Have Ice Chest, Will Travel

When we went home two weeks ago we drove and driving home has one huge advantage - I can bring as much of New Orleans back to DC as I can fit in my mid-sized Acura. During the trip I collected several frozen New Orleans ingredients and packed them in an ice chest to take back to my kitchen. I was determined that for the next several months I would not have to reject a single recipe that interested because I didn't have the proper ingredients. I am proud to say that although I can find Andouille Sausage in DC, my next few recipes with Andouille will use 100% authentic Andouille Sausage from the "Andouille Capital of the World" secured for me by my mother in law. There is nothing like it and the andouille you can buy in the supermarket in DC doesn't even come close. You have already begun to see the fruits of my Louisiana Crawfish smuggle so I wanted to round it out with another recipe featuring my well traveled grub.

Andouille Burgers with Grilled Sweet Onions and Creole Remoulade Sauce
Recipe Courtesy Emeril Lagasse

Ingredients

6 ounces andouille sausage, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 1/2 pounds ground beef
1 tablespoon minced garlic
2 teaspoons Worcestershire
1 1/2 teaspoon Essence, recipe follows
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
4 large Kaiser onion rolls
4 (1/4-inch-thick) slices sweet onion, such as Vidalia, Maui or Walla Walla
1 tablespoon olive oil
3/4 cup grated sharp cheddar
Creole Remoulade Sauce

Directions

Preheat the grill to medium-high.

Place andouille sausage in food processor.

Finely chop the andouille sausage in a food processor. Transfer to a large bowl. Add the beef, garlic, Worcestershire, 1 teaspoon of the Essence, 1/2 teaspoon of the salt and 1/2 teaspoon of the pepper.

Blend together being careful not to overwork the mixture. Form mixture into 4 (1-inch-thick) patties.

Grill the Kaiser rolls just until golden, turning, about 1 minute per side. Transfer to plates. Brush the onion slices on both sides with the oil and season with the remaining 1/2 teaspoon Essence, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Grill until golden, turning, about 5 minutes per side. Remove from the grill.

Place the hamburgers on the grill and cook to desired doneness, about 5 minutes per side for medium-rare. During the last 2 minutes of cooking, sprinkle the cheese over the tops of the burgers and cook until melted.

Spread the insides of the buns with the Creole Remoulade Sauce. Place the hamburgers on the bottoms and top with the sliced onions. Serve immediately.

Essence (Emeril's Creole Seasoning):
2 1/2 tablespoons paprika
2 tablespoons salt
2 tablespoons garlic powder
1 tablespoon black pepper
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 tablespoon cayenne pepper
1 tablespoon dried leaf oregano
1 tablespoon dried thyme

Combine all ingredients thoroughly and store in an airtight jar or container.

Yield: about 2/3 cup

This burger was so yummy. I rarely cook things that are so "junk foodish" and I am glad that when I did it was a gourmet twist on an American classic. It didn't even really taste like a burger at all. The flavor of the Andouille was so strong and gave the entire burger a surprisingly different twist . Both Forrest and I really enjoyed it!

Mama Mia !

This weekend my girlfriends and I went to see Mama Mia at the National Theatre. Mamma Mia is a stage musical, based on the songs of ABBA, the 70's pop music group. I am a sucker for the performing arts and can't tell you a musical I have seen that I didn't love but this one was fabulous! It was my first time seeing a production at the National Theatre and it was very exciting. The evening was so enjoyable that I decided I shouldn't miss any Broadway productions that come to DC. I enjoy them too much to let them pass me by.

In the meantime I wanted to pay homage to Mama Mia! through dinner. Mama Mia! is set on a fictional Greek Island and I decided I would make a Greek inspired dish to help the memories of the musical live a little longer in my mind.

Greek Orzo and Grilled Shrimp Salad with Mustard-Dill Vinaigrette
Recipe Courtesy Bobby Flay

3/4 pound orzo, cooked al dente
1 large cucumber, seeded, quartered lengthwise, and sliced
3 green onions, thinly sliced
1 pint grape tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup chopped fresh dill, plus extra for garnish
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1/2 cup olive oil, plus additional for brushing shrimp
Salt and freshly ground pepper
3/4 pound feta cheese, crumbled
16 medium shrimp, peeled and de-veined

Combine orzo, cucumber, green onions, and tomatoes in a large bowl.

Place dill, vinegar, and mustard in a blender and blend until smooth. With the motor running, slowly add the olive oil and blend until emulsified. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.

Pour the vinaigrette over the orzo mixture and stir well to combine. Gently fold in the feta cheese.

Heat grill to high. Brush shrimp with oil and season with salt and pepper. Grill for approximately 2 minutes per side or until just cooked through. Divide orzo salad among 4 take-out containers or plates and top with 4 shrimp. Garnish with additional dill.

This pasta salad was very delicious, easy to make and I have a feeling it will make great leftovers!

And the Crawfish They Caught in Arabi

I have lived several places in and around New Orleans but grew up in a small town about 15 minutes southeast of the city named Arabi. Arabi is really small town and like most small towns it moves at a very slow pace and has several unique characteristics. In Arabi everyone refers to you as dawl'in whether they are an old friend or you are meeting them for the first time. Can you imagine my culture shock when I moved to DC where people avoid eye contact on the street and go out of their way to ignore your greeting? The people of Arabi exemplify southern hospitality. Everyone is friendly, everyone is excited to see you and everyone acknowledges each other on the street. This hospitable nature carries into other aspects of conversation and when you see someone you haven't seen in a while instead of asking "how is your family?" they leisurely inquire, "how's ya mama and them?" Unless you lived in Arabi you really had no reason to be there. You didn't pass through on your way to another town and there was nothing there you couldn't get or do elsewhere. For me it was never my ideal geographical location. The hospitality was refreshing but I never wanted to settle in a small town. Although I knew I was destined not to stay, I am certainly happy it is where I started. Something about that close knit community in which you know you can rely on others is very comforting.

Since Arabi is such an obscure town with very few "passer throughs" it wasn't a place that most fellow New Orleanians knew much about. I went to high school in the city and anytime I told someone where I was from I got the same reaction - "Oh yeah, that town from that Christmas song!" Arabi got its 15 minutes of fame when it was the featured in the classic New Orleans Christmas Carol Spoof, The Twelve Yats of Christmas. In the first line of the song Benny Grunch states, "On'da foist day'a Christmas mah Mawmaw gave'to me a Crawfish'dey Caught in Arabi". The funny part about this line is that I never knew a person to catch a crawfish the whole time I lived in Arabi and couldn't tell you where you would go to do so- but who cares right? If it got us on the map then it was worth it, despite its accuracy.

Louisiana Crawfish Cakes
Recipe adapted from James O'Donnell of the House of Blues

1 tablespoon Olive Oil
10 tablespoons yellow onion, 1/8-inch diced
3 tablespoons green bell peppers, 1/8-inch diced
3 tablespoons red bell peppers, 1/8-inch diced
3 teaspoons garlic, minced
1 1/2 pounds crawfish tails
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon Tabasco hot sauce
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon of Zatarain's Crab Boil
1 teaspoon of Tony Chachere's Cajun Seasoning
6 eggs
1/2 cup Parmesan, ground
1 cup plus 5 tablespoons bread crumbs
Parsley sprig, for garnish

Heat oil in sauce pan and sweat onions and peppers for 1 minute. Add garlic and crawfish tails and heat through. Add Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, salt and Cajun Seasoning.


Remove from heat and let cool. Beat eggs in stainless bowl and add crawfish mixture. Fold in Parmesan and 1 cup bread crumbs.


Combine all ingredients and form into 5-ounce patties. Dust cakes with additional bread crumbs.

Heat crawfish cake through in broiler. Place Rémoulade sauce in the middle of the plate. Place heated crawfish cake on top. Top each cake with a 1/2 teaspoon of remoulade sauce. Top cake with parsley sprig.
Forrest and I were invited to a dinner party (a very great one I might add with awesome food and equally as awesome company) this weekend and I volunteered to bring the appetizer. I was delighted to make something that offered a little piece of where I came from!

Fruit - Nut - Cheese

My sister went on a fourth of July vacation with her In-laws this past week. Her husband's family is a huge family blessed with several fabulous cooks. Each night of the vacation, all of the home chefs took their turn at sharing their creations with the others. My sister relayed a story back to me about one of the recipes that included a pearl of cooking wisdom from one of her sister in laws, Jaime. Jaime made a salad one night that everyone couldn't stop talking about. The entire family found it so delicious and their constant praise prompted Jaime to share her salad secret with the rest of the family. She said that every great salad must contain a "fruit, nut and a cheese"!

It sounded so simple yet so insightful. As my sister delivered this hot recipe tip I quickly replayed all of the salads I have ever prepared in my head and matched their ingredients to their reception. Jaime was right! Every salad that I have made in the past and managed to impress with had in fact included those three special ingredients. I have several recipes that I use for salads but decided to share a simpler one that I created when I was in a time crunch during a dinner party one night. If anyone remembers the Coq Au Vin dinner party you will remember that I didn't even have two free seconds to get fancy with the salad. So I quickly threw together the "three magic ingredients" (before I knew they were called that) with some spinach leaves and everyone loved it.

Goat Cheese, Candied Pecans and Spinach Salad
Courtesy Me

Ingredients

2 bags of baby spinach leaves
2 Granny Smith Apples, seeded and sliced (The Fruit)
1/2 bag of candied pecans, I used Trader Joe's (The Nut)
1 8 ounce log of goat cheese, crumbled (The Cheese)
Salt and Pepper

Directions

1. Mix spinach leaves with goat cheese and apple slices. Salt and Pepper to taste. Top with your dressing of choice. (See Below)

My Favorite Homemade Dressing
Recipe Courtesy of Paula Deen

Ingredients

2 tablespoons raspberry vinegar or red wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 small garlic clove, minced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/3 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley leaves

Directions:

Using a glass jar with a tight lid, combine the vinegar, mustard, garlic, salt, and pepper, and shake well to blend. Add the oil and parsley and shake.

Now that I am privy to this successful salad secret I am inspired to make another salad using a new fruit, a new nut and a new cheese. Any suggestions? Plus, making a salad gives me a reason to use the beautiful soda glass salad bowl given to us by Forrest's Grandma Gottung!

You're a Grand Old Flag

This past weekend Forrest and I drove home to New Orleans to celebrate the Fourth of July with our families. Even though gas prices are a killer, it was still much cheaper for us to drive than to fly home. Airline tickets are considerably more outrageous and we decided driving was the most economical decision. We had a fun packed weekend that consisted of skeet shooting, wake boarding, jet-skiing and dining on traditional New Orleans cuisine such as boiled crabs, oyster po'boys, and catfish. By far, the highlight of the trip was the party my parents had on the Fourth of July. Forrest's family, my family and all of our friends gathered at my parent's Lake House for a grand celebration. I made a Martha Stewart Flag Cheesecake recipe that was a big hit and we spent a lot of the day (when we weren't in the water) at my Dad's newly constructed Tiki Bar he built over his new Boat Hoist. My mom personalized the bar before we arrived by decorating the stools with the college emblem from each one of the schools my brothers and sister and I graduated from. Conveniently we all went to different colleges so there was one for each of the four stools. I don't have any pics of me making the cheesecake because I had trouble baking in my mom's kitchen and forgot to photograph the process due to the chaos. Since I don't have pics of the baking steps, I included one of my Daddy at his new bar with the painted College barstools.


Fruited Cheesecake Flag
Martha Stewart Living July 2007

Ingredients

Makes 48 squares

• Vegetable-oil cooking spray
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• Coarse salt
• 12 ounces (3 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons light-brown sugar
• 32 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
• 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon pure almond extract
• 4 large eggs, room temperature
• 6 ounces (1 1/2 cups) blackberries (I omitted and only used blueberries)
  
• 8 3/4 ounces (2 cups) blueberries
• 1 pound strawberries, hulled and sliced lengthwise into thirds
  
• Confectioners' sugar, for dusting
• 12 ounces (3 cups) raspberries ( I omitted and only used strawberries)
  

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Coat a 13-by-18-inch rimmed baking sheet with cooking spray. Line with parchment, leaving a 2-inch overhang on the long sides. Coat parchment with spray.
2. Sift flour and 1 3/4 teaspoons salt into a bowl. Cream butter with a mixer on medium-high speed, occasionally scraping bowl, until fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes. With the mixer running, slowly add light-brown sugar, beating until very pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add flour mixture all at once, and beat on low speed until just incorporated.
3. Transfer dough to sheet. Use a large piece of plastic wrap to press dough into an even layer that covers the bottom of the sheet. Cover and refrigerate until firm, about 20 minutes.
4. Bake dough until entire surface is golden brown, about 40 minutes. Let cool completely in sheet on a wire rack. Raise oven temperature to 350.
5. In a clean bowl, beat cream cheese with a mixer on medium speed, occasionally scraping bowl, until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low, and add granulated sugar in a slow, steady stream. Scrape bowl, then mix in lemon zest, vanilla and almond extracts, and a pinch of salt until well combined. Scrape bowl, then beat in eggs, 1 at a time, until incorporated. The mixture should be very smooth; scrape bowl as necessary. Pour over crust, and spread into an even layer.
6. Bake until filling is set, about 25 minutes. Let cool completely in sheet on rack. Refrigerate until firm and cold, about 4 hours (or overnight).
7. Run a sharp knife along short sides of sheet, and use parchment to lift out cheesecake. Run knife under hot water and dry well. Use it to cut cheesecake into 48 squares, wiping knife clean between cuts.
8. Transfer squares to a serving platter, reforming the rectangle. Decorate top left squares (3 down and 4 across), placing a blueberry in the center of each square and mounding blueberries around it. Using a long offset spatula, slide out 4 squares from bottom row. Top each square with 3 strawberry slices, dust with confectioners' sugar, and return to rectangle. Repeat with remaining 4 squares on bottom row and then squares on alternating rows. Alternatively, omit strawberries and dust alternating rows generously with confectioners' sugar. Serve immediately (or refrigerate overnight).

Bonding by Blogging

One thing I never imagined when I started this blog was how much of a social aspect it would have on my life. I imagined that my blog would be read by my close family and friends and occasionally stumbled upon by a stranger on the Internet. I am not very shy and have never had trouble making friends or talking to strangers. But if I did, blogging would be a great way to break the ice. Since I started my food blog I have made friends with co workers that I never knew before, talked to my in-laws family members via email, met other food bloggers and been introduced via email to some people I knew about but hadn't previously met.

Just last week I got an email from my best friend Amanda's boyfriend's mother - Ms. Kay. Amanda and I talk on an average of 5 times a day so as you can imagine I have definitely heard a lot about Ms. Kay from Amanda. Amanda has described her generosity, her knowledge of plants, her devotion to her sons, her adoration for her puppy and her love of cooking. Although I have never met Ms. Kay I felt like I knew a lot about her through my discussions with Amanda and was thrilled to get to interact with her someday. To my surprise, I "met" Ms. Kay earlier than I had expected. Amanda shared my blog URL with her and I received the sweetest email from her last week. She mentioned that she really enjoyed my blog and wanted to share a recipe with me that she had cooked for her sons to rave reviews. I am never one to turn down a proven recipe so I gave it a shot. I was so appreciative of Ms. Kay's suggestion and could have hugged her when I realized how easy and delicious it was. Forrest really enjoyed the meal as well and I will assuredly be making this again.

Maple Pork and Apples

Better Homes and Gardens February 2007

Ingredients

4 Pork Loin Chops, 1/2 inch thick

2 Tbsp. Butter

12 Baby Carrots with tops, halved lenghtwise (I couldn't find ones with tops so I did without)

1 Medium apple, sliced and seeds removed

1/3 cup maple syrup

Preparation

1. Sprinkle chops with salt and pepper. In skillet melt butter over medium heat; add chops.

Brown for 2 minutes, turning once.

Reduce heat to medium-low. Add carrots, apple, and maple syrup.


Cover; simmer for 8 minutes or until desired doneness.

2. Using slotted spoon, transfer chops, carrots and apples to platter; bring syrum mixture to a boil. Boil gently, uncovered, 1 to 2 minutes or until thickened. Pour over Chops. Serve.

Good Things Come to Those who Bait !

For someone who tries to cook relatively healthy (most of the time), it may seem strange that I have never featured fish on my blog. I love fish, but mostly I love fried fish! I am pretty sure that I can attribute that to my southern roots. The truth is that I don't actually ever cook fish. Fried fish is out of the question because I don't tend to deep fry anything. There have been several recipes featuring fish that interested me in the past. They have all been fairly healthy and I have attempted several of them and never really had much luck. I have struggled with the fish breaking apart in the pan and have never been overly pleased with the flavor. I found almost all of the fish recipes I have prepared to have a fishy overtone that wasn't very appetizing. The last time I cooked fish I swore it off for good. No more fish for me unless I was close to the Gulf of Mexico and eating it fried with hush puppies!

My pact didn't last for long. I came across a recipe in this month's issue of Cooking Light and the picture was so beautiful that I couldn't resist. I have never prepared salmon during any of my failed fish fiascoes and figured I should give it a try. Salmon didn't seem like it would have a fishy taste. I eat salmon raw at sushi joints, so how bad could this be? Well it wasn't bad at all. In fact it was delicious! The particular feature in the magazine was on marinades and it emphasized using a few important ingredients to maximize flavor. That is exactly what resulted from this marinade. This dish was amazing! The flavors of the marinade ingredients blended together to create a perfect medley. We couldn't get enough of this. All I can say is that I am glad there are other fish in the sea !

Maple Grilled Salmon

Cooking Light July 2008

Ingredients

1/4 cup rice wine vinegar

3 tablespoons maple syrup

2 tablespoons fresh orange juice

4 (6-ounce) salmon fillets, skinned

Cooking spray

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Preparation

1. Combine first 3 ingredients in a large zip-top plastic bag; add fish. Seal and marinate in refrigerator 3 hours.

2. Preheat grill or grill pan to medium-high heat.

3. Remove fish from bag, reserving the marinade. Pour marinade into a small saucepan; bring to a boil. Cook until reduced to 2 tablespoons (about 5 minutes).


4. Place fish on grill rack or pan coated with cooking spray; grill 4 minutes on each side or until fish flakes easily when tested with a fork or until desired degree of doneness, basting occasionally with marinade. Remove fish from grill; sprinkle with salt and pepper.

This Salmon dish is so delicious that I forgot to salt and pepper the fish and didn't realize it until I was cleaning up after dinner!