Garlic Marinated Ribeye w/ Creamy Parmesan Polenta & Blistered Tomatoes
Man, that title is a mouthful. Rightfully so. This dish is big, rich, in your face… and SO delicious. Ben always makes fun of me for my “dinner-lunches” (a lunch that should be eaten for dinner). If you can have breakfast for dinner, you can have dinner for lunch!
Spaghetti Squash & Meatballs
Happy Monday everybody! If you read my last post, you heard my side comment about my dream of opening a food truck. Many of you were intrigued by this, so I figured I would share a little bit about that with you all. I just love the idea of food trucks, being able to go where ever you want, the beach, a ski resort, main street, etc. I also love the fact that once you have made enough money you can pack up and go. Gives you time to do other things that you love. I would want to have a sandwich food truck; I love sandwiches. I think there are just so many possibilities and ways to be creative. My sandwiches would be super unique and out there, with the option to build your own as well. So there is a little bit about my dream of owning a food truck, haha. And yes, the squash are back. You didn’t think that winter was over yet did you?
Tequila Marinated Tri-Tip w/ Avocado Cream Sauce
At my Foodbuzz 24×24 party, I made a tri-tip for the entree.
The Best Tri-Tip Steak Marinade!
The tri-tip marinade was made of tequila, soy sauce, olive oil, cilantro and much more. Marinating it for a whole day made it nice and juicy for my guests. With this, I made an avocado cream sauce to serve over the top. I had seen a recipe for this type of thing earlier on For the Love of Cooking and was waiting for my chance to make it. It is similar to guacamole, but I added sour cream along with red wine vinegar to make it into more of a sauce.
Sun-Dried Tomato, Flank Steak & White Bean Stew
I feel the need to start this post by saying that this was supposed to be a recipe for Mexican Posole. Of course, I had a bit of trouble with the one ingredient needed to make an actual posole- the hominy. I have heard many people say that they usually used canned hominy, but I decided to use dry hominy since that was what was in the pantry. Recalling my artichoke disaster, I am noticing a trend that apparently canned food works better for a lot of things. Luckily, I had a feeling the dry hominy would take a long time to cook and decided to cook it separately, rather than cooking it in the stew. I must have refilled the pot with water at least four times, but the hominy still wasn’t getting soft. I don’t know what I did wrong, but I had to improvise from there. I decided that white kidney beans would be a good substitute for the hominy, since they kind of have a similar texture.
London Broil w/ Tomato-Bell Pepper Pizzaiola Sauce
There is something about large cuts of meat that is just amazing. I always feel like a large tenderloin or roast is always much juicier and flavorful than individual pieces of meat. Lucky for me, my mom belongs to a local farm and receives ungodly amounts of meat. I have had a two-pound hunk of beef in my freezer tantalizing me for months. I had not gotten around to cooking it because I did not want to cook the entire thing for only two or so people. This weekend I finally had the chance to have a dinner party, if you want to call it that, and serve this delicious cut of meat to a group of friends.
Falsomagro
My roommate recently went to visit her brother in Switzerland. While she was there she ventured over to Italy and was nice enough to get me an authentic Italian cook book. To thank her for the cook book, I told her I would cook her a recipe out of it. I spent hours reading over all of the unique Italian recipes. Eventually, we decided on Falsomagro.
I had never even heard of Falsomagro before seeing it in this book. Vegetarians beware… Falsomagro is a protein loaded Italian meat dinner from Sicily. It is a large flank steak filled with bacon, Italian sausage, eggs and cheese, then rolled up and slow cooked. I am 100% a meat eater, so I was pretty excited about packing as many proteins as possible into a big hunk of beef. I was a bit worried about cooking the meat for so long; I thought it was going to end up over-cooked, but it ended up being surprisingly tender! This is a great meal for a dinner party; it serves a lot of people and is very filling. I served my Falsomagro with parmesan roasted asparagus and potatoes.
Throwback Thursday: French Onion Cheesesteak Sandwich
I am a huge fan of French onion soup. I love making it homemade because it is so easy, plus I think mine tastes better than most bought ones. This week’s throwback recipe is one of my random creations, there might already be a recipe for this but I thought I was pretty dang smart for creating this.
One day, after a long day of snowboarding, I was craving French onion soup but I was starving and wanted more substance to it. I came up with this French-Philly hybrid sandwich. It was absolutely delicious, but super messy! You will definitely want napkins handy while eating this bad boy.
On a side note, I am leaving for South Africa today!! I am going to still try to post recipes that I made before I left, but they might not be as frequent. I am also going to have a few foodie friends post guest posts to help satisfy your cravings while I am gone. Also, keep an eye out for posts about my food adventures in Cape Town; I heard you can eat alligator there!
Throwback Thursday: Sauteed Steak w/ Green Peppercorn Sauce
This weeks Throwback recipe includes a very important staple in cooking- a basic brown sauce. A basic brown sauce is the base for many different gravies and other sauces. Once you are able to make a basic brown sauce, you will open all sorts of new doors for sauces. For me, this was a very exciting thing (like I tell you constantly, I am obsessed with sauces).
The green peppercorn sauce is great for steaks and simple enough to whip up on a weeknight. Looking back I am laughing at this meal… I ate every single peppercorn in my sauce and ended the dinner with my mouth on fire. Even with that, this was a delicious recipe!
Chorizo, Poblano & Beef Tacos w/ Pepper Jack Cheese Sauce
Before I say anything about this recipe, I would like to announce the end of my comfort food bender. As good as all of the pizza and mac ‘n’ cheese has been, I am cleaning up my act. That’s not to say it won’t happen again sometime in the next few months, but for now I am going to be eating (and blogging) a bit healthier. I will be baking a bit though. For my final post of my bender, I give you these spicy, cheesy and tasty tacos.
First, I combined chorizo and beef for the base of these tacos, which makes the filling a bit more exciting. Then I added some spice with the seasonings and poblano chiles. To top it off, I made a pepper jack cheese sauce to pour over the tacos. Top them off with some lettuce and green onion and there you have it- a unique taco that will have you coming back for seconds (and more cheese sauce!).
Bison Chili Cheese Dogs
Watching the Food Network can be dangerous sometimes. A few of my guy friends recently learned why I am so addicted to it after they watched a couple shows one night with me. Every recipe you see makes your mouth water and makes your hungry. This week we all found ourselves drooling over a chili cheese dog from some small-town diner. Being from Britian, my friends had never eaten a chili cheese dog, so I had to show them what they were missing!
This chili cheese dog is a bit different from others because it uses as bison chili instead of beef. The bison does not taste much different than the beef, but gives it a bit of new flavor. This recipe can easily be made with ground beef instead. Before you eat these bad boys, make sure you have a napkin and aren’t wearing a white shirt!
