A touch of El Diablo

My last post on Chips and Salsa mentioned an old chain restaurant that is no longer in business, Chi Chi's. The brand lives on in supermarkets where you can purchase salsa, taco seasoning, and corn fritter mix, but when it was a restaurant chain, it was among Sandra's and my favorite places despite the fact that it was a chain.

What was special about Chi Chi's? The taste. I may have fell in love with Mexican food at El Torito, but Chi Chi's always had a fresher taste. I believe that they used cilantro more liberally than in any other place I ate at when I first started on my Mexican kick, and cilantro has this very "fresh" taste that enhances salsa, rice, and most Mexican dishes. This fresh taste made me feel that every dish they made was made solely for me. It's a wonderful way to run a restaurant--freshness is probably a quality that will keep you coming back, and it worked for me with Chi Chi's.

I remember one of the first times that Sandra and I visited Chi Chi's. I believe it was in Sunrise, Florida, in Broward Country up route 27 (this was before I-75 and I-595 were created, and Rt. 84 was "Alligator Alley"). The two of us made quick work of their chips and salsa and we asked the waiter for more. He cheerfully brought us out some more warm chips, but then admonished us: "You should watch out. They expand when they hit your stomach!" Sandra and I were both amused by this, and we've repeated it to each other (and our kids) many, many times whenever we eat chips and salsa.

Anyway, as I mentioned in my other article, I grew up thinking that Mexican food was hot. I've learned since that while you can find some spicy Mexican dishes, you are more likely to find dishes that don't have too much spiciness at all. In fact, corn and cheese really defines the cuisine, with spiciness a distant third.

After I moved from Miami to New England, I found a Chi Chi's was never too far away. The closest was a twenty minute drive, which was close enough for a special meal for Sandra and me.

I remember one day when I was visiting Chi Chi's, they had some new items on their menu, advertised to be pretty spicy. They were touted as Diablo (Spanish for "Devil"), but of the selections, nothing really appealed to me. At the time, I favored Chi Chi's beef chimichangas, and didn't want to order anything that was too different from that. Luckily, I noticed that they also had Diablo Sauce, which could be ordered separately, so I did. It came out with my chimichanga in a small bowl. The sauce was deliciously spicy--a warm, green sauce with meat in it. After a taste, I knew that they had something special, and I dumped most of it over my chimichangas and--voila!--a very good dish became ever better! I left a bit of sauce so that I could dip my chips into it.

From that day, I had a new favorite dish, and until the Chi Chi's near us closed, the Beef Chimichangas with a side order of Diablo Sauce was what I ordered every time I visited the place.

Alas, the place is no more. They closed the restaurants near me quite a few years ago, and the entire chain has since gone out of the restaurant business.

Last spring, I was feeling nostalgic about Chi Chi's and did a Google search to find out whatever became of them. In doing so, I found a Chi Chi's Copycat Recipes site, which I linked in my previous article. Two recipes linked on that sight intrigued me: Baked Chicken Chimichanga Chi Chi's Copycat Recipe and Chi Chi's Diablo Sauce Copycat Recipe. I copied those recipes into my personal recipe collection and did a Chi Chi's Mexican Dinner night with Sandra, including some freshly fried tortilla chips and Chi Chi's Garden Salsa (see previous post). Both Sandra and I enjoyed the trip down memory lane, although Sandra has never been as fond of the Diablo Sauce as I was; the recipe they gave would have made too much for the two of us.

I include the recipes for the Diablo sauce and the chimicangas below.

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Chi-Chi's Diablo Sauce

Source:	#131271 (C) 2009 Recipezaar. All Rights Reserved.
Cook Time:	35 min
Prep Time:	10 min
Yield:	Serves 4
Catalogued:	21-Apr-2009

Ingredients

1 lb ground pork

2/3 cup chopped white onion

1 (4 ounce) can diced green chilies, with juice

10 tablespoons la victoria green chili salsa

jalapeno (x-tra hot)

3 cups water

1 (1 ¼ ounce) package Ortega taco seasoning (Hot & Spicey)

2 tablespoons cumin

½ teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons cornstarch

¼ cup water

Brown ground pork, onions.

Add diced chilis, La Victoria salsa.

Add 3 cups water.

Add Ortega taco seasoning.

Add ½ tsp salt.

add 2 tbsp cumin.

Combine 2 tbsp corn starch and ¼ cup water and add too sauce.

Continue to simmer till thickened.

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Baked Chicken Chimichangas like Chi-Chi's®

Source:	Copycat Recipe Site
Prep Time:	0:45
Yield:	Serves : 8
Catalogued:	21-Apr-2009

Ingredients

1 sm. onion - chopped

3 cloves garlic - minced

1 Tbls vegetable oil OR butter OR margarine

2 cups salsa

1 ½ tsp chili powder

½ tsp ground cumin

½ tsp ground cinnamon

1 pinch salt

2 ½ cups cooked, shredded chicken OR turkey

8 12 flour tortillas

1 cup canned refried beans

non-stick cooking spray - as needed

In a large saucepan over medium-high heat, sauté onion and garlic in oil/butter until tender; stir in salsa, chili powder, cumin, cinnamon, and salt; fold in chicken/turkey; remove from heat and set aside.

Working with one tortilla at a time, spoon 2 Tablespoons of beans down the center of each tortilla; top with a scant ½ cup of the chicken mixture.

Fold the top and bottom of the tortillas toward the center, then roll up the sides.

Secure with wooden toothpicks or pieces of spaghetti noodles if necessary.

Place chimichangas in a 13" X 9" X 2" baking pan, seam side down.

Spray all sides of the chimichangas with a light coating of cooking spray.

Bake in a 450 degree oven for 20-25 minutes, or until golden brown and crisp, turning after 10 minutes.

Serve with sour cream and guacamole.

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Bon Appetit!

Celebrating Mardi Gras

When I went to the butcher shop this weekend, I was a bit disappointed that there wasn't any andouille sausage; I had really wanted to make some chicken and shrimp gumbo for Mardi Gras this week.

Instead, I found a nice package of four pork chops. I immediately thought about a meal I made before the kids were born. I believe I saw the recipe in James Beard's "American Cookery" cookbook, but I know that I adapted it to my own and Sandra's tastes.

Remembering that I liked that recipe, I decided to try to re-create it once again, this time doing it straight from memory. I had all the necessary ingredients, and asked Sandra if she had any packages of the "yellow rice" we both like (Carolina's Yellow Rice, packaged just right for the two of us with a hint of saffron).

This gave me a great opportunity to use my (relatively) new Calphalon pot, a 4.5 quart "Slow Poke" Saucier that I got for Christmas. It was the perfect size to saute four pork chops without crowding the bottom.

Sandra helped by making the Saffron Rice, substituting the water in the package directions with a can of chicken broth (for additional flavor).

The meal took about 45 minutes to accomplish (including preparation and cooking), and we each had a glass of Pinot Grigio to accompany the meal.

I won't claim that this meal was the next best thing to a pot of gumbo or to being in New Orleans watching the revelry, but it was a nice, relaxing meal for the two of us.

Would we do it again? Well, if I can get andouille sausage next year, I might just make a gumbo, but if I can't find them, this might good enough for the two of us!

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Creole Pork Chops with Rice

Yield:	2 servings (2 pork chops per serving)
Catalogued:	24-Feb-2009

Pork Chops

4 medium sized pork chops

Extra-virgin olive oil

One half of a large, sweet onion, slice thin

Flour (for coating pork chops)

2 tsp Cajun seasoning

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground thyme

1 dash Accent flavoring (MSG-optional)

1 10 oz can Tomatoes and Green Chiles (Rotel)

¼ cup red wine (dry or sweet)

Rice

1 package Carolina Yellow Rice

1 tbs butter

1 15 oz can chicken broth

On a stove, put 2 tbs olive oil into a large sauce pan (4.5 quart) on medium-high heat. Add sliced onions and saute for about 5 minutes until they get translucent.

Meanwhile, combine flour, Cajun seasoning, cumin, thyme, and Accent (if using) into a 1 quart Ziploc bag, and mix thoroughly. One by one, add a pork chop into the bag, seal, and then shake to coat the chops with the flour mixture. Set aside.

Remove the onions from the large saute pan and add floured pork chops, adding additional olive oil as needed. Saute over medium-high heat for 10 minutes a side until nicely browned on both sides (do not burn).

Prepare the yellow rice by bringing the can of broth and 1 tablespoon margarine to a boil in a medium (2 quart) saucepan. Stir in rice mix. Cover, reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

When pork chops are all browned, add the can of tomatoes and green chiles, the onions that you have set aside, and red wine. Mix thoroughly together, moving the pork chops so they are setting on top of the tomato mixture. Cover pan, and simmer at medium-high heat until the sauce starts to bubble, and then reduce heat to medium. After ten minutes, turn the pork chops over and mix the sauce again, adding water or additional wine if the sauce starts to reduce too much. Lower heat to medium-low and allow the mixture to set for an additional 10 minutes.

To serve, fluff rice lightly with fork and then spoon rice onto two plates. Next, add two pork chops per pate, dividing the sauce over the four chops.

Serve with a dry white wine (Pinot Grigio or Chardonnay).

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Bon Appetit!

Shepherd's Pie

I've always liked the idea of Shepherd's Pie. In it's most basic form, it's a simple stew to make. I've had this in restaurants, and I've made it myself. Sandra likes it as well... up to a point. I'll explain that in a bit.

For the life of me, I cannot remember when I first had Shepherd's Pie. I do not remember having it at home as we grew up at all, nor do I recall having it when I was living in Miami.

I do know that when I was working in the North End of Boston (between 1987 and 1992), I not only knew what Shepherd's Pie was, but I had it on a semi-regular basis at some of the restaurants nearby.

To this day, the best version of the dish that I've had was from The Black Rose restaurant and pub on State Street near Quincy Market in Boston. I went there on a regular basis and had Shepherd's Pie there more often than not.

The dish isn't particularly difficult to figure out. That's lucky for me, since this was before The Food Network or being able to Google a recipe on the Internet was possible, and I do not believe that I had a recipe for this dish in my cookbooks at home. What it tasted to me was ground lamb, seasoned with Worcestershire sauce, mixed with onions and vegetables (peas, carrots), with a nice helping of mashed potatoes on top. Almost always, it was served as if it were baked in the bowl from which it was served. It wasn't particularly expensive, and was tasty and made a great lunch meal. (Meat, potatoes, and even a few vegetables, all in one dish!)

Sandra and I have a nice set of covered bowls that we used many times for making onion soup. The first time I made Shepherd's Pie at home, I knew that I just HAD to use those bowls! I've seen presentations of Shepherd's Pie since, usually made in a large casserole dish with portions cut out with a spatula, and to me, this is just no way to make the dish. It's not that much more difficult to cook it in the bowl that you will be serving it in, as long as the bowl is oven safe, of course.

Anyway, I didn't have too much trouble putting the recipe together. As I said, the ingredients were easy to detect from tasting it. I just sautéed the ground lamb and added freshly chopped onions (you don't want your vegetables too prominent in this dish), and continued cooking until the meat was done and the onions translucent. I may have added some chopped carrots that first time--I'm not really sure. I know I added some frozen peas near the end, to let them thaw out.

Ground lamb can get greasy, so it was necessary to drain the sautée pan once the meat was cooked. After that, I added some spices to taste: Worcestershire sauce (about two tablespoons), some onion powder, and some garlic salt. I tasted as I went along, and I was confident that I found the Black Rose's recipe. (As I said, it wasn't difficult.)

I then portioned the meat and vegetable mixture into the bowls, and then spooned some instant mashed potatoes (yes, I really used instant!) on top. I baked the bowls in a 350°F oven, and cooked it for about 10-15 minutes. Afterward, I turned the heat up in the oven and switched to Broil to give the potatoes a bit of a brownish tinge--about 4-5 minutes.

When the meal was served, I was ecstatic. The meat was bubbling underneath the dome of mashed potatoes. In fact, when I made a hole in the potatoes to get to the meat, a lot of steam came out of it! The taste was right on the spot!

Sandra, on the other hand, didn't like it much. The problem was that she doesn't like lamb at all. Not grilled, not cubed for Irish stew, and (apparently) not ground. The lamb was the deal breaker for her. In deference to her, in all my subsequent efforts in making this dish, I've been using ground beef. I think that ground beef lessens the "authenticity" (at least to the Black Rose taste I came to love), but it is perfectly workable, and I've come to enjoy the beef variety. Sandra does, too.

I never jotted down my recipe from that first time, since I managed to get it right just by using my taste buds. Since then, I've found a pretty good recipe by Rachael Ray on her Thirty Minute Meals show, which I now use as a guide. She goes into the details of mashing the potatoes (and still does the meal in thirty minutes!), which I don't do personally—Sandra is the one that usually mashes the potatoes. I still make the recipe to taste, but I use her ingredient list as a guide to make sure I don't forget anything. (Old age can do that to a guy!)

Last week, I asked Sandra if she'd like Shepherd's Pie. I got the idea from watching a show on Irish Pubs on the Canadian version of the Food Network. (Interestingly enough, The Black Rose was featured prominently on that show!) She thought it would be a great idea, but she didn't know how much mashed potatoes to make (she doesn't like instant mashed potatoes much, and doesn't mind making them from scratch for a meal).

I went shopping and got the requisite ground beef. Market Basket also had some Angus "pub burgers" (large, ⅓ pound burgers) and I bought them for a Salisbury Steak meal. When I told Sandra of my purchases, we figured it would be a great idea to make the Salisbury Steaks one night, and Sandra would make an extra helping of mashed potatoes. She put them in the refrigerator overnight, and then I used them to spoon over the bowls. It had been a couple of years since I made Shepherd's Pie, but it turns out that I still have the knack!

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30 Minute Shepherd's Pie

Source:	Rachael Ray—30 Minute Meals—Food Network
Prep Time:	15 minutes
Cook Time:	25 minutes
Yield:	4 servings
Catalogued:	17-Dec-2004

Ingredients

2 pounds potatoes, such as russet, peeled and cubed

2 tablespoons sour cream or softened cream cheese

1 large egg yolk

½ cup cream, for a lighter version substitute vegetable or chicken broth

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, 1 turn of the pan

1 ¾ pounds ground beef or ground lamb

1 carrot, peeled and chopped

1 onion, chopped

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 cup beef stock or broth

2 teaspoons Worcestershire, eyeball it

½ cup frozen peas, a couple of handfuls

1 teaspoon sweet paprika

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves

Boil potatoes in salted water until tender, about 12 minutes. Drain potatoes and pour them into a bowl. Combine sour cream, egg yolk and cream. Add the cream mixture into potatoes and mash until potatoes are almost smooth.

While potatoes boil, preheat a large skillet over medium high heat. Add oil to hot pan with beef or lamb. Season meat with salt and pepper. Brown and crumble meat for 3 or 4 minutes. If you are using lamb and the pan is fatty, spoon away some of the drippings. Add chopped carrot and onion to the meat. Cook veggies with meat 5 minutes, stirring frequently. In a second small skillet over medium heat cook butter and flour together 2 minutes. Whisk in broth and Worcestershire sauce. Thicken gravy 1 minute. Add gravy to meat and vegetables. Stir in peas.

Preheat broiler to high. Fill a small rectangular casserole with meat and vegetable mixture. Spoon potatoes over meat evenly. Top potatoes with paprika and broil 6 to 8 inches from the heat until potatoes are evenly browned. Top casserole dish with chopped parsley and serve.

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Bon Appetit!

Roll Your Owns

One of my family's favorite weekday meals is tacos. Although we use the packaged taco seasonings, we don't use the taco shells that they sell in the Mexican aisle in the supermarket. Instead we have what we've come to call "Roll Your Owns."

The process is simple. First, we brown some ground beef, discarding the extra fat that renders out. We use a wooden spatula to break up the beef into small crumbles as it cooks. Afterward, we add between a half cup and a cup of water and taco seasoning. Actually, we use a combination of one packet taco seasoning, and one packet "salsa mix," which I've found to give the meat a fresher taste than just taco seasoning alone. I've found that if you add too much water, the meat gets very runny; you can fix that up easily by adding a bit of cheese to make the mixture a bit firmer until you get the consistency you want.

As the meat is cooking, the rest of the taco ingredients are prepared. Lettuce is shredded, tomatoes are diced, onions sliced and diced, shredded cheese taken out of the refrigerator. We also add other things, depending on what's on hand: scallions, cilantro, whatever. All these ingredients, as well as the cooked meat, are put onto plates or bowls.

Next, we quickly wash the skillet we used to cook the meat, and then add about an inch or so of vegetable oil. The oil is heated until a drop of water "dances" when added to the pan.

Now, it's time to make the tortillas. We've found that about a dozen corn tortillas makes enough tacos for our family of four, so we usually make sure we have on hand two dozen tortillas in case somebody is hungrier than usual.

We fry the tortillas in the hot oil for varying amounts of time: about a minute for a "soft taco," a couple of minutes for a "medium taco," up to four or five minutes for a "hard taco" (folded) or "tostada" (flat). At our house, the "medium taco" is usually the favorite, with occasional requests for tacos or tostadas. The fact that they are "cooked to order" is why we call them "Roll Your Owns."

Once finished, the tortilla is placed on a plate covered with absorbent paper towel, and then the recipient will fill it with meat and various veggies and cheese, topping with taco sauce.

By the time four tortillas have been prepared, it's time to start again with the first person's second taco, and keep frying until everybody has had their fill.

Usually, at the end, there are still some tortillas, meat, and other ingredients left over. Not to fear! The remaining tortillas are cut into pie wedges (about six pieces per tortilla), and fried to make tortilla chips. Meanwhile, the remaining ingredients are collected into a single bowl to make taco salad. A few chips are crushed to top the salad, and the salad is eaten with the remaining chips.

Yum!

Veal Piccata

Let's face it. I love Italian food. Even if it isn't your every day red sauce meal.

First, there's nothing wrong with red sauce. I love it very much. My wife loves it as well.

However, you can't have tomato sauce every day, and Italian recipes offer much more than just sauce.

Enter Veal Piccata. I've always loved it. I can't remember the first time I had it, but it was most likely after I got married, since I wasn't the kind of person to experiment with new ideas before then.

Anyway, I made Veal Piccata about a year ago, and was amazed. The veal was grilled on my grill pan, and then added to the sauce.

Amazingly, I never kept the recipe I used!

This week, I got a good deal on Veal Scallopine at McKinnon's market, and I wanted to make Veal Piccata. So... I had to search the web to find the recipe I found back then. I think I managed to find it!

I made this on Tuesday, and it's just as good as I remembered.

Have fun!

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Veal Piccata

Source:	Gourmet, January 2002
Active Time:	20 min
Total Time:	30 min
Yield:	Makes 8 servings.
Catalogued:	12-Feb-2008

Grill the veal while the noodles boil so both are ready at the same time.

Sauce

1 ¼ cups low-fat chicken stock or low-sodium fat-free chicken broth

⅓ cup dry white wine

1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon unsalted butter

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

2 tablespoons chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

Boil stock and wine in a 2- to 3-quart heavy saucepan until reduced by about half (to about ¾ cup), about 3 minutes. Whisk together flour and water in a cup, then whisk into stock. Boil, stirring, 1 minute, then remove from heat and stir in butter, lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste. Keep sauce warm.

Veal

2 lb veal cutlets (also called scallopini; ¼ inch thick)

¾ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon black pepper

1 lemon, thinly sliced

Cut veal into 3-inch pieces, then pat dry with paper towels. Lightly oil grill pan and heat over high heat until just smoking.

While pan is heating, sprinkle veal with salt and pepper. Grill veal in batches, without crowding, until browned, about 30 seconds on each side, transferring with tongs to a platter. Grill lemon slices, in batches if necessary, until lightly browned, about 1 minute per side, transferring to platter with veal.

Stir parsley into warm sauce and pour over veal.

Serve with buttered noodles with chives

If uncooked cutlets are more than ¼ inch thick, pound to ¼ inch thick between 2 sheets of plastic wrap with a rolling pin.

Nutritional Information
calories	143
grams fat	2

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Bon Appetit!

Rolled Tacos

According to the Wikipedia, taquitos are small rolled-up tortillas with some sort of filling, usually beef or chicken. They are also called Rolled Tacos, and sometimes (usually when made with flour tortillas) Flautas.

I first came upon these things as flautas when I was living in Miami. A few restaurant had these intriguing things in the appetizer sections called "Flautas" and I tried some. I wasn't particularly impressed with them at the time; they seemed to be crispy rolls that didn't really have much to offer as far as taste was concerned—they just didn't have enough filling in them for my taste.

Over the years, I saw flautas on menus, usually as an appetizer, but occasionally as an item in the "combination plates" as well. I didn't really dislike them, but I never really found myself impressed with them. In fact, my impression was that they were just chimichangas with smaller tortillas and without most of the filling. Almost always, they were served "dry" without any sauce on top as a chimichanga would be served, but with some sort of salsa to accompany them.

I'm not sure when I first encountered taquitos by that name. I'm pretty sure that, like flautas, they were on the appetizer or combinations section of Mexican menus. I noticed something about them almost immediately: they tasted better. I think the difference (to me) was that fried corn tortillas have an inherent crunch and taste that is simply lacking in flour tortillas. They still didn't have much as far as filling was concerned, but they were a step up from flautas to my taste.

Today, you can find taquitos in many supermarket freezer sections. Get a box of ten or twenty and heat them up in your oven. Simple meal or snack. Of course, when I first tried these frozen varieties, I knew that I needed something to dip them into. Salsa was an obvious choice, but I wanted something a bit special for these.

I'm not sure where I got the idea the first time, but I distinctly remember making a spicy ranch dip. I simply put some ranch salad dressing into a small dipping bowl. To this, I added some chili powder and a few drops of hot sauce. Voila! Instant classic in less than a half hour!

While I still get the frozen taquitos, I've noticed that a lot of them are now being made with flour tortillas: exactly what I didn't like about flautas originally! Luckily, the boxes will tell you what you are getting, but you should look carefully!

Recently, I started making taquitos from scratch. I surprised Sandra by making a breakfast for her one weekend. I made an omelet, and added ground chorizo and some salsa to make the filling, which then I wrapped into small corn tortillas that I first sprayed with cooking spray. I assembled the breakfast taquitos onto a cookie sheet and cooked them in the oven for about twenty minutes. Sandra really liked the result!

Sandra noticed recently that Rachael Ray had a recipe for taquitos on her "Thirty Minute Meals" show, and she asked me to capture the recipe for her into our recipe collection.

I'm excerpting her recipe below, which also includes some burritos (you decide if you want both taquitos and burritos!).

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Poquito and Grande: Taquitos and Burritos

Source:	Rachael Ray—30 Minute Meals—Food Network
Prep Time:	15 minutes
Cook Time:	30 minutes
Yield:	6 to 8 servings
Catalogued:	04-Feb-2008

Taquitos

2 cups shredded rotisserie chicken

1 teaspoon ground cumin

½ teaspoon dried oregano

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 can chopped green chiles, 4 ounces

A few leaves fresh cilantro or parsley, finely chopped

Vegetable or canola oil, for frying

12 (6-inch) corn tortillas

Preheat oven to 425°F.

Season the chicken with cumin, oregano, salt and pepper and mix in the chiles and cilantro or parsley. Dip the tortillas in 1-inch warm oil to soften. Tightly roll a couple of forkfuls of chicken up in the tortillas. Place seam side down and bake 12 minutes.

Dipping Sauce For Burritos And Taquitos

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

1 red onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, grated or finely chopped

1 teaspoon sugar

1 tablespoon chili powder, a palm full

1 ½ teaspoons ground cumin, ½ a palm full

A pinch ground cinnamon

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 (28-ounce) can fire roasted crushed tomatoes

Heat a sauce pot over medium heat and add 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, red onion and garlic and soften 5 minutes then season with sugar, chili powder, cumin, cinnamon, salt and pepper and stir in the fire roasted tomatoes. Reduce heat to low and simmer.

Burritos

8 (8-inch) flour tortillas

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided

1 ½ pounds ground pork

1 small zucchini, grated

2 cloves garlic, grated or finely chopped

2 to 3 tablespoons (medium to hot) chipotle in adobo, mashed into paste

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 (19-ounce) can black beans (recommended: Progresso)

2 cups shredded Chihuahua cheese or Monterey Jack or Cheddar

½ head iceberg lettuce, or 1 heart romaine, shredded

Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat with 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil. Add the pork, brown it for 2 minutes then add in zucchini, garlic, chipotle in adobo and salt. Cook for about 7 to 8 minutes more.

Heat the last tablespoon of extra-virgin olive oil in a small nonstick skillet. Add the black beans and mash with a fork. Season the beans with salt and fry until crisp at edges, about 3 to 4 minutes.

Soften tortillas in microwave or in hot oven. On each tortilla pile a little refried black beans, cheese, pork and lettuce. Tuck in the sides then wrap and roll the tortilla.

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Bon Appetit!

Gumbo

I spent a lot of time last week wandering through Shaw's supermarket after work trying to come up with ideas for meals for Sandra and myself. Our nest is still empty, and I don't have too many items in my repertoire for two people.

On Sunday, I got a great idea. Instead of going to Shaw's looking for ideas, I should go to McKinnon's Meat and Super Butcher Shop instead.

McKinnon's is, as its name suggests, a combination butcher shop, meat market, and super market... all rolled in one. The prices for groceries aren't bad, but their specials on meat, poultry, and seafood are fantastic!

They advertised Baby Back ribs for less than $2.50—but they were unfortunately out of stock. Sandra and I looked at different meat items until I came across their andouille sausage.

"I could make gumbo," I suggested without much hope.

"Do you know how to make it?" Sandra asked.

"I think I have a recipe in my private collection," I answered. (I did; it was one of Rachael Ray's 30 Minute Meals.)

Sandra then surprised me by saying, "If you want to make it, then I'll try it."

Up until that moment, Sandra never even tried gumbo. I've found a couple of restaurants that serve it—like Border Cafe, which serves it as an appetizer, but every time I offered a taste to Sandra, she always turned me down.

I was so happy that Sandra gave me the chance that I realized that I did not actually know what was needed for the recipe. I knew that okra played a big part, and suggested celery and onions. I wanted to make it with chicken, sausage, and shrimp (Hey! Why not go for broke?). I checked a can of Campbell's Gumbo Soup (their Healthy Request version of Gumbo is surprisingly good, by the way!), and checked the recipes and confirmed the ingredients, which included tomatoes, so I got a big can of crushed tomatoes as well. Instead of green pepper, which doesn't appeal to either Sandra or me, I got a tiny can of chopped green chiles from the Mexican aisle.

When I got home, I searched my recipe file and found Rachael's recipe. It wasn't exactly what I wanted, so I searched the recipes on FoodNetwork.com, and found about seven pages of hits for gumbo.

The one I chose had most of the ingredients that I already had, with the exception of shrimp, which I figured could be added in later.

When I made this recipe, I noticed a few things:

• I needed more than the three tablespoons of oil to make the roux
  
• I needed more than a half cup of flour, but the recipe DOES say a half cup plus flour for dredging. I dredged the chicken in the half cup of flour, and used the remainder for the start of the roux. I needed to add more flour to get what I thought was enough.
  
• I threw a handful of peeled shrimp into the gumbo about fifteen minutes before I was ready to serve the dish.
  
• Next time, I think I will cook the vegetables separately, since cooking them in the roux didn't seem to work so well.
  
• Sandra found out at the last minute that we didn't have white rice, so we substituted jasmine rice (Thai rice) instead, which worked nicely.
  
• I used the crushed tomatoes rather than the peeled whole tomatoes called for in the recipe. After putting in about half a can, I realized I had enough, so I put the remainder into the refrigerator for later on this week when I make an Italian sauce.
  
• I used some spicy creole seasoning (not very much, though) instead of the red pepper, since I didn't want to make the gumbo too spicy.

Sandra's verdict? She liked it! She was surprised that it wasn't very spicy at all, which I think was the reason for her hesitancy for even trying it in a restaurant.

We had enough for two meals (so much for the "meal for two" I wanted to make), and we plan on having leftovers on Monday evening.

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Chicken and Andouille Gumbo

Source:	From Food Network Kitchens
Prep Time:	15 minutes
Cook Time:	50 minutes
Yield:	6 to 8 servings
Catalogued:	02-Dec-2007

Ingredients

2 to 3 tablespoons vegetable oil

12 ounces andouille sausage, cut into 1-inch pieces

½ cup all-purpose flour, plus more for dredging

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

12 chicken thighs

2 medium onions, sliced

2 red or green bell peppers, stemmed, seeded and cut into strips

2 ribs celery, chopped

10 ounces fresh or frozen okra, cut into ½ inch pieces

10 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

3 sprigs fresh thyme or 1 teaspoon dried

2 bay leaves

1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

6 to 8 cups low-sodium chicken broth

1 (15-ounce) can whole peeled tomatoes, with their juice

2 tablespoons cider vinegar

3 scallions (whit and green parts), thinly sliced

Chopped parsley leaves, for garnish

Heat a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat and add the vegetable oil. Add the sausage and cook, stirring occasionally, until browned and much of the fat is rendered. Remove the sausage to plate with a slotted spoon.

While the sausage browns, pour a good amount of flour into a shallow baking dish, and season with salt and pepper. Dredge the chicken with the flour and add to the Dutch oven, in batches if necessary, and cook until brown on both sides. Remove to the plate with the sausage.

Add the ½ cup flour to the Dutch oven and cook, stirring constantly, until light golden brown. Add the onions, peppers, and celery to the Dutch oven and cook, stirring, about 2 minutes. Stir in the okra and the garlic and cook, stirring, about 2 minutes.

Strip the leaves from the thyme into the Dutch oven, and stir in the bay leaves, red pepper flakes, and 6 cups broth. Crush the tomatoes through your hands into the pot. Return the chicken and sausage to the pot, bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer, uncovered, 25 to 30 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through. Stir in some additional chicken stock to thin the sauce a bit, if desired.

Stir in the vinegar, scallions, and parsley, taste, and adjust the seasoning.

Rice

2 cups long-grain rice

3 cups water or chicken broth

1 teaspoon kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Put the rice in a medium saucepan with a cover. Stir in the water or broth, salt, and pepper. Smooth the rice to make an even surface, cover and heat over low to medium-low heat until all the liquid has been absorbed and rice is tender, about 15 to 20 minutes.

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Bon Appetit!

French Bread Pizza

(Sorry for the delay in posting; holidays and everything kept me busy! —lar3ry)

When the kids were very young, Sandra and I had two vastly different work schedules. She worked from about 3pm until 11pm at night (evening shift), and I worked during the day. We usually had a babysitter watch the kids between the time Sandra had to leave for work, and the time I got home, although we sometimes used day care instead.

What this meant was that I was responsible for feeding the kids their supper. When they were in the "baby food" ages, I had a selection of a few pre-made foods for the kids. Sandra used to joke that I wouldn't feed the kids anything I wouldn't eat myself, and that was actually mostly true. The kids ended up eating a lot of mashed banana, sometimes carrots, and some rice cereal for the most part.

When the children were old enough for "real food," they progressed quickly from Cheerios and other bite-size items to more sophisticated items like soups and pizza.

Now, I've already explained history with pizza in another blog entry, and I won't repeat myself here. Needless to say, I knew that the kids loved pizza, and it wasn't in my heart to avoid it. For a time, those "Red Baron" mini-pizzas that you could cook in a microwave were popular, but they started to get repetitive. Another frozen pizza that I seemed to always have liked is Ellio's (the square pizzas), but they weren't a big hit with the girls. A small pizza from the pizza place just down the road from my house was cheap enough (about three dollars for a plain pizza), that I occasionally chose that as well.

At the time, I was working in Boston's North End in a building that sits right across the street from the Paul Revere house on North Street. The North End is a well known Italian neighborhood, and has many block party "feasts" throughout the year.

On my way home, I would walk from my office, through the North End, towards the Boston Garden, and pick up my commuter rail at North Station. The trek through the North End had me passing a number of bakeries, and one day as I was passing by, I saw a large loaf of French Bread. That got me to thinking about French Bread pizza—something that Sandra and I may have had once or twice, but I don't think we ever made it from scratch. "How difficult could it be?" I asked myself, and I purchased a fresh loaf on my way home.

I love fresh bread, and it was a big act of self-control that kept me from eating the bread while I was sitting in the train on my way home. However, I had a couple of hungry pizza-eaters to feed, so good ol' dad kept his appetite at bay and the loaf made it safely through the train ride in one (complete) piece. Driving home, I stopped at the grocery store to purchase some pizza sauce from a jar (I wasn't that familiar with making my own pizza sauce), and some shredded mozzarella.

I was set.

At home, I cut the bread, added the sauce and cheese, and popped it into the oven until the cheese melted (about 400 F for about ten minutes).

The kids loved it!

I did, too, although I simply made mine without the sauce and cheese—toasted French bread!

Over the years, I varied the recipe a bit, sometimes using leftover (homemade) spaghetti sauce, sometimes adding cooked sausage or slices of pepperoni, and this was always a quick, easy meal to make.

A couple of years ago, while watching Rachael Ray on Food Network's "Thirty Minute Meals," I saw Rachael make what I thought was a French Bread Pizza on Steroids. Of course, she had her own name for it (shown below).

I've made this myself, although I did my own take on the recipe, as neither Sandra nor I wanted the pepper, spinach, or ricotta. Still, Rachael's recipe was a great starting point for a whole new era of French Bread pizza at my house. It's still a quick and easy meal.

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Super Stuffed French Bread Pizza Rustica

Source:	Rachael Ray—30 Minute Meals—Food Network
Prep Time:	10 minutes
Cook Time:	25 minutes
Yield:	4 servings
Catalogued:	03-Nov-2005

Ingredients

1 (2 foot long) loaf French bread

1 pound sweet Italian sausage

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

1 small red bell pepper, seeded and chopped

1 small onion, chopped

2 large cloves garlic, chopped

1 package frozen chopped spinach defrosted and squeezed dry

Salt and pepper

1 ½ cups part skim ricotta

½ cup grated Parmesan

½ pound sweet sopressata, from the deli, sliced thick, chopped

½ stick pepperoni, chopped

1 sack (10 ounces) shredded mozzarella

1 sack (10 ounces) shredded provolone

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

Preheat oven to 425°F.

Split bread lengthwise and hollow it out. Cut in half across, making 4 shells for pizzas.

Heat a skillet over medium high flame and brown sausage in extra-virgin olive oil. Brown and crumble sausage. Add red bell pepper, onion and garlic. Cook 3 to 5 minutes, add spinach. Remove mixture from heat and season with a pinch of salt and black pepper, to your taste.

Transfer to a bowl. Combine sausage and veggies with ricotta, Parmesan, sopressata and pepperoni. Fill bread shells and top with mounded mozzarella and provolone cheeses. Place in hot oven on cookie sheet and bake until cheese melts and bubbles and bread is super crisp, about 10 to 12 minutes. Top pizzas with oregano and hot pepper flakes. Serve immediately, or snack all night!

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Bon Appetit!

Pasta with Meat Sauce

My family has come to enjoy my pasta with meat sauce recipes. I use the plural here, because my sauce comes in about three varieties: traditional, without vegetables, and with ground meat.

The first variety, which is most closely associated with the Italian Bolognese sauce, consists of cubes of beef simmered with onions, carrots, celery, beef stock, and crushed tomatoes. Now, according to the Wikipedia, my use of tomatoes may make it less than authentic, but we seem to enjoy it this way.

Sandra, however, doesn't really like when I add the finely cubed vegetables (carrots and celery) to the meat, which is about the only time that I prefer more vegetables to a dish than Sandra. If I'm in a rush, I will use ground meat (make sure it's relatively lean, about 85%) to make a quick meal. Hence the three varieties.

Below is my traditional meat sauce with notes at the bottom for additional varieties.

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Bolognese Sauce

Source:	My recipe that evolved over twenty some-odd years
Yield:	Serves 4-6
Catalogued:	13-Nov-2007

Ingredients

2 ribs of celery, chopped into small cubes

1 carrot, chopped into small cubes

2 Tbs olive oil

1 ½ lbs lean beef, cut into small cubes

1 medium onion, chopped

1 can beef broth

¼ cup red wine

1 Tbs dried basil

1 Tbs dried bacon bits (artificial is fine)

28 oz can crushed tomatoes (Contadina preferred)

6 oz can tomato paste

1 lb hearty pasta (linguine, tagliatelle, perciatelli, bucatini, or penne)

Grated hard cheese (Parmesan or Romano)

Chop the ribs of celery and carrot into tiny (about ⅛") cubes. Slice the onion thinly, and then chop to make small cubes.

Using a Dutch oven, drizzle the olive oil onto the bottom of the pot over medium-high heat, and rotate the pot until the oil covers the bottom. Add chopped carrots, celery, and onions, and cook for about five minutes, stirring occasionally, until the onions are translucent. Add extra oil, if necessary.

Add the cubed beef and continue to cook, stirring occasionally to ensure that all the beef is cooked. Sauté the meat and vegetable mixture for an additional three minutes and then add the broth, wine, basil, bacon bits, tomatoes, and paste.

Wait until the mixture starts to bubble and then lower the heat to medium-low. Cover the pot and simmer for at least twenty minutes— the longer you cook, the more chance for the flavors to "marry."

Prepare a pound of pasta according to package directions until al denté.

Serve Bolognese sauce over pasta, garnishing with Parmesan or Romano cheese, as desired.

• Add one frozen sausage, cubed for additional flavor
• Ground beef may be substituted for the cubed meat
• Sandra prefers the sauce without the cubed vegetables

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Bon Appetit!

A Simple Japanese Meal

Japanese food consists of simple ingredients, simple preparation, and impeccable presentation. This column will detail two simple dishes that don't take a lot of time to prepare to make a good Japanese meal.

This meal comes mostly from a recipe book that Sandra and I truly love: "Cooking With Mickey" (a collection of recipes from various restaurants at Disneyland and Walt Disney World). We have two volumes of this book—a first volume which has a light cardboard cover and plastic spiral binding, and the second volume which has a traditional "hard cover" with the same spiral binding.

In EPCOT's World Showcase, there is a tiny restaurant in the Japan pavilion called the Yakitori House. The specialty of this restaurant is, as you might guess, Chicken Yakitori. The cookbook has the recipe for the Yakitori Sauce, and the rest of the recipe is my recreation of the Chicken Yakitori.

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Chicken Yakitori

Source:	Cooking With Mickey, Gourmet Mickey Cookbook Volume II
Yield:	4 Servings
Catalogued:	28-Sep-2007

Yakitori Sauce

¼ cup Sake wine^*

1 cup Mirin wine

1 cup soy sauce

1 tbs sugar

2 tbs cornstarch

⅓ cup water

^*Note: Like Sake, Mirin wine is a rice-based wine. Sake can be used instead for a total of 1 ¼ cups.

Chicken Skewers

1 lb boneless chicken thighs, cut into half-inch pieces

2 green onion, cut into half-inch pieces (optional)

bamboo skewers

Combine Sake and Mirin (if using both) in a medium-size saucepan and bring to a boil. Add soy sauce and sugar. Simmer, covered, for 30 minutes.

Soak bamboo skewers in cold water for 30 minutes (to prevent burning during grilling).

Dissolve cornstarch in water and add to the sauce. Cook and stir until mixture thickens.

Heat grill to medium high, or preheat grill pan over a medium-high burner.

Thread chicken pieces onto skewers, optionally alternating with green onions, about 4-6 pieces of chicken per skewer.

Begin grilling the chicken skewers without the sauce, turning after five minutes. When the meat starts changing color, brush the sauce on both sides, and continue grilling, brushing onsauce about four times total, turning until done (about ten minutes total).

Serve hot over rice.

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No Japanese meal would be complete without a fresh, crispy salad of iceberg lettuce, some shredded carrots, a bit of red cabbage, and this wonderful Ginger Dressing...

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Ginger Dressing

Source:	Cooking With Mickey, Gourmet Mickey Cookbook Volume II
Yield:	2 quarts
Catalogued:	28-Sep-2007

This recipe comes from EPCOT's Mitsukoshi Restaurant, located in the Japan pavillion in the World Showcase.

Ingredients

2 ounces ginger root (about ½ cup)

1 medium onion, cut in quarters

3 cups vegetable oil

1 cup rice vinegar

1 ¾ cups soy sauce

1 ½ tbs tomato paste

½ lemon, juiced

1 ¾ cups water

Soak ginger root in cold water for a few minutes to make it easier to remove the outer skin with a peeler. Remove skin and cut into quarters.

Combine all ingredients in a food processor with a steel blade and blend until smooth. If blender will not handle entire recipe, divide in half and blend each half separately and then mix afterward.

Refrigerate and serve on salad.

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Bon Appetit!

Spicy Pork (aka Nom Prik Oong)

Yesterday afternoon, my daughter Chardonnay called me up to ask what was for supper. I hadn't made any plans, and she asked if she could pick up some ground pork. I smiled at the request, knowing that she wanted "Spicy Pork." I told her to pick some up at the supermarket and she could make the dish for dinner. Later on, I called her back to make sure we had plenty of "Sticky Rice" for the dish, and we did.

I first had this dish at a lovely restaurant called Southeast Asian Restaurant in Lowell, MA, right next to the National Park. This place was run by Joe and Chanthip Antonaccio, until the summer of 2007, when it was purchased by somebody else who has promised to use the same recipes. I've been there once since the change of ownership, and things still seem to be very good there.

For lunch, Southeast Asian Restaurants has a (very) spicy version of this disk on their buffet, and for dinner, you can order it from the menu. (We always do!)

I've never found a recipe for this on the web, and the description from the menu is quite simple: "Ground pork, tomato, chili peppers, scallions (Very Hot)."

I have a recipe book called "The Classic Cuisine of Vietnam" by Bach Ngo and Gloria Zimmerman, and in it is a recipe for pork chops with classic Vietnamese seasonings and tomato paste. I substituted ground pork for the pork chops and adjusted the seasonings a bit until I had something that approximated the dish from the restaurant.

When I first joined Cisco Systems, Inc., human resources were requesting recipes from employees, and I submitted this recipe from memory (after doing a bit of a Google search for some product names). The following is my re-adaptation of the recipe I submitted to Cisco.

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Spicy Pork

Yield:	Serves 4
Catalogued:	22-Aug-2007

Original Recipe adapted from a Burmese dish called "Nom Prik Oong."

Ingredients

1 ½ pounds ground pork

1 Tbs Asian chili flakes

1 Tbs Asian chili sauce ("Sriracha" Hot Chili Sauce is recommended... get it at Asian markets)

⅓ cup soy sauce

⅓ cup fish sauce (Nuoc Cham)

1 cup water

2 Tbs sugar

1 six oz. can Tomato Paste

1 egg (optional)

⅜ cup Thai Basil, sliced (optional)

½ bunch scallions (green onions), sliced

¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro (coriander leaf)

Rice

3 cups Sticky Rice (also known as Sweet Rice or Glutenous Rice)

3 cups hot water

Brown ground pork in a 5 quart Dutch Oven over medium-high heat, crumbling it as it cooks. Add chili flakes as the pork cooks and stir well.

In another 4-quart pot, combine 3 cups hot water and sticky rice. Bring to a boil, and then let it boil for exactly one minute. After one minute, add cover to pot, and dump the water OUT of the pot, using the lid to keep the rice in the pot. Set heat to very low, and allow the rice to simmer for 25 minutes.

When meat is completely cooked, add chili sauce, soy sauce, fish sauce, water, and sugar, and stir until it boils. Add tomato paste and stir to thicken. If desired, drop egg in middle, and let it sit there for about four minutes to cook. Once cooked, stir the egg throughout the sauce... it will thicken the sauce some more. Taste sauce and correct seasoning as necessary (usually sugar may be needed, but if it's too sweet, add more soy sauce). Once the seasoning is perfect, add basil (optional), scallions and cilantro and continue to let the sauce simmer as the rice finishes.

Note that the sauce does not have to have too much liquid. in Laos, dishes are prepared with less liquids to accommodate the use of sticky rice!

When the rice is finished simmering (it will be quite sticky!), serve.

If doing individual servings, put the rice in a small bowl and the sauce in another bowl. Alternatively, put the sauce into a big bowl in the center of the dinner table and serve sticky rice in individual small bowls.

In Laos, sickly rice is traditionally eaten separate from the sauce. It is eaten with the hands, and can be dipped into the sauce, or you can press a small portion of the rice into a patty with your hands, and clutching the patty in your fingers, pick up the meat and sauce with the rice.

If you find this sounds a bit messy, it is perfectly acceptable to simply serve the sauce over the rice and eat with a fork (or chopsticks). However, it won't be the traditional Laotian way of eating this sort of meal. When you are feeling a bit more adventurous, try it the traditional way. It's especially fun for younger kids!

After preparing this meal the first time, feel free to experiment. Find the amount of chili flakes and sauce that tastes perfect to you and your family. The measurements were made one time when I was teaching my children how to cook this dish; generally, I just eyeball everything and it usually comes out perfectly.

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Bon Appetit!

Barguy's Quesadillas

I've seen quite a few places with quesadillas on their menus, and a lot of them are forgoing the traditional Mexican theme. None of them ever appealed to me until I was having lunch at Chip Shots Grill and Sports Pub in Littleton, MA. On their weekly specials menu was a quesadilla with fried chicken, cheese, and broccoli. The chef called it "Cassie's Quesadilla" (after one of the waitresses that made the request). Since I have a strong dislike for broccoli, I simply smiled at it and commented (to Cassie) that if they replaced the broccoli with bacon, that might be a quesadilla I'd try.

Little did I know that Cassie talked to the chef. When I looked at the specials menu the very next week, they had a quesadilla named after me, which was fried chicken, cheddar cheese, and bacon. Color me impressed—I think it's nice when a restaurant chef would consider the opinion of a patron enough to name a dish after that patron!

I had the quesadilla, and I must admit that it was delicious! I had it a couple of times that week, bringing leftovers home to my family (like it or not, I can never finish a quesadilla at lunch time at Chip Shots!).

So, without further ado, I'd like to present, Barguy's Quesadillas.

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Barguy's Quesadillas

Source:	Chip Shots Grill and Sports Pub, sometime in 2005
Yield:	One quesadilla (two servings)
Catalogued:	20-Aug-2007

"Barguy" is a name I used when I play the NTN Trivia Games at various pubs. I'm a guy and I sit at the bar; simple name, eh? This is a recipe that was created based on a suggestion from me at Chip Shots Pub in Littleton, MA.

Ingredients

2 large (quesadilla or burrito style) flour tortillas

4 oz cheddar cheese, shredded

4 oz Chicken Tenders, fried as for chicken fingers, cut up into 1" pieces, cooled

2 slices bacon, crumbled

Parsley or cilantro for garnish (if desired)

Sour cream for garnish (if desired)

A grill pan and a heavy frying pan

Heat the grill pan on a burner over medium-high (at most) heat. On another burner, heat the large frying pan over medium heat. Put a tortilla on the grill pan and heat for about 30 seconds to a minute. Flip over. Meanwhile, put the second tortilla on the frying pan to heat.

On the (flipped) tortilla in the grill pan, assemble the quesadilla. Sprinkle the tortilla with half of the cheddar cheese, to cover the tortilla to within ¼" of the edge. Sprinkle half the bacon on top of the cheese, and then arrange the chicken pieces on top so that they cover the tortilla evenly. Add the remaining bacon on top of the chicken, and then sprinkle the remaining cheddar on top of everything.

Flip the tortilla from the second frying pan onto the top of the assembled quesadilla (hot side down), and then place the frying pan on top (turning off the heat of the second burner if you are only making a single quesadilla). Continue to heat until the cheese on the bottom of the quesadilla has melted nicely (about a minute to two minutes).

Flip the quesadilla by flipping the frying pan over the grill pan and turn both pans together so that the quesadilla is now upside down with the frying pan on bottom. Slip the quesadilla from the frying pan to the grill pan.

Grill for another minute until all the cheese is melted.

Move the cooked quesadilla onto a cutting board and cut into six slices, pizza style (a pizza cutter will work wonderfully here). Sprinkle with parsley or cilantro, if desired.

Serve hot with a dollop of sour cream on the side.

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Bon Appetit!

Recipe: Shrimp Provolone

This recipe is one of my originals. It can be described as a "Shrimp Fra Diavolo with Sausage and Cheese" but that doesn't quite get the entire feel of the dish.

Twenty or so years ago, I was reading a James Beard cookbook (American Cookery) and came across a dish that consisted of shrimp, pancetta, and tomato sauce. I didn't have pancetta, so I decided to use sweet Italian sausage instead, crumbled and browned. Then I added provolone cheese on top, and this dish was born! Sandra and I loved it the first time we made it.

Interestingly, the second, third, and fourth times I tried to make this dish, I failed miserably. I used cooked shrimp instead of raw, and apparently made a number of other mistakes until I got the hang of the dish.

With regard to the hot spices (cayenne, Tabasco, red pepper flakes), I tend to use a lot more when I'm cooking for just myself than when I'm cooking for my family (medium spice) or for company (mild spice). Keep that in mind when you make this.

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Shrimp Provolone

Source:	An original recipe by lar3ry
Prep Time:	20 minutes
Cook Time:	20 minutes
Yield:	6 servings
Catalogued:	17-Feb-2002

Ingredients

1 pound uncooked medium shrimp, peeled and deveined

¼ to ½ pound Provolone cheese, sliced thin

1 pound pasta (linguine or spaghetti)

Butter (to taste)

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Parmesan cheese (to taste)

Sauce

3 links sweet Italian sausage (frozen is best)

2 Tbs olive oil

3 cloves garlic, crushed

2 tsp dried basil flakes

1 15 oz can crushed tomatoes

½ tsp red pepper flakes (to taste)

Salt and pepper (to taste)

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Peel and devein shrimp, removing tails, set aside.

Chop Italian sausage by slicing links into ¼" slices, and then cutting each slice into six cubes about ¼" square. This works best if the sausages are frozen, and the cubes will retain their shape.

Heat olive oil in a 3-quart saucepan over medium-high heat. Add sausage and fry until they are all cooked (about five minutes). Add garlic and red pepper flakes, and cook an additional minute.

Mix in the crushed tomatoes and basil and stir to blend completely. Bring to a boil and simmer for 15 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Remove from heat.

In a 9" x 13" oven-proof dish, spread a small layer of sauce. Assemble the shrimp in the dish, keeping the shrimp in a single layer. With a ladle, spoon more of the sauce on top of the shrimp until the shrimp is completely covered. Reserve remainder of the sauce.

Place slices of Provolone cheese on top of the shrimp. Tear some of the round cheese slices in half in order to have them cover even. You want at most three layers of cheese. Cover the oven-proof dish with aluminum foil and cook at 350°F for 40 minutes.

During the last 15-20 minutes of cooking, prepare pasta according to directions on box. Drain after it's cooked al dente, and drizzle with melted butter and extra-virgin olive oil to keep pasta from sticking together.

After the dish has baked for 40 minutes, remove the aluminum foil from the oven-proof dish, and turn oven controls to "broil." Broil for five minutes until cheese is brown and bubbly.

Serve shrimp and sauce over pasta. Add some of the reserved sauce on top, if desired. Serve with shredded Parmesan cheese.

• Frozen sausage is best for this dish, as you can cut it into cubes easy and they will retain their shape as they cook. If using fresh sausage, don't cut it, but rather peel the casings off and cook the ground meat within it, crumbling it as it cooks.
• DON'T USE JUMBO SHRIMP FOR THIS DISH! It will dilute the sauce too much, as the larger shrimp give off too much water as they cook! Medium to large shrimp work best.
• If the sauce seems too thin, add 3 tbs. tomato paste to thicken.
• Substitute 1 ½ pounds of chicken tenders if you don't like shrimp (we adapted this rule for my daughter, who doesn't really like shrimp).
• Add ¼ pound of Prosciutto ham sliced thin and cut into tiny pieces and 2 oz. grated Parmesan cheese to sauce for additional taste.
• Add up to 3 Tbs Tabasco Sauce and increase red pepper flakes for a much spicier dish!
• Garnish dish with sliced pieces of fresh basil for a more professional presentation.

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Bon Appetit!

Mission: Shrimp New Orleans

Last year, Sandra and I visited an interesting chain restaurant called Bubba Gump's Shrimp Co. while we were on our second honeymoon in Cancun, Mexico. At that restaurant, I had a delicious dish called Shrimp New Orleans, which is described as "an authentic spicy recipe from our staff in the French Quarter featuring lots of shrimp sautéed in butter, garlic, and spices with jasmine rice." Almost a year later, we found a Bubba Gump restaurant at Universal Studios in Orlando, and after having the same dish prepared the same way, I was hooked.

The problem with trying to reproduce this dish at home is that there isn't any Bubba Gump restaurants close by for "research," so I did the next best thing... I searched the web to see if anybody had a recipe for this or something similar.

I got lucky. I found some web sites that claimed to have the recipe:

• A TV station in Minneapolis apparently got the recipe from a chef at the local chain.


• This site claims to have reproduced the recipe (or pretty close).


• An interesting exchange on this site also claims to have the recipe from "Dave Trombetta of the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co." along with other variations on it.

The problem was that all the recipes were different—there didn't seem to be any definitive recipe. What's a guy to do? Well, I checked the recipes, and stood over my stove and did my best. I think I took some ideas from these three sources (which are now in my personal collection in case the sites disappear), and then created my own:

Shrimp New Orleans

Total Time:	25 min
Prep Time:	10 min
Catalogued:	25-Mar-2007

1.5 lbs medium to large shrimp, peeled and deveined (frozen is okay)

4 tablespoons butter

1 tablespoon cajun seasoning

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1/2 tablespoon Old Bay seasoning

1 teaspoon lemon/pepper seasoning

1/2 tablespoon garlic powder

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1/4 cup broth (clam broth or chicken broth)

3/8 cup white wine

1/2 tablespoon fish sauce

1 fresh baguette

1 cup cooked Jasmine rice (optional)

lemon wedges (optional)

Cut french bread into thin slices. Place on cookie sheet into 400°F oven for five minutes to warm. Increase oven temperature to broil, and broil an additional 2-3 minutes to toast slices. Set aside and keep warm.

Melt butter, and add cajun seasoning, minced garlic, Old Bay, garlic powder, and pepper. Stir to mix. Saute shrimp until pink. Remove shrimp from butter.

Stir in worcestershire sauce, broth, white wine, and fish sauce into seasoned butter. Saute until reduced by about a third.

Serve shrimp with toothpicks (for serving), along with Jasmine rice. Put sauce into a ramekin and serve with French bread slices for dipping and lemon slices for garnish.

Finally... when I made this for the first time, my daughter Chardonnay was also making Garlic Knots for the first time; my brother-in-law (who owns pizza parlors on Long Island) was teaching her how to prepare them. Garlic Knots and Shrimp New Orleans are a match made in heaven! Fortuosity!