Luscious Lemon Bars

while ago my husband came come with a load of fresh off the tree lemons for me. I was excited but there were a lot of lemons. One of the things I did with them was to make lemon bars. We love almost anything and everything lemony in my house so this was perfect. The crust turned out so buttery and the filling was firm but not overly so. The filling melted in your mouth leaving a most pleasant tart lemon after taste. It really was a hit! The recipe makes a 9×13 pan. Other than the two pieces I got out of it…my husband ate it all in maybe a week. And I think I’m being generous with the week. LOL And yes it is already on the to make list again.


Now onto the the recipe!

Crust:
2 Cups Flour
1/2 cup Powder Sugar
1 Cup Butter (2 sticks cut into cubes)
1 Teaspoon Lemon Zest
Add flour and powder sugar into a bowl give it a quick stir with a fork. Now add in cubed butter and zest. Mix well. I used my hands as it was easier and quicker. Press into a 9×13 baking dish, making sure to keep it as even as possible and go up the sides as well. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 20-25 minutes. You want the crust to be lightly golden as it will cook more with the filling. Let cool for 5 minutes.

Filling:
4 eggs
2 Cups Sugar
1/2 cup Lemon Juice
1/4 cup Flour
1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
1 teaspoon Lemon Zest

Beat the eggs, sugar and lemon juice until light and slightly fluffy. Sift in the flower and baking powder. Mix lightly just to get rid of any lumps. Pour over crust and let bake in a 350 degree oven for 25 minutes. You want the filling to set but not be overly firm. Cool and dust with powder sugar.

Enjoy!

Sausage and Veggie Soup

1 package of mild Italian sausage
1 stick of butter
1 onion, diced
2 carrots, diced
4 mini bell peppers, diced (or one medium bell pepper)
1 medium zucchini, diced
1 can of corn, drained
1 can of diced tomatoes
1 box of chicken or veggie stock
2 cups of water
8 oz of dry pasta
2 tablespoons minced garlic
salt & pepper to taste

In a dutch oven pot saute the onion, carrots and bell pepper in the butter. Add the rest of the vegetables, the stock and water. Bring to a boil and turn down to medium low heat. Add the pasta and let simmer for 30 minutes. While that’s going in a separate pan sear the sausages on all sides. Take off heat and slice. Add back to pan to cook all the way through. Add to the soup while it’s simmering. Top with a little Parmesan Romano cheese and there ya go.

It’s very chunky and filling. I went with the sausages instead of ground pork/sausage because I wanted it to be meatier. It would be just as good without the sausage though.

Braised Short Ribs

I’ve been meaning to post this recipe for a while now. My brother-in-law is an amazing chef and he or his wife sometimes posts pics of some of his culinary creations. One that he posted is his version of braised short ribs and it inspired me. Especially since it sounded so good and if I wanted I was going to have to make it for myself as Texas is bit of a far drive for dinner. So this is what I came up with. It was so good. The meat literally fell off the bone and damn near melted in your mouth. The sauce was rich and the creamy mashed potatoes was the perfect bed to serve it all on.

8 whole Beef Short Ribs
Kosher Salt and Pepper To Taste
1/4 cup All-purpose Flour
6 pieces Pancetta, Diced
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
1 whole Medium Onion, Diced
3 whole Carrots, Diced
2 whole Shallots, Peeled And Finely Minced
2 cups Red Or White Wine
2 cups Beef Broth (enough To Almost Cover Ribs)
2 sprigs Thyme
2 sprigs Rosemary
Prep the carrots, shallots, and onion.

Salt and pepper ribs, then dredge in flour. Set aside.

In a large dutch oven, cook pancetta over medium heat until complete crispy and all fat is rendered. Remove pancetta and set aside. Do not discard grease.

Add olive oil to pan with the pancetta grease, and raise heat to high. Brown ribs on all sides, about 45 seconds per side. Remove ribs and set aside. Turn heat down to medium.

Add onions, carrots, and shallots to pan and cook for 2 minutes. Pour in wine and scrape bottom of pan to release all the flavorful bits of glory. Bring to a boil and cook 2 minutes. Note about the wine: You should always cook with wine that you are willing to drink. In my case I don’t drink wine but I’m not opposed to cooking with it. I picked a nice full bodied cab that was recommended to me at the grocery store.

Add broth, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, and plenty of freshly ground black pepper. Taste and add more salt if needed. Add ribs to the liquid; they should be almost completely submerged. Add thyme and rosemary sprigs (whole) and the pancetta to the liquid.

Cover and place into the oven. Cook at 350 for 2 hours, then reduce heat to 325 and cook for an additional 30 to 45 minutes. Ribs should be fork-tender and falling off the bone. Remove pan from oven and allow to sit for at least 20 minutes, lid on, before serving.(Trust me this is the hardest part…by this time the kitchen smells amazing!) At the last minute, skim fat off the top of the liquid.

Serve 2 ribs on bed of creamy mashed potatoes, spooning a little juice over the top or in my case a lot of the juice over it. But the hubby gives this recipe two thumbs up.

You can use this recipe with cross cut beef shanks. It turns out just as good.

Macaroni and Cheese

My husband and I love macaroni and cheese. Seriously…what’s not to love about noodles covered in a cheese sauce? As convenient as the box mixes are, it really does not take much more time to make it from scratch. Well semi from scratch as I’m not making my own noodles. We prefer the stop top method as we are not big fans of the crumbly topping that normally comes with the baked version.

Bechamel Sauce
1 cup shredded cheese
1 teaspoon Worcestershire
8 ounces of dried noodles (elbow macaroni is what we normally use)
Salt, pepper to taste

Using the basic Bechamel Sauce recipe (for the purpose of this macaroni and cheese I use 1 tablespoon butter, 1 tablespoon of flour to one cup of heavy cream. I know the recipe calls for milk but my husband and I love the added richness the cream gives the sauce.)

While cooking the Bechamel Sauce, bring a pot of salted water to boil and cook the noodles per instructions. Drain well but do not rinse. Rinsing will take the starch off the noodles and they need that starch for the sauce to cling to.

Once the Bechamel is ready, add the Worcestershire and slowly add the shredded cheese. You can use any good melting cheese. I have a soft spot for Gruyer. Chedder and Fontina also work well. Stir until all the cheese is melted. Add salt and pepper if you think it needs it (the Bechamel should have already been seasoned). Slowly add the cheese sauce to the noodles, mixing until every noodle is covered with cheesy goodness.

Serve and enjoy! This makes four servings. Normally I have a little bit of sauce left over, steam some broccoli and/or cauliflower and pour over that! YUM!

Bechamel Sauce

In my opinion every cook should know how to make a few of the mother sauces, especially Bechamel. What is a mother sauce, you ask? I am very happy to tell you! There are five mother sauces as described by chef Auguste Escoffier in his book: A Guide to Modern Cookery. These sauces, in both French and Italian cuisine, are the basis for most of the other sauces you will find. The five mother sauces are Bechamel, Espagnole, Veloute, Hollandaise and Tomate.

For this post we are going to talk about Bechamel, which is one of my favorites. There are so many things you can do with a Bechamel sauce…you can turn it into a Mornay sauce (a cheese sauce with Gruyere and Parmesan cheese), or the English version Cheddar cheese sauce. Bechamel Sauce on it’s own is used in a wide array of dishes as well.

The basic recipe for a Bechamel is 1 to 3 tablespoons of butter and flour to one cup of milk. It is most important to keep the ratio of butter and flour equal. Otherwise your sauce will have an overly starchy non good eats flavor. Trust me I know this from experience. What you need the sauce for will depend on how many tablespoons of butter and flour you use honestly.

One tablespoon each of butter and flour per cup of milk makes a thin, easily pourable sauce. Two tablespoons of each makes a medium thick sauce. Three tablespoons of each makes an extra thick sauce.

Melt the butter and whisk in the flour until smooth. This forms a roux.

Cook the roux for about five to seven minutes. You don’t want it to get dark, but stay a light golden sandy color. Make sure to stir frequently. 

 Depending on the recipe…some say to warm the milk, some say to leave it cold. The whole purpose of it is to prevent lumps. Honestly I’ve never found it to make much of a difference. I just pull out my milk when I start so it can get to room temperature. Add the milk slowly, whisking it constantly. If you are making more than one cup…add a cup at a time, mixing well each time. Whisk together until smooth. Bring to a boil. Turn down the heat and let simmer for about 10 minutes, stirring constantly. The milk will thicken with the roux. Season with salt, pepper and a dash of nutmeg (freshly grated is best). Remove from heat and set aside until ready to use.

That’s the basic mother sauce…now you can get creative!

One of my favorite variations is to make a cheese sauce for homemade mac cheese. I make the thin sauce version as the cheese will thicken the sauce. I add a teaspoon of Worcestershire and a cup of shredded cheese. (A ½ cup to a cup of cheese per cup of milk is my normal ratio.)  As for what type of cheese to use? Any cheese that has a good melting point is good. Really it will be up to your tastes. Just make sure to have the cheese shredded (it melts better) and to add it to the sauce in small quantities, stirring well each time.

Pulled Pork Sandwiches

Yes this happened tonight. It was so yummy. Seriously one of the best things I have made in a long while, which is saying something as I’m a pretty damn good cook. This adventure started last weekend when I was grocery shopping. Pulled pork sounded really good to me and in Sacramento there isn’t a whole lot of choices when it comes to BBQ. The one really good place is a good 30 mins away and pricey. Not that I mind paying for good food…but let’s see what I can come up with. So I find a really nice pork butt roast or a Boston Butt roast as it is sometimes known and start to plot.

A little bit about pork butt…it’s not the behind! Seriously. That is where most cured and/or smoked hams come from. The pork butt or Boston butt cut comes from the top part of the shoulder. The rest is considered the picnic or shoulder roast. The Boston butt cut is preferred for pulled pork because it has heavy marbling (which means juicy yumminess) and overall a more tender and not a stringy. It works really really smoked, grilled low and slow or as I did used my crock pot. And this recipe is good for just regular pulled pork. You don’t have to make them into sandwiches. It can stand up on it’s own. Trust me. It’s that damn good.

Pulled Pork Sandwiches
3-4# pork butt roast
2 tablespoons paprika
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon sugar
1 1⁄2 teaspoons black pepper
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon ground red pepper
1 teaspoon liquid smoke
1 onion chopped
8-10 hearty buns

Note: You will hear various opinions about removing the fat cap or not on the roast. I don’t. Why? Because if done right, the fat will melt into the meat making it juicy and yummy. Now if it’s too thick, feel free to trim it back some but I highly recommend on leaving some of it on. Trust me on this.

Combine all the seasonings in a small bowl. Massage the seasoning mix all over the pork roast until it coated fully. Heat a pan on high, add a tablespoon of vegetable oil. Sear all sides of the pork roast in the pan. Put the chopped onion in the bottom of the crock pot and place the pork roast on top (fat cap up). Deglaze the pan with a cup of water and the liquid smoke. Pour the juice over the pork roast. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours or until fork tender.

Remove the pork, drain juice (reserve some) discard onions (or you can shred them into the pork like I did). Shred and return to crock pot. Add a little bit of juice just to keep it moist.

Stack the pulled pork on buns, add bbq sauce, coleslaw and pickles. Enjoy!

Tangy Mustard BBQ Sauce

So in my quest for a yummy pulled pork sandwich…I need a sauce. A little something something to pull it all together. This is where it gets tricky…my husband doesn’t like a lot of bbq sauces. Most are either too sweet or too heavy on the tomato/ketchup. So I looked and looked…then it came to me. I’m trying to do this pulled pork Texas style and in Texas…they really don’t do pulled pork. That there’s beef country. So what goes well with pork…something sweet, something tangy…kinda like a Carolina style sauce…yeah that was the ticket.

Tangy Mustard BBQ Sauce
1 cup prepared yellow mustard
1 cup brown sugar
¾ cup apple cider vinegar
¼ cup water
1 tbsp chili powder
1 tsp black pepper
1 teaspoon cayenne
½ tsp onion powder
½ tsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
3 tablespoons butter

Whisk all the ingredients together in a saucepan until smooth. Cook on medium low heat for about 20 minutes to allow the flavors to get all nice and happy together. Store in a jar or squeeze bottle in the fridge. It’s best when it’s had a few hours to set before serving. It’s tangy with a touch of sweet and a little bit of a kick that likes to linger on your tongue. The perfect sauce to go on top of the pulled pork.

Quick and Easy Coleslaw

I’m not the biggest coleslaw fan. Most times I find coleslaw to be either too soupy or too heavy on the vinegar. But I was making pulled pork sandwiches for dinner and that is one of the few times I actually like it. So I started to research…and there are a lot of different recipes out there. And I also had to keep in mind that my husband isn’t the biggest mayonnaise fan. It makes it a bit hard but after looking around this is what I came up with…

Coleslaw
1/2 cup of Mayonnaise
1/4 cup of Sugar
1 teaspoon of White Distilled Vinegar
1/2 teaspoon of Black Pepper
1/2 teaspoon of Salt
14 0z bag of shredded cabbage/coleslaw mix

In a bowl mix all the ingredients with a whisk. Add the shredded cabbage mix and toss. Cover and let chill for a few hours before serving. Do not be alarmed by the amount the coleslaw condenses down to. The salt and the vinegar draws out the the moisture.

I have to admit I’m pretty stoked with the result. It wasn’t too soupy and the tang was just right. The husband approved of it as well.

Beef Tips in Mushroom Gravy

1.5 – 2# of cut of beef. (I used a nice looking London Broil)
Salt, Pepper, spring of rosemary
Mirepoix (onion, carrots, celery)
Beef Stock (homemade is best but a good organic stock works as well)
3-4 large button mushrooms, sliced
1 recipe of Pasta or 1# of dried egg noodles

Season the beef liberally with salt and cracked black pepper on both sides. Add to a heated pan to sear on both sides. Once seared, remove the meat from the pan and deglaze with a little bit of the stock. Add the mirepoix (chop an onion, 3-4 good size carrots and 4 ribs of celery – mirepoix adds a depth of flavor to stocks, sauces, etc.) to the pan. Place the meat on top of the mirepoix and add enough stock to come up about halfway to the meat. Strip the rosemary from the sprig and add. Cover and braise in a 275-300 degree oven until the meat is fork tender. (About 2 hours or so)

Once braised, remove from the oven. Take the meat out, cover and set aside so it can rest. Strain the braising liquid. In a large sauce pan, make a roux (equal parts of melted butter and flour. I used a 1/3 cup of each). Slowly whisk the braising liquid to the roux until there are no lumps. Add the mushrooms (you can use any type of mushroom. The hubby just prefers button mushrooms.) and cut the beef into small chunks. Add beef to the gravy. Season with salt and pepper to taste and simmer for about 15 minutes.

While the sauce is simmering, cook your pasta. You can either serve it over the pasta or just mix it together like I did. Serves at least 4.

Enjoy! I know we did!

Basic Pasta

Pasta…it can be a very daunting concept but it doesn’t need to be. In my opinion, there is nothing better than the taste of fresh pasta. And really it is not that hard.

The recipe is really easy.

1 cup of flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 beaten egg
1-2 Tablespoon water, as needed.

In a medium mixing bowl, combine the flour and salt. Form a well in the middle and add the beaten egg. Mix with a fork, bringing in sides of the well little by little. The dough may be dry. If it is, you can start to add the water a tablespoon at a time. Knead for 3-4 minutes on a lightly floured surface.

Cover and let rest for 20 minutes. The resting is essential for a tender pasta as this allows the gluten to relax.

Using either a rolling pin or a pasta machine, roll out and cut to your desired thickness. Bring salted water to a boil and add pasta. Don’t walk away as fresh pasta does not take nearly as long as the dry variety to cook. Once al dente, drain and serve. Makes about 3-4 servings