food – Page 4 – kristilynk

Kooking with Kristi

If the family would let me..I would eat seafood EVERY SINGLE DAY. Last night I made an amazing clam chowder soup with bread bowl and the time before that was calamari tacos. The man of house, AKA the Jason, told me that although the last few dishes have been spot on…”I need MEAT, not poultry, not fish…MEAT”.

Sometimes we just have to compromise, eh? OK, OK…tonight..it is Hamburger steak with a sweet-onion mushroom gravy concoction.

I found this simple recipe online and manipulated it to my liking. http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/hamburger-steak-with-sweet-onion-mushroom-gravy-10000001723326/

In the large mixing bowl I dropped 1lb of angus ground beef, 1/2 cup of Panko bread crumbs, 1 egg, as much salt as I wanted, as much pepper as I wanted and I think I squished up 4 large garlic cloves…I love the garlic!

I used a broiling pan and put tin foil on it ahead of time..I have been known to just start making patties and have no where to put them 🙂

Wedding rings and fashion rings off, washed the hands and dove in to mix it up!

NOTE! If you want left overs…seriously..you need to double up on the meat I only bought 1lb and it made only three burgers!

After I made the meat stuff into patties, I set them on the broil pan and left them alone while I went on to step two.

Cutting up one medium white onion and slicing of the 8oz fresh mushrooms. You can, of course, buy the pre sliced but my disappointing grocer (as of late) only had whole mushrooms.

In a frying pan, I melted as much butter as I wanted to – probably around 1/2 a stick and then I threw in the onions and mushrooms.

While those were browning, I started a sauce pan for the gravy..yep…I cheated and bought a packaged brown gravy and just followed the directions..after about five minutes I added the gravy to the mushrooms and onions and just let that simmer for a bit.

Turn the broiler on and put the patties on the top rack – cook them for 3 minutes on each side…I wondered off and let the man tend to the broil…I should have stayed..they were cooked a little bit longer than they should have been. Oh well, they were still REALLY good and moist!

and here is the end result! I will NEVER admit to what the side dish is, by the way. 🙂

Just imagine it to be something yummy that goes well with the patties!

Friday Food Frenzy…

Two posts in one day? Sorry but I couldn’t help myself. I tried to wait a few days but I have no self control..so enjoy anyway. 🙂

Last night, I was home alone on a stormy Friday and found myself perusing through Pinterest, like I normally do, to find my next meal to try.

I stumbled upon this little delight ( http://hotcookinmama1.blogspot.com/2013/08/baked-chicken-and-spinach-flautas.html) and decided to give it a whirl. I followed the instructions but instead of 16oz of chicken broth I used 14oz..it seems my grocer does not stock the 16oz sizes. It was either 14 or 32..14 won! Instead of garlic powder, I used five cloves of fresh garlic and instead of paprika, I opted for Cayenne pepper 😉 For the grated cheese option I used La Chona Quesadilla..PERFECT CHOICE, I might add.

I boiled three chicken breast, in the chicken broth and 2 cups of water, for about 10 minutes.

Shredded the chicken and placed it in a mixing bowl, added the cayenne pepper, salt and chili powder then set off to the side.

Using the same pot I used to boil the chicken, I took out the broth – all but 1/4 cup as instructed – and added four cups of freshly chopped spinach, fresh diced jalapeno and the five cloves of garlic.

Then I preheated the oven to 450 – my opinion – 450 may have been a bit too high – try 425 🙂

It took about 3 minutes for the spinach to wilt. Once complete I transferred the spinach mixture into the spiced up chicken.

How pretty is that?? 🙂

After I mixed it up nice mixed like…I took the burrito tortillas and cut them in 1/2 — I’m not sure why they are cut in half. I can see that a burrito tortilla is a little big for a flauta but couldn’t we have just used maybe a taco tortilla? Oh well, I did what I was told. 🙂

So tortillas cut in half and I was ready to start spooning the bowl contents onto the tortilla.

Take note: Notice I put the mixture on the rounded side..don’t do that..place the mixture on the long straight side. This was the only one I messed up but by this time my fingers were greasy and I didn’t want to get any of it on the camera and I didn’t want to wash my hands.

Bake for 10 minutes each side. That’s it!

This picture is before they were baked.

Now…who’s going to come over and clean my kitchen?? 🙂

A strange concert experience….

A friend of mine invited me to go with her to watch the mid 1980’s British Rock group, The Cult, play at the Celebrity Theater in Phoenix this past Thursday night. Normally, I would not go to a concert on a “school” night nor would I pay an outrageous amount of money to see The Cult play…BUT..I didn’t have to work on Friday AND my friend had a hook up so we were able to buy tickets for only ten dollars opposed to the sixty to eighty dollars a seat the venue was asking!

I picked Denise up at six and then went to her friend Bubba’s house, he was coming with us. I had never met Bubba before so introductions were done and before we left he wanted to show me The Scottsdale Beer Museum. Basically, it is a wall in his garage dedicated to beer ~ of all the beers, in all the world, Bubba’s favorite is Pabst Blue Ribbon ~ Yes, you read what I wrote ~ Pabst Blue Ribbon. He has a little shrine specifically for all things PBR. There is not much more I can write about the “beer museum” so if this type of thing interests you…you can read more here: http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/jackalope/2011/03/bradford_whickers_beer_can_and.php

Moving on, we piled into the Jetta and rolled on out. When we pulled into the parking lot of the Celebrity Theater..there were maybe ten cars?? Confused, we walked up to the box office to get our tickets and figure out what the deal was. Well, turns out we were like two hours early. What to do, what to do?

Bubba has a friend who works with The Papago Brewing Company in Scottsdale where there are beers o’ plenty and Bubba tells us the pizza is amazing.

We were greeted by this fella:

I took this picture off of their website: http://www.papagobrewing.com

We ordered a T-Rex pizza ~ Pepperoni, sausage, bacon, ham, red sauce, and mozzarella on super thin crust..DELISH! I was driving so I was not able to over indulge in the beer but I was able to buy a half pint of the Orange Blossom Ale and it was oh so good!

I don’t think I have been able to get a half pint anywhere? It’s the cutest little thing and it made my mouth happy!

We ate, drank and scootched back to the concert event.

We should have stayed at the brewery a little longer. I have no idea where the promoters found this group but the opening act was so boring! Isn’t the opening act to be a lively group – you know – to get the old people in the audience pumped up for the main event? I was and still am so confused as to why this trio was able to go on tour with The Cult? I will let you decide for yourself..here’s their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/WHITE-HILLS/90476409450

I actually could not sit in my seat for another song ~ Thoroughly confused we three went outside. Denise was just as confused as I was but Bubba?..He may have been the only one in the theater who actually liked them.. The bass was droning and never ending – repeating the same line over and over..blahhhh I’m becoming irritated right now just remembering so let’s move on. 🙂

The Cult was supposed to have started their set at nine-forty…supposed to have…they didn’t come out until ten-twenty. I have never seen The Cult live and I have been told by many “how great they are live”…I was not impressed. It was obvious something was not right.. the performance of the entire band lacked energy and you could feel bad vibes emulating from the stage. I made up this scenario in my head, which is probably not far from the truth:

I think..there were sound issues or equipment issues or maybe it was Ian Astbury wasn’t provided with the exact eyeliner color he requested. “I TOLD you I needed black ONYX..this is not Black ONYX…this is Black NOIR..I am NOT going on stage with this shit, you MORON!”

I don’t even remember what song they started with but after the fist song, Ian Astbury ripped up the set list from the stage floor, crumbled it up and threw it..yes..threw it at the sound guy. I bet the sound guy wrote the set list in blue ink and had to re-write it in black onyx.

Fervently, the sound guy did what he was told, jumped on stage to re-tape the new set list to the floor and in the process..he bumped into Ian Astbury ~ ..no doubt that was an embarrassing moment for the “rock star”.

I sat through the entire first half of the set fascinated with what was going on up there…it was the most bizarre scene I have ever witnessed on the stage of a professional, once accomplished, touring band.

Meanwhile, Denise and I had noticed Bubba has been gone quite a while. I asked, “Where is Bubba”? Denise replied, “He went to the bathroom but that was kind of a long time ago.”

Hmm, ok.

Bubba came back and after a few minutes says, “I found some seats that are closer..wanna go”? SURE! We followed and proceeded downstairs to the front row. 🙂 Yay for Bubba!

The energy on the stage was a little better this second half ~ not much better ~ but they were starting to get into the groove a little. I know it didnt have anything to do with the eyeliner fiasco because Ian was still wearing his sunglasses. 🙂

Oh, so yes, we were in the front row – just behind the sound guy – I felt so bad for this man! Through this second half of the set, it was the guitar player who started in on berating him. What made the situation all the more sad was..even through getting a set list thrown at him, being screamed at by Ian and then continued yelling from the guitar player..this poor sound guy was singing along to the songs of The Cult. Broke my heart for a minute.

I had a great time with my friends and the event was..fascinating.. but I am pretty sure I will not go see The Cult live again.

Boring?? Maybe to some…

Some might say my weekend was “boring”. What is boring? To me, nothing I do is boring – there are no boring moments, it’s all in how you look at those….let’s call them…uneventful, moments.
The hubs was feeling under the weather, down with a lovely little chest cold.
Friday afternoon..after work, I drove straight to Trader Joes to grab something quick to whip up for dinner and of course a bottle of wine. 🙂 Yes, I admit it..I am a wino.
In the wine section, there behind a portable wine tasting cart, (hmm, I’ve never seen that before) was a man who asked me if I needed any help. I had been eyeballing a couple of wines in the Spanish wine section. Since my trip to Spain, I fancy Spanish wines the most. I told the man, yes, I hoped he could help me. I found a super cheap (4.99) bottle of wine from Tempernillo and I wondered if he knew anything about it or had he ever tried it, what were his thoughts?
He had never tried but he did go to his handy dandy wine booklet and read to me the process and we found the grapes are from the Rioja valley – I love a good Rioja so I told him..Sold, thanks for your help!

It took me less time to select an easy dinner for the night. I picked up a couple of pouches of beef bolognese ravioli and coupled it with a beef bolognese red sauce. I know, I know, maybe one day I will make my own raviolis..but for that night…it was already six p.m by the time I got home. I don’t know how long it takes to make home made raviolis but certainly it would take more time than I was willing to wait for dinner to be served. Besides, the pre-made ones from Trader Joes are actually pretty tasty and in less than 15 minutes we were ready to eat.

The wine I selected wasn’t horrible but..it wasn’t great either. I don’t think I will be buying another bottle.

The rest of Friday night was spent vegetating on the couch watching movies, I honestly don’t remember which movies we watched nor what time it was we fell asleep.

It must have been pretty early though because I woke up at six am ready for coffee and a jaunt to the grocery store. I was excited to try out a new recipe my sister in law told me about (check out her blog page dutch13@wordpress.com ) She gave me the link to the egg salad recipe but I didn’t use that one – I lost it so I had to google another one. It called for eggs, avocado, radishes, green onion and mayo. I threw in cilantro as well because — everything is better with cilantro! I liked the mix but I think I was expecting it to be a little more flavorful..Jason really enjoyed it..Phew! He is always so skeptical at trying “my” new dishes, so I was glad to know his mouth and belly were happy! 😀

The remainder of the day we watched movies..Comdey Central was the movie channel for the day – I think we may have watched four or five movies..Saving Silverman (an old one but neither J nor I had actually seen the movie all the way through before), Get him to the Greek..(always a funny one..I’m pretty sure we have both seen it now at least three times) and I can’t remember the other two.

On the menu for dinner that evening was Turkey burgers..Our friends Shane turned us on to this awesomeness. One lb. of Turkey, one packet of onion soup mix, a tub of feta cheese and one egg (ya know..to make all that other stuff stick). Jason was still not feeling well so grilling the burgers was not an option – nope, I don’t know how to cook on a grill – I broiled them in the oven on high for seven minutes on each side…I also learned how to make corn on the cob. That’s right, I had never boiled corn on the cob before Saturday night. It was all delicious – I think I could eat those burgers every day – I don’t think my taste buds would ever tire of the taste.

Full bellies from a day of nothing but eating and tele watching..it was another night of early to bed!