Hot Stuff for Your Super Bowl Wings

According to a story in USA Today, Americans eat 1.35 BILLION chicken wings on Super Bowl weekend. And that insane number of hot chicken parts needs an insane amount of hot sauce to flavor them. If you're like me and prefer to make your wings at home rather than consume them at whatever purveyor of alcoholic beverages you plan to visit in order to watch the Big Game, you might be interested in a few of the hot sauces I've encountered recently. Unless of course you're a wimp and like your wings sans sauce. :)

First up is the Harissa Hot Sauce from Moore's Marinades & Sauces. While the sauce is hot and garlicky with a North African flair from harissa spices, it's not a radical change from a classic Buffalo wing flavor once you mix some up with a good dose of melted butter. In other words, celery sticks and bleu cheese dressing are still a perfect match for wings made with this sauce. But if you wanted to switch things up, you could make your dressing with feta cheese instead of bleu. And if you want to go a different direction entirely, swap out the chicken wings for lamb sliders and top them with a dose of Moore's Harissa hot sauce (and the feta cheese sauce, too). Yum.

Moore's also makes a Spicy Mustard hot sauce, and both Jalapeno and Habanero sauces, plus a whole line of ready-to-eat wing sauces and marinades. Find them at various supermarkets including Giant and Weis.

Then we have Marion's Kitchen Coconut Sriracha and Coconut Sweet Chili Sauces. The Coconut Sriracha is fiery, like regular sriracha, but with the added creaminess of coconut. Never fear, the coconut doesn't do anything to ease the heat--the sauce is still pretty damn spicy. The Coconut Sweet Chili is like the chili sauce dip that comes with spring rolls in a Thai restaurant, again with the addition of coconut. It's not nearly as hot as the sriracha, but it does have a kick. If you don't want to set your mouth on fire, you can blend the two. I want to say that the coconut gives it a sweet heat, but that's like saying a summer day in Arizona is more pleasant than a summer day in Baltimore. It may be a dry heat, but it's still HOT.

Marion's Kitchen also has a line of marinades, stir fry sauces, meal kits, and coconut milk, all starring Asian flavors like ginger, lemongrass, lime, and of course, chiles. I have the marinades at home, too, and will be experimenting with them in the future. I'll be sure to post the happy results here.

In Maryland, you can buy Marion's Kitchen products at Sprouts, Wegman's, and select Walmart stores. Check the store locator for details.

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Farro Salad

I'm a fan of Deb Perelman's blog, Smitten Kitchen. It's actually one of the few blogs I still read regularly; she writes in an entertaining manner, and her recipes are uniformly successful. Because I knew the recipes would be solid, I made sure to get a copy of her cookbook and read it from cover to cover. Several recipes jumped out at me, screaming, "make me! make me!" One of those was this salad of farro with carrots, parsnips, feta, and mint, all bathed in a dressing of lemon juice, harissa, and honey. And there you have the recipe. It's really simple and really good. The farro is pleasantly chewy, the root vegetables are sweet, the mint aromatic, and the dressing and cheese really liven up the dish. I think this will become a warm-weather staple in my house, once I can figure out how to cook the root veg without turning on the oven. Perhaps pan sauteeing over high heat, maybe charring the veg first over a gas burner.

I'm just going to paraphrase the recipe here, telling you what I did. If you want the exact recipe, you'll just have to buy the book!

Farro Salad with Carrots and Other Good Stuff

1 pound of parsnips, peeled and cut into matchsticks
1 pound of carrots, peeled and cut into matchsticks
Seems like a lot of veg, but they shrink down to nothing. Toss the veg with olive oil and salt and spread out onto two foil-lined baking sheets. Roast 20 minutes at 400°F, stir, then roast an additional 10 minutes. Set aside to cool to room temperature.

8 ounces of dry farro
Add farro to 2 1/4 cups water or stock with a big pinch of salt and bring to a boil. Turn down to a simmer and cover pot. Cook 35 minutes, or until tender and fluffy. (I used Wegman's brand farro and it was done in about 25 minutes. YMMV.) Cover pot and let sit for 10 mins or so to allow farro to absorb remaining water (I poured it out.) Fluff with a fork.

Make a dressing with 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, 5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, a big pinch of cumin, 2 teaspoons of honey, and harissa to taste. (I have dried harissa powder in a jar and it's very mild so I used 2 teaspoons. Other brands will be uber hot, so use judiciously.) Season with salt and set aside. Have more lemon ready, in case you need more oompfh.

Toss the cooked farro with the dressing and add the veg. Toss again. Add a big handful of crumbled feta cheese and another handful of chopped fresh mint. Stir and taste for seasoning. You might need more salt and or lemon juice, as I did.

I served the salad with boneless skinless chicken thighs that I had marinated in a combo of salt, harissa, cumin, and olive oil (pinches of each for 3 thighs). Browned on both sides in a bit of olive oil, then turned down the heat and cooked until done, about 20 minutes total.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Mediterranean Pimento Cheese

Pimento cheese is a southern specialty. A fairly simple combination of shredded cheese, mayo, and chopped pimento or roasted red pepper, it's great slathered on everything from crackers to burgers. Not being particularly southern, I am willing to take liberties with the recipe and make it my own.

We had a jar of fairly mild harissa paste in the fridge looking for things to do. I decided to employ it in a pimento cheese that could hail from a land in the vicinity of the southeastern Mediterranean sea. Most pimento cheeses use cheddar as a base, but I wanted something more neutral so the feta cheese could be prominent. The harissa stands in for the pimentos, but you could certainly add red pepper to your cheese if you choose. Don't forget to add the herbs, which add more character to the salty cheese.

I spread it on ciabatta and topped it with an over-easy egg, and it was mmm! Next I'll use it on a lamb burger with lots of red onion and fresh tomato.

Mediterranean Pimento Cheese

4 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, grated
4 ounces feta cheese, crumbled
2-3 teaspoons harissa paste (or to taste, depending on the strength of your harissa)
3 heaping tablespoons mayo
1 tablespoon finely chopped mint
1 teaspoon dill seeds, crushed

Combine all ingredients in a bowl until fairly homogenized in texture. There will still be small lumps of feta. Pack into a lidded container and refrigerate for several hours so the flavors can mellow. Serve with crackers or as a sandwich spread.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Purple Cauliflower Tacos

I purchased the most gorgeous purple cauliflower at the University of Maryland farmers' market the other day. It was ridiculously purple, and I had to have it. But when I got it home, I tucked it into the bottom of the fridge and forgot about it for a few days.

Then came the weekend and I had to rustle up something for dinner. Purple cauliflower to the rescue! I'm perfectly content to eat my cauli simply steamed and salted, maybe with a nice knob of butter on top. Honestly, I could eat a whole head myself--and have--and be completely content. But that wouldn't work for Mr Minx. He likes to have a more balanced meal, one with starch and protein. But I didn't feel like fussing with protein. I wanted to do something creative with the beautiful purple cauliflower.

So I made tacos. With cauliflower fritters, harissa mayonnaise, pickled carrots, and esquites. You may think that one (or more) of those things doesn't belong, but oh, they do! These tacos were full of intense flavors and textures - the herbal and crispy fritters, the pop and sweetness of fresh corn kernels, the salty funk of feta cheese, and the spicy tang of the yogurt. They were soooo good!

The fritters themselves were a bit of a gamble. I had never made them before, so wasn't sure about the texture at all. Would they fall apart in the pan? Would they get crispy enough? Should I make balls or patties? No, yes, and both. The cauli mixture (I can't really call it a batter) was very sticky. There was a lot of veg and very little binder, so it was easiest to make quenelle-style blobs that were roughly the same size and place them into the pan. Once I deemed the bottoms were browned enough, I flipped the balls onto their opposite sides as best I could, then smashed them flat with the spatula. Like a smashburger. It worked perfectly--they didn't fall apart, and it was easier to get them browned on all sides, as after smashing there were only two of them. I flipped them once or twice to make sure both sides were amply browned before draining them on paper towel-lined plates, and cooked them in two batches so as not to crowd the pan.

Since I had made the fritters with feta and mint, I thought I should just stick with Middle Eastern/Mediterranean-inspired flavors. I had a jar of fairly mild harissa in the cupboard that I thought would make a nice sauce with some Greek yogurt, and figured pickled carrots could add a bit of tang. (I totally cheated with the carrots. We were gifted with a jar of pickled yellow beets a while back, and after we ate the beets themselves, we saved the brine. It was perfect for a quick pickle with no effort on our part. I recommend saving your favorite pickle brine in its original jar in the fridge for such occasions.)  But then I had two ears of sweet bi-color corn to use. I was originally going to put the corn in the fritters, but thought it might get lost and simply become a texture. Salsa came to mind, but then I decided to make esquites, the off-the-cob version of Mexican street corn. Completely Minx-ified, of course, with little or no authenticity. It's the taste that counts, right?

Pretty and delicious. What more do you need from dinner?

Purple Cauliflower Tacos

For the harissa yogurt:
1/4 cup Greek yogurt
2-3 tablespoons harissa, or to taste (depends on the brand you use)
Lemon juice
Pinch salt

For the esquites:
2 ears corn, cooked and still warm, kernels removed
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
1 teaspoon chile powder
1 tablespoon lime juice
1/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
1 tablespoon chopped scallions

For the cauliflower fritters:
1 medium head cauliflower
Salt
1/2 cup chopped mint and cilantro (one or the other, preferably both)
1 scallion, chopped
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
2 large eggs, beaten
3/4 cup AP flour
Vegetable oil for frying

To serve:
Pickled carrots
Cilantro
Feta cheese
Taco or fajita-sized flour tortillas

To make the harissa yogurt: Combine all ingredients in a bowl. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.

To make esquites: Mix everything together in a bowl. Serve warm or at room temperature

To make the fritters: Remove the leaves and bottom of the stem from cauliflower and discard. Rinse the cauliflower well and place in a large pot with a couple inches of water. Cover the pot and bring the water to a boil. Cook the cauliflower until a knife inserted through the top goes through with only slight resistance. Drain the water and transfer the cauliflower to a bowl.

Flip the cauli over and remove the rest of the stem and any overly large "branches" that might still be a little hard. Bash the florets into small pieces with a potato masher - you don't actually want to mash the vegetable, just to break it into very small bits. Discard any other hard stem bits you may find during this process. Stir a large pinch of salt into the cauliflower and let it cool to room temperature.

Once cool, add the remaining ingredients and stir well to combine. You'll have a purple and green sticky mess in a bowl. Using two tablespoons or your hands, form the mess into 15 or so football-shaped blobs, placing them on a couple of plates or a clean cutting board.

Heat a tablespoon or so of the oil over medium-high heat in a large non-stick skillet. Place as many of the purple blobs in the skillet as will fit comfortably without crowding. Cook until the bottoms are nicely browned, 3-4 minutes. Flip the blobs so the browned sides are facing upward, then gently smash each ball into a patty with your spatula. Continue frying until browned on the bottom side, then flip again to cook the exposed still-purple bits that didn't get browned the first time around. Once browned on both sides, remove to a paper towel-lined plate and hit with a pinch of salt. Repeat with remaining blobs.

To serve: Place a stack of tortillas on a microwave-safe plate. Cover with a damp paper towel and nuke for 45 seconds to 1 minute, until tortillas are warm and pliable.

Put a warm tortilla on a plate. Smear with some of the harissa yogurt. Top with one or two fritters, depending on the size of the tortilla. Add a spoonful of the esquites, some pickled carrots, a few bits of feta, and some cilantro. Eat and repeat.

Makes 8-12 tacos.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Blackened Carrots with Harissa Yogurt and Carrot top-Mint Pesto

I have developed a passion for carrots. Cooked carrots. I especially enjoy young carrots, so fresh they still have the greens attached. So when I saw a charred carrot dish on the menu at Bobby Flay's new restaurant, Gato, I had to have them. And they were wonderful.

There are recipes for "charred" carrots on the interwebs, but they are more caramelized than charred. Flay's carrots were literally black with char, as if they had been dropped directly into a fire and forgotten for a few minutes. I figured I could do the same thing at home, blackening the carrots over an open gas flame much as I do when I roast peppers. It took a few minutes to get the carrots black all over, and they had to be moved around regularly, but it worked beautifully. Although charred, the carrots were still mostly raw at this point, so I popped them in the oven after oiling and seasoning them.

Flay's carrots were served with a spicy yogurt flavored with harissa, a Tunisian spice mix heavy on chiles that can be found in both paste and dry form. The one I use is Frontier brand and not too spicy, so use your own tastebuds when seasoning your yogurt. I hated to waste those glorious carrot tops, which are a bit too metallic in flavor to eat like other greens. At first I was thinking a carrot top vinaigrette, because I had eaten one on a salad locally, but then I remembered that I really didn't care for that particular dish at all and opted to make a pesto, instead. And rather than remake Flay's crispy parsnip chips, some recently purchased fried shallots became the topping. The combination was stellar, if I do say so myself. (And I do!)

I think blackened carrots will become a part of the summertime vegetable rotation. Next time, with feta cheese and dill....or preserved lemon yogurt.

Blackened Carrots with Harissa Yogurt and Carrot top-Mint Pesto

For the carrots:
1 pound small to medium carrots with tops, scrubbed but not peeled
Extra virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper

For the pesto:
About 1 cup loosely packed carrot tops, washed thoroughly and dried
Handful fresh mint leaves
1 clove garlic
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
Handful of fresh grated Parmesan
Few tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
Salt to taste

For the yogurt:
1/2 cup 2% Greek yogurt
Harissa
Squeeze of lemon juice
Salt to taste

To make carrots: Turn on a couple of the gas burners on your stove and place the carrots directly on the flame. Use tongs to turn and move them around occasionally to make sure the entire carrot gets mostly blackened. Once carrots are nicely charred (about 10 minutes), remove them to a plate and set aside.

To make pesto: Place all ingredients into a food processor and blend until combined but still slightly chunky. Set aside.

To make yogurt: Stir either harissa paste or harissa powder into yogurt to taste. Season with a squeeze of lemon juice and salt. Refrigerate until ready to use.

To finish dish: Preheat oven to 400°F. Place charred carrots on a foil-lined baking sheet and drizzle with a little olive oil and salt and pepper. Roast for 15-20 minutes, turning once or twice during baking, until the carrots are tender.

Serve with harissa yogurt and carrot top-mint pesto.



Posted on Minxeats.com.