Roasted Shrimp Cocktail

Posted on by tinycookba
2


In honor of last night’s mid-season premier of The Walking Dead, I made Roasted Shrimp with “Bloody” Cocktail Sauce and it was bloody delicious!  If you’re looking for a quick, easy, make-ahead recipe for Valentine’s Day tomorrow, look no further.  The traditional way to cook shrimp for shrimp cocktail is to boil them in seasoned water.  This recipe, from Barefoot Contessa, roasts the shrimp, which I think makes them tastier and easier to work with than a giant pot of boiling water.  I used 21-25 shrimp per pound, instead of the super jumbo shrimp she suggests, and if you choose to go smaller too, just remember to reduce the cooking time to about 5 minutes. The cocktail sauce takes all of 2 minutes to put together and it’s out of this world with a great kick to it.

“Cooking done with care is an act of love.” – Craig Claiborne

Strawberry Jam

Posted on by tinycookba
1

When I saw the first luscious strawberries of the season at the farmers market, one thought came to mind: Strawberry Jam.  I had a Quick Strawberry Jam recipe from Martha Stewart that I’ve been wanting to make, so I went for it.  I changed things up every so slightly and here’s what I did:

I hulled and chopped 2 overflowing green baskets worth of strawberries (I chopped them rather than put them in the food processor because I like some texture to my jam).

I added ½ cup of sugar and 2 Tablespoons of lemon juice and cooked over medium-high heat for about 10 minutes, until it was the thickness I liked.

It lasted 10 days until it was all gobbled up.  The kids had it on they PB&J, my husband put it on toast, and I stirred it into Greek yogurt.  The verdict: I thought it was a bit too sweet (and the strawberries weren’t even the uber sweet ones yet), my sweetie-loving husband also thought it was too sweet.  So, next batch I’m going to use only 1/4 cup of sugar and 1 Tablespoon lemon juice and see how that tastes; maybe I can get it down to even less sugar than that!  One more note – you could make a really big batch of this and freeze it in smaller containers and skip the whole sterilizing process!

Pupusas at the Farmers Market!

Posted on by tinycookba
2

I had the most amazing pupusa this morning at the Westchester Farmers Market – Beans, cheese, a cabbage salad (curtido), and spicy salsa – all for only $2!  Seriously, those El Salvadorans need to raise their prices.  I’ll do some blogging soon about our trip to El Salvador that my family took a few months ago, and I’ll also show you how I made my own pupusas at home.  They taste extraordinary, they are healthy, and they are very easy to make!  For now, just drool over the picture above.

Potstickers and Purple Brussel Sprouts with Browned Butter and Lemon!

Posted on by tinycookba
Reply

Happy (Chinese) New Year!

I am back my foodie friends!  We had a busy, but wonderful, holiday season and now I am trying to get caught up with real life.  I’m a bit behind on posts, but here are a few you can look forward to: Kalbi (Korean short ribs), Artichoke Pie, Arancini, Swedish Meatballs, Baked Potato Soup, Goat Cheese Quiche, and much, much more!

For now, let’s talk about Pork and Shrimp Potstickers (made in honor of the Chinese New Year), and Purple Brussel Sprouts with Browned Butter and Lemon.  When I took the kids to the farmers market last week, I asked them to find fruits and veggies from every color of the rainbow, and to our surprise and delight, we found purple brussel sprouts!  I trimmed the bottom, quartered them, and drizzled them with olive oil and kosher salt and roasted them on a sheet pan in a 425 degree oven for about 20 minutes.  Then I took 2 Tablespoons of butter, and browned it over medium heat in a small skillet, and poured it over the brussel sprouts in a bowl.  I squeezed some lemon juice until it tasted yummy and added a little bit more kosher salt.  Simple and SO delicious.  We all scarfed them down and my kids even asked for seconds.  I’m not sure there was a discernable difference between the purple brussel sprouts and the green ones, but my husband was convinced these were less bitter.  And the reason I’m talking about them before the potstickers is because those purple brussel sprouts stole the show!

Okay, now onto potstickers, which I got the recipe from FineCooking.com.  The mixture of pork, shrimp, and other yummy stuff was easy to mix up – you can easily substitute the pork with ground chicken.  Also, next time I would do either pork or shrimp because I didn’t feel like the shrimp flavor really came through.  I do wish I had ground my own pork shoulder in the food processor (next time!), because my 95% fat free ground pork that I got at the market, made the dumplings not as moist as I would like.

A few more recipe notes: I did not make my own dumpling dough – just bought the round dumpling wrappers from the market.  Also, I did not have rice wine or sherry, so I used marsala.  The scallion-soy dipping sauce took the potstickers over the top (salty, sour, and sweet), I’m only sorry I forgot to take a picture of it!  If using store-bought dumpling wrappers, dab a little water around the edges, or if you have a 4-year-old kid, they would be happy to do that for you.

Assembling them was pretty easy and this particular recipe made tons!

So, I froze half of them and can’t wait to put them into broth with some veggies, for won ton soup!