Shrimp Scampi with Artichokes and Basil

When I woke up this morning I could smell the scent of garlic on my pillow, then I remembered last night’s wonderful dinner of shrimp.  We have tried cooking shrimp before frozen from the bag or from our local grocery store, and the results are less than satisfactory.  Typically, the shrimp either are fishy smelling (old) or have no flavor at all, so why bother.

In preparation for cooking this dinner, I visited the local fish market and purchased two pounds of medium shrimp.  I could have purchased slightly smaller shrimp that were already shelled and de-veined, but I though I would do that work myself and save the extra $1 per pound.

Last night my wife and I returned from our 3-mile walk, and I started right in to shelling and de-veining the two pounds of shrimp.  An hour later, I was ready to start cooking!  What a tedious job that is, next time I will take the smaller shrimp and pay a little bit more.

This is a Paula Deen recipe from page 67 in The Deen Family Cookbook, so of course I started with the full stick of butter as directed.  Next time I would use about 3 /4-stick of butter and the results should still be great.  I heated the butter over medium-high heat, added the garlic, and cooked for about a minute.

Next into the frying pan went the 1 /3-cup of the white wine, some red pepper flakes (next time I will only use about 10 flakes), salt, and pepper.  This simmered for a couple of minutes.  While that was simmering, I dried the shrimp and squeezed out one third cup of basil paste.  When I went to the store to get the basil, there was no fresh basil, but a basil paste that comes in a squeeze tube.  So, I got that to try, why not! 

I quickly hand juiced a lemon that was in the refrigerator that I had already zested the outside for another meal.  I finally managed to open the giant jar of artichoke hearts that we had purchased at Costco.  The recipe calls for one cup of artichoke heart pieces, I added about one and a half cups, and next time I will add two cups to balance the shrimp.  I will also cut the artichoke pieces into smaller sections as some were to large. 

Into the frying pan went the shrimp and artichoke hearts and while it cooked, I stirred together all the ingredients until the shrimp turned pink.  Removing the frying pan from the heat, I stirred in the lemon juice and the basil paste.

I served the shrimp with the artichokes and basil sauce over brown rice with raw baby carrots on the side.  The flavor of the shrimp was fantastic!  The lemon and basil made a flavorful sauce on the shrimp and rice.  There was a little too much fire in the sauce, so as I mentioned, next time I will reduce the amount of red pepper flakes.

This recipe will easily serve four people and we have quite a bit left over for our lunch.  This recipe is quick to make (with pre-peeled and de-veined shrimp) and tastes wonderful.  It is a recipe that I will definitely will make again.

What do you think?  Should this recipe be served on the red (above) or the white plate?

Adventures In Food: Author: Kerry Howell 

Scalloped Edges

Last night I thought I would be brave and cook scallops.  I normally stay away from scallops for two reasons: the first is that it is very easy to overcook and then they end up rubbery, and the second is that many scallops are not really from a shellfish, but are punched from fish cheeks.

Looking through my Deen Family Cookbook, I found a Paula Deen recipe for Seared Scallops with Pineapple-Cucumber Salsa on page 156.  I put both of my scallop concerns aside, went ahead, and purchased about two pounds from Costco.  I also had to pick up some pineapple, a jalapeno pepper, and a cucumber for the recipe.


The meal only took about 30 minutes to prepare.  The first step was to fix the salsa by chopping pineapple, the cucumber, one-half a red onion, the jalapeno pepper, and some fresh parsley.  This was all mixed in a bowl and then I added the zest and juice from one-half a lime.  I added a little salt and pepper and tried the taste.  It was a little too hot, so I chopped and added another wedge of pineapple and mixed it all up and it tasted much better.  The recipe calls for cilantro instead of the parsley, but I don’t care for cilantro.  I also didn’t add the hot sauce as the onion and jalapeno added enough fire to the mixture.

I washed and dried the scallops, then sprinkled on a little salt a pepper.  I heated a little olive oil in my large frying pan over medium high heat then added the scallops to the pan.  Paula recommends cooking the scallops for two to three minutes a side until golden brown.  After three minutes I turned each scallop over and found that the ones near the outside of the pan were browning, but those in the center were sautéing.  I moved all the scallops so they were near the outside edge of the pan.  I might have used too large a gas burner so the middle of the pan was not getting as much heat.  I also cooked the scallops just a little longer than recommended to make sure they cooked all the way through.

We enjoyed a wonderful dinner of scallops, pineapple-cucumber salsa and sliced tomato.  The scallops were cooked to perfection and very tender.  The salsa had a nice contrast of cool from the pineapple and cucumber to the heat of the jalapeno.  I added the tomatoes for a nice addition of color to the plate.

I highly recommend this recipe and we will use it again.  Now I need to find another similar recipe so we can use the leftover salsa.

Adventures In Food: Author: Kerry Howell

Here’s The Beef

Last night was very busy and we didn’t get a chance to go shopping as we had planned.  I went and rummaged in our freezer and found a container of frozen beef stew that I cooked several weeks ago.  The stew made a quick trip in the microwave to defrost while I prepared a potato and steamed some asparagus, then I heated the stew and we had a wonderful dinner.

I made Stick-to-Your-Ribs Beef, Onion and Mushroom Stew from the Deen Family Cookbook.  The recipe is on page 87 and this dish is wonderful, of course, any recipe that includes a lot of butter and a bottle of dark beer has to be good!

When planning for this recipe, I saw that we had all the ingredients at our house except the three pounds of stew meat and ten ounces of mushrooms.  I went to our local store with an in-house butcher department and picked up the fresh stew meat.  A visit to nearby Albertsons yielded some nice large mushrooms.

The first step was to setup our slow cooker crock-pot so I could add the different ingredients as they finished on the stove.  The stew meat is browned in a large frying pan with two tablespoons of butter (of course it’s butter, it’s Paula Deen).  This cooked for about 7 minutes on high heat.  When it was finished, I placed the meat in the crock-pot and added to the mixture salt, pepper and three tablespoons of flour.  I stirred all the ingredients together until they are well mixed.  (Truthfully, it doesn’t look very good at this stage.)

In the same frying pan I put the next two tablespoons of butter, then the washed, trimmed and quartered mushrooms.  I used the largest white button mushrooms I could find, so they would have presence in the final dish.  These cook for about four minutes, turning once half way through the cooking.  The cooked mushrooms are added to the crock-pot and stirred into the beef mixture.

The recipe calls for large Spanish onions, our store offers: red, white, and yellow onions, so I used two large white onions.  I cut the onions in half, then used my onion slicing skills that I learned when making French Onion Soup.  Another two tablespoons of butter go into the frying pan and then the sliced onions are added to cook for about three minutes until soft.

The kitchen really smells good now.

The onions are added to the crock-pot and stirred in with the meat and mushrooms.  Now comes the fun part, the recipe calls for adding ten ounces of dark beer to the frying pan.  I used a sixteen ounce Moose Drool (yes, that’s really the name of the beer), so I couldn’t waste the remainder even if it is only ten in the morning.  I simmered the beer while using my spatula to loosen all the meat, mushroom, and onions bits from the side and bottom of the pan so these bits simmer with the beer for a few minutes

Now the beer mixture goes into the crock-pot.  The remaining ingredients: garlic, brown sugar, mustard, lemon juice, thyme, bay leaves and two whole cloves are stirred into the mixture in the crock-pot.

I place the lid on the crock-pot and set it to cook on low for eight hours.

Dinner that night was fantastic!  The gravy was thick and very rich and the beef cooked to a very soft texture.  Retaining their form, the mushrooms really add to the look and consistency of the dish.  My wife found this meal almost too rich to eat as a stand-alone item and commented that next time we should try serving this recipe with cooked noodles or even adding some sour cream to make a stroganoff.

For dinner last night, I cut the richness by having a little cooked potato with my stew.  I compare this recipe to a delightful dinner I had of wild boor in the small town of Chenonceaux France.

I strongly recommend this recipe, it is fast and easy to make, just allow the eight hours for cooking and don’t forget the beer!

Thai-Style Chicken and Veggies

The other night I decided to be very brave and cook some Thai chicken.  This style of cooking is new to me but I though I would give it a try.  Going through my The Deen Family Cookbook, I found Corrie's Thai-Style Chicken and Veggies recipe (page 78).  Fourteen ingredients is quite a few to handle, but several are cans or jars, so it actually looks pretty simple.

The first thing I had to do was shop for a few of the ingredients that we don't normally keep at our house like Asian fish sauce.  We had recently watched an Alton Brown Good Eats show about Asian fish sauce so we understand what it is, how it is made, and how strong it is.  We also had to get a can of unsweetened coconut milk, a can of bamboo shoots and some baby corn (we got them pickled in a jar and they worked just fine).

Just before I started on the chicken, I started one cup of brown rice in our rice cooker so we would have a starch to accompany the chicken.  This is a new experience for me as my wife usually is in charge of making the rice.  To prepare for the actual cooking, I gathered all the ingredients and placed them on our island counter top and then I sharpened the knife I was going to use.  With it nice and sharp, I chopped one yellow onion and put it in our large frying pan with some olive oil to start cooking. 

I was placing some old newspaper over the cutting board to retain the raw chicken juices when I moved the knife off the cutting board and nicked the side of my index finger near the tip with the backend of the knife blade.  OK, turn off the range and move the cooking onions off the heat.  Access the damage that is about one quarter of an inch long (but really bleeding well).  Off to the bathroom to wash out the cut and then I had to find a Band-Aid.  I was applying direct pressure (remember I was a Boy Scout) and had to have my wife open the wrapper for the Band-Aid and help me get it applied.  A quick check that the bleeding has stopped and all the blood is cleaned up and it's back to work.

The recipe calls for one and a half pounds of chicken, which turned out to be two chicken breasts.  I laid them flat and cut crosswise into strips.  I ended up with strips of chicken about one quarter of an inch wide and an inch deep.  I should have then turned the cut strips 90 degrees laying them flat and sliced them long ways, or even before cutting the chicken crosswise, I should have fillet each chicken breast in half to reduce the thickness.  I ended up cutting each strip in half after cooking.

I put my chicken strips in with the onions, placed the pan back on the heat, and added some salt and pepper.  While this was cooking, I started to prepare the rest of the ingredients.  The first thing I found was that I should have really shaken the can of coconut milk before I opened it!  There was a very thick layer of solids on the top and underneath a very watery layer.  I added enough of both parts to my mixing bowl for the recipe. 

I opened the jar of mini pickled ears of corn and managed to get the eight ears sliced long ways before my wife and I started eating the delicious little picked ears of corn directly from the jar.  The recipe calls for one tablespoon of sweet chili sauce.  I intentionally didn't buy the chili sauce, but I did substitute about a tablespoon of mild salsa left over from making soft tacos and about a quarter teaspoon of chili flakes.  I cut up one stalk of broccoli to get the one cup of broccoli florets.

After about six minutes, the chicken finished cooked so I moved the chicken and onions from the frying pan to a small bowl for later.  Into the frying pan went the remainder of the sauce ingredients to heat to a gentle boil until the broccoli was tender.  Then in went a mixture of equal parts cornstarch and water as a thickener for the sauce.  However, I didn't see any real difference to the thickness after adding it.

I added the chicken and onions back into the frying pan and heated the entire mixture until warm.

The rice was ready, so we dished up some rice and added the Thai chicken on top.  This dish was excellent; the coconut flavor is present but not overpowering.  The chicken was moist and there is just a little hint of heat in the sauce.  Next time I make this dish, I will add a second stalk of broccoli to enhance the visual presentation, as we found that the dish can use a little more varied color that additional broccoli will add.

We used our white cafe ware plates and realized that the white chicken in white sauce on whitish rice on the white plate looked somewhat plain.  Next time we will use some colored plates.  In fact, four new colored plates are on our kitchen-shopping list

Baked Tilapia with Brown Rice

Last night I tried out another new recipe from Paula Deen's cookbook: The Deen Family Cookbook.  This recipe is Corrie's Lemony, Buttery Baked Fish (page 65).

I grew up North of Seattle Washington, and our family had a 20 foot boat and we would go fishing (it seems like every weekend) on Puget Sound for Salmon.  We didn't catch too many salmon, but we did catch just about everything else that lives in that body of water: red snapper, true cod, sea bass, flounder, rock fish, dog fish, sea plumes, even once a seagull, but that's another story.  I know that I would clean the fish and my mom would cook it up for us, though I don't remember much about how she cooked it.  Typically, my experience with cooking fish is barbequing salmon on my Weber grill and occasionally adding some shrimp.  Even though we are close to the ocean, the seafood available in the standard stores does not seem that fresh.  I have stayed away from cooking fish indoors due to the lack of adequate ventilation that would result in smelling up the house. 

Last week I had a nice lunch with some former co-workers and afterwards I checked out a fairly new seafood store that is close to the restaurant.  This market has a very good selection of fresh and frozen seafood.  One of my former managers was with me and said while the tilapia from this store looked good, that Costco offers both fresh and frozen tilapia.  This is what led me to Costco for my tilapia purchase.

This was a very easy recipe to make; it has seven ingredients including the fish.  I followed the recipe by lining one of my Bakers Secret cookie sheets with foil then laid out the three of the tilapia fillets on the foil, then I sprinkled on a mixture of salt, pepper, and garlic powder.  I made a mixture of butter, fresh lemon zest, and green onions that I spread over the fillets.  Then I put them in the smaller, bottom oven of our Electrolux oven for eleven minutes at 400 degrees.

My wife had already put some brown rice in our rice cooker and it finished about the same time as the fish.  We also had leftover corn and beans from the beef vegetable soup, so we reheated those to go with the fish.

It was a great meal.  I was very pleased with the results of cooking the fish this way.  It was very light and flakey and had a very mild flavor, the lemon and onions really enhanced the flavor.  As I started with good fish fillets, they didn't have the strong "old fish" smell or taste that can ruin a good fish dinner.

This is definitely a recipe that we will use again, perhaps soon when we have some company coming over for dinner.  I did see that Paula Deen also has a similar on-line recipe that uses lime instead of lemon, that also sounds delicious and I am looking forward to trying it.