Category: Gastronomagic

Bite, Delight, and Indulge: Anything and everything to do with adventures of the palate!

My Cuban Black Beans

Historically black beans and rice were introduced to Cuba by the Spaniards during its colonization starting in the 1450s.

My only deviation from the recipe taught to me by my mother is I use red bell pepper instead of green.

Ingredients:

  • 1 lb dry black beans
  • 1/2 tsp cumin
  • 1 tsp ground oregano
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
  • 3-4 garlic cloves, minced
  • 1 medium onion, finely chopped
  • 1 red bell pepper, diced & 1/2 red bell pepper, seeded
  • 4oz pimientos, run through food processor
  • 1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
  • pinch of sugar

Preparation:

  1. Place dry beans, 8 cups water, and 1/2 red bell pepper (seeded) in pressure cooker. Cook on high pressure for 45 minutes. Let pressure dissipate on its own. Discard red pepper.
  2. Add all other ingredients and cook on medium-high for 30-40 minutes stirring occassionally. If beans start sticking, lower heat.

Notes: With spices like oregano, I put the measure into my hand then grind them together between my palms before adding to release the flavor and aromas.

Sliced or diced pimientos come in jars or cans in water. You should process the pimientos in a food processor with their water. Alternatively you can finely dice (if they’re sliced) and add them. (Any brand is fine.)

The key to the flavor is to let the beans cool, then store them overnight, covered, in the refrigerator. This allows the flavors to coalesce and produces the most flavorful dish.

Cuban-ish Red Beans

Beans are a staple in any Cuban household. From black, to red, to garbanzos and split peas…Cubans have a recipe for them all and beans and rice are a typical accompaniment to any traditional Cuban meal. While I could never be accused of being traditional in any sense, I love beans in all their incarnations and red beans rank right at the top. This recipe is relatively easy to make and keeps well in the fridge for a week. Hopefully you’ll love them as much as I do!

Frijoles Colorados

My recipe is based on my mother’s with some minor changes to make it a bit healthier and to account for my preference for boniato over malanga.

Ingredients:

  • 1 small smoked ham hock
  • 1lb dry red kidney beans
  • 1 onion, diced
  • 1 red bell pepper, diced
  • 3 -4 garlic cloves, minced
  • 4 oz tomato sauce
  • 1/8 cup extra-virgin olive oil
  • bay leaf
  • generous splash of dry white wine (or your preferred cooking wine)
  • 3/4 tsp salt
  • calabaza (winter squash) @ 1 lb peeled and cut into large cubes
  • 2 boniato (white sweet potato), peeled and cut into medium cubes
  • 3-4 oz Palacios spanish chorizo, casing removed & cut into 8 pieces
  • 1/4 lb ham steak, cubed

Directions:

  1. Place beans, ham hock, and 10 cups of water in pressure cooker. Set for 20 minutes. Let it depressurize automatically or release pressure manually after 10 minutes. Discard ham hock.
  2. Add all ingredients and stir.
  3. Cook on medium-medium high (so you have a constant roiling boil) for 30-45 minutes. It’s ready when you can pierce the boniato with a fork easily.

The recipe yields about 8 cups. A one cup serving has approximately 200 calories, 10g of fat, and 440mg of sodium. (As always this depends on your brands and salt preferences.) It’s a hearty meal on it’s own but can certainly be served as part of a more elaborate traditional Cuban meal with rice, roasted pork, and baked plantains.

Calabaza
Chorizo
Boniato

Over the years I’ve developed a personal preferance for brands so when I specify, feel free to substitute with your own preferences or whatever may be available in your area. For example, boniato is readily available in areas where Caribbean ingredients and food are common, but not necessarily in other places in the US.

Bay 13 Brewery & Kitchen

Bay 13 is an Aussie brewpub and one of the many working breweries to spring up in South Florida over the last few years.

It’s a super cute space with plenty of outdoor seating away from traffic. The vibe is totally casual and not the typical Coral Gables pretentiousness.

The beer selection is phenomenal! This beer flight included Uno Mas (Mexican lager), Oceana (Australian sparkling ale), Alhambra Honey (Bamberg Marzen Rauchbier), and Goofy Foot (Neipa Ale).

Corvina Fish Dip
Chickpea & Olive Salad w/ Salmon
Aussie Chicken Parmesan

You can see my full review on Yelp if you’re interested.

Irish Mule

Homemade Pizza

Homemade pizza really can be made in less time than it takes for delivery, crust included!

The crucial element is the dough recipe, which I found on COOKIE + kate years ago and have been using ever since. It’s versatile, comes together in less than 20 minutes, and tastes great. Plus when you make your own dough, you can roll it to your desired thickness. Win/win! My other recommendation is use the highest quality ingredients you can find, organic and fresh really make a difference in something like this. Personally I like caremelized onions, bacon, chicken, basil, oregano, and parmesan and mozzerella for the cheeses.

easiest-whole-wheat-pizza-dough-cookie-and-kateDownload

I also use this basic white pizza sauce, but if you prefer tomato based, knock youself out! Any sauce will work!

  • 1/2 cup estra-virgin olive oil
  • 2 tbsp minced fresh garlic
  • 1/2 tsp dried oregano
  • 1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
  • 1/2 tsp dried parsley

Crispy Chicken Schnitzel

This is one of those recipes that shocked me with how excellent it came out! We’re trying to eat healthier and we like variety so when I found this in one of my cookbooks I said “eh, why not” but didn’t have high expectations.

Really I should’ve known it’d be excellent. It’s from the cookbook Skinnytaste One & Done by Gina Homolka and it’s one of my most trusted cookbooks. Nothing ever requires modification or adaptation, the recipes work right like they say, and you get excellent taste without feeling guilty!

crispy-chicken-schnitzel-dinnerDownload

Pineapple Fried Rice

This recipe is another gem from the NYT Cooking App, offering a perfect balance of flavors that will leave your taste buds dancing with joy. Created by the talented Pepper Teigen and skillfully adapted by Eric Kim, this dish is both visually stunning and incredibly delicious.

pineapple-fried-rice-recipe-nyt-cooking-1Download

It was a bit of a challenge, mostly just in cutting the pineapple, but I wanted at least once to serve it the way I’ve had it in restaurants and I absolutely felt a sense of accomplishment when it was done.

But the real payoff came as I savored the first mouthwatering bite, I was transported to a tropical paradise. The sweetness of the pineapple mingled with the savory notes of the rice and other ingredients, creating a harmonious dance of flavors that delighted my taste buds. So when you have a litle time and your creativity muse nudges you, try it. I don’t think you’ll regret it.

Kimchi Fried Rice

This is another recipe from the NYT cooking app, by Grace Lee as adapted by Francis Lam.

Although I haven’t eaten a lot of Korean food and this was a bit out of my usual wheelhouse, I found this recipe easy to make and delicious! I didn’t use the spam as I’m not a huge fan, so I substituted chicken. This is one of those dishes you can use whatever meat or meat substitute floats your boat (even bacon!). There’s tons of recipes online and more or less they all follow the same pattern. I’d stay away from using the ones that add Gochujang unless you’re familiar with the flavor and like your food high in heat. I love it, but kimchi tends to be spicy already so it can be a bit much if you’re not accostomed to the combination.

kimchi-fried-rice-recipe-nyt-cookingDownload

Cuban-ish Chicken Soup

So, I call my chicken soup Cuban-ish because although the core of my ingredients derive from my Cuban heritage, I’ve made so many modifications I doubt my mother would recognize it as having been derived from her recipe once upon a time.

First, I roast a chicken to make the stock. (You can, of course, just use a premade rotisserrie chicken.) When it’s cool, I pull all the meat I can off the bone, making sure to leave behind all the gristle, bone, and skin. I place it in a zip lock or other food storage container in the fridge until I’m ready to make my soup.

Second, I make the stock. You can put pretty much anything you like in a stock. It took me a long time to accept this but it’s true.

There are some base ingredients I always use:

  • 2 onions,
  • 3-5 garlic cloves,
  • 2 celery stalks,
  • 3-5 bird’s eye peppers (use only if you like heat),
  • 2 carrots, roughly 1 tsp whole peppercorns,
  • 2 bay leaves, and
  • 1 tbsp white-wine (or apple cider) vinegar. (The vinegar is the only essential ingredient since it draws out the nutrients and minerals from the bones into the stock.)

If I have parsley or thyme I’ll toss them in as well as any other herb I may have getting past it’s prime in my fridge at the time. Roughly chopped is fine for your ingredients, no need to peel etc. (some say you don’t even need to peel, but I feel like it releases the flavor better).

Place the chicken remnants (bone, skin, and gristle) and all your ingredients in a large stock pot with 6 quarts of water and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer. Let simmer, covered, for at least 4 hours (if you have the time you can do 6 hours). Then strain through a sieve and discard everything but your stock.

Note: Of course, you can skip both these steps and use a rotiserrie chicken and store bought stock (I recommend unsalted). I’ve done it and it’s certainly much faster but it’s NEVER as good.

Third, while the stock simmers I prepare my soup ingridients:

  • 1/2 Calabaza (winter suash) peeled & cut into large chunks
  • 1 large boniato (no real English equivalent but white sweet potato comes closest), peeled and cut into small chunks
  • 2-4 carrots, peeled and cut into 2 inch chunks
  • 2 ears of corn, shucked and cut in half
  • 2-4 oz Diana brand Fideos Finos (any angel hair pasta will do). Quantity is dependent on whether you like thicker soups (like me) or brothier versions.

Finally, when my stock is ready, I toss my ingredients in (except fideos/pasta), don’t forget the chicken!, and salt to taste. I let simmer/low boil for 20-30 minutes (until boniato and carrots can be pierced easily with fork) and then add fideos/pasta and cook for another 10 minutes. Voila!

Yes, it takes all day, but I promise you the taste is worth it!

Yard House

Since I love to cook, we don’t really eat out much and when we do it’s usually not at large chains. But we happened to be at a mall and hungry and YH was just convenient. It was surprisingly good!

Spicy Tuna Stack & Cali Roll Stack

I was skeptical a non-specialty chain restaurant could do any version of sushi/sashimi well, but the fish was definitely sushi-grade tuna and the crab was real crab and not krab. The flavors were delicately balanced and delicioous! We also tried the Ahi Crunchy Tuna Salad and the lettuce was incredibly fresh and they honored our request for light dressing. So kudos all around.

Of course, YH is also famous for its number of taps. It is an impressive collection of both foreign & domestic as well as local beers.

Angry Orchard’s Crisp Apple Hard Cider & Tripping Animals’ Dark No Mames, a mexican style dark lager brewed in Miami.

Frozen Pizza

I love pizza and at some point I’ll give you my tried and true quick crust recipe and favorite ingredient combos for homemade pizza, but here I just wanted to share a recent discovery. I had pretty much written off frozen pizza because every time I tried one, it just felt like a poor imitation of what I was actually craving. Then I saw this at Whole Foods a few weeks ago and decided to give it a try. What a revelation! I’m not going to say it tops homemade pizza, but this comes as close to the real thing as I’ve ever had (give it a rest DiGiornio). I place it right on the rack and 15 minutes later I have a really tasty pizza with a firm crust (but not a cracker) and perfect sauce to ingredient ratio. If you live in an area with a Whole Foods, I encourage you to give it a try.