Delishytown

Hard Root Beer Braised Brisket

This was a delicious experiment. Traditionally, red wine is used when cooking brisket. I’ve used beer before, mostly IPA’s, when slow cooking meats, and it always comes out yummy. So, I recently bought a six pack of the “Best Root Beer Ever” hard root beer, to make fancy, alcoholy, root beer floats, (so good). We still had a bunch of cans leftover, so I decided to try the hard root beer in this recipe to see if the sarsaparilla spices would give it a mysterious savoriness. It worked great! This was pretty dang delicious.

This is easy, cooking time is about 4 hours, with 20 minutes of prep. You could easily crock pot this and have dinner ready when you get home from work or school. 

Sear salted and peppered meat in butter and a small amount of bacon grease, or vegetable oil. Let it cook until browned, browning on all sides. Meanwhile, in a saucepan, 2 tbsp olive oil, 3 big garlic cloves, chopped, 1 med chopped onion, 1 large chopped shallot, 1 tbsp brown sugar, 1 can hard root beer, 1 Meyer lemon, juiced, 2 tbsp ketchup, 3/4 cup hot water, 1 tsp beef base, 2 tsp Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper, and 1 or 2  bay leaves. Stir it around and let the sugar dissolve. Place the meat in a roasting pan, pour the aromatic mixture on top of it, and scoot some underneath. Cover tightly and bake at 325 for 3 to 4 hours. (For a crock pot version it would be about 8 hours, on low, I think.)

Slice against the grain, serve on a crusty roll and garnish with fresh slaw and jalapeño slices if you like it hot. For easy fresh slaw: Shred 1/4 of a small cabbage and 2 carrots, dress with a mixture of 1 tbsp mayo, 2 tbsp plain yogurt, 1/2 cup milk, juice of 1/2 lemon, sprinkle of salt, pinch of sugar or honey, a fresh grind of pepper, 1 fresh chopped shallot, and a sprinkle of fresh or dried dill. Yum!

Goat Cheese, Roasted Red Pepper, & Sun-dried Tomato Chicken Sandwich

This sandwich is easy and so delicious! I used leftover herb roasted chicken from dinner the other night. Start with everything French bread (toasted) spread with plain Goat cheese on the bottom, chopped sun dried tomatoes on the top, (the kind packed in olive oil), the cooked chicken, lots of sliced roasted red peppers, (char under the broiler, cover and steam, then peel and chop), mesclun greens, a drizzle with Balsamic vinegar de Modena (this stuff is delicious!) and garnish with peperoncini, and my favorite Castelvetrano olives. Yum!

Cuban Sandwiches for my Man’s lunch today. These were delish! Baguette, leftover smoked pork tenderloin, butter, yellow mustard, sliced pickles, Swiss cheese, grill on both sides. #cubansandwich

Brown Sugar Bacon BLT with Avocado

This is my favorite summertime sandwich. The heirloom tomatoes growing in our garden are sweet, tangy and so good! The recipe is easy, the difference with this is brown sugar bacon, which cooks in the oven and is much easier than standing over a splattering pan. It's also completely delicious. I buy the nitrate free stuff, to pretend like it's healthy.

To make brown sugar bacon: Line a cookie sheet with foil, add the bacon to the cookie sheet with the fat side touching the pan, and the meatier side overlapping on top. Sprinkle with brown sugar. Turn the oven to 400. Add the pan to the un-preheated oven, this way it renders slowly. Cook for about 15 to 20 minutes, turn it around if it needs it, to cook evenly. Drain on paper towels with the sugar side up, or you get tiny bits of paper towel on your sweet bacon. I found this out by noshing on tiny bits of sugar coated, bacony paper towel one time. Please don't tell anyone.

Layer all the ingredients on toasted sourdough with mayo, avocado, heirloom tomato, lettuce, celery salt and pepper. Yum!

Enjoy your Sunday Tumblrs!

Brown Sugar Bacon BLT with Kale & Fennel Salad 

The kale and fennel in this salad are from our winter garden. Yum! I love fresh garden greens. And I love a good BLT! BLT with kale salad gives you  healthy vitality from fresh greens, and amazing decadent flavor of brown sugar bacon with tomato and creamy avocado slices. Mmmmm, food is my second best friend.

For Brown Sugar Bacon: Line a cookie sheet with foil. Place nitrate free bacon strips on it, sprinkle the bacon with 2 tblsp organic brown sugar. Bake at 375 until crispy, about 10 to 15 minutes. Check on the bacon and remove any that are done before others so they don't burn. Let the bacon rest on paper towels, sugar side up or it'll stick to the paper towels. I found this out by eating way more teeny bits of bacony paper towel than I ever thought I would.

Make the BLT by toasting bread, dress with a little organic mayo, crispy bacon, sliced tomato, sliced avocado, & lettuce.

For Kale Fennel Salad:

Thinly slice fennel. Wash and spin kale, any kind you have. Make a vinaigrette by whisking 1 tblsp red wine vinegar, juice of 1/2 lemon, juice of 1 tangerine, 2 tblsp olive oil, 1 smashed open garlic clove, a drizzle of honey, and salt and pepper. Garnish with the feathery fennel fronds.

This yummy sandwich came partly from our back yard garden. This is a Tarragon Chicken Salad Sandwich with Sun Dried Tomato. This sandwich features some home grown ingredients, including Rocket Arugula,  "Pineapple" tomato, fresh Tarragon and French shallots. It was soooo Yummy! Recipe here:

Chop cooked chicken, white or dark meat whichever you prefer. For each cup of cooked chicken, dress with appx. 2 tblsp organic mayo, 1 to 2 tblsp fresh chopped tarragon or 1 tblsp dry, salt and pepper to taste, juice of 1/2 lemon, 1/4 tsp Dijon mustard, 2 stalks chopped celery, 1 small chopped shallot. Serve on toasted bread with fresh slices of cucumber, tomato, arugula leaves and sun dried tomatoes, (the kind packed in oil).

Delicious!

Fried Chicken Banh Mi with Wasabi Mayo

Yum! This was my lunch today. It was so delicious. I went to the Asian market yesterday, so I have a lot of delicious vegetables and a few new spices and condiments to cook with. One of them is a spicy little tube of Wasabi paste. I love Wasabi! I knew I had to make wasabi mayo for this sandwich today. It was a good choice, and had just the right amount of heat and creaminess to go with the crispy chicken and crunchy vegetables.

Heat oven to 400 for the oven fried version, or heat high heat cooking oil in a cast iron skillet for a fried version.

Dip boneless skinless chicken breast or thigh pieces in scrambled egg, then in Panko bread crumbs seasoned with salt and pepper. Spritz the chicken pieces with olive oil spray and bake for about 25 minutes or more until cooked through. If you want to fry the chicken pieces, place them in the hot oil and carefully cook on both sides until cooked through. (Or you could buy cooked breaded chicken cutlets and do a shortcut version.) 

Slice napa cabbage, red jalapeños, Persian cucumber, shallots, grate carrots, Stem and chop cilantro.

Mix organic mayo with a little Wasabi paste.

Make some toast or cut a roll or baguette in half. I used whole wheat sourdough. Spread the wasabi mayo on the bread and build your sandwiches with the chicken on the bottom, the veggies and herbs on top. Season with salt and pepper. Yummmm

Baked Brown Sugar BLT with Kale Chips and Crudités 

I made these delectable BLT's with baked brown sugar bacon, small green and red striped garden tomatoes, and served them with homemade kale chips & crunchy delicious crudités on the side. This was so delicious! I look forward to home grown tomatoes all year long so I can have this sandwich. Yummmm.

This post is about cooking the bacon in the oven, with a little brown sugar and black pepper sprinkled on top. This way of cooking bacon is very easy, and it doesn't mess up the stovetop. Yay for not having to clean something!

I like to use organic, nitrate free bacon. It's more expensive, but much better for you, as far as eating bacon goes. Since I rarely eat bacon anyway, it's worth it to buy the best I can get.  

Heat oven to 375. Place bacon strips on a cookie sheet lined with foil. Sprinkle with about 1-2 tsp brown sugar and freshly ground black pepper. You don't need to add salt because bacon is pretty salty already. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes until crisp, turning once. Drain on paper towels.

While the bacon cooks, slice cucumbers, carrots, and celery into strips for crudités garnish.

On another cookie sheet, sprits olive oil spray and add freshly washed, dried, and stemmed kale. Spritz with a little more olive oil spray. Season with kosher salt, pepper, and smoked paprika. Toss the kale around on the cookie sheet to coat evenly. Bake for about 3-6 minutes at 375 until they crisp up. Keep a close eye on them because they cook pretty fast depending on how dry it is outside.

Toast whole wheat bread. Add a little mayo, salt and pepper, sliced garden tomatoes, lettuce, avocado slices, and the brown sugar bacon. Serve with the kale chips and crudités. 

Yum!

Vegetarian Breakfast Sandwich with Tomatoes and Basil

This was a delicious breakfast! The carrots & basil were grown in our back yard.

Cook veggie sausage, fry an egg, top the cooked egg with a little grated cheddar cheese and let it melt. Toast some sourdough bread or any kind of bread you have. Serve with tomato slices and fresh chopped basil, salt and pepper. Garnish with carrot sticks and more basil. Yum!

Grilled Cheddar and Tomato on Sourdough

This was my delicious lunch, with a salad from the garden. It's not a recipe so much as it is fresh tomato slices cooked into a grilled cheese sandwich on sourdough. I like to serve mine the way my friend Grace does, with Dijon mustard. Yum!

Curried Chicken Salad Sandwich

This is so yummy and is a great way to use up leftover chicken. My husband loved it! 

Chop leftover cooked chicken into cubes. Mix 2 tblsp plain Greek style yogurt, 2 tblsp mayo, the juice of 1/2 lemon, 1/2 tsp rice vinegar, 1 tblsp honey, 1/2 tsp curry powder, celery salt and pepper, chopped celery, shredded carrot, 1/4 cup chopped onion and a small handful of raisins or chopped grapes. Serve on toasted sourdough bread with garden greens & a side of pickled giardiniera. You could also wrap this  into  sandwich wraps for a lighter version. Yum! 

Chicago Dog with Everything

This was our delicious dinner tonight. We were in Chicago last weekend and brought these poppy seed buns back on the plane with us. They don't make poppy seed buns in California. All our Chicago friends out here go crazy for "real" Chicago dogs. This was so good and worth the trouble of carrying poppy seed buns on the plane.

In Chicago this type of garnish is called "dragging it through the garden". The celery salt is a key ingredient here and adds to the fresh garden taste. 

Cook organic beef hot dogs in simmering water and dress with mustard, relish, chopped onions, sport peppers, (or your favorite pickled peppers), tomatoes, and celery salt*.   

* I was out of celery salt so I made my own by grinding celery seed with kosher salt in the mortar and pestle. Yum!

Grilled Turkey, Arugula and Swiss w/  side of Giardiniera

Grilled Eggplant, Bell Pepper and Roasted Tomato Sandwich on Garlic Bread

This was our amazingly delicious lunch today made with the leftover ciabatta rolls (they came 6 to a package) from yesterday. The thing I'm happiest about is that I'm finally  starting to learn how to use my camera in manual mode, thanks to my wonderful camera teachers. 

Here's how we made these veggie sandwiches:

First, make the rolls into garlic bread. Garlic, olive oil and foil help to freshen up the rolls. Crush 1 large garlic clove, mix it with 2 tblsp olive oil, salt and pepper and any fresh or dried herbs you like. I used a little chopped rosemary from the garden. Brush onto the cut sides of any bread or rolls. Place in foil packet in a hot oven for about 5 minutes. Then open the foil and open the rolls, face up and bake at 400 until toasted.

Slice some cherry tomatoes in half and place in a small casserole dish with a sprits of olive oil spray and salt and pepper. Bake with the bread at 400 until bubbly & cooked.

Heat a grill pan to high. Slice eggplants and season with some salt. In a few minutes you'll see a little of the moisture come out. Brush away the salty moisture and blot with a paper towel.  Slice onions. Quarter a  bell pepper. Spray both sides of all the veggies with olive oil spray and season with fresh ground pepper. Sear on the  hot grill pan, reduce the heat to med, cook on both sides, flipping occasionally to cook evenly. Remove to a plate.

Grate some of your favorite cheeses. We had queso fresco, cheddar and parmesan. Chop some lettuce or greens. I used red chard from the garden.

Layer the eggplant on the bottom, top with cheese and return to the oven to melt the cheese. Add the rest of the grilled veggies, the chopped greens and top with the roasted tomatoes. Drizzsle with a little balsamic vinegar. Yum! 

Garlicky Chicken Sandwich with Swiss Cheese, Avocado and Sun Dried Tomatoes

This was our lunch today and features Romaine lettuce from the edible front yard garden. Yumm! This is easy, I bought all the other ingredients from TJ's this morning, including the ciabatta rolls.

Heat a skillet to med high, add a little grape seed oil. Season boneless skinless chicken thighs with salt and pepper. Add the chicken pieces to the hot pan and don't move them until they get a golden crust on the bottom. Crush 2 cloves garlic with a garlic press, spread the raw garlic on the uncooked side, flip and cover, leaving the lid off at the side to let some steam escape. Keep cooking until cooked through and the juices have reduced a little. About 10-15 minutes. Add chopped Swiss cheese and partially cover again until melted. Remove to a plate and let rest for a minute.

Cut ciabatta rolls in half and toast under the broiler or in a toaster oven being careful not to burn the tops of them like I did.

Slice avocados, shred lettuce. Spread a little mayo on the top bun, add some sun dried tomatoes, julienned or sliced if they aren't already. Place the chicken on the bottom, add shredded lettuce and avocado. Season with salt and pepper. Yum! 

Veggie Sausage and Egg Sandwich on Whole Wheat English Muffin w/ Cheddar, Avocado and Tomatoes

This is easy and delicious. I dressed these with a little mayo, Thousand Island would be nice too. Don't forget the salt & pepper.

Have a great weekend everybody!

I'm posting this because people don't talk about it enough. Grilled cheese with a big slice of tomato in the middle. The tomato gets extra juicy and hot while the cheese melts. It's easy and delicious. Spread the word. 

I hope you can see this, I accidentally had my camera on a setting that made my sandwich look all sexy and mysterious.