Category Archives for "Cooking From My Box"

0 Cooking From My Books: Thanksgiving Edition

I’ll admit it, this week I’m not actually cooking from my books. But don’t worry – as soon as Shadow Of Sin hits the virtual shelves, I’ll have a bunch of Erin Flannery’s recipes to share.

In the meantime, seeing as next week is one of the most food centric of the year, I thought I’d share my all time favorite recipe for Thanksgiving stuffing.

To be honest, stuffing is one of my least favorite of the traditional Thanksgiving dishes. I mean, why waste the calories on a bunch of soggy seasoned bread?

Then I discovered this recipe for Cornbread Sausage and Dried Fruit stuffing, and my stance on stuffing completely changed. Okay, it’s still not the star of my Turkey Day – we all know it’s all about the gravy. Still, once I started making this version of stuffing I started saving room on my plate for a scoop. The savory sausage and the tart-sweet dried fruit give the cornbread a ton of flavor, and the cornbread gets soft but not mushy.
Enjoy!

Ingredients
1 pound bulk pork sausage
2 cups chopped onions
2 cups chopped celery
7 to 8 cups crumbled cornbread
1 cup dried apricots, chopped
1 cup dried cranberries
2 large eggs, beaten to blend
1 tablespoon chopped fresh sage leaves or 1/2 teaspoon dried rubbed sage
1/2 cup (1/4 lb.) butter or margarine, melted
About 3/4 cup chicken broth
Salt and pepper

Preparation
1. Crumble the sausage into a 10- to 12-inch frying pan over medium-high heat. Stir often until sausage is lightly browned, about 5 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer sausage to a large bowl.

2. Discard all but 2 tablespoons fat in pan. Add onions to pan and stir often until limp, about 5 minutes. Add onions to sausage.

3. Add celery, cornbread, apricots, cranberries, eggs, sage, and butter and stir to mix well, adding just enough broth to lightly moisten dressing.

4. Spoon dressing into a shallow 2 1/2- to 3-quart casserole and cover.

5. Bake in a 325° oven until hot, about 25 minutes (if chilled, 50 to 60 minutes). Then uncover and bake until top is lightly browned, 15 to 25 minutes more. Add salt and pepper to taste.

0 Cooking from My Box – paleo snacks!

Several of my friends are doing a program at our local swim/tennis club that involves going on a paleo diet for 20 days. So when I hosted a mom’s night in last night, I thought I’d do my best to support their efforts by offering up something other than the usual dairy and gluten fest that is the cheese board.  First, I made this olive and almond dip (recipe from Eating Well Magazine)

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup pitted briny green olives
• 1/4 cup Marcona almonds, or other almonds, toasted (see Ingredient Note and Kitchen Tip)
• 1 teaspoon fresh tarragon, or 1/2 teaspoon dried
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

Preparation

1. Combine olives, almonds, tarragon and lemon juice in a food processor. Pulse until roughly chopped. Add oil in a steady stream and process just until the oil is absorbed. (Alternatively, finely chop the olives, almonds and tarragon by hand and combine with lemon juice and oil in a medium bowl.) The spread should have a coarse but easily spoonable texture. Let stand for about 30 minutes for the flavor to develop.

I also made Baba Ganoush:

I took 1 big eggplant and roasted it with a few whole cloves of garlic at 350 for about an hour (or until the eggplant was super soft)
then I scooped out the eggplant and put it with the garlic into a blender (food processor might work better – I didn’t feel like dealing)
added a couple big blobs of tahini, juice of one lemon, about a tsp of salt and blended the bejesus out of it 🙂

I served both with crudites and sweet potato chips.

Happy snacking!

0 Tap, Tap. Is This Thing On?

Uh, hello? Anyone still there? Anyone?
So, I’ve been kind of absent around here.  I would love to say that it’s because I’ve been off traveling the world or curing cancer or something equally amazing and time consuming.

But nope. I’ve just been living my life, hanging with my family, writing, and yes, cooking.  Today, I cracked out my crockpot and made something so delicious, I decided it was time to bring this little corner of the blogosphere back to life. Even if it’s only to help me remember the meals I’ve made that I’ve particularly enjoyed as I endeavor to use up all the treasures I receive through my weekly organic produce delivery and my monthly meat CSA box.

So, without any further ado, I bring you another edition of Cooking From My Box (paleo style).

Slow Cooker Beef, Pork and Vegetable Stew with Cauliflower Puree

For the stew:

1T cooking fat of your choice (today I used leftover bacon grease from breakfast. That’s right. I said it. bacon grease.)

1 pound each beef and pork stew meat, cubed (you could use all of one, but I had both, so I used both)

1 large onion, diced

2 large carrots, diced

2 celery ribs, diced

4 cloves garlic, chopped

2 T chili powder

1 T cumin

1 quart beef broth

1 can diced tomatoes

2 large carrots, cut into chunks

2 large or 4 small sweet potatoes, cut into chunks

1/2 lb green beans, ends trimmed, cut into 2 inch pieces

Dry your meat with paper towels and season with salt and pepper. In a saute pan or cast iron skillet heat oil or fat until shimmering.  Working in batches, brown the meat on all sides and put it into the slow cooker.  To the pan, add the onion, diced carrots, and celery. Cook until softened and maybe a little brown, about 5-7 minutes. Add the garlic, chili powder and cumin, stir and cook until fragrant.  Deglaze the pan with about 1 cup of the beef stock, then pour the veggie mix, the rest of the broth, and the tomatoes on top of the meat.  Set your slow cooker to low and let it cook for 8 hours.

5 hours into the cooking, add the chunked carrots and sweet potatoes, and the green beans.

For the Cauliflower Puree:

1 large head cauliflower, cut into florets

4 garlic cloves, peeled

1/2 cup chicken broth

2 T butter or ghee

1 tsp salt (plus more to taste)

Put cauliflower, garlic and stock into a large pot. Cook until cauliflower is very tender, 20-25 minutes.  Put it into a blender or a food processor with the butter/ghee and process until smooth.  Taste, add salt as needed.

To serve, spoon the puree into the bottom of a bowl and ladle the stew on top. If you’re like me, you might want to add a dash of chipotle tabasco to you stew.

Bon appetit!