Entree – Page 17 – Rosemary and the Goat

Pork in Whiskey Sauce Tapas

Who ever thought little plates of food could be soooo good!

We returned from our cruise and time in Spain a few weeks ago. A couple of days in Amsterdam, cruising for 8 days and 9 days in Spain and I only gained 2 pounds. Didn’t think I would ever be glad to say I gained weight, but after the way we ate and drank for 19 days, I’m surprised my husband could fit me through the door.

My last entry had pictures of many of the tapas we had while in Spain. We had a Pork in Whiskey Sauce at this one tapas bar in Seville and I have tried to recreate that recipe and I must say, it was almost exactly like the one we had there.

A little more about our trip. We had some great Indonesian food in Amsterdam and were able to visit Van Gogh and Reich museum. Ann Frank’s house was a very interesting tour and we toured Heinken Brewery — who doesn’t like beer (me). In Brugge we tried steamed mussels and frites, Belgium chocolates (DELICIOUS), Belgium waffles with chocolate and a cup of coffee that was half chocolate, 2 shots of espresso and topped with a creamy hot chocolate.

Our food on the ship was wonderful and I got a lot of great ideas for tapas and things I might want to try for dinner parties. Our port calls were Brugge, Cherborg (did Normandy tour there), Lisbon, Gibratar, Vigo and the cruise ended in Barcelona. Then it was time to hit all those tapas bars I had been reading about. We spent two days in Barcelona making the Mori and Picasso museums and Gaudi cathedral and lots of shopping and walking, walking, walking (guess that is why I only gained 2 pounds). We flew from Barcelona to Sevilla (my favorite of all our Spain cities). Very cool city with streets just wide enough for a taxi to race down causing people to jump up on the curb (no sidewalk to escape to, so watch out).

October 9, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood/ Pasta

Lemon Cream Pasta with Shrimp

Pasta with a creamy lemon sauce — Rich, creamy and lemony.

I love pasta, I love lemon and I love anything with shrimp in it. So, this recipe was a match made in heaven.

We watch a lot of food shows in this house. My husband is even into all the competitive ones. And, even he is getting ideas of different things to try out on his grill. I leave the grilling to him because I can’t improve on perfection. 🙂

I was watching Paula Deen one day and and she was making this recipe with lemon pasta and sour cream. I know all of her recipes are loaded with butter, cream and everything good (or not good for you) but for some reason I perked up and started paying attention to her show. I made a few changes; blue cheese for the Parmesan cheese, and I added some sauteed shrimp to the finished dish. Thank you Paula for inspiring my version of your recipe. I loved the blue cheese in the sauce.

September 20, 2010 By Sherry

Appetizers/ ColdApp/ Entree

Grilled Flank Kebabs with Chimichurri Sauce

I love Chimichurri on this flank kebab. The color of the sauce is so vivid and pretty on the plate.

I love flank steak. It’s one of those pieces of meat that a lot of people don’t know what to do with because it can be tough. I have cooked flank steak for years and have found that if you marinade it for a few hours it will be very tender. Flank should always be cut cross-grain and never cooked more than medium to medium-rare.

The flank comes from the abdominal muscle of a cow and is a long thin piece of meat. It looks a little like skirt steak that is used in making fajitas. Normally it needs some type of moist cooking method. But I have found just marinating it, grilling for about 30 minutes, produces a juicy, tender steak.

Over the years I have taken flank steak strips and spread them with a blue cheese spread, rolled it up, skewered it and served as an appetizer. We have had it as an entree marinated in my teriyaki sauce (see below), and I have skewered it with marinated mushrooms for an appetizer. Always cut it very thin and you will never be disappointed in this piece of meat.

July 26, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Food Stories/ Game

The Tortoise and The Hare

Slow but steady did not win their race this day!

We all have heard the story about the tortoise and the hare and how the turtle was slow but steady and won the race. Neither one was very lucky the day my dad caught this turtle and rabbit.

While visiting my sister a couple of weeks ago, she found a couple of bags of turtle in the freezer that she had gotten from our dad’s last year. So, we decided to have fried turtle. If you didn’t know it already, turtle has 7 kinds of meat. These are the seven types that I came up with from researching turtle meat — turkey, fish, poultry, veal, pork, duck, mutton. After thawing the turtle she found that my dad had frozen a rabbit in with the turtle. Maybe that was my dad’s way of giving us one last laugh when we thought about him catching turtles on his fishing lines he put out everyday.

July 1, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood

Firey Pasta with Bay Scallops

I just wanted something easy and light for dinner tonight.

I love making anything with pasta and seafood and we do get beautiful seafood here in Texas any time of the year. Scallops and pasta are a perfect combination for a light dinner and this recipe fits all my criteria for quick and easy. Today while shopping the seafood section of my favorite store, the scallops were screaming “buy me”. Originally I was going to do this recipe with shrimp but decided to give these little bay scallops a try since they were on sale.

The firely pasta recipe is one of Giada’s. I made 1/4 the amount of chili oil need and that was probably enough for 2 recipes.

The chili oil is really easy to make. Simply heat the oil with the chili peppers. Be careful not to fry your pepper flakes.

June 2, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Sandwiches

Smoked Chicken Salad Sandwiches

Once upon a time I was sitting in a tea room wishing it was mine.

Several years ago I thought I wanted a tea room. Who doesn’t like going to tea with all those cute little tea cups, lace table cloths, cucumber finger sandwiches, cheese straws, and a pot of steeping tea sitting right there on the table snug under it’s little tea cozy.

Several years ago, a friend of mine and I had talked about opening a tea room. After all, with all the catering experience I have, it would have been a perfect fit. We tried just about every tea room in our area, all the time envisioning what our tea room would look like. We attended a 3 day tea conference at Magnolia and Ivy in Georgia on “How to Open A Tea Room”. Magnolia and Ivy is listed as one of the great tea rooms in America and doesn’t that name just elicit the idea of an afternoon tea with ladies with big hats sipping their tea and talking about what’s going on in their lives.

Well, we collected china, tea pots, teas, and anything we would need to serve tea all the time looking for a perfect place to house our dream. We really wanted an old place with Southern Charm and that was not to be found in our area. So, eventually we gave up on that dream but I continue to cater teas and luncheons so I still get my “fix” on doing tea type foods.

May 21, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Poultry

Stacked Green Chili & Grilled Chicken Enchiladas

Talk about stacked!

Our hosts this month, Barbara of Barbara Bakesand Bunnee of Anna+Foodhave chosen a delicious Stacked Green Chile & Grilled Chicken Enchilada recipe in celebration of Cinco de Mayo! The recipe, featuring a homemade enchilada sauce was found on www.finecooking.com and written by Robb Walsh.

This is another “cooks” challenge from www.thedaringkitchen.com. Even though I sometimes feel like we eat nothing but Mexican food here in Texas, I can honestly say I have never made enchiladas or stacked enchiladas before.

For about the first 18 years of living in Texas we pretty much had a standing Friday night date with a Mexican restaurant. In fact, we went exclusively to just one restaurant for most of those years. The waiters knew us, the owners knew us and we pretty much knew what we were going to order before we even got there. JUMBO margaritas were also the first words out of our mouths. And we knew before the night was over, someone would be celebrating a birthday, get the BIG hat, and then get a plate full of whipped cream pushed in their face and a picture made to commemorate the event.

These days we have given up the weekly fix for Mexican food and we are making fresh margaritas instead of making them from a mix or limeade as we had done for years.

I liked making these enchiladas in my individual salad/pasta bowls. Each person had their own serving dish and it made for easier serving.

May 14, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Poultry/ Sauces

Kotopits (Chicken in Phyllo)

Another phyllo recipe I love and have made many times.

As I have said before, I love working with phyllo dough and this recipe is so amazingly simple and elegant.

My journey to learning to cook, create, and recreate dishes has been a long one. As a teenager my sister (twin) and I never cooked. Our “cooking” for the week was to make dinner the nights our mother had her bowling league. The only meal I remember making is Bologna sandwiches. Once I made some home made divinity candy to send to my husband at college. Well, his fraternity brothers were always eating the cookies etc that I would send. That was until after the divinity incident. Evidently I did not do a very good job of shelling the pecans and one of his frat brothers borrowed a piece of candy and broke a tooth on the shell that was hidden away inside the candy. So, even though I did experiment with cookies and candies, I didn’t do any serious cooking until I got married, then my sister and I started sharing and collecting recipes.

Recently I calculated I have probably prepared 43,800 meals (at least) in the last 40 years 7 months. We have been in a dinner/supper club 4 different times since we have been married and we have always learned something new and creative from each group.

My daughter has prepared this dish several times and one of those times she was still in college. So, if you are thinking this is too hard, think again. I have catered this several times for rehearsal dinners and dinner parties and it is always a hit.

To me anything served in a little packet whether it be phyllo or parchment packets is a surprise waiting to be discovered. What’s hiding way all snug and wrapped up in that phyllo or parchment bundle?

May 2, 2010 By Sherry

Appetizers/ Entree/ Fish/Seafood/ HotApp/ Sauces

Coconut Fried Shrimp with Zippy Orange Dipping Sauce

Like Bubba Gump, I love shrimp prepared just about any way.

I have boiled shrimp for shrimp cocktail, bar-b-qued it, ceveched it, grilled it, kebabed it, baked it, butterflied it, creoled it, scampied it, sweet and soured it, foo yunged it and Shrimp and Gritted it. So if there is a way out there I haven’t tried I would like to hear about it. Several days ago I decided to try a healthy version of Coconut Fried Shrimp trying to make it gluten free.

You see, several weeks ago (Fat Tuesday I think) my daughter, Alexis, gave me a challenge to give up grains along with potatoes and sugar. I have pretty much done that for the last 5-6 weeks with the occasional slip with the sugar.

I have tried many great cracker and scone recipes from the Almond Flour Gluten Free Cookbook by Elana Amsterdam and they are fabulous. I’m lucky I don’t have to eat gluten free, but if there is anyone out there that does, please take a look at her cookbook and she also has a website www.elanaspantry.com where you can find some fabulous recipes.

(Carb friendly — substitute a sugar free orange marmalade for the regular.

April 5, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood/ Pasta

Asparagus and Mushroom Risotto with Lobster & Proscuitto

Creamy Risotto made with Mushrooms, Champagne and topped with Lobster and Proscuitto – think of anything better!

I have made risotto several times before and one of my favorites is one of Giadas” for Champagne Risotto. I decided to add the mushrooms and lobster and use a seafood stock instead of chicken stock. Riscotto could possibly be my all time best comfort food. And while it is still cool here at nights here in Texas I thought we needed a little comforting tonight.

I first had risotto on our trip to Italy. I had a shrimp risotto that was so delicious but I always laugh thinking about it. If you have ever seen the movie “Big Night” you know the scene I’m talking about where this lady orders shrimp risotto but she can’t really see any shrimp in it and ask the chef to bring her another dish to go along with her risotto. The chef refuses to bring her what she wanted because he said “it did not go with HIS risotto”.

My son, Scott, made a risotto once when he was visiting us that had a grilled, then crumbled Monkfish on top. It was delicious and that’s where I got the idea for the lobster garnish. I had a hard time finding a 4 oz. lobster tail and I would have rather had a 2-3 oz. tail but couldn’t find one. I guess I could have gotten some crawfish since they kind of look like lobsters.

March 14, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Poultry/ Salads

Asian Chicken Salad

I love all the flavors of Asian food and this has them all.

I remember the first Asian type salad I ever had and it was sitting by myself in a pub in Truckee, CA. Years ago, our family had gone on a ski trip during a spring break from school. One day they were skiing at Squaw Valley and since I don’t ski (been there, done that, hurt knee, surgery, all that stuff–afraid now) I decided to drive myself over to Truckee to shop and have lunch. I didn’t know it at the time but later I found out that about 100 movies have been filmed in Truckee –Misery and True Lies were two of them.

Anyway, I went to this little pub for lunch. They had this great Asian Chicken Salad and I remember they had these fried won ton chips in and around the salad. I love this addition to the salad and now I make the little chips all the time for salads. When I set out to make an Asian type salad, I hardly ever remember what I put in it from one time to the next. So, I’m always coming up with something new to add to the recipe. Sometimes I use red cabbage sometimes the radicchio. You can pretty much put anything you like it in and it will be delicious.

February 24, 2010 By Sherry

Entree/ Soup

Fried Turkey Gumbo

So what to do with the fried turkey carcass? You make gumbo!

Well, it was raining today down here in South Texas which pretty much destroyed my plans to play in a golf tournament this morning. It was not only wet, it was cold too — almost 40 degrees so I really wasn’t too motivated to work in the yard or do anything that was particularly constructive.

Being trapped inside for a day led me to the refrigerator to chow down on some comfort food. As it turned out, I couldn’t find anything interesting but I did notice a frozen fried turkey carcass in the freezer. It was left over from Thanksgiving when we deep fried turkeys out in the backyard.

We have fried a ton of turkeys for ourselves and friends for many years. One of my sons and I get up early every Thanksgiving, crack open a bottle of cognac, pour some cotton seed oil in a pot, light up a fire and start frying turkeys. Lots of people use peanut oil for frying but we’re from SE Missouri cotton country and we use cottonseed oil (it burns cleaner and has a high flash point). Sometimes we have two pots going. I generally take a break and run the annual 5 mile turkey trot with our other son, daughter-in-law, daughter and anyone else who feels up to it, then it’s back to turkey frying. Sure helps build an appetite for the rest of the day.

February 5, 2010 By George

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