Baconfest 2016!

I usually share recipes that I have tried but I have to share this with you. I went to Baconfest earlier this month and it was so much fun, not to mention delicious.

 There are basically between 50 and 60 chefs that cook their best bacon dishes and you have the privilege of walking around, tasting it all. It is delicious but there is no way you can try them all so you have to have a little game plan and be picky. You just can't taste it all ;)

The first thing we tried sounded so good. It was from The Italian Village Restaurant. A beer and bacon pancake topped with applewood smoked bacon beer syrup. The topping was delicious but the pancake itself, not so much.

 We moved on to Mercat a la Planxa. They served Iberico bacon, smoked Calasparra rice, cage-free eggs, and Iberico bacon aioli. You mix all that goodness together and YUM. 

I actually didn't eat this one. I have no idea why. However, Emelie said it was delicious. It was an Old Style cupcake with Koval Whiskey ganache, maple bacon buttercream and candied bacon from ZED451.

This was such a cute display, and also delicious. It's from Creative CONEcepts. I was a bacon flavored breadcone filled with potatoes, peppers, onions, scrambled eggs, bacon with brown bourbon and bacon gravy and, onion and garlic jam.

Next up was a yummy little bite from Kaiser Tiger called The Happy Goucho. It was Argentinian chorizo wrapped in bacon and topped withbacon guacamole and tequila sour cream. :P

Homemade Sin Bakery lived up to it's name with this delicious trio of goodness. Bacon fat gingersnaps, maple bacon scone and peanut butter chocolate caramel bacon fudge. It was all good but that fudge though.....heaven.

The Signature Room at the 95th went all out with a Porklava. It's pretty much what it sounds like, baklava with pork. Strangely enough, it was really good. They totally made it work. It was phyllo dough, pork belly, apple chutney, pistachio, and a bourbon caramel sauce. 

Woodhaven Bar and Kitchen had a taste of home with their Elk of Perfection. Cherrywood bacon infused ground elk wrapped in bacon and jalapeno with truffle and bacon white blanc. Just WOW!

(Pretty sure I captured the exact moment Fred realized he had taken a bite of an incredibly spicy stuffed jalapeno. :))

These are just a few of all he delicious dishes we tried that day. Some disappeared before I could snap a picture ;) But as always, it was a great day and we were all in a bacon coma when it was over. Absolutely worth every penny!

Art Smith's Parmesan and Almond Crusted Chicken with Asparagus and Lemon Sauce

I have had this cookbook forever but as with a lot of my other ones I never cooked any of the recipes. Now that Emelie and Fred are here I figured I'd try and make them something from this book since her dad used to work with him :) It was delicious!

I started by marinating the chicken in kefir (the closest thing to filmjolk I could find). 

While that was marinating I blanched the almonds and asparagus tips in chicken broth and set aside, saving the broth. I then got started on the sauce. 

I added 2 Tbsp of butter, 4 finely chopped shallots and 4 cups of white wine in a saucepan. I let it reduce to about half and then I added the chicken broth. I brought it to a boil and again reduced it by half. Add 2 Tbsp of lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste. Slowly add the heavy cream and let it simmer until it is reduced by half. Meanwhile, heat the oven to 250 F. Mix 2 cups of breadcrumbs (you are supposed to use crisp bread that you turn into bread crumbs but I went with regular bread crumbs), 2 cups of Parmesan, 1/4 cup shredded almonds (I actually used hazelnuts and it turned out really good), 4 Tbsp herbs, and salt and pepper to taste. 

Remove the chicken from the kefir, dust with flour, dip in eggs and then dip it into the bread crumb mixture. I had a special lil helper for this part :) 

Then you just sear the chicken for about 2-3 min on each side and finish them in the oven for about 8 minutes. Let the chicken rest for about 5 min before serving. Here you are supposed to add the blanched almonds to the sauce, which I totally forgot but the sauce was still very tasty.  

Parmesan and Almond Crusted Chicken Breast with Asparagus and Lemon Sauce

4 Servings (I doubled the recipe)

4 boneless chicken breasts

1 cup Kefir

2 cups chicken broth

1/4 cup blanched almonds

1 cup bread crumbs

1/4 cup shredded almonds

1 cup Parmesan cheese

2 Tbsp chopped herbs (parsley, tarragon and thyme)

salt and black pepper

1 cup all purpose flour

2 eggs, whisked

4 Tbsp olive oil

Lemon Sauce

1 msk unsalted butter

2 shallots, finely chopped

2 cups of white wine

2 Tbsp lemon juice

salt and black pepper

1 cup heavy cream

Enjoy! 

Pork Chops with Sweet Potato Latkes and Cinnamon-Spiced Apples

This recipe comes from a cookbook by the absolutely amazing Graham Elliott. I had the pleasure of meeting him a few months ago when he was doing a signing at Mariano's. I did not get a picture this time but I did get one of his books signed for Tobias. Last time when we were in Sweden I learned that he was a huge Masterchef fan so I figured he'd appreciate it. 

However, I still have my unsigned copy :) so I wanted to try one of his amazing dishes. I was just a little intimidated buy this recipe but it sounded so good that I had to give it a shot. 

I started out by preparing the brine for the pork chops. I mixed 1 cup of salt, 1/2 cup of sugar, 6 whole black peppercorns, some coriander (the recipe called for whole coriander but I didn't have any), 3 cardamom pods, 2 bay leaves (it called for fresh but I used dried), one tea bag (once again, I didn't have black tea so I used a cardamom, green tea) in my trusted dutch oven. I then added about 8 cups of water and brought it to a simmer. Just until the sugar and salt dissolved. I removed the spices and tea bag and let it cool. After about an hour a poured it over the pork chops, covered it and left it in the fridge until dinner time, about 6 hours or so. At that point I just fried them up in a pan until done.

While the chops were cooking I started the apples. 

I peeled, cored and sliced 2 honeycrisp apples.Then I melted 2 tbsp of butter in a pan and put in a cinnamon stick. When the butter was melted I tossed in the apples. 

I cooked them until they turned a little brown, about 5 minutes. I then added 1/2 cup of beer and 1/2 cup of hard cider and cooked them for another 5 min or so. At that point they should be glazed and most of the liquid should be gone. Season with a little salt and cover to keep warm. 

The latkes really intimidated me because I'm just not good a deep frying stuff and pretty much stay away from recipes that require it. However, this time I went for it. I started out by shredding the sweet potatoes and the onion. I tossed that with some salt, 3 eggs and about 1/4 cup chopped green onions. I sprinkled 3 Tbsp over everything and mixed it well. I then poured about an inch or so of canola oil into a pan. When the thermometer showed 350 I started frying up the mixture that I had shaped into little disks. Actually pretty easy. They're not as pretty as Graham's but it's the taste that matters right? ;) I kept frying them until they turned golden brown, turning once. 

 The end result was absolutely delicious. I went a little over on the pork, it could have been a little juicier. The sides though, oh god. So yummy! Axel loved the pork and ended up eating almost two chops, but he was not convinced about the sides. He tried them both and said they were ok but he preferred the meat. No worries, more potatoes and apples for mommy :)

Pork Chops with Sweet Potato Latkes and Cinnamon-Spiced Apples

Pork Chops

1 cup kosher salt

1/2 cup sugar

6 whole black peppercorns

6 coriander seeds

3 cardamom pods

2 fresh bay leaves

1 black tea bag

4 (10-12-ounce) pork chops

Cinnamon-Spiced Apples

2 Honeycrisp or Jonagold apples

2 Tbsp unsalted butter

1 Ceylon cinnamon stick

1/2 cup German lager

1/2 cup hard apple cider

Salt

Sweet Potato Latkes

2 lbs sweet potatoes, peeled

1 small onion

2 tsp kosher salt

2 large eggs, whisked

1/4 cup sliced scallions

2 Tbsp all purpose flour

Vegetable oil, for frying

coarse sea salt and coarsely cracked black pepper

Enjoy! 

Dutch Hatchee

Axel is so sweet. Every time he picks a country he asks if it says Sweden on the note. I have told him that I can  make Swedish food any time. However, turns out he wants Swedish waffles with ice cream and Euroshoppers chicken nuggets. :) Oh well, this week he picked the Netherlands. I found a great recipe of something called Hatchee. It is a beef stew served over mashed potatoes. 

It called for quite a few ingredients and it also said that you could add either beer or red wine to it to enhance the flavor. I decided to go for a beer. Mostly because I happened to have it at home. I didn't take a lot of pictures this time but I started out by browning the meat in a dutch oven ;) with some salt and pepper. I did this in batches to give the meat a nice even color. I then took out the meat and started cooking the chopped onion. Once it is a little brown and translucent, add the meat back in the pot and sprinkle 3 Tbsp of flour over everything. Cook a few minutes. Add 3oz of tomato paste. Then you add the liquid. Since I used beer i added a bottle of that first and then i added enough water to just cover the meat. It ended up being about 3 cups of water. Add in the chopped apples, thyme, peppercorns, cloves (i skipped them), beef bouillon cubes, molasses, bay leaves and rosemary sprig. Bring to a boil and let it cook for about 2.5 hours (or until the meat is tender). Once tender, mash everything with a potato masher and cook until the consistency you like. I ended up taking the lid off and cooked it about 30 min to reduce it down a little. 

I served it over mashed potatoes with some red cabbage salad on the side (that I bought already made). 

It was absolutely delicious. Definitely the best dish I have made from any of the countries we have picked so far. 

Hachee

2 pounds stewing steak

4 big onions

3 tbsp flour

water (about 4 to 5 cups)

2 beef bouillon cubes

2 tbsp molasses (of appelstroop)

2 slightly sweet and sour apples

1 small can tomato paste (3 oz)

1 tsp Thyme

1 rosemary sprig

2 bay leaves

4 cloves

10 peppercorns

salt and pepper

butter

Optional: adding beer or red wine intensifies the flavor of the stew

Enjoy! 

Canadian Tourtiѐre

A few months ago I wrote down every country in the world on small pieces of paper and then I had Axel pick one or two countries every week and we would cook food from that country. I also got him a map so I could show him where the country was. We put a little pin in each country wee cooked food from.

I wanted to teach him about different cultures and expose him to new flavors and foods. We cooked food from many different countries from all corners of the world. After a few weeks I felt like it made him an even more picky eater. He would love to help me cook the meals but barely ate at all. He would taste it but rarely finished a meal so I decided to stop. He recently asked me about it and said he wanted to start doing it again. Figured it would be a good thing for the blog as well so we'll start with one country a week. This week's pick, Canada :) I found a recipe for Tourtiѐre, which is a meat pie, and figured I'd try it out.

The crust was really simple. I just mixed the dry ingredients, cut in the butter, added the water and chilled it while I made the filling. 

(Axel insisted on being in the pic so there he is :)) The filling was not bad either. I peeled the potatoes and cut them into smaller pieces. Cooked until soft and then mashed them, reserving about 1/2 cup of the cooking liquid. I browned the meat along with the chopped onion and garlic until cooked through. I then added the spices and some of the cooking liquid from the potatoes. I let it simmer for about 10 minutes. I took it off the heat and combined the meat with the potatoes. 

I realized I did not have a pie dish so I used a regular, square dish. The recipes I saw had a completely covered pie, however, not my strong suit so I created my own pattern. Might not be the prettiest pie in the world but I was pretty happy with it anyway :)

I created the pattern, brushed it with egg and baked for about 30 min. I served it with some spinach and red pepper. 

Final verdict? I might make it again but I would use different spices. I should know by now that I don't like the clove/cinnamon/nutmeg blend in savory food. The recipe can also be found here: http://growagoodlife.com/tourtiere/

Canadian Tourtiѐre

Pastry

2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup butter or lard

6-7 Tablespoons cold water

Filling

1 pound ground pork

1 pound ground beef

1 small onion, finely chopped

1 clove garlic, finely minced

2 large potatoes

1/2 teaspoon poultry seasoning

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Salt and pepper to taste

1 egg, scrambled for glazing

Prepare the Pastry

1. In a large bowl, combine flour with the salt. Cut in butter or lard until mixture is a roughly even crumbly texture. Add water and blend just until dough comes together.

2. Shape into a rough disc, wrap and chill in the refrigerator. While pastry is chilling, prepare filling.

Prepare the Filling

1. Cook potatoes in a pot of water until tender, about 12 minutes. Reserve 1/2-cup of potato water and drain the rest. Mash potatoes and set aside.

2. In a large skillet, cook the onion, garlic beef and pork over medium heat until no longer pink. Drain off excess fat. Add seasonings and reserved potato water. Mix in well and simmer for about 10 minutes until the liquid is absorbed. Remove the pan from heat, stir in mashed potatoes, and set aside to cool slightly.

3. Preheat oven to 400°F/205°C

4. On a lightly floured surface, divide dough in half and flatten one ball of dough with your hands. Roll dough to about 12-inches in diameter to fit a 9-inch pie pan. Place the pastry into the pie plate and add the meat filling. Brush around the outer edge of the pastry with the beaten egg. Roll out the top pastry and place on top of the filling. Fold the top crust under the bottom crust and pinch or flute the edges. Brush with egg wash and cut vent holes.

5. Bake in a preheated over for 30 to 35 minutes or until the pastry is golden brown. Remove the tourtière from oven and let it cool at least 10 minutes before serving. Yield: Makes 1 pie, about 8 servings.

Marcus Samuelsson

I have had this cookbook for 11 years now and I have to admit, I don't think I have ever tried any of the recipes. Marcus Samuelsson is an amazing chef but his recipes seems very long and have a ton of ingredients. There are also often recipes within a recipe. Very intimidating!

The one I decided to make had two recipes within the actual recipe :) Oh well, I decided to go for it. I made the lamb sausage wrap. I actually read the entire recipe this time :) so I decided to start with the garlic mashed potatoes since I figured that would take the longest. 

The recipe called for heavy cream. However, I left a bag at Walmart and of course it was the one with the cream so I decided to just substitute with milk. Save some calories ;) I ended up using just 1% milk. It was really easy. You peel the potatoes, cut them into quarters, add 3 cups of milk, 4 garlic cloves (it called for 8 but I didn't want to overdo it), and a couple of sprigs of thyme.

I cooked them for about 20 min and then I added them to my kitchen aid (reserving the cooking liquid). Add olive oil, butter, Parmesan, salt and pepper. Then add as much of the liquid as you like. Done!

I decided not to roast my own red peppers. I have never done it before and I know I would probably burn them to a crisp. I had a jar in the cabinet so I just used those. I cooked the red peppers, shallot and garlic in some olive oil until softened. In a bowl, mix lamb and pork, the red pepper mix, thyme, salt and pepper. Shape the mixture into eight small sausages and cook in olive oil until cooked through. Set aside. 

I really cheated with the spicy sauerkraut. At this point I was not happy to see that there was a recipe for kimchi within the sauerkraut recipe. Nope. So I made my own version. I took the sauerkraut, rinsed it and put in a bowl. Chopped the apple, half of the onion and a jalapeno (not in pic) and sauteed until softened. I then added that to the sauerkraut and just mixed it up. Easy peasy. 

To serve, put some mashed potatoes on a tortilla, two sausages and cover with the sauerkraut. It sounds so strange but it was delicious! 

Lamb Sausage Wrap

2 Tbsp olive oil

1 roasted red bell pepper, peeled, seeded, and finely chopped (I used jarred)

1 shallot, finely chopped

3 garlic cloves, finely chopped (I used jarred)

1/2 lb ground lamb

1/4 lb ground pork

1 tsp fresh marjoram, oregano or thyme leaves (I used thyme)

1 tsp kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

1 1/2 lbs fingerling or Yukon Gold potatoes

2 cups milk

1 cup heavy cream

8 elephant garlic cloves

2 fresh thyme sprigs

Freshly grated nutmeg

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 Tbs unsalted butter

1 Tbsp Parmesan

Salt and pepper

Spicy Sauerkraut

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 medium onion, halved and thinly sliced

1 Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored and diced

1 3-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and finely diced (i used dry)

2 cups sauerkraut, rinsed, squeezed dry, and coarsely chopped.