Foodies BS Thread.

Nice presentation. Are those Bon chon chicken wings on the grill?

 

That looks good. I will have eggs for breakfast, lunch and dinner...

 

I put a small 5lb. boston butt on the grill for 7.5 hours at about 275-300 degrees, had some home made slaw and barbecue sauce, it turned out great...

 

There are those tots again! Looks good Pete!

 

Breakfast: scrambled eggs with cilantro & sun-dried tomato basil feta in basil infused oil.. topped with bacon crumbles on wheat pita

 

Everything looks really good guys. I won't be cooking I will be at a seminar all next week. I will definitely be missing TW....

 

Definitely no cooking......

 

So, I realized this morning that I haven't put our famous "Sausage, Peppers, and Onions" to page here. I cannot, in good conscience, let this stand.

I personally think that the crock pot is one of the most under-rated and under-appreciated tools in the modern american kitchen. Especially when my commute was an hour each way! It was such a blessing to walk in the door after a long day and an even longer commute and get gobsmacked by an entire house that smells like a sumptuous meal already waiting for you.

With that, we dive right in! One of my favorite recipes to make and eat.

INGREDIENTS

Pretty simple and straightforward, as the name would suggest:



-Three to five bell peppers, of various sizes/varieties/colors/flavors
-Two or three medium onions, also of various sizes/varieties/colors/flavors
-2 pounds of your favorite italian sausage
-Two cans (14.5 oz each please) of diced or petite cut tomatoes, UN-DRAINED
-Rice (or other starch/pasta/whatever) to serve over
-Salt to taste
-Fresh black pepper to taste

(Other seasonings to taste: garlic, italian, etc)

METHOD

Break down and cut peppers and onions into rough strips. Not so small as a julienne, but not giant hunks like a 'rough chop'. Someplace in the middle...You want to be able to handle several with a standard spoon. I quarter the onions then slice into .25 rings for this.





Now, start with an empty crock:



Toss in a handful of peppers, a handful of onions, rinse/repeat, until you have about half of them in the pot. Sprinkle a teaspoon of salt over them, then lay your raw sausage out in a single layer, if you can, across. I can get two 1-pound packages from the store in here at once this way.



Scatter the remaining onions and peppers across the top, fairly evenly. Sprinkle another teaspoon of salt over the whole mess.




*NOTE

There's a lot of room for improvisation and individual taste tweaking in this dish. I've had it where the sausage was grilled and browned prior to crocking. I've had mushrooms and carrots added. I've had different spices of every kind added. Once you get your head around how simple this whole thing really is, you can really have fun with the flavors. The basics, though, are what I'm putting in.

The Mrs and the yout have wildly different tastes than I, so we play around with a LOT of different kinds of spices and flavors at our house. This is just whats right over the range-top for instant always access:



This time its fairly simple: Black pepper (about a dozen grinds), and italian seasoning, with some garlic tossed on for good measure.



Now, take your UN-DRAINED diced or petite cut tomatoes (yes, you can use 'special' or 'flavored' ones too, as shown here with low salt and basil, or just plain...don't matter) and dump them over the top of the pile, spreading around with the lids or a spoon to get nice even coverage:



Yes, you can use fresh tomatoes and broth/stock for this part, if you wanted. At...what, $1.79 a can that you probably already have in the pantry...I usually use the canned.



Slap on the lid, set for a long time at a low heat, and...whatever. Go to work, go to sleep, go play Call of Brother's Mass Effect: War Zone 5 Dark Ops, or whatever FPS is hot this week. Just go away for at least 5 hours.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Much, much later

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Now, my kin prefer this over rice, and while that's fantastic, there's a couple things I do to liven it up a bit more. First, don't just use 'Minute Rice' or some other blanched, boil-bag junk that tastes like paper. WHY BOTHER?

We settled on Jasmine long grain rice, available in the local Walblixmartixie. It gets a bit heavy if you eat too much, but you'll learn this the first time you try it, so it's a handy built-in portion control.

Also, another tip: Don't use WATER to make your rice. Do something else:



Water doesn't bring ANY flavor to the dish. Why use it? (Yea, I prefer home-made stock too. But there's nothin' wrong with store-bought if that's what ya got handy!) Also, add a sprinkle of salt and...say...



Try it this way. I promise you'll never want just white boring rice made with water ever again.

Anyhow, while that cooks (20 minutes), about halfway through, turn your attention back to the crock pot!

I pull the power and yank the ceramic sleeve out to let it start cooling. Believe me, there's PLENTY of residual heat in that mass to keep the food plenty hot to eat for the next 30 minutes easy, even uncovered.



No, it ain't much to look at. Who cares? Slap some of that nummy rice down into a shallow bowl, dunk some sausages down on it, grab some peppers/tomatoes/onions, and slather some juice over the top of the whole mess.



If this doesn't stick to your ribs...you might not have any. Plus, if there's a dish with more room for tweaking the flavor all over the map than this one, without changing the basic, fill-you-up-but-GOOD qualities of the basic meal itself, then I have yet to see it.

Not a long ingredient list, fairly simple to make, and you can start in the morning and have it waiting for you when you get home from work.

Enjoy

 

Hey Pete, OT but what kind of camera do you use?

 

Looks good Pete! ^^^

 

tonights dinner!




love it over easy!

 

Nice Ant!!

 

Mmmmmm bacon! !!!!!


Dinner tonight: rotisserie chicken, focaccia, raw sugar snap peas.... and I took a plain jane box of white cheddar macaroni & showered it with basil & parmesan love

Ice Cream Bread is in the oven.... Curious how it will turn out!

 

^nice, my diet precludes me from eating almost any of that


mine is bacon-wrapped backstrap/tenderloin

 

F*** why did I click on this thread.. Now I'm hungry.

 

Ice Cream Bread!

2c ice cream any flavor (full flavor no fat free lowfat whatnot)
1 & 1/2 cup self rising flour

Mix together, put in greased loaf pan.

350* for 40min.

I used carrot cake ice cream. Yes I have weird taste!

 

It's kinda a pain in the butt to mix up well, because you don't wait for the ice cream to melt...just soften up enough to work in the flour.

This one didn't stay super sweet, but not a bad taste. I think toasted with melted butter would make it better. Can't wait to try the next flavor!