Eggrolls

In the early 70s my family sponsored two Vietnamese families who lived with us.  This was life-changing for us, and the many lessons and memories involved would need a separate blog.  I do often think of the dishes taught to my mother by the matriarchs of the families, Monique and Hieu.  Monique's chicken chow mein is a favorite that is sure to make an appearance on my blog.
Hieu made the BEST eggrolls.  I'm not exaggerating here.  I did work with a lovely young woman from the Phillipines, Ruth, and she was a close second. It was a sad day when I realized we didn't have Hieu's coveted recipe but I've gotten back in touch with her children and I am working on it!  I didn't get Ruth's either.  What the heck was I thinking?
Since I don't have either awesome recipe, I made some on my own without great expectations.  Good thing, because these ain't pretty, but they're MY eggrolls. I usually call anything I make that doesn't look like it should, RUSTIC.  I'm not sure eggrolls can really be rustic..but I'm sure no one would doubt these are homemade because they are far from perfect.  I AM pleased to report that for my first time, they were quite tasty, and fun fun fun to make!

Eggrolls

1 lb lean ground chicken (or pork, beef, firm tofu)
1 tsp. minced fresh ginger
2 c. finely chopped cabbage
1/4 lb. bean sprouts
1/2 c. shredded carrot
3 finely chopped scallions
2 T oyster sauce
1 pk. egg roll wrappers
oil for frying

Stir-fry meat or tofu and ginger in skillet over high heat until browned, 2-3 minutes.  Add cabbage, sprouts, carrots and scallions; cook 2 min.   Stir in oyster sauce.  Allow mixture to cool.  Fill each egg roll with 2 T of filling and follow folding directions.  Deep-fry at 350 turning occasionally, until golden, 2-3 min.  Drain on paper towels and serve with Sweet & Sour Sauce.

I mix ketchup, apple or plum jelly, mustard and a dash of soy sauce for dipping.

We enjoyed these despite the fact they weren't made by sweet, loving Hieu with a smile that meets her eyes every time...who could do this in her sleep...whom I love dearly, even though her eggrolls are prettier than mine.

Peach-Mustard Glaze

I'm starting to see a pattern here with my bourbon-infused recipes.  I don't even drink bourbon.  I don't even like bourbon (straight).  WE don't drink bourbon, but we have a good friend who does, and he adheres to his own BYOB policy when he comes over.  Then he leaves the rest here.  Then I'm forced, FORCED I tell you, to figure out what to do with it.  As you may know, I try to get out of frying whenever I can.  This peach-mustard glaze helped me escape the fryer.  I am forever indebted.  I decided to grill some peach halves too, for presentation, you know.  Presentation is important!  Now remind me of that next time I go to the grocery store or Wal-Mart COMPLETELY lacking in presentation.

Yield:  1/14 cups



Peach-Mustard BBQ Sauce




3 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons minced onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 tablespoons cider vinegar
1/2 cup whole-grain mustard
1/4 cup Dijon mustard
3/4 cup peach jam or preserves (I used APRICOT)
1 tablespoon bourbon
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt



Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and garlic and cook until translucent, about 3 minutes. Add the vinegar and boil until almost completely reduced and the mixture looks like wet sand, about 4 minutes. Whisk in both mustards and the jam or preserves. Simmer, whisking, until jam melts, about 1 minute. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the bourbon and salt.


Adapted from Food Network Kitchen.

Brown Sugar Bourbon glazed Pork Chops

Fried pork chops are good...anything fried is good...just go to your local fair.  Fried Twinkies, fried Oreos, fried Coca-Cola, fried BUTTER...there's a Bubba Gump's list of what you can fry.  I love to EAT fried foods...but I don't like to FRY foods.  Whatta mess...like cleaning up after any meal isn't ENOUGH work!  I'm always looking for different ways to serve pork chops and chicken so I can fry less, which means clean less...and worry about fat and cholesterol less..examples of when less is a good thing, right?  I just happened to have some bourbon lying around, you know, left over from the Strawberry Bourbon Sauce.

The flavors of bourbon, brown sugar and dijon are a great sweet and tangy combination.  If it weren't for the alcohol, I might have a booth at the fair selling fried Brown Sugar Bourbon Glaze on a stick. You don't need no Twinkies!



Makes 6 servings



Ingredients

1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

3 tablespoons Dijon mustard

2 tablespoons soy sauce

2 tablespoons bourbon

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

6 (1-inch-thick) bone-in pork chops

Preparation

Stir together first 6 ingredients in a shallow dish or large zip-top plastic bag; add pork chops. Cover or seal, and chill 30 minutes, turning once.



Remove pork from marinade, reserving marinade.



Grill pork, covered with grill lid, over medium-high heat (350° to 400°) about 10 to 12 minutes or until a meat thermometer inserted into thickest portion registers 160°, turning once.



Bring reserved marinade to a boil in a small saucepan, and cook, stirring occasionally, 2 minutes. Pour over chops before serving.

Bourbon Strawberry Sauce

One night my husband asked if I had anything sweet around.  I hadn't baked anything that day...because I didn't FEEL like it, ok!

I had some fresh strawberries and frozen low-fat yogurt (hubby didn't look interested in that for some reason).  I love to prove him wrong, so I decided to find something simple to add to the "not the saaaame as ice cream" vanilla froyo.

I found this recipe in mom's cookbook and when I realized I had all of the ingredients, I knew it would be an easy sell.  I worried that it would defeat the purpose of lowfat frozen yogurt but it just takes a drizzle to add flavor, but really...who just drizzles yuminess?  I bet it would be great on warm pound cake, angel food cake or brownies too! 

Bourbon Strawberry Sauce

1 c. brown sugar
1 c. water
1 c. strawberry preserves (I used Smucker's seedless jam)
Juice of one lemon
Juice of one orange
1/2 c. bourbon
1 c. chopped nuts (optional)

Cook sugar and water until it spins a thread. (looks like a spider web when you "drip" it from your spoon).  Add remaining ingredients and stir well.  Delicious over ice cream. (and lowfat frozen yogurt, you don't have to tell your picky partner like I did.)

Better than Brownie Cookies

When I was on my cookie-baking kick over Christmas, my hubby and son would ask when I was going to make some brownies.  I like baking cookies because they only take about 10-15  min...nobody said I was patient.  But, I LOVE brownies. 

I came across these brownie-cookies on Brown Eyed Baker's site, which she adapted from Culinography, who got it from Technicolor Kitchen.  These are the perfect combination. They only take about 12 minutes to bake and they have that shiny, crinkly outside and a soft, chewy center. They're dense enough to dunk in milk, if that's how you roll.


They didn't last long at home and as much as my guys enjoy my cooking, I'd say their pet peeve is that I don't have time to make the same recipe twice because I'm forever searching for the new next best thing.  I can think of worse things than taste-testing a bunch of brownies and cookies. :)


Now, go whip these up and see if you want to make a 35 minute pan of brownies again.


Better-than-Brownies Chocolate Cookies

Makes 24 large cookies

2 2/3 cups (about 16 ounces) bittersweet chocolate, chopped

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature

4 eggs

1 1/3 cups granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

½ cup all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon baking powder

1 cup semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chips



1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.



2. Put the chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl and set it over a saucepan of barely simmering water, stirring occasionally, until completely melted and smooth.



3. In the meantime, stir together the eggs, vanilla and sugar in a medium bowl. Set aside.



4. In a small bowl, sift together the flour and baking powder.



5. Add the melted chocolate mixture to the egg mixture and stir to combine well. Slowly add the dry ingredients, folding them into the batter. Once all of the flour is incorporated, stir in the chocolate chips.



6. Scoop 1½ tablespoons of dough (a medium cookie scoop’s worth) onto prepared baking sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until they are firm on the outside. Like brownies, do not overbake! Leave to cool completely on the baking sheets.

Chopped Wedge Salad

Poor iceberg lettuce gets a bad rap.  It's snooty counterparts get all the attention.  I do love arugula, radicchio, baby spinach, romaine, etc., but I always come back to iceberg.  Imagine how happy I was with the popularity of the "wedge".  Who was the genius that came up with that?  Quarter a head of lettuce, pour some dressing over it and charge about $5-$7.  Not me : /  
It is a bit of a pain to eat though so when I read about Zach Braff's (Scrubs) restaurant in NYC, The Mermaid Oyster Bar, and their chopped wedge salad I said..DUH.
Then I read that iceberg lettuce is a superfood in disguise. Yeah, that's right...a SUPER food!  Ha.  And I quote.."Conventional wisdom suggests this salad staple is nutritionally bankrupt. But as it turns out, half a head of iceberg lettuce has significantly more alpha-carotene, a powerful disease-fighting antioxidant, than either romaine lettuce or spinach."  Winner winner steak and chopped wedge salad dinner!

1/2 cup mayonnaise (OK to sub light)

2 tablespoons ketchup

1 tablespoon horseradish

1 dash Worcestershire sauce

to taste kosher salt (I used sea salt)

6 thick strips smoked bacon, cut into 1 inch pieces

1 head iceberg lettuce

5 cherry tomatoes, halved

4 scallions, thinly sliced

1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese

to taste fresh ground pepper

1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley


Time: 20 mins

Make the dressing by whisking the mayo, ketchup, horseradish, Worcestershire sauce and salt to taste in a small bowl until smooth.

Cook the bacon in a skillet over medium heat until crisp, then transfer to a paper towel to drain.

Roughly chop the lettuce, then toss with some of the dressing in a serving bowl. Top with the tomatoes and scallions.

Scatter the bacon and cheese over the salad; season with pepper and sprinkle with the parsley.

Serve with more dressing on the side.

Oxtails with butter rice

When I met my hubby, literally, the first night..I agreed to cook for him.  We went to the store and I said pick out what you want.  He wanted fried pork chops, mac and cheese, green beans and rolls.  Easy enough...and good enough for a 2nd date and so on...and the rest is a crazy, roller coaster meant-to-be story..but anyway...he's definitely the kind of man that wanted a woman who could cook like his mama and his sister.  This meant he requested some dishes I hadn't made before.  His mom's corn pudding is sweet...my mom's was more savory.  His sister made fried apples and he loved his dad's blueberry pancakes.  Another first for me was oxtails.  Not only were they a first for me to prepare, but I hadn't eaten them either.  I have to admit, they are prettttty gooood.  I saw an oxtail stew on Down Home with the Neely's that I plan to make for him soon.  Shhh..don't tell him.  He'll figure out where I got the recipe when I start calling him daddy and dance around while I cook, a la Gina Neely ;)  Ooooo baby...STIR that stew and BUTTER them noodles. MMM mmmm!  They are too cute.


Ingredients


2 whole oxtails, sliced into 2-inch pieces

Favorite seasoning (I used Lawry's, garlic salt, black pepper)

Several dashes soy sauce and Worcestershire

2 large yellow onions, diced
3 to 4 bay leaves

Buttered Rice:

2 cups uncooked rice

4 cups water

1 stick butter

Kosher salt

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.



Trim fat from oxtails. In a broiling pan, toss oxtails with seasoning, soy sauce and Worcestershire. Top with onions and bay leaves. Add water to fill pan 1/4 of the way to the top. Cover pan with foil and bake until oxtails are tender, about 2 1/2 to 4 hours. Prepare rice according to package directions, adding butter and salt, to taste. Serve rice alongside oxtails.

I used pan drippings and added flour for a gravy for the rice with butter in this picture.

Baby Blueovers

Fresh uneaten blueberries the night before vacation + a son who won't eat them + a mom who was blueberried out (plain, cereal, smoothies) + puff pastry = what I call blueovers.  Yes, my son ate them....turns out blueberries are fine with him if they are sugary and surrounded by cream cheese and dough.  Who knew?



4 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 egg
1/4 cup sugar plus extra for sprinkling
1 sheet puff pastry, thawed
1/2 pint blueberries (1 cup)



Preheat the oven to 400 . Lightly coat a baking sheet with oil or cooking spray.

Place the cream cheese in a small bowl and stir until completely smooth.

Separate the egg yolk from the egg white. Place the egg white in a small bowl and add the egg yolk to the cream cheese. Add the sugar to the cream cheese and stir to combine.


Lay the sheet of puff pastry on a flat surface and cut into 9 small squares. Spoon a tablespoon of the cream cheese mixture down the center of each square from one corner to the opposite corner. Press the blueberries into the cream cheese. Fold the sides into the center, wet the points with a little water, and press tightly to seal. (Press the sides tightly together or they will open while they bake.)



Place the turnovers on the baking pan, brush with the egg white, and sprinkle lightly with sugar. (If you are making these ahead, you can cover the pan with plastic wrap and refrigerate them for up to 4 hours before baking.)



Bake for 15-17 minutes, until golden brown. Remove from the oven and serve.

These are NOT my brother's lamb chops!

My brother, Dale, was a wonderful cook and I dare say he enjoyed it more than the rest of us, if that's possible.  Actually, he enjoyed EVERYTHING.  He never met a stranger and rarely had a conversation without laughter.  He was a very handsome, loving father and a talented carpenter. 

He had hemophilia and that's the last thing he wanted to be known for, but I mention it because it kept him in the kitchen. He couldn't go out and play like most boys, so he spent many days inside with mom.  He learned to cook, developed a passion for food and gleaned more knowledge from mom than the rest of us put together. 

Dale passed away in 5/08 from an aneurysm at the age of 58.  I haven't forgotten anything I learned from him, from riding a bike without training wheels, water skiing and playing pool to living life to the fullest. We like to think he is at mom's side again, in a kitchen, feeding people whether they are hungry or not and entertaining them with his stories. :)

I can't eat lamb chops..okay..hear the word lamb chops, without thinking about Dale at the grill, smiling, and serving them with mint jelly and a corny joke on the side.  My husband still talks about how good they were but I don't have his recipe and honestly, I don't want to attempt to duplicate it.  I did find a great recipe of Bobby Flay's, with some of our favorite ingredients.  Honey, Dijon, horseradish and of course, mint.  The glaze is delicious and it's not supposed to taste like Dale's.  Bobby may be famous for his grilling, but when it comes to a bigger-than-life personality, my brother would have won that throwdown EASILY! 

Ingredients

12 baby lamb chops

Olive oil

Salt and freshly ground pepper

Glaze, recipe follows

Directions

Preheat grill to high. Brush chops on both sides with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Grill for 2 to 3 minutes on both sides for medium-rare doneness. Remove from grill and brush with the glaze.



Honey, Horseradish, Mustard, Mint Glaze:

1/4 cup Dijon mustard

1/4 cup honey

2 tablespoons prepared horseradish, drained

3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh mint

Salt and pepper

Whisk ingredients together in a medium bowl and season with salt and pepper to taste.



Yield: 1/2 cup


Savor every bite and remember to savor LIFE!







 

Payday Bars (Homemadely Yours Cookbook)

I made these recently for some lovely ladies at work.  They were a hit with several others as well.  They are very similar to a Payday bar even though they have Rice Chex in them.  My favorite compliment was that they are better than a Payday.  They also prompted a coworker to buy one of mom's cookbooks, and another to order one.  So I'm pretty confident that IF you like Payday candy bars, you will love these!

1 c. sugar
1 c. white karo syrup (I used light)
1 c. creamy peanut butter (I used reduced fat)
1 tsp. vanilla
6 c. rice chex cereal
1 1/2 c. cocktail peanuts

Mix sugar and karo syrup together in a small saucepan and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until boiling.  Stir in peanut butter and vanilla.  In a large bowl mix cereal and peanuts and cover with the hot mixture.  Stir to blend.  Pour into a 9x13 baking dish and press until firm.  Cut into bars when completely cool.