Monthly Archives: April 2015

New, Holiday Leftover and Weird Foods Out There

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I don’t forking know if I want to eat anything that says on a forking box “you gotta try it”?

Peanut Butter and Jelly that’s Hard and Crunchy? WTFork? Is that the stuff that misses the jar and gets hard, scraped off and forking rolled into a ball and then gets sold to you kind of stuff?

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Not too bad… sort of like forking peanuts in your chocolate kind of thing but in a can.

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I’d be too frightened to eat these. Would anyone forking eat anything from anyone that looks like forking Cap’n Crunch?

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Not a bad idea. It’s like an art project that you get to eat too!

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Forking sugar cookies are in forking Pop-tarts with ink on them. WTFork.

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The pumpkin spice almonds would be great in a pie crust for pumpkin pie. So why the fork would you ever thing of just using forking regular almonds and forking adding the spice yourself?

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Just like fried onions on green bean casseroles but Jalapeño instead!

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Like the jalapeños but peppers.

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Maybe the weirdest food was this… Organic Mulberries.

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They forking look like insects to me.

I just don’t know what the fork I’ll see next!

Forking Truth

Forking Truth

Piri Piri Style Chicken Recipe

Piri Piri Style Chicken

Piri Piri Style Chicken

“REAL” Piri Piri is made with Piri Piri Peppers that are also called African Bird’s Eye Chilli(s). Most piri piri is red in color and I noticed some people actually add red food coloring to their recipes. I’ve never noticed real piri piri peppers being sold anywhere I shop and that’s why any recipe you find uses other various red peppers.

Many variations of Piri Piri are made but they all should have some sort of ground chili, lemon, oil and red bell pepper. Piri Piri is usually chicken that’s marinated in the spicy red pepper sauce with citrus.

Ingredients This will feed about 11 people If you use dark meat any leftovers will reheat very moist.

About 8 Lbs. Of Chicken (I used about 4 lbs. that were 3 whole legs and about another 4lbs. that were 8 boneless thighs) Thought I pulled out white meat but forking screwed up.

12 roasted Red Peppers seeds, skin and stem removed and then roughly chopped and the liquid released from the red peppers

7 cloves of garlic chopped

4 red Thai Chilli(s) depending on how strong they are and your spice tolerance. The 4 in mine were spicy but not too spicy I might do 5 next time.

1 Meyer Lemon – The juice and grate about 1/4 of the rhine

1/4 large sweet onion chopped

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

About an inch Fresh Ginger grated

1/2 teaspoon aleppo ground red pepper (pinch of cayenne if you don’t have aleppo, the aleppo is milder and fruitier in taste and I like it very much with red peppers)

1 teaspoon ground black pepper

1 Tablespoon + 1 teaspoon Kosher Salt

1 teaspoon Paprika

1 Tablespoon Basil

1 Tablespoon Oregano

4 Bay Leaves

Directions

Split up your chicken into two 1 gallon zip lock bags and place two whole bay leaves in each bag.

Blend up all the ingredients except the lemon rhine. After smooth add the lemon peel.

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Pour one cup of sauce/marinade into each bag. Close up bag and let sit in refrigerator over night. You will have around 24 oz. of sauce/marinade to use over the chicken dinners.

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Set oven at 350 degrees to roast. For the whole legs I lined two lightly oiled baking pans and sat some thick onions on them. Then I pulled out the chicken legs and sat them on the pan.

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The legs absorbed almost all the sauce but I did wind up with maybe a 1/4 cup and basted them in the oven a few times with the leftover marinade. These took about two hours at 350 and came out like this.

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To the boneless thighs I shook off whatever sauce stuck to them and rolled them in mung bean flour but really most of your flours would work for this. I like mung bean flour, it’s healthy and doesn’t add any weird taste or raw flour taste to what you cook. You can find mung bean flour at any Indian Market and at most Asian Markets.

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I put the boneless thighs in a medium high fry pan that was sprayed with oil and cooked them 6 minutes on the first side and 5 minutes on the second side. If yours are smaller they will need maybe a minute less.

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Put the boneless piri piri chicken together like this.

Piri Piri Style Chicken

Piri Piri Style Chicken

They came out nicely flavored and super forking  juicy.  The added sauce mellowed a little the next day but was still delicious. 2nd day you might want to adjust seasonings to the sauce slightly. The Whole legs came out super tender and ultra moist too.

Forking Good!

Forking Good!

 

Rocket Burger Phoenix AZ It’s A Forking Blast!

Rocket Burger and Subs Phoenix AZ

Rocket Burger and Subs Phoenix AZ

I’ve been here before but not in a forking while. I was reminded of Rocket Burger while watching the PBS TV Show about local eateries called Check Please Arizona. This is an extremely casual eatery where you order at the counter and seat your forking self. This place isn’t fancy so don’t forking expect to see any forking linen napkins.

Rocket burger is well known for burgers, sandwiches, beef hot dogs, sub sandwiches, soft serve ice cream and a forking wall of assorted bottled sodas. They had so many sodas I don’t know what I forking saw. The Portions are forking HUGH and the prices aren’t much more than fast food but the food your receive is FORKING much better than fast food.

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So I forking made it back to Rocket Burger and ordered my first burger and ordered the Popular New York Burger platter.

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This was forking much larger and better tasting than I was expecting. The rolls were carefully toasted and the 100% Angus Burgers were cooked a perfect medium to my liking. The pastrami on top of my burger was much tastier than most pastrami you get anywhere and was actually grilled nice and tasty. The house made coleslaw with rocket sauce was delicious. Even the fries were very good. They tasted like real potatoes!

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After a few bites I was almost forking full. At this point I lose the bun and go and get a fork. Bag up half the burger left for my dogs and pick at the rest of the filling.

My husband had a double bacon cheese burger platter. Each platter  we ordered was a double patty sandwich with a side of fries or onion rings and a bottled soda.

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He said his burger was great and we should forking come here more often.

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He got all these corn meal crusted onion rings with his burger! I would like to try the soft serve ice cream but I doubt I’ll ever have the forking room in my stomach after eating here.

We had a BLAST! at Rocket Burger!

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Forking Truth

Worth a Fork          Forking Truth

 

Forking Dinner Idea Piri Piri Chicken

Piri Piri Style Chicken

Piri Piri Style Chicken

I put this forking photo up on twitter and it got retweeted to 44,370 people. It came out forking great!  Piri Piri is basically a spicy red pepper sauce that you also use as a marinade and let sit overnight and then cook the chicken.  I served mine with my new favorite grain freekah and roasted vegetables. I’ll post the forking  recipe this week.

Forking Good!

Forking Truth

 

More Food that Wasn’t Worth a FORK in San Diego California

Sabortooth Grill San Diego Zoo

Sabortooth Grill San Diego Zoo

I didn’t plan my day well and was on this end of the zoo at lunch time. We waited in the forking long line for quite a while for sandwiches that forking took me back to the days of disco, polyester and days of eating processed food. Yum yum what to get? Do I want leftover fried, now cold, chicken in a big wrap with forking mystery sauce or a boxed very uninteresting salad. For some odd reason the grilled chicken sandwich with some guacamole sounded good to me so that’s what I ordered. Sadly the chicken sandwich didn’t live up to my only average dreams. This chicken sandwich tasted like an On Cor frozen processed chicken patty but worst. It  seemed like a large dump truck forking unloaded a pile of salt on it. I thought I was forking going to get sick. The onion rings were very crispy and reminded me of Burger King. The slime like guacamole reminded me of pond scum and actually might have been forking pond scum. I thought the house made pear ketchup sounded good but sadly it just tasted like watered down generic ketchup. Nothing on my plate was worth a fork.

My husband just had a mediocre cheese burger. He said it was cheap cheese on dry chewy burgers but it was what he expected.

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Not Worth a Fork

Not Worth a Fork

In Old Town San Diego were all the tourist shops are many mostly Mexican Restaurants.

Grilled Salmon Tacos from Barra Barra Saloon San Diego

Grilled Salmon Tacos from Barra Barra Saloon San Diego

This one restaurant had a nicer menu than most of the others and looked more inviting so we stopped there. I read that they forking make all their own tortillas. That sounds good right! We had some service issues here and would up waiting for our order for an hour at lunch time making us feel like prisoners in jail. We recieved several forking apologies from our waiter. My tacos really weren’t forking terrible, they really were just ok. The waiter told me they usually use forking pre-cooked salmon and ran out and had to cook some for me so the tacos were ok.  However  the corn salad and beans were forking gross. The corn in my corn salad were soggy with the forking centers of the corn missing. I don’t know if that is from being overcooked or old? All I know is that they were forking not fit for prisoners. I don’t know how they flavored the vegetarian beans but they tasted like dirt maybe it was forking dirt?

My husband thought his plate of food wasn’t worth a fork either. He had some sort of combo plate. He said, the sausage was burnt, the chicken was dry and the pork was flavorless. He did say the beef was good. Well at least something was good.

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Not Worth a Fork

Not Worth a Fork

I heard about the most anticipated new restaurant opening and it was a Seafood House so we forking went there. It was a beautiful restaurant that was new but looked very old fashioned. The help seemed very polished. We decided to share an appetizer of butternut squash tortellini.

Water Grill San Diego California

Butternut Squash Tortellini Water Grill San Diego California

The waiter warns us about the forking hot plate. We each take a tortellini. We bite into them and we forking look at each other for a moment. We both have forking ice cold, I mean really cold tortellini in our mouths. WTFork! Did the cook just pull out cold tortellini from the refrigerator? Who the fork does that?

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This is Forked Up!

This is Forked Up!

Our dinner had some issues and I wanted to forget about this dinner that should have been our best in San Diego so we forking ordered dessert.

Water Grill San Diego CA

Water Grill San Diego CA

I didn’t think the dessert looked bad but it forking tasted burnt!

BURNT!

BURNT!

FORKING BURNT!

We only tasted BURNT!

Not Worth a Fork

Not Worth a Fork

These were the plates that weren’t worth a FORK in San Diego.

Forking Truth

Forking Truth

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My Most Disappointing Forking Meal I had In San Diego CA

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These Tortellini look pretty nice! Don’t They?

But it seemed like someone just pulled them out of the forking refrigerator, dressed them up a little and threw them on a heated plate hoping we’d just forking eat them that way.

This is Forked Up!

This is Forked Up!

It’s really very odd that someone did this…

We said something to our waiter and before we knew it the manager was over and apologized profusely. The manager took the tortellini off our check and asked us if we’d take a properly made plate of butternut squash tortellini.

A long time passes by and we are wondering what was happening. Eventually a plate of hot butternut squash tortellini’s have arrived. They are delicious but slightly spicy. They have a creamy butternut sauce that is cut with fresh crisp apples and some fried sage.

Soon our pink sea bream arrives.

Water Grill San Diego CA

Water Grill San Diego CA

The fish looks sort of nice with fresh herbs and a cooked lemon.

But it’s slightly overcooked and slightly dried out like it’s been sitting awhile. It’s sort of like fish off a buffet and not that moist perfect fish your hoping for from a fish house.

I said it was forking ok to the waiter because it was ok just not great.

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OK so I was expecting an excellent fish dish since this is a fish place and was sort of disappointed and thought I needed dessert to cheer me up and forget about the disappointment.

We decided to share a Pear Tart Tatin.

Water Grill San Diego CA

Water Grill San Diego CA

The ice-cream was suppose to be caraway flavored but neither of us could taste caraway. Everything under the ice-cream just tasted burnt. I don’t really know if it was just a burnt sauce or a burnt cake and sauce. Neither of us could saw threw the cake with our forks because the tart tatin was hard like a rock. This dessert was awful and I told the waiter that it was hard to eat. He said well you can order something else next time.

I don’t know who they have working there in the kitchen? Was it these guys?

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Or it was these guys?

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Not Worth a Fork

Not Worth a Fork

Forking Truth

Forking Truth

I note this may not be typical of this restaurant but if you happen to give them a try I’d recommend the raw shellfish.

Food that was Worth a FORK in San Diego California

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No one would ever guess that a FORKING airport restaurant could ever be on a better food list. The Pasifica Breeze Cafe at the San Diego Airport (Pre-Security Floor 1 Terminal 1) Prepares non-typical airport cuisine. Nothing we had was dry, old or flat. Everything we tried was fresh made and forking tasty!

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I had a sugar spiced salmon salad with fresh mixed greens napa cabbage and other vegetables with a house made sesame peanut vinaigrette. It actually was surprisingly delicious and tasty. This was an above average preparation of salmon and everything about the salad was fresh and tasty.

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My husband’s burger with yam chips was also great!

We enjoyed many plates from Juniper & Ivy. The Chef at J&I is the celebrity Chef Richard Blais. He is Bravo’s Winner of Top Chef All Stars and is known for his innovative classic American Cuisine.

We started out with fun deviled eggs with whipped crispy whites.

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Trout that tasted like a pastrami on rye,

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But the most delicious plate was the forking carrots.

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These carrots were almond wood grilled,topped with pickled apricot puree, jalapeño chimicurri and grilled peanut oil and I think almonds? These were really amazing and far forking better than I make them sound.

Banker’s Hill made a really awesome Happy Hour Beet Salad.

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The spiced herb creamy dressing went really well with the greens and beets but the sweet citrus really made the salad pop and it did’t hurt to add a yummy toasted buttery cheesey bread treat to the plate.

Nearby in La Jolla at Nine-Ten I had house cured and smoked salad that was topped with a very detailed salad.

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At Cucina Urbano I enjoyed a whole roasted pink bream over studded couscous.

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We also had this really great dessert that I will have to try to create someday.

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This was really delicious and worth the calories. Dense in a forking good way (rich and moist) cake filled with something like cannoli filling that sits on a thin buttery thin cookie base and is topped with a very thin pine-nut brittle thats savory with salt and pepper. Fresh blackberries, blackberry sauce and blackberry sorbet complete the dish.

I had other dishes that were good but these were the highlights of the forking better food I had in San Diego.

Forking Truth

Forking Truth

 

Forking EZ BAKED Carrot Chips

 

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These carrots come out crispy, sweet and salty and are great to top a salad, an entree or just to snack on.

This recipe is what I remembered reading from “Tasting Table.com” and is called Root Vegetable Chips. The Chef that came up with this recipe saves the pealed skins from all root vegetables that are pealed in her restaurant and turns them into the “chips” to garnish plates.

I only tried this recipe with carrots so far.

The recipe is very easy to do but I think it will vary depending on the vegetable you use and your peeler. I liked the way the carrots came out, extremely crisp.

Set your oven to 225 to bake.

Put 6 cups of water and 2 cups of sugar on medium high heat.

Using a vegetable peeler peel as many carrots as you like. (I peeled 6 large carrots)

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When the pot boils add the carrot peels and let boil 1-2 minutes.

Remove the peels from the boiling liquid and dry them on a towel.

Spread the peels out on a silicone mat lined pan and sprinkle with salt. (I used a parchment lined pan and that worked well for carrots) I don’t think salt will stick to the carrots if you forking wait to salt them at the end because of how crisp they get. The salt might just fall off.

Bake around 2 hours at 225 degrees (my batch was perfect in 2 1/2 hours)

Serving Suggestion

Serving Suggestion

Forking Good!

Forking Good!

 

 

More WEIRD, Different and Limited Edition Foods I saw at the Markets

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Buffalo Wing and Blue Cheese Potato Chips and forking Bacon Cheeseburger Sliders.

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Vlasic Dill Pickle Potato Chips.

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Slow Cooked Rib Flavored Potato Chips.

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I think these are Green Tea Kit Kats but I can’t say for sure since I can’t read Asian. For all I know they could be forking green frog flavored.

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Spaghettis that aren’t “O” shaped and are FISHY now.

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Hershey’s Chocolate Flavored Twizzlers.

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Since when are forking Rice Krispies not Rice Krispies anymore? These sure don’t forking go Snap, Crackle and Pop!

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Sriracha Grinders

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Sprinkled Donut Crunch

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Fruit Loops Bloopers. I think that really forking means Fruit Loop Rejects.

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Cinnamon Sugar Pretzel Poppers. I don’t know why the fork they are called poppers. They look like forking straws to me.

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Bacon Cheeseburger sandwich crackers

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Sausage on a stick wrapped with forking blueberry pancakes

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I just don’t know what I’ll forking see next!

Forking Truth

Forking Truth

 

 

 

 

 

A Different way to prepare Home Fries (America’s Test Kitchen Style)

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I was forking watching Rachel Ray and Chef Sara Molton was preparing home fries inspired by an American’s Test Kitchen Recipe. I found MANY variations of this recipe on the web.

I do have to say these home fries came out really delicious with a deeper potato flavor because  boiling with baking soda breaks down the surface of the potato and condenses the potato flavor. The surface is suppose to crisp up extra too. Mine came out fluffy and a little crispy but with delicious flavors. These home fries FORKING have the most delicious potato flavor.

I cleaned up some potatoes (about 1 1/2 lbs.) and chopped some onions. (less than 1/2 of a BIG sweet onion)

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Drained the potatoes and added them to a pot of boiling water that had about a Tablespoon of kosher salt in it and a teaspoon of baking soda.

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I let it boil ONLY ONE MINUTE.

Drained the potatoes and added a couple tablespoons of butter, the chopped onions, about 1/2 teaspoon of cayenne pepper and the drained potatoes back to the pot and let them absorb for about a minute.

My oven was set at 500 degrees and I had a pan in there getting hot.

I then added the contents of the pot to the heated baking sheet. (don’t forking make fun of me for using this forking pan) For the best results a heavy pan that holds heat will work best. The potato mixture was sprinkled with canola oil.

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For me these took about a half hour turning the potatoes a few times.

Then I wound up with this after I sprinkled them with scallions.

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This recipe was inspired by America’s Test Kitchen and was shown on the Rachel Ray TV Show prepared by Chef Sara Molton. I prepared just from memory from watching the show. On TV the potatoes came out with a little more crust.(maybe mine would have too if I just used a forking better pan)

The proportions, ingredients  and instructions may have differed some. But these sure did come out forking good!

Forking Good!

Forking Good!