Some of the best and most delicious busy week-night comfort food you can put together for your family may not be the fanciest or prettiest, but it certainly delivers satisfaction.

These recipes often also leave you with baking pans that have a crust of baked-on food that can leave the cook with a, let’s try to say this nicely, lessened enthusiasm for making that recipe again. There isn’t a much†more dispiriting thing in the kitchen than a baking pan that has a death grip on baked-on cheese and pasta.

Be honest – how often do you consider a recipe, think it sounds delicious, but then a vision of the baking pan you will have to clean later puts you off the whole enterprise? I don’t like using throw-away foil pans, so that’s not a short-cut I consider for feeding the family on a daily basis.

I tend to use olive oil to coat my baking pans or, if I run out of that, I use a discount oil spray (because that’s what I have on hand a lot). Whether it’s high quality and tasty olive oil or butter or cheapy spray, food still sticks on the pan.

If I am the one loading the dishwasher I scrub the pan with the steel scrubber I use for my stainless steel pans – sometimes with a lot of elbow grease – and then put it into the dishwasher. If someone ELSE loads the dishwasher, they don’t pre-scrub, and I go to unload the washer to find a pan with very well-washed, baked-on food on the pan. I then have to scrub the pan with the scrubber and put it through AGAIN. Yeah – tell me I am not the only one with this issue?

BlogHer – working with the makers of PAM® – reached out to some blog reviewers to use their new spray formulation. You can learn more about the new PAM at this link and also ìlikeî their Facebook page.

I am going to share my experience with this new product, a recipe, and also a chance to win a $100 Cooking.com gift card giveaway plus coupons for the new and improved PAM Cooking Spray and Hunt’s Tomatoes (details at the bottom of this page)

So you could see from the photos above that I made a baked cheesy sausage rigatoni. I hope you try the recipe. Its not a major innovation in recipe development and won’t win any Nobel Prizes, BUT I think your family will find it irresistibly delicious both on the day you make it fresh and as leftovers at school and work the next day.

I have video farther down of the dish burbling away in the oven-you should have smelled it-knock out. Watching the video is the next best thing, and maybe it will entice you to try it.

In terms of stick-factor, this recipe definitely offered a challenge to the new PAM spray formulation.

And how did that turn out, you may ask? I can tell you that the stuck-on food came off with just my bare fingers-amazing huh? I then poured some hot, soapy water in the pan and grabbed my iPhone and shot the video below-showing you how the food was just barely clinging. After the video I rinsed the pan, ran a soapy sponge across it to remove oils and then rinsed it again, et voila – done with the clean up.

Please dont forget to enter the giveaway at the bottom of this page!

Herb Kissed Sausage Whole Wheat Rigatoni Bake

Ingredients

• 1 lb box whole wheat rigatoni
• 1-2 pounds raw sweet Italian sausage, cooked, diced
• 4-6 cups pasta sauce (not white cheese sauce type)
• 32 ounces whole milk ricotta
• 2 whole eggs
• 8-10 ounces freshly shredded mozzarella
• one large ball of fresh mozzarella, sliced
• bunch of fresh basil, rough chop
• bunch of fresh oregano, rough chop
• 1/2 Spanish onion, diced finely
• 1-2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 3 tablespoons good olive oil
• salt as needed

Directions

Boil whole wheat rigatoni about 3/4 of recommended time, drain, set aside.

Preheat oven to 375 F.

Saute sausages on medium heat until 3/4 cooked and nicely browned on the outside.

Remove sausage and cut into small pieces.

In the sausage pan, saute onions in leftover oil, sprinkle with a bit of salt.

Once lightly browned, add garlic and turn off the heat and set aside.

Mix ricotta, eggs, basil, oregano, 1 teaspoon salt, until fluffy.

Fold in sautÈed onions and 3/4 of the shredded mozzarella.

Spray your baking pan(s) with PAM lightly. Add boiled pasta. I had to split this recipe across two baking pans. Add 1/2 pasta sauce to each pan, add 1/2 ricotta mix, add 1/2 sausage, mix evenly. Sprinkle tops with last 1/4 of shredded cheese and also add slices of fresh mozzarella. If you like, add a slight glug of olive oil across the fresh mozzarella. Spray some foil with PAM, and then cover the pans.

Bake them about 30 minutes.

Remove the foil and put the pans back in the oven with it on the broil setting to crisp up the surface cheese. Allow to cool 15 – 20 minutes. Serve and enjoy! Leftovers only get better

SWEEPSTAKES/GIVEAWAY RULES

Prize: $100 Cooking.com gift card giveaway plus coupons for the new and improved PAM Cooking Spray and Hunt’s Tomatoes, courtesy of BlogHer and PAM.

To be entered for a chance to win, let me know your favorite recipe that uses PAM.

No duplicate comments.You may receive (2) total entries by selecting from the following entry methods:

• Leave a comment in response to the sweepstakes prompt on this post
• Tweet about this promotion and leave the URL to that tweet in a comment on this post
• Blog about this promotion and leave the URL to that post in a comment on this post
• For those with no Twitter or blog, read the official rules to learn about an alternate form of entry.

This sweepstakes runs from 2/1 – 3/31.

This giveaway is open to US Residents age 18 or older. Winners will be selected via random draw, and will be notified by e- mail. You have 72 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected. The Official Rules are available here.†

Be sure to visit the PAM round-up page on BlogHer.com where you can read other bloggersí reviews and find more chances to win!

Food can be non-intuitive if you eat mindlessly. When you fall into a rut with your daily cooking or if you never venture out of box or frozen food from the store or are always eating out in restaurants sort of like they are your dorm cafeteria, you miss an opportunity to hear what food has to say to you.

When you are bored with cooking or what you have been eating, its your body’s way of telling you that its well past time to wake up and pay attention.

What better way to wake up the mind and mouth than with the deep mind-awakening transformation that can happen when you eat a cuisine that has spent 1,000s of years intensely focused on the information within food and how our bodies respond to that information.

Indian cuisine is not just something you buy off an all-you-can-eat buffet line in an indian food restaurant, in a building which had once been a Supercuts or a pet store or a shoe or eyeglass store in a forlorn strip mall somewhere near your work.

Its food that can be made at home and it can bring you great satisfaction, not only on the palate but also a sense of accomplishment as you broaden your food knowledge and choices.

When you cook from the Indian Cuisine universe you get to enjoy the perfume and alchemy that happens as you cook with spices and then you get to sit down to food that will not only fill your belly but enliven the rest of your being from your toes, to your chest, to your sinuses, to your imagination.

A good place to start is with a resource that will guide you to the irridescent pools of Indian spice magic at home; start with Hari Nayak’s new cookbook “My Indian Kitchen: Preparing Delicious Indian Meals without Fear or Fuss“.

Chef Nayak’s books are always visually mouth-watering and the recipes are approachable, authentic, and delicious. I reviewed another of his books previously – “Modern Indian Cooking by Hari Nayak and Vikas Khanna“.

He has worked at famed New York restaurants like Aquavit and Daniel, has just opened the Soul & Spice Restaurant in Kuwait, and owns the Orissa restaurant in Dobbs Ferry, NY. These are just a FEW of the many things he has going on, very busy guy.

You can see a video trailer for the book here.

I decided to give a couple of more mainstream recipes a try in this book to help gauge how well it enables the average non-Indian cook to prepare favorite treats.

I made the most delicious potato and pea samosas (page 58) and found it to be very simple. Nayak provides plenty of guidance on how to make the samosa dough from scratch and then how to form these pockets of goodness.

My photos show a samosa made by a shortcut – using wonton wrappers. You can use either method with great success. My family completely enjoyed these, they were gone as soon as they cooled.

I also made another favorite, roti, chapati, or parathas (these all vary a bit but are similar in shape and all can be made with an infinite variety of additions/secret touches).

This recipe could NOT have been any easier and the result was simply delicious. Again Nayak provides a lovely illustrated guide to making these griddle cakes.

These too were eaten by my little kids as soon as they had cooled enough.

Some particular aspects of this book include:

• Indian cooking for the spice sensitive
• Which wines to pair with Indian cuisine
• How to jazz up your summer grilling ideas by using Indian ingredients and flavors
• How to create an Indian/Bollywood-themed cocktail party with his bruschetta recipes using Indian flavors for a twist.
• Diwali, the festival of lights, celebrated from Wednesday, October 26 through Sunday, October 30 this year. Hari can explain why it is an important holiday in the Indian culture, how it is celebrated and what food traditions are associated with it.

I have really enjoyed this cookbook and I look forward to more of Hari Nayak’s books in the future! Its my hope that you will get an opportunity to give this book a try, I highly recommend it.

Book Details

• Title: My Indian Kitchen: Preparing Delicious Indian Meals without Fear or Fuss
• Hardcover: 160 pages
• Publisher: Tuttle Publishing (August 10, 2011)
• ISBN-10: 080484089X
• ISBN-13: 978-0804840897
• Book Dimensions: 11.8 x 9.1 x 0.8 inches

This is a both a cookbook review and a giveaway. Five copies of this cookbook will be given away, the winners being selected on October 31, 2010 when there will be a simultaneous live event by Meredith Laurence, the author, on QVC on In the Kitchen with David at 12pm EDT. She will also be introducing her line of cookware along with her book on that day. The details on the giveaway are found later in this post.

Table of Contents

• Soups and Salads
• Snacks and Sandwiches
• Pasta
• Meat and Poultry
• Fish and Seafood
• Vegetables
• Breakfast
• Desserts and Treats

As with any cookbook author, Laurence seeks to present a select group of recipes to the reader in a certain way to make cooking easier and more enjoyable. Laurence crafts her book around core or basic recipes that introduce basic techniques. She shares some of her experience in these basic recipe sections to help the reader feel more comfortable with these techniques and suggests cookware and tools that makes the job easier. She then shares related recipes that helps novice cooks spread their wings with confidence and creativity.

Examples of basic recipes include:

• Chicken Noodle Soup
• Mac n Cheese
• Roast Chicken
• Meatloaf
• Hamburger
• Mussels
• Roasted Vegetables
• Pancakes
• Cheesecake
• Pie Dough
• Dessert Souffle

For this review I chose the “Chicken Fried Steak” recipe which is listed under the basic recipe “Pan Fried Chicken”. In my version I used pork because thats what I had on hand!

I cut thin medallions from the loin to use in place of the tenderized beef steaks.

I found that we got a delightful and moist result from this simple recipe, I recommend it! As a side, I made fried green tomatoes because its the end of our gardening season and I have an abundance of green tomatoes! That recipe is not one I found in this cookbook.

Chicken Fried Steak (Page 118, modified here to pork vs beef)

Ingredients

• 1 C buttermilk
• 1 C + 2 tablespoons flour, divided in half
• 1 teaspoon salt
• freshly ground pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 4 tenderized round steaks (~5-6 oz each, 1/2 inch thick)
• 1 pound shortening (2 C oil)
• 2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves
• 1 C milk, room temperature

Directions
Preheat oven to 170 F. Pour buttermilk into shallow bowl. Combine 1 C flour, salt, pepper, garlic powder and divide mixture between two separate bowls or plates.

Heat shortening/oil (I used olive oil) in a 12 inch heavy bottomed saute pan, about 1/2 inch of oil. Heat to ~ 350 F. When hot, dip tenderized steaks, one at a time, in the flour, then the buttermilk, then the flour and then put into the pan. Fry about 2 – 3 minutes per side (until golden) and then remove to the oven to keep warm.

When done cooking all meat, drain all but 1 tablespoon of the oil from the pan. Add 2 tablespoons of flour to the pan along with the fresh thyme. Cook about 2 minutes or until flour is cooked. Add the room temperature milk to the pan and scrub up all bits of fried meat from bottom of the pan. Whisk this sauce and cook until it comes to a boil and then thickens. Season with salt and freshly ground pepper.

Pour this gravy into a gravy boat ad serve with the steaks as well as your desired sides.

Fried Green Tomatoes

Ingredients

• 4 large green tomatoes
• 1/2 C flour
• 1/2 C bread crumbs
• 1/2 C corn meal
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 C milk
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• enough oil for about 1/4 to 1/2 inch oil in bottom of pan

Directions
Preheat oven to about 200 F. Heat oil to about 350 F. Slice green tomatoes about 1/2 inch in thickness. Dip tomato slices in eggs/milk and then dredge in the flour mixture. Place dredged slices into hot oil and cook until golden on each side. Remove slices to a baking pan in the 200 F oven to hold until time to serve. Sprinkle with some salt before serving.

Giveaway Details
To enter for a chance to win one of five copies of this cookbook you must do at least one of the following and may do all three to enter up to three times:

• Leave a comment below telling me about your most important basic go-to recipe
• Tweet about this giveaway with this specific tweet ” I entered 2 win @bluejeanchef ‘s cookbook Comfortable in the Kitchen @ Nikas Culinaria visit http://bit.ly/c8Hwh1 2 enter! #recipes #foodies ” MAKE CERTAIN to comment below to let me know about the tweet
• Blog about this giveaway and then let me know that you blogged it (with valid link) in the comments below

At the end of the contest, I will use a random number generator to select the winner.

I am looking forward to hearing from you!

Product Details

• BLUE JEAN CHEF: Comfortable in the Kitchen
• By Meredith Laurence
• Walah!, LLC Publishing
• October 2010
• $24.95/Softcover
• 96 full-color photos
• ISBN-13: 978-0-9827540-3-0

Thanks to the generosity of the CSN Stores, their site Cookware.com and their great social media outreach people I have been given an opportunity to review several kitchen tools that are basic but, in my mind, are “good things to have.”

The one I am going to share with you today is a piece of technology that can be enabling for even the most novice of cooks – a pasta maker.

This one, a CucinaPro Imperia, is a step up from the most basic in that it can be attached to a motor as well as a variety of pasta cutting accessories. I am reviewing it without the motor and I find that using it without a motor is not at all difficult (as some might suggest if you look around on the web).

I have written about making pasta before:

• Simplicity – homemade egg pasta
• Homemade Sprouted Whole Wheat Pasta

In each of those cases (and the many many times I have made pasta without blogging about it) I rolled the pasta dough out by hand and also cut it by hand.

There is a qualitative difference in process between making it by hand (the way I did it anyways) and by pasta machine.

I minimized the amount of folding and kneading of the dough to the very minimum because I am generally the sort to do just that (my hands only have so much strength).

This leads to a heavier thicker dough and also same with the finished pasta.

When you use the pasta maker, as I describe below, you get a much more homogenous pliable dough and you can get thinner pasta strands (if you wish).

These both have their good points. Hand rolled and cut is thicker and “meatier” with more “dente” to it while the pasta machine gives a more standard pasta experience.

The biggest advantage to making your own pasta is that you have 100% control over the quality of the basic ingredients and also, somehow even if made with bargain ingredients, it always tastes more delicious – much more savory and bursting with flavor.

When it comes to pasta – fresh is best!

Spinach Basil Pasta (1 pound)

Ingredients:

• 8 oz cooked spinach greens, well drained and squeezed
• 2 eggs
• 2 1/4 cups flour
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon water

Directions:

Puree the spinach in a blender VERY WELL – you want to molecularize the spinach as much as you can (I use my Vita Mix).

Add the two eggs, oil, and water and mix well.

In a bowl or in a stand mixer, add liquids to the flour and mix until you have a dough.

Wrap with plastic and allow to rest 30 minutes or longer. Overnight is good. You can also freeze it down at this point! To thaw take out in the AM, put in the fridge, will likely be ready for you to shape by evening. I found that my thawed dough was simply fantastic because it had time to meld and hydrate well.

Once the dough has melded/rested, its time to either roll out and cut or to begin to use your pasta maker.

You have to run the dough through the machine to condition it before you make your final sheets and then final pasta shape.

First you make a log of a part of your dough, run it through, fold into thirds, rotate so that its 90 degrees from the direction you fed it in previously. Roll through. Repeat with the folding and turning.

Do this 6-7 times or until the dough takes on a very even pliable consistency – a bit of practice will get you there.

Now you begin to thin out your dough. You will no longer fold your sheet in third but run it through with successively thinner settings on the adjusting button on the side. If you are making ravioli, go for thin. If you are making other types of pasta like fettucini then do not let the sheet get too thin – its again a matter of practice for you.

Once its a thickness you like/need, you can run it through the detachable pasta cutting accessory to get your finished product!

You can now hang it all up to dry a bit and then use immediately (cook in boiling water for 2-3 minutes, depending on your tastes), dry it more for later, or freeze it down for later.

I wanted to test out my new FoodSaver vacuum system that I bought because we have a new freezer (we bought it from Sears – its awesome).

I learned one big lesson – do NOT vacuum pack fresh raw pasta – you will get this:

It mushes your fresh pasta back into dough.

The solution is to freeze it FIRST and then vacuum seal it and then put it back in the freezer.

Product Details:

• 6in wide roller
• Includes double cutter for spaghetti and fettuccine
• Optional motor and attachments

When I was offered an opportunity to review the book “Viva Vegan!: 200 Authentic and Fabulous Recipes for Latin Food Lovers” by Terry Hope Romero I was intrigued. Knowing latino cuisine as I do, the thought of a vegan adaptation of this heavily pork laden foodway boggled my mind. You can see from the traditional Colombian recipes that I have blogged about on this site, meat often figures heavily in our cuisine.

It should not have boggled my mind but it did. One has to banish the thought of chicharrones from one’s mind to be able to grasp vegan latino food and that seemed like too dear a price to pay! (winks)

When I got the book and browsed the recipes I had a huge head-bonking “I get it” moment.. of course! Latino food is at its VERY best when you eat the freshest ingredients and that doesnt really encompass chicharrones but avocados, cilantro, tomatoes, corn, platanos (plantains), yucas (casava), lime, and so much more.

When you remove the pork and replace it with olive oil you still have the beautiful flavors of latino foods. I would not recommend the margarines that the author does but she is trying to recapture some of the magic of butter that veganism bans. Any vegetable fat that is solid or semi-solid at room temperature is in some way modified (hydrogenated) and that is not good for your body. The best solution here is coconut butter – organic only and produced by a company that you trust and KNOW isnt using benzenes to purify their product.

The book consists of two parts and within those two parts a broad array of basic knowledge about vegan cooking and the adapted recipes:

Part One:

• The Vegan Latin Pantry
• Kitchen Tools (or How do I slice a mango)

Part Two:

• A Few Essential Latino Vegan Recipes
• Salsas and Condiementos
• Bocadillos, Snacks, and Appetizers
• Ensaladas
• Beans and Rice, Los Dos Amigos
• Vegan Asado: Tofu, Tempeh, and Seitan
• Complete Your Plate: Vegetables, Plantains, and Grains
• One Pot Stews, Cassaroles, and Cazuelas
• Super Fantastico Latin Soups!
• For the Love of Corn: Arepas, Pupusas, Tortillas, and More
• You, Too, Can Tamale
• Empanadas!
• Drinks
• Desserts and Sweets

For this review I intentionally chose a recipe that uses a common vegetarian/vegan ingredient that is relatively foreign to latino cuisine – tempeh – so that I can see if the author had been successful at making the translation. I prefer authenticity and loathe fake meat concoctions (tofurky?). I like tofu for its tofu-ness and would never eat it hoping to feel like I am eating meat.

What is tempeh? Trust me the following description might sound a bit – umm – revolting and it kept me from trying it for a long time but also trust me that tempeh is in fact really quite delicious!

“Tempeh, or tempe in Indonesian, is made by a natural culturing and controlled fermentation process that binds soybeans into a cake form. Tempeh is unique among major traditional soy-foods in that it is the only one that did not originate in China or Japan. It originated in today’s Indonesia, and is especially popular on the island of Java, where it is a staple source of protein. Like tofu, tempeh is made from soybeans, but tempeh is a whole soybean product with different nutritional characteristics and textural qualities. Tempeh’s fermentation process and its retention of the whole bean give it a higher content of protein, dietary fiber, and vitamins. It has a firm texture and strong flavor. Because of its nutritional value, tempeh is used worldwide in vegetarian cuisine; some consider it to be a meat analogue.” Source

I bought the organic three grain tempeh for this recipe (in addition to whole soybeans – brown rice, barley and millet). I can highly recommend this product – quite delicious!

Just a quick side note: The notion of “stuffing” an arepa is most popular in Venezuela versus Colombia. In Colombia, generally, arepas are not stuffed but eaten simply with butter and salt. I am sure now a days the propensity to “stuff” them is also spreading into Colombia (its not immune to change!). I qualify the term “stuff” here because the arepa isnt really suited for stuffing because it falls apart. Its not a pita bread. You cant really form a hinge by cutting half way through it and then stuffing it. Its more like you cut the arepa in half and then make a sandwich sort of thing.

The Recipes

For today’s review I worked from the following recipes (with some modifications based on availability of ingredients):

• Pan-Fried Tempeh with Sofrito (page 112)
• Basic Onion-Pepper Sofrito (page 32)
• Black Bean – Corn Salsa Salad (page 72)

Feedback: I can tell you ahead of time, before we go through all the recipes, that my non-vegan chicharron-eating family (3, 6, 13, adults) reveled in the deliciousness of this tempeh dish. I was fully ready for the kids to reject this new food (and I didnt tell them how it is made, they just need to trust me that its edible) but they LOVED it.

The tempeh has a unique nutty flavor (a stretch for our family too, we have extreme nut allergies here) and had a great mouth feel. My 13 yo said it tasted sorta like meat (likely with respect to the texture). They also gobbled down the corn-black bean salsa.

It was a definite hit here! I hope you give it a try and see for yourself. You do not need to be vegan or vegetarian to love these foods, they are a way to expand your own personal food habits and expose you to new flavors!

Pan-Fried Tempeh with Sofrito (page 112)

Ingredients:

• 1 (8-oz) cake of tempeh
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• vegetable oil, for pan-frying
• 1/2 cup Basic Onion-Pepper Sofrito (pg 32)
• 2 plum tomatoes, seeded and minced
• 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
• 1 tablespoon finely chopped cilantro
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 cup white wine, vegetable broth, or beer
• olive oil for pan-frying

Directions:

Slice the tempeh cake in half lengthwise, slice into thirds (I cubed it). You now need to steam it in a steamer basket, a covered saucepan with 1 cup water or in a microwave (covered dish, 1/2 cup water, nuke about 5 minutes). Drain all the water and then sprinkle with the soy sauce (I also sprinkled with lemon juice). Set aside.

Make your sofrito (see below).

Pan fry your tempeh on medium high in small amount of oil until golden on all sides.

To the hot pan add the following: sofrito, tomatoes, wine vinegar, cilantro, cumin; fry all until tomatoes are soft – 6-8 mins. Add in the tempeh and stir to coat and warm, ~ 5 mins. Pour the wine over this until almost absorbed, some sauce remaining. Serve in arepas, as shown.

Note on my modifications: We do not drink so we have no wine on hand, didnt add that. I also didnt add vinegar but added a splash of lemon juice.

Tempeh before preparation.

Steamed tempeh on to toast.

Golden tempeh

Basic Onion-Pepper Sofrito (page 32) (note – I made a few key changes to this recipe for this review)

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 6 cloves of garlic, chopped coarsely
• 2 pounds green bell peppers, seeded, chopped finely
• 2 pounds yellow onions, diced
• generous pinch of salt
• freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

Saute peppers, garlic, onions, salt and ground pepper in a heavy pan on medium heat for about 10 mins. Lower heat and continue to cook for some 20 – 30 mins until all is soft and reduced to a 1/3 original volume.

Use immediately or cool and store in the refrigerator as a condiment.

Note on my modifications: In Colombian cuisine, we call the analogue to this “Hogao” and it doesnt include peppers or black pepper and would NEVER be made without cumin or cilantro. I had no peppers on hand so I made more of a traditional hogao versus this version. This means I also added cumin and tomatoes. Green onions are also especially good in this.

Arepas

Ingredients:

• 1 C “La Venezolana” or “ArepaHarina” precocida masa harina (extremely fine precooked corn meal – you simply can not use any substitutes here, find this ingredient)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/4 C boiling hot water

Directions:

Mix arepaharina with salt and hot water, mix well. Set aside for 5 – 10 mins. Shape into small balls (larger than a golf ball, smaller than a baseball) and then flatten into pucks (smooth edges).

Toast in a hot pan until brown on sides, put into 350 F oven until ready to serve. Poke holes on top and slather with butter and sprinkle with salt or prepare as per desired recipe.

Black Bean – Corn Salsa (page 72) (I am leaving out the salad part as I only made the salsa portion)

Ingredients:

• 2 cups roasted fresh corn
• 1 (14 oz) can organic black beans (2 cups cooked black beans)

Directions:

Drain the can of beans, add the roasted corn.

Note on my modifications: I added 1 tablespoon chopped vidalia onion (raw), 2 plum tomatoes (chopped), salt, good sprinkle of cumin, 1 teaspoon minced garlic.

Bring all of this together for a delicious meal! In a traditional latino home, this would not be served without rice (I recommend organic brown rice) but we are dealing with a nasty heat wave here in the Northeast (104.7 in the shade the other day, 109 with heat index) so cooking and eating rice was the LAST thing we wanted or needed. As it was, making these arepas and hot hogao and roasting corn – it all made my kitchen hot and I was POURING with sweat – not a happy picture, that.

There are MANY more very delicious recipes in this cookbook. I recommend it for all – vegan or not. I also especially recommend it to the Latino/a who is considering or is a vegan and would like a taste of home with not so much pork in it!

Product Details:

• Viva Vegan!: 200 Authentic and Fabulous Recipes for Latin Food Lovers
• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Lifelong Books; 1 edition (April 27, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0738212733
• ISBN-13: 978-0738212739

[Follow this link for a recipe for Whole Wheat Cheddar Cheese Kefir Irish Soda Bread]

St. Patrick’s day is almost here and I feel like I am getting whiplash with how fast this year is passing already! The stores put out St Patrick’s day decorations right after Christmas so by now, all that Chinese import crap is in the clearance bins which makes it seem like the holiday never had a chance!

Here in New England, St. Patrick’s means something more than green beer, crappy bar food, bar crawls, and green dye dumped in midwestern rivers. Here it is actually linked in with an authentic memory and nostalgia for Ireland. The traditional meal eaten for this holiday is the New England Boiled Dinner: boiled cabbage, carrots, potatoes, and a spiced but boiled corned beef brisket. This is traditionally served with a side of strong mustard or even horseradish (I adore this meal with sour cream and horseradish, I almost like that part more than the rest, just like I am with wasabi and sushi, I prefer the wasabi! Same with oysters and red sauce – LOVE the horseradishy red sauce).

This is not to say that this meal is traditional for Ireland. Not at all. But it IS traditional for New England for this holiday. We also enjoy it with soda bread which IS traditional and authentic to Ireland. I will blog separately about the Whole Wheat Kefir Cheddar Cheese soda bread I made later.

Today’s corned beef brisket is all about method.

I had a 2 week opportunity to test out the Sous Vide Supreme, a consumer level self regulating hot water bath that is the same as that used in a huge range of food provider settings from haute cuisine restaurants to crap food high throughput food companies.

Here it is opened up to show the inner chamber where the hot water and rack is.

Sous Vide = under vacuum and refers to the use of food grade plastic bags into which your food goes and then most if not all the air is vacuumed out. It was “pioneered” by the French in the 1970s as a method used in the food production setting.

The vacuum packed food is then put into a hot water bath.

As a scientist, I have used circulating hot water baths for many things including making nucleic acids, precipitating proteins, etc. This sort of water bath is common in the lab. It used to be the only way to do PCR (polymerase chain reaction) which meant a lot of futzing with little microfuge tubes floating on little styrofoam rafts on the surface of the hot water. Sometimes these baths were even behind radiation shields when the stuff being heated was radioactive. Nowadays, much less radionucleotide is used and PCR is done in cute little benchtop thermocyclers.

Water bath manufacturers probably freaked when this change came. I am guessing that is when they started to market heavily into the restaurant and molecular gastronomy spheres.

So, my experience was that these baths were nasty contaminated in a food sense (you could not SEE any contaminants but you sure could imagine it) – it took a bit to reorient my brain to using hot water baths for cooking in.

There is no reason to think this water bath will be anything but super clean! You really should use distilled water so that you do not get water scale build up on the walls of the bath interior. You should also dump the water after each cooking session and clean the bath with non-abrasive means.

The key reasons to cook this way:

• NO juices lost to cooking water or as steam or roasted off and are left to reabsorbed into meats
• Very little fat needed to cook moist foods
• your food is infused with the seasonings you added (dont add too much!)
• you set the water temp to the desired end temperature – your food will not burn or over cook if you set it to the correct end temp!
• you can put in collagen containing meats like short ribs and allow it to cook very slowly for DAYS so that at the end you have almost completely solubilized the collage which = tender tender TENDER meat
• you can cook temperature sensitive things like fish and shrimp to the very minimum temperature needed and loose NO moisture (dont leave seafood in for long – doesnt help it and might lead to possible protein degradation = drying out)
• you can par-cook foods to almost done and then put the food in the fridge to be ready to be warmed for later
• you can cook meat to the PERFECT internal doneness – you will then need to char the outer surface to get your maillard reactants that we perceive as delicious on meat

I made quite a few different recipes (even bread!) but today I am writing about using the Sous Vide to make corned beef. I can attest that the corned beef we made in the sous vide was the very best we have ever had – so moist, so tender, just amazing.

Note that at this time of year we get corned beef with spice packets. I used those spices in this recipe.

You simply remove the corned beef and the spices to a bag, seal it, stick it in the sous vide at 175 F for 10 hours, remove, cut, enjoy!

I served it with boiled potatoes and carrots, no cabbage, and on top of some of the whole wheat kefir cheddar cheese soda bread I made. Also, horseradish sour cream and some mustard.

I made the left overs into corned beef hash the next morning. Explosively delicious. I could recommend making this corned beef JUST for corned beef hash alone!

We loved our experience with the Sous Vide Supreme and regretted having to return it after our loan period!

Product Details:

Specifications:

• Model SVS-10LS
• Water Baths 1
• Total Volume 11.2 liters
• Capacity 10 liters (Max Fill Line)
• Power 120 Volt 850 Watts @ 60Hz

Dimensions (w/d/h):

• Overall 11.5″/14.2″/11.4″ (Metric 290mm/360mm/289mm)
• Bath 9.9″/12.6″/6.8″ (Metric: 252mm/320mm/173mm)
• Weight (approx.) 13 lbs (5.9 kg)

Temperature:

• Display Digital LED 0.1°F (0.1°C)
• Range 41°–203°F (5°–95° C)
• Sensitivity 1°F (0.5°C)
• Over-temperature Alarm +5°F (+4°C)

Timer:

• Display 1 minute resolution
• Settings Variable 0—99hr:59mins
• Cycle End Audible buzz & “end” message

BlogHer has teamed up with Kelly Ripa and the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund to bring us a fun way to raise money for this important cause.

You can design a virtual cake and Electrolux will donate $1 to the fund! In addition, Electrolux is donating $100 to OCRF for every new range sold this month. Thats pretty serious!

Follow this link to see more about this!

[This was cross posted at my raw food blog Raw+Simple]

I had an opportunity to dive into the book, written by by Mark Reinfeld, Bo Rinaldi, and Jennifer Murray, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Eating Raw.

I had not previously read one of these Idiot’s Guides but I found that they use uncomplicated first person language that feels quite direct and the layout is actually a great one because there are useful summaries as you move through the content which leads to great knowledge pick-up and retention. There are little call out boxes with nice tips relevant to the recipe or topic on that page.

There is a VERY useful chart showing you times and temperatures for dehydrating a range of foods. As recommended by many raw food chefs, this book suggests starting the dehydrating run at 145 F and then turning it down to 105 F some 2 hours later. This might seem contrary to what you have heard, which is likely that you should NEVER raise the temperature on living foods above 115 F. What is happening in those first 2 hours at 145 F is that the rate of evaporation is higher because there is the most water at the beginning of the cycle. This evaporation COOLS the food so the food is not actually at 145 F, just the air blowing over it. This 2 step process is recommended to ensure that the food you have put so much work into does not begin to mold before it dries sufficiently.

There is so much fundamentally useful information in the first several parts that its hard to cover. I think there really is very little if anything they have failed to cover for the beginner and the experienced.

The chapters are well organized and include:

Chapters

• Part 1: Raw Foods Illuminated
• Raw Benefits
• Myth Busters
• Going Green with Raw Cuisine
• Ancient Foods, Superfoods, and the Future of Food
• The Perfect Pantry
• Tools of the Trade
• Part 2: Raw Techniques
• Preparation Basics
• Soaking and Sprouting
• Advanced Techiques
• Part 3: Recipes on the light side
• Appetizers and Spreads
• Salads and Dressings
• Sublime Sauces and Toppings
• Sumptuous Soups
• Nut Milks and Cheeses
• Bountiful Beverages
• Part 4: Hearty Fare
• Unbeatable Breakfasts
• Filling Wraps and Sandwiches
• Pizzas, Crackers, and Breads
• Delicious Main Dishes
• Puddings, Pies, and Parfaits
• Cakes, Cookies, and Energy Bars
• Part 5: Raw Transitions
• A Day in the Life
• Fasts and Cleanses
• Four Week Raw Success Program
• Glossary
• Further Resources

As usual in these reviews, I choose a recipe and test it as well as photograph it.

I chose the following mushroom recipe and I can tell you, I was quite happy I did. This is an explosively flavorful dish with a lovely contrast between the intense meaty mushroom and the fresh tartly marinated asparagus. It was a huge thumbs up from everyone in my family from the 2.5 yo to the old adults.

I also found the marinade so beguiling that I used it on other vegetables, loved it all.

Portobello Mushroom Steaks with Balsamic Asparagus (Page 226)

Ingredients

• 4 portobello mushroom caps
• 2 cups filtered water
• 1/4 cup plus 3 teaspoons nama shoyu (raw soy sauce)
• 1/2 cup fresh basil, thinly sliced
• 2 teaspoons garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons olive oil
• pinch salt
• pinch freshly ground black pepper
• 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
• 1 teaspoon stone ground mustard
• 1 bunch asparagus (or enough for 4 servings
• 1/2 medium red bell pepper, seeded and diced
• 1/2 medium yellow or orange bell pepper, seeded and diced
• undisclosed amount of maple syrup (try 1/4 cup) – book left this out of the ingredients!

Directions

Must caps in quarters and place in a baking pan with gills facing down. Add the water and 1/4 cup nama shoyu and put into 145 F dehydrator for 30 minutes. Remove from dehydrator and pour off the marinade (save 1/2 cup).

In a separate bowl mix basil, garlic, 1/4 cup olive oil, 2 teaspoons nama shoyu, salt, black pepper. Push mushrooms into this marinade, coat evenly.

In a bowl, mix 2 tablespoons olive oil, balsamic vinegar, stone ground mustard, maple syrup, 1 teaspoon nama shoyu.

Clean and trim asparagus, put into pan, add this balsamic marinade.

Put asparagus in pan into 145 F dehydrator for 1 hour, stir every 15 minutes.

After this hour, add remaining 1/2 cup balsamic marinade to bottom of mushroom pan and put it into the 145 F dehydrator with the asparagus for 45 to 60 minutes.

Remove from dehydrator and serve warm, if desired (its not bad at all cool). Recipe suggests sprinkling with the bell peppers but I didn’t for my photos.

Again, this recipe was amazing and I would recommend it completely, lots of amazing flavor.

Product Details

• Title: The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Eating Raw
• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Alpha; 1 edition (July 1, 2008)
• ISBN-10: 1592577717
• ISBN-13: 978-1592577712
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.3 x 0.8 inches

Does the idea of mixing pomegranate juice with iced coffee make your eyes bug out like the cute little lamby slippers above?

POM has done this craaazy thing with their POM iced coffees.

.. (click for more) ..

At the end of this post I will share with you how you can win a $200 gift certificate from BestBuy! You will see that you’ve got 8 chances to win that $200 Best Buy card. Keep in mind, the giveaway is for the gift card and not appliances.

See that photo above? That is the biggest fanciest thing in my kitchen and my new favorite toy.

When asked if I would consider reviewing it my answer was simple, “Why, yes, yes I would like to review that crazy fantastic appliance.”

Please click through to the review of this range and microwave at this page -> Samsung Range and Microwave Spectacular