Summer came and went.

Well all, Summer came and went with the breeze. Or hurricane. Or flood. Whichever shit happened the fastest. I’m trying to gracefully accept Fall and to alleviate the process I’m going to resurrect our site. There’s nothing that will make me happier than a good book with scrumptious food, so while we are stuck in our house trying not to freeze to death I’m going warm up with some Fall/Winter treats.

Summer was filled with bbq experiments galore, cooking classes happened with close friends, and the amazing farmers markets came to a close. The peak was a trip to Portland, OR to visit my baby sister Shannon with my father, which was an epicurean’s paradise. Albeit, there are many cities in the U.S. that rivals Portland’s hotbed of foodie culture, but holy hell I was not prepared for that city. Coming back from Portland was hard, but little gems like the Venezuelan taco truck Yerba Buena, Japanese Crepe Cart, and Late Night Slice made the transition bearable.

With the passing of Summer, comes more time to cook in the house, therefore more time to update the site. I’m excited about the possibility of Fall recipes and I hope you guys will have fun watching our cooking adventures.

Here are some pictures from this Summer:

Thai Shrimp Halibut Curry

and where can you find this delicious recipe you say? http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Thai-Shrimp-Halibut-Curry-364570

 

Salta-Style Empanadas

While in Argentina this past summer, Katharina, Pat, and I munched on these delicious little treats for a cheap, quick snack. The Salta region of Argentina is allegedly where you can find the best empanadas in Latin America, and good grief, they were amazing. Empanadas from Salta are traditionally baked, whereas in Tucuman or other provinces they are fried. I love both versions, but considering it’s the winter, I think I’ve store quite enough extra warmth and will gladly pass on the extra fat this time.

There are quite a few variations you can use for this recipe. We decided to stick to our recipe book for the first round, but depending on what you want for a filling you can add olives, raisins, cheese, and/or hard boiled eggs.  You can also choose to make savory empanadas. I think after making this recipe, I would opt out of this type of dough as it may not be a good compliment to a sugary filling.

RECIPE:

• 2 tablespoons Olive oil
• 3 green onions minced
• 1 tablespoon cumin
• 1 tablespoon paprila
• 1 Ilb steak cut in small dice (grass-fed preferably)
• 1 large potato, peeled and diced
• 1/4 cup beef stock (for extra flavor, although you can use water as a substitute)
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 tsp red pepper (cayenne or gochuchan *_*)
• 1 1/2 packages of empanada wrappers (we made ours from scratch since we couldn’t find those)
• 12 green olives
• 3 hard boiled eggs, quartered
• 1 whole egg beaten

HOMEMADE DOUGH (2 1/2 doz. empanada shells)

• 4 cups flour
• 3 tablespoons lard
• 1 cup water

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To make the dough: Combine the water, melted lard, and warm water in a mixing bowl. Stir, then knead with hands to form dough ball until soft. At first it may seem that you do not have enough liquid for the amount of flour, but as you knead the dough, it should be the perfect amount. After kneading dough, pull off walnut sized balls and roll the out into circles.

I made about 12-15 shells (I think I might have made them a little thick).

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The filling:

Heat oil; add onions and cook until transparent. Add cumin and paprika; fry 1 minute. Incorporate meat; cook for 5 min. Add potatoes and stock; cook until tender; add raisins. Add salt and crushed red pepper; mix well. Remove from heat and cool.

-using beef stock rather than water gives the filling a richer flavor. You can also use bouillon cubes. For best results, chill the mixture overnight and stuff and bake the empanadas the next day. We didn’t do that because we were hungry, so I stuck the filling the refrigerator for 30 min and it was sufficient. Next time I will wait a day, I can see how the flavors might become richer as the beef and potatoes marinate for a while.

Once finished cooling, add 1 tablespoon of filling to the empanada shell, wet with water around edges, fold to seal. Brush with egg wash and bake for 350 degrees fahrenheit  for 12 min until golden.

Slow-Cooked Cilantro Chicken

YUM!

Due to our ghetto camera, I made sure to include the photos in the recipe book. We have been cooking later and later in the day and our  camera uses a HORRIFIC flash that just makes our food look really unappetizing. This way, you guys get to see what the food actually looks like *_*

This recipe was awesome and very simple to make. First, heat oil in a large casserole over medium heat. Season chicken pieces with salt and pepper. Brown; transfer chicken to a plate. After chopping your onion and garlic, add to the pan and cook for 2 min. Return Chicken to pan, along with oregano and flour; stir. Pour broth, white wine, and the rest of the salt and cover. Simmer dish for 30-40min till the chicken is done and no longer pink. Just before serving stir fresh cilantro and chili into sauce. Since we use gojuchan for everything it seems, we substituted that for the merken chili powder. Voila! A perfect dish made from start to finish in less than an hour!

Don’t forget to blast some jams while cooking, holla South America!

Here’s a totally ridiculous song/video that we love jamming to:

src=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/YUXH2DqVOC8″ frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

Tomato & Cilantro Pebre

• 2 large Tomatoes
• 3 green onions, minced
• 1 fresh jalapeno
• 1 garlic clove minced
• 1/2 chopped cilantro
• 1tsp dried oregano (we used 1-2 tablespoons)
• 1 tbs white wine vinegar (we used rice wine vinegar)
• 2 tbs olive oil
• salt to taste

This recipe was amaaaazing. Some of the best salsa that we have ever had…honestly. We bought “South American Cooking” by Liz Caskey (available on Amazon) and the book is awesome! The author (and contributors) put a large emphasis on food from the “southern” region of S. America. It includes food from Chile, Argentina, Peru, Brazil, and Uruguay. I’m not entirely sure why the other countries were excluded, but despite all that, the food included is fantastic.

This recipe is ridiculously simple to make as I’m sure all salsas are, but with very little time and ingredients it’s a Class A appetizer for any party. We had a couple friends over the night we made this salsa and it went over really well. Simply gather your ingredients, the fresher the better, chop, slap them together, then wait 30 min to let all the juices mingle with one another. I found after several times making this recipe there is definitely a difference in flavor between trying the salsa right after you make it, to letting the juices sit for a little bit.

Tandoori Spiced Chicken

So as you can see this is not tandoori chicken…it’s tandoori spiiiiced chicken, because believe me, they look n’ taste different. We basically aren’t sure how to make the real deal, but this experiment was fun, quick, and easy. It all started when we were browsing the amazing Bon Apetite and saw a recipe for a tandoori spice blend. When we saw the spice recipe, we immediately went to get chicken from Whole Foods and the rest you can see below.

Apparently, the real tandoori chicken from India/Asia is marinated in yogurt with the spice blend, and at times cooked at high temperatures in an earthen oven (i.e. tandoor), but can also be prepared on a traditional grill.

Buuut, we were too hungry to deal with all that so, we bought some chicken quarters and rubbed 1/2 tbsp of spice on each side. To be perfectly honest, at times the spice was too think and grainy, but all in all I think it was a good amount. After we baked the chicken (no oil or butter necessary), we served it with jasmin rice and wedges of lime for a kick.

This dish was also great for left overs. We made sandwiches with the left over chicken and it was AWESOME. I can imagine this chicken would be an great substitute for meat in tacos as well. I think there are several Indian taco trucks out in L.A. doing something like that already DAMN! Check out Curry Up Now if you are curious.

TANDOORI SPICE BLEND

Use equal parts of each spice (we used 1 tbsp of each to have some left over).

• ground ginger
• ground cumin
• ground coriander
• paprika
• turmeric
• salt
• cayenne pepper

Chilean-Austrian cuisine: Pastel de Jean-Claude

This is a dish that me and Amy discovered in Santiago last summer. We stumbled across this restaurant that looked really cute and when we walked past, there were all those people eating something that looked yellow and amazingly delicious. We sat down and when the waiter came to take our orders, Amy pointed to our neighbor and said: „I want just that.“

We later found out – thanks to our friends Marielle and Janson – that this dish is called „Pastel de choclo“ and that it is a Chilean speciality. We loved it and even went back to the very same restaurant to eat it again.

When I got back to Austria, my boyfriend Jean-Claude came back from Luxembourg and I wanted to surprise him with a bottle of Chilean wine and a “Pastel de choclo”, I figured it wouldn’t be too hard to make. It was in fact delicious and thanks to his non exisiting Spanish, the Austrian version of this dish is from now on called Pastel de Jean-Claude, as that is what he understood and he thought I had invented it just for him.

It is really easy to make. All you need is a lot of sweet corn. And if I say a lot, I mean a lot. The other ingredients vary, depending on what you want to add. The traditional dish is made with chicken, beef, eggs and raisins. I did my version with minced meat as that is what I had in my fridge. I guess it tastes good no matter what!
In general, you need (for 4 people):

3 cans of sweet corn (300g each can)
2 onions (finely chopped)
2 cloves of garlic
Paprika powder (one spoon)
Chili powder (two soons)
Sugar (3 table spoons)
Salt & Pepper
Olive Oil
In my case: 500g minced meat

Preheat the oven at 200°C. Heat the oil and fry one of the onions till it‘s done, add minced meat, paprika powder, 1 clove of garlic (pressed), salt & pepper. When the meat is done, take it out the pan and keep it warm somewhere. In the meantime, use a blender to mix the sweet corn until it is pureed. Use the same pan again, add some olive oil to fry the second chopped onion, add the chili and a clove of garlic (pressed). Add the mixed corn and cook it, stirring constantly, until well thickened, about 5-8 minutes. Add some salt and pepper if needed. Spread half of the corn puree in a greased casserole dish. Add meat as the second layer. Cover it with the second half of the corn puree. Sprinkle sugar over the corn topping so that all of the corn puree is covered by it. Bake for 30-40 minutes until it’s golden on top!