The Food in my Beard

Hiatus

2013-05-02T21:05:17Z

I mentioned about a month ago that posts would be sparse around here as I finish up my cookbook, but as time slips by and especially over the past few weeks, I realize that I just cant keep up with everything that's going on right now. Something has to give, and the only way I can work it is to stop posting here for a bit. The way things are going right now, I work about 40 hours week, have a few other writing obligations, cook and write for the blog, and when I do finally sit down to write for the book, I end up just falling asleep or something. I could just do what some other food bloggers do, and post only a few times a month, but it's just not the way this blog works, and not the way I operate. It's all or nothing around here. I love writing recipes for you guys more than anything else that I do, so it sucks to have to stop and it was a tough decision, but believe me, when you see the awesomeness of this cookbook, I hope all will be forgiven! In the meantime, you can follow me on twitter, cook something from my endless archives, or just wait a month till I'm back! See you all June 15th!

Loaded Potato Rings

2013-04-30T21:44:46Z

Fried little rings of potato bacony goodness. This was the first thing I ate after my 3 month diet ended about a month ago and it was fantastic. Check out the Loaded Potato Rings on Tablespoon

Korean Flavored Octopus and Gnocchi

2013-04-28T21:32:15Z

The premise of this dish was to to create a textural study between 3 different gummy ingredients, braised octopus, potato gnocchi, and korean rice cake. All 3 of these things can remind me of each other, so I thought it would be fun to put them all together in a korean flavored sauce. It came out pretty tasty in the end, but I don't feel that I fully achieved what I was going for. The main issue was the size differences between the 3 main ingredients. I was aiming to make them all a similar size and shape but failed. Regardless, if you like octopus you will enjoy this dinner, but on a normal night I would make it with either gnocchi or rice cake, and not both.

I chopped the octopus into what I considered to be gnocchi sized, but they ended up shrinking like crazy. I knew this happens when braising octopus but for some reason I wasn't thinking.

Next start the sauce. Sauteed onions followed by some garlic, ginger, and gochujang.

Can of tomatoes in next.

Then the octopus.

Let this simmer about 2 hours.

Meanwhile I made the gnocchi. In addition to cutting the octopus too small, I also made the gnocchi too big for some reason.

Rinced and blanched the rice cakes. Only cook them about 1 minute.

Tasty stuff all mixed together. The rich hearty octopus infused sauce really coats the gnocchi and rice cake well.

Good, but not exactly what I was going for.

Saute onions until beginning to brown. Add garlic and ginger, then gochujang. Add a can of diced tomatoes. Then the squid and a little rice vinegar, soy sauce, and salt. Cover and simmer on low about 2 hours, stirring occasionally. When octopus is tender, add in the (blanched) rice cake or (cooked) gnocchi. Simmer another few minutes before removing from heat and serving.

Cheesy Broccoli Quinoa

2013-04-23T20:33:47Z

It's a perfect little side dish, loaded with ancient grain goodness and tender veggies. This almost tasted like a healthy version of broccoli cassarole. Try my Cheesy Broccoli Quinoa on Tablespoon

Spring and Summer Playlist

2013-04-21T08:30:34Z

Around this time every year, I send out a mix to a bunch of friends, and this year I decided to share it with all of you. All of these songs are from 2013 releases and would be a great soundtrack for cooking, hanging out, BBQing, sitting by the pool, or any of the other enjoyable things you will be doing in the next 5 months.

New Food Wallpapers

2013-04-18T21:00:19Z

Wallpapers guys! What I do these days is just put all of my favorites into a folder and have windows rotate through them and change every half hour or so. At this point, I have an insave amount of these in the archives. Please don't use these commercially without asking. If you want to use these on your smartphone, browse to the 1024X768 option from your phone and choose 'set as wallpaper'. And as always, let me know if you end up using any of these!

Green Chile Chicken

2013-04-16T22:02:06Z

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone for your concern and well wishing the past few days. All my friends and family are safe. As many of you remembered, I have mentioned having a good time at the Boston Marathon in past years. We were in fact out and about this past Monday, mostly on Beacon st and the Fenway area, and about a mile from the finish line when the shit went down. Enough has been said about the horrific events of that day, so I am not going to add it it, I just wanted to mention that I am proud of the first responders and quick charitable instincts that my city has shown in crisis.

Back to business as usual around here, starting with this delicious Green Chile Chicken on Tablespoon

Arrested Development Cocktails

2013-04-11T22:42:03Z

We needed cocktails for our arrested development party, so we devised some clever drinks inspired by our favorite moments and characters from the show. I had a lot of fun all week with these posts, and I hope you guys enjoyed reading them as much as I liked writing them! Without further ado, the drinks.

Lucille's Breakfast

Instead of eating the toast on the side of the vodka, why not just put it into the drink? Just make some toast and crumble it into breadcrumbs.

Then make a martini and rim the martini glass with the toast. Toss in a strawberry for good measure.

Le Cousins Dangereux

This drink is a "relative" masterpiece of complex eroticism.

Basically it's an old fashioned(Sugar, bitters, whisky, citrus, cherry), but instead of just whisky, I used two related whiskeys, a bourbon, and a rye.

Buster's Juice

Buster loves his juice, and with this cocktail, you will too.

Any store bought berry juice, with vodka, pino nior, and soda water.

I just Blue Myself

Another simple one. Get one of those weird blue bar mixes from the liquor store. I'm not the biggest fan of these normally, but there was no other way to get this drink to be the right color.

Then just mix it with some vodka, a splash of lemon, and blueberries.

The George Sr.

George loves his ice cream sandwiches. I couldn't find a clip for this one, but the quote is "I'm having a love affair with this ice cream sandwich." I just popped them into the blender with some Kahlua and vodka and called it a day.

This was the one fail of the night. We all thought it was gonna be amazing, but the issue was the weird chemicals in the crappy ice cream sandwiches made the texture all funky(not "funke"). If I ever made these again, I would just do a few ice cream sandwiches, and then add a few scoops of cookies and cream, then the booze.

The George Sr. was so aggressively weird that it put Kim out of commission for about a half hour!

Which one do you think you would like best?

Chicken Fingers... with Spicy Club Sauce

2013-04-10T22:27:47Z

Fried Cheese... with club sauce. Popcorn shrimp... with club sauce. Chicken fingers... with spicy club sauce! I had no idea what club sauce was, but I imagined it to be like a cross between bbq sauce and cocktail sauce. The internet didn't really help me in figuring out what it was, so I just made it how I wanted it to be. Honestly I thought the sauce was awesome, but the people I was with apparently don't really like horseradish, so they didn't enjoy the sauce as much as I did. I probably should have asked them before I dumped a bunch of horseradish into the sauce!

Onion and habanero starts the sauce.

Tomato in followed by some worcestershire, sugar, honey, and vinegar. Let it simmer an hour and a half before blending.

AHHHHHHHH!!!!!! GENE PARMESAN! But yea, bread your chicken with some breadcrumbs and parm.

Just the usual chicken breading. Flour, egg, then the breadcrumbs mixed with parm.

Fry em up!

Pull them out when they are nice and browned.

And serve with the sauce. This dish is enough to give you vertigo!

Spicy club sauce
Saute an onion and 5 habaneros until beginning to brown. Add 2 cloves garlic followed by a 28oz can of tomatoes. Add in 2 tablespoons of worcestershire, 2 tablespoons mustard, 2 tablespoons smoked paprika, 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup honey, and 1/4 cup vinegar. Simmer for an hour and a half, remove from heat, and blend until smooth. Add 1/2 cup of mayo and 1/4 cup of worcestershire Cool before serving.

Frozen Bananas

2013-04-09T21:10:50Z

There's always money in the banana stand! I couldn't make it down to the big yellow joint, so I thought it would be fun to make a few frozen bananas. I'd never had a frozen banana before this and I was pleasantly surprised by how tasty but also simple and healthy(for a dessert) it was. I just used a simple chocolate ganache and some peanuts for the coating as it was my first time, but you could really get crazy with this idea and make all sorts of different topping combos.

The bananas in the freezer

Rich helped out by crushing up some peanuts.

A quick dip in the ganache. This was just bittersweet and milk chocolate chips with a splash of cream and microwaved until melted.

Coat with the peanuts. Don't go overboard though, it's not mardi gras.

When I finished mine, in true Bluth fashion, I just ate it and let everyone else make their own. By this time I was tired from a lot of cooking, and my kitchen was clearly a mess.

I really liked these though! I was kind of surprised.

Don't let Mr. Bananagrabber get you!

The ganache was a cup each of bittersweet and milk chocolate chips, a pinch of salt and 1/4 cup of cream. Microwave in 30 second increments, stirring in between, until all melted. Freeze the bananas for about an hour and a half with a popsicle stick in one end. Dip the frozen bananas into the ganache and coat with the broken peanuts.

Bluth Family Cornballs

2013-04-08T21:28:13Z

If you don't want to travel all the way to Mexico to get a cornballer on the black market, you can just make this tasty snack in any deep frying situation. I assume that the cornballs in question are similar to a hush puppy, so that was the approach I took making this recipe. They came out great and were a fun app for our little Arrested Development party. Yo soy loco por los cornballs!

I had Kim cut up some jalapenos for me, because as Michael says, making cornballs is a bonding experience for family and friends. Kim wasn't too busy to help, unlike George Michael.

Cornmeal, cheese, corn, and the jalapeno.

Be careful when frying your cornballs!

Tasty stuff!

Crunchy, salty, and tender on the inside.

I think ketchup was the preferred sauce for these. You are gonna have to wait till Thursday for more info on the other pictured sauce.

Snacks as we watched a few episodes.

1 1/2 cups cornmeal
1/2 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
15 pickled jalapenos
about one ears worth of corn
1/2 cup grated cheddar
Splash of milk
Mix all the ingredients together and add a little more milk if it needs the wetness to hold itself together. Deep fry in ball shapes until browned, about 4 minutes each. Serve with some ketchup, mayo, bbq, salsa, or other dip.

Hot Ham Water Soup

2013-04-07T21:46:00Z

Finally there's a date! The much awaited 4th season of Arrested Development will be available on Netflix in full on May 26th. To celebrate, I am dedicating a week of recipes to the greatest food moments of the first 3 seasons. Today is one of my all time favorites, Hot Ham Water. In this episode (s3-e9 "S.O.B's"), Lindsay is trying to be more of a domesticated mother figure to the family, and her first attempt at cooking dinner is a dish she likes to call Hot Ham Water. I took inspiration from this scene to make a flavorful ham broth and load it up with some sauteed ham, collard greens, and udon noodle. Tasty stuff!

Whoa whoa, dont throw that ham bone away! There is still plenty of meat on that bone! Throw that in a pot with some carrot, celery, bacon, onion, garlic, and kale... Baby you got a stew goin!

Some fresh collard greens really make this soup hearty.

Cook it in the broth with some sauteed ham and once it's tender add the udon.

Tastes watery... but with a smack of ham!

Really though, this wasnt watery at all. A flavorful homemade ham stock really makes this soup something special. We topped it with some quick-pickled habanero. Soup mondays makes a sudden cameo on Arrested Development week!

A pound each of carrot and celery, a few stalks and leaves of kale, about 12 cloves of garlic, 2-3 onions, 2 strips of bacon, salt, pepper, some chili flake, and a 2 pound ham bone with some meat still hanging on to it. Put this into a pot with a gallon of water and cook about 3 hours, or an hour and a half in a pressure cooker like I did. Strain fat. In a pot, saute diced ham in some oil or butter. Add in the stock. Add in shredded collard greens. Simmer about a half hour. Add in your udon and serve after it's been heated through.

Banana Walnut French Toast Bread Pudding

2013-04-04T20:13:23Z

Last year at Easter brunch at my Aunt's house, she asked me "Dan, where is that french toast bake that you told me you would bring when we talked on St. Patrick's Day?" You guys probably can guess the end of that story, but the moral is, don't give me a future task at 10pm on a Saturday St. Patricks! That night I put a reminder in my calendar for the week before easter 2013 to make a fun french toast/bread pudding bake.

My goals for this dish were as follows. Don't make it to desserty; keep the sugar on the lower side so it registers more as a french toast than a full on bread pudding. Make it very juicy; I wanted the texture to be creamy and not dried out at all. Make it as different from my Mom's bread pudding as possible; She makes a really good one and this needed to be different to avoid comparisons. I personally thought the goals were achieved and it tasted really good, but my Mom of course couldn't help but do some comparing.

Cubes of brioche.

Bananas, eggs, bread, cream, cinnamon, and vanilla. How could it possibly be bad?

Don't overmix or it will turn to total mush. Top with the walnuts and toss it into the oven.

This expanded a ton in the oven but sank back down.

Creamy and super moist.

A nice addition to the brunch spread.

Stick of butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
5 eggs
2 cups cream
1 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup whiskey
1 tablespoon cinnamon
2 teaspoons vanilla
6 bananas
1 cups walnuts
2 loafs of brioche

Mash one of the bananas and slice the rest. Cube all the bread. Whisk the eggs, soften the butter. Mix everything except the bread and walnuts together and whisk well. Toss in the bread. It should be pretty wet (see image). Don't overmix or the bread will all dissolve to mush. Top with the walnuts. Bake at 325 for about an hour and a half. Serve with syrup.

How I Fixed a Cake Fail, and Other News

2013-04-03T21:51:29Z

If you follow me on Twitter you might have noticed that I had a serious cake fail last week. Wait what? I never told you that I'm on Twitter? Oh yea, I sometimes forget to mention these things. And while we're mentioning things, the posts might be a little sparse around here in the next few months. Why you ask? Oh, just cause I am writing my first cookbook. No big deal right? The book is called STUFFED! and it is going to be stuffed with comfort food recipes that are literally stuffed inside other comfort food recipes, so you can not only stuff your face, but also your soul! But for now, back to the matter at hand. I messed up this cake while frosting it, so I smashed it up, frosting and all, and stuffed it (see what I did there?) into a graham cracker crust. I tossed some marshmallows on top and gave it a quick broil before serving. It was a huge hit and my friends were none the wiser.

The smashed up cake going into the crust. This is like the stuff people make cake pops with.

Marshmallow on top.

A quick broil. mmmmmm.

Like I said, it was a big hit. I might even make a cake pie again without a fail!

Quinoa Burgers

2013-03-31T21:26:54Z

Ok guys, one more healthy recipe. I swear I'll go back to some fatty comfort nonsense later this week. Until then, check out these Quinoa Burgers on Tablespoon