Tag: recipes

Old-Fashioned Cracker Dressing & Stuffing – Do You Dare?

Here we go again, delving into the treacherous topic of
changing up your traditional Thanksgiving side dishes. This time, it’s an
old-fashioned cracker dressing vying to be that surprise, uninvited guest.

Sure some you alternative lifestylists may go for the
cornbread, but generally, bread-based variations rule the day. There’s a
great reason for this; they’re easy, delicious, and most importantly, very
familiar. Therein lies the problem.

Why mess with past success? Your loved ones wait all year
for your Thanksgiving feast, so why take the chance of disappointing them on
the big day? You have the entire rest of the year to do that.

Anyway, I’m not going to try and convince you that this is a
superior dressing, or that you should change your regular routine, but if
you’re someone who’s looking for a change of pace dressing, that’s still very familiar and
comforting, this could be the one.

Of course, you can use whatever ingredients you normally add
to your bread dressing, and it should work just the same. By the way, I never
stuff my turkey, so if you choose to use this as a stuffing, please refer to
the roughly one million Thanksgiving turkey cooking guide linked online. Enjoy!

Ingredients for 16 portions:

1 pound saltine crackers (4 sleeves)

1/2 cup butter

1 large or 2 small yellow onions, diced

3 or 4 ribs of celery, diced

1 tsp salt, or to taste

1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

cayenne to taste

1/2 tsp dried sage

1/2 tsp dried thyme

1/2 tsp dried rosemary

2 3/4 cups chicken or turkey broth

1/2 cup cream or milk

1 or 2 eggs

*Tip: you can cook a small nugget in a pan and taste for
seasoning

Bake at 375 degrees F. for bout 45 minutes

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Columbus Discovers New Sport – Competitive Salami Sandwich Making

I don’t do a lot of sandwich recipes here on Food
Wishes, mostly because, well, they’re sandwiches, but today I’m making an
exception. On Thursday, I participated in a sandwich making contest sponsored
by Columbus Salumeria, and I wanted to share what turned out to be the winning
concoction.

Columbus sponsored the #TopWichSF event to promote their new line of
Farm to Fork Naturals, and things got off to a appetizing start as Sean
Timberlake, from Punk Domestics and Hedonia, treated us to an array of small
bites he created using these great new products.

Photo courtesy of Columbus Salame

I really loved his wonderful
Waldorf-filled endive topped with strips of oven-crisped salami. With
entertaining season right around the corner, I highly recommend you add this to
your repertoire.

I was grateful for the energy and inspiration the tasty
bites provided, as I was up against two very worthy opponents in Michael
Procopio from Food for the Thoughtless, and Lynda Balslev from TasteFood.

The
competition was held at the Hotel Vitale, and started with a romantic pedicab
ride to the Ferry Building across the street. We were given 10 minutes and $10
to buy any additional ingredients we wanted to accessorize our sandwiches with.

My idea was to do a smoked turkey and teleme sandwich,
topped with some kind of meat relish made with soppressata and fruit. I ended
up finding some beautiful pluots, and used the rest of my cash to get a small
bag of pine nuts. They were raw, but I figured I could toast them on the panini
press, which I knew was hot and waiting. I was gifted a few grapes which while delicious, played no part in my creation.

We had just 20 minutes to build our sandwiches, while a
distinguished panel of five judges looked on. I was a little nervous to begin
with, and knowing there were representatives from YumSugar, Chow, SFWeekly, and
Tasting Table there, only added to it. The time went by incredibly fast, which
made my fellow competitors’ work that much more impressive.

Getting ready to bone marrow the bread.
Photo courtesy of Sean Timberlake

Michael bought some bone marrow butter and used it to toast
a turkey, soppressata and apple panini. A brilliant idea, and had time
allowed for a longer, deeper caramelization, it would have crushed my
non-beef-fat-fried offering.

Photo courtesy of Columbus Salame

Lynda did a fennel salami, fig, and goat cheese sandwich,
which she topped with apple slaw, shaved fennel, and her secret ingredient,
fennel pollen. It was a classic combination of flavors, and a great way to show
off the Columbus salami. By the way, check out Lynda’s great recap of the event, where you can see and read more about her beautiful sandwich.

Despite their worthy efforts, the judges awarded my
rustic-looking sandwich the grand prize. I received a dangerously large basket
of salami and other gourmet goodies, as well as $500 cash!

I figured that a two-year’s supply of salami was enough of a prize, so I’m having them donate the
money to the SF Food Bank. I would have just spent the money on more salami
anyway.

A huge thank you to Columbus for inviting me to participate. They have a bunch of great photos on their Facebook page in case you want to check out some more of the action. Also, a sincere thanks to
Michael and Lynda for helping make the event such a fun experience. Enjoy!

Photo courtesy of YumSugar

Smoked Turkey & Teleme Sandwich with Pluot, Sopressata,
& Pine Nut Relish

Ingredients for 4 Sandwiches:

For the relish:

8 oz Columbus Sopressata, diced

1 cup pluot, diced

1/4 cup toasted pinenuts

2 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

2 basil leaves, chopped

salt and pepper to taste

The rest:

1 tbsp Harissa or other hot chili pepper paste

6 tbsp mayonnaise

8 slices bread or 4 rolls

4 oz room temp teleme cheese

8 oz Columbus Smoked Turkey

Mix relish ingredients and let sit in fridge for 1 hour to
develop flavors. Mix the harissa and mayonnaise; spread on bread. Spread both
sides of bread with teleme cheese and top with turkey. Top with relish, and
serve immediately, or wrap and press with a plate in the fridge for 30 minutes
to compress.

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Mini Pecan Phyllo Tarts

These bite sized pecan tarts are the perfect “skinny” replacement for pecan pie this holiday season! They are so easy to make, and really good!

Traditional pecan pie can set you back about 480 calories! These mini tarts, are only 68 calories each, even if you eat two you are still ahead of the game! I found this neat Thanksgiving calorie counter^[1] that totals your calories and tells you how many miles you need to walk to burn them off.

Luckily I’ve lightened up so many Thanksgiving favorites, you can see them all here: Lightened Up Thanksgiving Recipe Index^[2] from cranberry sauce, stuffing, pumpkin pie and lots of leftover ideas.

I’m in a bit of a panic that Thanksgiving is next week! Losing power for two weeks really set me back and quite honestly, after a few days of dealing with long gas lines, no power, no traffic lights, no supermarkets, no school, no gym, I really started to lose track of time (I think I need a vacation).

Pecan pie has been requested quite a bit, so when I stumbled on these mini pecan tarts, I thought I would try them with some minor tweaks.

I loved how they turned out and they are so stinking easy, even a beginner baker can make them. If you’re in charge of dessert this Thanksgiving, give these a try, you can double the recipe to make 30.

Mini Pecan Phyllo Tarts
Adapted from Athens Foods
gordon-ramsay-recipe.com
Servings: 15 • Serving Size: 1 mini tart • Old Points: 1 pts • Points+: 2 pts
Calories: 68 • Fat: 4.5 g • Carb: 6.5 g • Fiber: 0.3 g • Protein: 1 g • Sugar: 4 g
Sodium: 23 mg ^[3]

Ingredients:

1 tbsp butter, melted
1 large egg
4 tsp brown sugar
2 tbsp honey
1/4 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup pecans chopped
15 Mini Phyllo Shells (Athens)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°F.

In a medium mixing bowl, combine all ingredients except pecans. Mix well. Stir in chopped pecans. Arrange mini shells on a baking sheet. Fill mini shells with one heaping teaspoon of pecan mixture. If any of the mixture remains, distribute evenly between all the shells.

Bake for 10-15 minutes. Let them cool before serving.

References

^{^} Thanksgiving calorie counter (walking.about.com)
^{^} Lightened Up Thanksgiving Recipe Index (www.gordon-ramsay-recipe.com)
^{^} Athens Foods (athensfoods.com)