Tag: black pepper

Green Bean and Potato Hash – March 2011

Posted on by AuSable

This is totally a random creation on my part, but a pretty taste one. It all started earlier in the week, when I cooked up some green beans to go with my dinner. Which ended up being nothing more then boiling 1.66 lbs of green beans for 5 mins, then adding them to a hot frying pan with a little bit of bacon fat, red pepper flakes and garlic powder, and just cooking them on medium high heat until browned (about 5-10 mins.)

It wasn’t until after I made all those beans, that I realized I needed to re-purpose those beans into another dish, since eating just a pile of cooked beans is boring.

As usual I dug into my memory banks, and the week before in Utah, JRR made up this hash for breakfast one morning with leftover steak and fingerling potatoes. As usual, I had a bunch of random stuff in the fridge, so here was what I came up with for a quick hash:

Ingredients:

  • A large handful of cooked green beans (using cooking direction above)
  • 4-5 russet potatoes, peeled, cubed
  • 1/3 lb of hot breakfast sausage
  • Rendered bacon fat
  • Lawry’s Season Salt
  • Black pepper

Technique:
It really could be simpler to make this dish. First thing, in a hot frying pan, brown the breakfast sausage until fully cooked. While you’re cooking the sausage, microwave the potatoes using this recipe. With the sausage cooked, and transferred to a bowl to cool, add the bacon fat to the hot pan, season and cook the potatoes using the same recipe. Finally during the last 2-3 mins of cooking time on the potatoes, add in the sausage and green beans, and toss until the green beans have heating thru, then serve and enjoy.

Side Notes:
1) The green beans were pretty good on their own, with the garlic powder, bacon fat and red pepper flakes. But they are out of this world with the potatoes and sausage, so this “recipe” is a keeper in my book.
2) When I originally made the green beans, I didn’t really anticipate using them for another dish. So they were fully cooked the first time around. This was part of the reason why I added the green beans at the very end of the potato cooking, since they really only needed to be re-heating, from being in the fridge overnight.

Christmas Eve 2010 – Baked rainbow trout with lemon & green onions

Posted on by AuSable

I needed a quick and easy recipe to bake a fish for Christmas Eve, so I ended up finding a recipe on the Food Network website, and modified the hell out of it as usual.

My original inspiration for making this dish, was seeing Jacques Pépin a long time ago on either Fast Food My Way, or Cooking with Julia, but I just can’t remember which one off  hand. But what I do remember from Jacques, was him using a parchment paper pouch to cook the fish in the oven.

So with my basic recipe in hand, and a vague memory from Jacques, I was off and running.

Ingredients (serves 2-3):

  • One farm raised rainbow trout, head-on, approximately 3/4 lb in total weight
  • One whole lemon, sliced
  • Herbs (most recipe use thyme or rosemary, but I had some green onions on hand that I wanted to use)
  • Kosher Salt and Finely ground black pepper
  • Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Technique:
Pre-heat the oven to 375F. Wash the fish inside and out, then season with salt and pepper on all sides. Lay the fish on a sheet of parchment paper, and place the lemon and herbs inside the fishes belly. Fold the fish back together, drizzle with olive oil, and fold the pouch to seal tightly. Place the parchment pouch on a rimmed baking sheet, and pop it into the oven to bake for 20-25 mins. Once done baking serve immediately.

Side Notes:
1) If the fish is about 3/4 lb, go with 20 mins, but if closer to 1 lb go with 25 mins. For the 3/4 lb fish that I cooked, I went with 25 minutes, and the fish ended up being slightly on the dry side. So don’t overcook that poor fish.
2) Like I mentioned with the herbs, I used green onions, only because I had of bunch of them on hand. So feel free to experiment with fresh or dried herbs.
3) Don’t go overboard on the black pepper. For some reason, a little goes a long ways in the recipe. Also use a finer grind, since a courser grind added a unnecessary “heat/spice” element to the flavor of the fish.
4) For an off the cuff recipe, this fish turned out pretty good. So I’ll have to remember this recipe, if I ever need a quick fish dish.

Hash Browns – Home fry style – v3

Posted on by AuSable

I’ve been working on this recipe for about the last 9 months, until I arrived at the recipe you see below. I’m not going to bother posting any of the earlier versions of the recipe, since they mostly resulted in being complete and utter failures. But some of the low lights from v1 & v2 include bland flavor, soft texture and excruciatingly long cooking times. So with that out of the way, it’s onto the winning recipe listed below. Continue reading →

Sausagefest – July 2010

Posted on by AuSable

Nothing to me says Forth of July, like grilling out with family and friends. So I thought that I would do something a little special this year and make my own sausages for the Forth. But what really spurred the decision to make fresh sausage was when I found out that Fareway sells fresh casing packed in brine for $14.99 a pound. So after I bought a 1/2 lbs worth of casing, it kind of pushed me in the direction of making fresh sausages. Continue reading →

Guacamole Recipe – v4

Posted on by AuSable

For some strange reason avocados from Chile were on sale at Wal-Mart for $.50 each. So not being one to stare a gift fish in the mouth and take advantage of a food opportunity. I ended up buying about eight of them, which provided me an excellent opportunity to work on a guacamole recipe on the cheap. Since testing out guacamole recipes at $.99 an avocado really isn’t the best use of my grocery dollars. But at $.50 a piece I’m more then willing to throw a little bit of caution to the wind in trying to develop a usable guacamole recipe. Continue reading →