The Great Dinner Retrospective - Part 2

Here we are with another round of delicious meals we've made over the last year of our cooking adventures. If you missed the last dinner retrospective, you can check it out here.

This week we'll start off with a quick, but still amazing, meal. Every now and again I get the urge to make sushi at home, but Megan isn't a fish fan, so she usually puts together a simple stir fry for the less nautically inclined guests. This is a quick and easy way to put together a big meal, using chicken, frozen veggies, and beef ramen noodles.


The cold winter months are coming back again, so here's something fun we like to do when it gets chilly and you need something warm and comforting. We've made several different kinds of biscotti to dunk in coffee, but on this occasion we went with fruit scones instead. They make a perfect match for a nice steaming mug of joe with some french vanilla, caramel, or cinnamon creamer.


One of the meals we've had the most over the last few months is bacon wrapped chicken breasts, which are glazed with a variety of different mustards and other ingredients. Here's the chicken in the first stage of bacon wrapped goodness.


And here they are coming straight out of the oven and wafting out a truly heavenly scent.


We've made this dish in a lot of different ways and with several different types of sides. This time we went with stuffing and green beans.


Here it is again, but this time with with a mammoth baked potato and a side of hot vegetables. We also melted cheese on top during the last few minutes of the baking for this edition of a wonderful and easy meal.


We're always looking for ways to take advantage of sales or make our weekly shopping a little more cost efficient. We were craving enchiladas one week, but weren't looking forward to buying all the ingredients or taking the time to assemble them. As a fun new twist on this Mexican classic, we took frozen burritos and doused them in enchilada sauce, cheese, and olives, and then baked them. Way easier than making the enchiladas by hand, but still tasty and super cheap. Don't worry Mexican fans, we still make plenty of big production Mexican meals, this was just a little diversion.


Here's a quick breakfast we put together when oatmeal pancake mix and yogurt were both on sale one week. Using yogurt and sliced strawberries makes it not only healthier, but even more delicious than using syrup. Here I've used a strawberry yogurt, but it's also good with flavors like cinnamon bun and Boston cream pie.


To finish off this week's dinner retrospective, here's an amazing Caesar salad we recently had. Normally we'd make our own Caesar dressing, but for this meal we found a great deal at Albertson's where a bag of Romaine lettuce with Caesar dressing, Parmesan, and croutons was on sale for half the normal price. To make it a full meal, Megan broiled a chicken breast with a variety of seasonings and then shredded it up into thin strips.


See you next week for another round of meals we've enjoyed!

The Great Dinner Retrospective - Part 1

Hey there food fanatics! We've been on a massive "not spending" spree lately, which unfortunately means we haven't been making anything in the grand old "man vs. food" tradition. That doesn't mean we haven't been making delicious meals, though! While we are in between massive food projects, and while we wait for our chicken taco videos to be finished, I'll be putting up several new posts in the "Great Dinner Retrospective" series. This series will chronicle the many amazing meals we've had over the past year, as well as a few special occasions with more restaurant style meals.

Let's start off with something truly mouth watering - tomato raviolis stuffed with cheese and lobster. These little gems were waiting for me at Sam's Club one day and I couldn't resist trying them. A pasta that spectacular deserves something special to go on top, so I sauteed all the best veggies I could find the fridge, including red onion and green pepper. I wanted to give it a little more of a twist, so they were sauteed with cut up bacon bits, using the bacon fat as the grease. For another interesting change, I seasoned it all with lemon pepper, which gave it more of a seafood feel. Once it was all cooked, the ravioli was topped with sun dried tomato alfredo, the veggie and bacon mixture, and a handful of grated Parmesan.


This next one is a neat breakfast Megan puts together every now and again when spinach is on sale. The idea is to take the standard omelet but make it a little more healthy, so it uses spinach and cottage cheese instead of cheddar or meat. We sprinkle a little Parmesan on this one as well before flipping it closed and finish off with a side of wheat toast.


For awhile we made an effort to try out some of the more lean meats, like ground turkey. This one is a non-traditional take on the standard burger, mixing in adobo sauce, chillis, onion, and cilantro. You can find small cans of chillis in adobo sauce at just about any market, and the amount you put in determines how much kick the burger gets. We've had these several times now, trying out different levels of heat each time. You definitely can make this one a real spicy motha if you put your mind to it. To offset the scorching adobo sauce, I like to use different condiments like Caesar mustard or a sweet and spicy mustard with mayo.


Up next is a meal we had last week that rolls chicken up with stuffing, instead of cutting open chicken breasts and stuffing the inside. We pound out the chicken flat with a meat mallet for more rolling room, and then season each side with whatever spice strikes your fancy. This is another one that happens when spinach is on sale, and usually the same week as the omelets to ensure we use up all those wonderful greens. The chicken is stuffed with cottage cheese, mozzarella (or monteray jack or pepper jack or whatever fits the bill!), and chopped spinach.


Then it's all baked and served with some delicious sides. In this case we went with a Parmesan risotto and fresh, locally grown green beans.


Hey, that's not food! I couldn't help but sneak in a little picture here of last year's stocking wall. We take that particular holiday very seriously, and ensure we have plenty of delicious items waiting in our stockings for the real present opening!


In keeping with the holiday theme, here's a picture of Jacob and Jayne trying out a cheese fondue we made for New Years. This was seriously among the most delicious things I've ever had, consisting of six different types of cheeses and a white wine. You can also barely make out me in the background with Matt playing Modern Warfare 2.


Here was our full New Years setup, complete with all the different breads and veggies we were using to dip into the fondue.


That's it for the first Dinner Retrospective! We'll be back next week with more adventures in cooking we've experienced over the past year, and hopefully you see something that sets you on your own amazing food journey.

Impromptu Chili Cheese Fries

Hey again food blog readers! Our massive chicken taco project is still in the works, but fear not, it's going to be here soon. In the mean time we've made quite a few delicious things that need to be shown to the world. A few weekends back I was craving something to snack on while spending an unnecessary amount of time playing video games (the original SNES version of Lufia and the PC game Septerra Core, for anyone who is interested in that sort of thing). I knew I wanted something involving potatoes, but wasn't feeling like chips, so I decided to whip up some chili fries with the potatoes we had sitting on the counter.

Halfway through, I realized we didn't actually have any chili, so I had to improvise. What I ended up with was wedges of potatoes seasoned with chili powder, garlic powder, and red pepper flakes. I cut up strips of red bell pepper and threw on green onion and "mozzarella" flavored rice cheese (basically tastes like slices of American cheese). When it popped out of the oven I knew I was onto something and we decided to make it the basis of an another meal later that week.


For a meal based around the oh-so-delicious, not-exactly-nutritious chili fries we wanted to ramp it up a notch and make it worthy of a food blog. First Megan seasoned chicken thighs (way more tender than breasts) and broiled them. After pulling them out she cut them up into thin slices to put on top of the home made fries.


As with last time we also baked red pepper and green onions with the potato wedges. This time we didn't bake the cheese on, as we wanted to have a sort of assembly line where everyone could add whatever they wanted on top.


Here's all the various ingredients to put on the fries and the side salad. There's avacado, chicken strips, shredded cheddar and mozzarella, hard boiled egg slices, tomato, mandarin oranges, cucumber, sour cream, and hot sauce. For anyone wondering why that isn't Cholula - well, we ran out and I wanted to try something different. Tapatio probably won't be replacing Cholula for me, but it is significantly spicier and has a nice kick.

Here's the first layer of the fries with a dollop of chili and a generous handful of chicken strips tossed on top.

To finish off my plate of fries I put sour cream, sprinkled cheese, and then threw on a whole lot of hot sauce.


Here's the finished meal with my salad, using tomatoes, eggs, avocado, and some more of the chicken. It's not pictured here, but I topped it off with green goddess dressing.



That's it for this week! Check back soon for our latest creation (impromptu or planned - who knows?) and the soon to arrive "War in heaven chicken taco" videos! For anyone who missed them, you can see the original teasers for the chicken tacos at here, here, and finally here!

Shrimp and clam Po Boys

All the voice overs have been recorded for our upcoming first video blog, and now all the video is being spliced together for our amazing take on chicken tacos. You can check out the first two teasers for the upcoming video here and here if you haven't seen them yet. Just to keep you hooked a little bit longer, here are two more photos from the recording:





Trust me when I say the final product will be well worth the wait! Now onto the purpose of this week's blog: fried shrimp and clam Po' Boys! I'd been craving seafood and wanted to try something a little different, so we went the route of making sandwiches with them. To get started I put together the coating for the shrimp and clams, which consisted of tempura batter and a few other spices.


Megan and her siblings frequently get me new seasonings for gift giving occasions, and one of them was an all seafood themed seasoning mix. The "South Seas" seasoning has a great savory taste, and it works for things other than seafood as well. I tossed in a liberal sprinkling of South Seas and cayenne to give the batter a little kick.


Next up was trying to figure out how to shuck clams. It only took us all day, but we did finally find a kitchen store that had clam shucking knives. My first attempt was a disaster, but I got it down pretty quick. The secret is to use the entire length of the blade to find the best point of entry, instead of trying to use the tip. Once the knife is in you can then twist it around from vertical to horizontal to pop open the shell. Here's me on my first try, about to gash open my thumb:


After pulling the tails off the shrimp and getting the clams out of their shells I dipped all the seafood in milk and then coated it in the batter.

Because they are so small, the shrimp and clams only take about four or five minutes to fully fry in the oil.



The condiment is the most important part of any sandwich, and I wanted this Po' Boy to be something spectacular. Instead of using any of my standard mustard or horseradish concoctions, I put together a spicy remoulade sauce. The sauce is made by blending together mayo, garlic, capers, Chalula hot sauce, horseradish, pickle juice, coarse ground mustard, and a few spices.


A couple of layers of remoulade sauce and some lettuce top the sandwich, and then we are ready to start adding on the seafood.





For a little more zest and tang, I squeezed fresh lemon juice all over the shrimp and clams.


Here's the finished sandwich, with a heaping helping of curly fries.

A second crack at the french fry sandwich

We recently recorded the voice overs for our upcoming video blog, which means its time for the second teaser for our "War in Heaven" chicken tacos. Here's two more pictures to give a taste of the upcoming glory:






Last weekend I decided to take a second crack at the french fry sandwich. I liked how it went before, but I wanted to change up a few things. This time around I went with waffle cut fries, so they'd fit inside the sandwich better. To get the flavor right on the fries, I used Jamaican Jerk, Onion Powder, and Roasted Red Pepper seasonings.



Last time we used corned beef, but as I mentioned in the previous post I thought it would be amazing with buffalo chicken instead. For some reason Albertsons has stopped selling it at their Deli, so we took a little trek to Smith's instead and got a good deal there. As before, I slightly cooked the meat with the cheese on top to make it hot and gooey.


It turned out going to Smith's was a good idea, as they have a big selection of artisan breads. I again went with Italian bread that's slightly crusty on the outside and soft on the inside. Since I was going a little spicier on this go around, I went with one that had jalapenos cooked inside.

Sliced cherry tomatoes went on for a little more color. For the perfect condiment I mixed together ranch, horseradish, and spicy jalapeno mustard.




Look forward to our upcoming video blog chronicling the creation of our home made salsa and the best damn chicken tacos ever!

A Little Teaser

The making of our latest, greatest creation (which we've dubbed the "War in Heaven Chicken Tacos") was all caught on film. Since it will be some time before its all edited together and we've recorded all the voice overs, I thought I'd give a little brief taste of the glory to come. What could all these photos possibly have to do with each other?




















Taste buds excited yet? There is much, much more to come. I have no reservations in saying this was as good or better than our Fried Chicken Benedict, so expect greatness!