'Mazing Mexican Meatloaf

So, it has been an interesting few weeks. I'm not bailing on the blog or anything folks, just had various things I needed to handle. Anyway, with life rolling on I figure it's time to provide you some good food and what better than a little FIESTA MADNESS-- I GIVE YOU:


'MAZING MEXICAN MEATLOAF


That's right, screw your mom's meatloaf-- this thing is /awesome/. Seriously, this is one of the better things I've done with my life. 


Ingredients for the science:

• 1 lb ground turkey (I know, pansy meat but I just don't see this flying with beef)
• 1 lb ground chicken
• 3 eggs
• 2 cups of bread crumbs
• ~20-30 oz. of Enchilada sauce (made mine from sauce packet, tomato paste + water)
• 1 cup of salsa 
• 1- 4oz. can of diced green chillies (This won't be spicy. Promise.)
• 1 packet of taco seasoning
• 1 15oz. can of whole kernel corn
• 1 15oz. can of black beans
• 2 Tbsp of cilantro

Instructions:

1) Thirsty? Open a beer. It just so happens your fridge is loaded with beer after St. Patricks Day. 

2) In a large mixing bowl, mix turkey, chicken, eggs, bread crumbs, salsa, chillies, taco seasoning, corn, cilantro, and black beans together. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. 

3) Take a deep breath. Seriously, damn that list in #2 almost hurt to type, let alone say. Yeah, despite how amazing this recipe is, it's really quite simple, isn't it? Sure don't want to cook over anyone's head. 

4)  Prepare your enchilada sauce (if necessary). Let your loaf mix and settle for a few minutes, then form it into the bottom of a greased baking pan. Shape it however you like. I went with a traditional "loaf" form. Mine was a bit taller/thicker so it took quite a while to cook. Cover with about half of the enchilada sauce. 

Alien crysallis, or Mexican Meatloaf. YOU decide. 

5) AVERAGE TIME ESTIMATE WARNING: Bake your meat loaf in the oven for 45 minutes. Remove from oven and cover with remaining enchilada sauce. Bake for 15 minutes. 

6) Check temperature. Continue to bake meat loaf till it reads 160 degrees if you're not already there.

I'm telling you, this one was pretty fantastic. Despite being a meat loaf it came off as light and flavorful. The lack of beef kept the fat down. All in all, there's nothing overly complicated about this one. Serve it with tortilla chips or, you know, suck at life. Whatever suits you. 

Pepper-Pepper Eggs (Reddit Inspired)

Just like that, back down the culinary trail we go, and do I have a breakfast (lunch/dinner, usually taking place at about 3a.m. ) for you! 


PEPPER-PEPPER EGGS - They're not just for Reddit Anymore


So yeah, this idea was brought to my attention a few weeks back on Reddit, and I think I've finally brought it to an adequate conclusion. 


Ingredients for the science: 

-Eggs
-1 large green pepper
-Crushed Red Pepper (seasoning)
-Sprinkle-y delicious cheese
-1 - 1/4 remaining bottle of Riesling
-Katana






Steps:


1) Using your katana, slice the top of the pepper off (about 1 cm) and remove the seed bulb from within. Throw the top portion away.


2) Slice the pepper in about 3/4" sections untill there are four rings (typically) + the bottom of the pepper. Be sure to remove any interior "gunk" so that only the external dark-green part of the pepper remains in your slices. 


3) In a large, sprayed skillet, fry your pepper rings on either side to get them heated thoroughly and slightly cooked. With the peppers as flush to the bottom of the pan as possible, crack an egg into each opening. Turn your heat on low and sprinkle crushed red pepper on each of the eggs. 

(In this example, i'm also frying the bottom which I will use as a top for one of the peppers. Notice how some of the egg-white escaped in the top of the pan? That, folks, is called failure. )


4) At this point you're gonna wanna cover the pan and turn the heat down a little bit below medium. Eggs do NOT cook in this form very well at all. You need to cook them thoroughly, but SLOWLY or else you'll burn the egg-white. Continue cooking this way for about 5-10 minutes till most of the milky white crap has denatured. After that point, cook them to your desired hardness. You can cook these eggs slowly until they are fully cooked and hard, even though they are sunny-side up. In all honesty, however; learn how to eat egg yolk...pansy. 


5) Open the cover of your pan and sprinkle some of the shredded cheese of your choice. Recover for 2 more minutes. 


6) Pour your wine which you had left over after the whole steak incident a few weeks ago, and make some toast - pause--


I know what you're thinking. "Bryan, why didn't you list bread in your ingredients? Since you're planning on berating us about not eating exactly like you, how can you expect us to follow instructions when you put down extraneous crap in your lists like swords and alcohol, yet refuse to put in bread, which is easily the only carbohydrate to be found in this meal". 


Well, that's a good point, but honestly-- I wish you'd stop interrupting my blog, and toast some damn bread. More importantly, swords and alcohol go together like swords and anything. Honestly, pick any activity and add a sword. Now tell me it did not just become incredibly more fun...thought so...


Glad we took care of that. At this point, you can use a spatula to remove the pepper-eggs out of the pan. They'll come together and should be mess free, no worries :) 
 Here we are: 

Any recommendations for the next recipe? Something you want to see me do my take on? 
LEAVE A COMMENT

Waffle Batter of the Gods

Hey there! Sorry for the late post but as it turns out I didn't care till just now. 


It's 10:46 PM as of the beginning of this writing this and considering the next meal is breakfast, I've decided to grant you an easy recipe-- but one I hold very dear. Unfortunately, there will be a complete lack of Riesling in this ingredient list but hey; I won't hold you back. 


WAFFLE BATTER OF THE GODS


It may be a cop out, but i'm not going to give you any amounts for these. I don't know how many people you're gonna make waffles for. I'm not going to just assume you have friends. 


Ingredients for the science: 


-Bisquick
-Eggs
-Milk -----------------------------------Make a Bisquick recipe batch of these three things then add: 


-Cinnamon (not cinnamon sugar)
-Nutmeg (go light with this, chief)
-1tsp of Vanilla Extract for every 1cup of Bisquick used (Feel free to substitute whiskey. True story)


Instructions:


BUY A WAFFLE MAKER AND USE IT. 




Expect a second post this week as well. Coming soon--Chicken and Dumpling Stew!!!

Valentine's Steak-- Because She's Probably Worth It.

This one is going to be a bit different. I promise to start including pictures from now on...but honestly they would be of little help here. With Valentines Day approaching and me with things to prepare for a special someone, I've decided to rush and get this post out ahead of schedule. 


So let's talk Steak. It's awesome. Good, i'm glad we've had that chat. 


INGREDIENTS FOR THE SCIENCE: 

• 2 - 10oz. or greater NY Strip Steaks
• 1 cup -  Shredded Cheese (Parmesan, Pepper Jack, or Mozzarella- your call.)
• 6 - Jumbo sized pre-cooked, thawed, shrimp
• 2 Tbsp Vegetable Oil- This is for pan release. Lube up, yo. 
• 2 Tbsp Olive Oil- More lube.
• 4 Tbsp Butter (separate from above, you'll see why)
• Mushrooms (Preferably large, raw, baby-bellas) 
• 1/2 medium-sized red onion (sliced)
• 2 cloves of garlic- finely diced
• Steak seasoning (personal preference: Cavendar's Greek Seasoning)
• * - Black Pepper

WHAT ELSE YOU'LL NEED: 

• Grill
• 2 small skillets/frying pans
• 1 bottle of chilled Riesling (Spatlese- you really don't want anything sweeter than this.)
• By now I hope you're detecting a pattern
• The desire to grill something like a man. 

1) Preheat your grill till it's hotter than 400 degrees - or .67 Scarlett Johanssons. Wash and slice the raw onion, garlic cloves, and mushrooms. These are to go over the steak once it's all done. If she's already over at your place, you may want to let her go play Skyrim while you're cutting the onions. You know how they make her sad. Also, if it didn't come shredded, shred that cheese now. If your shrimp still have tails, deny them that right and remove them. 

2) Melt the butter any way you see fit and apply half of the butter to each steak on both sides. Apply the seasoning to both sides of the steak and put it in the fridge for five minutes so that the butter hardens up a bit with the seasoning. Keep a little bit of extra seasoning on the side. 

3) Apply your steaks to your hot grill once you're ready to eat within 20 minutes. You'll flip it at about 5 minutes. (5 min/ per side given 11 oz. NY Strip--roughly).

4) In one skillet apply the olive oil, mushrooms, and red onions and garlic. Turn it up on high and saute them. 

5) In pan number two, add the vegetable oil and shrimp to the pan. Saute these, adding a little bit of the same steak seasoning as you did previously. 

6) By now, you probably want to look at flipping that steak. You're going for medium-rare here, by the way. You'll probably disregard that and cook them to whatever doneness you normally prefer here. Don't worry too much, you'll only be wrong. This here is an art that I couldn't teach in one paragraph. 

7) After you've flipped the steak, wait three minutes. Place 3 sauteed shrimp on each NY Strip. Cover each of the steak/shrimp combos with half of the shredded cheese. Close the grill and wait two minutes. Then remove your steaks.

8) Cover what looks to be the most amazing steaks you've ever seen with the onion-mushroom-garlic mix. 

9) You may now pop the cork on that wine and enjoy your evening.

10) ????

11) Profit. 

The Eternal Lasagna

If you're here, you wanna eat something awesome. Every week I will post one of my recipes and you'll get to....you know what. I hate this damn font. One moment.

....

helvetica-- for pros. 

Alright let's rock this. I give you: 

THE ETERNAL LASAGNA

What ingredients you'll need for the science: 

• 1- 1 lb. box of Lasagna noodles (not oven ready--this is the pros, champ...)
• 1 lb. of ground Italian sausage (you may substitute veal if you like the idea of baby cows dying; I wouldn't blame you). 
• 1 - 28 oz. can of crushed tomatoes
• 1- 16 oz. can of tomato sauce
• 3 eggs
• 1- 1lb. container of Ricotta cheese
• 1/2- 1lb. container of small-curd cottage cheese
• 1/8th cup of fresh parsley (chopped--don't fret too much over the amount, it's parsley. It's basically France if your lasagna was the United Nations)
• 2- cloves of garlic (finely diced)
• 2- 1lb. bags of shredded Mozzarella cheese
• 3/4 cup of freshly grated Parmesan cheese (Asiago and Romano will also fly here...you pretentious twit)
• Undetermined ballsy sprinkle of salt
• Even ballsy-er sprinkle of sugar.
• Enough Italian seasoning to cover Jay Leno's Chin. 

Now that you have your ingredients together you'll also need the following implements: 

• Mixing bowl
• Large skillet
• Large pot
• 9x13" baking (half-size) pan, preferably one you stole
• 1- bottle of Riesling
• 1- bottle of Riesling
• Aluminium foil

Okay, are you pumped to show off your mad cooking skills to your family and/or the person you're trying to convince you're worthy of sexual intercourse with? Okay, lets walk through this step-by-step.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1) Fill that large pot with water and heat it to a boil. You can add a touch of olive or vegetable oil  if you subscribe to the myth that that helps keep your noodles separate. (Add a touch of oil once you drain = more success). 

2) While the water is heating up, place your ground sausage of your choice into the skillet and cook it thoroughly. Drain off the excess fat and then sprinkle some Italian seasoning on it. It wasn't quite Italian enough. 

3) Once the water is boiling, put your noodles in. Cook them for about 10-12 minutes till "al dente". Drain most of the water, but leave enough in the pan to kinda keep the noodles all floaty in water and stuff. It's just a good place to store them where they won't stick too much with all the starches. 

4) Pop the cork on one of the two bottles of Riesling and pour yourself a glass. Forget about what they said at the last meeting; you deserve this. Drink throughout the remaining steps.

5) Once your sausage is cooked, add the crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, salt, sugar, garlic and Italian seasoning to the skillet. Heat thoroughly and slowly till warm throughout. Think of this as a great time to learn some patience. Now, preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Also, have another sip of wine. You're doing great. 

6) In your large mixing bowl, mix the eggs, ricotta, cottage, Parmesan, and fresh parsley together. Stir frantically until you have a lovely cheese sauce. If it's not lovely, keep stirring until you get bored. Then you're done. 

7) SPRAY THE INSIDE OF YOUR PAN and remove 5 lasagna noodles. Lay three down the long way into the pan and then two overlapping where each of the noodles meet in the middle. Open one of the two bags of mozzarella.

Once you have your noodles in the bottom of the pan continue this rotation:

-Light layer of cheese sauce mix

-Light layer of tomato/meat sauce mix

-Medium layer of shredded mozzarella

-3 noodles

8) Do this until you've exhausted all of your ingredients (and use the whole 1lb bag of mozzarella). I usually run out of noodles first, but don't worry: your lasagna is going to look sexy no matter what you're forced to pile on top of it. 

9) COVER WITH ALUMINUM FOIL and bake this 7lb + monstrosity for 40 minutes. If you used veal, please reconsider what happened to those baby cows, you heartless monster. For the next 40 minutes, please watch 2.5 episodes of How I Met Your Mother on Netflix, and finish the first bottle of wine, preferably with the person you're planning on sexing up this evening. 

10) Almost done! If 40 minutes have passed, go ahead and open bottle 2 of the wine. You'll actually enjoy this one with dinner. Take the lasagna out of the oven and remove the aluminium foil. Now, open the second bag of Mozzarella and cover that lasagna completely. You'll likely use almost the whole bag (I tend to use any remainder to make garlic bread, but that's another recipe). Now is also a splendid time to ignore all those things your mother told you about your family's history of heart disease. 

11) Bake this near 8lb. creature for 10 more minutes till the new, thick, delicious layer of cheese you added melts and starts to lightly brown. 

BAM. DONE. 

Now, enjoy your meal and let me know anytime if you have questions.