Chicken and Mushroom Posole Soup, Recipe by Bobby Flay

A couple of years ago we went on vacation to Las Vegas and the San Francisco/Wine Country area.  I posted about our trip and all the food adventures we had (a lot!). Check out our restaurant experience here.   While in Vegas we ate at Bobby's Flays Mesa Grill at Caesar's Palace, a 1 star Michelin Restaurant.  Here we are outside the restaurant: 

A couple of days ago we tried our first recipe from Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill Cookbook. Since it's so cold outside, a soup sounded like a good idea. We made Chicken and Mushroom Posole Soup. The soup is very simple to make, all in all probably taking an hour or less, with most of that time allowing the soup to simmer or vegetables reconstitute.  We had a little trouble finding the ancho chilies; surprisingly no chain grocery store in town had them.  Zac finally found them at an Hispanic grocery store in Montgomery about 25 minutes away.  The porcini mushrooms also were hard to find, but a local Publix ended up having some in stock. 

We followed the recipe and oven roasted the boneless but skin on chicken breasts.  I bought bone-in chicken breasts and simply removed the bones.  You could also use leftover rotisserie chicken.

Most of the ingredients from our local Publix. This was our first hominy-cooking experience. It made the soup very hearty. 

While the chicken roasted in the oven, we reconstituted the chilies and mushrooms for about 30 minutes, then chopped them up. Once the chicken was cooked, we removed the skin and shredded it:

stemmed, seeded, then chopped ancho chilies

We also used our enameled cast iron pot for the first time too! It's 7-quart, quite heavy, but destined to get used quite a bit. Here we are bringing chicken stock up to a boil. 

After the chicken stock was boiling, the chilies and mushrooms were added, and simmered for a few minutes. Then, the chicken, herbs, and hominy were added and left to simmer.

Then it's time to plate! The soup is topped with chives, a squeeze of lime, white cheddar cheese, and blue tortilla chips.  The recipe includes instructions on how to make your own blue corn tortilla strips, but we opted for the store bought chips to make our life a little easier.  It worked out well.

Looking forward to making more recipes from our Mesa Grill cookbook! 

Donald Link's Spicy Crawfish Fettuccine

I just finished eating leftovers of our dinner last night - Spicy Crawfish Fettuccine.  The recipe is from Donald Link's cookbook "Real Cajun", which we've made several recipes from in the past, all successes.  Click here for my post on other recipes we've made from this cookbook. This fettuccine is so creamy and flavorful and just all around good.  There is even a suggestion if you want to make it "light"!  We did not take that suggestion, by the way.  

I have consumed crawfish on many occasions, from taking heads off freshly steamed ones at crawfish boils (quite messy I must say), to eating crawfish etouffee at our local Cajun restaurant, but I've never cooked with it before. I was personally not feeling adventurous enough to buy whole crawfish and pull out the tail meat, so I bought frozen tail meat to use in the dish. I realize if this were Top Chef, I would be scolded and likely kicked off for this.  

Also, this was our first time buying and using a poblano pepper. Thankfully Zac isn't as affected by the pepper aroma as I am, so he did all the chopping.  Plus he's just a great chopper!  Here are all the things he had to chop, well except the lemons, I juiced those. 

Poblano, chives, lemons (for the juice), plum tomatoes, onion, garlic,
jalapeno pepper, and basil

 The mise-en-place:

plum tomatoes

Getting pan ready to cook the vegetables, followed by sauteing the vegetables and chopped ham. Oh, and no tasso ham to be found at our local Publix. So I just got regular old ham. Again, another offense not overlooked if this were Top Chef.

crawfish tail meat

mixture cooking down, juices reducing

good stuff (heavy cream) has been added, after adding flour and butter

final step of mixing in the basil leave

Ready to Eat!! Served with Parmesan cheese and chives on top

We can't wait to make more recipes from the cookbook "Real Cajun"!

Seafood and Sausage Gumbo

We love making this gumbo.  It's super tasty, fun to make, freezes well (that is if you have leftovers!), and has become one of our favorite recipes.  We've adapted this from a recipe my husband found on cooks.com many years ago. We followed it exactly at first, then started changing mainly the meat quantities and types to suit our tastes.  The original recipe called for crab meat, but it seemed to dissolve into the gumbo and omitting it didn't skimp on flavor (but did cut down on the cost!).  We've also used water as the recipe calls for, or made and used shrimp stock.  Going with the water works just fine for us so it how we typically make it.  Doubling this recipe works great too! When we can't find fresh okra, using frozen okra works just fine too. 

Seafood and Sausage Gumbo

Ingredients:

1/2 c. flour

1/2 c. canola or vegetable oil

1 c. chopped onion (we use sweet or Vidalia)

1 c. chopped celery

1/2 c. chopped green bell pepper

3 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 gallon warm water or vegetable or seafood stock

2 c. sliced okra 

8 oz. tomato sauce (1 small can)

1 Tbsp salt

1/2 tsp black pepper

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

2 lbs shrimp

1 lb andouille sausage, sliced

4 c. cooked rice

Small bunch scallions

All the photos below were of us making the gumbo, doubling the recipe.  

Browning the sausage

I prepped while Zac made the roux

 

oil and flour

Zac patiently stirring the roux

cooking the veggies

with water, okra, and tomato sauce

Almost ready for the meats and seasonings

sausage, seasonings, and shrimp ready to go

last round of simmering, rice out of the rice cooker

all done! Best served with crusty bread

Directions:

Combine flour and oil in a large heavy bottom stock/soup pot, over medium heat, stirring constantly until roux is dark, about the color of a copper penny, 10-15 minutes.  Add onion, celery, garlic, and green bell peppers to roux. Cook 2-3 minutes, stirring constantly. Gradually add warm water (or stock), blending well after each addition. Add okra and tomato sauce. Bring mixture to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 1 to 1-1/2 hours, stirring occasionally (approx every 20-30 minutes). 

While gumbo is simmering, cook the sliced andouille sausage in a pan over medium heat to brown.  Drain off fat and pat dry. 

Stir salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper, andouille sausage, and shrimp into gumbo. Bring gumbo back to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes or until shrimp are cooked. Remove from heat. Serve in a bowl over rice with chopped scallions on top.

Rachael Ray's Italian Sub Stoup with Garlic Toast Floaters

We've been making this recipe since we first saw it on 30 Minute Meals when my husband and I were in college.  It's quick, easy, tasty, and great as leftovers.  And fun to make together.  We can also get it prepped, cooked, and ready to eat, including clean up in 30 minutes! (Most "30 Minute Meals" seem to actually always take longer than 30 minutes for me if i'm cooking solo).  Link to the Food Network site and recipe is here, I've also copied it below. We have not ever put arugula in the soup as the directions indicate, primarily because we couldn't get arugula at the grocery stores in Tuscaloosa, Alabama 10 years ago, back when we first started making this dish. Now for some reason it feels strange to start doing it, even though we can readily find arugula.

Happy cooking!    

bell peppers from our garden! still going strong

veggies sliced, don't need to chop small

Browning the meats.  We cook the Italian sausage in a separate pan first, then drain off fat, then add to pot with the remainder of the meats

meats and veggies cooking

cubed bread for the "Garlic Toast Floaters"

Almost ready! 

Yum-O!

Recipe from FoodNetwork.com, from Rachael Ray's 30 Minute Meals:

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, 2 turns of the pan, plus 1/4 cup for croutons
• 3/4 pound, 3 links, hot or sweet Italian sausage, split and meat removed from casing
• 1/4 pound piece stick pepperoni, diced
• 1 ham steak, diced (about 1/2 to 3/4 pound)
• 1 green bell pepper, seeded, quartered and sliced
• 1 medium yellow onion, peeled, quartered and sliced
• 1 (15-ounce) can diced tomatoes
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 6 cups chicken stock
• 1/2 pound gemelli pasta or other short-cut pasta
• 5 cups cubed crusty bread
• 3 large cloves garlic, cracked from skin
• 1/2 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano, a couple of handfuls
• 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 2 bunches arugula, trimmed and coarsely chopped (about 4 cups)

Directions

Place a soup pot or deep sided skillet on the stove top and preheat to medium high heat. Add olive oil, 2 turns of the pan and the sausage. Brown and crumble the sausage, drain off excess fat if necessary then add the ham and pepperoni. Cook meats together 2 minutes then add peppers and onions and cook 2 or 3 minutes more. Add diced tomatoes and season with salt and pepper. Add chicken stock and bring stoup to a boil. Stir in pasta and cook for 8 minutes. Make croutons while pasta cooks.

In a large skillet heat about 1/4 cup of olive oil, 4 turns of the pan over medium heat. Add garlic and cook 1 minute. Add bread to garlic oil, toss and toast the cubes 5 or 6 minutes. Season the toasty cubes with red pepper flakes, oregano and lots of grated cheese.

Stir arugula into soup just before you serve it up. Ladle up the stoup and float several toasty garlic bread cubes in each bowl.

Cambodian Chicken and Rice Soup with Shrimp

Fall temperatures have come to the Deep South.  Well, at least for today and tomorrow.  Tonight we were inspired to make a nice warm soup, one we've made a handful of times and will continue to make again and again.  I actually posted the recipe almost 2 years ago in my early stages of this blog, but didn't take any photos of the soup. Scroll down for the full recipe, recipe courtesy of Food and Wine magazine.  

This soup is very easy to prepare despite the long list of ingredients. First thing we did was cook two large chicken breasts.  We did this versus using the meat from a rotisserie chicken.  Definitely to save time you can buy a pre-cooked chicken then just pull the meat off and cut in to chunks. You can do this while you wait for the liquids to come to a boil.  While the chicken cooked, we prepped the remainder of the ingredients except the herbs.  Also, after the chicken started to cook, we started cooking the rice. I used a rice cooker so we could put it off to the side and not have another pot on the stove. 

The main cooking in this dish is the ginger (lots of ginger!) and garlic, then bringing the liquids to a boil.  The shrimp, herbs, lime juice, and chicken all go back in near the end, so it all cooks very quickly.  The prep takes longer than the cooking! 

You can vary the heat by leaving the seeds in or taking them out of the pepper.  We don't have Thai chili's nearby, so we subbed in serrano. 

Enjoy! 

I only needed two of these limes to get the 2 Tbsp needed for the recipe

Sky while we were cooking. I ran outside to take this =)

Liquids and honey

Good stuff is happening in that pot

Herbs, we didn't have quite enough basil left on our plant, so used some mint as well

More good stuff happening. Proteins have been added. 

All done!

Cambodian Chicken-and-Rice Soup with Shrimp Recipe 
by Ratha Chau 


ACTIVE: TOTAL TIME: 40 MIN SERVINGS: 4 

FAST,HEALTHY,STAFF-FAVORITE

Ingredients 
One 3-pound rotisserie chicken 
1 tablespoon vegetable oil 
2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger 
2 garlic cloves, minced 
4 cups chicken stock or low-sodium broth 
1 cup water 
3 tablespoons Asian fish sauce 
1 teaspoon honey 
1 cup cooked jasmine rice 
8 shelled and deveined medium shrimp, halved lengthwise (about 1/4 pound) 
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice 
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
2 tablespoons chopped basil 
1 Thai chile, thinly sliced 
Lime wedges, for serving 

Directions 

1.Cut the chicken into legs, thighs, breasts and wings. Cut each breast crosswise through the bones into 3 pieces. Remove the thigh bones and cut each thigh in half. 

2.In a large saucepan, heat the oil. Add the ginger and garlic and cook over moderate heat until softened, about 3 minutes. Add the stock, water, fish sauce, honey and rice and bring to a boil. Add the chicken pieces and simmer for 5 minutes. Stir in the shrimp and cook just until opaque, about 1 minute. Stir in the lime juice, cilantro, basil and chile and serve right away, passing lime wedges at the table.