Smoked Chicken Tacos
Our pre-paddle meal tonight was Smoked Chicken Tacos on flour tortillas. It’s kind of important to have smoked some chicken for this meal. The key to this is the black bean base. Heat some olive oil in a small sauce pan. Add about 1/4 cup of diced sweet onions and saute for a minute. Add about 5 cloves of fresh diced onions and stir for about 30 seconds. Add half a teaspoon of cumin and half a teaspoon of turmeric. Grind in a healthy amount of black pepper. Stir this till fragrant, and then pour in a can of low sodium black beans. Once it comes to a light boil, stir and put on simmer for about 15 minutes or so. Saute some sweet onion slices with some red bell pepper slices in olive oil. Shred the smoked chicken. Cut us some slivers of the white, crunchy...
Warm Pork Salad
My salads I’ve written up are usually side dishes, like a black bean salad, or a cucumber salad. But with access to 8 LBs of freshly smoked Boston Butt, I couldn’t resist… Warm Pork Salad with romaine lettuce, shaved carrots, quarters of English cucumbers, minced sun dried tomatoes, sliced queen onions stuffed with garlic, diced green onions, shaved Vidalia onion, sliced roasted red bell peppers, fresh cracked black pepper topped with feta cheese and drizzled with Bolthouse Ranch dressing. Yum! Wish I had a boiled egg to slice on...
Sliced Lamb Gyros
When life gives you perfectly smoked leg of lamb leftovers…you make sliced lamb gryo’s! First, make your tzatziki sauce and put it in the fridge to meld. 1 cup Greek yogurt1 clove garlic1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice1 Tablespoon olive oil1 teaspoon red wine vinegar1 teaspoon dried dill weedsalt and pepper, to taste, we just used pepperWe also sliced in about half of a cup of diced English cucumber. We had about a pound of leftover smoked lamb robert from Easter yesterday, so tonight we made the best of it. We THIN sliced the lamb and tossed it into a high-heat cast iron skillet with a little olive oil to quickly sear it. Meanwhile we warmed up some pita bread with a little olive oil. Onto a plate with a square of aluminum foil went the pita, and then...
Easter Lamb Robert
Lamb Robert for our Easter Dinner! We actually fired up the smoker for a couple other things too, a chicken and a Boston Butt. But the star of today was the leg of lamb. In a blender/food processor put about a cup of olive oil, add a fair amount of oregano, Italian seasoning and dried basil. Also about 8 cloves of garlic and a couple tablespoons of black peppercorns and a smidge of kosher salt. Blend this well, and put the leg of lamb into a ziplock bag with this mixture and let it spend the morning together. The chicken got my usual rub, and the pork got my usual rub with a bit of cumin. At noon, the 4 lb off rubbed Boston butt went into the smoker, with apple wood chips. At 1 pm, the chicken went into the smoker. At 2 pm, the marinaded leg of lamb went in....
Garlic Shrimp and Broccoli
A meal as simple as it is good. 8-10 shrimp, peeled and deveined1/2 pound broccoli For the garlic sauce:5 cloves garlic, mincedWhite part of 4 green onions1 tsp corn starch1 tbsp light soy sauce1/4 cup waterDrizzles of sesame oil First, make your sauce. Just stir the ingredients. Steam your broccoli, you want it slightly crunchy. Heat some oil in a skillet, medium heat, add some minced garlic. Add the shrimp. We used prawns. Cook till opaque. Add broccoli and turn the heat to high, Add the sauce, stir for a minute and remove from the heat....
Chicken Marengo
Theoretically, this is the meal that was prepared for Napoleon after his successful battle in Italy at Marengo. This is probably PR hype from restaurants in Paris hyping the victory for sales. But, it’s a great dish, and one I wanted to prepare on the last of our cool nights. In about 1/3 cup of hot olive oil, cook your chicken. I did 4 thighs and 5 drumsticks, as they nest well in a my large skillet. Add a bundle of parsley, a bundle of thyme and a handful of garlic cloves. Season with salt and pepper. Cook, covered, for 10 minutes. Flip, cook 10 more minutes. Flip, cook 5 more. Remove the chicken and cover it. Remove the shallots and herbs too. Add 1/3 cup of flour to the oil and drippings and stir till you get a good rich roux. Add 2 cups of beef broth...