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Archive for the ‘Southwestern’ Category

©2008 Harry Kenney

One thing you know about the way I do things, for those who follow me, is that besides pointing out tips I point out the rough spots, the mistakes that I’ve made on a previous version or how to correct mistakes if they’re made. What you don’t see (though I sometimes talk about) are the once in a while big flops.

Yes, I have them too. We all do. (You might find some comfort in that.) Maybe I made a silly mistake that flopped the whole thing. Once in a while the technique I used was the downfall — as when I tried too tough a cut of beef for shish kabobs. Sometimes I misjudge as with a recent braised Swiss chard recipe where by (having not used it before) I totally miscalculated the amount of shrinkage and so the other ingredients in the dish came out in too much proportions.

Then there’s this dish. Over half a year ago I tried something like this. I was going to call it a California salad. It has pineapple and avocado and other ingredients. I also attempted to make some kind of yogurt dressing, though I forget now what was in it besides the yogurt. It was a miserable flop. The dressing and salad didn’t work individually and they worked worse together. I’m still not sure what I did wrong.

Point is, many months later I made a Greek yogurt dressing and it came out nice. And then I made a tropical salsa and it came out excellent. With more time and experience behind my belt, I once again decided to make this salad. But I didn’t take what I did before in to account on purpose. I didn’t try, that is, to go to the same blueprint and make corrections. I just went at it anew with whatever my gut told me to do. You see my gut, my experience had grown more since then, I just let it guide me.

In short, it worked. (If it hadn’t the recipe wouldn’t be up and it you wouldn’t know about it.) So, if you think I cook a lot now judging be the recipes you see on this site. Well sometimes things go wrong behind the scenes and I end up wasting food and my time and taking photos. (Fortunately my flops are few and far between, but they happen.) I don’t feel bad, that is, we all make mistakes. Look at Top Chef, look at other shows … did the winner of the competition ever have a bad dish or were they perfect from day one? They all, even the best of chefs, have a bad day, a bad dish. In fact, if you experiment — and you should — this will always happen; it’s part of the game. So I don’t let it get to me. Again, we often learn from our mistakes.

One thing I do want to mention briefly is that while I’m not sure what happened to that first attempt of a salad similiar to this, my best guess is it was just the wrong mixture and/or proportion of flavors to each other. I like making complex dishes at times. I like the harmony, the interplay of tastes. You know this from other dishes like BBQ sauce. You’ve heard Bobby Flay talk about this. Ming Tsai has made a career out of these balances. The yin and yang. The sweet to offset the sharp; the sharp to liven it up; the hot to give it bite; the oil to clam it down; the tang against … You get the idea.

You might recall one of my very first articles here, Secret to Great Cooking: A Harmony of Contrasts, where I talked about “combining to create a unity of opposites”. That’s what this particular dish — both the salad and the dressing, and more so the two together — really is about. Last time out, my “grasp” of this was off a bit, and that was just enough that it didn’t work. This time my understanding of combining these disparate elements was better and I was successful. Point is, try things. Fail, get up, learn, try it again. Maybe you can figure it out and get it right the next day, maybe eight months has to pass by. Either way, don’t force it, but don’t give up.

One final thing. Not only is this one delicious salad, but the dressing is one of the best I’ve ever made. You will be very surprised how absolutely fantastic it tastes. I’ve made this with both extra-virgin olive oil and at another time with vegetable oil and both work fine, though the olive oil is preferred as it adds an extra fruity dimension to it. Enjoy!

Avocado Salad
©2008 Harry Kenney

2 avocados, peeled and chunked
1/2 medium red onion, chopped
1 pint (16 oz.) cherry tomatoes, leave whole
1 corn cob (roughly 1-1/2 cups), cooked, kernels seperated
1/2 cup fresh pineapple, chunked
1/2 cup fresh papaya, chunked
1/4 cup fresh cilantro, finely minced

Simply mix above together well and serve with dressing.

Cilantro-Lime Vinaigrette
©2008 Harry Kenney

1/2 cup cilantro, finely chopped
2 tbsp lime juice
2 tbsp honey
extra-virgin olive oil (vegetable oil also works)

Place first three ingredients in a blender (can be an old ordinary bar blender, doesn’t have to be a new super powered one). Take off blender top and while mixing, pour in olive oil from top to emulsify. Use approximately 3 parts olive oil to rest of ingredients or until looks right consistency. Taste. Add more if needed until happy with result.

Add by tablespoons over avacado salad (or other salad of your choosing) and mix in well. Serve.

Note: Keep this in refrigerator in a conventional wide-mouthed leftover container; do not bottle. Refrigeration will combine mixture into a thick gelatin-like consistency. To reuse simply mix well with fork for 15 seconds. If needed you could add 1/2 teaspoon of both water and oil.

I needed a side for my oven BBQ brisket. Yeah I had little baked potatoes and some fresh coleslaw, but I still wanted something warm and flavorful and that was (for lack of better words) very “veggie”. I also wanted something more “regional” … in this case, southern or western or southwestern. It just seemed like that would go right with my indoor BBQ meal.

Now last week there were quite a few things I had bought for my BBQ party that I never made it out to the table. Why is that, you may ask? A combination of my being too ambitious, wanting to make too much food than was necessary, as well as for various reasons six people, three couples basically, had to bale out because of sickness or previous commitments. So there just wasn’t the impetuous to cook twice the amount of food for half the amount of people.

In short, I had these wonderful sweet yellow corn cobs in the freezer (Now, don’t knock frozen. When the Iron Chef makes Frozen Peas a secret ingredient, and various other frozen veggies are used by even five star chefs, frozen doesn’t deserve a bad knock, necessarily.) Ok, so here I was doing a Texas-style BBQ dish and I had corn. Only natural thing to do was stay in the same general area and go Southwestern.

Just as I had made my brisket in the oven. Here I was going to treat my frying pan more like a grill and “grill” (obviously the technical term here is actually in the title, pan roast) some corn and toss in some more regional ingredients and spices. I never tried this one before and I was happy with the success, the taste of it, this one is definitely going to be a oft-cooked dish in this house from now on!

Two thangs (yes, I said thangs), one, if you think this meal based on the ingredients is going to be hot, you’re wrong. It’s spiced but not spicy and actually a tad sweet. So no reason to be faint of heart, try it out. And secondly, considering this recipe I’ll jump right over giving any kind of “bon appetites” and just say instead: pull up a seat and chow down, amigos!

Southwestern Pan-Roasted Corn Vegetable Medley
©2007 Harry Kenney

ingredients:

4 small cobs or 2 large ones, kernels cut off
14 oz can black beans, rinsed and drained
1 cup of diced tomatoes, drained (no can juice)
1/2 of a medium red onion, chunks, (or one whole small one)

season to taste:

cilantro
chilli powder
garlic powder
onion powder
salt
pepper
half-lime, juice

Roast the kernels in a pan on medium-high heat with a little vegetable or peanut oil. Don’t make it too oily as you want more of a “grill” thing than a “fry” thing going here. That said you do want a lot of movement of the food in the pan (like a stir-fry). Do though add oil now and then as needed as pan will burn it off and corn may soak some up. Add seasonings. Do want to see darkening of the yellow. A touch of brown. You do not ever want to see black or “burn” on your corn. If you do, it’s either too hot, or more than likely you are not moving the pan around enough or moving the corn with a spoon enough.

After a few minutes add the onion. And a little more oil. After another couple minutes, constantly stirring or flipping the pan, add the beans and tomatoes, more oil, a second helping of all the seasonings. Turn down to medium heat. After a few minutes, juice of half a lime. Wait another half minute for that to mix in and burn a little off. Serve. Makes enough for about four people.