Pisto manchego (grilled ratatouille)

Last Saturday was Saint Francis Xavier, my Saint's day, so I got a cook book as a present. It's Spain, a culinary road trip, by Mario Batali with Gwyneth Paltrow. So, to celebrate I made the first recipe of the book: the pisto manchego, which is a sort of grilled ratatouille. I put half the ingredients and then I realized I could have even reduced them even more since I had leftovers for some days after, it was so yummy anyway. I put 2 ripe plum tomatoes, half a medium to large eggplant, 2 red bell peppers and a red onion and rubbed them with 2 tablespoons of olive oil inside a baking tray. I roasted them in the oven at 375 degrees Fahrenheit for about 45 minutes. I cooled them off outside, removed the skin as much as I could from the tomatoes and peeled the onions, scooped out the flesh of the eggplant and roughly chopped the vegetables, and finally chopped them a little bit more in a blender with 1/4 cup of Spanish olive oil (Goya brand from Seville). I seasoned the dish on the plates with salt and pepper and served it on toasted bread. It's a little different from the pisto gallego or andaluz that I usually make, but gorgeous and flavourful anyway.
Maybe next time I'll have a glass of red wine from La Mancha to go with it to make it perfect.

¡Buen provecho!

Chimichurri pork steaks

Listening to the tango rhythms of Argentina one evening I decided to make this dish of chimichurri sauce pork steaks. So I bought 4 little pork steaks at Buschs supermarket and grilled them in a pan with a tiny bit of olive oil, about 3 tablespoons. For the chimichurri sauce I bought this spice bag at World Market:
http://www.worldmarket.com/product/index.jsp?productId=11500210
for just two bucks. In a small glass I poured a little bit of olive oil, about a third of it of Sherry vinegar and 2 tablespoons of the chimichurri sauce flakes. The ingredients of the spice bag, by the way, were: garlic, parsley, oregano and sweet pepper flakes (maybe next time I'll prepare the mix myself). Once the steaks were golden brown, medium rare, I took them off the pan and to the plates and sprinkled them with the sauce helped with a teaspoon. I accompanied the dish with some sweet potato fries, which I fried in olive oil and sprinkled with sea salt. I'm not eating that much red meat lately, so the taste to my mouth was like heaven, wow, I felt like a gaucho in the middle of the pampa, haha. I had an excellent red wine to go with it: I should've chosen a Mendoza or something but I had a good old Rioja (Lan brand) this time, which can never go wrong.

Autumn pasta

http://www.rtve.es/alacarta/audios/comer-y-cantar/comer-cantar-spaguetti-otono-castanas-setas-albahaca-20-11-10/936415/

Not long ago, for dinner I cooked this gorgeous Autumn pasta dish full of decadent colors like orange, brown and ocher. I bought fresh pasta in the supermarket, some Italian linguine and boiled them in a saucepan for a couple of minutes (counting from the second the water started to bubble). I set them apart and refreshed them in cool tap water before adding to the rest of the dish. I pour in a blender some olive oil, some leaves of fresh basil and a big clove of garlic and mixed it to a sauce that I used to fry the rest of the ingredients in a pan: a peeled and chopped sweet potato, finely chopped mushrooms (a difficult word for me, since I always called them champiñones) and roasted, peeled and chopped chestnuts. When they started turning golden, I poured in the pasta and a glass of heavy whipping cream and let a sauce be formed in the heat for about 1 minute and a half, no more, as you want that carbonara texture, light brown in this case. Before serving I refreshed in mixing the whole thing with a whipped egg white.

 Seasonsetional!

Mushroom and shrimp lasagna

Last weekend I made for dinner this dish of lasagna whose recipe I got from the Spanish radio:

http://www.rtve.es/alacarta/audios/comer-y-cantar/comer-cantar-lasana-setas-gambas-29-10-11/1236298/

In a pan I lightly fried in very little olive oil some sliced mushrooms, chopped shallots basil leaves and shrimps, then I added 2 spoons of flour, and then 2 small glasses of milk, salt and pepper, stirring all the time. Out of the fire I added 2 egg yolks to make it more creamy. In a separate saucepan I boiled 9 lasagna panels in water with a bit of olive oil and bay leaves. I put the beds and layers of lasagna panels in an oiled metal pan filled with the 2 stairs of mushroom-shrimp-salsa, and the top floor I sprinkled with salsa and grated parmesan and Mahón cheeses. To the oven at 390 for about 10-12 minutes until golden.

  Not bad at all for being my first lasagna. Quite tasty and Autumny...

Salmon and bacon bites

To Kashi, in memoriam

Last weekend we went to the Windy City and had a great time as usual, running up and down the streets having fun. We had lunch at Fado's Irish pub and ate a delicious dish called salmon bites:

http://www.fadoirishpub.com/chicago/main-menuSmoked Salmon Bites

$8.95

Traditional cold oak-smoked salmon on crisp boxty “blini” with capers, onions, light horseradish sauce and lemon.

It was unusually delicate for the normal deal you get at a pub, quite tasty indeed, so I decided to cook it as soon as we came back. When I took the first bite I didn't notice it was a blinis based delicacy and thought it had bacon. So in my dinner imitation this is what I did:
Listening to piping music (http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/search?q=piping%20music), I sliced a small whole grain baguette and toasted the slices very lightly. I spread light horseradish sauce on them, put on some Spanish capers and sliced white onion. I fried some bacon slices and rolled pieces of dill sprinkled salmon around them, which I finally set on the aforementioned bread ship.
The result was magnificent, tasting quite similar to the pub's, a little bit like sushi, a little bit spicy, really flavourful. Our beloved kitty Kashi (the leader of the sleeping team) would have loved it and licked her tongue in anticipation and delight.

Bon appétit!

Crab cake sandwiches

Some evenings for dinner I toast two slices of bread, sprinkle some olive oil on them and lay in between either fresh cheese or Philadelphia cheese and a big slice of smoked salmon. It's one typical montadito or small sandwich which is served at tapas bars in Spain. This time I got some crab cakes from the Buschs supermarket and I layed them between toasted slices of bread previously sprinlked very lightly with oilve oil, mayonnaise, and with a layer bed of sliced tomatoes and onions:

Et voilà, a tasty little sandwich treat for dinner, simple and delicious.

Arranque - Start

One evening last month, as a farewell to the bright summer season, I made an Arranque, to start up the following morning with energy and zest. So, following roughly this cool recipe from the province of Cádiz (http://www.cosasdecome.es/recetas-tipicas-de-la-provincia/arranque/) I put in a blender to roughly chop 4 medium ripe tomatoes, 4 small green peppers, 3 cloves of garlic, a good piece of bread previously soaked in water, 125 mililiters of Spanish olive oil and a pinch of salt. It shouldn't be too liquid, thats why you don't add water and don't blend it too much. And this kind of primitive gazpacho without vinegar tasted like heaven when I woke up that Saturday morning at around 11 am, and I could feel as a sheperd or a hunter in the middle of their country endeavours. A delicious rush of strength in the palate.