Not feeling okey dokey? BROIL!

Wherein Mr. Ullman salutes the pork tenderloin in an odd way-- it is easy

Not a great week.  Basically spent most of it feeling vile and had no
real desire to eat.  However, one must.  So this is going to be a real
easy one.

I love pork tenderloin.  I was going to do a stuffing I love.  That
didn't happen.  I was going to do a sweet and sour sauce.  I didn't do
that either.

So what is easy?  How about a more or less straight-forward broil?  Sounds good.

So this is what I did.   I had some green and red kale.  I had some
mushrooms.  I had some baby leeks.  I had an orange.

So I chopped up the kale and the mushrooms.  I peeled the orange.  I
took a couple of slices from the orange and rub the tenderloin and
sprinkled some thyme on it.  I then took the kale, leeks, mushrooms
and two more orange slices into the blender. Hit chop.

By this time the oven should be about to broiling.  I rolled the pork
in the blended mixture and put into an over safe pan with a bit of
oil.  Whatever of the blended mixture that was leftover I tossed into
the pan.  Broiled for 15 minutes, Flipped and add some goat cheese on
the upside (goat cheese tends to toast rather then melt).  And I also
noticed I screwed up the rice which should give you an idea about how
bad I was feeling.

Served with a salad.

Not bad but it needs a little work.

Bell Peppers – They are actually botanically fruits which explains a lot!

Wherein the character of bell peppers are questioned

Bell peppers exist to offend no one. The choice of red, green or golden bells has more to do with your taste in colors then your taste in flavor. No one would mistake these things for apples.

But stuffing them does give them a bit of a shine. The bells really don't add anything but but are pleasant enough and seem to encourage better conversations between the other flavors. I know people who provide the same service at bars.

The base of the stuffing is important but a little experimentation will be your guide. I have used sausages, pulled pork and chicken with great success. Rice or potatoes work well. Tofu too.

I am going to use Bulgar wheat simply because I am eating to much meat recently. It is a friendly grain for someone who cooks for themselves. For the most part you use 2 parts of water to one part of wheat. This makes it easy to prepare as much Bulgar wheat as need. What makes Bulgar even more friendly it that it can be soaked rather then boiled.

One of the problems with a lot grains is the difficulty in using them without some waste. Short grain white rice is equally friendly ratio-wise (though not necessary tasty). Brown rice is a good example of the problem.

Take a look at the instructions on the back of the package of brown rice. One cup of rice, 2 ½ cups of water to make 3 ½ cups of rice. However, all I usually need is a ½ cup of rice. The rice to water ratio won't work in this case – most of the water will boil off before you can use it to simmer the rice. If you try to add more water there is a good chance you will add to much and end up with soggy rice. Not that big of a deal with rice since you can use it in a number of ways. Other grains are not so useful.

Cook the Bulgar wheat per the instructions on the package. I usually just soak it but that is a personal choice. Since I am going to make two peppers I would make about a half a cup raw, a full cup when the water is adsorbed.

Grab an apple and mince. Get a sweet onion (Walla Wallas are great) and finely chop up about a third of it. Take a couple of good tasting mushrooms and slice them. Mince some flat-leaf parsley and mix in a bit of cumin and rosemary. Take two cloves of garlic (or one clove of a shallot) and finely chop.

Get a pan and add some oil. Turn the knob to medium and allow it to heat up. Toss in the onion and mushrooms into the pan and saute for about four minutes. Toss in the garlic and let cook for about 30 seconds. Add in the parsley mixture and chase it around the pan for a lap. Place all the items, except the bell peppers, in a large bowl and mix heroically.

Heat the oven to 350f. Slice off the top of the peppers and remove the seeds. Fill the pepper about half way with the Bulgar wheat mixture, add some cheese (I would suggest a soft cheese), fill it most of the rest of the way, more cheese, and put a hat of the mixture on the final layer of cheese.

Place in the oven on a baking pan and cook until the tops are brown and the peppers are soft.

I usually eat with cottage cheese & oranges as the salad.

Roasted Garlic and the Breast

Wherein Mr Ullman professes his love for roasted garlic while Mr Broman appears to express some doubts.

Chicken breast. This isn't that sort of Blog.

There is nothing bad to be said about roasted garlic. I eat it alone. I spread it on crackers. I use it on salads. I have used it on fish, beef, pork, lamb, potatoes and corn. Should someone start a religion that worships roasted garlic I will be the first to the baptistry pool.

Let's start with roasting the garlic because this is where heaven is announced. This is the very definition of simple.

Heat your oven to 400 F.

Remove the outer layer of skin – the packaging so to speak – so that the individual cloves, still in their skins, are exposed.

Chop the top ¼ inch off the top of the cloves.

Drizzle olive oil on the heads of cloves. Don't over do it but make sure each clove is covered. By the way, feel free to go crazy here. I have used seed oils, nut oils, veggie oils. I have yet to meet a oil that that garlic didn't like.

Place the garlic into a muffin pan (or, if you are like me and view baking as someone else's problem, a cupped bit of aluminum foil).

Bake for 30-35 minutes until the cloves are soft.

Let those suckers cool enough to touch-- if you raise a blister it is to soon.

Reserve two cloves to be spread on wheat cracker or if you have a date – sorry about that, it is not that sort of blog (as an aside of you are blending it with mayo make certain the mayo is allowed to get to room temperature).

Create bread crumbs. I usually just toast some bread and crush it into fine chunks and dust. In this case I used whole wheat since I didn't want the bread fighting with the garlic.

Chop up some leeks, a bit of mint and mushrooms as finely as possible and toss them into a bowl with the bread crumbs. Throw is some thyme just for the hell of it. A zest would be good too but I haven't tried that yet. Toss.

I should have mentioned that this should all be done while the garlic was roasting. However, I got distracted.

While the garlic is still warm squeeze the garlic out its skin and rub it on the boneless chicken breast . I use about two cloves per side and only leave a few chunks behind. Put the breading mix into a plastic bag, throw in the chicken breast and shake vigorously so that the chicken if fully covered.

Heat the oven back to 400 F. Cook for thirty minutes, 15 on aside. I usually serve with coleslaw for no particular reason.

 

Halibut that (Or you have my phone number damnit!)

There are certain people in my life who I find breathtaking interesting but with whom the relationship is confined, slightly creepily, to a certain location. There are other folks who, on brief occasions, I wish were bit more location specific.

I know a 46 year old who is brilliant, smart, well read, funny, outlandishly beautiful and (damn it) a lesbian. She also has a weakness for appearing at my doorstep a couple times a year with a small group of people and an entree. She doesn't call in advance.

 

So this is a story of such a visit. Halibut was the dish. Skinned thankfully but one large fillet.

Unexpected fish is something of a pain. Bring me unannounced lamb, pork or beef and I can wipe up something up regardless of the state of my larder. With care, something that tastes good on pork will taste good lamb or beef. This isn't really true with fish. 

Fish is all about textures. Throw a tilapia into boiling water with a good selection of herbs and I am with you. Do the same with salmon or trout and I'll not only pity your guests but I am likely to hunt you down and make the last hours of your life notable.

When I have guests over I will usually do a recipe mainly because the quantity of the food involved. If I want to wing it I would cook something that has individual servings like pork chops. No big deal about making sure the meat is not going to taste wildly different on different areas. Each has a pork chop and I can do each pork chop the same way.

Halibut is a shared dished so I would usually do a recipe. This assumes that the halibut and three diners don't show up out of the blue. It assumes you have some time for prep and for shopping.

So it was a time to open some wine and give the fridge a cold, hard look. There were some onions, some kale and some other very sharp veggies and roots. Halibut is a sweet fish so you don't want to overpower it. However, I did have a good supply of fruits. 

This is what I did. I cut up a Honeygold grapefruit and put it off to the side. I also vigorously chopped up two mandarin oranges, canned pineapple (eek), a bit of mango,two green, red or yellow peppers and put them off on a different side. I gave the avocado a serious looking at and decided to pass (ripeness issues).

Most fish cooks fast so you have to prep things before you start cooking the fish. I took the mandarin oranges, pineapple and mango and put them in a mixing bowl. I added some lemon juice ( a couple of squirts), a bit of chives and some lime zest. For some shapeness I added three cocktail onions that were drained, rinsed and chopped finely. I added a dash of oregano simply because there was no reason not to add it to the dish. Thought about some honey and decided to pass again. I tossed this together.

I got out a baking dished. I took the Honeygold grapefruit and squeezed some juice on both sides of the fish. Then I took some grapeseed oil and rubbed it on the fish. I placed the fish into baking dish and peeled the skin off the remaining grapefruit slices and placed it around, not on, the fish. Heated the oven to 350 F and tented the dish with some aluminum foil to slightly hold in the essence of the grapefruit slices.

You should cook the halibut for about five minutes (it depends on the thickness, see the internet). For the last two minutes stick the mandarin orange, chives, pineapple et al into the oven in a covered dish to heat that mixture slightly.

Divide the fish and put the fruit mixture on top. On the side, offer sour cream with a some grated cucumber, dill weed and minced garlic just in case. The veggie in this case was lightly fried asparagus (that will be addressed later) -- the fiber was wild rice.

Just a note about the art.  Carl Broman did the drawings.  With a bit of luck this will become a feature. I certainly hope so.