Eat more Albacore!

Posted on May 18, 2013 by Blue Jean Chef
Spaghetti with tuna, tomatoes, capers, basil, olives in a white bowl

Spaghetti with Tuna Putanesca Sauce

As I often have the pleasure to do, I’ve been eating a lot of fresh fish from Anderson Seafoods lately. The fish from Anderson Seafoods is one of my favorite food items to present on QVC. The fact that it arrives at my door fresh (never been frozen) always astonishes me, and that freshness comes through when you cook and eat it. Absolutely delicious!

Then there’s the health aspect. No other part of my work life leaves me feeling as healthy as working with Anderson Seafoods! As a result, I eat more fish than anyone I know and I’m proud of that. Everyone has heard by now that we should eat more fish. Eating fish gives us the critical Omega-3 fatty acids that most of us are lacking. These fatty acids are such an important part of our general health and help to manage and prevent cardiovascular disease. On top of that, fish is low in saturated fat and high in protein – great for those watching their weight. Beyond the actual scientific facts, eating fish generally leaves me with a clean, healthy feeling (as long as I don’t eat it battered and fried!) which helps me feel mentally healthy too. No matter how you look at it, fish is a great choice.

Slices of pepper crusted tuna, raw in the center with egg, lemon, tomatoes and olives in background

Black Pepper Crusted Tuna

The most recent species that I have been cooking up is perfect for this time of the year when all you want to do is get outside and grill – Albacore Tuna. Tuna is one of the very easiest fish to grill – it’s firm and won’t fall apart, making it very easy to manage. Albacore also benefits from the quick, high-heat cooking that you get from grilling, helping to keep it moist. It takes about 2 or 3 minutes per side on a hot grill for a 1-inch thick fillet if you want to cook it all the way through (and do try not to overcook it). I prefer my tuna rare (or even entirely raw), so I simply do 1-1/2 minutes per side. Then, you can simply dress the tuna with all kinds of salsas, sauces or even just a squeeze of lemon and you can have dinner on the table in no time. Tuna is super versatile – it adapts to all sorts of flavors. PLUS… and I always get excited about this, leftover tuna makes the BEST tuna salad ever. You’ll never want tuna out of a can again!

Grilled Tuna Salad Sandwich with Celery, Walnuts and Apple

Grilled Tuna Salad Sandwich with Celery, Walnuts and Apple

Tune into QVC on Monday, May 20th at 5pm ET to get your chance to order Anderson Seafoods’ Albacore Tuna. It’s coming straight from Fiji (no kidding!) AND is from a sustainable fishery that is certified by the Marine Stewardship Council. When you’re talking about putting food in your body (the only body you have), how can you go wrong with something that is healthy, tastes great and doesn’t cause any negative impact on the environment? That’s something to feel good about. Eat more Albacore!

Tuna fillet on plate with grill marks, gribiche sauce (egg, capers, herbs, olive oil) over the top, grilled zucchini and red pepper in background

Grilled Albacore Tuna with Gribiche Sauce

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Carne Asada

Posted on May 4, 2013 by Blue Jean Chef


Today was one of those days when dinner was sort of pre-determined. The weather was so glorious that inevitably the outdoor grill was going to be put to use. The only question was … what exactly was I going to grill? Well, with tomorrow being  Cinco de Mayo – a celebration of Mexican culture and heritage – I decided to give a nod to our neighbors to the south and made Carne Asada.

Carne Asada literally translates to “grilled beef”, and is generally flank or skirt steak that has been rubbed with a spice blend or marinated before grilling, and then thinly sliced before being served. I chose to marinate my flank steak and served it wrapped up in a tortilla with avocado and a refreshing summer salsa. It was a delicious and refreshing end to a perfect weather day.

Here’s the recipe for you… just in time for Cinco de Mayo!

Carne Asada with Tomato Corn Salsa, Avocado and Arugula

A white plate with corn and tomato salsa in a small bowl, sliced avocado, sliced beef with some salsa on top and folded flour tortillas

Serves 4

Ingredients:

  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 chipotle peppers in adobo, chopped
  • 1/3 cup chopped fresh parsley
  • 1/3 cup chopped fresh oregano
  • ½ teaspoon ground cumin seed
  • 3 limes, juiced
  • 1/3 cup olive oil
  • 1 – 1½ pound flank steak (depending on your appetites)
  • salt
  • freshly ground black pepper
  • 1 cup fresh corn kernels (about 1 ear of corn)
  • 1 cup chopped fresh tomato (about 2 tomatoes)
  • ¼ cup minced red onion, rinsed with cool water
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • ½ lime, juiced
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • freshly ground black pepper
  • 4 (8-inch) round flour tortillas
  • 1 avocado, peeled and sliced
  • 2 handfuls of arugula

Directions:

  1. Make the marinade: Combine the garlic, chipotle, parsley, oregano, cumin, lime juice and olive oil in a non-reactive bowl. Coat the flank steak with the marinade and let it sit together for 1 to 4 hours (refrigerated).
  2. While the steak marinates, prepare the salsa. Combine the corn kernels, tomato, red onion, olive oil, lime juice, salt and pepper in a bowl. Set aside.
  3. Pre-heat your outdoor BBQ or a cast iron grill pan over medium-high heat. The grill should be hot enough that when you hold your hand 1 to 2 inches above the grill grates, you want to pull it away after 2 or 3 seconds. Grill the steak for 3 minutes per side for medium (depending on the thickness of the steak). Remove the steak from the grill and let it rest for a few minutes. Quickly grill the tortillas, just to create marks and warm them up. Slice the steak on the bias against the grain, making thin strips.
  4. Wrap the strips of steak in the tortillas along with some sliced avocado, a handful of arugula and a spoonful or so of salsa.  Happy Cinco de Mayo!
Posted in Beef, Pork, Lamb, General, Recipes | Leave a comment

Grilling Rockfish

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Blue Jean Chef

Just typing the words “grilling Rockfish” makes it feel like summer. For instance,

“What are you doing for dinner?”

“Me? Oh, I’m grilling Rockfish.”

The words immediately conjure up images of backyards, hot grills, fresh fish and delicious meals. It’s not just the words, however, that make you want to put on a pair of shorts, lie back in a lounge chair and grab a glass of white wine. If you actually get out there and grill some Rockfish you’ll see that the feeling of summer will be upon you in no time. I experienced this over the weekend and can testify to its truth.

a piece of grilled Pacific Rockfish with colorful salsa - orange segments, red pepper, herbs - on top

Grilled Pacific Rockfish with a Citrus-Herb Salsa

For those of you unfamiliar with Rockfish, there are more than 70 species of Rockfish living off the West Coast of North America. Pacific Rockfish is a firm, lean, mildly-flavored, pink-fleshed fish. It is sometimes marketed as Snapper, Red Snapper, or Pacific Snapper on the west coast. (True Red Snapper, however, is an Atlantic fish.) Pacific Rockfish is a very approachable fish. It’s delicious with an almost sweet flavor, tender and flakey, and appeals to both the fish-lover and those who have just started to incorporate fish into their weekly diet (which we should all be trying to do!).

There are so many ways to prepare Pacific Rockfish. It’s easy and versatile. Continue reading →

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This year, try clay for St. Patrick’s day!

Posted on January 19, 2013 by Blue Jean Chef

iStock_000011992145XSmallI know it’s still only January, but I’m already prepared for St. Patrick’s Day in March. You see, while I do enjoy the annual meal of corned beef and cabbage, when I really think about it, it’s not my favorite meal. The beef can often be tough and rubbery, and honestly when was the last time you really enjoyed a dinner that was entirely boiled? That’s not to say that you can’t make a tasty meal out of boiled corned beef, but I’ve found a much easier way to make a delicious corned beef dinner using a terra cotta clay baker.

baker

Terra cotta clay bakers have been around for … well, almost forever. Continue reading →

Posted in Beef, Pork, Lamb, General, Kitchen Products, Recipes | 2 Comments

Kitchen Resolutions!

Posted on January 12, 2013 by Blue Jean Chef

2013 year calendar. January. Isolated 3D imageAhhh… the New Year… Every January I think my life will slow back to a normal pace again because the crazy holidays are over.  Every January I am wrong.  Why is it that January feels just as busy, if not busier than December? Maybe it’s that feeling of a new beginning and so far to go before you reach your goals? Start the race off with a sprint, so to speak? Or maybe it’s because we all finally slow to a stop when the holidays eventually arrive, and gearing up to go again seems hard?

Regardless, the fresh start of January makes me strive for success, efficiency and new promises. I, along with many other people, make grandiose plans (aka “resolutions”) about how the next year will unfold. When it comes to the kitchen, some people resolve to cook more healthfully. Others just resolve to cook more often. I usually resolve to venture into cooking a different ethnic cuisine. jerusalemThis year, I’ve started by working my way through my newest favorite cookbook – “Jerusalem” by Yotam Ottolengi and Sami Tamimi.  Yotam Ottolengi is my favorite chef/cookbook author.  His food is beautiful, creative and I have yet to come across something that I didn’t love or that didn’t turn out how I wanted it to.  If you haven’t seen any of his stuff and have an adventurous kitchen spirit, I highly recommend both his books – “Plenty” and “Jerusalem”.

But, enough about me and more about you…  What are YOUR kitchen resolutions? Are you going to entertain more? Promise to try new techniques or dishes? Or maybe you’re hoping to make more homemade meals for your family this year? Maybe you’d like to commit to one vegetarian meal a week?  Or promise to eat fish once a week?  I think I can subscribe to all those resolutions.

How can I help you with those resolutions? The same way I’ve tried to help cooking students throughout my career – by setting you up for success with good cookware. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again … the two essentials in the kitchen are a good set of pots and pans and a good chef’s knife. If that were all you had in your kitchen, you’d be ok (not necessarily happy, but ok!). Well, your opportunity to upgrade your cookware set to a great set is coming on Wednesday January 16th  on QVC! Continue reading →

Posted in General, Kitchen Products | 12 Comments

Strombolis – easy app or delicious lunch?

Posted on December 4, 2012 by Blue Jean Chef

chicken cheesesteak stromboli sliced and fanned out on a wooden cutting board; red checkered napkin in backgroundThe holidays seemed so far away just a week or so ago, and now they feel like they will soon be over!  Still, between now and then, there’s a lot of entertaining that will take place.  I’m a strong believer in taking help when it’s needed, and when you’re the host of a holiday party, you definitely need help.  Sometimes that help comes in the form of a friend or relative in the kitchen, or hiring teenagers to act as waitstaff, or in planning your menu carefully.  Of course, the best holiday parties have delicious homemade foods, but there’s no shame in having a couple of prepared food items on your menu that are tasty and easy to make and serve. Remember, you’re supposed to enjoy yourself at your party too, so take the help when you can!

Those prepared food items that you buy and serve always act as your safety net – should something go wrong with what you’re making, you always have the “fall back” foods. Often, however, those prepared food items that you pull out of your oven at the last minute can be the stars of the show. Tomorrow at 4pm ET on QVC, I’ll be showcasing one such holiday fall back item – Assorted Strombolis from Rastelli’s.  The best thing about these strombolis, however, is that they are not just for holiday entertaining, but make a great lunch or dinner and would be fantastic for the Big Game parties that are just a month or two away. Continue reading →

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Two things I love about pie

Posted on November 28, 2012 by Blue Jean Chef

An apple pie on a cooling rack with two red apples in the background

 

There are two things I love about pie – the pastry and the filling.

Ok, so I love everything about pies! After all, what’s not to love? What could be better than a warm, flakey crust that breaks gently under your fork paired with a warm sweet fruit filling? It’s a dessert that pleases your heart as much as your taste buds. It’s sort of the chicken noodle soup of the dessert world.

If I had to choose which is more important to me in a pie, the pastry or the filling, I’d probably be forced to go with the pastry (although the two components truly are inseparable). I like a pastry made of butter, rather than shortening. The butter gives the pastry great flavor and a crisp texture. Shortening does make a flakey crust, but I can’t go without the flavor of butter. Sometimes I do compromise, however, and accept a pastry made of both.

The rule to making pastry is simple – keep everything cold. The goal is to work butter into the dough without completely blending it into the flour. In a finished pastry, you should still be able to see chunks of butter. Those patches of butter will separate the proteins in the flour when baked, making it more like flaky pastry than chewy bread. By keeping the butter cold, you run less risk of blending it into the flour. By using ice-cold water, you also increase your chances of keeping the butter in small chunks.

How the pastry is baked is critical. It’s easy to get the top crust to look perfectly golden brown, but it’s the bottom crust that needs help cooking through and crisping up. It is the bottom crust after all that is sitting at the bottom of a pie pan with moist fruit filling piled on top. You can see how it would be a challenge to ensure the bottom crust is cooked through and has that prized pie texture.  There are a few things a home baker can do to get the pastry cooked properly on the bottom of a pie. Continue reading →

Posted in Desserts, General, Kitchen Products, Recipes, Techniques | 3 Comments

tuesday is for brining, wednesday is for drying, thursday is for roasting…

Posted on November 19, 2012 by Blue Jean Chef
a whole roast turkey on a white platter with oranges and herbs around it.

@ Bochkarev Photography

It’s the monday before American Thanksgiving and the plans for this thursday’s meal are under way. As I write this, the turkey stock is simmering on the stovetop and the turkey brine is cooling on the counter. I’ve been brining my Thanksgiving turkeys for several years now. It’s easy to do and really does result in a deliciously moist turkey. All you need is a little forethought and some room in your refrigerator.

To brine your turkey just means to submerge it in a salty solution over a period of time. What happens when you brine is all science. The brine works to flavor the turkey through the process of osmosis.  The salty solution initially draws moisture out of the turkey, but then, the salty solution gets drawn back into the turkey, taking along with it all the great flavors of whatever you’ve put into the brine. The salt denatures the cells of the turkey meat, making them better able to hold moisture. And so, after some time in the brine, those cells can actually hold 10 – 15% more water than they did before brining.

There are a couple of simple ratios to remember when you’re brining.

  • Use 1 cup of table salt (or 1.5 cups kosher salt because kosher salt has a higher volume by weight) for ever 1 gallon of water you need to cover the turkey.
  • Brine the turkey 1 hour for every pound of turkey.

At it’s most basic level, a brine could consist of just water and salt, but since you’re going to the effort of brining, why not put some other flavors in there that will help season the center of your Thanksgiving plate?  Here’s what I use in a brine: Continue reading →

Posted in General, Ingredients, Poultry, Recipes, Techniques | Leave a comment

The beautiful simplicity of a vinaigrette

Posted on November 10, 2012 by Blue Jean Chef

Arugula and radicchio with shards of parmesan cheese on a brown plate on a marble tableLast week, I found myself inundated with salad greens. Superstorm Sandy left my friends without power, and I inherited all their perishable food so that it wouldn’t go to waste. For someone who cooks for only one or two most of the time and shops every day for whatever it is I want that night, inheriting the weekly produce for a family of three was a little overwhelming. I had a large tub of mixed greens (you know – the size that you can wash a baby or small dog in!), a huge bag of spinach, and a couple of heads of radicchio, all on top of the usual box of greens and other salad ingredients that I had on hand for myself. It looked like salad was going to be an “every meal accompaniment” – with eggs for breakfast, as an entrée for lunch and along side every dinner – for as long as they would last.

The good news was… I love salad.  I truly do. I have a fondness for foods that are so variable (like omelets, pizza, pastas). You can add any mixture of ingredients and dressings to a bowl of greens and change the salad completely from what it was the last time you had it. All this salad got me thinking about vinaigrettes and in talking with my friends about my overabundance of salad greens, I realized that the simplicity of a vinaigrette often eludes the home cook.  So, I thought I’d put together some tips for making a perfect vinaigrette. Continue reading →

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I always wanted to be a fishwife

Posted on October 19, 2012 by Blue Jean Chef
Seared salmon in a white bowl with broth, peas, potatoes and a few chili flakes

Salmon with Potatoes and Peas in a Ginger Broth (click for recipe)

Years ago I worked as a cook in a couple of restaurants in Les-Baux-de-Provence, France. During my time there, I used to go into a nearby village on saturday mornings to visit the local market. I didn’t buy food at the market - after all, I worked in a fully stocked restaurant and was living in quarters without a kitchen. Instead, I would just sit and watch the women who ran the fish stall. There were three of them working in a caravan with an open side, and they spent the whole morning preparing the fish for sale - cleaning, de-scaling, breaking down whole fish into fillets, doing all things to all sorts of fish. They were masterful with their knives, slicing the fish with grace and precision. They worked quickly and quietly as they prepared their display.  I admired their skill and thought at the time that I might like a future working as a fishwife. Strange to some, I suppose, but that’s what I thought at the time.

Well, time passes and plans change. My career path has never been predictable, and I never did become a fishwife. Perhaps now, however, I’ve come as close as I ever have to realizing my dream of selling fish. No, I’m not actually fishing, cleaning or preparing the fish, but for the first time I’m about to provide access to the freshest, tastiest fish many people will ever taste (unless they visit a seaside town and buy fish off a boat). Here’s how I came to this… Continue reading →

Posted in General, Ingredients, Recipes, Seafood | Tagged , | 1 Comment