Award Winning Salsa!!!!

Award Winning Salsa-Guacamole-Bean Dip-like for reals

If you know me you know I’m not athletic at all. Never have been. The only trophies I’ve ever received were for being on the Honor Roll. Wait....I did receive a medal for an Art Contest in Chicago in High School, which I am proud of to this day! But that has now changed and my head is slightly a little bigger now!

Upon returning to the office after a long day of work outside, I returned to find a trophy bestowed to me for the best salsa, guacamole, bean dip.

I walked in and there it was…the biggest trophy to ever exist! With MY name on it!!!!

Acceptance speech moment with the crowd of 2 people (J.Quick and one other coworker I can't remember who) within 10 feet. All I kept thinking is thank god Kanye isn't here to interrupt my lame attempt of an acceptance speech.

I look at this trophy with admiration. I thought this was the best badass motherfucking trophy ever! Sure I may be a little biased in saying that but I can say that because its MY trophy. And you may find yourself asking...."why Batman?" um why not.

It was like so much better than a DUNDIE award! And I definitely was not shy nor quiet about receiving it. Really ask my coworkers. As they were walking back in to our office I kept announcing to them my newest accomplishment in a polite manner. Except I wasn't polite about it at all. I was so excited and super hyper. You know my normal caffeinated self. And I think I recall saying something like....

"Recognize the motherfucking skills!" and

"Check it out, I got a badass trophy!"

But wait my obnoxious behavior did not stop there.

No, no, no!

I felt like holding it in the air and running around like Rocky. Can you picture it now....Marcela holding that badass trophy whiles humming the Eye of the Tiger, running around the office. I know I see it now. But I didn't, only in my head.

I eyed the trophy with a sense of accomplishment. I know what you're thinking/asking.... “Over salsa, guacamole and bean dip like really?" Yes! Come over and I'll make you some. Or lets barter for some. Suddenly I understand what Gollum was feeling…

I arrived at home and proceeded to ask my family "How does it feel to have a mother/wife who received a trophy for her badass cooking?!" Or something like that. I asked Rory (our cat) "Rory, are you proud of me?!" And she looked at me like "Stop! Talking to me!"

Okay so my moment has passed and I know its just food. But this is my food blog and receiving that trophy was definitely a highlight worth bragging about. Although its not the first time my food has received recognition. Thanks NB!

Watch out Michael Scott as there is a new, definitely note worthy award in town. I shall call it the Mark Wainscott Award! Take that Dundie. As this wonderful trophy was given to me by my good friend and coworker Mark! Thanks Mark!!!!

So if you ever try my cooking or try out my recipe, you can proudly say “award winning food” or “award winning recipe” because technically you wouldn’t be lying. I have now officially obtained a Mark Wainscott Award for my cooking and those don’t get handed out often! Hi Kathy! ;-)

Thank you for getting knocked up pasta recipe!

Holy shit! Is this thing on? Like seriously when was the last time I posted up in this motha. So like most adults I have found myself living the full work load plus the non stop parenting train. And I have been quite lost when it comes to all things blogging and documenting my cooking adventures.
So returns the food snob with a recipe I keep meaning to share!

This pasta!!!! Spaghetti in a green sauce. Oh what a lovely take on Mexican and Italian!!!!! My two favorite!!!

Origin:

So I first tried this spaghetti at a baby shower. I wasn’t sure what it was but was intrigued by the aroma of poblano peppers. I served myself some with whatever else was being offered. And fell immediately in love. I asked around “what is this?” to which my cousin Miros replied “Crazy chic, its green spaghetti”. Ok I don’t recall the exact conversation but it definitely left an impression. So months passed and I was craving something. This often happens to me and I may not recall what the item is called that I am craving. So pinpointing what I'm craving can be quite challenging. And it finally came to me, it was the green spaghetti. SO I searched for my phone to ask Miros for the recipe. She didn’t know it but directed me to ask our aunt Norma. My aunt gave me her recipe and I ran out for all the required ingredients. As I raced to the store I was savoring what was to come……

After making the green spaghetti…. I started imagining what I can combine with this dish. Or how can I put my own twist on it. And thus was born “Thank you for getting knocked up pasta” or TYFGKUP for short! HA!

You will require the following:

6-8 Poblano Pepper

1+ Serrano pepper(optional depending on spice level desired)

Heavy Cream-Small container whatever size that is

Box (16oz) Spaghetti

Chicken bouillon

Salt/Pepper to taste

Garlic clove

Shrimp

Parmesan Cheese to top off

Alright you have to treat the peppers the same way you do for Chile Rellenos!

Roast them, peal outer skin, remove stem and seeds. This step is my least favorite and possibly the reason why I don’t make Chile Rellenos often. Refer to chile relleno recipe for detailed step by step.

 Meanwhile put some water to boil for your pasta.

Pictured below are a pic of them roasting and after I did all that darn work….. but so worth it!

After Chiles are done toss them in the blender with the salt, pepper, garlic clove, one chicken bouillon cube/tablespoon and the heavy cream. Blend! After sauce was made I cooked my shrimp. And added my sauce to the shrimp and brought it to a simmer. Slow simmer. No overcooking shrimp over here.

Once spaghetti was cooked I drained it and added the sauce/shrimp to the pasta!

Gluttony comes to mind! As this is the one dish that I make that I can eat and eat and eat and strangely not have enough of. Its like I've injected the fucking poblano peppers with cocaine or some other addicting drug. Please note I have not injected the peppers with any form of drug. Refer to ingredients as confirmation. Behold......drum roll please!

This dish is best when hot but I have eaten it cold, which was still freaking amazing! So once again ANGIE(don't kill me) thank you thank you THANK YOU!!!! For getting knocked up and letting that event turn into me attending your baby shower and falling deeply in love.


ps this post is a bit rusty as the only writing I have done lately has been addressed to Tom Riddle aka my diary!

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Pork loin with Mole Sauce and Nopales

Pork Loin in mole and nopales/ or Nopales y puerco en mole

 

 

This recipe came about when I use to make my dad’s and my favorite dish, which is Nopales en molito con tortas de huachal. I would make the favorite dish but my hubby suggested it needed meat. So instead of the tortas I made this with pork loin.

 

So what the hell are nopales you may be asking…. Nopales = Cactus! Yup that sums it up. I will admit as a child I was not a fan, but fuck are they good.

 

Alright so lets get to cooking…..

 

For the Mole/Sauce(a very basic sauce)

7/8 chile guajillo (for more pics of dried peppers refer to enchilada recipe)

5 or so chile de arbol (use less to none if you are not a fan of the level of heat)

1 garlic clove

Salt – I eyeball amount. I lose the dam tsp/tbs measuring things all the time

Flour – about 2 tablespoons

 

For the rest:

About a pound of pork loin

4 nopales

 

Get your mole going first by de-stemming/deseeding the peppers.

Add enough water to cover peppers and garlic. Bring to a boil, let simmer. I will blend the peppers before adding to meat. Done:

 

Next the pork:

You can sub for costillas de Puerco, which will be awesome but I opted for the easier to eat cut of meat here. So then I cut the meat into about 1 inch pieces. Heat up about 3 tablespoons of oil and add meat. Season meat with your choice of seasoning. I used Goya Adobo Sazon. Sear meat till brown. Enjoy the aroma!!!!

Its getting there! Still browning....

 

Finally lets work on those nopales:

 

Nopales have these spike like things on them that need to be removed.

So I just get a knife and start sliding knife on top of nopales to remove them.

Next I trim the edge of the nopales. Be very careful when doing this! Some Mexican grocery stores may already have these ready to cook, de-spiked and all. And you may even see canned/jarred nopales but I prefer fresh. Last I chop the nopales to desired size.

 
So by now the meat should be nice and brown. I remove meat from pan and add in nopales to sauté. Sauté the nopales for about a minute. You do not want to over sauté the nopales. They cook fast.

Once slightly cooked I add back the pork.

 

Time to blend the peppers! I add the flour, salt, peppers, garlic and some of the water used to cook peppers in to the blender and blend. I then pour the mole using a colander over the meat/nopales and let simmer.

 

Serve with rice/beans or just eat it with tortillas! Enjoy!!!

Also try with sopa de fideo, which is what I prefer but didn’t have fideo. You can also add chopped onion to nopales when cooking.

Flan flan and more flan!

She’s ALIVE! She’s alive!

I am indeed. Feel my wrath! Eat my FLAN! You will love me for it!



So once upon a time you were craving something sweet, heavenly and creamy to indulge in! And you came across this long hair skull/Halloween/chocolate loving chic and she said ‘hey do you want some flan?’ And in spite of her scary appearance and wait are those spiders crawling all over her you tried her flan and immediately were bewitched! Mmmm desserts!





For the flans times 3 you will need:

3 cans of condensed milk

3 cans of evaporated milk

9 eggs

1 cup of sugar

1 tsp of ground cinnamon (estimated measurement I eyeball this)

vanilla (I eyeball this amount too)



If you must make just one flan and not follow my advice divide all by three….





So to create such deliciousness start by heating the sugar and cinnamon on a sauce pan till it's like a syrup…

Once the sugar/cinnamon mixture is in syrup form add to your pan*. No need to try and spread it. It will spread once its start baking.

*I think 8/9” pie foil works well because its sticks less and sometimes I’m a lazy @ss so easy cleaning works for me!



So oh yeah preheat oven to 350 degrees… and while you wait for the oven to heat up…. Mix the rest of the ingredients. I start with mixing the eggs and then add the cans in and the vanilla.

Once all mixed up prepare the bake ware!



Okay here is the tricky part. Flan is creamy delicious because of the cooking method. It’s called bano maria or like bain marie according to Wikipedia. I use what I believe is a 8x8 square baking dish and add hot/boiled water till about half full. Then I insert the pan with just the syrup goodness. Next add the flan mixture and insert in oven. 

 Make sure you are not high on caffeine or like in my case my normal dose of Pepsi and chocolate because you will not have a steady hand and might spill some of this deliciousness.



Once the flan, flan, and flan are in the oven bake those bad boys for about an hour. If you use a smaller but deeper pan add more bake time. You might see it turn a little golden on the rim of bake dish. It’s done once the center is not runny. Let the flans cool down and enjoy.



So here are the reasons I make three:

1 is to eat immediately after baking

2 to let cool down and then put in fridge for next day enjoyment

3 to kindly share with my co-workers because sometimes they are awesome and share their cooking with me! If your co-workers are assholes just eat the third one.



TRY ALSO:

Top with whipped cream

Add rum to mixture

If you are a coffee fan…add coffee to sugar when melting

Run a toothpick or knife around the rim of bake dish to loosen the flan. Cover with plate and flip.



And there you have it folks FLAN FLAN & FLAN! Now you don’t have to wonder “how does she do it?” After reading this and you find yourself still lacking the motivation to make some we can use the good o’l fashion barter system and exchange food!

Hint: I kind of like chocolate!

I almost forgot to take a pic. So here is a pic of my breakfast serving! Dont judge me!

gone fishing

so apparently ive gone fishing...will be back soon! stay tuned for flan, pork with nopales in mole, etc

Bistec con papas y salsa

Bistec con papas y salsa!

 

You will need:

1 ½ pound of bistec de bola (top round steak)

1 med onion

1 potato

2 tbsp of oil

About 2 cups of salsa (refer to salsa picante recipe) You can substiture Salsa El Pato or no salsa at all if the spice is too hot to handle.

A few tbsp of flour to mix with salsa for thickening

 

I originally purchased the bistec/steak from my local Latin grocery store with the intentions of making breaded steak but due to the lack of bread crumbs and eggs….. I decided to prepare the meat a different way.

 

So I cut the meat to about 1 inch or so.....You can have your butcher do this for you.

 

Put oil in cooking pan. Season meat and then add to oil. For the seasoning I used Adobo all purpose seasoning with pepper. They do sell it without pepper if you don’t care for black pepper. I highly recommend buying this seasoning. Its fudging awesome! I use it on pork, beef, chicken, and on some veggies too. Even on ice cream... well okay not really but it is awesome.

 

So as the meat starts cooking I dice up the potato and onion.

Then add that goodness to the meat…..Like:

Cover and cook for about 15 minutes. Mix salsa with the flour with a whisk and add to meat. Let meat with salsa simmer for an additional 5-10 minutes.

If you don’t want to make salsa or lack ingredients to make some use Salsa El Pato which is mainly a spicy tomato sauce. This sauce is really good. In fact I usually use it when making this dish but decided to use homemade salsa instead.

 

Serve bistec con papas y salsa as tacos or with rice and beans. Enjoy! If you try this recipe out or put your own twist on it please do share.

 

Pork Stew

This recipe I came up with when I was in the mood for chili but didn’t have all the ingredients to make it. So I looked in the pantry and looked at a few food sites and came up with the following:

 

 

You can top off with crackers, cheese, diced avocado or pour over some mashed potatoes or white rice. All by the way SUPER yummy! So to create you will need the following:

 

1 ½ pound of boneless pork loin

1 can of corn

1 can of black beans

1 can diced tomatoes

6 chile guajillos

1 package of hot chili mix

 

First remove seeds and stems from guajillo peppers and rinse. Put the peppers in water and boil with about a tsp of salt. Once peppers are tender pour peppers and water into blender and blend.

 

 Next cut boneless pork loin about one inch. Spray pan (I used my cast iron deep pan) with cooking spray and toss in meat. Sprinkle some salt over meat and sear for about 10 minutes.

 

 

Once meat has a nice crisp on it add in all canned drained rinsed goods. Well don’t rinse the tomatoes. Duh…. You can even chop up some fresh tomatoes…but I was kind of winging the recipe as I went along. So next add in your mole sauce….BUT use a food strainer to catch seeds and whatever like……

 

 

Then add in hot chili mix. You can use mild chili mix if you are weak. Let simmer and enjoy!
Pictured below over mashed potatoes....