Well, here it is the end of March and spring is upon us.  I am so glad winter is on the way out!  With spring coming and warmer weather it gets me in the mood to cook.  I had a craving for some Empanadas.  So….off to the local specialty food store  for some Empanada shells.  I am not brave enough yet to make those myself.

 

Filling

1 pound ground beef

1 small onion – diced

2-3 cloves of garlic minced

2-3 Russet potatoes boiled, cooled and diced

2 Roma tomatoes seeded and diced

1 packet hot taco seasoning

salt and pepper to taste

 

 

How to prepare

Well the title says it all, spicy beef and potato filling.  I used ground beef, onion and garlic.  Browned the beef, 1/2 the onion and garlic in a pan.  Mix in the taco seasoning, the one I used is pretty spicy.  To that I added the potatoes. Cook until potatoes have warmed up then add the tomatoes.  Stir to mix in the tomatoes.  Salt and pepper to taste.

Remove from heat, let cool and add the rest of the onion.

Place a couple of tablespoons of filling on half the Empanada shell top with cheese of your choice.  (This time I used sharp cheddar.) Fold the Empanada shell over the filling and seal with a fork.

I sprinkled Sazon on top of the Empanadas before frying them in a shallow frying pan.  About 1 minute per side until golden brown and puffs up a bit.

All that is left is to eat and enjoy!  We had them with a small salad and some Spanish rice.

I am actually thinking about starting to sell the Empanadas.  To start a little business of my own.  Anyone interested in some Empanadas???  : )

 

Step by step photo gallery, after the break…

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Happy New Year Everyone!  So, for New Years Eve, I wanted to make some snacks for us to munch on at home.  I picked up this recipe booklet at the grocery store just before Christmas and found this recipe and it sounded very yummy and it was very yummy!

Here is the recipe for Southern BBQ bites by Guy Fieri:

1/4 cup buttermilk and Miracle Whip

2 Tbsp. apple cider vinegar

1-1/2 Tbsp.  Canned chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, minced

1 tsp. sea salt

1/4 tsp. fresh cracked pepper

3 cups green cabbage, shredded

1/3 cup carrots, shredded (about 1 small)

5 cups shredded cooked chicken

1 bottle (18oz.) Bull’s-Eye Memphis style barbecue sauce

72 Ritz Crackers

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After eating some bread pudding made from a mix by Tastefully Simple and getting some at Famous Dave’s, I decided it should be rather easy and inexpensive to make at home.  I did my usual search on Allrecipes.com and  found one that seemed fairly simple and had good reviews.

So,  I bought a loaf of french bread from Meijer and let it get a little stale, just left it sit in the bag for a day on the counter and dry out a bit.  I cut off all the crust and ripped it into little pieces.  I basically follow a recipe the first time out,  that way I know how to adjust it the next time.  I really hate when people find a recipe and rate it poorly when they have changed a bunch of things in it.

The recipe I used was called simply Bread Pudding III.  It had a 4 1/2 out of 5 star rating, so it had to be pretty good I thought.  I did double the recipe because I wanted to use up all the bread I bought.  I did change two things with this recipe.  Nothing major, even though I said I don’t change things, I changed things that wouldn’t change the outcome of texture or basic taste of the recipe.  I added some cinnamon and golden raisins. I did not double the sauce part of the recipe because I thought it would be plenty even though I doubled the pudding part.  It ended up being plenty of sauce without doubling.

I hate baking using a water bath.  For those of you that do not know what a water bath is, it is baking in water.  You put your dish of food in another pan filled about half way up with water.  This is to provide a constant, steady heat source and ensures even, slow cooking.  Usually used in cheese cakes and custards.  Because I hate using this method, I simply turned down the oven 25 degrees and it came out great.  Cook it for one hour.  It was still a little jiggly when it came out, but finished cooking  while cooling and was perfect.

As soon as I took it out of the oven I started on the sauce.  How can you go wrong with cream, butter, sugar and vanilla (real vanilla, never use imitation).  When the sauce was done I poured it over the warm pudding, making sure to get it all over and around the edges.

This was definitely a hit with my family.  I will be making this again.  Would be a great dessert to take to work or for a family dinner or holiday dinner.  You could really add a lot of different things to this simple dish and make it your own.

So as I brainstorm for ideas in what to write about on WhatTwoEat, I thought about one of my favorite foods, Bacon. As a friend mentioned to me ‘Everything is better with Bacon.’ I thought to myself that a series on wrapping Bacon around different foods would not only be fun, but delicious all at the same time.

So here is the first contribution to that series; Bacon wrapped Jalapeno poppers. Now, I’ll admit that there are quite a few other food bloggers out there who have done this very same thing, but none that I had found to do it quite the way I envisioned.

Cream Cheese is the standard filling for a Jalapeno Popper, but I didn’t want to just use Cream Cheese, and at the same time, I didn’t want to take away from the flavor of the Cream Cheese.  So in an effort to tie all the flavors together I decided to incorporate some Jalapeno and Bacon into the Cream Cheese filling.  Also, most others who have made these before, only use a 1/4 to 1/2 a slice of Bacon, not me…I’m all about the Bacon, I’ll use a full slice, thank you very much!

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Hola mi amigos! ¿Cómo estás?

On this first Cinco de Mayo since WhatTwoEat has come online I wanted to take a little time to introduce you to my favorite new Food Network television all star, Chef Marcela Valladolid. If you’re a fan of Food Network, you’re likely to already know about this fabulous new addition to the line up of great TV chefs.

Marcela is the host of the new show ‘Mexican Made Easy’, in which Marcela ‘prepares a fresh take on Mexican food‘, has recently completed it first season with six episodes that started towards the end of January.

The show, which airs on Saturday mornings, gained popularity quickly, despite its unusual time slot.  Food Network did do a great job of running promo ads throughout the day to ‘show off’ their new star, which is what caught my attention early on. In the spot, the vivacious Valladolid does her best to share her excitement about the dishes she creates; and let me tell you, it worked!  Sure, you’re thinking…’Oh you’re a guy, you just think she’s hot…”, and yes, while I’ll agree with that statement, I’ll say it’s more than just that, way more. Her looks & her personality go a long way in hosting a TV cooking show, but the originality of the dishes she prepares is what really piques my interest.  While a title of ‘Mexican Made Easy’ eludes to just that, easy Mexican food such as Tacos, Burritos or Nachos; Marcela does pretty much the opposite, and shows the rest of us that Mexican food is more than just corn or flour wraps and shells stuffed with meat, beans and cheese, and at the same time makes it interesting, fun and ‘easy’ to make!

While this young chef may seem like a relative newcomer to the television food crowd, she’s no stranger to the business and has fought long and hard to get where she is now, using some of the same tactics other Food Network chefs have used to get noticed, even hiring the same publicity company, the William Morris Agency.

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I have been trying to find easy recipes for Indian food.  I love to go out and eat it but it is so expensive.  I thought I could try and make it at home way cheaper.  While looking through the Food Revolution book I found a chapter called ‘Easy Curries’.  Right!? I thought, Easy? Really??

So after reading the intro to the book and looking over the recipes, I figured Jamie says to make it and share it.  So I am giving it a whirl.  I will make it and share my experience with you.

After making the tikka paste which was super easy!  Cut up some chicken, done!  Slice the onion, chile and ginger, ok good.  Peel off the cilantro leaves and cut up the stems.  Man this is easy, can it be?

Saute up the onions, chile, ginger and cilantro stems, add chicken and tikka paste, stir it all up.  Dump in a can of tomatoes and coconut milk add one can of water and let simmer till done.  Took about 30 minutes. Read the rest of this entry »

Well, as I had posted earlier, I won the cookbook, Jamie’s Food Revolution.  So, tonight I made the Chicken Tikka Masala, but before you can make the dish you have to either have tikka paste or curry paste.  I have purchased Patak’s pastes/sauces before and they are quite good but, this time, in the ‘food revolution‘ style, I made it from scratch.

We went to a couple of different Asian Markets and got all the needed supplies.  I peeled the garlic, cleaned the ginger, measured out all the spices.  I toasted the cumin and coriander seeds then put them in my Mortar and Pestle and ground them till fine.  Put all the spices, garlic, ginger, cilantro, coconut, tomato paste and oil in my food processor and ground until it turn into a paste.  For the complete recipe see Jamie’s Food Revolution book, page 99. Read the rest of this entry »

So when it comes to buying ethnic groceries, do you have someplace close to buy them from? Or do you have to use the power of the Internet to get what you need? While Grand Rapids, MI might seem like the last place you would imagine finding what you need, if you look hard enough, you’ll find it. Especially if you live in the SE part of the city.

In preparation for Kris being able to make Jamie Oliver’s recipes for Tikka Masala and Vindaloo, as well as my first attempt at Maki Sushi we needed to run out today and pick up a few things. There are two stores that fit the bill for this. The first being Asian Delight Market, which is located next to Horrocks at 44th St and Breton Ave in Kentwood, and the other being Spice of India. We would most likely have been able to get the Indian groceries we needed at Asian Delight, but they looked like they were in the middle of revamping that section of their store.

There were some other odds and ends that we grabbed along the way, such as a package of Krupuk Udang, or ‘Shrimp Chips’ as I had mentioned enjoying in my review of ‘Thai Fusion’. They look super simple to make, so for a few bucks, why not give it shot ourselves. I also picked up a bottle of Huy Fong Sriracha hot chili sauce, which is tabled like it was ketchup in most Asian restaurants. And yes…you see Pocky in the photo, what would a trip to an Asian grocery store be without picking up some Pocky? Read the rest of this entry »

I am a fan of (or ‘like’ as it is now) on Facebook, of The Face of 4 WOTV.  On her Facebook page she was having a contest;  watch a video of her cook one of the recipes in the Jamie’s Food Revolution book, answer a question and hopefully win a book.  So, I won ‘Jamie’s Food Revolution: Rediscover How to Cook Simple, Delicious, Affordable Meals‘ Cookbook.

I am looking through it and some of the Indian recipes sound good and easy.  I am making a list for the grocery store to test some of them out.  Lets see how simple, delicious and affordable this really is…

Watch for another blog post to see how it all turns out.

Just a few short months ago, on what was one of many shopping trips to the 28th and Broadmoor area of Grand Rapids my wife and I discovered a new sign over what used to be the Adriatic restaurant and bar. ‘Thai Fusion’ it said, and certainly piqued both of our interests, as good Thai food is a rare breed of restaurant in the Grand Rapids area.

As we were out this evening trying to find some place to eat, a place that we either hadn’t been to in a while, or somewhere we haven’t been to at all, I remembered ‘Thai Fusion’ and drove by to see if they were open; indeed they were!

This being a Saturday evening, nearly 8 PM, there were a few groups of people and some couples seated inside, all seeming to be enjoying what they were eating. The restaurant is very nicely decorated and is large enough to handle a good sized dining crowd. We were greeted and immediately seated. Our server, Jenny, was very attentive and friendly and took care of us quite well throughout the dining experience. Read the rest of this entry »