Cook for me !!!

Jennifer Jeffrey, whom I know very well, recently wrote an article about her love for cooking for others. And, not so whiz-bang excited to do the same for herself. And that's, okay. The way I see it, I'm going to give you the supreme pleasure of cooking for me! If you're interested, come along and show me your best.

And what do you get in return? The warm knowledge that you made someone very happy. However, if you're the best of the best? You win The River Cottage Meat Book supplied by the most special publishing company in the whole wide world, 10 Speed Press. I've had this book far longer than I was supposed to without saying something and have had the time to read through it. I love this book and not just because it says MEAT on the front of it. The darned thing is absolutely filled with solid technique and recipes and prose and, and and it's pretty. He's even got a section on Gravy! If you're a fan of the gravy but can't quite pull it together, this is your book. The River Cottage Meat Book is Meathenge approved, and if you possess those mad skills, you'll receive yours in a few weeks. The rules are simple, cook me a dish, main or otherwise. Write it up, include a picture or 3 and email it to me at drbiggles at cyberbilly . com. All I ask is that it's a fresh dish, not something you made last November. And guess what? Anyone can play. And you know what? I'm not going to use some damned confusing 3rd party web site to post entries, no ma'am. I'll toss it in to a simple html document and make it easy to find & peruse. You have until April 25th at 5:00pm Pacific Time to get your entries in. Sometime over the weekend, Meathenge Lab's staff will offer up the 3 top entries and I will choose the winning dish. MMmmMmM, winning dish.

Divide chicken into serving pieces. In a small bowl, combine garlic, salt, pepper, ginger, nuts, coriander, cumin, fennel and laos (if used). Mix to a paste, adding a little of the oil if necessary. Rub paste well into the pieces of chicken and leave for 1 hour.

Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a frying pan and fry the sliced onion slowly until golden brown. Drain from oil and set aside. Add remaining oil to pan and fry the spiced chicken pieces gently, just until they start to colour. Add thin coconut milk, curry leaves, lemon grass (or rind) and cinnamon stick. Stir until it comes to the boil, then cook uncovered for 30 minutes or until chicken is tender. Add thick coconut milk, stir thoroughly and cook for a further 15 minutes. Remove from heat, add lemon juice and season to taste with extra salt. Remove whole spices.

Garnish with fried onions and serve the chicken with white rice, vegetables and what have you.

Mrs. Guy

Entry #2 comes in from Zoomie of Zoomie Station. She's posted her entry on her blog, the title is Cooking for a Meaty Guy! Slow roasted pork with onions? Oh man, I can smell it now.

1/2 tsp salt
2 lbs. beef, lamb or chicken, very thinly sliced
1 cup Tahini (sesame seed paste)
1 clove of garlic, minced
1 tsp lemon juice
2 Tbsp parsley, chopped
1/2 cup water (approximately)
Pita bread
1 medium tomato, sliced
1 medium onion, sliced

Combine yogurt, lemon juice, garlic, pepper sauce, vinegar, onion, black and cayenne pepper, mace and salt. Add meat and marinate overnight.

Place the marinated meat in a barbeque cage and cook over hot coals for 15 minutes. OR cook on slotted broiler pan in oven on broil for 3 minutes, turn and continue to broil until cooked through.

Combine tahini, garlic, lemon juice and parsley until it is of a creamy texture, Add water if necessary. Place the cooked meat, sliced tomatoes and onions in pita bread and pour on the tahini mixture as desired.

Substitutions: You can substitute Ranch or buttermilk salad dressing for the tahini sauce.

Notes: So I was poking through the freezer, and found 3 chicken thighs. Hmm, what to do, what to do? Then I remembered I'd sent you that swarma recipe. So I printed it out and went to work. The first thing I didn't like was the small amount of garlic and onion, so I doubled it. I also added a 1/4 tsp of cinnamon. Why? Because I could. I sliced up the thighs about 3/16th thick, though it varied. I took off as much fat and skin as I could, but I didn't get anal about it. Mixed it all up and marinated it over night. It calls for a BBQ with some sort of basket thingy I don't own. I thought about the broiler, but didn't have the pan, so opted for the griddle. I heated it up to 400 degrees and used half the chicken. In hindsight, I'd go buy the BBQ thingy next time, as the chicken needs a place to lose its marinade, and become black and crusty. Served on top of a bed of humus, it came out really good. The humus really tempered out the spicyness of the chicken. Its really filling, so using only half the chicken was a good move. Plus I have some in the freezer now, for whenever i get the basket thingy and a rainless day. Enjoy brother.

Wow, wow, wow. Salvage stopped by with his Crawfish Pie recipe. Damn! Look, they in they cage. Nice presentation mang.

4 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup red onion, minced
1/2 cup celery, minced
1/4 cup red bell pepper, minced
1/4 cup green bell pepper, minced
1/4 cup finely minced curly parsley, minced
1/2 cup green onions, minced
2 lobes garlic crushed and minced very fine
1 1/2 tablespoons Creole seasoning
3 tablespoons flour
1 LB cooked Crawfish tailmeat (check closely for shell fragments)
1 teaspoon hot pepper sauce (Tabasco traditional or Louisiana Gold brand)
3/4 cup real cream
2 prepared (rolled) refrigerated pie crusts

In glass bowl combine tail meat and ½ of the Creole seasoning and mix. Remove 12-16 nice tails for garnish and set aside. Run the remainder of crawfish tails through a food processor just long enough to coarsely shred meat. Set aside

Heat oven to 350°F. Roll pie crust to ¼-inch thickness and cut circles with a French Market coffee can. Press crust circles into 3-inch tart pans. Pierce generously with fork tines to let steam escape, then pre-bake the crusts for 8-10 minutes until light brown (Use of tin foil and pie weights helps keep shells shape, optional). Remove to cool, set aside.
.
Melt butter in a large skillet. Over medium heat, sauté Celery, Red Onion, Bell Peppers and Garlic with remaining Creole seasoning. Stir occasionally until vegetables are tender. Add flour and mix very well. Remove from heat and stir in the shredded crawfish with any liquid, stirring until seized and smooth. Return to medium low heat, and cook 3 minutes more, do not let mixture brown much by scraping pan. Add the Tabasco and the cream. Add green onions and parsley. Bring to a hard simmer until thickened, stirring constantly. Check for salt, filling is going to reduce during baking, so salt level should seem low at this stage. It will not be completely set, will thicken more while baking. Remove from heat, and turn out into pre-baked pie crusts, fill to a slight crown as it shrinks some. Press 1-2 whole tailmeats down into surface of each pie.

Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes, or until center is bubbly and the crust is golden brown. Cool to just warm before serving, pass the Tabasco sauce.

mMMmMmm, Michelle of Montreal stops by with a fantastic Ragu. I have a soft spot in my heart for such meals, you get to put CHEESE on it!

Ingredients (base ragu):
4 stalks celery
2 carrots
3 medium onions
5 cloves garlic
4 oz prosciutto (or pancetta)
1 lb ground beef
1 lb ground pork or veal
1 cup whole milk
1 cup white wine
6 oz can of tomato paste
3 or 4 bay leaves

Directions (base ragu):
Mince celery, carrots, onions and garlic into thesmallest pieces you can muster. Do thesame with the prosciutto, or run it through a meat grinder.
Heat a little olive oil in a saucepan and sweat theminced vegetables until tender. Addground prosciutto, beef and pork, stirring until browned.
Add milk, wine and tomato paste to the saucepan,mixing well.
Drop in the bay leaves and simmer the whole lot on low for as long as possible (I recommend at least three hours)

Additional ingredients (for actual serving):
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 tomatoes, chopped
red wine
oregano
red chili flakes

Directions (for actual serving):
Heat a little olive oil in a saucepan and fry redchili flakes and garlic until fragrant. Add a few large spoonfuls of the base ragu cook that down a littlebit. Add tomatoes, wine and oregano andlet simmer for about 10 minutes (or more) for the flavours to meld together. Toss in some cooked pasta pieces (I like shells,wagon wheels or rotini), combine and serve.