Category Archives: Recipe

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Easy Beef Bourguignon

Note: This recipe is an homage to “Bob’s Short Ribs Bourguignon”, by one of my favorite chefs from the Outer Banks.

A few years ago, I was privileged to spend some time with a chef during a group cooking class.  He cooked in a way that was very similar to my own, using his hands/eyes as a way of measuring ingredients and his intuition as a way of creating a dish that was both delicious and flavorful.  Having a trained chef share his take on a traditional, classic recipe was a gift beyond compare and I’ll always be grateful to him for opening my own eyes to cooking this way.  This recipe used some basics from Bob’s recipe and added my own twist, allowing me to use my own intuition (The Force) to create a new dish.

I was at a wine/food festival recently and was asked if I had a Beef Bourguignon recipe on my blog.  Since I hadn’t “formally” cooked and blogged about this recipe, I decided to remedy that problem as quickly as possible.  EasyBeefBourguignon

I started with a package of beef that I found on sale at my local grocery store. NOTE: I try and pick up packages of meat anytime they go on sale, that I can use in various recipes, and keep them in my freezer until needed.  This helps keep my costs down and I can “shop” in my freezer for dinner inspirations most any day.  I sliced the beef into 1-2″ chunks and, using my favorite large stock pot, browned them in a bit of olive oil after dusting them with some flour, salt, and pepper.  Since I had so much beef, I did this step in two stages, removing the first half of the beef once it was browned and repeating the process.  

Once all the beef was crispy, I placed it all back into the pot and added the following ingredients:  1 sliced onion, 4 diced bacon slices, 4 cloves of garlic, 2 bay leaves, 1 beef bouillon packet (I like G. Washington Brown), a few globs of ketchup, and covered everything with a lovely red wine (think James River Cellars Monitor).  I stirred everything to combine it nicely, popped the lid on the pot, and put the entire dish into a 300 degree oven to cook for awhile.  I think it cooked for about 2 hours, but I was really waiting for the entire recipe to reduce and mesh together well.  You could easily reduce the heat on the stove top, pop the lid on, and cook it for the two hours, but I prefer to use the oven when I can for this sort of meal.

Once the wine had reduced and the sauce was thick and rich, I added half a bag of frozen peas to bump up the color factor on the meal.  The final touches involved adding a few dashes of worchestershire sauce and a small bit of butter to gloss the sauce.  It looked delicious!

As we got closer to dinner time, I cooked some egg noodles and sliced some crusty bread to complete the meal.  The final product was deep, dark, and rich… a perfect meal for a cold, snowy evening, even if it *was* March.

I hope you’ll try making your own version of this wonderful recipe.  Using short ribs (when on sale) is a great alternative to a piece of pot roast, but you can use most any meat that will handle this sort of long, slow cooking process.  Changing up the vegetables by using carrots, pearl onions, or any other favorite vegetable is a great way to add nutrition and tailor the recipe to your family’s preferences.

Remember, cooking is about sharing your love with the ones you love.  Enjoy!

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Recipe: Breakfast Egg Casserole

I’ve been trying to plan my meals and eat better this year, so I’m always on the lookout for a fun and tasty breakfast that will fill me up without a sugar-rush.  Being able to make this casserole at home and control the ingredients is a definite bonus.  My college friend, D, shared her version of this casserole with me and I knew I just had to give it a try.  The wine I use is a surprising ingredient, but one that adds a lovely depth to this recipe.

I started with 1/3 package of bacon.  I diced the bacon and cooked it in a skillet until the bacon was nicely toasted.  I then added about a cup of frozen sweet peppers.  I chopped them fairly fine and used red, yellow, orange, and green peppers, and allowed them to soften with the bacon.  Once this was done, I spooned the bacon and peppers to the bottom of a 9×13 casserole dish, leaving a little of the bacon grease in the skillet.

BreakfastEggCasserole

I gathered 2 cups of kale, removed the ribs, and roughly chopped the kale.  NOTE:  You can also add in some spinach if you prefer. Using the remaining bacon grease in the skillet, I tossed in the kate and added 2 oz Dry Rose wine (like Boordy Dry Rose), sauteing the kale until it had wilted and the bitterness had dissipated.  NOTE: If using full leaves of kale, be sure to massage the kale to remove some of the initial bitterness from the leaves.  Trust me… this is important.  I like to season the dish while cooking the greens so the spices have time to develop – for this dish I used salt, pepper, herbs de provence, and smoked paprika. Once I finished sauteing the greens, I layered them in the casserole dish, on top of the bacon/pepper layer.

Here’s the easiest part of the recipe… I poured 1 1/2 cup fat-free egg substitute into a Pyrex measuring cup, gently poured the egg over the entire contents of the casserole dish and pressed the bits of vegetable down into the egg mixture.  How simple is that?

Once everything was in the pan, I popped it into a pre-heated 350 degree oven for 30 minutes.  If your oven runs hot, you might want to check it after 25 minutes, but 3o minutes seems to work best for me.  I allow the casserole to cool for at least 10 minutes and then cut it into 6 square, equal-sized pieces and wrap each in Saran to store in the fridge.  It’s easy to reheat (30-45 seconds in the microwave) and tastes wonderful in a breakfast sandwich, using bread thins.

Hope you’ll consider trying this fun recipe sometime.  Use what you like or what you’ve got in your fridge and it can take on whatever flavors you want.  I love it…. especially when I realized that it’s only 91 calories per square… SWEET!

Enjoy!

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Recipe: Beef Steak Sandwiches

Ideas for this sandwich kept popping up in my newsfeed all week, so I thought I would make my own rendition of this delicious recipe that Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Woman) calls The Marlboro Man Sandwich.  It’s a fabulous-looking steak sandwich that isn’t anywhere near as expensive as it *could* be, since it uses cube steak as the main ingredient.   While I would highly recommend checking out the original recipe on The Pioneer Woman site – she’s very entertaining and, IMHO, the sort of personality to which *I* would strive as a cooking show host – this is my own version that recipe but includes WINE (of course)BeefSteakSandwich.

Ingredients:

  • Onions (I used one and sliced it for this recipe)
  • Butter (I used 2 Tablespoons, but will try coconut oil next time to see if that would work as a substitute)
  • Cube Steak (I used just under 1 pound of meat for 2 1/2 sandwiches)
  • Red Wine (I used a Pinot Noir from my fridge, but would typically use James River Cellars Rad Red)
  • Worchestershire Sauce
  • Lawrey’s Seasoning Salt

Directions:

  1. I started by melting a tablespoon of butter in a saute pan and then browned an entire sliced onion until it was soft.  I added a bit of red wine to brown with the onion to give it a bit more flavor, then removed it from the pan once the wine was absorbed.
  2. Once the onions were cooked and the pan was empty, I added the second tablespoon of butter to melt in the pan.  While it melted, I sliced the meat across the grain and seasoned it with salt and pepper.  When the butter was hot, I placed the strips of steak in the pan and allowed them to sear well before flipping them over and doing the same thing to the other side.
  3. As the steak finished cooking, I re-added the onions and poured in about a half cup of red wine to make a base for the sauce.
  4. Using the wine to scrape up the browned bits on the bottom of the saute pan, I seasoned the meat with a bit of worchestershire and some Lawrey’s Seasoning Salt.  The sauce reduced fairly quickly and was ready for dinner soon after.
  5. To serve this lovely sandwich, I toasted two hoagie rolls and spooned the steak/onion mixture onto half of the roll.  I love cheese, so I added some shredded mozzarella cheese to my sandwich while my husband had his without cheese.  The best part of this recipe is to drizzle a bit of the sauce down over the meat once it’s on the roll… I think it’s the sauce that makes this sandwich so very salty, flavorful, and deep.

I hope you’ll try your own version of this sandwich sometime.  Add peppers to the onions if you like – that would add some great nutrition to this meal as well as a bit of a fun twist.  I used the last bits of the meat in a salad, so I can safely say that this is a recipe that you can use in most any way you can imagine.  It’d be great in wraps, salads, over noodles, or just as the original sandwich… you just can’t go wrong!

Salud!

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Recipe: Wine Cupcakes

Ok…. Even I was a bit skeptical when I came up with this idea.  I had a box of white cake mix… I had James River Cellars Reserve Chardonnay white wine… I had some Pinot Noir red wine… what’s a girl to do?  Swap the wine for water!

WineCupcakes

I weighed out the cake mix to make sure that I actually was able to separate the mix into separate bowls and then went to work.  I used the cake mix directions and simply swapped out the water in each half with a different wine.  I used exactly the same ingredients for each half of the mix, but I used James River Cellars Reserve Chardonnay white wine for the “white cake” and I used a Pinot Noir red wine for the “red cake”  Don’t they look interesting?  NOTE:  I would absolutely have used James River Cellars Rad Red, if I’d had some in the fridge when inspiration took hold this morning.

Rather than add frosting to these cupcakes, I decided to add sprinkles.  I had gold sanding sugar to add to the white/chardonnay cupcakes, but I didn’t have any red sanding sugar on hand, so I used multi-colored tiny sugar balls for the red/pinot noir cupcakes.

I know this is a weird way to use wine, but I just had to try it… nothing lost by trying and everything gained by finding another fun use for wine!  I hope you’ll consider trying these out sometime.  It’s bizarre, but I think they’re surprisingly tasty.  Have fun!

NOTE:  I shared these with my co-workers and we all agreed that the Reserve Chardonnay cupcakes were tastier than the Pinot Noir ones… but check it out for yourself and let me know what you think!

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Recipe: Chardonnay Chicken Piccata

Wow… this recipe was a huge hit last night.  It’s not a difficult recipe, but it has such huge presence and flavor that it’s quickly going to become one of my favorite recipes to make for company.  I really hope that you’ll consider making this for your family… It’s hard to imagine any chicken fan *not* enjoying this dinner!

Again, I started by using an actual recipe that I found by flipping through allrecipes.com and searching out a basic recipe that would utilize the half bottle of chardonnay that I had in my fridge.  Of course, I had to alter the recipe to fit my family’s preferences, but isn’t that what I do with every recipe I make?  NOTE: Most Piccata recipes also call for capers, but since my family isn’t big on them, I left them out of this recipe.  Here are the basics of Chicken Piccata:

Ingredients:

ChardonnayChickenPiccata

  • 3 whole chicken breasts (one package from my freezer), sliced in half, lengthwise
  • Salt and Pepper, to taste
  • Flour – enough to dredge breasts, approximately 1/2 cup
  • 2 Tablespoons Butter
  • 2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
  • 1 cup White Wine (I used a half bottle of James River Cellars Chardonnay)
  • 1/2 cup chicken stock (I didn’t have any on hand, so I used 1 packet of G.Washington Golden bouillon and a little water)
  • 2 whole lemons (I used both juice AND zest)
  • Fresh Parsley
  • 3/4 cup heavy cream (I never have cream on hand, so I used 2 Tablespoons of nonfat plain greek yogurt instead)
  • Egg noodles or your favorite pasta

Instructions:

  1. Start by simmering your water so you can drop your pasta when your dinner is almost finished.
  2. Slice chicken breasts in half, lengthwise, so they are fairly thin and each person can have two breasts per serving and still not feel like they’re over eating.
  3. Sprinkle each chicken breast piece with salt/pepper and dredge in flour.
  4. Heat one Tablespoon of butter with one Tablespoon of olive oil in a large skillet over medium high heat.  Fry each chicken breast until golden brown on both sides, in batches as needed so as not to crowd the pan.  Once breasts are golden, remove to a separate plate and keep warm.  NOTE: I did this in two batches and used another Tablespoon of butter and olive oil each for the second batch.
  5. Once the chicken is done, reduce the heat in the skillet to medium low.  Pour wine into the skillet, add the juice and zest of both lemons, and use the liquid to stir in all the bits from the bottom of the skillet.  Add chopped parsley to the sauce and allow it to cook long enough for all the flavors to combine.  Add greek yogurt (or heavy cream, if you are so inclined) and whisk in to thoroughly incorporate.  This is when I taste the sauce and adjust the seasonings – add salt/pepper as needed while it’s cooking so you don’t have to add more when you’re serving your meal.  I also add a spoonful or so of pasta water to lighten up the sauce if it seems to be thickening too quickly.
  6. While you’re making the sauce, start your pasta so you have everything done at the same time.  Drain pasta and get it ready to serve.
  7. For this meal, I added a bag of green beans, so I microwaved the bag for about 5 minutes to cook them quickly.  My favorite way to serve beans (especially for company) is to put a sliver of butter in the bottom of the serving dish, top with salt/pepper/seasonings.  I then toss the hot beans in the serving dish, distributing the butter and seasonings throughout the beans and making them look impressive!
  8. As the sauce thickens, add the cooked chicken back into the sauce and flip them so both sides get covered in the sauce.
  9. To plate your dinner, put the egg noodles on the plate, top with two chicken breasts, and spoon a bit of sauce over both.  Add a serving of green beans on the side and you’ve got a well-rounded meal that will impress your friends and any company that may happen over for a special dinner.

I really did love this dinner.  I’m a fan of anything that has a great punch of flavor and still looks pretty when plated, so this recipe really fit the bill for me.  Add capers, heavy cream, or whatever else makes this recipe taste best to you.  The idea isn’t to follow *my* recipe exactly… it’s to create a meal for those you love.  Enjoy the process… it’s what makes cooking such a fun thing to do!

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Recipe: Coq au Vin (Chicken in Wine)

This classic French stewed chicken recipe (actual translation is “rooster/cock in wine”) with bacon, mushrooms, and onions is such a wonderful one to have in your arsenal of favorites.  It’s not terribly difficult to make, extremely impressive sounding, and the taste is outstanding.  These three reasons alone should have you running to your local grocery store to pick up a few fresh ingredients to make this for dinner soon.  Even better (for you), I used a “real” recipe as my starting point, so this is going to *look* like a real recipe when I finish this post.  Please know that I did use The Force when making it, so I took liberties with the recipe as I was making it for my family, but I’ll include those notes throughout the recipe for you.  I hope you’ll consider making this recipe soon… it’s absolutely delicious!

Ingredients:

  • Bacon slices (I sliced up 1/3 package into small diced pieces
  • 1 large yellow onion, sliced, or equal amount of sliced leeks (I used leeks)
  • 6 chicken breasts (skinless/boneless)CoqAuVin
  • 6 garlic cloves
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • 2 cups chicken broth
  • 2 cups red wine (pinot noir, burgundy, zinfindel – I used James River Cellars Rad Red)
  • 2 bay leaves
  • Several fresh thyme sprigs (or use dried)
  • Several fresh parsley sprigs (or use dried)
  • 1/2 lb button mushrooms, cleaned and roughly chopped
  • 2 Tablespoons butter
  • Chopped fresh parsley for garnish

Directions:

  1. Brown bacon on medium high heat in a dutch oven big enough to hold the chicken, about 10 minutes.  Remove cooked bacon, set aside.  Keep bacon fat in the pan.  NOTE:  I used a large/deep skillet, with a lid, that could go in the oven
  2. Working in batched if necessary, add onions (my leeks are shown in the middle pic on the left side of photo) and brown until slightly toasty.  Remove and then brown chicken well, on all sides, about 10 minutes.  I seasoned the chicken with salt and pepper during the browning stage to bring out the flavor of the chicken.
  3. Once chicken is all browned, return all the chicken and onions/leeks to the pot, add the garlic, chicken stock, wine, and herbs.  Add back the bacon.  Lower the heat to a simmer, cover and cook until chicken is tender and cooked through.  NOTE: at this point, I put the lid on the pan and popped it into the oven at 300 degrees until the chicken was tender.  I had started this dish much earlier in the day than was necessary, so I needed to slow down the cooking time.
  4. Once chicken is cooked through, remove the chicken and onions to a separate platter, cover and keep warm.  Remove bay leaves, herb sprigs, and discard.  I like to keep the garlic in the sauce, but you’re welcome to remove the garlic at this point if you prefer.
  5. Add mushrooms to the remaining liquid and turn the heat to high.  Boil quickly and reduce the liquid by three fourths until it becomes thick and saucy.  Lower the heat, stir in the butter, and adjust seasonings as needed.  NOTE: I added a touch of milk to tone down the seasonings.
  6. Return chicken and onions to the pan to reheat and coat with sauce.  Adjust seasonings and garnish with parsley and serve.

This should serve 6.  Serve with roasted potatoes (as seen in the photo), mashed potatoes, or over egg noodles.  My husband loved this dish and commented that “everyone would eat this”, meaning that I could serve this to my entire family and everyone would be happy.  Spices weren’t too overpowering and the flavor of the wine and stock meshed well together to create a thoroughly enjoyable meal.

Nothing could have been better to hear, in my opinion!  I hope you try it and hear the same accolades…

 

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Crock Pot Recipe: Tuscan Chicken and Sausage Stew

I love using my crock pot.  Having a slow cooker can help you make a lovely, healthy meal any night of the week.  All it takes is a little thought beforehand and a few minutes in the morning before you leave the house (or start working from home).  This was a recipe that I thought looked particularly yummy, but the ingredients needed to be changed out before I could make it for my family.  I know that they balk at large pieces of mushroom or the texture of artichoke hearts, so I did some substituting and came up with a version that worked well for me.

Since I started with an actual recipe (thanks to Weight Watchers for the inspiration) so the ingredients are much more accurate that I typically offer on my blog.  I used “The Force” for this recipe, but vaulted from the actual recipe, so I’ll be kind today and share it with you that way.

Ingredients:TuscanChickenSausageStewMB

  • 8 small chicken thighs, skinless and boneless, cut into 2″ cubes
  • 1 package Turkey Polska Kielbasa, cut into 2″ chunks
  • 1 cup, chopped Onions, raw
  • 1/2 cup Chicken broth, canned, low sodium
  • 1/2 cup James River Cellars Montpelier Wine – you could use a nice Chardonnay, if you prefer
  • 1 cup, cubes, all varieties Squash, winter type, baked, no fat or sugar added in cooking, butternut
  • 1 cup, sliced Pepper, raw
  • 4 cloves Garlic, raw
  • 3 tsp, leaves Spices, oregano, dried
  • 1 tbsp Spices, rosemary, dried
  • 2T cornstarch, if needed for thickening

In true “not originally mine” style, here are the steps to follow when you make this recipe, using the ingredients I’ve used in my own swap.

Instructions

  1. Chop onion and butternut squash into chunks – place on the bottom of a crock pot.
  2. Collect the thighs and sausage that you’ve already cut into 2″ chunks and layer them on top of the onions/squash
  3. Layer peppers (in a variety of colors) on top of meats, then top with spices.
  4. Add broth and wine.
  5. Cover and cook until chicken is tender and vegetables are cooked through, 4-5 hours on high or 8-10 hours on low.
  6. If you want to thicken the broth at the end, whisk 2T of cornstarch with some of the cooking liquid (in a separate cup) until there are no lumps, then return it to the pot and allow the broth to thicken.
  7. Serve over polenta (which my family doesn’t like) or mashed potatoes (which my family *does* like).

I’ve been trying to be better about using a “recipe builder” application (for my iPad) so that I know the actual nutrition analysis of my recipes.  I got a FitBit Flex from my husband for Christmas this year, so I’m coupling that with the (free) MyFitnessPal app to get a better handle on my own health.  To that end, I’m working to make better choices with regards to the foods that I make.  This stew actually makes six servings, with the following nutritional information:  Calories 302, Total Fat 14g, Saturated 3.9g, Polyunsat.  2.9g, Monounsat. 5.4g, Cholesterol 80mg, Sodium 903mg, Total Carbs 16g, Dietary Fiber 2.5g, Sugar 2.8g, Protein 25g, Vitamin A 129mcg, Vitamin C 20mg, Calcium 51mg, and Iron 3.3mg.

I hope you’ll consider playing around with this recipe.  I really loved it, and had it for the next few meals before it was gone.  At only 302 calories, it seemed reasonable and tasty at the same time.  Enjoy!

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Recipe: Easy Wine’d Guacamole

Since yesterday was the Super Bowl, I wasn’t in the mood for a big meal for dinner.  Maybe it’s just conditioning, but I felt like having “snack food” for dinner and decided to try my hand at making a quick guacamole.  Surprisingly, it came together much quicker than I expected and was so tasty that I’ll probably try it again soon.  See what you think of this “recipe”…

EasyWinedGuacamole (1)

I started with one whole avocado. I sliced it in half, removed the seed, and scooped out all the flesh of the avocado into a bowl.  Using a fork, I mashed the avocado until there were just a few chunks left.  I drizzled a touch of lemon juice, some James River Cellars Petit Verdot (since I didn’t have any tomato on hand), a touch of hot sauce, finely chopped cilantro, and finally some salt and pepper to taste.   I let it rest until the sliced crustini were warm and toasty, then served the bread as “dippers” for the guacamole.  It was delicious!

To those who make guacamole all the time, I do know that this recipe is not a good representation of a traditional guacamole.  There should be pieces of tomato and onion, bits of other unique flavors, and whatever else people put into guacamole to make it spicy, flavorful and tasty.  For me, however, this was a great way to get the basic flavor of the dip without having to make a special trip to the store for extra ingredients that I didn’t have on hand.  Feel free to play with this recipe, if you’re so inclined.  I loved it and thought it was “just enough”.  Happy Dipping!

 

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Leftover Recipe: Leftover Breakfast Hash

Dinner recently consisted of roasted potatoes, chicken tenders, shrimp, bacon, and a few other items but I ended up with enough leftovers to play a bit with breakfast the next morning.  As you can see in the photo, this is a rendition of my previously posted Breakfast Hash recipe.  I didn’t have to run to the store for anything and it was a great start to my day.  Hopefully, you’ll find this to be a recipe that you can re-create for your family.

LeftoverBreakfastHash (1)

I started by sauteing a singe leftover piece of bacon (honest… it really was left over) until it was crispy.  I then added a cup of leftover roasted potato and allowed it to crisp a bit.  The “fun” addition here was a bit of James River Cellars Petit Verdot red wine and some frozen pieces of peppers (red, yellow, and green).  Once I let the wine incorporate into the potato and the peppers cooked, I added 1/4 cup fat-free egg substitute and tossed that with everything so the cooked egg would end up all over the recipe.  The final addition was 1/8 cup of 2% milk shredded mild cheddar cheese.  Once the cheese melted, I plated my breakfast.

This was a fun and tasty way to use up leftovers.  Chopped peppers freeze very nicely, so it’s easy to have them on hand for a touch of color in a dish.  This is something that I’ll be incorporating more often, since I love seeing the bright additions to dishes that can sometimes become a bit bland.

Next time someone tells you the old joke, “what do you call a meal without wine… Breakfast”, feel free to share this idea for a yummy turn on using wine in your cooking.  Enjoy!

 

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Recipe: Petit Goulash

I’ve been told that this isn’t really a goulash recipe, but since that’s what my husband called it, that’s what I’m going to call it as well.  This was a two-pot dinner… one medium pot for the pasta and one large skillet to brown the meat and mix everything together.  Simple and comforting… that’s what I was craving last week when the snow hit our area.

PetitGoulash

I started by dicing together a large onion and half a large green pepper and sautéing them together in a pat of butter.  Once the vegetables were browned, I added a package of ground turkey and cooked this until the meat was thoroughly browned.  To this mixture, I added a healthy pour of a dark Petit Verdot and cooked the meat mixture until the wine had been thoroughly absorbed.   The last “flavor addition” was a can of petit diced tomatoes, which added some great color to the dish.

While I was cooking the meat, I started cooking a pot of water with jumbo elbow macaroni and salt.  Once the pasta was cooked, I drained it and added it into the large skillet and stirred everything together, seasoning with garlic, salt, pepper, and paprika.  This recipe is very similar to the mazetti that my mother-in-law makes (which is absolutely delicious) and was a huge hit with my family.  The flavors melded together nicely and the dish was hearty enough to be filling without adding bread on the side.  A simple green salad would have been a nice addition, but not totally necessary.

Enjoy playing with this recipe if you choose to make it for your family.  A wonderful Hungarian smoked paprika would be fabulous – Think  I might be able to talk my local grocer into stocking this spice if I whine about it enough?  Have fun making your own family’s favorite “goulash”… after all, you’re creating something for those you love.  What could be wrong about that?  Enjoy!