Red Bell Peppers even OLD ones are versatile.  I always forking stock up on red bell peppers when they are for sale at a great price.

I cut some up, cook them up and freeze them and a roast up a bunch and freeze roasted red bell peppers. I find that when the pepper is old and wrinkled they roast up more even with the easiest to peel off skins and the pepper gets a better roast. It’s sort of the same reasoning on why the best fried chicken is the kind that sits uncovered in the refrigerator for maybe three days and the skin dries out.

After the peppers are roasted (actually broiled all around) The skins come right off and I use the roasted red peppers in a variety of ways.

Muhammara

Muhammara – basically a roasted red pepper dip traditionally made from roasted red peppers, walnuts, spices, pomegranate and thickened with bread. (I made mine with forking almonds and didn’t add the bread)

Roasted Red Pepper hot paste

Timbale

A layer in the Timbale

Hot Sauce

The backbone in red hot sauce.

Spaghetti Squash with Harissa Vinaigrette

Harissa – roasted peppers, tomatoes, lemon and spices

Romanesco Cauliflower with Romesco Sauce

Romesco sauce – roasted red peppers, garlic, almonds, hazelnuts and most people add bread.

With Dinner

Roasted red bell peppers are great with many dinners, a layer in a sandwich, and also stuffed with breakfast fillings.

Piri Piri Style Chicken

Piri Piri Style Chicken is marinated in a spicy pepper sauce.

Piri Piri Style Chicken with piri piri style sauce

Piri Piri is usually  a spicy red pepper sauce with garlic herbs and citrus.

. Red Pesto

Red Pesto – Roasted red peppers, fresh basil, pine nuts, garlic, EVOO and Sardinian Cheese (Fiore  Sardo).

A Red Pistou might be – Roasted red peppers, basil garlic EVOO

Red Bell Peppers even OLD ones are forking Versatile and Delicious!

Forking Truth

I didn’t forking know that people pickle kale stems until I watched Celebrity Chef Richard Blais at the Chipotle Cultivate Festival in Scottsdale AZ. He mentioned that Chefs do things like pickle kale stems.

Chef Richard Blais in Scottsdale AZ Chipotle Cultivate Festival

Richard Blais specializes in innovative American Cuisine. He made a forking oyster po boy sandwich with not real oysters but used chicken oysters and he also made boudin sausage but not with regular casing he used a forking squid and stuffed that. So while he was forking chatting about Star Wars he gave a helpful hint and suggested to use the stems from kale and make pickles out of them so I thought I’d give it a try. I got this forking wild idea that ginger lemon mint pickles would taste good. Honestly it did taste good on the carrot sticks. But that’s about it so I’m not pushing pickling kale stems. I did boil them a couple minutes as Chef Blais suggested before pickling but I don’t think they are worth it because the kale stems came out just like celery. After boiling the stems they still had that stringy thing like celery. You can peal celery but you can’t peal a kale stem so I forking prefer celery to kale stems. I only liked the way the carrots came out. I sure Chef Blais did kale stems FORKING better or just had forking better kale stems.

I’m not going to forking pickle kale stems again.

Forking Truth

Over the past few years I got suckered into trying a few of the Food Network Cupcake War’s Winner’s Cupcakes in various places I’ve been. When I come across one I can’t help it I just want to know what a winning cupcake is like.

Oddly none of them looked or tasted like what I was expecting. Instead of something sweet, natural tasting with a normal cake-like texture, I got almost a forking wet and spongy texture with a artificial like flavor…just like from a forking boxed mix.

I don’t eat cupcakes too often but I did eat quite a few during my childhood. Back then you ate many of them from classmates birthdays and also every neighborhood had a bakery with cupcakes and if you were lucky you got to eat a few. The cupcakes also usually had fun little ornaments on top of them. Like a fun cat head, heart, football, turkey or a little flag. Usually they were always vanilla flavored but always tasted like a moist birthday cake to me. I don’t mind other flavors and I can get by without the cupcake ornament. I just can’t stand that fake texture spongy wet sponge texture that sucks out all the joy in my mouth and pollutes my childhood memory. These days the cupcakes are extra large too with a mountain of frosting. I just wished these cupcakes tasted better. This last one I tasted was unnatural tasting and made my heart sink and also makes me wonder how the fork could I have chewed this mass of yuck up.  I can’t help to wonder how the fork this can this be a winning cupcake?. The icing wasn’t even sweet and just seem like forking whipped fat with a disappointing amount of chocolate in it to me.

That doesn’t mean all the forking cupcakes in the world suck. Just the ones I tried over the past few years.

Cupcakes really Forking Suck to me now.

Forking Truth