Tequila Sunrise…

Simply put, one of the tastiest cocktails I know. I am a tequila lover, no doubt. Tequila cocktails, well, there is no other way to put this except, Mmm  Mmm Good.

Saturday, I spent lunch in a small, local Neighborhood Pub that is known for it’s great food, and had a pre-lunch cocktail.. well, because it’s Saturday and, you know, a cocktail while you wait for lunch is just plain smart. .. and yummy.

Problem with this drink situation is this:

Young (very, very young – perhaps inexperienced (?) bartender, with minimal cocktail knowledge + Watered down frozen orange juice + Lots of ice + Minimal Grenadine = Watery Tequila Sunrise (I’m wincing here).

Oh well, I think I just might make my own Tequila Sunrise, at home, next time. Quality control will prevail.. and believe me, in my world, Quality Control is of utmost importance!

Tequila Sunrise ~ (Made with Maximum Quality Control)

Ingredients: 

  1      ounce Golden Tequila (Jose Cuervo Especial is a good one)   

1/2    ounce grenadine (or more to taste.. I like more)

  4      ounces orange juice

  1      slice orange  and  1 maraschino cherry  – for garnish

Directions:

Grab a nice slender glass – or something with a stem..

Pour tequila into the glass.

Add orange juice and stir to mix.

If you are using fresh orange juice, it will add much better flavor, but if you are using frozen orange juice, make sure it’s a brand that isn’t watery tasting, when you make it up. Some “no-name” brands are not as flavorful, however, you will have a favorite,  (you know exactly what I mean when I say some just are not flavorful when you mix them up). Use a good tasting one. It really does make a difference in your cocktail’s flavor.

Slowly, pour in your grenadine, letting it “slip” into the mixture.. and let the grenadine settle into the bottom of the glass, leaving it there. DO NOT STIR!

You will notice the separation of colors, looking like a sunrise (red at the bottom graduating to orange).. this is how the drink got it’s name.

Carefully, add a couple of chunky pieces (or a scoop of crushed) ice on top of the orange juice.. once again DO NOT STIR!

Add your garnish on a pick – One slice orange and one maraschino cherry

Attach the pick to the glass edge.

Add a straw.

Serve drink – Still NOT STIRRED.

When it has been served, and just prior to drinking this cocktail you “stir” the mixture with your straw (or a stir stick) and watch as the grenadine mixes into the drink making a wonderful orangey pink color.  Love that color!

The flavor is very delicious ~  The tequila adding a little punch.. the grenadine adding a little sweetness.

Split Pea Soup ~ Comfort Food for the Fall Season

So.. it’s that time of year when the temperature drops and we are all looking for the nice warm “comfort style” foods that we so love. 

One of many all-time favorite soups is Split Pea Soup.  It’s perfect for this time of year.  Great comfort food, warm and delicious and good for you.

I am showing the “easy” method here..  (the method for those who don’t always have a hamhock around). The less easy (and more traditional method) is made with a hamhock bone.. your stock, peas, and simmered.  You can make it that way too!  If you do happen to have a hamhock around, (like the leftovers of a ham dinner from the previous night)..  at the point of the recipe where it wants you to simmer the chopped ham and the peas together.. plop that little hamhock into the simmering water, and let it simmer along with everything.. Mmm.. it does add some smokey flavor.

Here’s the recipe:

Split Pea Soup

~ 2 Ways ~

Hearty Potato & Carrot Bits or Creamy, Thick & Blended

Ingredients:

  1  – Tbsp. Olive Oil
1/2 – Onion – chopped  – (you can use a leek here if you wish, is yummy too)
  1  – Clove Garlic – (or a couple shakes of garlic powder if you like it better)
  2  – Stalks Celery – chopped
  2  – Carrots – peeled and chopped
  2  – Russet potatos – peeled and cubed
  1  – Bag of green split peas – approximately 1 lb. of peas

4 to 6  – Cups Chicken Stock – (vegetable stock can be used here)

You can adjust amount of stock to how thick or thin you would like your soup, keeping some handy to have around when soup is simmering and thickening… you may want to add some more.

2  – Large Cured Boneless Ham Steaks 

(One ham steak chopped for the soup and one ham steak cubed to evenly bite-sized pieces, to add to your soup a few mins before serving.)

Directions:

(Don’t peel the potatoes yet.. you don’t want them going dark – unless you keep the potato cubes under cold water.)

Warm up olive oil in your soup pot
Add the onion, sautéing until it looks a bit clear and tender
Add garlic. 
Add half your ham (the chopped ham)

Keep the  nicely cubed half of the ham to add to the soup later.

Saute the onion, ham, garlic mixture in your soup pot for a minute or so,
to mix the flavors.
Add the chicken stock. 
Add your split peas
Salt and pepper to taste. 
(You can season it up here if you wish.. you may want to add another spice)
Bring to a boil and turn down to a simmer.
Cook for 1 – 2 hours (depending on how your hard split peas are softening up). When peas are soft, and mushing into the soup, your soup is basically done.
 

(You can peel your potato now.. and dice to evenly bite-sized cubes)
Add the carrots, celery and potatoes

If you want the  hearty ’vegetable bits showing’ or ”hearty” style of pea soup.. add the rest of your ham here. Let soup simmer for 10 mins. or so, to warm the ham.

*Cook for an additional 20-30 minutes or until the vegetables are softer. 
Remember you don’t want mushy potatoes here (unless you are making the creamy soup, so, a fork test can tell when your bite-sized potatoes are almost done.  Carrots too.

You can serve your hearty style soup, now.

All the veggies add flavor, but the soup is very slightly thinner than the creamy blended style. The split peas, softened, do add some thickening on their own, though.  I like the pototato pieces along with the ham.

(For creamy blended, more traditional style split pea soup – see directions below).

* * * * *

If you want the creamy, blended style of pea soup (a bit thicker) and the TRADITIONAL kind of split pea soup served in restaurants, etc…

After the vegetables are softened in the simmering soup (above *), do NOT add the other half of the ham yet…

If you are going to blend your pea soup, so there are no vegetable bits in
it ~ don’t add the rest of ham until soup has been blended.  Blend soup with a blender, a food processor or “stick blender”.. add soup back to pot.  Add ham.. reheat to serving temperature and serve.

Note: Sometimes you don’t even have to blend it.. the veggies sometimes break down on their own.. and it all becomes a thick pea soup ~ like magic.

This soup is fun to make and very easy to enjoy.

photo credit: I.Britton

The statement is out there:  “to salt” or “not to salt” – that is the question.  

I LOVE SALT!  

Simply put.. it makes food taste good.  Not to say, though that spices and herbs don’t do the same.  They also add to the flavor.   I just don’t know what I would do if I boiled potatoes without salt in the water.. it really does affect the outcome of the flavor when you mash them.  And – salads -  love lots of pepper on them but also, salt makes those lettuce leaves taste great. There are clearly too many reasons to love salt to list them all, or even to list some, because I would be writing here forever.  

Health issues.. yes.  I do think there is valid reason for not using salt.  I can also say that I should be one who is not using it at all.  Blood pressure has been known to plague me and stay high from doctor visit to doctor visit, even with meds.  

Can I steam my veggies and not salt them at all?

 (-yes but do I want to?-)

Do I need to read all the labels in the grocery store for salt content?   

Will my blood pressure actually lower if I cut out salt?  (?) (?) My blood pressure doesn’t respond to much except it has been known to lower when lying on a beach in Hawaii… (..cue hula music). 

What about my mashed potatoes????? 

I will surely test out the steamed veggies without salt, coming up very shortly. I already know what my report is going to say.. but I have an open mind (-cough).  

I changed from plain old Iodized Salt to Sea Salt recently.  I actually love it more. Is sea salt actually healthier?  Minerals Minerals Minerals – on my lettuce.  

Is there a Mrs. Dash out there that will truly make me become salt free? 

Am I destined to smell like spices and garlic?  

To be continued..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt - Wikipedia on Salt 

 photo credit: lusi & dr.evil

I have searched recipe after recipe for this one simple recipe.  Apple Crisp. Shouldn’t be hard to find, however…  None have held a candle to the Apple Crisp my grandma used to make for the family.  I wish I had her recipe.  Unfortunately, lots of the stuff my grandma used to make were all in saved in her memory and not ever written down.  When she wanted to pass on a recipe, she would physically take you to the stove and show you the step by step process.  I always forgot those steps.. and after many years gone by, and grandma not in her kitchen for me to watch.. I would love to have maybe had the foresight to write some of these things down for future reference.  But alas, I didn’t think of it at the time.  What I wouldn’t give to watch my grandma at the stove, right now. What I wouldn’t give to have some of those recipes written down on recipe cards .                         

The above picture is of an Apple Crisp I made this past summer (taken from one of my own recipe cards, and adapted slightly by me), and it is very close to my grandma’s apple crisp in ‘taste’.  I really don’t remember a lot of oatmeal in my grandma’s recipe, though.  This recipe, of course has lots of oatmeal. Most of the recipes I find for apple crisp or crumble have oatmeal as the main ingredient.  I remember hers being soft and mellow, yet crunchy with a flour and sugar kind of crunch, which I cannot seem to re-create, whatever I do.  I will search the pages of the net for recipes that when I make them, come close to my grandma’s.  I will ask for apple crisp in restaurants and when I find the perfect one, I will coax the recipe out of the chef (that is -if they will release the recipe).  So, I am on a quest for the Ultimate Apple Crisp, -hot, steamy, crunchy, with not a whole lot of oatmeal (but a whole lot of crunch), lots of apples, lots of cinnamon, lots of brown sugar and the taste that I remember from my grandma’s recipe.  

 CAN I FIND IT? 

In the meantime, here is the yummy recipe I followed for the above Apple Crisp with the oatmeal crumble topping:

Apple Crisp 

Ingredients:

 
  1   – cup flour
  1   – cup brown sugar
1/2  – cup butter or margarine
  2   – tsp. cinnamon
1/4  – tsp. salt
  1  – cup rolled oats
  6  – large peeled apples – sliced or cubed
        (Granny Smith are good)
Note: apple amount is approximate… you will know how many will fit in the bottom layer of your favorite baking dish to make a dessert.
 
An extra sprinkle of cinnamon from your cinnamon shaker.
A couple squirts of lemon juice.
Approximately 1/4 to 1/2 cup white sugar to blend into your apples.

Directions:

 
In a bowl, mix the apples with a squirt or two of lemon juice and your white sugar. 

Toss gently to cover.

Place the lemony sugared apples in a baking dish.

Shake a sprinkle of cinnamon over the apples.

Mix flour, the brown sugar, margarine, salt, rolled oats and 1 tsp. cinnamon in a bowl, and then, with your fingers.. crumble and  squeeze up the mixture to blend.  Mixture should look like coarse crumbs.   If the mixture isn’t sticking together well enough, add a little more butter or margarine.  Texture should be squeezable and stick together in little clumps.
 
Sprinkle mixture evenly over the apples in the baking dish.
 
Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 45 minutes to one hour. Watch it and make sure the top doesn’t burn.  You want it nice and golden, not charred.  I think the time depends on the oven.  Gas ovens tend to bake a little hotter than electric ovens.  I would check it after 30 minutes, to see how it is coming along.

Serve warm with ice cream or whipped cream.

Refrigerate leftovers.

Can be warmed up by microwave to be served the next day.

photo credit: capricious connoisseur