Steak Tips, Bow Ties with White Sauce and Peas

1 1/2 cups warm 2% milk
2 tbls butter
2 tbls flour
1 lb steak tips
2 tsps chopped fresh basil
1/2 cup chicken stock
2 tbls minced onion
2 cloves minced garlic
1/2 cup frozen peas
1/2 lb mostly cooked bow tie pasta
salt and pepper


Cut steak tips into 1" chunks and season them with salt and pepper. Brown them well in a skillet, then set them aside on a ceramic plate tented with foil. Deglaze the skillet with the chicken stock and once all the brown bits are up and it's reduced by at least 1/2, pour it off and set it aside. Turn the heat in the skillet down to medium-low and melt the butter in it. Add the onion and garlic and saute for a minute or so, until the garlic is fragrant. Add the flour and cook, stirring constantly for 2-3 minutes. Slowly add the milk while still stirring, keep stirring until the sauce is thickened, about 3-5 minutes. Let simmer, stirring frequently, until it's reduced to around a cup then add the deglazing liquid. Season with salt and pepper as needed. Let simmer for another minute or so, stirring frequently, then add juices from the rested steak tips, the peas and pasta (and tips, if you want it all combined). Toss it all together and let it simmer for another minute or two, stirring occasionally, until the pasta has absorbed some of the sauce. Add the basil, stir to combine and serve.

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The other day my girlfriend came up to me and said, "I want steak tips. And bowties with peas."

I said, "Ok". And made this. She sat across the blue plastic tv tray we've been using as a table, eating it with a little smile on her face.

"Is it good?" I asked.

"Oh yes" she said, "it's exactly what I wanted."

That, kids, is my personal favorite response. Sure "I love it! ", "it's even better than I thought it would be" or an enthusiastic thumbs up because their mouth is too busy to talk are all great. But really, there's nothing better than craving something and getting just what it was you wanted. Well, when it comes to food anyway. Heh.

The icing on the whole deal here is that this is a surprisingly low fat dish considering how rich it is. I used homemade stock which makes a big impact with texture and richness, but was almost completely fat free. The sauce didn't taste chickeny at all, but you got the smooth, rich mouth-feel from all the collagen in the stock so I could use 2% milk and still have it be really creamy. Other than that it was just the two tablespoons of butter, perfectly reasonable for something that serves 4-6 people, and the tips. The tips weren't too fatty, although I did cook them in bacon grease. Because I could. I didn't get many pictures, but fortunately it's nice and simple. I don't see why you couldn't do this with something other than steak. You would just want something that leaves good fond since that's where most of the flavor for the sauce comes from. Next time I'm going to add a tablespoon or two of sour cream to it to brighten up the flavor a bit.

Speaking of the sauce, does anyone know if it's still a white sauce? Does adding the broth, fond and meat juices change it? I think it might, technically, be gravy. Not that I'd mind, of course. In fact if that were so I'd probably change the title of the post to reflect it. Heh.

Homemade Honey Mustard Dressing/Dip/Sauce, Homemade Quick Flatbread and the Sandwich I Made with Them

Honey Mustard Dressing/Dip/Sauce

1 part honey
1 part dijon mustard
1 part mayonnaise
dash of salt
pinch of cayenne
twist or two of fresh black pepper
dash of rice wine vinegar

Whisk everything together. Chill for an hour or two (or longer) to let the flavors mingle.



Quick Garlic and Black Pepper Flatbread

3 cups all purpose flour
1 cup ice water
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
pinch of baking soda
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 tsp fresh black pepper

Combine all the ingredients and mix into a dough. Cut into 4 or 5 equal pieces. Roll out to a thin 8 inch circle. Prick the surface of the dough with a fork and cook on an oiled hot griddle. Turn with a spatula. Watch these flat bread disks closely because they cook fast, about 30 seconds. Serve warm. (slightly adapted from here.)

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First off, the dressing. I love honey mustard stuff. It's just a good time. And since I enjoy it I clearly needed to make my own. This is a mash-up of a couple different recipes I found online, adjusted to my tastes. I realize the measurements are less than precise, but it's really the best I could do with it. This kind of thing is really best adjusted to your own tastes. Like it spicy? Add some more cayenne. Extra tangy something you enjoy? More vinegar or a sharper one like straight up white vinegar. I saw a couple recipes that had has much as three times as much mayonnaise as honey and mustard. I suppose if you wanted a more mayo-y sauce you could do that, but it seemed a little much to me. I found this to be a great balance and will definitely be making it for all my honey mustard needs in the future. And it couldn't be easier either. Just put everything in a bowl and whisk it. Let it chill for a bit and there you go.

Now, the flatbread. This recipe is ok, but it needs more tweeking. The texture comes out really good, but the flavor is kind of... well, weird. They tasted like salty pancakes. The original called for a tablespoon of salt, which I found painfully salty. So I cut it in half and it was still pretty bad. So I suggest using a teaspoon, that's what I'm going to do next time. I also might cut down on the baking powder since I think that's where the pancake taste is coming from. But I think that will mess with the texture, which would be a shame. Well, more experiments are clearly needed. I will do an update when I get it better. Here is what I did this time. I had whisked together the dry ingredients then added the oil and water. Mixed that up. It comes together pretty fast, which is nice. Turned it out onto a floured counter and rolled it into a tube kind of thing. And didn't get a picture. Sorry. I was doing a half recipe, so I cut it into three pieces instead of four or five. I was wicked excited to use my bench scraper too. I hadn't used it to cut dough yet. Then I just rolled it out into... er, trapezoids? Something like that. Then I slapped it onto a hot preheated, non stick skillet. Let it sit for a bit, then flip. They cook in about 30 seconds. Like I said, the flavor wasn't the best, but the texture was very good. Soft and pliable, but not too chewy. You could actually wrap them around things without breaking it. Which was the whole reason I made them, so that was good. Next, the wrap.

I fried up some strips of turkey kielbasa and some peppers. I used frozen, sliced mixed peppers. They're great for this kind of thing. Then onto a piece of flatbread with it, added some of the honey mustard and some spinach. Then fold and eat. This was a great sandwich and pretty healthy too. The kielbasa was a low fat turkey kind, lots of peppers and fresh spinach. I used reduced fat mayo in the dressing and the rest of the fat is olive oil, so... yeah. Not too bad. And check this out:Wrapped around the stuff, no ripping.

Reduced Fat Carrot Cake

for the cake:
2 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsps ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp salt
2 large eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 4-oz jar carrot baby food
1 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 pound carrots, peeled and shredded

for the frosting
1 8-oz package of Neufchatel cream cheese, softened
1 cup Fluff
1 1/2 tsps vanilla
1/4 cup confectioners sugar

Preheat the oven to 350. Grease a 13x9 pan and line the bottom with parchment. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and salt in a large bowl. In a separate bowl mix the eggs, baby food and sugar until smooth and creamy. Slowly add the oil to the egg mixture, while still mixing. Mix until thoroughly incorporated. Add the flour mixture in two additions, mixing until nearly smooth. Fold in the carrots. Spread the batter in the prepped pan and bake until a toothpick comes out almost clean, about 25-30 minutes. Cool completely before frosting. For the frosting, beat together the cream cheese, Fluff and vanilla. Add the sugar and mix till smooth.

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I'm back! And I brought some cake. When I asked my girlfriend what kind of cake she wanted for her birthday I was expecting her to say something like "super chocolate fudge", "strawberry butter cake" or something. But she said "reduced fat carrot cake". I said "er, what?" But she insisted. She had found this recipe in one of my Cook's Illustrated magazines and really wanted it. So I made it. It's actually really good, you would never guess that it was reduced fat. According to CI, it has a third of the fat of regular carrot cake and about half the calories. Not too shabby. Plus the frosting (the most important part) is wicked good. I was a bit worried, since it had Fluff in it. Fluff kind of weirds me out. The cakes texture isn't perfect, but I think if you served it to someone and didn't tell them it was a light version they would never know.

Ok, first the dry ingredients. Flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. In a bowl. Whisked together. Now, the wet ingredients and the sugar. Eggs, brown sugar and baby food. Yeah, baby food. Apparently a lot of low fat carrot cake recipes call for things like prune puree. I don't know why you would use that when carrot puree is available and matches the flavor you are going for, but who can tell why people do anything. Make sure to get baby food that has just carrots and water as its ingredients. You don't want any of the other stuff they might put in there. Anyway, mix the wet stuff together. Add half the dry stuff, mix it together, then the rest of the dry stuff and mix it most of the way. Now it's carrot time. These are just bagged pre-shredded ones, but next time I think I will do it myself. They were a little thick, not that you notice it in the finished product. Fold those in. Next, spread it out in the prepped pan. I don't have a 9x13 pan, only a 8x11. So I used most of the batter in the pan and then made a little cake in a ramikin. Baked at 350 till they're done. While they were cooking I made the frosting. I'd never had Neufchatel before, it's pretty good. First you take the cheese, vanilla and Fluff and mix them together. Ok, I'm not really a big Fluff fan. I was deeply concerned about putting it in one of my favorite frostings. But you don't notice it and according to CI it adds something good. So there you go. Anyway, mix it all together, then add the powdered sugar. Mix it together and that's that. Feel free to ignore the finger marks in it. Hey, I had to check it! What if it was no good? Let's move along, ok? Pull out the cake, let it cool and frost it. I frosted up the little one for my girlie. So there it is, reduced fat carrot cake. Good times kids, I highly recommend it.

Orange Ginger Glazed Chicken

1 large clove of minced garlic
2 tsps of minced ginger
4 chicken breast cutlets
1 cup orange juice
1 tsp brown sugar
2 tsps soy sauce
1/2 tsp corn starch
salt and pepper
cashews

Mix together the orange juice, soy sauce and corn starch. Rinse the chicken then pat it dry with some paper towels. Season the cutlets with salt and pepper. Brown them on both sides over medium-high heat with some butter in a steel pan. Don't cook them *quite* all the way. Remove them from the pan and add in the garlic and ginger. Saute them for 40-60 seconds then pour in the orange juice mixture. Let it simmer till it's reduced by half or so, then add the chicken back in. Let the chicken simmer till it's done being cooked then turn it several times to coat with the glaze. Top with cashews.

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Just so you know, the measurements up top are guesses. This was very much a hip shot recipe. But, it's really easy and came out wicked good. I needed something quick to make one night and saw we had some chicken breast cutlets, a big ass orange and fresh ginger. It all just kind of fell into place. And except for the tablespoon or so of butter that you saute everything in there is pretty much no fat.

First, I minced up my ginger and garlic. Well, I used a press on the garlic. I like my garlic pieces small and don't have the knife skills to do it quickly yet. Then I juiced the orange. This is half of it. It was bigger than a softball, I got about a cup of juice from it. I think, I'm afraid I didn't measure it. Anyway, then I rinsed the chicken and dried it off. This helps it brown. I don't always do it (and never take pictures of it, apparently), but it does make for a better end result. Then I melted some butter and browned the chicken. I didn't cook it quite all the way because I wanted to finish it off in the glaze. Then I pulled it out and tossed in the garlic and ginger. That, my friends, is a fantastic smell. Chicken fond, butter, ginger and garlic. My apartment still smells like it and I couldn't be happier. Once I had sauteed them for about a minute I poured in the orange juice. If I had been planning ahead a bit better I would have mixed the sauce up beforehand, but I wasn't so I didn't. Brought it to a simmer and scraped up anything from the bottom. Then I added the brown sugar and soy sauce. After reducing for a while I tossed in a little cornstarch mixed with water, to thicken it up a bit. Then I tossed the chicken back in and let them finish cooking. Then I just flipped them around a couple times to coat them and that was that. Except for the cashews. I had cashews. So I put them on it. I mean, why not?I served it with potato medallions. I will be posting about them sometime next week probably, I need to do a few more things. Like take pictures. But having it with rice would be good, or double the sauce and serve it over noodles. Slice it and put it in a sandwich/wrap, or on a salad. You know, stuff you do with chicken.

Experiment: Rotini with Chicken Sausage, Asparagus, Peppers and Sun Dried Tomatoes

4 chicken sausages
1 small onion
half a red pepper
1/2 pound (?) asparagus
1/2 pound mostly cooked rotini
1 cup chicken broth
1/2 tsp thyme
1-2 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup sun dried tomato, chopped
1/2 tsp rosemary
1 tbl butter (optional)

Chop the onion into small pieces and mince the garlic. Cut the asparagus, sausage and pepper into bite sized chunks. Brown the sausage over medium high heat. Once it's nicely browned remove it and add the asparagus. Cook for a minute then add the peppers. Continue cooking till the asparagus is almost done how you like it. Remove the veggies from the pan and add the onion. Brown it up well then add the garlic. Saute for 30 seconds or so then deglaze the pan with the broth. Reduce the heat to a low simmer, add the butter, rosemary and thyme and let it reduce till it's about a half cup, maybe 5 minutes. Add the pasta, toss to coat and let it simmer till it's absorbed most of the liquid. Add the veggies back in along with the sun dried tomato and sausage. Stir to combine.

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I don't know about all of you guys, but I've been eating a lot of heavy stuff lately. So I wanted to make something a bit lighter and this is what I came up with. It was pretty good, lots of veggies, low fat, plenty of flavor. I did, however, completely forget to write down the recipe while I was making it, so this is really just a guess. This is one of those recipes where you can sub out anything with pretty much anything else. Don't want chicken sausage? Replace it with kielbasa, regular chicken, whatever. Same with the veggies. Have something in the fridge that you need to use up before it starts to stink up the place? Toss it in. Anyway, this is what I did.

First off I prepped the veggies. Asparagus and half a red pepper (a whole pepper would have been good, but half was all I had). Next time I will cut them a little smaller, it would make it easier to eat. Although I did do a slick thing with the pepper, check it out. All the seeds and ribs in one piece! I'm a sorcerer! Heh. I also chopped up some onion, garlic and sun dried tomato. Next I took some chicken sausage, this is a garlic/herb flavored kind, and cut it into discs. And browned it. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of chicken sausage, I find the texture leaves a bit to be desired. But if you brown it up well that helps and the flavor is usually good. But if you don't like it you don't have to use it. Once the sausage was browned I pulled it out and tossed in the asparagus. Sauteed that for a little bit, but not too long. You don't want it thoroughly cooked since it will have more pan time before the end. I also tossed in the peppers, but just for a minute. Squishy peppers make me angry. Then the veggies come out and the onion goes in. And since I apparently can't ever get a picture of every step, browning the onion and garlic won't be shown. But you want to brown the onion first and then cook the garlic till it's fragrant. Then add in the broth and herbs. Scrape up the fond and let it reduce by half or so. Instead of broth you could use wine for this and I bet it would be awesome, but I didn't have any. Once the sauce has reduced add the pasta. The pasta should be a bit under done because you want it to absorb most of this liquid. To get it to do that you let it simmer, mixing it around a bit while it does. I also added a pat of butter at this point. Just because. Once most of the liquid is absorbed you just add the sausage, veggies and sun dried tomatoes to it, mix it around and there you go. A nice light lunch or dinner.
Update: I've decided to send this over to Noobcook for Presto Pasta Nights. I hadn't heard of PPN before, but it sounds like fun!