Lamb Burgers with Rhubarb Onion Sauce

The past few weeks I have been in discussion with the 61st Street Farmers Market. At first we were discussing the possibility of me being a vendor of some kind, but after long thought and putting together a business plan, I had to pass. An offer was then made to volunteer this summer and perhaps do a few cooking demos. I naturally jumped on the chance. The 61st Street Farmers market is located in  a food desert behind the University Of Chicago. Their mission is to make great , healthy locally sourced food available to people that have little means otherwise of obtaining this. To help this , they are local participants of the Wholesome Wave Program, which enables the Farmers Markets to accept Link Cards( a public aid) and provide great programs such as Double Value Coupons. All in all a fantastic organization in which I'm proud to volunteer for.

61st Street Farmers Market (local, sustainable food)

61st Street between Dorchester and Blackstone 

Every Saturday from May 15 to October 30, from 9am to 2pm  

 Rain or Shine

 LINK Accepted

Double Value LINK Program -  Double LINK purchases up to $25 per cardholder, per market day

fruit, vegetables, chicken, beef, lamb, pork, cheese, eggs, baked goods, prepared food, etc.

Chef Demos, Market School and Music every week!

 My first cooking demo will be Saturday May 22. In my excitement I'm brainstorming with what I can do that uses the great local products available and will be seasonal. At this time of year we are starting to see a lot rhubarb. So I was thinking Lamb Sliders with Rhubarb Onion Chutney as its easy for most home cooks, and accessible/affordable.I love Rhubarb  myself, but its a tough sell to family and Certain Someone. I want to find ways to use it  in savory applications , as opposed to a traditional Strawberry Rhubarb dessert. I had envisioned a chutney to go over a childhood favorite of mine, lamb burgers. However the Chutney morphed more into a sauce which was delicious, but not the original plan. Nevertheless its worth a post as I can see this on not only burgers, but chicken, pork , salmon or any other fatty type protein.

Lamb Burgers with Rhubarb Onion Sauce
3/4 to 1 lb Rhubarb
 1 onion chopped
2 cloves garlic minced
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
1 cup Brown Sugar
1 Cinnamon Stick
3 cloves
3/4 cup water

1 lb Ground Lamb
1tsp Cumin
Salt and Pepper to taste

In a saucepan heat the vegetable oil. Add the chopped onion. Turn down heat to medium and cook till translucent. and golden with minced garlic, Cinnamon stick, and cloves.Chop Rhubarb into small pieces and add . Add sugar and water and vinegar. Cook down on med/high heat until Rhubarb breaks down and mixture starts to bubble. Simmer for about 15-20 minutes. Remove from heat.
This can be stored in the refrigerator in a sealed jar for 2 weeks or so.

Mix Cumin, salt and pepper with ground Lamb and form patties. In a hot skillet cook until med  done.Serve with sauce on a bun.

Fresh Homemade Hot Sauce or Sambal

 I'm in  a phase right now. Fellow blogger Cheryl  face booked  some cool pictures takes with her I Phone and Hipstamtic and I have been obsessed ever since. I even set up a Tumblr acct to showcase my cool artsy pictures and other stuff that I cant put here. It's that bad.  So I figured I could get some stylized  shots of these Red Chili Peppers to make the feeling of heat even more visible with this analog style of photography via digital means. I love the vintage feel . So you may see this from time to time here. It's a phase I need to work through.

 A few weeks back I received my Culinaria Southeast Asia book and was captivated by the Sambal''s. Sambal's are essentially chili based dipping sauce that precedes what we in the Western world think as as ketchup. Sambal Oelek being the most popular one to come to mind. Some Sambals have shrimp paste, lime, soy, sugar, ginger, garlic, tamarind, peanuts,etc. All sorts of variations exist.

I made my own variation  based on  the Sambal Cuka ( Vinegar and Chili Dip) in Culinaria. I ended up altering things and adding more ingredients. My batch was also larger because I had about 50 or so Chili peppers. I will give you roughly what I did. Taste and alter according to your tastes.This makes a large batch, that's ideal to divide up and bottle to share. Fresh Sauce  keeps for 1 week in the refrigerator.

Fresh Homemade Hot Sauce/ Sambal

(You can scale this down as this makes over 1/4 liter, a rather large batch. You can use minimally 10 red chilies and amounts of 2 tbsp of vinegar, 2 garlic cloves, 1/2 inch ginger, 1 tbsp soy, 1 tbsp sugar)

1/4 lb red chili peppers ( about 50 chili peppers)

 2 inches of fresh ginger root, peeled and cut into small pieces

1/2 fist of garlic. Cloves peeled

1/2 cup white vinegar

1/4 cup sugar

3-4 tablespoons of Soy Sauce

Wash and Stem chilies (wear gloves to protect skin).  Add rest of ingredients. Process with food processor. Store in sealed jar in the refrigerator. Keeps 1 week

Playing Around With Country Bob's Original All Purpose Sauce

A few weeks back, the people at Country Bob's emailed me and asked would I mind reviewing and talking about their product.Would I mind? Send it on over.

The promptly sent over 2 bottles of their Original All Purpose Sauce. Come to find out they are based in Illinois! With all my cake projects, etc I was to busy to cook. Certain Someone was leaving for Sweden and I relented and let him have his Harold's chicken. He's addicted to this South Side Specialty. Normally they drown the chicken and fries in either a hot or BBQ Sauce.Its unbelievable. I told him to order it plain and undressed so we could add the Country Bobs to it. On first taste it pretty good. Not as sweet, thick, and gooey as most BBQ sauces. I actually described it as cross between a Steak Sauce and a BBQ . I liked. I just felt eating it with the chicken, I poured more on as it was a thinner sauce.

So then I decided to actually cook with it. If you visit their web site, they have a lot of great recipes. On a leisurely Sunday with the man away I decided to make Chicken Sausage. With that I was going to make Chicken Meatballs baked with Country Bobs! I much preferred using Country Bobs Original All Purpose Sauce as a cooking sauce , but it was good as a dunking sauce too. I definitely would like to try their other products.

Here is my quick Chicken Sausage Meatballs recipe:

Chicken Meatballs

4-5 chicken thighs

1 leek

1 apple

1 egg

1/2 cup unseasoned bread crumbs

1/2 bottle of Country Bob's Original All Purpose Sauce

olive oil

Spices to season:* play around with your qty's to suit your tastes

Maple Sugar

Red Pepper Flakes

Salt

Smoked Paprika

Cumin

Run the Chicken Thighs, leek, and apple through your Kitchen Aid Meat Grinder. Season with your spices. Add egg and breadcrumbs. Mixture is slightly runny, but able to handle with oiled hands to form balls. Place formed meatballs in a pre oiled baking dish. Bake at 350 for approx 25 minutes. Pour 1/2 bottle of Country Bobs and toss the meatballs. Cook for an additional 10 minutes. Serve as appetizers, as a sandwich, etc.

Sorry you missed it Honey!

Sartu ...Festa Italiana

When Maryann and Marie announced their event I was so excited. I really respect and love these bloggers, and look forward to seeing their great Italian cuisine each week.I felt intimidated by the event as they really know they stuff . However I reached for one of my favorite cookbooks The Silver Spoon, and decided on a dish that was new to me , and sounded great,Sartu. This recipe attracted me for many reasons. 1)Certain Someone would love it.2) The use of chicken livers and other sorts of meat and sausage.3) It reminded me of a alternative version of a dish Marie presented on her blog called a Timpano from the movie Big Night.

Certain Someone is heading out for Germany this weekend and I wanted a special hearty dinner before he goes home to his Mama CS( I love her dearly,she's a amazing cook). But I don't want him telling her I haven't been cooking good things for him lately due to our schedules. Plus with him gone , who's going to eat all the leftovers? So timing was important. This dish is pretty simple , just requires some time and prep. If I do it again I will make the risotto before , etc,and just assemble. I also took the liberty of adding green peas.If your not a fan of chicken livers( like Certain Someone) just add more meat. This dish can be so versatile.He said next time skip the livers. I don't eat a lot of chicken liver , but make a mean chopped liver with black truffle oil that my family and friends love.But I digress. Final verdict was he had two servings and said it was OK. By the fact he ate two helpings was a good enough sign to me. We served it accompanied with tomato sauce.

Timbale Sartu from The Silver Spoon,Phaidon

Serves 6

7 tablespoons butter, plus extra for greasing

1 1/2 cups bread crumbs

1/3 cup dried mushrooms

1 thick bread slice, crusts removed

¾ cup milk Scant 1 cup ground beef All-purpose flour, for coating

3 tablespoons olive oil

3 1/2 ounces chicken livers, thawed if frozen, trimmed and chopped

2 ounces Italian sausage, peeled and crumbled

2 1/2 ounces mozzarella cheese, diced

3 cups Meat Stock

1/2 onion, chopped

1/4 cup bottled strained tomatoes

Scant 2 cups risotto rice

2 eggs, lightly beaten

Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 3500F. Grease an ovenproof dish with butter and sprinkle with the bread crumbs, turning to coat. Tip out any excess.

Put the mushrooms in a bowl, add hot water to cover and let soak for 20 minutes, then drain, squeeze and chop coarsely. Tear the bread into pieces, place in a bowl, add the milk and a pinch of salt and let soak for 10 minutes, then squeeze out.

Combine the ground beef and soaked bread, then roll the mixture into hazelnut-size balls and coat with flour.

Heat 2 tablespoons of the butter with the oil in a skillet, add the meatballs and cook until golden brown all over. Remove with a slotted spoon, drain on paper towels and set aside.

Heat 2 tablespoons of the remaining butter in another pan, add the mushrooms and a pinch of salt, cover and cook over low heat for 20 minutes.

Melt 2 tablespoons of the remaining butter in another skillet. Add the chicken livers and cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, for about 5 minutes until lightly browned. Remove from the heat and season with salt.

Heat the sausage and mozzarella in a small pan until the cheese has melted.

Bring the stock to a boil.

Meanwhile, melt the remaining butter in another pan, add the onion and cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes, then add the strained tomatoes and stir in the rice. Add a Ladleful of the hot stock and cook, stirring, until it has been absorbed. Continue adding the stock, a ladleful at a time, and stirring until each addition has been absorbed. This will take 18—20 minutes.

Cover the base and sides of the prepared dish with a layer of risotto. Combine all the filling ingredients and spoon them into the dish, pour the eggs over the filling and cover with the remaining risotto. Bake for about 45 minutes. Remove from the oven, let stand for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a serving dish and serve.

Holy Mole

I haven't been a good participant in the weekly challenges of
Chou over at Balance announced the final week 3 super food and it was Cocoa. Not necessarily meant to be used in a dessert. Check out all the nutrition facts on cocoa on her site, who would have guessed. No wonder people feel so good after having chocolate. I immediately thought of a mole sauce. I have never made mole but decided to do some research. None of my cookbooks had a recipe, so I improvised.And that's the beauty of Mole, there are so many variations.I used a combination of chilies, spices,chicken broth,and cocoa powder . I read ground peanuts or almonds are also added but I passed on that.Hey its Coco's Mole so I can do what I want.In shopping for my Chilies I noticed some Corn Husks, and decided to attempt some tamales too. A chicken poblano tamale drizzled with Coco's Mole. Yummm. Certain Someone the other night asked what a tamale was when we were bowling. 'The Tamale Man' came into the place selling his wares from a cooler type device .Seems hes legend around Chicago at after hours spots. Me, I have never heard of him , but though it was a good business idea.

Just so you see I really made my own Tamales! This dough batter is Masa (tamale dough), a combo of shortening or lard,with Masa, baking powder,salt,and water. Seemed simple enough.
Here is my Chicken breast cooked down with some Mole, poblanos, and onions.A
And here is the star , the Mole. I cooked this for about a hour, but it could have simmered down even longer.
And here are my tamales steaming in my homemade contraption. I took a baking cooling rack and placed it a long roasting pan with water. I covered it too.
All in all a long labor that Certain Someone seemed to enjoy. He ate four. I explained how its not really a entree and felt bad after all that effort he didn't have more to eat.But he liked it and the Mole of which he spooned more unto his tamales.

Coco's Mole ( adjust spices to your taste)

3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon sugar
6 cups chicken broth
2 oz dried chilies( ancho, California chili pods,etc)
1 large onion
minced garlic
olive oil

Bring your dried chilies and broth to a boil. Reduce heat and let simmer until pods soften, take pods and slice open to remove seeds. Reserve liquid, but strain to remove any excess seeds. Saute the sliced onion , cumin,and garlic in olive oil until soft. Using your blender, in batches pulse chilies ,reserved broth, and onions.Once all has been processed put in heavy sauce pan and simmer . Add your cocoa powder and sugar and stir constantly until incorporated. Simmer stirring occasionally for at least 1 hour. Be sure to taste to adjust seasonings to your taste.