With cooking to keep it interesting I like to do things I haven’t before, some new flavor combination, some new cooking method, or some new ingredient.  This means the recipe might not turn out.  No risk, no reward is of the essence.  If there is no risk I’m not moving forward.  Now I’ll read up on the new idea if there is literature.  I still want to succeed.  The first time I heard of a risotto was on “The Gilmore Girls” and Sookie was being Sookie cooking something way more elaborate than I dared.  I researched a risotto in the literature and it sounded like something I could do, but I never tried it until now.  It seems to have one large advantage in that you do not need as large of a pan to realize your result, because you don’t have to have a pan which will accommodate the entire volume of the water necessary to cook the rice at one time.  I also enjoyed the flavor and the texture, but I like the flavor and texture of rice to begin with.

Ingredients:

• 1 14 oz smoked sausage
• 2 chicken thighs cooked and shredded
• 1 32 oz chicken broth
• 2 jalapenos
• 1 cup rice
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 8 oz tomato sauce
• 1 15 oz diced tomatoes
• 4 cloves garlic
• 2 small avocados
• About 1/2 cup water

Instructions:

1. Thinly slice jalapeno and smoked sausage.  Set aside.
2. In large frying pan brown smoked sausage.
3. After sausage is fried, add jalapenos and soften.
4. Add previously cooked and shredded chicken.
5. Add oil, stirring to coat everything.
6. Add rice, coating in oil and allowing to heat up.
7. Open cans of tomatoes and chicken broth.  Set near your cooking space.
8. Add 8 oz of chicken broth and 2 oz tomato sauce to pan.  Cook until all liquid is absorbed.
9. Repeat for a total of 4 times.
10. Add 8 oz of chicken broth and 5 oz of diced tomatoes.  Cook until all liquid is absorbed .
11. Repeat for a total of 3 times.
12. Blend avocados, garlic, and about 1/2 cup water until pureed during one of your times when the rice is absorbing liquids.  Set aside.
13. Add remaining 8 oz chicken broth to pan.  Cook until absorbed.
14. Remove from heat.
15. Fold in blended mixture while still cooking off burner.
16. Let set 10 minutes to thicken.
17. Serve.

I became interested in cajeta through dulce de leche ice cream.  First with Homemade brand ice cream in the midwest, then later through HEB creamy creations in Texas.  I realize cajeta and dulce de leche aren’t quite the same thing.  One to my knowledge is Mexican and one is South American.  I researched recipes and then made up my own using as many Hispanic ingredients as possible.  The recipe makes a lot and I have a hard time finding uses for it.  Of course there is the use of ice cream topping.  There is also just eating it with a spoon.  I have tried to add it to coffee, but have not really liked the combination.  It was brought to my attention by a friend and coworker that in convenience stores in Mexico they sell cajeta between two sheets made of a thin carb, so my next exploration will be into pizzelles, which are a thin Italian waffle type cookie.  I’m going to try to make a sandwich cookie with two pizzelles and cajeta in between.  Anyways I’ll let you know how that goes when I’m making up a recipe for pizzelles.  And now the recipe,

Ingredients:

• 3 8 oz cones of piloncillo
• 1 64 oz 2% goats milk
• 1 tablespoon real vanilla
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 3 tablespoons Mexican desert blossom honey

Instructions:

1. In large pot, I use a copper pot made for boiling down jams, mix together goats milk, piloncillo, honey, and vanilla.
2. Bring mixture to a boil, while melting and breaking apart piloncillo.
3. When mixture starts to visibly boil, remove from heat and add baking soda.
4. Stir soda in well.  You should see a visible chemical reaction and the mixture should be foamy for the duration of the recipe.
5. Place mixture back on heat.
6. Allow mixture to boil down.  This will be a process of conduction and convection.  This mean that as the viscosity of the mixture increases you will either have to stir more, reduce the heat, or both.
7. When you can see ‘trails’ behind the spoon as you stir, the mixture is thick enough.
8. Remove from heat.
9. Allow to cool.
10. Package.  Refrigerated should last at least 3 months.

I’ve gotten along fine when it comes to cold foods for breakfast or lunch, but when it comes to supper I want something hot like what I would imagine the meaning of the word supper to be.  A soup or stew that has literally cooked all day and the heat has already started the breakdown or what is known in the body as digestion.  An alternative to soup has always been a salad, but a salad was salted lettuce in Rome.  Adding heat would have just melted the lettuce turning it into goo.  The meal of northern Europe was always meat and potatoes.  What if you had hot thinly sliced meat along with potatoes and other vegetables?  The salted lettuce idea has gone through many iterations.  Oil and vinegar have at times been popular.  You can choose salts fit for a king on a Ceaser salad with parmesan, anchovies, croutons, and more.  More often than not our salt has become an oil based dressing with acid, salt, and other flavors.  Anyways that was long winded.  For this dish I made hot meat and potatoes tossed with a dressing I made up.

Ingredients:

Meat and potatoes:

• 1 lb smoked sausage thinly sliced
• 3 medium sized zucchini
• 10 medium sized potatoes
• 1 bag of sliced carrots

Dressing:

• 1 small avocado
• 1 8 oz sour cream
• 4 clove garlic
• 2 8 oz tomato sauce

Instructions:

1. Cut all ingredients for the meat and potatoes into bite sized easily cookable portions.
2. Place heat into these items in your favorite way.  If you can’t choose your favorite, pick a way you can live with.  I fried mine in olive oil.  Boiling would probably be healthier.
3. Place in large “salad” bowl.
4. Blend avocado, sour cream, and garlic with about 3 oz water until everything has been incorporated.
5. Mix cans of tomato sauce with blended mixture until homogeneous.
6. Pour dressing over your bowl and toss.
7. Add additional heat if desired and serve.

The immersion “stik” blender is the soup tool.  Basically you just need some flavorful mixture which you can turn into a broth.  When I was a kid my mom made a lot of pea soup.  Every time we had a ham the last dish made was a pea soup.  I didn’t care much for peas as a kid.  I didn’t really like tuna casserole for this reason.  However, when you took split peas and made a broth out of it, peas were not only tolerable but good.  With an immersion blender you can do the same with almost any starch.  Just pick a staple.

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup korean roasted red pepper paste
• 1 1/2 cup rice
• 6 medium yellow potatoes
• 1 24 oz cottage cheese
• 1 16 oz greek yogurt
• 1 8 oz sour cream
• Skim milk to fill slow cooker – about 4 cups
• 1 16 oz fresh mushrooms
• 2 lbs ham

Instructions:

1. Place cottage cheese, sour cream, greek yogurt, potatoes, and red pepper paste in large slow cooker.
2. Fill with skim milk, stir to keep dairy from burning to bottom, and cook on low for 6 hours.
3. Add rice cook additional hour.
4. After adding rice begin sauteing mushrooms.  Follow by heating diced ham.  I choose frying.
5. Blend contents of slow cooker with immersion blender until smooth.
6. Take a portion of ham and mushrooms.  Cover with hot broth.  Stir.  Serve.