Choco-coco balls (no bake)

I was inspired to make up this recipe after tasting a cookie Mark got at the coffee shop the other day.  These aren't too sweet, but satisfy any craving for a little bite of chocolate.  They are, of course, gluten free.  They're also super quick and easy to put together, and I think they taste fancy enough that they can be served with something like fruit for a company dessert.

Makes about 10 1-in balls

75 g ground almonds or almond flour 

60 g finely shredded coconut (unsweetened)

28 g maple syrup

16 g (~2  T) cocoa powder

1/4 - 3/8 t. salt

30 g melted coconut oil

Stir everything together in a bowl.  Let it sit for a minute or two.  Press into whatever shape you want - I tend to make 1-in balls.  Cover with plastic to keep them from drying out.

Notes:

- To make the ground almonds, I just throw a couple handfuls of almonds into the food processor.  I store any extra in the freezer for the next time I'm going to make these.  

- The first time I made these I used 60 g of almond flour and 60 g of coconut.  They were really good, very striking, but in some ways too much.  I think upping the almond flour makes them a bit more balanced, but if you like really strong bold flavors you might prefer it with less almond flour. 

- The amount of salt indicated here results in a "salted chocolate" taste.  So, in the midst of coconut and cocoa, you get an occasional taste of salt, in a pleasant way.  If you don't like that taste, use 1/8 t of salt or less.

Serbian cornbread muffins

A Serbian astronomy friend that we met in Madison made these muffins for us last fall, and they very quickly became my staple cornbread recipe.  They're super moist and healthier than regular cornbread.

They're amenable to lots of variations.  The original recipe calls for the addition of feta, which makes them the most eastern European-like.  The kids like them plain.  I like to mix in a handful of chopped pickled jalepenos and queso fresco if I'm serving them with chili.  It's also been really easy to make them gluten free as there is very little regular flour in them.

Depending on your additions, the recipe below makes about 10-12 muffins

3 eggs
1.5 c yogurt
3 T oil
7.5 T flour*
7.5 T (56 g) cornmeal
1 T baking powder
3/4 t salt

Additions: cheese (feta, queso fresco, cheddar) - 1/4 - 1/2 lb, peppers, bacon, etc

*(for gluten free muffins, I use 4.5 T (42 g) of corn flour + 3 T of a 1:1 replacement flour mix

Stir together the wet ingredients, stir together the dry ingredients, add the dries to the wets and mix.  Fold in any additions that you're using.  Bake at 375 for 18-25 min until a toothpick comes out clean.  Note: these tend to stick to regular muffin liners a lot, for some reason.  I use silicon liners, and they pop right out with no mess.  You can also grease your regular foil or paper liners with a spray oil.

Chicken and Sausage Gumbo

Ed gave me a year subscription to Cook's Illustrated for Christmas and it's a game changer.  My goal is to make something new each weekend, so I'm getting good use out of the magazine.  This weekend was chicken and sausage gumbo.  I've never made gumbo before and I'm not even sure I've really had gumbo before, but ya'll...ya need to make this recipe.  I'm telling you...it was so so good.

It takes some time, about 90 minutes, but that's not all active time by any means.  It uses pretty common ingredients.  In fact, we subbed some things because I didn't feel like searching for andouille sausage on this island.  We struck out at Whole Paycheck and decided not to look any further.  Here are the substitutions I made...

chicken thighs - chicken breasts (probably would be even better with thighs though)
andouille sausage - Italian sausage (again, probably awesome with andouille)
fresh thyme - dried thyme
white vinegar - rice vinegar (what the heck, how do I not have white vinegar on hand?)

Despite my lame substitutions, it was great because the secret, I believe, is in the sauce.  It's all about toasting the flour to create a dry roux.  You throw the flour in a cast iron skillet and put it in the oven for about an hour, until it's the color of cinnamon.  That's where all your flavor comes from and holy cow, is it good.  I can't imagine that subbing a gluten free flour would have a negative impact on the final product.  I will say that the gumbo had a velvety texture so it's possible a GF flour would effect that, but I don't know enough about GF to say.

Anyway, here's the recipe.  Give it a shot, I doubt you'll be disappointed.  Oh, one more thing, if you're sensitive to spice, go easy on the cayenne.  I'm pretty sure I measured the cayenne and the final product had some kick to it.  Might be better to go easy and then add more if you need.  Oh and we both thought the addition of hot sauce after serving was awesome.

Ingredients
1 C flour
1 T vegetable oil
1 onion, chopped fine
1 green pepper, chopped fine
2 celery ribs, chopped fine
1 T minced fresh thyme (I used about 3/4 t of dried)
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 t paprika
2 bay leaves
1/2 t cayenne
salt and pepper
4 C chicken broth, room temp
2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs, trimmed
8 oz andouille sausage, halved and sliced 1/4 inch thick
6 scallions, sliced thin
1 t distilled white vinegar
hot sauce, to taste for serving

Method

1. Heat oven to 425, adjust rack to middle.  Place flour in 12 inch skillet and bake, stirring occasionally until it's the color of ground cinnamon (approximately 40-55 minutes).  Towards the end it needs to be stirred more frequently.  Transfer to a bowl and let cool.
2. Heat oil in a dutch oven over medium heat until shimmering.  Add onion, pepper, and celery and cook until softened, about 5-7 minutes.  Stir in thyme, garlic, paprika, bay leaves, cayenne, 1/4 t salt, and 1/4 t pepper and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.  Stir in 2 cups of broth.  Add chicken in a single layer (it won't be completely submerged).  Bring to simmer, reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until chicken is fork tender, about 15-17 minutes.  Transfer chicken to plate.
3. Slowly whisk remaining 2 cups of broth into flour until thick, smooth, batter-like paste forms.  Increase heat to medium and incorporate paste into gumbo, making sure each addition is fully incorporated before adding the next.  Stir in sausage.  Simmer, uncovered, until gumbo thickens slightly, about 20-25 minutes.
4. Shred chicken and put in gumbo with scallions.  Remove pot from heat and stir in vinegar and season with salt to taste (I didn't add any more salt).  Remove bay leaves.  Serve over rice with hot sauce.

It's stick-to-your-ribs good!

Enjoy,

Molly

Spam Musubi

Well, ya' go to Hawaii and what do you have to try?  Spam Musubi, of course.  Ya' come home from Hawaii and what do you have to do?  Buy a Musubi press and try it yourself!

Japanese Style Pickles

If you Google "Japanese Pickle Recipes" there are a number which use rice vinegar, salt, and sugar - seems to form the basis of Japanese pickle making and I look forward to a lot more exploration.  But for now, I started with a recipe for soy/ginger pickled cucumber spears.  That's nor what I made, of course but it is where I started.

The recipe called for pickling cucumber spears and fresh ginger slices in a marinade of rice vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, and toasted sesame oil.  I used a sliced seedless cucumber rather than spears and used some pickled ginger strips which we had picked up at the Asian market in Philly.  These are definitely ginger but not really very tasty, useful for adding to other things but not something you would want to eat by itself.  I substituted apple cider vinegar for rice vinegar because that's what I had and honey for sugar because I prefer it.

The pickling brine consists of
1/3 c. vinegar
1/3 c. soy sauce (I used Kikkomen's)
2 T. sugar (I used honey)
1/4 t. Toasted Sesame Oil



Slice the cuc's and ginger as you want them,

1. Put soy sauce, rice vinegar, sugar and toasted sesame oil in a bowl and stir until sugar has dissolved.
2. Put cucumber and ginger in a ziploc bag and pour vinegar mix on top. Removed air before sealing the bag. Once sealed, lightly massage the cucumber and ginger, making sure the pickling liquid evenly coats all the vegetables.
3. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours and for no more than 12. Drain pickling vinegar and keep the cucumber and ginger pickles in the fridge.

I saved the brine and used it for another batch.

This is about as easy as it gets and the pickles were awesome!

Pretty Good Zucchini Fritters

Did I sell it to you?  Pretty good.

If I'm being honest, I don't use a lot of fancy ingredients anymore, mostly because it's too expensive.  And since the exhaustion of pregnancy and having a newborn hit, I tend to cook pretty darned simply.  It was a miracle that I tried a new recipe last night at all.

That said, these fritters were good and healthy, though nothing fancy.  I made a half recipe and we ate them up.  I recommend the accompanying yogurt sauce.  I made it as written, except I left out the mint because I didn't have any.  Also I wouldn't say that I necessarily measured as much as estimated.

Instead of posting the recipe, I'll just post a link to the blog where I found it.

http://sallysbakingaddiction.com/2015/08/17/zucchini-fritters-with-garlic-herb-yogurt-sauce/

Molly

Fish Quesadilla

I don't think we've had a discussion of quesadillas on the blog yet.  We've taken to making these as a great way to use up small bits of leftovers, especially things like spicy beans.  Or sometimes we will start from scratch with chicken strips and mixed vegetables or some such. 

The other night we got a reasonably good piece of cod fish from the store and ate it broiled with salt, pepper, and lemon juice with baked potato slices and steamed broccoli - very good in a straight up, traditional way.  Last night I sauteed up the left over fish, some left over rice, and fresh asparagus from the  garden with salt, pepper, a little horseradish, and some fresh lemon zest and used it for quesadilla filling.  We use shredded orange cheddar for the cheese cause that's what we tend to have, not too much, don't what to overpower the flavor of the fish.  Served it up with just a little bit of salsa (again, don't overpower) along with a big plate of lightly steamed fresh asparagus (you know what season we're in).  This was a winner.  The lemon zest provided a brilliant  high, light overtone.