Looking for recipe ideas for your July 4th celebration? Here are a number of our favorites from the Blue Kitchen archives.
JULY 4th IS AT THE APEX OF GRILLING SEASON IN THE UNITED STATES. It’s practically written into our constitution that every household shall cook out of doors on this day. So I’m going to start this post with ideas for the meal’s centerpiece. Continue reading “Recipes for a delicious 4th of July”
Canned black beans cooked with onion, red bell pepper, garlic and chipotle peppers in adobo sauce make a smoky, spicy, show-stealing side for pork chops, chicken and fish—or a vegetarian meal with tofu. Recipe and variations below.
There is something almost primeval about combining food and smoke. Cooking with fire and its attendant smoke links us to our earliest ancestors. Indeed to all our ancestors before the invention of gas and, later, electric stoves. Smoke is why we love hot dogs charred on sticks over campfires. And why, when grilling season rolls around, some of us refuse to cook indoors again until the first snowfall.
But there are simple ways to add the taste of smoke to foods without firing up the grill, some as close as the supermarket shelves. One of our favorites is canned chipotle peppers in adobo sauce. Continue reading “Where there’s smoke, there’s delicious: Braised Pork Chops with Chipotle Black Beans”
Butcher and chef Chris Turner marinates thinly sliced beef short ribs in a mixture that includes garlic, onion, Asian pear, mirin, soy sauce and sesame oil to create authentic Kalbi Korean Barbecued Beef Short Ribs. Recipe below.
On a recent visit to our favorite butcher shop, The Butcher & Larder, we saw butcher Jimmy Shay working over thin slices of beef short ribs with the back edge of a cleaver. When we asked what he was up to, he said he was tenderizing them so that fellow butcher Chris Turner could turn them into the “most amazing, authentic kalbi, Korean barbecued beef.” We immediately asked Chris if he would share the recipe—and story behind it—here. Happily, he said yes:
Continue reading “Guest chef: Chris Turner rocks Grilled Kalbi Korean Beef Short Ribs”
Lamb Navarin combines lamb, peas, carrots, new potatoes and turnips for a spring stew that is hearty, but lighter tasting than beef stew. Recipe below.
MANY RECIPES HERE ARE INSPIRED BY COOKBOOKS. THIS ONE WAS INSPIRED BY A NOVEL. The World at Night is set mainly in Paris, in the early 1940s, during the time of German occupation. To call it a tale of intrigue and romance is accurate enough, but falls far short of doing it justice. Continue reading “Navarin d’Agneau: a French lamb stew for spring”
For many home cooks, meat takes the biggest bite out of the food budget. There are plenty of cheap cuts, though. Some require a little extra care to tenderize them (or acceptance of the fact that their extra fat is what makes them delicious as well as affordable), but all will reward you with big flavor while saving you money. Here are five cheap cuts we love.
Lamb’s wonderfully rich flavor is often matched by its price tag. Not these guys. Lamb shoulder chops (like the one pictured above) deliver as much or more lamby goodness as pricier (and tinier) lamb rib or loin chops. And their sometimes chewy texture can be tenderized quickly with a citrus marinade or dry brining. They also respond well to braising. Continue reading “Top cheap cuts: five flavorful, budget-friendly meat choices”
A lemon juice/olive oil/tarragon marinade quickly tenderizes lamb shoulder chops and adds a lively citrus note. Recipe below.
Lamb is one of our favorite carnivorous pleasures. And shoulder lamb chops are one of our go-tos for scratching our occasional lamby itch. They’re typically one of the cheaper cuts, they cook quickly and they’re big on flavor. Unfortunately, they can also be chewy. The good news is there are simple techniques to tenderize these delicious chops. Continue reading “Pan-grilled Lemon Tarragon Lamb Chops, weeknight quick and naturally tender”
Juniper berries add a subtle, light freshness to pork meatballs. Wine, sherry and sour cream create a simple sauce. Recipes below.
This weird and messy winter just won’t quit us. Today it is a pleasant 50 degrees, and sunny, and all our windows are open. But Saturday was cheerless and frigid, and not that far in our future is “damp and raw,” “periods of rain” and even a nasty “wintry mix.”
The term wintry mix always sounds so dull and industrial. And it always makes me remember Sonny Eliot, a “weathercaster” in the Detroit of my youth, who brought the spirit of playfulness to TV reporting.
Continue reading “Refreshing the taste of comfort: Pork Meatballs with Juniper Berries”
A pork loin roast is coated with a glaze of Dijon mustard, rosemary, shallot and garlic, allowed to marinate for several hours, then roasted until just cooked through. Recipe below.
We are so over winter. Two weeks ago, I reported here that we were already a foot over our annual average of three feet of snow. We have now had more than five feet of snow, and we’re not done.
The only good thing I can say about the weather is that it encourages firing up the oven and roasting savory cuts of meat. The warmth fills the entire apartment, as do wonderful, meaty fragrances. Chickens, beef pot roasts and, when I’m feeling flush, legs of lamb all spring to mind when I’m ready to roast. Somehow, though, as much as I cook with pork, I seldom think of it as a roast. This weekend, I decided it was time to fix that. Continue reading “Dinner fit for winter’s apparently endless tale: Mustard-glazed Pork Loin Roast”
Mexican pork short ribs are given a classic French comfort food treatment, oven braised with aromatics, herbs and wine. Recipe below.
Our neighborhood is rich with little Mexican groceries, each with a small produce section and dairy case (that shuns anything low fat), aisles of canned goods and imported candy, and—no matter how tiny the store—each with its own fresh meat counter, presided over by a living, breathing butcher.
The other night, during one of the rare breaks in the snowfall, I was walking around looking at stuff in the neighborhood and remembered we were out of, well, everything fresh. So I clomped across Diversey to the store we now like the best (it is “the one that is kind of across the street”—our immediate ambit also includes “the one around the corner,” “the creepy one by the El,” and “no, five blocks west is too far”). Continue reading “Classic Mexican cut of meat meets French technique: Braised Costillos de Puerco”
This is my first experience cooking with a slow cooker—pot roast with carrots, onions, rosemary, bay leaves, garlic and red wine. Recipe below.
This recipe is brought to you by Black Friday. For some years now, Marion and her sister Lena have treated Black Friday as an annual, mostly-for-entertainment ritual. At some point on Thanksgiving Day, the ad-fat Chicago Tribune is explored and a plan of attack is, well, planned. Lena arrives at our house in the predawn hours on Friday and they head off. By late morning, they’re breakfasting in some pancake house and relishing the shopping adventures they’ve just shared. My total involvement in previous years’ predawn sorties has been to open one eye and wish Marion good hunting as she departed.
This year, we slept in. After a leisurely breakfast, we all headed out mid-morning with just a couple of goals in mind. A slow cooker was not one of them. But as we stood in a checkout line, wildly discounted mattress pads and comforters filling our arms, we saw the impressive tower of slow cookers, also impressively priced. Continue reading “That ’70s cooking experience: Slow Cooker Pot Roast with Carrots”