The Sophisticated Enchilada and a Nouvelle Mexican Take on Salad

I have a house full of teenagers.  OK, well maybe I should qualify that to "a few days a week I have a house full of them."  I actually only have two of my own, and one is away at college, so the house really should be...well...kinda empty.   But the kids have always had their friends over, and since those friends know I cook, they still come over to hang out...after soccer practice, for extended study sessions, movies, after-prom-breakfast, you name it.  No complaints here - I love it.  Recently some of the girls have expressed interest in wanting to learn how to cook themselves, so I gathered them up one night and we drove to Barnes and Noble where we grabbed a table, got our Starbucks and started flipping through cookbooks.  They browsed world cuisines, and after much debate across the spectrum from Indian to French, we settled on our theme for the first meal - Mexican.  Decidedly an American favorite, right?  Complicated at times because it can range from freshly delectable to nothing better than a TV dinner (do the teenagers even know what that is anymore - I forgot to ask them).  

Some of you may know that I am part of this awesome program with Allrecipes.com, where as a home cook, I have the opportunity to test out some of their brand partner products and recipes.  One of this month's brand partners is Herdez (you may be familiar with some of their Mexican sauces).  Could the timing be more perfect?  I settled on two recipes for the girls - Enchiladas Suizas and a Sweet Pulled Pork Barbacoa Salad.  Can you ever go wrong with enchiladas?  This great dish translates from a family meal to a last minute potluck offering to dinner for your college roommates.  And to go with the dish, I thought I would throw a salad into the fray to introduce the art of mixing textures and savory/sweet flavors.

When enchiladas are made just right, the filling is wrapped in warm tortillas, and covered with a creamy, tangy, flavor-bursting sauce.  Enchiladas Suizas are a family favorite...we make the sauce from scratch, with grill-roasted tomatillos, chunks of swiss cheese, serrano peppers, onion and garlic, sour cream to cool it down a bit, and chicken broth to add to the flavor.  For this recipe I added one bottle of Herdez tomatillo Verde sauce to up the zing factor, and holy cow, that move was spot on.  The sauce was not only as good as always, but probably topped the sophisticated scale.  I felt like a pro when our little dinner party sat down and tasted this beautifully baked cheesy wonder.  I'm a huge fan of placing sliced avocados on top of the cheese, then covering with more cheese--it bakes up to something fiercely satisfying.  Here's the link to the recipe:  Enchiladas Suizas

 

By far, though, my favorite recipe of the night was the Sweet Pulled Pork

Barbacoa Salad.  Besides how creative you can be with salad making, I wanted the girls to take away two other things:  they were using an inexpensive cut of meat to make something that tastes like it came from a 5star restaurant, and the recipe is so easily filling with...wait for it...healthy foods that are impossible to resist.  I marinated the pork the day before, and then slow-roasted it all day.  You mix anything with a good cola and brown sugar, and it's going to taste good.  In this case, I also added Herdez Roasted Pasilla Chile sauce to the mix, which was so much tastier than traditional red enchilada sauce.  We built the salad by placing a flour tortilla into a bowl and filling it as follows: black beans, rice, lettuce, pork, pico de gallo, shredded cheese, tortilla strips, and a side of guacamole.  I made a creamy tomatillo dressing to be served on the side.  It's a salad that gives you the sweet and savory, the tangy, and all kinds of soft and crunchy textures.  Please try it:  Sweet Pulled Pork Barbacoa Salad

We ended the evening with churros...no, no, not homemade...purchased from the bakery around the corner.  And a discussion of our next adventure...into French cooking.  But, first, we are planning a trip to one of the more popular Mexican restaurants in town to compare our food...to theirs. 

Chicken Cacciatore

The thing about being an untrained home cook...you learn while you go, and every once in awhile you stumble across amazing little gems that you would normally only learn about from years-trained-and-experienced culinary academy faculty.  Like, braising, for example.  After a few years of making this recipe, I came to the realization that what I was doing was actually a recognized technique that involved searing meat at a high heat and then finishing it off in a covered pot in a deliciously seasoned liquid.  I was floored...this recipe came from a social connection, and it taught me a cooking method.  One day, I may go back to culinary school.  Do you think they have cooking courses suited to a computer engineer?  Something that teaches the difference between following a recipe and "cooking"?   
I still have the original handwritten source of this recipe - it was sent by mail to me from a cute couple I met near Venice.  We met on a train--they were excited to meet an American (imagine that) and practice their English.  We exchanged addresses, and eighteen months later I was sending them a small wedding gift.  In their thank you note, Chiara jotted down this recipe, something she said her mother's mother served at her rehearsal dinner.  I have since learned that this recipe is typical of Northern Italy where white wine is used in the sauce versus a red wine like you'd find in Southern Italy.  Pretty cool. 

I've converted the measurements and changed it a tiny bit over the years (like dried oregano instead of fresh, canned tomatoes instead of garden, canned chicken broth).  But, I have kept some things authentic - like NOT dredging the chicken in flour when searing.  I hope you enjoy this as much as my family does.  :) 

Ingredients
1 hen, cut into 8 pieces (about 3-4lbs)
2 T olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 celery stalk, chopped
1/2 box mushrooms, chopped
1/2 c dry white wine (you can substitute chicken broth)
1 14oz can chopped tomatoes
1/2 c chicken broth
1 t dried oregano
1/4 c fresh chopped parsley
salt and pepper
pinch of red pepper flakes

Directions
Rinse chicken pieces; pat dry.  Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat, and brown the chicken pieces well on both sides.  Remove chicken.  Add mushrooms, onions and celery to pan drippings.  Saute until soft, about 5minutes.  Add garlic and cook 2min more.  Add chicken back to the pot and add white wine.  Cook on medium heat until it has almost completely evaporated.  Add in chopped tomatoes, broth and seasonings.  Simmer covered for 30minutes.  To thicken the sauce, remove the chicken and add a a cornstarch-water mixture.  Bring to a boil, cook until reduced.  Serve over pasta. 

** Here's the link to my personal recipe:  http://allrecipes.com/personalrecipe/63545263/chicken-cacciatore/detail.aspx

He Had Me at the Tuna Melt

Mango Jam, or Gourmet Syrup, or Smoothie Flavoring

Butternut Squash for a Late Summer Saturday Evening

We are butternut squash fanatics.  If there is one thing to love about the end of summer, it's seeing these beige beauties ripen on the vine in the garden, or stacked in the produce section in huge crates like the pumpkins that have come early.  I love them, and will take them any way - steamed, mashed, in souffles, as part of risotto, creamed into soups, or pureed for a pasta filling.  It's absolutely worth the work cutting through the hard shell...the fleshy inside is sweet, and when cooked becomes soft, rich, caramelized and substantial. It pairs nicely with butter and spices like cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, anise, ginger, cumin, nutmeg, paprika, sage...the list goes on (as I'm discovering)...it depends on whether you are looking for sweet or savory.  Either way, the flavor will be bold.  I've served it as a main course, a side dish, and as a dessert.  Fantastic vegetable.  <3  Here are a few of my favorite recipes: 

This is actually a soup that I found thick enough to serve over pasta...my son had some friends over and they ate this for lunch...BOYS even!!!   





 Butternut Squash Soup





I made another soup this evening...the recipe really surprised me as the flavor changed intensely at each step...love the addition of bacon on top when serving, which completely balanced the honey in the recipe.

Caramelized Butternut Squash Soup 

And, my favorite recipe of all, the Butternut Squash Souffle, which was one of the first foods I have ever blogged about. 

I wasn't properly introduced to the butternut until a few years ago...didn't even know what it was until I had been in this country for probably 10 years.  This squash and I have some catching up to do!!!  Enjoy!

Sitting Down to a Meal of Garden Fresh Veggies and Grilled Chicken Sausage

Mmmm... Summer... Saute.  Wait...garden vegetable saute!  Add some sausage, in particular chicken sausage, and you've got one of the tastiest dinners calling your family to the table.  And it was so simple!!

As an Allrecipes Brand Ambassador, one of our September assignments is to try a few of Al Fresco's All Natural Chicken Sausage recipes found on Allrecipes.com.  I chose the Garlic Chicken Sausage and Summer Vegetable Saute for tonight's dinner because I had a few bell peppers and a couple of zucchini left from this weekend's garden picking.  Plus, we had piano lessons tonight and not a lot of time to prepare a big home cooked meal. 

I put the chicken sausage links and zucchini on the grill, and started the onions in my wok a few minutes later.  After the sausage links had browned up nicely, I brought them inside to slice diagonally and add to the onions.  We are big fans of tofu, so I cubed some up and added to the saute.  Tofu takes on the flavor of whatever it is cooked with, so I knew it would not only extend the well-mixed flavors, but also add a texture to replace the mushrooms, which we are not fond of.  I added the peppers to the stir fry last to keep them crisp and crunchy.  And, finally, I served the dish with the grilled zukes sliced up chunky-like and added to the side.

What an awesome celebration of seasonal bounty...grateful for yet another amazing recipe from Allrecipes.com.  And, of course, thank you, Al Fresco!!

Lemon Bars (or Squares, depending on how you cut them) :)