Red Gold Tomatoes

I was offered a complimentary sample of Red Gold canned tomatoes, which is a family owned business based in Indiana which has been around since the 1940's. The website provides information about the company and lots of great recipes. I used the tomatoes for turkey chili, in omelets and to make bruschetta. If you are in the market for a new canned tomato you should definitely Red Gold a try!

Pig Pickin'

The pig pit.

Friends of ours actually roasted a whole pig in their backyard in late August. The process took more than a day and the result was juicy, delicious pulled pork. We enjoyed a fun afternoon with great food and friends. More photos below.

Salmon Under Fur Coat

Over the summer a friend of ours from Russia brought the above dish as a contribution to our BBQ. Traditionally, it's "Selyodka Pod Shuboy" or "herring under fur coat". However, in this case our friend thought the American palate would be better pleased by "smoked salmon under fur coat". It was delicious, with carrots, potatoes, beets and mayo making this a superb summer salad. Try this recipe to make it yourself.

Making Sushi at Home

Salmon/avocado and tuna/cucumber rolls + inari tofu pockets stuffed with rice.

I recently made some pretty decent sushi. The best place to buy ingredients as well as fresh fish appropriate for sushi making is at the Buford Highway Farmer's Market where you can get a large portion of sushi-ready raw fish at a low price. However, this time fish from the sushi bar at Whole Foods had to do. Delicious and not as hard to make as I thought!

Chef Amy.



Close up of the sushi - also made some spicy sauce with mayo and Sriracha - yum!

Guy T. Gunter & Associates Highlights Amy on Food

Guy T. Gunter & Associates recently featured Amy on Food on their blog! Guy T. Gunter & Associates are purveyors of fine appliances and have been around since 1952. To see their website click here. Thanks for the post!

The SpongeBob Cake

The finished product - homemade for sure but there's no doubt who this is!

My favorite 8 year old requested a SpongeBob cake this year so I thought it time to try some amateur cake decorating. I used red hots as part of the shirt and cookie icing on top of homemade lemon frosting for the design. It's not the most beautiful design but it was really tasty and most importantly, the birthday girl loved it. Always fun to try something new!

A work in progress. I had to print out a photo of Bob so I could draw him on the cake! It was yellow cake with lemon frosting. I used a new recipe for the cake and it turned out moist and tasty.

Mexican Night with Homemade Salsa and Homemade Nachos

Homemade restaurant style salsa from The Pioneer Woman.

Served with corn tortillas, sauteed chicken and onions with avocado and sour cream. Oven baked nachos round out this delicious meal. For the oven baked nachos, spread large chips on a cookie sheet, spoon a small amount of salsa on each chip, followed by a bit of shredded cheese. Top with a jalepeno slice if desired. Then bake at 425 for 5-8 minutes until melted.

Pig of the Month Club

Baby Back Ribs and Pulled Pork.

The folks at Pig of the Month were nice enough to send me the above samples. They came packed in dry ice and kept fine for a few days in my refrigerator. I wanted to make a proper meal to go with this delicious meat so I opted to make a simple homemade sweet cornbread along with my grandma's slaw and okra, corn and tomatoes. The results were extremely satisfying and the Pig of the Month items held their own. I particularly liked the pulled pork, but the ribs, (I sampled Key West style) were also really delicious. This would make a neat gift (wedding present?!) for those who would like to give a gift that lasts all year.

Pulled Pork from "Pig of the Month" with homemade cornbread, cole slaw and okra, corn & tomatoes.

OK - Finally into 2011

New Year's Day feast: black-eyed peas, collard greens and cornbread. See the giant smoked chicken wing in the corner?

Although it's pathetically late, I am excited to report that the blog has officially made it to 2011 material, starting with the New Year's day traditional meal I cooked up for the family. Everything was pretty good considering it was my first time cooking greens and black eyed peas. I made some honey butter to go with the cornbread and it was delicious! I plan on catching up fast so get ready for many more posts ahead.

Pizza and Gingerbread - what could be better?

Ready to go into the oven!
One of our favorite family traditions is pizza making. We've gotten better at it over the past couple of years and the toppings only get more creative each time! One day we decorated a gingerbread house and made pizza - quite a fun day! The pizza was extremely tasty also and it made it from board to stone without getting too messy. The trick is LOTS of cornmeal - both in the dough and on the board. Having two people move the pizza from the board to the hot stone helps a great deal as well. Practice makes perfect I suppose! The dough from Your DeKalb Farmer's Market is our favorite - they have lots of tasty topping options too - check out the cheese section!

Gingerbread house decorating - what fun!

After cooking on the hot pizza stone - so delicious!

San Pellegrino Almost Famous Chef Competition

On Monday I was thrilled and honored to be asked to judge the San Pellegrino Almost Famous Chef Competition's Southeast Regions event, held at Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Tucker, Georgia. I, along with four awesome Atlanta chefs, watched the eight culinary students from across the Southeast prepare their signature dishes. We tasted each one and had the opportunity to ask questions of the culinary student who created each dish. The winner, Elizabeth Freer, pictured above, cooked "Rabbit Two Ways: Sweet Braised Rabbit Ravioli with a Pecan and Spice Encrusted Tenderloin". It was delicious - especially the ravioli. Other highlights: Stuffed Pork Tenderloin with Mole Scented Demi and Wasabi/Beet mashed potatoes! Sweet tea polenta also made an appearance - very creative. The other judges were: Shaun Doty of Yeah Burger (and the now closed Shaun's), Hugh Acheson of Five and Ten, The National (both in Athens) and Empire State South, Jay Swift of 4th and Swift and Ford Fry of JCT Kitchen. It was a really fun event and actually an unexpected surprise that I was included as one of the judges. Elizabeth, along with the other regional winners, gets to go to Napa Valley for the finals. Good luck Elizabeth!

Mexican Night - Home Cooking

Grass-fed ground beef tacos with oven toasted nachos.

So I know you probably think I never cook - but I do, I just usually forget about taking photos until it's too late! I recently decided to make a full-on Mexican meal at home and it turned out great. I'm so glad they sell decent corn tortillas now in most of the regular grocery stores. Sometimes you have to hunt for them as they are not with the rest of the Mexican items. Here is how I make nachos:

Preheat oven to 425
1. Spread large tortilla chips on a baking sheet.
2. Spoon a small amount of salsa on each chip.
3. Sprinkle cheese - I usually use either cheddar or Mexican mix - on top of the salsa.
4. Place a picked jalepeno slice on top of the cheese (optional).
5. Bake for 5 - 7 minutes, remove and serve as soon as possible.

I also toast the tortillas with cheese before putting in the remainder of the fillings. Yum!

The setup with all the accompaniments - the avocado really makes it better!

More Pizza Making Fun!

Double duty pizza - dinner and dessert!

We've been experimenting with pizza making more lately, including this lovely pie with proscuitto, goat cheese mozzarella, mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes and cilantro on the left and sweet potato butter, mild goat cheese and cinnamon-sugar spiced apple slices on the right. The sweet potato butter and mild goat cheese came from our CSA share, which I'm really missing now that the season is over. The sweet side of the pizza made for a great dessert and an interesting change from the norm. We generously mix in cornmeal with the Trader Joe's pizza dough to make it roll out better.

Gazpacho-fest

Gazpacho with avocado and tomato to sprinkle on top.

Last week I decided to make homemade gazpacho for my UUCA covenant group. Luckily I got tomatoes in my CSA last week so it worked out perfectly! I looked at several recipes before making it, but I really just threw ingredients together in the blender and continued adding spices, salt and pepper until I liked the taste. I used habenero hot sauce as well as sherry wine vinegar to add to the spice. For serving, my guests poured olive oil over the soup and sprinkled in diced avocado and tomato. Everyone brought something to share so we also had great cheese and bread, potato salad, sangria and blueberry cobbler. Yum! I would definitely make this gazpacho again.

Gazpacho in process.

Secret Ingredient - Sour Cream in Pasta Sauce

Trader Joe's Lemon Pepper pasta with spicy mushroom eggplant sour cream sauce.

I started out thinking I would make a stir-fry. Then I remembered I had Trader Joe's lemon pepper pappardelle so I decided to make an olive oil sauce. After sauteing the mushrooms, eggplant, onion and garlic and adding spices, butter and olive oil, the dish looked like it would be so good with some cream. While I didn't have any regular heavy cream, I noticed there was a small container of sour cream left over from our last nacho-fest. Hmmm... will this work?! I started off adding just a bit of sour cream and after tasting it to ensure that it wasn't ruining the dish, I added in the rest (probably about 1/2 cup total). This turned out to be a great dish, mostly because of the sour cream and the terrific pasta - another winner from TJ's.

The sauce in formation.

Amy's Lasagna and Peach/Blueberry Cobbler

Lasagna - the finished product.

First, the sauce.



The filling, with mushrooms.



Ready for dinner!

Amy's Lasagna

1 lb. Ground beef or turkey OR chicken, cooked and cut into strips or cubes (or use thinly sliced eggplant, squash or zucchini to make vegetarian lasagna)

1 cup chopped onion

2 cloves (or more) garlic, minced

2 cup mushrooms (any variety), divided (if desired)

1 can stewed tomatoes

1 6 oz. can tomato paste

1-2 cups tomato sauce, more if you like it juicy

2 teaspoons dried basil, crushed

1 teaspoon dried oregano, crushed

9 dried lasagna noodles

2 beaten eggs

1 2 lb. Container of ricotta cheese (regular or part skim)

1 10-oz. Package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and well drained

3 cups mozzarella cheese

1 cup parmesan cheese (the fresher kind in the dairy case)

Make sauce by cooking onion, meat, 1 cup mushrooms (if desired) and garlic in a large frying pan. If you are using a lower grade cut of meat, strain the fat. Stir in stewed tomatoes with juice, tomato paste, tomato sauce, basil and oregano. Cover and simmer for 15-20 minutes, stirring occasionally. At the same time, cook the noodles for 10-12 minutes or until tender but still firm. Drain them and rinse with cold water. Set aside. For filling sautee the remaining 1 cup mushrooms in oil or butter. Combine the eggs, ricotta, spinach, sauteed mushrooms and ¼ cup of the parmesan. Put a couple of tablespoons of the sauce mixture in the bottom of a deep rectangular baking dish or divide to make several smaller dishes. Layer three of the noodles on top, followed by 1/3 of the filling, 1/3 of the sauce mixture and 1/3 of the mozzarella and the remaining parmesan. Repeat until all 9 noodles are used up. Allow for a generous layer of cheese on top. Bake at 375 for 30-35 minutes or until the cheese bubbles and browns. Let stand for 10 minutes before serving. Can be refrigerated for up to 24 hours before baking.

Fruit Cobbler

Ever since my mom suggested it when we were in the mountains, I have been making summer fruit cobblers using this recipe. You can use any combination of fruits you like, but I am partial to peach blueberry. I cut the sugar in the fruit by half (only 1/2 cup instead of a full cup) and add several teaspoons of vanilla to the batter. Also, I use regular flour and add about 2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder (instead of the self-rising flour). It's great by itself or with ice cream!

Boiling the fruit.



The cakey cobbler.



Yum! Ready to eat.

Home Cookin'

Last week my friend Kimberly and I created this tasty meal as we prepared to go to the mountains for the holiday weekend.

Chicken caprese salad over arugula - leftover grilled chicken, cherry tomatoes, basil* and arugula with balsamic vinaigrette.



Sun dried tomato chevre* with toasted baguette.



Mashed potatoes* with sauteed onions* and garlic and Bulgarian cheese.

* = locally grown/produced

CSA Creations, Peanut Butter Soba Noodles and Cal's Cookies

The finished product - spicy ratatouille sauce over Trader Joe's whole wheat pasta with freshly grated Bulgarian cheese and locally grown basil.

I continue to have a great time experimenting with the items provided in my CSA (community supported agriculture) bag each week. One evening last week I made the above pasta while Calvin made oatmeal cookies (see dough bowl below). Both turned out really well. I am making an effort to cook more and eat out less, as I actually enjoy both equally when I'm in the mood!

I also made a wonderful spicy peanut soba noodle salad with chicken and vegetables (sorry, no photo!) this week. The secret's in the sauce and while I do not have exact measurements I mixed several tablespoons of peanut butter with soy sauce, rice vinegar, sesame oil, fish sauce, sriracha and spices. To get the peanut butter to mix well, heat it in the microwave for a few seconds. Then I poured the sauce over cooked soba noodles, chopped cooked veggies and chopped leftover grilled chicken - it really did turn out well.

Also, our CSA bag sometimes contains chevre (very mild goat cheese) from Decimal.Place Farm. I usually mix the chevre with spices and chopped sun dried tomatoes to make a tasty appetizer served with bread or crackers. This week I melted some chocolate chips and mixed the chocolate with some of the chevre. I make a graham cracker crust in a ramekin and dumped the chocolate/cheese mixture on top. Unfortunately we ate it too quickly for a photo, but this was another great use for the chevre. I look forward to trying more new recipes soon.

Spicy ratatouille pasta sauce including bok choi, carrots, mushrooms, canned tomatoes, fennel, diced Thai chiles & TJ's arrabiata sauce.



Toppings for the pasta - fresh basil from Small Farms CSA and grated Bulgarian cheese from the Buford Highway Farmer's Market.



Calvin's cookie dough (Quaker recipe with chocolate chips and butterscotch chips instead of raisins; omit the cinnamon) - the cookies turned out perfectly.

Family Dinner with Ole Smokehouse Meats

Diane's fabulous rhubarb pie.

On Saturday night we had a wonderful meal at home including barbecued chicken and ribs from the Ole Smokehouse in Charlotte. Although the restaurant has a faded interior, I still remember fondly the weekly Thursday night meals I had here with my father growing up. We each always ordered the same thing: 1/4 BBQ chicken white meat, salad with homemade Greek dressing and blue cheese dressings on the side (had to mix the dressings), baked potato and hush puppies. The Smokehouse serves a fabulous BBQ sauce, which is sweet and spicy and goes great with almost everything. I used to slosh it all over my potato and hush puppies as well as on the meat. The secret to the meats is an old Chinese smoker oven, on display down the hall past the restrooms at the Montford Drive location.

Chicken and ribs from the Ole Smokehouse and Dad's delicious eggplant Parmesan.



Lynn's creative and tasty salad.

Mango with Sticky Rice

On Sunday my friend Thy called to let me know she had prepared sticky rice with mango. This is one of my favorite desserts, often served at Thai restaurants. She even made a coconut sauce to go over the sweet, sticky rice and she provided sesame seeds for sprinkling. This is the best sticky rice I've ever tasted. I have never made it as you need a steamer basket to make the rice properly. Thy - thank you so much! You are awesome. I really enjoyed the sticky rice!