Empty the Fridge Beef Stew

I have accumulated a lot of vegetables in my fridge and it's time to empty the thing.
Time to make stew, I'll only have to fill in th blank with a few things. The rest are in my fridge.

2.5 lbs of cubed stew beef
4 stalks of celery
2 cloves of garlic
2 yellow onion
2 potatoes
a box of mushrooms
2 jalapeños
3 sticks of green onion
some fresh parsley
Salt and pepper
Curry powder
4 cup container of beef broth
Dried rosemary
some red wine...
yes. this will last me a while.



First, I was suppose to brown the beef and sauté the onions and celery. I tried, but the pot I have is not that big. Oil and beef and onions and celery in the pot, medium/high heat. Some of it got brown, other parts kinda cooked, other parts starting to burn. It's time to move on. I dumped the broth and other stuff in. Other stuff includes everything but the potatoes and the mushrooms. If I had carrots, that would wait too. Simmer for about an hour and a half, the beef needs to get tender. After that put the rest of the ingredients in. and simmer for another hour.



The stew should get thicker and the beef and potatoes should be falling apart just a bit.

The taste test:



It was ok... , but a lot of the earlier vegetables like onions and celery melted. The jalapeños is a kick in the butt. Something is missing. It needed more salt. I added more salt and it was still kinda goodish.. I added too much, but still better than before.

Overall it was decent. If I do a better job of adjusting the salt,it would've been very good. It does seem like a bit of a waste of vegetables when so much of it melted and the taste is so full that it's hard to detect each taste. I think the secret to stews is to keep it simple and not throw everything in. That way you know what you're eating. Mystery stew is not a good thing. Oh, and use lots of salt but be careful how much to use.

-a

Cornish Hen with Honey Orange Glaze

Tonight I made Cornish Hen. I like the fact that I'm cooking the whole animal. Makes me feel caveman.

1 Cornish Hen, I had 2 but 1 was enough, the other one is gonna freeze
Sea Salt, Grounded pepper
Honey
Orange Marmalade



First chop the chicken in halves lengthwise, rinse the chicken and dry it with paper towel. Rub salt and pepper on all sides. Mix the honey and orange marmalade together. It was kinda thick so I threw a splash of raspberry vodka on it. Yeah, I just wanted some alcohol. It thin out the glaze some and it's easier to brush on the chicken.

Spread the glaze on all sides of the chicken. Bake it at 400, brush the chicken with the juice every 15 minutes. Bake for a total of 45 minutes.



I also made some rice as a side. It looks delicious.



Taste pretty good too. I think it can use a little more spice, maybe a little charred skin would make it crisy. That would be even better. Good nevertheless. The breast is kinda dry, but not as bad as bigger chicken. The next bird sitting in the freezer right now will get some chili pepper treatment. I'll up the temperature and maybe shorten the time.

-a

Chicken with mushroom cream sauce

I make chicken all the time but alway with dry spices. This time I'm gonna try making sauce.

3 Chicken thighs
A bunch of mushrooms.
A Bit of flour
Some milk
A pinch of chicken broth cube crushed up
Butter
Green onion
a clove of garlic
Cheap white wine

I marinade the chicken in the cheap wine and some green onions. I meant to do this overnight, but something came up and I ended up marinaded the chicken for 2 nights.

I had extra mushrooms so I baked the mushrooms and the chicken together. 350 for 40 minutes.



To make the sauce, I cook the mushrooms in butter until it's a nice soft. Then I put in the chopped up green onions and chopped up garlic. After a while, I put in the chicken broth crumbs and a bit of water. Stir it a bit and pour in the milk and flour. Keep stirring and heat in low heat until it's thick.



When the chicken is done, pour the sauce on the chicken and eat.



The chicken tasted a bit bitter from the wine. Not the best, I have to use a different marinade next time or just don't do it for so long. The sauce tasted good, but again, not perfect. Need more experimenting with sauce. Totally ODing on mushrooms. No more for a couple weeks.

-a

Pulled Pork with Baked Beans

I like pulled pork. When they're good, it melts in your mouth. I looked up how to do this and it seem easy. Lets do this.

3 lb pork shoulder roast
2 cloves of garlic
a big can of baked beans as side
chili powder
salt and pepper
1/2 cup of barbecue sauce, I like Sweet Baby Ray's.
1/4 cup of vinegar



First take the roast and spread salt, pepper, chili powder, and minced garlic all over it. Put it a oven pan and cover it with foil. You got to make it bake in its own sweat or it'll dry. Bake the roast at 350 for 4 hours. Yes, it takes that long to break down the meat so it will be tender. Meanwhile, just chill.

After the 4 hours, let the meat sit and resoak some of the juice back into the meat. Then use two forks to shred it. The meat should just fall right off.



Do this in the oven pan so it can soak up the rest of the juice that got baked off. I then put it in a pot to mix with the vinegar and BBQ sauce over low heat. Just mix it well, add more chili powder, pepper, whatever you want.

Throw the beans in another pot and just heat it up and you got a side.

You can put the pulled pork on buns for a sandwich, but I'm not a big bread guy. So I eat it with a fork on a plate.



This was absolutely delicious. I love it. Plus I got enough to last me a couple more meals. Shoulder roast have just enough fat on it to make it melt. Ohh man, foodgasm..

-a

Lazy man's Seafood Gumbo

I had toothache and didn't feeling chewing much. I'm making gumbo!
I looked up how to make gumbo from scratch and just didn't feel like doing all the work. I bought some gumbo mix, a bunch of vegetables and went to work.



1 pack of Zatarain's Gumbo mix. (They're so good it doesn't make sense to make it from scratch)
a few stalks of celery
a yellow onion
a stem of green onion
a couple mild peppers (I'm not sure what kind, below is a picture of it, maybe you know what kind)
a can of crab meat
about a dozen oysters (thanks mom)
Random dashes of Louisiana hot sauce



I threw everything except the crab and oysters in a big pot, add 6 cups of water and bring to a boil. Simmer for ten minutes and throw in the crab and oysters. Simmer for another 15 minutes and it's ready.



I was good. The oyster goes great with the gumbo. Everything was perfect. Yeah, using prepackaged mix might be cheating considering that I'm writing a cooking blog about it. It was good and I don't care.

-a

Pan seared ribeye steak

Simple steak, I've done steak before and did them quite well. But this is a new method that I'm trying out. Usually, I throw a steak and a pan and cook until done at medium rare like I like it. This time I'm going to just sear the outside at super high heat and finish it in the oven. It is suppose to create a caramelized outer crust that is gonna be tasty. Here it goes!

Ribeye steak, about 2/3 pound, an inch thick
sea salt
fresh grounded pepper
oil
frozen broccolis as a side



First I rub the salt and pepper on both sides and let the steak rest until it's room temperature. Then I heat the pan at high heat for a few minutes. Add the oil and let that get super hot. Meanwhile the oven is preheating to 275.

Throw the steak on, 2 minutes a side. It already look delicious. Throw it in the oven. I think this part need some adjusting. I was busy doing laundry and other stuff and lost track of time here. So I don't know how long it was in there for. Frozen broccolis are being microwaved now too.

Put everything on th plate for picture time.



This steak probably could've ben good, but I overcooked it. I like steak at medium rare and it came out medium well.



I had to use steak sauce to chew down this shoe leather. As thin this steak is, I probably could've skipped the whole oven part. The caramelized crust thing was good though. The outside of the steak was actually excellent, just the dried and tough overcooked inside that I didn't like. I've done better steak before. This kinda suck.

-a

Goat cheese pizza

I've had this one time at some restaurant, forgot where or what's the name of the restaurant. It was good and I'm gonna try to remake it. Goat cheese is expensive but if this comes out as good as the restaurant had it, it will be worth it. This is not really a eat till you're full type of meal, more a fancy appetizer thing. If this is good, next pot luck type thing, this is what I'll make. Yes, invite me to more stuff please.

1 thin crust pizza crust
2 packages of crumbled goat cheese
a handful of grapes
2 sausages
some olive oil.



First I spread the olive oil on one side of the crust and spread the goat cheese on top of it. cut up the grapes in halves and put them all over the pizza. Cut up the sausage in small pieces and do the same. This might a a part where I can go either way, I used raw sausage and most internet recipes with other sausage pizza uses cooked sausage. I think I just have to bake them longer.



I baked it at 350 for about 45 minutes. I had to completely cook the sausage. The crust turned out crispy. Exactly how I wanted it.



It turned out awesome. Cheese is a bit strong so it's not a really eat until you're full pizza. But perfect if cut up smaller as finger food, for those fancy schmancy parties. Probably really good with wine.

Throw more parties, people.

-a