Chocolate Chipotle Chili

Usually when one thinks of braising meats they don't really think of chili, at least I didn't until I ... well ... until I DID.  What is braising and why do people do it?  Well braising is simply taking meat (usually a tough cut) and browning it by searing, then cooking it low and slow in a low temperature closed moist environment for a lengthy time.  It is a process that's been around for a very long time.  In the very old days people used to cook by suspending a heavy metal pot over a fire to slowly braise their foods.  For more even heat people even placed embers from the fire below on top of the pot's lid.  Inside this metal pot meats and vegetables cooked low and slow in some liquid creating absolutely delicious dishes that take all that time and build wonderful character.  This dish is pretty easy to make.  Once you put it in the oven you have two whole hours to clean up, make a cocktail or pop a bottle of wine, and relax while it cooks away quietly in the old hotbox ... just don't finish the bottle and forget to take it out when it's done!

Ingredients:

about 2lbs of beef short ribs
1 large red onion, diced
1 green bell pepper, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
2 tbsp finely chopped garlic
2 tbsp chili powder
2 tbsp smoked paprika
4 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tsp ground cumin
about 16oz of beef stock
1 28oz can of beans (preferably black or pinto)
1 29oz can of diced tomatoes
3 or 4 finely diced chipotle chiles in adobo sauce
2 oz unsweetened baker's chocolate
1 bunch scallions

Description:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Set your dutch oven on the stovetop with enough oil to lightly coat the bottom and turn the heat to high.  Let it get very hot.  Lay out your short ribs bone side down and generously salt and pepper them.  Place short ribs into the very hot dutch oven meat side down to sear, about 4 minutes per side. Remove the short ribs and set aside.  Place the onion and peppers into the pot and cook on medium high heat for about six to eight minutes.  Add the garlic, chili powder, smoked paprika, brown sugar, cocoa powder and cumin.  Turn the heat back up to high and cook for another two to three minutes.  Now add the beef stock and scrape any bits from the bottom of the pot. Drain and rinse the canned beans.  Add the beans, tomatoes with the canned liquid, the chipotle with adobo and the chopped chocolate.  Bring the whole mixture to a low simmer and add the short ribs back into the pot.  Nestle the ribs down into the mixture, cover and place in the oven for two hours.  Carefully remove the dish from the oven.  Carefully remove the short ribs from the dish and, on a separate plate, discard the bones and shred or chop the meat and return it to the pot.  Give one final stir and serve in a bowl with chopped scallions and rustic bread!

Fall Apple Crisp

This is absolutely one of Dylan's favorite things that I make.  If you are like me or my friends you went apple picking this fall and had way too many apples for one household.  There are so many different ways to deal with that "problem" from applesauce to apple pie, but Dylan's favorite is apple crisp!  This dish is simple to make and the preparation takes about fifteen minutes from start to finish.  The best part is that it will patiently bake away in the oven giving you plenty of time to eat dinner and then be ready to jump straight into that anxiously waiting pie hole ... err ... apple crisp hole on your face.  LOL

Ingredients:

2-4 apples
1 lemon
1 orange
1/3 cup sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp good vanilla extract

3/4 cup flour
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oats
1 tsp salt
1 stick COLD butter (diced)

Description:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Chop apples and place into large bowl.  I like to leave the skins on but you can peel the apples if you prefer.  Add the zest of the lemon and the orange to the bowl and juice half the lemon and orange, sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla.  Mix everything together and place into small baking dishes for individual servings or place into a large baking dish.  For the topping place the flour, sugar, brown sugar, oats, and salt into a stand mixer.  Mix on low for about 30 seconds to combine then add the diced butter and increase the speed a little.  Mix until the butter is about the size of small peas and the mixture is a little bit like gravel.

Place the topping onto the apples, place the baking dish(es) onto a sheet pan in case they bubble over while cooking, and place into the preheated oven for 45 minutes.  Once the time is up, remove the sheet pan and let it cool for about 10 minutes before serving ... unless you want to seriously burn the roof of your mouth!  I use this time to pull the vanilla ice cream out of the freezer and let it soften for a few minutes.  You can top this hot fall treat with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and maybe even a dap of whipped cream and impress your friends with your culinary expertise!

Brined and Grilled Pork Chops with Grilled Kale and Pineapple

This is a strange way to start this off ... but I love pizza.  I am a New Yorker relocated to Boston and I hang on to my New York roots by always dipping my pizza in blue cheese.  My favorite type of pizza .. Hawaiian of course!  I simply love the combination of ham and pineapple together.  Now when most people think of pork chops they tend to think breaded pork chops with mashed potatoes and applesauce. No disrespect to antiquated cookbooks, but that's boring by today's standards isn't it?  I was thinking about ordering a Hawaiian pizza and then started craving pork chops, but wasn't entirely over my craving for Hawaiian pizza.  I am also starting to cook more without the use of starches for an overall lower carb meal.  The result here was grilled pork chops with grilled pineapples instead of applesauce.  I also grilled some Kale because it tends to have a wonderfully salty flavor and salt is one of the reasons I love mashed potatoes.  So now we have an updated, Hawaiian, carb-friendly, non-breaded version of an old classic!  Now when you get the pork chops make sure they are thick (between an inch or two) and that they are still on the bone.  I like to have my butcher cut them for me.

Grilled Pork Chops

Ingredients:

2 thick cut/Bone in pork chops
1 cup cider vinegar
1/2 cup kosher salt
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 whole star anise
1 tsp caraway seed
2 tbsp black peppercorns
2 tbsp good mustard
2-4 handfuls of ice cubes

Directions:

Start by heating the vinegar in a small saucepan over medium high heat.  In a bowl, combine the salt, brown sugar, anise, caraway seed, black peppercorns, and mustard.  Once the vinegar is good and hot (just starting to simmer) add it to the bowl and stir to help dissolve everything.  Let it sit for about fifteen minutes and then add the ice cubes to chill everything down.  Place the pork chops into a bowl or ziptop bag and pour the now chilled liquid to completely cover the chops.  Let these sit in the refrigerator for between two and three hours. Place on a searing hot grill for three four minutes, turn ninety degrees and leave for three minutes.  Flip and cook for four minutes, turn and cook for three minutes.  Remove from grill and let sit for five to ten minutes before cutting.

Grilled Pineapple

Ingredients:

1 pineapple

Directions:

Remove the top and bottom of the pineapple, then cut off the skin.  Once skinned, half lengthwise and then half again lengthwise.  Now holding your knife at a forty-five degree angle cut away the core from each quarter of the pineapple and cut into chunks.  Place these onto a searing hot grill for about four minutes on each side (eight minutes total).  The pieces should be charred.

Grilled Kale

Ingredients:

1 large bunch of kale
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tsp salt
2 tsp fresh cracked pepper
2 tsp red pepper flakes

Directions:

Remove and discard the stalks from the kale leaves.  Cut leaves into large irregular pieces and toss in a bowl with other ingredients.  Grill in a wire basket over medium to high heat for about eight to ten minutes or until the leaves start char.  Remove from the grill and enjoy with your pork chops and pineapple!

Grilling and You ...

Summertime, and for some (Dylan) even the dead of winter, is the best time for grilling.  There is something truly visceral about stepping outside, exerting your dominion over fire, feeling the wind on your face, and of course cracking open a beer!  We feel connected to our food.  And yes there is also that connection to an intricate meal that was perfectly prepared indoors ... but this is different.  This is carnal.  We are cavemen.  This is GRILLING!

Ever since our South Boston roof deck grill became "legal" by converting it to natural gas and having it hooked into the house gas-line (I think the legality has something to do with holding that ticking time bomb of a propane tank on a city roof ...) I have been obsessed with grilling everything and anything.  Meat, Fish, Vegetables, Cedar Planks, Par-Baked Breads, Searing, Roasting ... you name it and I've probably tried to grill it.  Heck, I have even grilled Dylan's famous spinach and artichoke dip!

Now I know that in Texas when you grill you think beef, but for this post I'm going the Carolina route and I'm talking about grilling pork.  If you think back to the colonial days, when pigs and cattle were the main sources of meat imported to the growing american colonies, there were a lot of slaves to be fed in the Carolinas.  One of the reasons that pork was so popular in that region at that time was due to the fact that pigs, unlike cows, were valued for being such low-maintenance animals.  Two great things about fast forwarding to today ... no more slavery AND we love to grill pork!

Grilled Pork Loin

Ingredients:

1 meat thermometer

1 roll of butchers twine

1 medium pork loin (5 lbs)

1 Tbl garlic

2 tsp ground coriander

2 tsp salt

2 tsp cracked black pepper

2 tsp chopped thyme

2 Tbl chopped rosemary

1-2 Tbl truffle oil

Directions:

You want to rinse and pat your pork loin dry with a paper towel or two before laying it down on your PLASTIC cutting board that is never used for food you will eat raw.  In my home, and most restaurants, all foods that are consumed raw like veggies and cheeses or previously cooked meats that pose no threat of contamination can be placed on wooden cutting boards.  Anything that has a harmful "bug" in it like raw meats and fish GO ON A PLASTIC CUTTING BOARD and placed into the dishwasher afterwards! Ok ... I'll stop yelling at you.  Now that you have your cleaned loin resting on the plastic cutting board it needs to be trussed.  If you've never trussed anything before then watch this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWxOJbMdU48

Now that you are an expert at trussing and your pork loin has been trussed, combine all of the other ingredients into a rub and generously coat all sides of the pork.  Turn one side of your grill to high heat and let it preheat with the cover closed.  Once searing hot, place your pork loin over the heat to sear all sides for about one to two minutes per side.  Once seared, move the pork to the other side of the grill (the indirect heat side) and turn the burners on the other side to low and close the lid.  The pork should take about one to one and a half hours to roast.  Remove from the grill when the interior temperature reaches 145 degrees and set aside to rest for ten to fifteen minutes.  This allows the juices to redistribute and calm down and also allows the internal temperature to climb to 155/160 degrees.  Once rested, remove the butchers twine and slice to serve!  ENJOY!!

Don't forget to pair the pork with a light to medium bodied earthy wine, such as a pinot noir from the Pacific Northwest region ... especially if you're special someone's alma matter is from that region!  ;o)

Truffle and Bacon Mac-n-Cheese

Who doesn't love a great mac-n-cheese?!?  I'm not talking about Kraft (no disrespect to Kraft of course) but this mac-n-cheese is for adults!  Where did this soothing and homey concoction get its start?  According to Wikipedia, pasta and cheese casseroles have been recorded in cookbooks as early as the Liber de Coquina, one of the oldest cookbooks from the medieval times. A cheese and pasta casserole known as "makerouns" was recorded in an English cookbook in the 14th century.  It has also been said that Thomas Jefferson first served Macaroni and Cheese at the President’s House in 1802.  Wherever it's beginnings began one two things are true: Macaroni and cheese in some form or another has been around for a very long time, and it's DELICIOUS!

Ingredients:

Mac and Cheese

1 lb. cellantani pasta

6 strips of bacon

1.5 cups of gourmet mushroom blend (roughly chopped)

7 oz. each of shredded, smoked gouda, fontina, and gruyere

2.5 cups half and half

3 Tbl butter

2 Tbl flour

1 t nutmeg

1 Tbl truffle oil

Bread Topping

3 pieces of toast with the crusts removed (sometimes I leave them on actually)

tons of fresh herbs (thyme, rosemary, parsley, etc)

parmesan cheese

Description:

Sautee butter and flour over medium high heat for about 3 minutes.  Add heated half and half, lower heat to medium low, and simmer for 5 minutes.  After rue thickens add nutmeg, salt, pepper, and cheeses.  Remove from heat and stir to melt together.  Once melted combine in a large bowl with pasta, mushroom mixture, and cooked and chopped bacon.  Place into a baking dish, sprinkle (kind of heavily) with the bread topping, and bake at 400 degrees for 25-35 minutes.

On Salts ...

I love salt and I hate bland foods.  I do however fear the day that my doctor may tell me to cut back on my intake of the stuff. Salt = flavor ... well so does fat. The thing is, without a healthy and appropriate amount of salt in our foods, our tongues aren't capable of realizing the true potential of even the most inspired combination of ingredients.

Except for the very occasional Big Mac (THERE DYLAN ... I admitted it!) I eat very little processed food.  Because of that, I assume that I do pretty well with my intake.  It is very difficult to devour too much salt when you are in charge of its addition into your everyday foods.  It's only when you rely on prepackaged and long preserved foods that you risk really exceeding your daily recommended amount.

Salt is extremely important in your kitchen, but while most people make do with the standard iodized table salt, there so many kinds of other varieties of salt out there!

A chunk of pink Himalayan salt that was a gift.  This little gem has AMAZING flavor!

Different types of salt

Table salt…this is a fine grained salt used by most of us in salt shakers and in our home kitchens.  Pretty neutral in flavor, it dissolves quickly in warm water. Table salt also contains anti caking additives, which make it flow evenly in humid weather, and iodine for health reasons.  It is my absolute recommendation to NEVER use this salt.  It has higher sodium levels and it is extremely easy to over salt dishes using table salt.

Kosher salt…Kosher salt is simply salt free from additives. Kosher salt can be finely grained or slightly larger, and is most often used by home cooks in canning or meat brines. The lack of additives makes for clearer brines, and does not impart any unwanted additive flavors over long preservations. This is the salt I use un my kitchen about 95% of the time!

Sea salt…sea salt is harvested after piping sea water onto a flat field, allowing the sun to evaporate the water, and collecting the salt that remains. Sea salt is often prized by cooks as it offers a much more complex taste. Sea salt contains additional fine deposits of other minerals which accounts for its varied and complex taste. The area from where the salt is harvested, and the mineral properties of the water in that location, affect the flavor. Sea salt can come both finely grained or more granular in nature.

Fleur de sel…very expensive sea salt from the northern Atlantic coast of France. The slightly gray salt from this reason is complex and elemental in nature and very prized…the fleur de sel is the very top of the evaporated salt layer, and is comprised of flake like crystals of salt, perfect for sprinkling on a great steak after cooking. The texture and crunch of this pricy sea salt is as prized as the taste.

Industrial or rock salt…salt sold in large crystals, not processed and full of impurities, this salt is normally used as road salt, ice cream machine salt, etc.

Other sea salts…there are salts of varying hues harvested from all of the world's oceans, and they all offer a subtle difference in taste.

Any way you slice it, salt is a necessity in any kitchen whether it's the White House, your neighborhood pub, or the one in your own home.  Experiment with salt and, as long as you drink a lot of water, it's difficult to eat too much of the stuff! 

Curry Roasted Cauliflower

So I grew up eating a LOT of broccoli and cauliflower.  I think my mother must have owned stock in a cauliflower farm or something.  Although I love eating the stuff when it is just steamed, I sometimes long for some spice in my vegetable sides.  If you too are seeking a way to spice it up with your veggies then wake up your tongue with this incredible dish that will not disappoint!

Ingredients:

1 large head of cauliflower

1/2 Cup olive oil

1 teaspoon yellow curry

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

3/4 Cup chopped walnuts

3/4 Cup golden raisins

fresh parsley

Description:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Cut the cauliflower into large bite sized pieces and place into a large bowl.  Add olive oil, yellow curry, smoked paprika, salt, and pepper.  Toss to coat evenly and place onto a sheet pan. Roast in the oven for 20 minutes.  After 20 minutes, remove the sheet pan from the oven.  Stir the cauliflower and add the walnuts and golden raisins.  Return to the oven for another 15 minutes.  Remove, top with chopped fresh parsley.