Dishes
Comfort Food!
February 22, 2011 | 
Author It’s been a long winter here in Canada and comfort food has been the focus of many a meal here. Aside from hundreds of bowls of home-made soup, there are a few “go-to recipes” that get made over and over and over! As so many people have asked for those recipes, I am sharing them here!!
One of our favourite meals is CHILES RELLENOS CASSEROLE – this recipe is an adaptation of a recipe I have had and have used for 15+ years…no idea where the original came from. There is always one in the freezer ready to defrost and cook, as it is a favourite meal in this house!
CHILES RELLENOS CASSEROLE
8 oz ground turkey or chicken
1 cup chopped onion
2 tsp. ground cumin
2 tsp. dried oregano
1 clove minced garlic
1 / 4 tsp. salt
1 / 4 tsp. pepper
16 oz can fat-free or vegetarian refried beans
2 x 4oz cans chopped green chiles: drained
8 oz / 2 cups shredded Colby-Jack cheese, divided (to be honest, I use Kraft Shredded Cheese with jalapenos as I like it the best!)
1 cup corn niblets (cooked)
1 / 3 cup whole wheat all-purpose flour
1 / 4 tsp. salt
12 oz fat-free/skim milk
1 / 2 tsp. (++ to your taste) hot sauce
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
2 large egg whites (only) lightly beaten
Red onion slices (optional)
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cook turkey and onion in a non-stick skillet until browned, stirring to crumble. Remove from heat and add the cumin, oregano, garlic, salt, pepper and refried beans: stir well to mix. Set aside.
3. Spread half of the chiles in bottom of an 11×7 inch-baking dish and top with a half of the cheese. Spoon turkey mixture on top of these chilies and spread gently, leaving a half-inch gap from the sides of the pans. Top with corn, then rest of green chiles and sprinkle the rest of the cheese on top of that.
4. Combine flour and salt in a bowl: gradually add milk, hot sauce, eggs and egg whites stirring with a whisk until well blended. Pour over casserole. Bake for 65 minutes in oven: remove and let sit 10 minutes before serving. Garnish with onion slices.
(I pre-bake the entire dish before freezing it … then I only have to defrost and heat it through!)
Sinful macaroni and cheese
I know that many of you are planning your new diets and committing to eating healthier in 2011. Well, I am about to give you a fantastic reason to put that plan on hold. My apologies in advance, but I think you’ll agree once you try it….it’s well worth the extra calories and a few more carbs.
Comfort food sure is aptly named, but nothing strikes me as quite so soothing as a creamy bowl of homemade macaroni and cheese. I have tried numerous cheese combinations and found that my final choices in this recipe combine the best for that “just right” taste. I have been to several restaurants just to try their own recipes and I’ve taken what I liked from each of them. So from the now shuttered Florent, and the tasty Cafeteria in New York City to Delilah’s in Philadelphia, I think I’ve throw together the best recipe I’ve ever had. I hope you all enjoy it, please feel free to comment. (I apologize for the lack of pictures but I had just made this a few days ago and wasn’t insightful enough to take pictures. And I would feel awful making it again just for pictures….because I’d have to eat it….all).
A few tips: Be sure to use quality cheeses, it makes all the difference. NO parmesan out of a plastic can. Don’t add more then a pinch of salt since the parmesan is a tad on the salty side to start with. As for the cheddar, I think a mild flavor works better then anything too sharp. I like a mild Vermont cheddar. You can try other cheeses but be sure they melt well and aren’t too oily. And despite what many have said, I do NOT think that putting that yellow/orange processed “cheese” in the mix does anything for the flavor at all.
1 lbs. elbow macaroni
1 tblsn olive oil
1 pint heavy cream
1 pint half and half
1 cup milk
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup flour
1 tsp. pepper
1/2 tsp. fresh ground nutmeg
pinch of kosher salt
2 cups diced mild cheddar
2 cups diced fontina
2 cups shredded parmesan
1/2 cup panko bread crumbs
Start by boiling 12 cups of water in a large pot with a handful of kosher salt. Once the water boils, add pasta and cook one minute under the directions on the box. You want the pasta to be slightly under al dente, it will finish cooking in the oven later. Drain the pasta and place into a large mixing bowl. Pour a tablespoon of olive oil and mix so the pasta does not stick. Set aside.
Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.
In a large saucepan combine the cream, half and half, and milk. Put on medium heat, stirring regularly so it does not burn on the bottom. Add pepper, salt and nutmeg to the cream mixture. In a small sauté pan, melt the butter under medium heat and then whisk in the flour to create a rue. You will get a tan paste that needs to be cooked for a minute or two to get rid of the flour taste. Once the cream is hot enough that steam rises off the surface, remove off the heat and start whisking in the rue mixture a little bit at a time. Being sure to whisk till dissolved completely. Put the cream back on the heat once all of the rue is incorporated. The cream should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon at this point. Allow to heat back up to the steaming point, still stirring regularly. Start whisking in all the cheeses except for a 1/2 cup of the parmesan. You will need to add small amounts of cheese and whisk till melted before adding more so you do not lower the temperature of the sauce. This process takes at least 10 minutes.
Once all the cheese is melted into the cream sauce, take off the heat and pour onto the pasta in the mixing bowl. Stir the pasta and cheese sauce together, combining completely. Pour into a medium casserole dish and sprinkle the last 1/2 cup of parmesan cheese on top. Finally, add the panko bread crumbs on top and place into the oven for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, turn on your broiler and allow the top to brown completely (about 5 minutes). Be sure to watch the dish closely for this step so it does not burn. Remove from the oven and serve hot and gooey. Bon appetit!
Foodnuts in Flanders
Last spring we traveled to Europe and went on a river cruise on the Rhine and Mosel Rivers. We started in Basal, Switzerland, and ended in Bruges, Belgium. We thought we’d share some of our food experiences from that trip, in no particular order. So, for our first post, we will showcase a dinner in Bruges. Belgians love to eat good food and there are places all over that serve spectacular food. It has been said that Belgium serves food of French quality in German quantities. Diners can expect high standards of ingredients and preparation but with a lack of pretentiousness of presentation. A number of traditional Belgian dishes use beer as an ingredient. For a rather small country, Belgium produces a huge number of beers in a wide range of different styles. It has more distinct types of beer than anywhere else in the world. You can drink different beers depending on whether you’re having fish/seafood, white meat/chicken, dark meat or dessert, much like you would choose different wines to complement a meal.
For our dinner in Bruges we ordered a typical Belgian dish, Flemish beef stew. Flemish beef stew is very similar to French boeuf bourguignon but uses beer instead of wine. The beer is representative of the region so the stew we had in Bruges was made with a dark beer from that area. Since there are so many different regional beers in Belgium, if you were to have Flemish beef stew in another area it would be prepared with that area’s typical beer and taste different from the one we had in Bruges. The restaurant is La Dentelliére. Their website is http://www.ladentelliere.be
Here is a picture of our dinner of Flemish beef stew.
Some diners had mussels.
And don’t forget dessert.
Here is a picture of typical Belgian waffles. They’re HUGE! No syrup. It’s whipped cream on top along with fruit or chocolate.
Ginger Coconut Seafood Soup
This is a great meal-soup, and I love the flavorful bite of ginger mellowed by coconut milk that really brings this dish to life! Its also quite inexpensive if you buy frozen white fish like haddock, cod or perch at a discount supermarket as I do. Shrimp or even crab and lobster are also a nice treat if you’re game! This is a very easy dish to make, that ends up looking quite impressive and tasting really nice! And especially at this time of year, having an excuse to open a bottle of wine while you cook is just fine in my book…
Ingredients: (Makes 3 servings)
- Cubed frozen or fresh seafood such as haddock, cod, perch, halibut, shrimp, crab, muscles, lobster, whatever tickles your fancy (or your budget!)
- 1 can coconut milk
- 1 cup white wine
- Peeled and diced ginger (2-3 tablespoons “ish”)
- 1 diced cooking onion
- Diced garlic cloves (2-3)
- Chopped firm veggies such as carrot, cauliflower, broccoli, snow peas, sugar snap peas, etc.)
- Salt
- Oil for the pan
What do I do?
- In a large pot on med-lo, saute onion and garlic in oil.
- Add seafood and stir lightly until just cooked through (fish will turn opaque)
- Remove contents of pot and set aside.
- In the same pot on med heat, stir fry veggies and ginger in more oil until slightly tender.
- Add white wine and stir for a minute to deglaze the pan.
- Add in seafood and stir for a minute.
- Pour coconut milk over mixture and bring to a boil.
- Turn down to simmer until vegetables are tender.
- Pour yourself a glass from the remainder of the white wine. (optional?)
- When the soup is done, season with salt to taste.
Simple, quick, potentially inexpensive, very presentable and even more tasty! Who needs take-out menus to Thai places when you’ve got this recipe in your arsenal? I would love to hear your comments on how this turned out for you, what wine you paired it with and anything else you’d like to share. And feel free to visit me at http://cooking-free.blogspot.com Cheers!
This dish originally appeared on http://cooking-free.blogspot.com on December 24th, 2010. If it is interesting to you, I would be delighted if you would check out the blog which specialized in gluten-free, dairy-free and sugar-free recipes and honored if you would take a second to pass it on to anyone who may find it helpful. Thanks so much, and happy Food-Nutting!
Wishing you health and happiness,
Victoria
Posted in Dishes, Gluten-free, Recipes, Wine | 
Tags: coconut, dairy-free, fish, ginger, seafood, shrimp, white wine | 
4 Comments »
JL’s New Year Beans, Greens & Grains
JL’s New Year Beans, Greens & Grains
Serves 4
INGREDIENTS
- 2/3 c farro
- 2 T olive oil
- 1/2 medium yellow onion, diced
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 t thyme (dry)
- 1/2 t sweet basil (dry)
- 3/4 c black-eyed peas (dry)
- 2 c liquid (I used 1 cup water + 1 cup low-sodium vegetable stock)
- 1 T Bragg Liquid Aminos
- 1/2 t Yuzu-It pepper sauce (any hot sauce is fine, I just happened to pick this up at a Japanese market on New Year’s Eve and wanted to try it)
METHOD
- Soak farro in water for about 30 minutes (long enough for a nice hot shower post-run).
- Heat the pressure cooker on medium and add the drained farro for a quick toss to toast.
- Add olive oil, onion, garlic, thyme and sweet basil and stir for a few minutes.
- Add the vegetable broth, water and black-eyed peas.
- Lock the pressure cooker lid and turn the heat to high.
- Once pressure is reached, adjust the heat to keep the pressure regulator gently rocking for 10 minutes.
- Remove from heat and let the pressure naturally release.
- Stir in the Bragg Liquid Aminos and hot sauce.
Serve the black-eyed peas and farro in a raw collard green
to make a “wrap.”
Originally posted on JL goes Vegan: Food & Fitness with a side of Kale. You can follow JL on Twitter and Facebook.