Sweet and Sour Pork

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My absolute favorite dish to get at Asian restaurants is sweet and sour chicken or pork.  This sweet and sour pork is fairly easy to make, and it is definitely easy to eat!

Ingredients:

• 1 pound of pork loin, cut into 1 1/2 sized pieces
• 2 cups of water
• 1 teaspoon of salt
• 2 tablespoons of soy sauce
• 4 tablespoons of cornstarch
• 1/8 teaspoon of ground ginger
• 4 tablespoons of canola oil
• 1 1/2 teaspoons of jarred minced garlic
• 1 8 ounce can of pineapple chunks in syrup
• 3 tablespoons of ketchup
• 1/2 tablespoon of onion powder
• 1 red pepper, cut into strips
• 1 green pepper, cut into strips
• 1 tablespoon plus 1/4 teaspoon of sugar
• 1 teaspoon of salt

Steps:

Pour 2 cups of water in a sauce pan, and add 1/2 teaspoon of salt.  Heat the salt and water mixture over medium low heat.

As the water is heating, cut the pork loin and add it to the water.

Boil the pork pieces until tender--about 30 minutes.

In a medium sized bowl mix together 2 tablespoons of cornstarch and the soy sauce.  Stir until smooth.

Remove the cooked pork from the water (broth).  Save the broth to be used later.


Coat the pieces evenly with the cornstarch mixture.

Add the remaining 2 tablespoons of cornstarch to the broth and mix well.

In a large sauce pan heat 1 tablespoon of oil over low to medium heat.

Allow the oil to heat up, then saute the minced garlic for 2-3 minutes

Add the pineapple including the syrup, ketchup, onion powder, sliced red and green bell pepper, sugar, salt, and the broth and cornstarch mixture to the garlic.

The mixture will be quite thin (watery), stir until sauce begins to thicken.

In a separate pan, heat 3 tablespoons of oil over medium heat.

Once the oil has heated, add the cornstarch coated pork, and brown on all sides.

Pile the pork on the top of the rice, and smother in sweet and sour sauce.

This dish is delicious served with rice and egg rolls.  For an added touch to the rice, I added about 1/2 tablespoon of soy sauce to the water.

Chicken can be substituted in the place of pork if you desire.

Simply delicious.  Enjoy!

Slow Cooker Chicken Teriyaki: A No Hassle Meal

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I just love our slow cooker. Having a great meal that is completely cooked by the end of the day is so wonderful! Also, if you haven't yet bought a slow cooker we highly recommend it because it never gets old finding new and exciting dishes to make with it. The bonus is the amazing smells that fill the house for the entire day. This is the slow cooker we have and it's never let us down.

This delicious meal has little prep time--20 minutes at the very most.  Serve the slow cooker chicken teriyaki with rice and egg rolls.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Yoshida's teriyaki sauce
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic (jarred kind)
• 1/8 teaspoon ground ginger
• 6 boneless skinless chicken breasts

Steps:

Combine the Yoshida's, garlic, and ginger.  Mix well.

Rinse and pat dry the chicken breasts.  Place them into your slow cooker.

Pour the teriyaki sauce mixture over the chicken.

Make sure that each piece is evenly coated.  I did this with my hands.

Place your slow cooker on high and cook for 1 hour.

After 1 hour, reduce the heat to low and cook for an additional 5 hours.

Prepare rice and egg rolls (or desired side dishes) and serve.  In the slow cooker there will be left over sauce, it is delicious drizzled over the chicken and rice.

Enjoy!

Awesomely Chewy Peanut Butter Cookies

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Peanut Butter Cookies are soft, chewy, satisfying, and did I say peanut butter.... It's hard to find someone that doesn't love peanut butter and what better way to enjoy it than in a simple cookie. That's why I've always loved making them and now I want to share them with you. These happen to be a little different from what I've made in the past, in the fact that they are made to be especially chewy. Chewy and peanut butter go good together so I said why not....so go ahead kick back, put your feet up, and enjoy these great peanut butter cookies for yourself.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup peanut butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup butter (make sure it's soft before you mix it)
• 2 eggs
• 2 tablespoons light corn syrup
• 2 tablespoons water
• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda 

 In a large bowl or mixer combine all the ingredients. You can see the peanut butter in there somewhere. I swear it's underneath all those other necessary ingredients.

Time laspe of mixing perfection:

 

Finally after the mixing is done, look at the tempting peanut butter dough just sticking to the mixing spoon. Wait just a second, before I continue making these I better eat a piece....

 I swear that is Chef Meg's girlie measuring spoon in the background.

After you've done your dough taste test which I know you will, you grease up a cookie sheet with non-stick cooking spray. Make sure to preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Then roll that dough into little 1 inch balls of goodness and place on the cookie sheet with enough space between them.

Cookies should be taken out of the oven in approximately 14 minutes or when they are brown on the edges. Once they are out, let the cookies cool a couple minutes before taking them off the cookie sheet. Also for ultimate cookie bliss let the cookies cool even more beyond that, trust me it's worth waiting. Finally,  a great recommendation would be to add chocolate chips to the mix.  Enjoy.. I know I did, cookie dough and all. Until next treat, Chef Matt signing off.

Update and I usually don't do updates to my posts but this case warrants it. I couldn't resist having some more of these awesome cookies the day after they were made. I have to tell you that there is no denying that these are absolutely 100% the best peanut butter cookies ever! If you like peanut butter cookies or cookies period, I understand that this recipe might require more ingredients than usual for cookies but it makes them really awesome and worth it....  This baker can't wait to make them again but this time with chocolate chips.

Bon Appetite!
                     Chef Matt

Empanadas: A Latin American Delight

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This weeks post will be an Off The Menu first: Chef Matt vs. Chef Megs!  Megs has made empanadas her way, while Matt has changed his slightly.  Note that the fillings in both versions are made with the same recipe. Now before we get to the recipe, a little background about why we've started this food competition.
Our tastes can vary bit when it comes to food. Meaning we generally like the same kinds of food but we sometimes differ on how it should be cooked and what ingredients should be used. That's ok though because everybody has different tastes but we thought it would be fun to introduce a new category to this blog called food competitions. Besides, the food competition, while living in Panama, Central America (Chef Matt that is) I had some of the best empanadas and when I got back to the States I was disappointed that I couldn't find them hardly anywhere. That's when we had to take matters into our own hands and make them so without furture ado, the 1st Off The Menu food competition....

Meg's baked version is made with home made dough.   

           

  

                                            

 Matt's fried version is made with refrigerated pie crust.

This recipe is quite labor intensive because there are a lot of steps involved, but the efforts are  worth the end result!

Dough Ingredients:

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup vegetable shortening, softened
• 2 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 1/2 cup ice water

Filling Ingredients:

• 1 lb. ground turkey (lean ground beef can be used if desired)
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 2 cloves of minced garlic
• 1/3 cup chopped toasted almonds
• 1/3 cup dark raisins
• 6 roma tomatoes
• 1-2 serrano peppers
• juice of 2 limes (I used the juice you can buy in the lime shaped squeeze bottle; you can find it in the produce section)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons sea salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/8 teaspoon cinnamon

Steps for Dough:

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, shortening, butter, and salt gently with your fingers until small pea to grape sized pieces are formed.  Be sure not to over-mix.

Slowly stir in the water.  As to not over-mix, I used a rubber spatula to carefully stir in the water.

Lightly knead the dough with a folding motion only for a minute or until the dough forms a ball; again I used the spatula.   Add a little bit more water if dough looks too dry.

 

 Cover dough with a kitchen towel, and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

While the dough is resting, prepare the filling.

Steps for Filling:

In a large skillet, brown the ground turkey (or beef) over medium heat.

While the meat is browning, add the chopped almonds (you can buy them already chopped) to a foil lined pan, and toast them (keeping a close eye on them) in the oven until slightly browned. 

Chop the onion.  I like to use a mini food processor that I have, it is such a useful tool, it saves me so much time.

In a blender, puree the tomatoes one at a time. 

Once the tomatoes are pureed, add the pepper(s) and the lime juice to the blender and puree.

Add the cumin, cinnamon, cloves, salt, and pepper to the puree mixture.

If using beef, drain the excess fat.  This is an advantage to using ground turkey; no fat to drain!

Add the onions to the skillet, and saute for about 2-3 minutes.

After the onions have cooked, add the garlic, toasted almonds, and raisins, and let cook for a couple of minutes.

When garlic, almonds, and raisins are ready, add the puree mixture.  Keep it on the stove until excess moisture has cooked off.

 

Steps for putting the empanadas together: 

If using pre-made pie crust, cut several 5" circles.  I used a small bowl as my "cookie cutter".

Put filling into the center, making sure not to put too much or else you will have a hard time closing the pastry.  I found that about 2-2 1/2 teaspoons of filling works well in a  5" circle.

Fold the dough over, and crimp the edges together very well using your fingers so that the filling will not leak out.  If desired, you can add a festive touch by using a fork to make a pattern on the edges.

The prepared empanadas can be fried at 375 degrees F for 2-3 minutes per side.  

If you have used made your own dough, roll out until the dough is 1/8 of an inch thick.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Again, cut the dough into several 5" circles. 

Just like with the pie crust version, fill the center with 2-2 1/2 teaspoons of filling.

Fold over and crimp edges.

Arrange the unbaked empanadas on a greased cookie sheet.

Glaze the empanadas with a mixture of 2 tablespoons milk and a beaten egg.

Bake the empanadas for 15-20 minutes or until slightly browned.

And the winner is? Well...both versions are simply delicious! It's a stalemate!

Until the next food competition and there will be a next one...enjoy!  

It's Pizza Night!

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There is nothing better than a cheesy, delicious pizza pie!  This recipe is neither too time consuming, or difficult, so you can make any night pizza night.  We love this recipe so much, we have to share it with you even though it's a secret family recipe. Shh... don't tell my family. 

 

Crust Ingredients:

• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1 package active dry yeast 
• 1 cup warm water
• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/4 teaspoon Italian seasoning
• cornmeal

Pizza Ingredients:

• pizza sauce
• 2 cups shredded mozzarella and provolone cheese mix
• pizza toppings of your choice

Steps:

Pour the warm water into a small bowl, and add the sugar and yeast.

Let the mixture sit until foamy.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

After the yeast mixture is ready, mix with flour, olive oil, Italian seasoning and salt.

Combine well.  This can be done with a wooden spoon, however I chose to use my hands.  If mixture is looking too sticky, add a little bit of flour.

When everything is mixed well, knead the dough for 5 minutes or until dough forms a smooth, elastic ball.

Cover dough with a warm, damp towel, and let rest for 20 minutes.

Grease pizza pan (I would suggest a pan that has large holes in the bottom, this makes the crust crispier) by brushing it with olive oil.  Generously sprinkle greased pan with cornmeal.

After dough has rested, use your fingers to spread dough onto the greased pizza pan.

Bake the dough in preheated oven for 10 minutes or until edges are lightly browned.

Let crust cool completely (20-30 minutes).

Spread pizza sauce onto the baked crust.  Be sure to use a good amount of sauce.

Sprinkle cheese onto sauce, and top with your favorite toppings.

Bake in oven for 10-15 minutes or until cheese is melted.

        

                      Enjoy!

~ Chef Megs