Spotting Lunch - Caribbean Steak Wraps

When I was checking out TasteSpotting for a lunch idea I came across cheesypoof's wrap. It's got prefect island flavors which would surely brighten up my mood. It's been raining here so much, you'd think I was in Seattle! Not to mention that I watched a Bobby Flay's Throwdown tonight that involved Miami kind of flavors. It got me into some kind of warm weather food mood.

Photo from deestroyer

Caribbean Steak Wraps
via deestroyer

3 T. olive oil
3 t. jerk seasoning (purchased, or make it as follows)
1 t. salt plus more to taste
1 lb. thin steak (flank or carne asada cut)
2 cloves garlic
1 can black beans
1/4 cup water
1 ripe mango
1 ripe avocado
1 T. lime juice
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
pepper
1 T. rum
4 large flour tortillas

Instructions:
Preheat the broiler.
Combine 1 T. of the oil with 2 t. of the jerk seasoning and 1 t. salt in a small bowl. Rub this mixture into both sides of the meat and place the meat on a baking sheet. Broil until medium rare, about 5 minutes per side for flank steak (less for carne asada cut). Let it rest until ready to serve.
Meanwhile, heat the remaining 2 T. oil in skillet. Add the garlic and remaining teaspoon of jerk seasoning and saute for a few minutes. Add the beans and and water and simmer gently for a few minutes.
Meanwhile, dice the avocado and mango and place in serving bowl. Drizzle with lime juice and add chopped cilantro. Toss with salt and pepper to taste.
Add the rum to the beans, and increase the heat to cook off the alcohol for a couple minutes. Season the beans with salt and pepper.
Slice the steak into thin strips. Serve fajita style with each component laid out, or roll everything into a burrito for your lucky guests. I also added a dollop of sour cream because I thought it was lacking in sauciness.

Easy Jerk Seasoning
1 T. brown sugar
1 t. garlic powder
1 t. cayenne pepper
1/2 t. ground allspice
1/2 t. ground black pepper
1/2 t. dried thyme
1/4 t. ground ginger


After reading what's in the easy jerk seasoning, I thought it was funny. I often make spice combinations that use these kind of ingredients - so I'm sure the mixture will taste great! I absolutely cannot wait to try this recipe out. Now all I need is a few people to make this for.

Here's to Miami and full bellies.
- Cait

Spotting Breakfast - Orange Vanilla Bundt Cake

Sometimes I crave something sweet for breakfast... In my house, if there's leftover cake from a birthday or occasion of some sort - it often becomes a morning treat. I don't know how that habit started, but my whole family does it and we've done it for as long as I can remember. When I found uptowngirl's bundt cake on TasteSpotting, I thought that would be perfect. Why? Because it has orange in it! Yeah, I know... Cake that is flavored with orange doesn't count as a serving of fruit, but it would be amazing WITH fruit. Orange is a wonderful flavor to go along with something like fresh strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries. So yes, orange cake with a cup of coffee or strong black tea and fresh fruit would make a nice sweet breakfast.

Photo from erinsfoodfiles

Orange Bundt Cake
via erinsfoodfiles
from Taste of Home

1 cup butter or margarine, softened
2 cup sugar
4 eggs
1 Tablespoon grated orange peel
1 teaspoon lemon extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1 cup milk

GLAZE:
2 cup powdered sugar
2 1/2 Tablespoons orange juice (I used freshly squeezed)

In a bowl, cream butter and sugar until fluffy; beat in the eggs, orange peel and extracts. Combine flour and baking powder; add to creamed mixture alternately with milk.

Pour into a greased and floured 12-cup fluted tube pan. Bake at 350° for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack to cool. For glaze, combine the confectioners' sugar and juice until smooth. Spoon over cake. Yield: 12-16 servings.


Bake up this cake and brew yourself some french press coffee or a espresso. Enjoying this outside in the morning on a sunny day would definatly be a great days beginning.

Here's to Florida and full bellies.
- Cait

Magazine Wednesday - Martha Stewart Living - Haricots Verts with Pecans and Lemon

I have a ton of food magazines, but Martha Stewart Living is one of my favorite magazines to find food inspirations and recipes. One thing I really love about Martha Stewart Living is the pull out recipe cards. It has been years since I started collecting them and I'm still going strong. Every time I get a new Martha Stewart Living magazine I read through the whole thing once, then remove the recipe cards and put them in a safe place.

I love green beans. They are one of my favorite vegetables and probably the green vegetable I serve most in my kitchen. They are simple and delicious and I'll often eat a bunch of them before I even get them to the table. Green beans are kind of like really great french fries to me. I usually cook them very simply - blanching them for a few minutes to get the "raw" taste out, a tiny bit of butter, salt, fresh cracked pepper, sometimes fresh garlic or garlic powder.

One year I used the recipe for haricots verts that I found in Martha Stewart Living and thought it was just great. It really dresses up your average green bean into something worthy of a dinner party. Plus, it's insanely pretty!

Photo from Martha Stewart Living

Haricots Verts with Pecans and Lemon
via Martha Stewart Living, October 2004
prep time: 10 mins. total time: 20 mins
serves 4

coarse salt
1 pound haricots verts or this green beans, trimmed
½ cup pecans
3 tablespoons sherry vinegar
1 teaspoon sugar
freshly ground pepper
¼ cup olive oil
1 teaspoon freshly grated lemon zest

Preheat oven to 425°. Bring a large pot of water to a boil; add salt and haricots verts. Cook beans until bright green and crisp-tender, 3 to 4 minutes; drain. Transfer to a serving dish.

Meanwhile, spread pecans in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet; toast in oven until fragrant, about 5 minutes. Coarsely chop nuts when they are cool enough to handle.

Whisk vinegar, sugar, and ¼ teaspoon salt in a small bowl; season with pepper. Whisking constantly, pour in oil in a slow, steady stream; whisk until emulsified. Just before serving, gentaly toss beans with vinaigrette and chopp nuts; sprinkle with zest. Serve warm.


The vinaigrette could easily be used on other vegetables - like asparagus - and be equally as great.

Here's to Martha and full bellies.
- Cait

Spotting Dinner - Carnitas Soft Tacos

When it comes to tacos, I love soft ones. I think they hold their stuffings much better than hard taco shells. I don't eat tacos very often, but sometimes I get a bit of a craving for them. With all the upcoming wonderful seasonal vegetables expected to show up in markets in the next few months, tacos would be a delightful treat. When I was poking around on TasteSpotting I found cookingontheside's soft tacos and knew I'd be trying this recipe out.

Photo from cookingontheside

Carnitas Soft Tacos
via cookingontheside
Adapted from the National Pork Board’s Arizona Carnitas with Green Chiles recipe on a pork shoulder package

Serves 8-10

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 1/2 pounds boneless pork shoulder, cut into bite-size pieces
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 large yellow onion, cut into thin slivers
• 1 4-oz. can diced green chiles, undrained
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• Flour or corn tortillas

Recommended Toppings:

• Shredded Cheddar cheese
• Chopped tomato
• Chopped cilantro
• Guacamole
• Sour cream

DIRECTIONS:

Heat oven to 350° F.

Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in ovenproof heavy large covered pot over high heat. Add half of the pork cubes; sprinkle with half of the salt and half of the black pepper. Cook pork until starting to brown, stirring often. Remove pork. Repeat with remaining pork cubes, salt and black pepper, adding more oil if necessary. Drain drippings from pot.

Heat remaining 1 tablespoon oil in the same pot over medium heat. Cook onion in hot oil until tender. Stir in undrained chiles and garlic; cook for 2 minutes. Return pork to pot. Add chicken broth. Cover and bake for 1 hour. Season with additional salt and pepper to taste.

Serve pork in tortillas topped with toppings.

You could definitely add some fresh hot peppers like jalapenos or habanaros depending how spicy you like things and of course salsa.

Here's to peppers and full bellies.

- Cait

Spotting Lunch - Red Lentil Soup

Sometimes I crave a good bowl of soup. Something rather new to me (my parents weren't too adventurous with foods when I was growing up) are lentils. I had lentil soups several times thus far and greatly enjoy it. When I was looking up some soup on TasteSpotting and found rhyleysgranny's soup, I was rather excited. I saw a dish with lentils cooked on Barefoot Contessa the other day, and finding another recipe for using them is going to inspire me to try cooking with lentils.

Photo from tea and wheaten bread

Red Lentil Soup
via tea and wheaten bread

Ingredients

250 gms/8 oz smoked streaky bacon
1 medium sized onion chopped
1 medium potato chopped
2 or 3 carrots chopped
2 red/orange/yellow pepper chopped (The more wrinkly they are the sweeter they are)
225g/8oz red lentils
1 teaspoon of paprika
A good pinch of cayenne pepper
A 400g/14oz can of tomatoes
900mls/1 1/2 pints approx. chicken stock (Keep some more to the side in case you find the soup too thick)
Black pepper
A little oil

Add any veggies around that need using up.


Method

Cut up the bacon and fry gently in the oil.
Add onion and spices and cook slowly until soft.
Add the carrots potatoes peppers and tomatoes then the lentils.
Give it all a good stir.
Add the stock and simmer until the lentils are nice and soft.

Using a stick blender, purée the soup.
Add more stock if you find it too thick.

It freezes well too if you are like me and incapable of making a small pot of soup.


I love how simple this recipe is - a great thing for trying a new major ingredient! One of my favorite ingredients is crème fraîche, which would be perfect to top the soup off. I'd have a simple salad and some bread with this bowl of soup to make a nice lunch.

Here's to new ingredients and full bellies.
- Cait

Spotting Breakfast - Scones with Honey and Dried Fruit

Sometimes I'm not in the mood for a full blown breakfast. That feeling really kicks in after something like a holiday weekend filled with all kinds of food goodies. I often enjoy a muffin or scone and a cup of tea or coffee instead of a whole meal, so when I saw carina's scone with honey and raisins on TasteSpotting I thought it would be the perfect addition to a morning checking e-mails or editing photographs. Not only did the scone itself look amazingly yummy, but carina's photography is breathtakingly beautiful. The only downside is that carina's website "carina-forum" isn't in english. The recipe is kind of "funny" looking because of the google translation, but it looks simple enough to mess around with to figure out.

Photo from Carina-Forum

Scones with Honey and Dried Fruit
via Carina-Forum

400 ml wheat flour
2 st.l. honey
50 g cold butter
2 st.l. orange liqueur
200 ml natural yogurt
70 g dried fruit
50 g chopped walnuts
1 ch.l. baking powder
1 ch.l. baking soda
dried peel of half an orange
1 egg
pinch of salt

preheat oven to 200 degrees C (392 degrees F)

cut dried fruit into pieces and put into orange liqueur

toast nuts in frying pan until golden

mix flour with baking powder and baking soda

cut butter into flour mixture

add orange peel, lightly beaten egg, yogurt, salt, honey and knead dough

add fruit and nuts last

sprinkle work surface with flour and roll dough to 3cm thickness

use circle cutter to cut scones

line baking pan with parchment powder, and put scones in a single layer

bake for 13-15 minutes until golden brown

slice and serve with butter or jam

* carina's notes - The amount of flour depends on the thickness of the yogurt you use. It's better to use very thick yogurt.

I'm not super sure about the tempature. I'd probably choose to round it up to 395 degrees F and make sure to keep an eye on the scones. I'm going to have to experiment with this recipe... It was disappointing to find out the website wasn't in english, but I couldn't use that as an excuse to not post about the scones.

Here's to google translations and full bellies.
- Cait

Easter Weekend

This past Sunday was Easter, so my sister was visiting from college. I had posts planned for the weekend but didn't get around to them because of the holiday. My sister went back to school today, so the rest of the week will be running smoothly. I did get a dessert post up on Saturday - Delicious Desserts - Chocolate Overdose Cake. I didn't post as much as I wanted, but I did cook a ton. So as a treat I'm going to edit my food photographs tonight and make a lovely post about what I made for Easter. We had brunch and dinner, both were great.

Here's to holidays and full bellies.
- Cait