Eat This: Pickled Peppers

Each year I grow herbs and peppers in my backyard in containers.  This year, I planted two tiny little jalapeño pepper plants I bought from the Home Depot back in March.  I think I paid $1.50 for each and by September they are 3.5 feet tall and producing lots of peppers.

I leave them on the plant until they turn red and then harvest and keep in the refrigerator until I have enough. I think they taste better than the green peppers, maybe more mellow?  For this recipe, I used a few large green jalapeños from the market to add some color.  These are definitely not like my Cowboy candy.  These are pickles. Great on a sandwich or as a, well, pickle!

Check em out.

Eat This: Herbed Focaccia

This summer we used a lot of the herbs we grow in the back yard.  Basil, rosemary, lemon thyme, German thyme, chives, mint and oregano.  I wanted some focaccia to use to make our favorite "Caprese sandwich" using more of the nice basil we have as well as some delicious tomatoes from the farmer's market.

I used an old tried and true quick focaccia recipe.  It turns out really well and doesn't take forever.  Quick and easy, almost fool proof try this and use anything you want to include as an add on.

Eat This: Blackberry Raspberry Cobbler

Between the blackberry bounty at the farmer's market and the special on raspberries at the grocery store, tonight's dessert is cobbler. Delicious, tart locally grown blackberries were HUGE.  I used my old standby cobbler recipe to hook them both up together and the result was outstanding.  Quick, easy and idiot-proof (I'm walking proof of that!)  Check this out:

Ingredients:

2 Cups fresh blackberries
1 Cup fresh raspberries
1/2 Stick butter
1 Cup Sugar
1 Cup all purpose flour
1 Cup milk
1 1/2 Teaspoons baking powder
1/2 Teaspoon salt
1 1/2 Teaspoons cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Butter a baking dish generously.  Melt the stick of butter.

Combine sugar, flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt in a mixing bowl.  Add the milk and mix.

Add the melted butter and combine until incorporated.  Pour into baking dish.

Distribute the berries over the top evenly. Sprinkle with a couple of tablespoons of sugar if you like a more crispy top.

Bake for an hour.  Look at sides on the top and if they are puling away, it's done.  If not give it another 5 minutes but no more.  

Remove form oven and allow to cool.  Serve warm or at room temp.  I personally love this the second day when it is ice cold.  refrigerate leftovers (if there are any).

Eat This: Arborio Rice Stuffed Tomatoes

It's that time of year. Tomato season.  Tonight I made Arborio rice stuffed tomatoes. They are light, refreshing and taste like summer.  Easy to make, it takes more time to prep than to bake. Here is how it works.

Eat This: Orange Pound Cake

One of my favorite cakes is Lemon Pound Cake. The one I made and posted HERE was well received by friends and family alike.  Coming from Florida, I love citrus.  I have posted recipes for orange marmalade, clementine marmalade and use lemon quite liberally.  Today I thought I would try the same recipe with orange as the flavor note.  It turned out nicely.  More subtle than lemon, but delicious as well.  

I also used two loaf pans this time instead of using the vintage cast aluminum Bundt pan that belonged to my grandmother.  I cooked these for one hour at 325 degrees.  It pulled away from the pan and came clear with the toothpick test.  Don't overcook.  Be sure you let the cakes cool for about 15 minutes before turning them out for the glaze.

One for us and one for a neighbor who always brings us nice food and is just a general, all around good guy.  We love to share and this is perfect for that.

The changes?  Use orange extract instead of lemon and I used the zest from the orange in the glaze as well.  Using a micro plane makes it easy!  Enjoy.

Eat This: Easy Peasy Fajitas

Everyone in Texas has their own recipe for fajitas.  Well, almost everyone.  Mine is pretty simple.  I think many fajitas I've had over the years are unnecessarily complicated flavor-wise. Try these and I promise you will make your own take on them as well.  I am afraid the only process photos I have are cooking photos.  I had a lot going on today and the prep isn't necessarily photo worthy anyway!  Try this.

Savor The Summer: Garlic Ginger Pepper Jam

I love the taste of Summer from the fresh corn to the nice fiery hot Jalapenos I grow in the back yard.  I also like grilled meats and think that once in awhile you might like to have something sweet and hot on a freshly grilled chop.  Enter this jam.

Eat This: Fish Friday - Maple Mustard Salmon

Stone Ground Mustard and Maple Glazed Salmon

I love salmon. When the wild caught, Copper River Salmon is available, I am always a step away from a feast.  Tonight, I made something a little different; Mustard-Maple Glazed Roasted Salmon.  It was DELICIOUS and so easy. 

Sadly, I was very lazy and only have the final product photographed, but I'll walk you through the process.

Eating This: Fresh from Southern California

Riverside Farmer's Market

I have been on a bit of a mini-vacation in Southern Calirofnia, hosted by friends in Riverside at their home.  The setting is idyllic, really beautiful and I know why they love being here so much.  Food is important here:  Fresh food. Local food. Delicious food.  Our dinners have been really extraordinary.  Here are some photos of the fresh products from their garden and the local Farmer's Market and the resulting meal!

Eat This: Fresh Blueberry Jam

Hello.  My name is Marc and I am a canning and preserving addict.  

I admit it.  Don't want to change it. Enjoy doing it and sharing with friends and neighbors.  Today I made fresh blueberry jam.  The blueberries came from a local farm here in North Texas and bought at the local Farmer's Market.  I water processed the results and it turned out great!  Next time I think I will do some spicy version, maybe a Jalapeño or other pepper infused variety.

Fresh Saturday: Purple Hull Peas For The Freezer

I love peas. Almost any kind.  When I was at the Denton Farmer's Market a couple of weeks back, one of the vendors I buy from was taking orders for Purple Hull Peas.  He has a family farm and grows a pretty large variety of things.  I ordered a half bushel of peas and they came in on the 4th!  It was amazing that farmers were in the market on the Fouth of July, but hey, that's their bread and butter and they were mobbed.  I also bought Blueberries which you will see in a subsequent post.

Eat Here: Coco Pazzo Cafe, Chicago

From the website - Try sitting outside and enjoy the neighborhood ambiance.

Last week I was in Chicago attending the American Library Association's "Annual Conference".  26,000 librarians, vendors and others converged on Chicago.  No surprise, a lot of Tweets, FaceBook and blog posts revolved around food.  Chicago has a long tradition of foods from everywhere you can imagine.

The Modigliani inspired murals high above head are just a small part of the ambiance.

Grow: Herbs and More

Lemon Thyme, German Thyme and Lavender

Living in North Texas we get some pretty extreme weather.  From ice and snow in the Winter to triple digit temps in the Summer.  So I do what any right minded person would do: I do container gardening on the patio.  Easy. Cheap. Manageable. So much less maintenance, and, when the weather gets dicey?  I move them under cover with no trouble.

Sweet Basil

I bought one basil plant at the Home Depot for $3 and we have been eating off this monster all season.  From caprese salads, to sandwiches and salads, it is a Summer staple we love each year.

Southern Style: Sweet & Savory Tomato Jam

FROM THIS ....

TO THIS ...

When sweet meets savory, delicious explosions happen. It's nature. Go with it.  I love Summer; tomatoes, sweet and delicious.  I want to save it for myself and to share with everyone I know.  I found a tomato jam recipe, but it didn't really fit the flavor profile I was looking for. So I did what anyone would do: I made up my own.  This is the result.  Try it.  The only thing it costs you is an afternoon.

Eat This: Peach Apricot Ginger Jam

Peach Apricot Ginger Jam

I love the fresh fruit taste of the Spring.  I went to the Farmer's Market and brought back some beautiful peaches, grown here in the DFW area. I knew I wanted something special, so I am paring them with dried Turkish apricots and ginger. Sweet and spicy with the ginger.  It's delicious.  This is a lower sugar recipe as well. The original called for 7 cups of sugar. I used 2 1/2.  The use of Low-No Sugar Pectin has changed the way preserving works!  Try this.

Eat This: Rosemary Oregano Parmesan Focaccia

Impossible not to cut a piece to taste.

I love focaccia.  I bought a loaf last week from a local grocery. It was delicious, creamy with Parmesan.  I wanted to try that myself and this was the result.  I added herbs fresh from my backyard, rosemary and oregano along with shaved parmesan.  Oh yeah. Delicious.  Just try to make at least two loaves because one?  Like eating one potato chip. Not happening.

Eat This Now: Strawberry Lemon Ginger Jam

I love strawberries.  Sweet. Tart. Pretty. Red.  Come on, everyone likes strawberries, right?  I've been on a jelly/canning/preserving kick over the past year and I thought, what could I do with strawberries?  These Texas grown berries are delicious. They're pretty BIG too.  I took a basic recipe from Susan Can Cook and modified it a bit.  It came out really nicely.  Delicious and tastes like "Summer".  Try this. It's easy and delicious.

Let's Eat Cake: Lemon Pound Cake

I love lemon anything. Cake. Cookies. Whatever.  I found a recipe and modified it and this was the outcome.  I gave our neighbors half of the cake, so I wouldn't eat it all, and they proclaimed it the best lemon cake they'd ever had.  You be the judge. It really WAS pretty awesome.  It is a basic cake that you can add any kind of extract and make it your own.  Enjoy.

Eat This: Crabcakes

I grew up on the North coast of Florida.  We had such wonderful, fresh and seemingly unlimited seafood to eat.  I reminisced with my mom recently that I thought we were poor because we consumed so much seafood!  I mean, it came from the end of the street, right out of the Intracoastal Waterway or a block up the street to the Atlantic Ocean.  You can still, in our old neighborhood in North Beach, St. Augustine, wade out in the water with a screwdriver, break off a fresh oyster and eat that bad boy right where it came from. That fresh.

I know better now. I know we were blessed.  We particularly loved blue crab.  Usually just boiled and picked, and now, in all their glory, crabcakes.  This is a new recipe I put together as I am limiting my carb intake so this really cuts it to the bone.  Enjoy! 

Neutral Friday: New Rooms From Restration Hardware

The cocktail table and sofa are awesome.

Ok. Yeah, I know.  You get the catalogs too.  I love Restoration Hardware's room vignettes.  This time I highlighted the "small spaces".  I feel like I could just move right in.  These are from the latest catalog set - you  remember, that 12# package in the mailbox?  Happy Friday.

Eat Smarter: Low Carb Peanut Butter Cookies

I love peanuts, peanut butter... whatever.  I am avoiding wheat at the moment and my craving for  cookie is hard to work out.  I found this recipe and it came out pretty good!  Not like a "regular" flour based peanut butter cookie, but pretty good as a substitute.

I didn't take photos of the mixing and measuring process but... well, it's pretty simple.  One caveat: I got mine from the grocery in the "grind it yourself aisle".  You don't want to use regular peanut butter because it has so much added stuff already, sugar, etc in it. 

SMOKIN!: Slow Smoked Baby Back Ribs

Smoked Baby Back Pork Ribs

I am crazy about BBQ. Crazy.  A couple of years ago, I got all worked up over smoked foods and it has become a hobby.  

Yesterday I was at Sprouts Market and they had some beautiful baby back ribs on sale - minimally processed - no additives - no hormones.  Naked pork.  I got 4, count em, 4 slabs.  They are great to smoke and freeze in individual freezer bags for a quick meal later on. Check this out - rub recipe after the jump too!

Eat This: Easy Tempura

Shrimp, broccoli and green bean tempura

I love tempura.  Hot. Crisp. Light.  I also hate cleaning up after making it, but sometimes the sacrifice is worth the trouble.  Tonight I made shrimp, broccoli and green bean tempura with a VERY simple tempura batter.  You should try this some time. It's delicious.  I'm also including a uber easy knockoff on the Bonefish Grill's Bang Bang sauce, which I love along side the shrimp.  Ponzu right out of the bottle is awesome on the veggies.

Photography: Point And Shoot Friday

Special Effects!

I continue to enjoy getting to know my Nikon D5100 DSLR.  There are so many settings and features that are built in it takes a quick reference guide just to get to them all!  I took these within about 15 minutes - fast, point and shoot.  Enjoy photography?  Let me know what sites you use as I am trying to improve my own repertoire.

Furniture Obsession: Chests

This could be my favorite.

I am crazy about some furniture.  I have recently been obsessing over what many call "bachelor chests"; small, usually three or four drawer chests that go beside a bed, or under a window, or stand all on their own.  Check these out. 

Try looking at my Pinterest board - Furniture: Chests (there is a link on the right side at the top of DUBD.).

Saturday Eats: Fresh Rolled Biscuits

Fresh Rolled Biscuits with Clementine-Habanero-Ginger Marmalade

These are wonderful biscuits that I adapted from Joy of Cooking.   It is a very simple basic recipe that only has 5 ingredients. 

I like a more “layered” biscuit so I actually turn them out onto a floured surface (my kitchen island has a SileStone top which is great for baking) and knead them turning 5 or 6 times only.  Don’t overwork them or they get tough and won’t rise as nicely.  This basic recipe can also be used as the top for pot pies and is REALLY delicious if you add a ½ cup of finely grated Parmesan for that purpose. Enjoy!

Super Simple: Strawberry Cobbler

I love cobbler. Pure and simple. Love it. It is super simple and awesome. It's pretty hard to screw up too. This is the simplest version yet. Incredibly moist, sweet and delicious. Not for the faint of heart carb-wise, but once in awhile you just have to have what you have to have!

Cheeburger: Home Made Hamburger Buns

I love fresh bread.  I also like a good burger.  When I wanted burgers today I realized I had no buns. Bummer.  But wait!  How about a quick and easy homemade hamburger bun in less than an hour?  I know, you think I am off my meds, but I am not.  This recipe was adapted from this one at Taste Of Home.

Sunday Supper: Shrimp & Green Grits

OK. It sounds a little out of the ordinary, but these creamy, buttery, cheesy grits are delicious on their own loaded with butter, cream, spinach, chives and basil.  Not for the faint of heart, or calorie counters, but once in awhile this is a delicious indulgence.  When topped with succulent shrimp, it's awesome.
Here's how we do it after the jump.

Savory Sunday: Parmesan-Cracked Black Pepper Shortbread Crackers

I have been making shortbread cookies for some time now.  Barely sweet, buttery, nutty with pecans, walnuts or hazelnuts.  I love the texture and the "not too sweet" nature of them.  I also love a nice cracker.  A little wine, a good cracker and some goat cheese?  What's better?

I use the food processor to make the shortbread cookies so I thought, why not go for a savory cracker?  See how I did it after the jump: 

Saturday Morning: Pecan Pie Muffins

I love pecan pie and I love muffins so when I saw the recipe this morning at The Tasty Kitchen I hopped up and made it.  The photos on the Tasty Kitchen website are much better than mine so check them out.  I made a couple of small changes and it was awesome.  My photo is above and at the end of the final product.

Eat This: Smitten Kitchen "Favorite Brownies" With Hazelnuts

Deb Perelman at the Smitten Kitchen blog got me started down the road to blogging and enjoying recipes online.  I read blogs like other people read biographies, unashamedly, unabashedly, happily.  

Deb's recipe for "My Favorite Brownies" was simple and delicious and now my new favorite.  I made three small changes and they turned out perfectly.  (1) I dusted the pan with cocoa powder before adding the batter (2) I added one teaspoon of instant espresso powder and, (3) I added one cup of chopped hazelnuts.  I was just in that kind of mood.  These lend themselves to additions really well.

Eat This: Gingered Sweet Pickled Jalapenos aka "Cowboy Candy"

 
I made candied jalapenos aka "Cowboy Candy" here in the past.  Click HERE for the original recipe with step-by-step instructions.  I ate or gave away my stock so it was time to make more. I wanted to change it up a little and this time, adding a layer of flavor so I added fresh ginger to the recipe.  I love the Asian ginger influence mixed with the Texas taste of the jalapenos.  I cooked fresh ginger, about a 3" long piece, peeled and chopped, in with the vinegar, sugar and spice mixture.  I strained it all before adding the jalapeños.

Preservation II: Clementine-Ginger-Habanero Marmalade

Oh yes baby.  Delicious: Clementine-Ginger-Habanero Marmalade.

I enjoyed making the Orange-Ginger Marmalade so much I decided to take on a new batch.  This time, I used Clementines.  They're sweet, seedless and full of flavor.  To give it a kick, I added ginger, this time in the form of candied ginger and three, yes THREE habanero peppers.  Surprise!  It was a little heat way back on your throat, but not "hot".  Turned out to be delicious.  And here's how it happened...

Preservation: Orange-Ginger Marmalade

Orange-Ginger Marmalade

I tried canning in November of 2011 for the first time when I made Chili Piquin Jelly.  It turned out well and gave me some confidence to try new things.  Up to that time, preservation for me was the freezer.  It turns out, that if you follow directions, things work out pretty well!  Who knew?

Eat This: Lemon Sour Cream Cake

I am crazy about lemons. In almost anything; freshly squeezed over a pork chop - a wedge served with my fried chicken .... anything.  Desserts are especially wonderful when they are really tart and sweet together.  This recipe was adapted from Ina Garten's Lemon Yogurt Cake recipe at The Barefoot Contessa.  Love her. This is not too sweet, just tart enough to be awesome.  Enjoy.

Southern Roots: Buttermilk Biscuits

The Final Product

Growing up in the Deep South in Northern Florida, I had a lot of biscuits.  Family members from Southern Georgia often baked the most delicious things I have ever tasted.  Some of the biscuits were called "Cat Heads" because of their size... these could surely be called catheads - they are huge and fluffy with a nice bottom snap to the crust.  

Buttery and delicious, not for the faint of heart nor an every day thing, so indulge and get back on that treadmill later! This recipe adapted from Saveur Magazine's article featuring the Island Creek Oyster Bar in Boston. 

Surprise: Polished from BespokePost.com

Out of the Box of Awesome: Polished

I have said it before, and I will say it again, getting a surprise once a month is a "Box of Awesome".  BespokePost.com has once again delighted me with the box: Polished.  I am an admitted shoe addict so this was a welcome addition to my closet: supplies!  The description below from BespokePost.com website.... you really should sign up.

Eat This: Pork Filled Asian Dumplings

I love Asian dumpling.  Pot stickers are a favorite and this is my own interpretation.  I used this as a boiled dumpling, but you can also pan fry and steam as well.  These are really delicious; a bit tedious, but well worth the effort.

Recycle: Holland & Sherry Fabric Samples To Scarf

I asked a tailor I know what they do with the fabric sample books in their shop when they are out of date or no longer available.  He said, "We throw them in the dumpster."  I was shocked.  Some of the fabrics sell for hundreds of dollars a yard.  I thought: "Recycle".

Texture: Layers & Textures For Winter

I change the look of my bedroom by changing the linens, coverlets or quilts.  This is my favorite Winter look - a mix of color and texture.  I am afraid I didn't get photos of the sheets which are Ralph Lauren oxford cloth blue and white stripe for the top and solid blue for the bottom. I love the details on the pillowcases - buttons used to close them!

 The RL cotton blanket contains the base colors.  The duvet, also RL, is made from lightweight denim with "Levi" fasteners to close.  The patchwork quilt is vintage all cotton and something I use most of the year in one form or another.

The Kilim pillow is Pottery Barn and is a very stiff vintage look. The two pigskin throw pillows I stumbled across at HomeGoods for less than $30 for both!  The indigo denim shams are part of a set I bought from an Etsy dealer some years ago.  All cotton and made from recycled demin.  Beautiful.

Milo is pretty happy with the choices too. The day these photos were taken, it was about 30 degrees outside.  He is perfectly happy to snuggle down and enjoy the bed.