KitchenKatalog: Blog 192

This was a prep-ahead meal since Meredith needed to be out the door quickly. So all of the work was done on Sunday afternoon. This is to. be dinner and lunches for two people.

For the fajitas, I sautéed 1 large onion and 3 sliced (on the thin side) red bell peppers in ghee. I added some salt, garlic powder, and Penzeys' Mural of Flavor (see below).

For the chicken, I pounded it out just to be even and then put on some salt, pepper, garlic powder, and even more Penzeys' Mural of Flavor. I got the grill really hot to sear the chicken and then turned the heat to medium and did it for 4-6 min per side.

It came out really good. I liked the seasoning on both the chicken and the vegetables, though it was especially good on the chicken.

I also made a quick stir fry for just broccoli. I stir fried the broccoli and added salt, pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder. I then added a bunch (too much) coconut aminos. It was ok with the stir-fry. Maybe a bit too sweet.

Mural of Flavor

"Green" Shrimp and Zucchini Noodles

We made shrimp with cilantro sauce/dip. We've done this before, but I think this is the first time we did it this with zucchini noodles.

It was really easy, especially since we prepped a bit ahead. Meredith made te sauce on Sunday and we defrosted the shrimp that night. Over Monday night, we marinated the shrimp until today.

I cooked it in something of a mix of stir-fry and sauté. I heated the cast iron pan on medium high and then did the shrimp while tossing it. I added some more chili sauce as it was cooking. Then, as it was almost done, I added the zucchini noodles, more chili sauce, some salt, and finally a bit of chicken broth. I think the broth really helped it since it have the sauce something to mix and stick to the zucchini to.

This was super simple. I think it took all of 10 minutes once we started today. It was pretty darn good, especially for how extremely simple it was.

It was also pretty darn healthy for a good amount of food. I think we would do this again.

Karniyarik - Turkish Stuffed Eggplant

We made Karniyarik, a Turkish stuffed eggplant dish with beef. We used the recipe from The Domestic Man (Local ¹). This dish is very well suited for prep ahead. We made the beef mixture on Sunday and did the eggplant and baking it on Monday.

We followed the recipe pretty closely. The only changes for the beef were that we used garlic powder. Otherwise, we just skipped the parsley, and did the eggplant differently. We halved the eggplant and salted it. After some time, we patted it dry before doing it on the stove (with [too much] coconut oil). I Think I would use ghee next time though...and maybe less.

We liked it a lot. It needed more salt but was otherwise really good. The serrano on top was also very good, I think we would add some hot peppers to the beef mixture too.

U: guest, P: name of my Boston Terrier, all lower case ↩

Whole Striped Bass and Roasted Potatoes

We decided to be adventurous and try making a whole fish. We got two small striped bass at Costco. We read a few recipes and went with Alton Brown's (Local). We were a bit surprised by the temperature and time, and sure enough, when we took it out, the temps were way above the 120°F they suggests. Still, it was perfectly moist. We kind of struggled to eat it but we eventually just pulled the meat off the bones.

It was a lot of work and kind of gross but also fun to try something challenging and new. The flavors were also pretty good, though I do not think Bass is my favorite fish. We would try to do a whole fish again, but use a different fish and different recipe/method.

We also made roasted potatoes like we had before on 2016-12-03. We tossed it with some ghee and then used Za'atar, salt, and pepper. I roasted it for 60 minutes at 375°F. I forgot to turn them at all, but it was also very good.

Fish Pictures

Salsa Chicken with Shishitos

I had originally made three salsa chicken breasts to prep ahead but we decided to eat them tonight. I pounded out the chicken breasts and then topped them with salt, pepper, and Pace Salsa (Whole30 Compliant). I baked it at 375°F for 25-30 minutes until it was done. (actually, I went a bit too long).

I also made Shishito pepper using my recipe. I used some extra ranch dressing from the Cobb Salad we made (but didn't really write up, recipe here. Same as used for the Buffalo Chicken Casserole.

Update: Salad

We used the leftover chicken and sliced it up to be chicken on a salad. We made a dressing by mixing Pace Salsa with the Cilantro Sauce. It worked surprisingly well as a salad dressing.

Turkey (and Beef) Scotch Eggs

We halved it with an extra 1/2 lbs of turkey from the night before with 3 hardboiled eggs.

They were surprisingly sausage tasting, though a bit dry. I would consider this again either for breakfast or using this sausage mix for other things.

Update: Made with beef

I made these again later with 93% lean beef. I did everything else the same except I did the eggs for only 9.5 minutes so that the insides wouldn't get overcooked. As you can see in the second picture, they were a bit undercooked after everything.

I did my very best to wrap them all and it worked well enough, except when I cooked them, the beef pulled back on some of it.

I think I liked the turkey more. With the beef, the flavors didn't meld as well and gave it a less-enjoyable taste. Certainly not bad, but I would do Turkey (or maybe pork?) next time.

Turkey Curry Meatballs

We made Coconut Curry Meatballs from Wholesomelicious (LOCAL). We used this as the base recipe but made a few changes because of what we had and general preference:

Between the lean meat (and no sausage), the difference of coconut flour (maybe?), and the egg, the meatballs were dry!. The flavor was good but they desperately needed some moisture!

For the sauce, we basically followed the recipe except that last 1/4 cup of coconut milk was the light kind.

The sauce came out very good but desperately needed some heat/spice. We should have thrown a bunch of chiles in there! The flavors were good, but this was just lacking the spice we like with Thai food.

We still liked it though. It made a lot of food with 50 meatballs (we ate half). We also did it on cauliflower rice (which I adjusted down the temperatures on that recipe).

Next Time

We need to put more fat in the meatballs (higher fat content turkey, additional other, some kind of real turkey sausage). They were simply way too dry! Also, everything needed more spice. There was none in the sauce and barely any in the meatballs.

Turkey Chorizo with Sweet Potato Hash

I made turkey chorizo for breakfast using the Feasting at Home recipe (LOCAL). I do not think it is even intended to be a Whole30 recipe, but it worked fine for it. I thought it was a bit heavy on the seasoning, especially the oregano. Less in the future. And maybe more smoked paprika.

We also made (purple) sweet potato hash. I chopped them and microwaved them with a little bit of water for 5 minutes. I then crisped them on the cast iron with some ghee and added salt as I went.

It all came out pretty good. A nice breakfast. And we have some leftover chorizo for later.