My work has an annual chili contest, this is the 2nd year I’ve submitted a chili.  In the past years, judges always complained the chilis are too hot.  So this year I tried to tone it down a little with only 2 habaneros and 4 fresnos.  Chili is hard to judge – ours was judged based on consistency, color, smell, and taste.  The consistency aspect is a little easier, the chili should not be watery, or thick like a paste.  The color and smell however are harder – I guess it shouldn’t be black… but what’s a good chili color, and what makes one chili’s color better than the next?  I am not a huge fan of the chili smell, there are much better smells in my opinion, like bacon sizzling in the oven… mmmm bacon.  I don’t really know why and how to judge if a chili smells better than another chili.  Taste is pretty subjective to the taster, this year apparently all the judges wanted more spicy and none of the chilis delivered!  So this year, most of the contestants toned down the spiciness of their chilis, and it just happens that this group of judges wanted spicier chilis!! Oh cruel timing, I should have added those two extra habaneros that I purchased.

I am sad that I didn’t even get the hottest chili like last year because I held back.  The hottest chili award went to a chili with only 1 habanero and a few comments that it wasn’t hot enough.  I loled.   Next year, they are all going to PAY.  At least 5 habaneros… at least.

So I don’t believe in Chili recipes – Chili is something that you make by throwing a bunch of stuff into a pot.  Here is the stuff that I threw into the pot.

• Ground Turkey
• Pork Belly
• Beef Stew Meat
• Onions
• Canned Tomatoes
• Canned Kidney Beans
• Canned Chiles
• Chili Powder
• Cayenne Pepper Powder
• Habaneros
• Fresnos
• Green Pepper
• Tomatillos
• Onion Flakes
• Garlic Powder
• Brown Sugar
• Cumin
• Salt

I didn’t get the consistency out of the pork belly that I wanted.  I wanted it to just melt in your mouth, and the way that it cooked in the chili was disappointing, it was a little too much like pork chunks.  Next time when I incorporate pork belly into a chili, I’m going to stew it first in the oven for a few hours and then add it to the chili.

This little decorating project started with a toothbrush.  We had this old Braun electric toothbrush that I didn’t like anymore, and my dentist and hygienists kept pushing me to buy a Sonicare.  So much that I think they’re getting a cut of the profits somehow…!  I had a gift certificate to Bloomingdale’s, and after 2 months of trying to spend it on shoes and clothing and everything I got sucked, I gave up and bought this.  Our old Braun was wall mountable, but this Sonicare requires a flat surface to live on.  Our only power outlet in the bathroom is on a wall, without any shelving.  The first step was to find wall mountable shelves which I found at Target – and if you’ve ever shopped at Target, you know you’re not walking out the door without spending another $100 on things that you don’t need.  So I ended up getting this shower curtain for our bathroom window and this mirror decoration set because we are on a polka dot theme here!  I was originally introduced to this awesome idea of round mirrors for decoration from this mirror set at cb2, but the target set is cheaper and I think it looks better without the frame.  Once the shelving was up, the toothbrush and my sonicdermabrasion dohickey (which is like $150 cheaper than the clarisonic one) sat on the bottom shelf, but the top two shelves were bare because I had nothing bathroom appropriate to put on it.

This led me to buy these alfie candle holders at Crate and Barrel.  They are on sale for 95 cents!!!  Here are some red ones also for 95 cents (which I bought 4 of, and you might have spied them on my dining room table).  I wish the purple ones went on sale, because I kind of love them too.  So there you have it, an economical redecoration of our bathroom for under $100, all thanks to a toothbrush.

Here is a full shot of the shelving.

In an attempt to cook healthier foods, I came up with this fennel and turkey ravioli dish.  It was inspired by a fennel and artichoke ravioli recipe, but I have no artichoke, and plenty of ground turkey in my fridge.  It was one of those nights, scrounging in the fridge for whatever that’s left, and try to come up with something that doesn’t taste like dog barf.  This definitely did not taste like dog barf, I enjoyed it a lot.  During the making of this, I had an egg emergency – I had 3 eggs total, used them in making the fresh pasta.  This is usually not enough for 3 cups of flour, so I had to put in some extra olive oil and extra water to make it come together.  Then as I was preparing the stuffing, I realized… hey… most people would use an egg to bring the stuffing together… I HAVE NO EGGS.  Despite the fact that the grocery store is about a mile from my house, going outside is just a terrible terrible option.  I live in Minnesota, it’s cold out there!  Also, if I went out to get just eggs, I would feel like it’s not efficient, and I would try to buy other things, which would take an hour, and I was hungry.  So in place of an egg – I used feta cheese as the binding agent.  It turned out delicious, and one less egg is always good for my waistline.

Evie’s Fennel and Turkey Ravioli

Ingredients:

Pasta Dough:

• 2.5 – 3 cups of flour
• 4 large eggs (or in my case, 3, and some water… )
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• fennel frond, minced

Ravioli Filling:

• 1/2 lb ground turkey
• 1/2 cup feta cheese
• 1/2 cup diced fennel
• Salt and Pepper to taste
• 1 teaspoon fennel seeds

Pasta Sauce:

• 1 28oz can diced tomatoes
• 3/4 cup sliced fennel
• 1 teaspoon fennel seeds
• 3/4 cup red onions
• 2 tablespoons capers (or olives)
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste

Directions:

Pasta Sauce:

1. In a large pan, heat up a tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat.  Add the fennel, fennel seeds, onions, and garlic.  Cook for 6-8 minutes until soft.
2. Add can of tomatoes with juices, tomato paste, and the capers.  Cook for about 5 minutes more.  Sauce your raviolis right away to prevent sticking.  Make sure you time your raviolis and sauce to be done at the same time.

Raviolis:

1. Mix the pasta dough by combining all ingredients, and then mix by hand or mixer, I use a mixer.  More in depth details here.  Cut it into 4 pieces, and roll it out using your awesome KitchenAid pasta roller, you do have one right?  I rolled the ravioli dough at the level 7 setting, so they are not complete paper thin like the level 8 setting.  For every piece of dough, I roll it out through level 4, then I cut it in half with a knife and roll it out some more into level 7.  Two sheets of pasta will make approximately 12 raviolis.    I love adding the minced fennel frond, it’s really visually appealing in this pasta.
2. Mix the filling by combining all ingredients in a bowl.  On the stove, boil a big pot of water to cook your raviolis in.
3. Lay one sheet down on your working surface, make sure the back is sufficiently floured so it doesn’t stick.  Use your ravioli cutter and lightly score the dough into the final shapes.  This helps you determine where to put the glob of turkey stuffing.
4. Spoon about a tablespoon of filling onto the pasta sheet.  Make sure you don’t overfill them, we don’t want them to explode.  Then use an EGG WASH (1 egg, 1 tablespoon of water) and brush every exposed pasta surface lightly.  See, I didn’t have an egg wash, because I had an egg emergency.  I used water.  It held fine.
5. Take the other sheet of pasta, and lightly layer it over the first two globs of filling.  Give it enough slack so the two pasta sheets touch.  Repeat to cover the rest of the raviolis.  Use your fingers and pat down the areas you egg washed.  Make sure there aren’t huge air bubbles near the filling.  You might have to pat the filling down a little for the ravioli cutter to travel over them.
6. Use your cutter, and cut out the raviolis!  This is my favorite part.  Super fun.  Separate them right away, I put them on some sheets of paper towels until they are ready to go into the pot.  Stack the sheets when you have a lot of them made.
7. Boil the raviolis for about 3-5 minutes in batches of 10 or less – you don’t want them to stick to each other.  Use a slotted spoon to fish them out, use them right away by saucing to prevent sticking.
8. Garnish with a little bit of fennel frond and serve!!

Here is the original recipe, and I deviated from it, quite a lot.  Mostly because I didn’t have some of the ingredients on hand, also recipes are guidelines meant to be broken, as long as you do not destroy key ingredients and proportions.  [like omitting flour from banana bread... that's a bad thing.]

For the risotto, I had no clam juice, and I had no fresh clams to extract juice from [insert image of me juicing clams].  I substituted chicken stock, and a cup of Eddington’s tomato basil soup that I stole from somebody at work this afternoon.  I started off with the oil/butter and onion base, added the rice, then worked in chicken stock and tomato basil soup.  Cooked it according to the recipe, added the parmesan cheese, and so forth.  This turned out incredible and my mind grapes are working furiously to find other soups that would work great as a risotto stock.

For the veggie mixture, I omitted the tarragon and spinach, added a bit of the fennel stalk (tastes like celery), and used a can of tomatoes.  The fennels needed more than 3 minutes to cook, more like 6.

Honestly, the salmon and fennel were pretty damn good and I would probably make it again, but the real winner here was my genius risotto creation.  I am seriously thinking about sending Sean out to Eddington’s once in a while to get this soup for me so I can make the risotto.  I would send him because I’m lazy, and we have come full circle as to why I can’t find fennel.

I still have a bulb of fennel left, what else should I make??

To participate

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.

2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.

3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating. [AS IF!!!!  Then my blog name wouldn't be true]

4) Optional extra: Post a comment at www.verygoodtaste.co.uk linking to your results.

Andrew has also published a FAQ answering some of the more obvious questions that come up from seeing this list.

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:

1. Venison

2. Nettle tea

3. Huevos rancheros

4. Steak tartare

5. Crocodile – I’m counting this because I’ve had alligator, tastes like chicken.

6. Black pudding – Ronnie counted blood tofu, so I am going to as well.

7. Cheese fondue

8. Carp

9. Borscht

10. Baba ghanoush

11. Calamari

12. Pho

13. PB&J sandwich

14. Aloo gobi

15. Hot dog from a street cart - I can almost say I did this in Mexico to make it more hardcore but the dude was totally not there when I remembered!

16. Epoisses – I suck at cheeses.

17. Black truffle – You’ve never had a burger until there’s fois gras and truffle on top.

18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes - I’ve had some super sweet Japanese pear wine… tasted like syrup ugh.

19. Steamed pork buns

20. Pistachio ice cream

21. Heirloom tomatoes – I think I get extra points for growing them.

22. Fresh wild berries

23. Foie gras – moar please.

24. Rice and beans

25. Brawn, or head cheese - love this stuff, want to make but too scared.

26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper – does putting them in a salsa count?  I’m counting it.

27. Dulce de leche

28. Oysters – big ones, little ones, cooked ones, raw ones, and even oysters the size of a fist.

29. Baklava

30. Bagna cauda – oh wow this looks delicious, do want.

31. Wasabi peas

32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl - eww, sourdough, why ruin the clam chowder that way?

33. Salted lassi

34. Sauerkraut – welcome to scandihoovia also known as minnesota.

35. Root beer float

36. Cognac with a fat cigar

37. Clotted cream tea – I’m a tea snob, creams do not go in teas.  That’s just so… British.

38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O Shots

39. Gumbo

40. Oxtail – hmm I just realized that I didn’t post my oxtail stew…

41. Curried goat

42. Whole insects – I swallowed a bug once accidentally.  Then I burped real loud.

43. Phaal – very intrigued, would love to try.

44. Goat’s milk

45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more

46. Fugu – I wish.

47. Chicken tikka masala

48. Eel – Mom used to buy these live and stir fry them.  So good.

49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut – What’s the hype?  They’re not that good.

50. Sea urchin – a few times I’ve tried this… I think I like it?

51. Prickly pear

52. Umeboshi

53. Abalone

54. Paneer

55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal

56. Spaetzle

57. Dirty gin martini – I prefer vodka.  Gin tastes like pine trees.

58. Beer above 8% ABV – Once at Buster’s on 28th, I had a flight of 5 beers, 4 of which were above 8%… I was so wasted.

59. Poutine

60. Carob chips

61. S’mores

62. Sweetbreads – mmm, innerds.

63. Kaolin – bwuh? [I left Ronnie's bwuh there, because... bwuh?]

64. Currywurst – I’m pretty sure I’ve had every kind of wurst there is to wurst.

65. Durian – mmm, stinky feet smell with rotten onion texture, how do you not like it?

66. Frogs’ legs

67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake – moar please.

68. Haggis - Just had this recently at L’Ecosse in Minneapolis.  I would highly recommend it.  And maybe order 2… because sharing 1 sucks.

69. Fried plantain

70. Chitterlings, or andouillette

71. Gazpacho

72. Caviar and blini - I’ve had them separate of each other… but eating them together? Interesting…

73. Louche absinthe

74. Gjetost, or brunost – I am cheese fail.

75. Roadkill  - ok cleetus.

76. Baijiu – hahaha Sean calls this Chinese moonshine.

77. Hostess Fruit Pie

78. Snail

79. Lapsang souchong - I’m going to say yes because last time I was in China, we did a tea house tour and tasted like 40 different teas… I’m pretty sure we covered this one.

80. Bellini

81. Tom yum

82. Eggs Benedict

83. Pocky – I got some in my pantry right now!

84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant – *sob*

85. Kobe beef – remember from up above I mentioned a burger with fois gras and black truffles on top?  Well, it was a kobe beef patty.  It also had braised short ribs on it.

86. Hare - one of my favorites.

87. Goulash

88. Flowers

89. Horse

90. Criollo chocolate

91. Spam

92. Soft shell crab

93. Rose harissa

94. Catfish

95. Mole poblano – I keep ordering this and struck out every time.

96. Bagel and lox

97. Lobster Thermidor

98. Polenta

99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee

100. Snake – tastes like chicken.

That is a total of 74, I tied you Ronnie dammit.

Ronnie’s additions to the list:

101. Jamon Iberico – mmmmm spanish bacon…. do want.

102-104. Tripe. Tongue. Trotters. – yum, I don’t care for tripe that much but I love a good tongue taco.

105. Marrow

106. Wild mushrooms

107. Huitlacoche - Ronnie this looks disgusting, but I’d try it.  I wonder if I can find it at that Asian/Mexican supermarket.

108. Natto – I bet this isn’t as bad as people make it out to be.

109. Bitter Melon – ehhh it’s ok, and kind of refreshing in a way, but I still don’t think I’ll go out of my way to eat it.

Lets add a few more shall we?

110: Lutefisk – who doesn’t want a big glob of lye soaked fish?  I still need to try this, and it’s not like it’s hard to get in MN.

111: Fermented Tofu – this is tofu fermented in white wine… I kind of love it.

112: Thousand year old egg – black eggs, ends up in a lot of episodes of andrew zimmern bizarre foods.  Yeah it’s gross if you eat it as is, you gotta prepare it with something, then it’s pretty delicious.

113: Salted Duck Egg – Super high in cholesterol but oh man it’s worth it.  The yolk is like roe.  The white I can care less about.

114: PORK BELLY – I mean seriously, how do you make a culinary must-eat list and not include pork belly.

115: Shark fin soup – kind of a delicacy is it not?  I don’t condone cutting fins off of sharks, but I do want to punch them sometimes.

116: Geoduck – they look so gross but they taste so good.

117: Chicharrones – basically pork rind, but if you’ve never had the skin of a perfectly cooked pig, you are not living life my friend.

I leave you with a picture of some roasted pork with the skin on.  Crispy and delicious.  Excuse the crappy iPhone picture, this is served at Mandarin Kitchen in Bloomington MN.

Do you have:

• A package of Ramen? (Or noodles and stock)
• Tomatoes?
• Bacon?
• Eggs?
• Frozen Peas?

If you have 3 or more of the above, you can make this kicked up ramen.  I make this one, all the time, because I usually have all these ingredients in my kitchen.  This looks pretty delicious right, you’re probably wondering, why would you throw that up!  Well, it wasn’t voluntary.  So a few days ago, a coworker of mine convinced me to start the Beachbody Insanity workout.  It was Sunday night, and I figured why not, I’m motivated from watching the Olympics all week, lets do this!  So I made dinner [this ramen], I ate it, omnomnom, while watching the USA vs Canada Hockey game [GO USA!].  About an hour later, the game is over, we kicked some Canuk ass, and I felt so great, lets start Insanity!!!  Well… I highly underestimated this workout routine.  Let me list my follies:

1. Eating a pretty big dinner.
2. Working out 1 hour after eating a pretty big dinner.
3. Did not read the warning labels and PDFs that came with Insanity – who reads manuals?
4. Extreme OCD at times.
5. Assuming this workout video is similar to other workout videos – in that you are suppose to follow along.
6. Assuming that the little Asian girl is the weaker out of the two people demonstrating with the trainer.  The other is a dude, with muscles.
7. Participated in a 3 month long program to keep my couch from flying into outer space (i.e. I sat on it, for a long time.)

I am sure there are more follies, but that’s not the point to this story.  I started the video, got through a pretty rough warm up, tried to follow the little Asian girl through out all the sets.  At the 4th set of workouts, I totally realized that she’s what you would call… HARDCORE.  She was kicking the dude’s ass, I’m pretty sure she’s a robot.  At this point I’m already half way in, I figured I can just power through it with what energy I have left.  At the end, I had a little bit of a second wind and went a little crazy with the plank leg raises… Right when we started the cooldown stretching, I suddenly felt a little woozy and started seeing stars.  I sat down, put my head between my legs, and hoped it would go away.  NOPE, not when I just ate nommy ramen 1.5 hours ago.  I threw it all up.  I worked out so hard that I threw up.  If you think about it, that’s pretty HARDCORE isn’t it?  So maybe, I did beat the little Asian chick on the video…. (ok no not really.)

The joke is on me tho, apparently this video, if I had read the manual, is a fitness test.  You are suppose to do only as much as you can do, and you were NOT suppose to follow along.  Throughout this entire video series, you are suppose to rest when you need to rest, because they call it INSANITY for a reason.  This is what I get for not reading the manual.  Just remember kids, read the manual if you don’t want to throw up like I did.  The only regret that I have is throwing up precious bacon.  :(

Evie’s Everyday Ramen

Directions:

1. Take 1 or 2 slices of bacon and cut it into 1/2 inch pieces.  Cook bacon in a small stock pot until it’s to your favorite bacon consistency.  (I prefer a softer chewey bacon myself).  Drain the bacon grease.
2. Take a tomato and cut it into about 8 pieces.  Add the tomatoes directly to the bacon over high heat, it will sizzle, cook down the tomatoes until they are tender and there are tomato juices on your bacon.
3. Carefully add 2 – 3 cups of water to the pot.   Let it boil, and add the spice packet.  [If you are using noodles and stock, add 2-3 cups of stock instead.]
4. Add your noodles and frozen peas.  Let it boil for a few minutes to tenderize your noodles.  No more than 2 or 3 minutes should be needed for most ramen.
5. Meanwhile, crack open an egg and whisk it.  At the end when the noodles are soft and ready to eat, drizzle the egg mixture into the pot.  This is how you make egg drop soup!  Turn off your burner right away, we want the egg to be light and fluffy, don’t boil it.  It will cook the second it reaches the boiling water.
6. Top ramen with fried shallots and drizzles of sesame oil and serve!

What do you do when you have too much tomatoes and basil left over from your pizza?  You make a caprese salad!  I apologize for the lack of bacon in this dish.  I’m sure you can sprinkle some on top… now why didn’t I think of that when I made this.

Evie’s Last Minute Caprese Salad

Ingredients:

• 1 tomato
• handful of basil
• 1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
• salt and pepper

Directions:

1. Slice up the tomatoes and arrange on plate.
2. Chiffonade the basil and layer on top of the tomatoes.  (This is where you roll up the basil leaves, bigger leaves on the outside, smaller leaves on the inside) and slice thin, illustrated below.
3. Sprinkle with shredded mozzarella.
4. Whisk together the olive oil and vinegar, pour over the salad.  Salt and pepper to taste.

Him: NoooOOoooOOoooOOOooooOOooo!!!!! (The Minnesotan kind of way)

When I said mushrooms, I meant green olives, because he likes pepperoni, sausage, and green olives.  I however, love alllll kinds of ingredients on my pizza, because I EAT EVERYTHING.  The best is a garbage pizza where everything but the kitchen sink is on it, and tons and tons of mushrooms.  But today, after seeing the prices of red bell pepper ($4.99/lb!!! WTFFFFFFFF IS IT COATED IN GOLD?!) I decided that I would much rather just make a margarita pizza with some tomatoes and basil and garlic.  I don’t eat a lot of pizza, so I got 1/4 of the pizza real estate. He ate one of my slices but since it’s valentines day, I was willing to share.  If this were any other day, THERE WOULD HAVE BEEN SOME ASS WHOPPING.

I used a KAF Guaranteed pizza dough recipe, and I do have to say, it was mighty delicious.  King Arthur KAF Guaranteed recipes have not let me down yet.  I was going to use a little bit of the KAF dough improver to make the dough less elastic and easier to handle, but I forgot, but it was ok because I didn’t need any.  For the sauce, I used 1/2 jar of pasta sauce mixed with a small can of tomato paste.  Tomatoes, basil, garlic on 1/4, and spicy turkey sausage, pepperoni, and green olives on the rest, all topped off with mozzarella.

First step in the dough is to let it rise, roll it out, let it rise some more, and then bake without any toppings.  Here it is just out of the oven.  Not very exciting, looks like dough.

Next went on the tomato sauce, and brushed the outside crust with some olive oil for color.

Next went on the first layer of toppings.

Now the rest…

Action shot of sprinkling on more cheese, because you can never have enough cheese.

My side!

His side!

Oh I mentioned something about roses and chocolates earlier too didn’t I?  Just to make this post even more image heavy…..

I am weak, I gave in to these ice cubes from cb2.  I am so excited to have these, because I’m kind of shoe crazy, and also kind of red crazy, and also kind of all around crazy about cute things.  I froze them last night, and put them in my OJ this morning.  I am a slow drinker (also slow eater) and these are the perfect ice cubes.  They are encased in plastic filled with water, so when they melt, they don’t dilute your drink.  I hate warm OJ and I hate watered down OJ, and today my OJ stayed at the perfect temperature for quite a few hours.  Cleanup is super easy as well.  If you follow the link, you can see the cb2 picture and they are super cool when they are in fizzy water, the little bubbles stick to the shoes and make them SPARKLE.  Ok I am officially a dork, but a dork with cool ice cubes.

Garlic-Shallot Butter Sauce with Surf and turf

• 1/3 stick of butter
• 1/4 cup of olive oil (you can use all butter if you want)
• pinch of salt and pepper
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 3 medium sized shallots
• 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Cut up the garlic and shallots a little, melt the butter, and mix all ingredients in a food processor until the garlic and shallots are really finely chopped up.  This sauce was good for 2 fillets and 2 lobster tails with enough left over for dipping.  If you don’t like spicy, omit the cayenne!  Cooking is all about using ingredients and flavors you like, mix it together, experiment.

• 2 fillet mignons
• 2 lobster tails

Cut the lobster tails in half down the middle.  Brush butter sauce over steaks and lobster.  Cook in a cast iron pan over high heat until steaks are medium rare (if it’s anything else it’s CRAP).  Work in batches if necessary, cooking the steaks first so they can rest while the lobsters are cooking.  Small fillets should take about 3 minutes on each side, lobster about the same.  Cook the lobster on the shell side first, and turn over on the flesh side last.

In a separate pan, cook the green beans with one clove of minced garlic, add a pinch of salt.

Do you find it weird that I have shallots, but no other real veggies/food in my fridge?  I find it kind of weird.