Week 9 Layered Tortillas, Mushroom Rice, and Buttered Plantains

We cooked for Linda and Kelly tonight.

Home-made chips. Just cut up corn tortillas and salt them and bake them for 30 min.



Layered Tortillas with chicken on top




Carl's Mushroom Rice Dish

Here is the plate with everything.

Buttered Plantains

Carl

this week was Delicious and there was no huge problem! We had tortilla layers that were awesome we had a tomato chili sauce with chicken on top. We also made chips and guacamole. I made my own rice poblano and wild mushroom it was great! can't wait till next week!

David

This meal tasted very traditional. To make the tomato sauce that went on the tortillas, I cut up 5 tomato's and added garlic, onions and jalapeno pepper to a puree. Then I cooked it for 5 minutes. We put this sauce on the deep fried tortilla pieces. It was good.

Carl and I are learning a lot. We talked about it tonight. We are doing things with a lot more efficiency. We are working with each other very well too.

To make the chips, all we did was cut white corn tortillas into fourths. Then salt them. Then put them into the oven for 30 minutes. You might have to turn them. This is an easy way to get low fat chips that also don't cost too much.

We made Rick Bayless's Guacamole as well. MMMMMMM.

Week 8 Ribs, Beans, and a Salad

Carl

This week was "GOOD" not great but "good". We messed up on a few but for the most part it was good. The salad was to red because of the beets so I wished we had chose a better veggie. The beans turned into "bean soup". Jamie of course said it needed more bacon (she a bacon worshiper). The beef was meaty dad wasn't so sure about not having a sauce on them (I did to, a little). Well can't wait for next week!

Dave

This week we had some guests. We had Daniel Rische and the Ganansia's over. We had a fun dinner. We really scrambled to get things finished. Here is what we did.

We boiled the pork ribs until the meat came off the bones. Carl wanted to cook it the way that Rick Bayless suggested. That is fry it in Lard. My health consious body said no to that. We also soaked the beans for 8 hours and then cooked them. I ended up burning them a little. I wasn't so sure about this recipe because it really didn't talk about the liquid too much. I think I need more specific instructions for this poor brain. Carl did a good job of steaming up the vegtables and making the salad.


Our guests said that they liked the meal. However, I was not so sure about this one. I don't think I will write out any of the recipes this week.


I did eat a piece of poblano pepper raw this week. It was hot. I think I have aquired a taste bud for it.

Week 7 Beef Tips, Potatoes and Corn Chowder

Carl:
Well this week was kinda spicy for the week mouths. The beef tips were ok the tomatoes were canned and not the same fresh feel because are grill is broken and we have no broil to roast them. The potaoes got a little dried out because of the delay on the other recipes. THE CORN CHOWDER WAS AMAZING! Creamy a little kick and the delicous corn flavor YUMM! This week wasn't so great but the recipes would have been amazing (if not for the couple problems). Can't wait for next week!

David

HOT. Jamie about screamed when she put the soup in her mouth complaining that it burned her throat. Jamie thought the meal was a little too spicy. I thought it was medium. The soup turned out really well. It was creamy and had poblano peppers in it. I think I could have put less poblano pepper in it to help out the spicyness. The beef tips were good. I don't think I would make them again. The potatoes were average. They had some charizo sausage in them. I will give you the ingredients to the corn chowder. You might want to make this on your own sometime.

Corn Chowder:

Brown 1/2 onion and 2 teaspoons of garlic in 2 tblspoons of butter.

Puree the onion mix with 1/4 cup of water and 1.5 tablspoons of corn starch and 3 cups of defrosted frozen corn.

Add 2 cups of milk and 1 teaspoon of salt

Simmer for 15 minutes.

Add 1 cup of cream and 1 diced poblano. (make sure you burn the skin off the poblano)

Simmer for another 10 minutes.

Enjoy

Week 6 Rick Bayless and Enchiladas

Carl

Well this week was amazing and very green. We had green enchiladas, green rice, and gucamole. Everything was good except the almond rice cooler was OK but we didn't have cheesecloth so we had some chunks in the drink the flavor was great but the sparse cinnon and rice bit didn't go over to well. On the other hand everthing else was amazing, it had a kick but not to strong (for me) jamie (my sister) had some trouble. Can't wait for next week!(kelly, my oldest sister is coming home for winter break!)

David

Authentic Mexican by Rick Bayless



Chicken Enchiladas

Tomatillo Sauce

Chicken

Cream

Onion

Salt

Corn Tortillas

Oil

Mexican cheese

garnish



Herb-Green Rice with Peas

Onion

Celery

Cilantro

Parsley

Poblanos roasted

Garlic

Broth

Salt

Peas

Oil

Rice



I liked the rice the best. It was had a little kick to it. It was easy to make as well. All you had to do is mix the greens stuff together, and get it boiling, then saute the rice, then bring the mixture to a boil and cook for 15 minutes. Then you will add the peas and you are done.



Our family really enjoyed the tomatillo enchilada's. Carl did a great job of making this dish. He had it for left overs the next day and said he thought this was a keeper.



The rice almond drink did not go over well. It tasted great at first, but ended up tasting a little like indigestion medicine.

Week 5 Rick Bayless Time

Carl
Introducing are chief Rick Bayless is an honor. He's has won numerous awards for his cuisine like top chief masters winner on Bravo TV also Rick has his own TV show (Mexico One Plate at a Time). Amazingly enough I had an oral procedure and the dentist that did it was Rick Bayless dentist! Anyway his food is definitely matches up with his profile EXCELLENT. WE made crispy fried tacos, guacamole, tomato stained rice, and flan. Starting out my favorite was the taco there crispy outsides and fresh delicious insides are the perfect match. All with the tacos the guacamole was outstanding it watched well with the tacos. The rice was OK not great but, the flan and caramel was amazing soft and delicate the smooth custard was definitely worth the effort.

David

Wow, this was fun to cook MEXICAN today. Carl and I have been looking forward to cooking with Rick Bayless's recipes for a long time. We really admire him as a cook. We watch many of his shows.

We had two guest cooks with us today. Jamie Sladkey and Daniel Rische. Both did a terrific job. We couldn't have done it without them. Jamie made the guacamole and Daniel cut put some tomato and also did a lot of dishes. Thanks Jamie and Dan.

First of all, Carl did a great job of cooking the flan. I really thought he burned the caramel, but it was very good. Needless to say, I'm proud of him.

I was very excited about the rice dish. It was a vegetable rice dish with peas and carrots. The family thought it didn't have enough taste. I think the problem was that I didn't cook it very well.

The Taco's were out of this world. It was very interesting to me to soften the tortillas up before we put the meat mixture into them. Rick Bayless suggests a little oil in the pan and then searing them for just a few second on each side. It was really a nice way to make them not crack. Then we put some oil in the bottom of the pan and fried them for a few minutes. They came out a little like taquitos. Of course we bought the Frontera Grill "Rick Bayless" chips.
Wow was I full after that meal.

Weeks 4 Cauliflower Soup and Some Scallops and Custurd

David

I thought this weeks recipes were so good that I'm going to type them in for you. I think that you will really enjoy two of these that we could today. Here they are

Roasted Cauliflower Soup by Tyler Florence

1 Quart of Milk

Salt

1 Head of Cauliflower

1/2 onion sliced

8 fresh thyme sprigs

1 stick of butter

1 bay leaf

Olive Oil

Freshly Ground Pepper

Heat the milk and salt to simmering. Add the broken up cauliflower, onion, butter, thyme sprigs, and bay leaf. Bring back to simmer. Cover and cook for 15 minutes. Discard the thyme sprigs and bay leaf. Put into a blender and mix for a puree. Serve with Olive oil on top.

Today was interesting. We couldn't find the BIG scallops, so we decided to go with the small scallops (Carl was reluctant). The only thing was that we had to put the prosciutto (like bacon) around the small scallops. This took some skill. We ended up really liking the golden apples that were cooked with the scallops. None of us would make the scallops again.

We have figured out so far that we have a 3 hour average from start to clean up. Wow. It has been fun. Lastly, Carl and I got into a little suds war. I made a beard on him with the suds from the sink, and then he smeared suds all over my head. It was all in fun.

Carl

Vanilla Pots De Creme

1 1/2 cups milk

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

5 large egg yolks

1/2 cups sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Amaretto cookies (optional contain gluten)

Preheat oven 325 F and bring saucepan to boil for water bath. pour milk and cream in saucepan place over medium low heat. bring to simmer, remove from heat.

whisk egg yolks and sugar in a large bowl till sugar dissolves. Gradually whisk hot cream mixture in a slow pour careful not to cook eggs. stir in vanilla.

Pour in 8 oz. ramekins (we used coffee cups what ever you have that is larger than 8 oz.) cover with foil to make the crust softer. Place ramekins into a large, shallow baking pan and pour boiling water (about a half inch) for water bath. Slide pan into oven. Bake about forty five minutes. Till set but still jiggles. Remove pan and let cool in water for 10 minutes. Put them in fridge for at least two hours.

Yummm and the closing of the eyes and I almost pulled a Dan Rische (a humm of enjoyment before the food entered my mouth). The vanilla pot de creme were to die for. Creamy velvet is the word I would describe. But I'm a sucker for any creme dish (especially Magginos creme brulee). But the dessert was sweet fresh and light perfect with about anything chocolate, fruit, nut, etc. need I say more. well we say so long to Tyler and on to Mexico for or festive feast of a Christmas (what?!).

Week 3 Middle East Meal

Carl:

This week was a very interesting week. A week of fun and wonderful ingredients and also our garbage disposal blew mango peel and water all of are kitchen.


One of are dishes was eggplant that was grilled and garnished with pomegranate and mint. We all didn't love the eggplant but were not an eggplant family eater but we loved the pomegranate. Also we had the chocolate mousse which was very heavy and left my sister lick the inside of the glass (she a chocolate lover times 10).

David

This was a fun day. We made a baked chicken dish that had a baste of yogurt, lemon zest, curry, and some spices. It was easy. We just basted it a few times with the sauce and it took about 50 minutes in the oven.

We certainly will remember this meal because of the extra clean up with the mango peel everywhere. I also enjoyed Carl trying to Zest his lemon again this week. He didn't cut himself. See the video. I loved the rice, mango, bean, cashew salad that was served with the chicken. It was awesome. I pretty much like anything with rice. This had a unique flavor and was served cold so was an interesting dish.

Here are the videos from the day.

Week 2 Berry Wonderful Week

Our second week was awesome.



Carl





We'll start out with dessert a berry wonderful dessert! The dessert was a berry trifle with rasberrys, blueberrys, strawberrys, and lemon whip cream. There also was pound cake but we ommitted pound cake from my dads dessert. All around are table we agreed that the lemon whip cream was wonderful with the berrys. We added lemon curd (a kind of lemon jelly ) to heavy whipping cream and sugar to create a tangy sweet mix.





















David

The salmon was easy. We just salt and peppered it and put it in a hot pan for 6 minutes each side. That came out great.

Next the side dish was an intresting mixture of flavors and ingredients. First, Carl was zesting the lemon and he accidently zested his finger. The zest was mixed with shallots in hot oil. Then we put in the peas and pearl onions. We heated that through and put that on top of some boiled potatos that were slightly mashed. I wanted the fiber in it so I left the skin on. Carl said we should have taken out the skin. We put a bunch of watercress in the mix. I don't exactly know what a bunch is. Carl told me to put the whole package in. OK. I think a bunch should be more descriptive. We also put some mint leaves in it.

All in all it was a great meal. I especially liked the potatos. Linda liked the dessert. Jamie liked the pearl onions. Carl likes just about anything. Talk to you next week.

Week 1 Tyler Florence:BBQ Night

We started our meal around 4:30 by making the brine for the chicken. It had to soak for 2 hours. Then we did do anything else until about 5:30 when we worked on the cole slaw. The slaw had apples, onions pecans, and cabbage in it. It was topped with a maynaise based dressing. We ended up making a little too much. I think the dressing probably should have covered half of the cabbage and we put the whole thing in. Linda and Jamie said the cole slaw was spicy.
We made the sauce for the beans which included chipotle chili's. Whew. It was really hot. We put bacon on the top of the beans as you can see in the picture. Wow. They were hot. Even Carl and I thought they were spicy.
All in all, I think it was a fun start for our project. We worked well together. We had fun. We learned a lot. We are looking forward to next week. Hope you can check in then.



The Peach Barbque Sauce Chicken was faboulous. It Definently was a crowd pleaser. With bacon, peach preserves, and thyme this barbque rocked the house. It took about an hour in whole but was well worth the thyme!

Everything we made was from Tyler Florence's book "TYLER'S ULTIMATE".