spicy turkey chili & bacon zucchini cornbread

Posted on November 18, 2011 by hilary924

it’s chilly in dc. time for some chili!

sorry. couldn’t resist. but good night, it is cold here today. completely unacceptable.

this chili would be the opposite of that. healthy AND tasty. and if you have a half-eaten can of chipotle from last week’s chicken, you’re in luck.

little known fact – not only was i born in texas, i spent my fair share of time at chili-cook-offs. i’m pretty sure i was wearing gingham, cause my mom knows what’s what.

but really, chili is my dad’s thing. this is one of two culinary gifts from my father, the mad scientist. the first is peanut butter on waffles with pancake syrup. i have yet to be able to convince anyone of the amazingness of that combination, so maybe you have to grow up with it?

anyway. that man is serious about his chili. he got his recipe down to a very precise combination of spices. when i asked him for it a while back, he asserted that the ratios require that you create a very large quantity of chili spice, making it useless for the home cook. pre-katrina, his local nola restaurant used his crazy spice mix, and i think he used to give baggies of it away to the worthy few.

not screwing around here folks, not screwing around.

anyway, we’re moving ahead without you here, dad, with what i’m sure would be a pretty solid contender for the blue ribbon.

tomatoes. green chile and chipotle chilies. white beans. freshly ground cumin. hard to go wrong here.

and hey, look! i grew those peppers! last gasp of summer, there you go.

this chili is seriously good. it is nicely spicy and smoky from the chipotle and paprika, has a brightness from the green chile and tomatoes. the ground turkey gives it heft without heaviness. and the white beans, especially on day two, are just pillowy soft. i caught the somm fishing them out of the leftovers, the sneak!

and . . . because i can’t leave well enough alone, i also made cornbread. the sweetness balances the chili’s spice, and the smoky bacon brings it all together.

the zucchini? well, i was just intrigued to see if it would turn out as a proper cornbread or more like a quick bread. happily, this is a true cornbread, maybe just a tad moister, with lots of green goodness tucked inside.

this is a hearty bread, between the whole wheat flour, bacon and zucchini.

it also has buttermilk – and i cheated and added a bit of lemon juice to milk for a DIY solution – and browned butter. yum.

i baked it in a cast-iron skillet coated with the bacon (ok it was pancetta, but how girly girly does zucchini pancetta cornbread sound!!) drippings so it was infused with bacon flavor.

legit.

Spicy Turkey Chili

Adapted from Epicurious

2 canned whole chipotle chilies in adobo, finely chopped or pureed with a little water
2 18-ounce cans tomatoes, whole or diced (you may not use them all)
1 large onion, chopped
6 garlic cloves
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon smoky Spanish paprika
2 pounds ground turkey
1 cup chicken broth
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon salt, or to taste
1/2 bell pepper, chopped
two 4-ounce cans mild green chilies, drained and chopped
2 teaspoons cornmeal
1 can white beans, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
sour cream
Shredded cheese

Warm oil in a large pot. Add onions and garlic and saute for a few minutes until softened and fragrant. Add cumin and paprika and cook for another minute or so. Add the turkey and cook until no longer pink.

Add the chipotles, broth, seasonings, and tomatoes. Let simmer for about an hour. Add more broth if it gets too thick. Then add your bell pepper and green chiles and cornmeal and simmer for half an hour. Then add your beans. Continue to add more broth or tomatoes to keep the consistency as you like it.

Discard bay leaf. Serve with cilantro, sour cream and cheese on top.

This keeps well for a few days in the fridge.

Bacon Zucchini Cornbread

Adapted from Epicurious

6 slices (or more!) of bacon
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 large zucchini (about 10 ounces)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup medium-grind cornmeal

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Melt the butter in a small saucepan until it gets a nutty brown, about 3 to 5 minutes. Transfer to a medium bowl and let cool before adding eggs and buttermilk.

While butter is cooling, you can:

Crisp your bacon in an oven-safe skillet (cast iron will work really well, but you can use any type, or just use a baking pan greased with your bacon drippings). Remove and roughly chop bacon. Swirl drippings around to coat pan, discard excess.

Cut a few thin slices from your zucchini and reserve; shred the rest with a grater or cuisinart. Add to bowl with butter mixture and stir until well blended.

Mix the flours, sugar, baking powder, salt, baking soda and cornmeal into a large bowl.

Add zucchini mixture; fold just to blend (mixture will be very thick).

Transfer batter to skillet and decorate with your saved zucchini slices.

Bake bread until golden and a tester inserted into center comes out clean, 30-40 minutes.

Eat with lots of butter and chili!

kettlecorn ice cream

Posted on September 27, 2011 by hilary924

um, why did i wait until the end of summer to get the ice cream cookbook du jour? (du summer? du l'été? sorry aunt k.)

let me just say, better late than never. i got my mom on the bandwagon too, and she's the real homemade ice cream artisan in the family.

everyone in foodie blog land loves this cookbook. jeni's flavor combinations are really amazing: sweet corn & black raspberry; basil & honeyed pine nuts; cucumber, honeydew & cayenne. i seriously considered just working my way through the damn thing: one ice cream a week! for a year! then i remembered my thighs. hi friends. we don't really need that much for reals ice cream around, right?

but the best thing about the cookbook is the basic ice cream recipe. the recipe is, SERIOUSLY, a revelation. especially for dorks like me who tend to produce scrambled eggs instead of ice cream custard no matter how much tempering and whisking occurs.

pre-jeni, the land of homemade ice cream was a choice of philadelphia-style cream and sugar ice cream or the richer french egg-based custards. jeni has use science, SCIENCE! to move us beyond this. the secret ingredients are cream cheese, corn starch, and corn syrup.

sounds weird, i know.

but, the result? the ice cream really is creamer and smoother than most ice creams i've made, and lasted longer in the freeze.

if you buy jeni's cookbook . . . which you should if you ever plan to make homemade ice cream . . . she has a long, interesting explanation of why her recipe version works. the short version is that it balanced the water, fat, protein and air to make ice cream taste like the best thing you've ever put in your mouth. not gritty. not cloying. just right.

kettlecorn isn't actually a flavor from jeni's ice cream book. it was inspired by a recipe for popcorn ice cream that i've been dreaming about for a month.

we're big popcorn fans around my house. you can usually tell whether the somm is home or not by the level of popcorn detritus on the floor.

sweeping: one of my favorite household tasks. if only i'd do it with any regularity.

isn't kettlecorn the best type of popcorn? sweet and salty and buttery. this ice cream does all of those things.

did you know you can pop popcorn in a brown lunch bag? for reals. turns out, there is nothing magical about the orville redenbacher bag, no matter what criss angel says.

pop some up, melt it into your warm ice cream base to infuse it with popcorn goodness. proceed with your ice cream recipe, but amp up the salt.

sprinkle some more sea salt on top (maybe that fancy flowerpetal sea salt you picked up in spain? yes? no, you don't keep that on hand?) and you'll have the sweet-salty goodness of kettlecorn, but with the creamy-cold goodness of ice cream.

mmm. stay tuned because the ice cream flavor that is next up is goat cheese and drunken figs courtesy of my momma.

Kettlecorn Ice Cream

Using Jeni's recipe & Inspired by Dash & Bella's Popcorn Ice Cream

2 cups whole milk
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon cornstarch
1 1/2 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon salt, plus more for sprinkling
1 1/4 heavy cream
2/3 cup sugar
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
4 cups air popped popcorn (about 1/4 cup unpopped) without salt or oil

WARNING: you need approximately 15 large bowls and various other accoutrement. This recipe relies on mise-en-place. I hope you have a dishwasher. Trust me, it's worth it. Also, you need an ice cream maker. They aren't that expensive. I have a Cuisinart that's about 4 years old and it's fantastic.

To pop your popcorn, put 1/4 cup popcorn kernels in a brown paper bag, fold over the top several times and microwave for a few minutes, listening for the popping to stop. Put the popcorn into a large bowl.

Fill a large bowl with ice water.

In a small bowl, mix 2 tablespoons of the milk with the cornstarch.

In another large bowl, whisk the cream cheese and salt until smooth.

In a saucepan, bring the remaining milk with the heavy cream, sugar, and corn syrup to a boil and cook over moderate heat until the sugar dissolves, about 4 minutes. Don't let it scald!

Take the warm mixture off the heat, and add it to the popcorn gradually. Stir until the popcorn mostly melts. I didn't get it to totally melt. Strain the mixture back into the pan, pressing on the popcorn solids to get all the liquid out.

Gradually whisk in the cornstarch mixture. Return to a boil and cook over moderately high heat until the mixture is slightly thickened, about 1 minute.

Turn off the heat, and slowly whisk the cream cheese mixture into the milk until it's smooth. Pour your ice cream base into a big plastic ziploc bag and seal. Set the bag into the ice water and chill for about an hour, adding ice if you need to to get it nice and cold.

Follow your ice cream maker's instructions to freeze, then cure your ice cream in the freezer until firm.

spicy corn saute

Posted on August 21, 2011 by hilary924

there’s a lot of corn in the world right now. it keeps following me home. there are going to be a LOT of corn recipes coming up, folks. bear with me.

today’s corn recipe comes courtesy of the spilled milk podcast. do you know spilled milk? you should. and if you don’t you’re in for a treat. i just discovered it about a month ago which means i have several years of past episodes to catch up on.

this is one of my favorite things – playing catch-up on books or tv shows. i’m impatient, so it works out not having to wait for new content, but also means i’m usually about two years behind the world, culture wise. highlights of the year: working my way through five seasons of friday night lights and discovering the bazillion pages of the first four game of thrones books. the two weeks i had to wait until the next book was released this summer? let’s just say, good thing i was mostly in spain. lots of lovely temperanillo and worrying about the somm avoiding the bulls in pamplona to distract me.

anyway, this is a food blog, and spilled milk is a food podcast. a hilarious food podcast. and about a year ago, they did a great episode on cord off the cob . . . or corn on the spoon as we prefer to call it around here.

you should always start with super fresh corn. this kind of fresh:

tell you what: they weren’t lying. farmer’s market produce, not for the faint of heart.

this corn is spicy. no kidding spicy. it calls for a whole jalepeno to four ears of corn, but man. i used about two thirds of a pepper (and no seeds) and it still killed me.

saute it up. this recipe is based around not just the jalepeno, but the yummy layer of brown gunky stuff that gums up the bottom of the pan when you saute corn. all the sugar and flavor of the corn. gunk. molly & matthew on spilled milk have assured me, it’s a technical term!

admission: i have been known to scrape that gunk up and eat it off the spatula. salty, sweet, like corn msg. this recipe is better, and less likely to disgust your friends and loved ones. deglaze the pan with a little water (or maybe even wine? live large!) and the corn kernals soak all that flavor back up.

i couldn’t tell if manchego approved or not.

he doesn’t particularly enjoy corn and can’t quite understand why if i’m going to cook rather than play laser tag with him i don’t cook something with protein. now, roasted chicken. there’s something he can get behind.

sorry dude. this corn was good. better in a quesadilla, where the cheese helped cut the burning fire in my mouth. hello jalepeno!

For this recipe: Corn off the Cob by Spilled Milk

My changes: less jalepeno, a mix of scallions and red onion cause that was what i had, and sprinkle of pepitas on top.

corn, tomato & zucchini pie

Posted on August 9, 2011 by hilary924

isn’t corn just wonderful? it really is one of my favorite foods. i love that corn can go either sweet or savory – or both, hitting that salty-sweet combo that just sings to me. like peanut butter or kettle corn or flaky sea salt on brownies.

last year, we went to san francisco for my (and a friends!) birthday and had dinner one night at a swanky restaurant with corn-themed dessert. it was a crazy landscape of a dessert. literally. it had “soil” and little plants and all kinds of amazing corn-based delights and i think i just planted my face into it and hoped the somm and friend were enjoying some other dessert menu item.

i’m not a good sharer.

at least when it comes to dessert. i’m totally happy to share this recipe – which is savory despite that long corn-dessert aside. homemade corn ice cream is sooooo on my summer wish list.

this corn “pie” delivers the essence of corn in all it’s summer glory. it’s rich but light, and the sweet corn is perfectly complemented by the crispy, cheesey topping and herbal notes from the basil and thyme.

plus it couldn’t be easier.

cut the kernels off your corn. i like to do it in a bowl. it keeps the kernels from going everywhere.

use your knife skills to matchstick some zucchini. this is not my best effort. but, to be honest, i put this bad boy together post happy hour on a friday. anything more advanced than take out or a bowl of cereal was winning.

throw it together in a pie dish with herbs, salt & pepper and some melted butter.

pretty.

layer on some tomatoes.

red and yellow. gorgeous.

finish it off with bread crumbs and parmesan.

bake until brown and crispy. nom nom.

Corn, Tomato & Zucchini Pie

Adapted from Epicurious

3 ears of corn worth of corn kernels
1-2 medium zucchini, cut into matchstick pieces
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon fresh basil and/or thyme
2 tablespoons melted butter
3 vine-ripened tomatoes, cut into 1/2-inch slices
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup dry bread crumbs, Panko-type are best
2 tablespoons olive oil – I used basil-flavored, yum

Preheat the oven to 375°. In a 9-inch pie dish, combine the corn, zucchini, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of pepper, the herbs, and the melted butter, tossing to coat the vegetables. Cover the vegetables with the tomatoes. Sprinkle with the remaining salt and pepper.

In a small bowl, combine the cheese and the bread crumbs. Sprinkle the mixture over the tomatoes and drizzle with the olive oil. Bake the pie for 30 minutes, or until the cheese is bubbling. Remove it from the oven, and let it stand for 5 minutes before serving.

roasted tomatillo & corn salsa

Posted on August 4, 2011 by hilary924

this salsa is a major victory. i mean, it tastes great – smoky and tangy and sweet and spicy – but the victory comes from the fact that it was produced and consumed without harm to myself or the kitchen.

the last time i made this salsa, i felt like i was starring in my very own adam sandler movie. jalepeno in my eye, me futily splashing it with water while the sommelier frantically googles for antedotes, then milk everywhere – especially crusted around my red, swollen face. add in a huge, bleeding cut in my fingertip to distract me, and to top it off, we inaugurated the kitchen fire extinguisher when the broiler got the best of the homemade tortilla chips.

not my finest hour.

at multiple points during this experience, the sommelier suggested perhaps some takeout from the lovely chicken place down the street might be a good idea. this is why he was better in economics . . . he knows a sunk cost when he sees one and is ready to move on.

but i'm a crazy cook, so i persisted. and was rewarded with yummy tomatillo salsa!

this time, having only slightly learned from past mishaps, i decided to step it up and char both the corn and the tomatillos. which i mananged without burning ANYTHING. so, let's get started.

have you met the tomatillo?

when you pull off the papery skins, they kind of look like little, unripe tomatoes. they're a little sticky, so you have to give them a good rinse.

to make salsa, you can blend them up raw, or roast them under the broiler.

kind of looks like a marimekko print, don't you think?

i went for roasted, because i also wanted to add some charred corn. i'd never done this before. now i've done it twice without burning anything that wasn't meant to be burned! progress!

the corn does pop a little, and the inevitable corn silk stuck between the kernels does flare up and burn off a bit. it kind of freaked the sommelier out, cause he knew i was up to no good. but i stood back at a safe distance. had the fire extinguisher out and ready (this particular kitchen safety measure, like the knife skills lesson, was totally the somm's idea). we worked through it, and it was worth it.

fact: add this stuff to roasted cherry tomatoes with some lime, cilantro, salt & pepper and the barest splash of balsamic and you'll have yourself a lovely summer salad. or, enjoy while standing at your cutting board and trying not to drop any on the floor. mmm.

but we're focusing on the tomatillo today.

blend up your roasted tomatillo with some onion, jalepeno, and lime juice. stir in the corn, chopped cilantro and salt to taste.

total victory. and yes, this time we skipped the homemade tortilla chips.

Roasted Tomatillo & Corn Salsa

adapted from Simply Recipes, via Kuhn Orchards at my local farmers market

1 1/2 lb tomatillos
2 ears corn
1/2 cup chopped white onion
1/2 to 1 lime, jucied, to taste
2 Jalapeño peppers OR 2 serrano peppers, stemmed, seeded and chopped
1/2 cup cilantro leaves
Salt to taste

Remove papery husks from tomatillos and rinse well. Slice in half and roast, cut side down, under the broiler until almost black.

Husk corn and char – carefully – over a gas burner. Slice kernals from cob.

In food processor, blend tomatillos with onion, lime and jalepeno. Place in bowl, and stir in cilantro and corn. Season and enjoy!

Manchego's Kitchen

it's his kitchen. i just cook here.

Category Archives: Corn

spicy turkey chili & bacon zucchini cornbread

kettlecorn ice cream

spicy corn saute

corn, tomato & zucchini pie

roasted tomatillo & corn salsa