Oomame Chile Crisp Ice Cream

Moroccan Oomame on Oatmeal with feta

One of my favorite products discovered at the 2021 Fancy Food Show was Oomame's line of globally-influenced chile crisps. Originally from China, chile crisp has become a popular condiment among chile-heads and others who enjoy a flavorful bit of spice plus crunchy texture. It's great on dumplings, but also pizza, pasta, and just about everything else. What I like about Oomame's product is that it comes in four varieties - a classic Sichuan style, plus others borrowing flavor profiles from Mexico, Morocco, and India. While I still like to use the Sichuan version on typically savory dishes, I have found that the dried fruits in the other varieties (fig in Moroccan, papaya in Indian, mango in Mexican) add a subtle sweetness that makes them also work well with foods that are traditionally sweeter. Try a drizzle of Moroccan Oomame with a sprinkle of feta cheese on your next bowl of oatmeal--rather than the usual brown sugar or maple syrup and fruit--for something totally unexpected and totally delicious. But let's push that proverbial envelope a bit, shall we?

Some ice cream shops in Sichuan province have taken to drizzling chile oil on vanilla soft serve. And while a chile crisp sundae seems like a fine idea, I took it even further by putting chile crisp in ice cream. Yes, I did! The Mexican-inspired version of Oomame Global Chile Crisp, in particular, seemed ripe for taking a savory condiment fully into dessert territory. But rather than using vanilla in my frozen confection, I borrowed some elements from the chile crisp itself to flavor the creamy base. I started with Jeni's ice cream recipe, which uses corn starch and cream cheese in place of eggs as a thickener, and infused it with mango and orange peel, adding peanuts as a substitute for the pepitas in the Mexican Oomame. (While they're great for crunch, I didn't think they'd add all that much flavor.) 

The result exceeded my wildest expectations. Mr Minx wasn't all that thrilled with the flavor of dried onion in his ice cream but it didn't bother me. Nor did the occasional hit of cumin. The predominant flavor was orange peel, even more so than chile, which I thought was enough to keep my creation well within the realm of dessert. If you're an adventurous eater, give it a try. 

I have no regrets.

Oomame Chile Crisp Ice Cream

1 clementine or half a small orange

2 cups milk

1 1⁄4 cups heavy cream

1 ounce dried mango strips

Small handful of roasted unsalted peanuts

4 t cornstarch

2⁄3 cup sugar

2 T light corn syrup

1⁄4 t kosher salt

3 T cream cheese, softened

2 T Oomame Mexican Chile Crisp

Additional roasted unsalted peanuts

Chocolate chips (optional - I used a Seattle Chocolates Mexican Chocolate bar, cut into slivers)

Peel the clementine or orange in large strips, saving the fruit segments for another use. Carefully scrape the white pith from the inside of the peel with a small knife. 

Reserve 1/4 cup of milk and put the remaining 1 3/4 cups plus the cream into a 4-quart saucepan. Add the mango, peanuts, and clementine or orange peel. Over medium-high heat, bring the milk to almost a boil. Turn off the heat, cover the pan, and allow the flavorings to steep for about 20 minutes. 

Stir the cornstarch into the reserved 1/4 cup of milk and set aside. 

Strain the steeped milk into another 4-quart saucepan, reserving the fruit and nuts. Add the sugar, corn syrup, and salt to the pan and bring the milk to a boil over medium-high heat. Cook for 4 minutes, then stir in the slurry. Bring back to a boil and cook until thickened, 2 minutes.

Put the cream cheese in a large bowl and pour in 1/4 of the hot milk, whisking until smooth. Carefully whisk in the rest of the hot milk. Stir in the chile crisp. Pour the milk into a storage container. Add a layer of ice cubes to the bottom of a baking pan large enough to fit the storage container and put the container on top of the ice in order to cool the milk mixture down quickly. After about 15 minutes, put the container in the fridge to chill completely, 4 hours or overnight.

Cut the steeped mango and orange peel into small pieces and reserve along with the peanuts.

Put the chilled ice cream base into the bowl of an ice cream maker and process according to manufacturer's directions. After the ice cream has started to thicken and is almost done, add the mango, orange, peanuts, and chocolate, if using. Scoop ice cream into a freezer-safe storage container (I just used the same one I used for the hot milk) and smooth with the back of a spoon. Cover and freeze until firm, at least 4 hours.

Serve with additional chile crisp, or over your favorite brownies. Or eat straight out of the container.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

Posted on Minxeats.com.

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.

Flashback Friday - Tomatillo Soup

This post originally appeared on Minxeats.com on August 18, 2014.

Once in a while I taste something in a restaurant that I feel I must duplicate at home. The tomatillo soup with caramelized tomatoes and cilantro that my brother ate at SoBo Cafe recently was one of those dishes. I had coincidentally just purchased a pound of tomatillos at the farmers' market, so it seemed like something I *needed* to make.

It seemed simple enough to reconstruct the dish. I could tell there was a creamy element to the soup, as well as a nice smoky dose of chipotle pepper. For the caramelized tomato element, I'd just make some oven-roasted tomatoes, like the ones in this recipe, only with a bare tablespoon each of the balsamic and olive oil, and no garlic.

With the help of a blender, I put together a soup that seemed pretty darn close to SoBo's version. It was tangy, creamy, and refreshing, with a bit of sweetness from the tomatoes. I loved it, but Mr Minx thought it was too tart. If you make it and find that to be the case, you could always add a bit more honey or agave syrup to the soup to balance out the tangy tomatillos.

Creamy Chilled Tomatillo Soup

1/2 onion, roughly chopped
2 teaspoons olive oil
Pinch salt
1 pound fresh tomatillos, rinsed after husking
1 big handful cilantro leaves and stems
1 teaspoon chipotle powder (you could also used minced chipotle in adobo, but it could affect the color of the soup)
1 tablespoon honey or agave syrup
1/2 cup full fat or 2% Greek yogurt
Salt to taste
Caramelized tomatoes
Cilantro for garnish

Cook the onion in the olive oil and salt until translucent. Set aside to cool. When cool, add to the pitcher of a blender along with the tomatillos and cilantro. Puree the vegetables and then add the chipotle, honey, and yogurt and process again until smooth. Season with salt to taste (a half teaspoon or so).

If you want a smoother soup, pass the tomatillo/cilantro mixture through a sieve before adding the seasonings and yogurt.

Garnish each serving with 3-4 tomatoes and some cilantro leaves.

Makes about a quart.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Sweet and Spicy Wings

It's Super Bowl time again, and while I don't have any horses in this particular race, I will probably still watch the game just to cheer against the Patriots. And since the game is on at dinner time, I'm going to want to make something that can largely be prepped ahead of time and warmed up just before we want to eat. Chicken wings are a perfect example of such a dish.

I'm not a fan of deep-fat frying, so I prefer to bake my wings. It seems like many of the baked wing recipes online call for ridiculously short cooking times. I think 45 minutes is the longest I've seen, and even then, the wings come out somewhat flabby and not crisp enough for my liking. So I came up with another method.

Everyone knows that cooking french fries twice makes them extra crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside. Korean fried chicken is extra crisp because it, too, is fried twice. And my baked chicken wings are nice and crisp because, you guessed it, I bake them twice.

The first baking is done in a baking pan or casserole dish, to capture all of the fat that oozes out from under the skin. The second baking is done on a cookie sheet at a higher temperature to brown the wings and crisp the skin. It may take over an hour in total, but the two bakings can be done separately, with a rest in the fridge in between. That way, you can prep the wings in the morning, and then when you're getting hungry, you only need to preheat the oven and pop the wings back in for 20 minutes.

The result is so good, it's definitely worth the effort.

Also worth the effort is cutting whole wings into pieces yourself. Pre-cut drummettes and flats are about $2 more per pound than whole wings. However, unless you have a nice heavy chef's knife, separating the joints is a little difficult. I remember panting and puffing through my first batch of wings because I didn't have the proper tools. So I bought a small cleaver. The problem with a cleaver, however, is they can be quite dangerous for those of us unaccustomed to using them. It's not a good idea to hold the wing with your free hand while you're chopping down with that big blade because if you slip.... oops. Well, you probably didn't need that finger anyway.

I stretched each wing out on the cutting board, put my left hand well out of the way, and aimed for the joint with the cleaver in my right hand. Sometimes the cleaver cut cleanly, and sometimes I had to chop twice. In any case, it was much more quick and efficient than my wimpy chef's knife.

A few days before I made my wings, I got a box of goodies from The Spice Lab. This Florida-based woman-owned and family-run business offers everything from spices and exotic salts to condiments, kitchen tools, and loose teas. They even offer unusual items for mixologists, like pink salt shot glasses. One of the samples they sent was Caribbean Jerk seasoning, a chunky blend of chiles, allspice, and salt in one of those convenient twist-top grater bottles that keep the herbs whole until ready to use. As the mango pepper jelly I used for my base had a tropical touch, I knew jerk spices would work well even with the other Asian flavors in the sauce. It definitely added a little extra sumpin'-sumpin' as far as seasoning was concerned.

So if you're looking for something other than the usual nachos or sliders as a game-time snack (or dinner), give these wings a try. Of course, they're also tasty all year 'round.

Sweet and Spicy Chicken Wings

3-4 lbs whole chicken wings
The Spice Lab Caribbean Jerk seasoning
3/4 cup pepper jelly (I used Trappist Mango Pepper)
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
2 tablespoons Asian fish sauce
2 tablespoons sambal oelek (I used Hung Foy brand)
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
Pinch cayenne or to taste
Lime juice
1 tablespoon butter

Preheat the oven to 350°F.

Carefully separate the wings into three pieces, drummette, flat, and tip. (I used a cleaver, but if you have a nice heavy chef's knife, that will also do.) Discard the tips or save in a plastic bag in the freezer until you get enough chicken bits to make stock.

Line two 9x13 baking pans with foil and arrange the chicken pieces in one layer, skin side-up. If you have more than will fit comfortably, use three pans. Bake for 25 minutes. Take pans out of the oven and, using tongs, move wings around to insure they're not sticking to the foil--but don't turn them. Give them a liberal sprinkling with the jerk seasoning and return pans to the oven to cook for an additional 25 minutes.

While chicken is baking, make the sauce.

Melt the pepper jelly in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the vinegar, fish sauce, sambal, garlic, ginger, and cayenne and bring to a boil. Turn down and let simmer for 3-4 minutes. Season with a bit of lime juice. Add butter and cook until melted, stirring regularly. Remove sauce from the heat and set aside.

Once the wings have spent their initial time in the oven, remove the pans and, using tongs, transfer them to a large rimmed baking sheet lined with foil or parchment. At this point they are done and only need browning. If you don't want to eat the wings just yet, cover the pan and place in the refrigerator. When ready to cook, preheat the oven to 400°F and return wings to oven. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until browned and crispy and warmed through.

Using tongs, remove the wings to a large bowl. Give the sauce a stir and pour over the wings. Toss wings to coat with sauce, then pile onto a plate. Sprinkle with more jerk seasoning, if desired.

Serve with celery sticks and creamy dressing of your choice.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Kung Pao Brussels Sprouts

When I was a kid, I felt like a bit of a weirdo because I didn't know anyone outside my family that liked Brussels sprouts as much as I did. (Truth be told, that's not the only reason I was weird.) I even liked them boiled and stinky; I suppose that came from living in a Polish household where cabbage was a regular part of mealtime. Nowadays, it seems like everyone likes Brussels Sprouts, or at least restaurants seem to think so. More than any other vegetable, the mini cabbages are served in interesting ways. One never sees green beans or peas or broccoli done up "Buffalo style," or deep fried and served with pancetta, or in a Dijon cream sauce, but that's the norm for Brussels sprouts. And I like it!

I was fortunate enough to marry someone who shares my affection for the little guys, so we eat them fairly often at home. We've even grown them (with mixed success) in our backyard garden. Ordinarily, we make them one of three ways: halved, tossed with oil, and roasted; leaves separated and steamed; grated raw in a salad. It's nice to mix things up sometimes though, so when I spotted a recipe for Brussels sprouts prepared in a kung pao-style sauce, and realized we had a bag of them in the crisper, it seemed like kismet.

The original version of the recipe calls for double the amount of ingredients listed here. It also requires much more sambal AND a handful of dried chiles. While we do enjoy spicy foods, we find sambal oelek (at least the Huy Fong brand we normally buy) to be incendiary and cut back on the amount used. Your mileage may vary, of course. We cut back on the amount of sugar quite a bit as well; the sprouts were still delicious.

Kung Pao Brussels Sprouts (adapted from Bon Appetit)

1 pounds Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 tablespoon finely chopped peeled ginger
2 teaspoons sambal oelek
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 tablespoon sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch
1 teaspoons unseasoned rice vinegar
Handful unsalted, roasted peanuts

Preheat oven to 425°F. Toss Brussels sprouts and 1 tablespoon of the oil, season with salt and pepper. Place on a foil-lined baking sheet and roast, turning once, until softened and browned, about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside.

Put remaining oil in a saute pan and turn heat to medium-high. Add garlic and ginger and cook for a couple minutes, stirring regularly. Stir in sambal, then add soy, sugar, vinegar, and 1/4 cup of water and bring to a boil. Mix the cornstarch with enough water (2 teaspoons or so) to make a runny paste. Stir into the sambal mixture and bring to a boil. Simmer until the mixture thickens enough to coat a spoon.

Add cooked Brussels sprouts and toss to coat.

Serve topped with peanuts.


Posted on Minxeats.com.

Roasted Shrimp

I order head-on shrimp at a Chinese restaurant (especially at dim sum), but I really don't like to eat the heads. To me, they taste funky in a bad way. However, I do like the way they look. So when I saw head-on shrimp for sale at the local Asian grocery store, I bought some. You have to admit, the sinuous curve of their pink bodies paired with the frilly heads and black eyes is quite ornamental. Sadly, they can't be put into a vase or left on the table in a bowl. (The smell would get unbearable pretty quickly.)

Even without any real idea of what to do with the shrimp, I decided they needed to be oven-roasted, whole, rather than pan-fried. Since we were also going to finish up some leftover Chinese-ish soup with the meal, I incorporated Chinese flavors into the shrimp by tossing them in a sauce of black vinegar and chile bean paste, using more of that sauce as a dip.

Eat the heads and shells, or peel them off before dipping. Either way, they're pretty tasty.

Roasted Shrimp

1 lb head-on shrimp
Vegetable oil
Salt and pepper
2 tablespoons soy
2 tablespoons black vinegar
3 tablespoons doubanjian
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon ground ginger
Sesame seeds
Handful of torn cilantro leaves

Preheat broiler.

Toss shrimp with a bit of olive oil and salt and pepper. Place in one layer on a foil-lined baking sheet. Broil shrimp for 8-10 minutes, turning once, until pink and cooked through.

While shrimp are roasting, combine soy, vinegar, doubanjian, garlic, sugar, and ginger in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil. Turn down heat and cook for a minute or so, making sure sugar is dissolved.

When shrimp are cooked, put them into a large bowl. Pour over half of the soy mixture and toss well. Pour remaining soy mixture into a ramekin, to use as a dipping sauce.

Arrange sauced shrimp on a plate. Garnish with sesame and cilantro, and serve dipping sauce on the side.

Serves 4.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Tomatillo Soup

Once in a while I taste something in a restaurant that I feel I must duplicate at home. The tomatillo soup with caramelized tomatoes and cilantro that my brother ate at SoBo Cafe recently was one of those dishes. I had coincidentally just purchased a pound of tomatillos at the farmers' market, so it seemed like something I *needed* to make.

It seemed simple enough to reconstruct the dish. I could tell there was a creamy element to the soup, as well as a nice smoky dose of chipotle pepper. For the caramelized tomato element, I'd just make some oven-roasted tomatoes, like the ones in this recipe, only with a bare tablespoon each of the balsamic and olive oil, and no garlic.

With the help of a blender, I put together a soup that seemed pretty darn close to SoBo's version. It was tangy, creamy, and refreshing, with a bit of sweetness from the tomatoes. I loved it, but Mr Minx thought it was too tart. If you make it and find that to be the case, you could always add a bit more honey or agave syrup to the soup to balance out the tangy tomatillos.

Creamy Chilled Tomatillo Soup

1/2 onion, roughly chopped
2 teaspoons olive oil
Pinch salt
1 pound fresh tomatillos, rinsed after husking
1 big handful cilantro leaves and stems
1 teaspoon chipotle powder (you could also used minced chipotle in adobo, but it could affect the color of the soup)
1 tablespoon honey or agave syrup
1/2 cup full fat or 2% Greek yogurt
Salt to taste
Caramelized tomatoes
Cilantro for garnish

Cook the onion in the olive oil and salt until translucent. Set aside to cool. When cool, add to the pitcher of a blender along with the tomatillos and cilantro. Puree the vegetables and then add the chipotle, honey, and yogurt and process again until smooth. Season with salt to taste (a half teaspoon or so).

If you want a smoother soup, pass the tomatillo/cilantro mixture through a sieve before adding the seasonings and yogurt.

Garnish each serving with 3-4 tomatoes and some cilantro leaves.

Makes about a quart.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Bulgogi-style Chicken and Kimchi Pancakes

Long, long ago, I had my first taste of Korean food. My Dad, who is usually up for anything, decided that we needed to try the new Korean restaurant in Towson. Sadly, my young palate was not ready for the bold combination of spicy and sweet plus garlic, and I swore it off for many years. After I moved to Towson, well into my adult years, I thought I'd give Korean food another try. And what do you know--I loved it.

Mr Minx and I soon became regulars at that Towson Korean restaurant. Until it closed. A sad day.

Sometimes we venture out to a Korean restaurant in Ellicott City (like Honey Pig), but mostly we make Korean food at home. It's not difficult, and the results are super flavorful. And it helps that gochujang paste can be found in some supermarkets (those that carry Annie Chung products), as can kimchi (in the refrigerated produce section; Giant has it). Otherwise, there are plenty of Asian supermarkets in the Baltimore area (H Mart, Lotte, Great Wall) that have the ingredients you'll need.

Typically bulgogi is made with beef, but one can occasionally find it made with chicken. That's what I had in the freezer, so that's what I used. And I just happened to have a jar of kimchi in the fridge! Kimchi, even the Americanized stuff, is highly seasoned. However, don't skip the salt in the pancakes because you think the kimchi is salty enough. The rest of the ingredients are bland, so you'll need the extra seasoning to take care of the veggies and the batter. When I say "bland," I don't mean "not spicy." Even mild kimchi is quite hot, and so is the gochujang. If you're not into a lot of heat, skip the gochugaru in the bulgogi.

Bulgogi-style Chicken and Kimchi Pancakes

For the chicken:
4 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
2 tablespoons gochujang
1 teaspoon gochugaru (Korean red pepper flakes)
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon mirin
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons sesame oil
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 teaspoon grated ginger
3 scallions, chopped

For the pancakes:
1 cup cabbage kimchi
1 cup chopped or julienned vegetables of your choice (I used thin asparagus but you can use carrot, regular cabbage, broccoli)
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup rice flour
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
4 scallions, finely chopped
Vegetable oil for frying

For the chicken: Slice the chicken into strips, removing any excess fat.

Combine the rest of the ingredients in a large bowl. Add the chicken and toss to coat in the marinade. Cover bowl and refrigerate for at least one hour or overnight.

For the pancakes: Pour the juice off the kimchi and reserve. Add enough water to the juice to equal one cup. Finely chop the kimchi.

Combine the flours, salt, egg, and juice-water mixture in a large bowl. Allow to rest for 10 minutes before adding the chopped kimchi, veg, and scallions.

Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add a tablespoon of oil. When oil is hot, add about 1/4 cup of the batter per pancake to the pan. Spread batter with a spoon to get approximately 5" circles. Cook until bottoms are crispy, then flip and cook other side, about 2-3 minutes per side. Remove to a paper towel lined plate to drain.

Serves 2-3 with pancakes left over

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Spicy Fish Soup

Over the years, I've likely posted several variations on this recipe, but I think it's one well-worth sharing. Why? Because: 1) it's so simple; 2) it's so good; 3) it can be altered to your whim.

Put a cup of chopped onion and a sliced bulb of fennel into a soup pot with a bit of olive oil and a pinch of salt. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, until veggies are wilted and maybe beginning to brown slightly. If you like garlic, stir in a couple of cloves, minced, now. Add a 15oz can of chopped tomatoes and their juices and two bottles of clam juice + 2 clam juice bottles of water. Or a bottle of clam juice and a fish bouillon cube (Knorr makes these) + water. Or, if you want to go vegetarian, about 4 cups of your favorite veggie stock/bouillon. If you have leftover tomato paste/Thai red curry paste etc., add about a tablespoon of that here, but if you don't have it, no worries. (I scraped out the last of a jar of Maesri chilli paste with basil leaves.) Squeeze in a bit of Sriracha, turn the heat up, and bring the soup to a boil. Once it boils, lower the heat, cover the pot, and simmer for at least 30 minutes so the flavors meld.

Meanwhile, prepare your seafood: shell and devein shrimp; check your crabmeat for shells; cut your fish into thumb-sized pieces. Taste the soup - if it seems flavorful enough, add your seafood. Turn up the heat and cook until the fish or shrimp just turn opaque. (Crabmeat only needs warming.) If you're going the vegetarian route, small cubes of extra-firm tofu would not be out of place here, but you could also add more vegetables, like corn, okra, or greens. Taste the soup again and fine-tune the flavors with salt and pepper, more Sriracha, a bit of lemon juice, a dribble of agave syrup or honey.

Serve soup with crusty bread. Yum.

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Spicy Chili

I enjoy making chili. For relatively little effort, it offers great rewards.

I seldom use the same recipe twice. I don't use a recipe at all, actually, I just toss ingredients into the pot, tasting frequently, until the flavor profile matches the one I keep filed away among the other junk cluttering my brain. So no matter what I put in my chili, it tastes pretty consistent from batch to batch - meaty, tomatoey, somewhat sweet, and only barely spicy. This time, I thought I'd try something completely different.

OK, maybe not completely.

Uncharacteristically, I used a bunch of dried whole chiles. I removed most of the seeds after soaking them, and I'm glad I did because their fumes nearly choked me in the process. I like spicy stuff, but I don't want my mouth (or any other body part) to burn. I also wanted the chili to have a predominant smoky flavor, so I used chipotles, fire roasted tomatoes, smoked paprika, and even a little smoked salt at the end to finish it.

It was darn tasty, and a perfect accompaniment to a Ravens victory.

Spicy Smoky Chili

3 dried ancho chiles
3 dried chipotle chiles
3 lbs beef stew meat
1 onion, chopped
salt
olive oil
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
5 cloves garlic
1/2 cup prepared molé sauce (I used the molé from my chicken nachos)
2 15oz cans fire-roasted tomatoes
1 cup beef broth
Soak dried chiles in boiling water until they are pliable. Remove stems (and seeds, if desired). Chop peppers in a food processor with a bit of beef broth until they become a chunky purée. Set aside.

In a dutch oven, brown meat in batches. Remove meat and add onions and a pinch of salt. Stir well to pick up any browned bits from the meat. If there doesn't seem to be enough fat, add a dribble of olive oil. Cook onions over medium heat until they are beginning to brown.  Stir in cumin and coriander.

Add meat back to pan along with garlic, combining well. Cook for about 5 minutes, then add molé, pepper purée, tomatoes, and beef broth. Bring to a boil. When mixture comes to a boil, turn heat down to low and simmer for about 3 hours, or until beef is very tender.

Serve with your favorite chili condiments (cheese, onions, cilantro, sour cream) and tortilla chips.

Posted by theminx on Minxeats.com.

Chicken Molé

We Minxes tend to eat dinner the way god intended - at the dining room table, with cloth napkins and real utensils. Very occasionally, however, we'll eat off of paper plates while glued to the basement television. Those occasions would be football games starting at 4:05pm and the Superbowl. If we're going to be paying more attention to the TV than the food, I think finger foods that can be prepped in advance are easiest to deal with. Bonus points if the items can be fully cooked during halftime! Usually, this means a pizza or nachos.

Nachos seem easy, but I tend to make a production out of it. If I'm lucky, I have leftovers that I can throw together, but even then I have to make a variety of salsas. Sure, I know I can buy salsa, but I really enjoy making them out of whatever I have on hand. For the most recent nacho feast, I made a salsa with canned tomatoes seasoned with scallions and smoked salt, a corn salsa, and one with fresh raw cranberries, honey, and lime juice.

I didn't have any leftover protein this time, so I poached several skinless, bone-in chicken thighs in chicken stock. I also made a kind of molé sauce to flavor the meat.

Molés are rather complicated sauces involving many types of chiles, nuts, and spices. I used what I had on hand and made a rather nice, mild, and non-sweet sauce that worked really well on the relatively bland chicken.

Fauxlé Sauce

1/2 cup chopped onion
olive oil
pinch salt
1 15oz can chopped fire roasted tomatoes
1 mulato chile, soaked in hot water until softened, destemmed, chopped coarsely
1 canned chipotle in adobo
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1/4 cup blanched almonds, toasted and ground finely
1 tablespoon ancho chile powder
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
1 teaspoon coriander
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons chocolate chips
1 tablespoon honey or agave syrup
salt

Over medium heat, cook the onion in the oil with a pinch of salt until onion is translucent. Add tomatoes, chiles, and garlic and simmer for about five minutes. Stir in the remainder of the ingredients and cook over medium-low heat for another 10 minutes. Add salt to taste.

Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly. Puree in a food processor or blender. Strain.

Makes one pint.

To use with protein: toss a few tablespoons with protein of your choice in a sauté pan; heat until warmed through. Or heat sauce and meat separately. :)

Posted by theminx on Minxeats.com.

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I adore Thai food and wish I had the opportunity to explore it more often. I don't always leave happy when I visit the Thai restaurants in the area, so more often than not, if I want Thai flavors, I have to create them at home. Recently, during one of my regular tours of teh Internets, I spotted a recipe for laap mu, or Thai ground pork salad, that struck me in that, "I have to make this now" way. After checking out several variations on the recipe, including Top Chef Season 1 winner Howard Dieterle's version, I concocted one of my own. I wanted a salad that was spicy and tangy, but also filled with the aromatics like galangal and lemongrass that have made me such a fan of the cuisine.

We are still dealing with that triglyceride thing, so of course pork was out. Chicken (gai) is another meat that would have worked in the dish, but I could only find ground turkey at the Wegman's. (I've purchased sweetbreads there, and they had whole quail, so it seems odd not to have such a basic cut of meat. I probably didn't look in the right place.)

The Thai word for turkey seems to be ki ngwng. Say that five times fast. Hell, say it once. Gai is so much easier.

Pronunciation aside, the problem with turkey - particularly breast meat - is that it is dry. Chia seeds are of no help for this recipe, so if you can find ground turkey that contains some dark meat, or if you can grind up some chicken thighs in the food processor, you'll have a much moister dish. In any case, even with dry turkey breast the flavors were quite nice - aromatic, refreshing, and tart, with a nice chile kick. Serve the laap with lettuce leaves to make wraps, or on a bed of lettuce if you want a more salad-y thing. It's a great meal for a hot summer night and it involves relatively little cooking.

The rice powder and the sauce can be assembled ahead of time, but for the best results, the salad should be dressed just before eating.

Laap Ki ngwng

2 tablespoons raw rice
1 pound ground turkey
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 tablespoons fish sauce
2-3 teaspoons chile sauce (I used Sambal Oelek; Sriracha works too.)
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon galangal powder
1 tablespoon lemongrass paste (Gourmet Garden)
3 tablespoons lime juice
2 scallions, chopped
1 shallot, thinly sliced
2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
2 tablespoons chopped mint

Toast the raw rice in a dry skillet over medium heat, stirring often, until the rice has started to brown and emit a nutty fragrance. Remove from skillet, allow to cool, and pulverize in a coffee or spice grinder. Set aside.

In a small bowl, combine fish sauce, chile sauce, sugar, galangal, lemongrass, and lime juice. Set aside.

Cook the turkey meat in the vegetable oil until cooked through and no longer pink, breaking up clumps with a wooden spoon or the edge of a spatula. Turn off heat. Add half of the fish sauce mixture while the meat is still hot, tossing to combine. Allow the meat to cool for 15 minutes before adding remainder of sauce, plus scallion, shallot, cilantro, and mint. Sprinkle with toasted rice powder before serving.

Serve over lettuce, or use large lettuce leaves as a wrapper for the laab.

With the laab, we ate a simple cucumber salad - sliced cucumber, splashes of lime juice and fish sauce, chopped scallions, cilantro, mint, and peanuts - and steamed Jasmine rice.

Posted by theminx on Minxeats.com.

Top Home-Cooked Meals of 2010

As a partner to my list of Top Restaurant dishes, I thought I'd do another list including of my favorite home-cooked concoctions of 2010. I experimented a lot with Asian flavors, and dishes with roots in Korea, Vietnam, and Thailand were some of the best of the year, including some Asian pork meatballs that were pretty terrific.

Korean BBQ Chicken Wraps

The Korean BBQ Chicken Wraps with Pineapple Relish were a big success, as were every iteration of Banh Mi I created. The Korean tofu with spicy sauce that Ruth Reichl demonstrated on an episode of Diary of a Foodie was so good, we made it several times, particularly in the hot hot summer.

Tofu with spicy sauce

Let's not forget the very delicious Thai-style seviche I concocted from a myriad of seafood products that were living in our freezer. Ok, not "living," per se.

Thai-style ceviche

Another Thai-inflected dish I really loved this year was my Coconut Gazpacho. My Thai dinner party guests really seemed to enjoy it, too. And speaking of the Thai party, the Tod Mun Mu - my porky variation of Thai fish cakes - were also a hit.

Veering away from Asia, I thought my Caprese Salad Stack was particularly successful. And while one of the versions of Chiles Rellenos I cooked up this year was a big hit, even better were the accompanying corn muffins. Another side that I really enjoyed was a dish of mushroom orzotto, served up for our 10th wedding anniversary.

It seemed that everything was fodder for tacos - it didn't have to have Mexican or Tex-Mex flavors, either. I prepared a couple of fish tacos for a recipe contest, and even though I used commercially-breaded, frozen shrimp for one of them, when combined with elements like bacon salsa and peanut butter crema, they were utterly delicious. (Those recipes will be coming up in a future post.)

I hope you enjoyed reading about my cooking adventures in 2010 and have tried some of my recipes. I plan to have more for you in the coming year.

A Scare - But Not for Halloween

Last weekend, I had what I am going to call - for dramatic purposes - an "attack." I was on the Light Rail, heading to M&T Bank Stadium to take in a Ravens game with my dad, when I felt a tightening in the center of my chest. The discomfort (can't really call it "pain") quickly radiated up my neck and into my jaw.

I thought, "is this what a heart attack feels like?"

I had experienced this same sensation two or three times in the past and I dismissed it as indigestion. I usually have some antacids on hand and one or two of them takes care of the problem. But this time, the word "angina" popped into my head.

Angina is bad. It can mean a heart attack is imminent. So sayeth the health nerds on Teh Innernets. So I got myself checked out. After donating many vials of blood to the cause and enduring multiple EKGs and chest x-rays, I got the verdict.

My heart is a gorgeous specimen that gave the doctor no concerns. (Whew!) What I experienced was probably Esophageal Spasms, which feel a lot like angina. But isn't. I was told to continue taking antacids, but if the spasms became more frequent, I could start taking Prilosec or similar.

And I was given a list of foods to avoid:

sodas that contain caffeine
chocolate and peppermint
spicy foods like pizza
acid foods like oranges or tomatoes
fried and fatty foods
alcohol

Oh, you're kidding me, doc. Killing me, too. If I avoided everything on the list, I'd be reduced to eating boiled chicken breasts with a plain baked potato and washing them down with Sprite.

And you know that is not going to happen.

While I have no problem with cutting caffeinated beverages from my diet (I barely drink soda at all and switched to decaf coffee a few years back), I cannot give up chocolate. Or pizza, citrus, or tomatoes. "Fried and fatty" is one of my major food groups, and while I will cut back, I will not remove it from my diet. As for alcohol - let's just say that sometimes it's...necessary.

I mean, if I'm have to avoid my favorite foods, I may as well have a heart condition. But I don't.

(Whew!)