter to fully melt and mix everything together really well after this and then reduce the heat and cover the pot with a lid. Allow to cook for 15 minutes, shaking the pot occasionally to prevent the carrots from sticking. (Alternatively, you can use a large spoon to stir, but be quick. The entire concept here is the small amount of water will 'flash steam' the carrots. Every time you take off the lid, you lose valuable steam and heat.) Once the timer goes off, your carrots and done and so is your wellington.

Adding the touch of honey 

Slice your wellington like a loaf of bread (don't worry about the contents falling out, everything sticks together very well after baking) and serve with a big spoonful of your honey carrots and enjoy!

The Results:

Oh

My

Goodness!

Tonight's recipe was, in a word, FANTASTIC. The beef wellington was full of flavor. The meat was incredibly juicy and flavorful and the vegetables all added their own unique flavors to create this perfect symphony of flavor. I was hoping for good thing from this recipe, but I wasn't expecting this. Next to the french baked potatoes from an earlier blog, this may be my favorite dish so far. Fantastic. I highly recommend you try making it for yourself. Heck, buy the ingredients and I'll come over and make it for you. It's THAT GOOD.

The honey 'roasted' carrots were a nice surprise as well. They ended up being nice, soft, cooked carrots with a light hint of honey. A delicious side dish that would compliment any main dish very well. These are also worth a look.

When it was all said in done, I'd say I conquered this recipe with relative ease. There were some tricky parts. However, nothing was too unbelievably difficult or overly taxing. In the end, I think I was letting all of the pictures and descriptions get to me. Taking it one step at a time, this recipe wasn't nearly as hard as I had originally thought.

One last note. You may have noticed in that first picture of the wellington - mine sprung a leak during cooking. I rolled the dough a little too thin in one spot and the juices from the hamburger oozed right out during cooking. Outside of that one small incident - this recipe came off relatively accident free. As of this moment, I'm still sitting here. (Meaning the peas haven't killed me yet). I can't really say if I've come around to them yet. I never really had a chance to taste their individual flavor. However, after a brief return to my diet - peas have proven to be not as horrible as I remember. Maybe (maybe) they will make another return to a recipe. That all depends on me surviving the night....

All kidding aside, I have one last thing to cover. As I alluded to earlier (and then flat out mentioned) we achieved a great milestone today. Today, we received our 1,000 page view.

That is pretty impressive considering we've been doing this for slightly over a month. We'd hoped to hit it yesterday, but Monday's are usually a lower traffic blog day and we came up short....one short. Yes, at 11:59 last night we had 999 blog views. So, if you didn't stop by yesterday to see what was new - because of you we had to wait an entire extra day to celebrate 1,000 views. Way to go.

I, of course, am kidding. Maggie and I cannot express just how much it means that so many people read our blog on a daily basis. What started off as a little place for us to share some cooking experiences has now developed into something more. It means so much to us that so many people have an interest in what we're doing. To those of you that leave us comments and give feedback - thank you. To those you just stop by to read - thank you just as much. We love what we're doing here. I love to write, I love to cook and this little blog is a blending of the two. It's a lot of fun to write, and I hope it's a lot of fun to read. Here's to another 1,000 page views and countless more recipes!

Stop back in tomorrow night to see what Maggie has in store. Until then,

~Cheers

This Week's Ingredients

Good Monday morning everyone! It's the start of a brand new week, which means the return to the working world. The good news is - it is also the return of recipes and cooking experiences on Out Of The Culinary (hopefully, that helps you get through the week, I know it helps me!) Once again, I have a list of the ingredients we're going to be using this week - all that you need is a little imagination and creativity and you could see a sneak peak at what's coming up. Without further ado - the ingredients we're using this week are:

1 X Large Potato
Frozen Peas
1 Lb. Ground Beef (90/10)
Linguine
Dijon Mustard
2 X Sheets Puff Pastry
Italian Bread
1 Bag Baby Carrots
2 X Sweet Potatoes
2 X 7 oz. Fillet Mignon
2 X Portobello Mushrooms

Yes, that does say 'frozen peas'. I have long been opposed to peas, I don't much care for their favor. But as I have been discovering lately, my taste buds are changing. One of the recipes this week calls for peas and we're going to leave them in. I may be putting my life on the line for the sake of the blog, dear readers.

That's all we have for you today! We're nearing a milestone here on our blog - something we could actually achieve today. If not today, then certainly tomorrow. We'll let you know what that is when we get there - but rest assured, it is quite the milestone.

We're using the normal schedule this week. I'm cooking tomorrow and Thursday, Maggie is taking Wednesday. We're off on Friday and in a slight change up - we will be shifting Saturday's post to Sunday because I have to work. Also, the blogs will be up later this week - sadly, I have the closing shift at my financial institution. Don't they know I have cooking to do!?!

Until next time,

~Cheers

Sunday Quick Hit: Site Updates & Mini-Recipe

Happy Sunday everyone! I know we said yesterday that we were taking today off - but we have a couple of quick things to share with you today. First, a mini  recipe. This morning, Maggie brought forward a great idea. "What happens if we added brown sugar and maple syrup to the oatmeal?" Well, we went ahead and tried it and found out that the result is fantastic!

The Recipe: Maple & Brown Sugar Oatmeal
Original Recipe By: (Concept) Maggie (Execution & Amounts) Tyler

What You'll Need:

1 Cup Oatmeal
2 Cups Water (Or Milk)
4 Tsp. Brown Sugar
4 Tsp. Maple Syrup

Mix your oatmeal and water together and put your pan on medium heat. Unlike yesterday's recipe, where you could leave the oatmeal alone for a little while, you'll want to keep your attention on the pot the entire time. (This is due to the smaller quantity of oatmeal in this recipe - it cooks faster.) Within two minutes, your pot should be bubbling nicely.

*Bubble* 

Add your brown sugar and stir in well. 4 Tsp. seems to be the right blend of great sugar flavor without overpowering the dish. You are free to add more to your flavor preferences, however. After about a minute, the brown sugar should be fully melted into the oatmeal.

Brown sugar - up close and personal 

Add your maple syrup and stir in as well. Let the whole mixture simmer for a full minute and then serve. The end result is a delicious and smooth oatmeal. A great addition to this recipe would have been chopped almonds or even chopped walnuts (nether of which we had at his time) or even sliced bananas.

Tasty start to the day

Site Update:

You may have noticed on the side bar by now, but early last week we added a new feature to the blog. We are now on twitter. You can follow us at Outofculinary (no 'the' twitter has a name size limit and adding the 'the' made it one character too long. This was our compromise.) We are using this to update things about the site, as well as lead to clues to the new recipes, and to share culinary experiences as they happen. We can use this to update about the site a lot more quickly and frequently than any of our other methods. It's a great way to follow and stay in touch with the blog.


Cook's Illustrated, Where Have You Been All Of My Life?

This may be my favorite magazine...EVER

This weekend, I made a discovery. A little magazine called 'Cook's Illustrated'. It is written by the folks at PBS who make the "America's Test Kitchen" television program. They share things such as kitchen tips (I.E. using bottle corks to store kitchen knives) recipes (that they test up to 40 times, until the find the perfect, fool proof method of cooking something) and product review. (You may recall a couple of weeks ago, when I asked for recommendations on canned tomatoes? Cook's Illustrated has a full review of every brand of canned tomatoes in their August 2010 issue - the best brand? Hunts.) The biggest find (for me) came in the June 2010 issue. "How to grill perfect tuna steaks".  It turns out the key to a perfect tuna steak is to make a vinaigrette composed of oil, vinegar, mustard and honey - that allows the outside to brown and keeps the natural waters of the tuna IN the fish. In addition, the key to a good tuna steak is to cook the outside 1/4 inch ONLY. The inside is supposed to be pink and even COLD (Cold!). So, that information may have been a few days too late - but it is certainly going to help when I take a second shot at the tuna steak in a new recipe. Needless to say, we will be opening a subscription to this magazine.

That's all we have for you today. Just a few mini-posts, all rolled into one surprise Sunday post. We're back tomorrow with a list of our ingredients for the week. Be sure to check in then to see what we have up our sleeves. Until then -

~Cheers

Birthday Breakfast!

Good morning everyone! It's the weekend! More importantly, (around here anyway) It's Maggie's birthday! I wanted to start her birthday off right with a fantastic homemade breakfast. I set to work last week (in secret - it had to be a surprise after all) to find a delicious morning recipe. I found just the thing in (where else?) Jamie Oliver's cookbook.

The Recipe: Blackberry and Apple Oatmeal
Original Recipe Found In: Jamie's Food Revolution: Rediscover How to Cook Simple, Delicious, Affordable Meals

What You'll Need:

2 Cups Quick Cook Oats (Not Instant)
3 Cups Milk (Soy Milk or Water are also suitable substitutes)
2 Apples
1 Tbsp. Butter
1 Tbsp. Honey
6 Oz. Fresh Blackberries

Begin by adding your quick oats and milk to a large pot and set on medium heat. Other than stirring it every few minutes, you wont have to pay much attention to that pot from here on out. Essentially, every time you hear the pot make a thick "gurgle" give it a good stir.

Behold! The tower of quick oats! 

Now, turn your attention to the apples. Last week, I picked up an Oxo Good Grips Corer (casually, so I didn't make Maggie suspicious) and it turned out to be a great idea. Simply place the corer over the stem of the apple and give a good push. The corer slides right through the apple and keeps the core intact, making it very easy to slide right out of the apple and get on cooking.

One apple, sans the core

Once cored. Slice your apples into smaller bits. As you are doing this, put one tbsp. of butter into a medium frying pan and set the heat to low. By the time you finish slicing both apples into smaller pieces, your butter should be completely melted in the frying pan. Toss in your apple slices and turn the heat up to medium. Stirring the apples every minute or so, allow them to cook for about 4 minutes or until they are golden brown and soft. If you'd like, you can 'sneak' a freshly fried apple here...they're really good!

Diced

And Fried

When your apples are almost done, add the tbsp. of honey to the oatmeal and stir it in well. I found that my oatmeal was thickening up quite a bit here, so I added an additional 1/2 cup of milk. That all depends on preference, if you like thicker oatmeal - 3 cups of milk should go very well for you.

The last step is to add the fresh blackberries to the oatmeal. Prior to this, I had never had a blackberry before. After washing one off, I popped one of the little purple fruit in my mouth and was amazed. They have an incredible flavor! Why more things aren't blackberry flavored I have no idea. Who ever decided the cherry was so great that it had to flavor everything from cough syrup to popsicles? The blackberry is a semi-sweet, flavorful piece of delicious fruit and has not been given its fair share in the culinary world.

The blackberry, the unsung hero of the berry world 

Stir in your blackberries, be sure to squish a few of them up. That releases their juices into the oatmeal - spreading the flavor around (and turning your dish a neat shade of purple). Spoon out the oatmeal into a bowl and top with your freshly cooked apples and -ta da! - a simple and delicious breakfast is ready for you to enjoy!

The Results

Yum! 

As I mentioned before, I find the blackberry's flavor to be very enjoyable. In this recipe, that flavor is the dominate one. The honey adds a subtle smoothness to the dish, and the fried apples give a very sweet hint in every few bites, but it is the blackberries that run this dish. The flavors aren't complicated, and the overall taste is fairly simple and 'clean' (coming off as 'fruity oatmeal') but, in the morning you don't want to bombard your taste buds with a barrage of complicated flavor combinations. It's nice to wake up with something simple, yet delicious. This recipe is exactly that.

I don't know if Maggie was 'surprised' per say by her birthday breakfast - but she enjoyed it none the less. I slipped away early this morning (while she was still asleep) to begin preparing the dish, and woke her up when it was ready. All in all it was an early birthday treat to start what I hope will be a great day for her. (Currently she is studying her birthday presents - I got her three books: Cooking with Curtis: Easy, Everyday and Adventurous Recipes for the Home Cook , Giada's Kitchen: New Italian Favorites & The Flavor Bible: The Essential Guide to Culinary Creativity, Based on the Wisdom of America's Most Imaginative Chefs She is intensely reading every page, scouring them for more recipe ideas. You can be assured that some of them will be making an appearance in the not-so-distant future!)

That's all we have for you today. Thank you for stopping by today and we hope you give the blackberry and apple oatmeal a try. It is worth the effort. We're back on Monday with a new set of ingredients and hints at next week's recipes. Until then, I hope everyone enjoys their weekends and be sure to wish Maggie a happy birthday!

~Cheers

A Whole New Flavor

Welcome back to Out Of The Culinary! Tonight was a big night for me. I had decided late last week that I was going to make a completely original creation. I didn't want to borrow from anyone or take an idea / flavor combination from anything- I wanted this recipe to be my own. I have always had one recipe set in the back of my mind - ever since we started our 'cooking for ourselves' campaign. When I was first browsing Jamie Oliver's cookbook (Jamie's Food Revolution: Rediscover How to Cook Simple, Delicious, Affordable Meals) I noticed a few recipes that called for grill tuna steaks. Now, up until this point, I never knew tuna came in anything but a can. Regardless, I was intrigued. Sadly, the consensus of the cooking world was that these tuna steaks needed to be put on a grill or cooked in a grill pan. Neither of which we had.

Until now.

As previously mentioned, we now find ourselves in possession of a grill pan. Which meant I had the means to (finally) try my hand at grilling up some tuna. Now that I had a basis in mind - I set to work trying to create the perfect meal around it. Here's what I came up with:

The Recipe: Lemon Basil Tuna
Original Recipe By: Tyler Trimble

What You'll Need:

2 Tuna Steaks
1 Lemon
3 Fresh Branches of Basil
8 Tbsp. Olive Oil

The Recipe: Fresh Fruit Salad
Original Recipe By: Tyler Trimble

What You'll Need:

1 Medium Pineapple (Sliced)
1 Mango
5-10 Strawberries
20-25 Grapes

*Fruit amounts will vary based on how large you want the salad to be. For my uses, I included 6 strawberries and 20 grapes.

I began this recipe the day before. I had previously read (also in Jamie Oliver's cookbook) about homemade oils. He says that the simple combination of olive oil, some form of fresh herb and another flavoring will make a great oil to use over fish, poultry or salads. Using this knowledge, I dreamed up the perfect oil (I hoped) to compliment my tuna. I chose to use a lemon base (no surprise there) and basil as my herb. (Basil acts a lot like mint in the way it almost 'cools' the flavors. That combined with lemon would make a very zesty - yet manageable oil, or at least that was my thinking!)

Fresh basil leaves

To begin making this oil, first pluck the leaves of basil off the branches. Next, juice your lemon. If you do it correctly, a medium sized lemon should yield about 1/3 a cup of juice. Alternatively, you can use one of those small plastic lemons full of juice. They also give you 1/3 cup worth. (Although fresh lemon juice is MUCH tastier) Next, measure out 8 Tbsp. worth of olive oil.

SEE?! 1/3 cup

Add the basil leaves, lemon juice and olive oil into a food processor or blender and mix well. You want the mixture to be as smooth as you can get it. Pour the blended contents into a jar (if you are the type who saves pickle jars or another type of glass jar because you think you may need it later - rejoice - you have a use for one right now!) and store in the refrigerator. The longer it sits, the more the flavors can blend. You should have a solid three day shelf life for the oil - allowing you to make this up days before you actually need it.

I then turned my attention to the fruit salad. Once again, I wanted to do something new here. So, I decided to use a fruit I have never eaten before - the mango.

The one, the only...the mango! 

Now, my only encounters with a mango in the past had been in mango flavored gum and in tropical skittles. Needless to say - I had absolutely no idea how to go about peeling this thing. A quick google search remedied all of that, however, and I was ready to tackle the round little fruit.

To begin peeling you mango, take a serrated knife (it has to be serrated as the mango has a waxy outside skin, a smooth knife's blade actually causes the mango to launch like a tiny fruit missile across your kitchen) and slice the 'cheeks' of the mango off. (about 1/2 inch away from the center stem - see picture below)

Chopping off the cheeks

Once the cheeks are off, take a paring knife and make deep cuts into each cheek. First vertically, then horizontally. (You should end up with a tic-tac-toe like board on you mango. Resist the urge to play a game though)

And circle gets the square! 

Once both cheeks have been cut, simply push on the skin side of the mango and make the fruit portion stand up. You should end up with a rather cool looking porcupine like fruit sculpture. All you have to do now is take your paring knife and slice off the squares.

It's fruit, it's art - it's fa...oops, better not combine those actually 

Now, turn your attention to the center section. With the paring knife slice just inside the skin. The knife actually follows the edge pretty well, making it easy to cut away. Once the skin is off, simply use your paring knife to get as much of the meat away from the pit as you can. Any time you encounter resistance, stop, that is the pit of the mango (which is not tasty). The pit is actually VERY large - so don't be too surprised if you can't get a whole lot of meat from the center section.

Mango pairs well with other tropical fruit (pineapples, oranges) as well as with grapes, strawberries, blueberries and any type of melon. With my fruit salad recipe, I chose to use pineapple, strawberries and grapes. All you have to do is slice up your choice of fruit and mix everything in a large bowl. If you are serving the fruit a little later on, simply drizzle some lemon juice over the bowl and place in the refrigerator.

Finally, I turned my attention to the main dish. Tuna steaks. We were able to find tuna steaks at our local Hy-Vee, right in the freezer section next to the tilapia and salmon. They were fairly reasonable as well ($3.50 per steak - around the same price per pound as chicken).

Luckily, I decided the day before to do some reading on grilling tuna. It was then that I discovered that you do not want to cook tuna until it is white all the way through. You actually want a little bit of pink in the center of the steaks. If you cook the steak until it's all the way white, you will have actually cooked out all of the juicy flavor. (Glad I found that BEFORE cooking - and am not telling you this having learned the hard way!)

Tuna steaks, no can involved 

To cook the tuna, get your grill pan 'screaming hot' (to borrow from Jamie Oliver) and place the steaks on for about 5 minutes per side. After the steaks are fully cooked, simply drizzle over your oil (after giving it a good shake) and enjoy!

The Results:

Tropical fruit salad 

Freshly grilled tuna steak, covered in lemon basil oil 

"Wow - that's a whole new flavor." That's quoting Maggie directly after a bite of the fruit salad. "Wow-that's a whole new flavor." again, quoting Maggie after a bite of the tuna.

Let's start with the fruit salad, which was AMAZING. Mango tastes a lot like a melon (sort of cantaloupe-y) but it also has a strong secondary "lemon-lime-orange" flavor that simply makes it delicious.  All of the other fruit ingredients complimented each other very well, resulting in a brightly colored fruit salad bursting with flavor.

The tuna was a hit and miss. I was hoping that grilled tuna would be somewhat juicy - it's not. It's a dry meat - no way around it. That's not a bad thing if you have the right sauce to accompany it...I was 50% 50% in that result as well. The lemon portion of the oil was great. It added a good zest to the tuna and gave a very tropical flavor to the dish. However, the basil absolutely overpowered the sauce. I don't know if simply reducing the amount of basil would remedy this - I have a feeling that basil is just too much given the very neutral flavor of the tuna. In the future, I think I'm going to replace the basil with a mint or oregano combination and see where that takes me.

In the end, the tuna was still enjoyable, albeit not as "OH MY GOODNESS - AMAZING" as I had hoped. I learned a lot about tuna tonight. How to cook it, and more importantly - how it takes on flavors. All in all, I suppose it wasn't too bad given I was flying without a safety net here. No one had done this before me - this was my time to find out if my ideas worked. And they did - to a point. Live and learn. Next time I tackle tuna, I have a (new) plan - something that (should) totally revolutionize the dish.

Stayed tuned for that one.

That's all we have for you tonight. I'm taking tomorrow off because I promised Maggie that I would take her out for an early birthday dinner. Saturday is Maggie's birthday (and I will have post up in the mid-morning on saturday - something birthday related for Ms. Maggie - check in then to see what I'm up to) and Sunday were off. Thank you once again for stopping by and enjoying our adventures. All of the positive comments really mean a lot. Until next time,

~Cheers

And Now, For Something Completely Different

Welcome back everyone! Tonight was Maggie's night in the kitchen, and she was determined to do something different. Last week, while searching for recipes, Maggie muttered to herself "I want to do something I haven't done before" While she was greatly satisfied with her cooking experiences so far - she feared she was falling into the same dishes. Chicken, pasta, chicken. pasta. It was time for a change. So - she set to work scouring cookbooks and finally came up with something original - something new and most importantly - something completely unlike what she has made before. I have to say - she did just that. Sadly, we couldn't make it as unique as we wanted to (due to supply issues - surprising supply issues at that) and she learned a few things along the way as well (some better than others). However, I'll let Maggie share all of that with you:


The Recipe: Veal Involtini with Pancetta on Bed of Spinach
Original Recipe Found In: Classic 30-Minute Meals: The All-Occasion Cookbook

What You'll Need:

1 Lb. Veal Scaloppini*
1 Lb Fresh Mozzarella Cheese
1 Red Pepper
1/3 Lb. Pancetta**
10 Oz. Baby Spinach***

* Substituted with two cuts of New York strip steaks. This was done because we couldn't find veal anywhere in the Des Moines metro area. Seriously. No one had ANY - we didn't realize that baby cow had a season...

** Substituted with bacon. Pancetta and bacon are nearly identical and bacon is a more cost effective ingredient.

*** Omitted from the recipe because...well, because we don't like it!

Hello food fanatics and blog readers alike!  Glad you made it back for another week of my shenanigans cooking.  Like Tyler mentioned, I really wanted to do something different this week.  I have an old standby of pasta and/or chicken.  I felt as an emerging chef, I couldn't be limited to those two kinds of dishes.  So, I turned to Rachael Ray to help me this week, and as it turned out, to be a good idea.


Before I began this week's recipe, I called two of our local grocery stores to see if they would have veal. One place said they could order it, but it wouldn't be in until Tuesday or Thursday.  The other place said they did not have it in stock and could not order it for me.  I was slightly bummed at the fact that I couldn't get veal, because it is quite the spectacular meat.  With the help of Tyler, we chose a thin versions of New York Strip Steaks, hoping this would help with what I would have to do for the recipe.

Sliced up New York Strip - a good substitute for veal 

I began by cutting the large steaks into smaller pieces and sprinkled pepper, salt, and parsley onto the strips. I then sliced up the red bell pepper (using the same technique as last night). Next, I transferred the steak pieces onto a sheet of parchment paper for easier mobility and to prevent sticking.  I placed a slice of cheese and a strip of red pepper on each slice of meat. Next, I wrapped the meat/cheese/pepper combination into a small roll. After said items were rolled up, I wrapped them with a slice of bacon and secured the whole thing with a toothpick slid through the center of the wrap. 

First the cheese... 

Then the pepper 

Topped with bacon 

And - ta da - one veal steak roll 

After all the food was prepped and ready to roll, I heated a pan up to medium heat (I can hear the gasps now - "Maggie, you don't cook meat at medium heat"....more on that later,) and drizzled the pan with EVOO (yes, since this is a Rachael Ray recipe, I will use her terminology.) (Tyler's Note: Extra Virgin Olive Oil for those who don't know) I sat four little guys in the pan at a time and cooked them each for 6 minutes on each side, just like the recipe tells me to. (We really need to get ahold of a large frying pan - I could have finished in half the time had I not been limited to such a small pan - I had to do three cycles to cook up all twelve wraps I had made).  After each wrap had finished cooking - it was time to chow down. 

Fryin' up 

Now, returning to my earlier point about a pan on medium heat. As some of you may know, cooking meat is an absolute no-no at medium heat. (Especially if you like your meat well-done, which I do).  But, since I couldn't tell what was going on inside the meat rollups, I followed the recipe exactly.  Bad idea.  High heat would have made my meat more cooked and probably more edible. Live and learn. 


The End Result:

(Tyler's note: for those wondering, we use our desk to take the photos due to the black surface (works better for pictures) that's why scotch tape keeps showing up in the background.)


After cooking the meat once more through the microwave, the bacon, New York Steak Strip, mozzarella cheese, and parsley came together in a very harmonious blend.  It was quite delicious.  The red pepper...I don't know if it was the microwaving we did to the pepper, but it didn't really work with this recipe.  Although I would have liked my meat to be a bit more cooked, I definitely broke out of my norm and did something completely different, and I am proud of myself for that.

Thank you Maggie. Tonight was a certain learning experience. As I cut into the first wrap on my plate - I was certain I heard it go 'Moo'. Yup, the meat was a 'little' (read: MOOING) undercooked. As Maggie mentioned, we had to turn to the microwave to save the dish - something that any cook absolutely HATES to do. Microwaves may be convenient but they absolutely kill the flavor and juices of a dish. In this case, the microwave cooked the juice right out of the steak, made the cheese extra runny and completely ruined the red pepper by giving it the consistency of a tire.

During our post meal "go over" (where Maggie and I chat about what we liked, what we didn't and what we would change) Maggie admitted to me that she placed the meat at "medium heat". I instantly cringed.  Medium heat...

"And how long did you cook it?"

"Six minutes."

Well that explains a lot. You have to laugh looking back at it now. The cookbook says 'six minutes' so Maggie cooked it at six minutes. What it doesn't say is "high heat" which I'm assuming Mrs. Ray THOUGHT was implied - but clearly isn't as obvious as she had hoped. All in all, Maggie now knows my saying in regards to this matter. Frying pan + meat = high heat. (Rhyming helps you remember things after all).

That being said the (salvaged) dish was still very enjoyable. The flavors all complimented each other well, and everything still tasted great (albeit a little tougher to cut after the microwave treatment). Considering all that popped up in her way - the fact that Maggie managed to make something good out of this dish says a lot. Kudos to her tonight folks, it's not as easy as it looks all the time - tonight was proof of that.

That's all we have for you tonight. I'm back tomorrow with a 100% original recipe. No borrowings - no influences (no safety net). Tune in this time tomorrow to see what we've cooked up. Until then,

~Cheers