Greek Tacos

One of the few prime-time Food Network shows
that I will actually watch is the Food Network Star.
Up until this past season,
it had been called the Next Food Network Star.

Why the name change?
Who knows.
But then again,
many of the decisions of the powers that be (TPTB)
don't seem to make much sense at  the Food Network
these days.

The winner of this year's the Food Network Star
is Jeff Mauro, the self titled Sandwich King.

He claims that he can make any meal into a sandwich
and any sandwich into a meal.
His prize for winning the competition was a
show that would last six episodes.

Jeff proudly put forth his six episodes of
"Sandwich King".

I do believe that FN was happy enough with him
that they renewed the show.

And now let's look at the food.

One of the recipes Jeff presented was his version of a gyro.

Since it is not truly a gyro, made in the traditional method,

Jeff called it Greek Taco!

Here are the ingredients,

with my substitutions noted.

Lamb:*

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 pound ground lamb

kosher salt and ground black pepper

1/4 red onion, minced

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

2 cloves garlic, grated

1/2 tablespoon tomato paste**

1 tablespoon dry red wine

*I halved this part of the recipe

**I used 1/2 tablespoon minced sun-dried tomatoes instead.

Feta Mint Tzatziki:

1/2 cucumber, peeled, seeded and diced

salt

1 cup whole-milk Greek yogurt

1/2 cup feta cheese

1 clove garlic, grated

2 tablespoons minced fresh mint

Cucumber Tomato Relish:

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

2 firm tomatoes, seeded and diced

1/2 cucumber, peeled, seeded and diced

1/4 red onion, diced

freshly ground black pepper

The Bread:

4 non-pocket pitas, oiled and lightly grilled on one side

Brown the lamb in oil over medium-high heat.

Sprinkle with salt and pepper and cook until the lamb

gets golden brown.

Lamb is very fatty,

so I drained the fat off so that the meat 

would actually brown instead of simply steam.
For this pound of meat I drained off 1/2 cup of fat.

While the lamb was cooking,

I made the cucumber tomato relish.

Mix together and set aside.

I also made the Tzatziki sauce

and put that in the fridge to let the flavors meld.

After the meat was nicely browned

I removed the meat from the pan and set it aside.

The recipe called for the onions to be sauteed 

in the lamb juices, 

but lamb fat is rather strongly flavored,

so I discarded that and used olive oil instead.

Once the onions had softened,

I added the oregano and garlic and cooked that for 

another minute.

Then I tossed in the minced sun-dried tomatoes

before pouring in the red wine.

Add back in the meat and stir together.

The meat mixture is now ready.

Spread the tzatziki sauce on the warmed pita 

before adding the other sandwich components.

Eat and enjoy.

We decided that we didn't care for the feta in the tzatziki,

but other than that,

this recipe is a keeper.

The flavor profile is very close to a gyro.

But this is a gyro you can make at home.

What Would Brian Boitano Make?

Well, Brian Boitano would make Coq au Vin-guine, but as I am famously allergic to chicken, I am making Dinde au Vin-guine per his recipe from his Food Network show. Hint, dinde is turkey in french.

I went to Wally World (WalMart) today and, thus had to make a couple of substitutions. I subbed pearl onions for the cipollini onions and bacon for the pancetta. Sigh, guess that's what I get for slumming it.

I also have:

linguine

olive oil

salt

black pepper

merlot wine

crimini mushrooms

flour

flat leaf parsley

tomato paste

garlic cloves

thyme

butter

turkey cutlets (on sale!)

I cut the turkey cutlets to bite size pieces.

Before lightly coating them in seasoned flour.

This was set aside in the refrigerator until needed.

Then I brushed clean the crimini mushrooms and sliced about half of them for the dish. The Foodie Daughter does not like mushrooms, so I opted to leave the rest for another meal.

And then it was time to get emotional. The package directed me to drop the onions in boiling water for a couple of minutes before rinsing under cold water. Honestly, I found it just as easy to simply peel the things as is. However, nothing stopped the tears. It got so bad that I couldn't see what I was doing. Tears were streaming down my cheeks and I was in pain. I was beginning to wonder if this dish was worth all this misery.

All right, fast forward a bit. The bacon has been cooked and drained and now the onions are cooking. The cat was busy being cute, so the Foodie Daughter had absconded with my camera for a while.

Then the mushrooms and the turkey were browned.

The garlic and tomato paste were cooked for a couple of minutes before the wine was added to the pan. This was allowed to reduce for a few minutes before the rest of the ingredients were added back in.

Finally the Dinde au Vin-guine was plated and presented to the hungry family.

The verdict?

This goes into the recipe rotation, but I will definitely be halving the recipe as it makes a lot of food.

Labor Day Weekend in Bloomington

This is always a special weekend in Bloomington. The students are back in town and Bloomington celebrates by hosting a nationally noted arts festival. I make sure to clear my calendar for this festival every year.

I was a bit sluggish this morning and didn't arrive until after 10:30 am. Things are already hopping.

A band is playing along one side street. Hm, that's an interesting place to put the port-o-lets.

Yep, definitely glad that I got here early.

I decided that since I was already going to be downtown, I would finally finish out my Asian culinary tour by eating at an Indian restaurant. I had earlier chosen the Bombay House Restaurant on 4th Street.



They had a menu posted outside the door, but for lunch they ran a lunch buffet. Well, why not? Let's be adventurous. And it's all you can eat for $5.99.

I found that the only meat on the menu was chicken, so I opted to go vegetarian for my lunch. Now, I knew better than to expect beef on the menu, but I had been hoping for some lamb. But that's okay. I can do vegetarian. And, hey, many in the population in India are vegetarians, so it's gotta be good, right?

I chose: curried potatoes
butter naan
garlic naan
chick peas masala
fried potato slices
green salad
chick pea salad
veggie biryani

These were all very good. For dessert I had a vermicelli dessert, which as far as I could tell was short pieces of cooked pasta in a sweet cream sauce. This was a nice finish to a somewhat spicy meal. The biryani was by far the spiciest thing I had picked out, but was child's play compared to some of the Thai food I have eaten in the past.

Now, would I go back? Based on this meal, perhaps not, but then again, India is a large country and this was but a small buffet.





Like many of the restaurants on 4th Street, this place was once a private home.

I would say that we were sitting in what was once the front parlor.

And now we fast forward a day. A favorite new show of mine on Food Network is "What Would Brian Boitano Make?" Based on the recent decline in the quality of the programming on this network, I, like many others, expected a glorified train wreck. Imagine my great surprise and delight to find instead an intelligent and entertaining program. Bravo, Brian.

One of his recent shows centered around bacon, and given that bacon is one of the Foodie Daughter's favorite and most important food groups, I knew I HAD to make at least one of these recipes. I chose to make the Bacon Cups with Sweet Potato Hash the first time out. Surprisingly enough, I pretty much followed the recipe, except that I only made ten pancetta cups and I used only two celery stalks. Of course, I had extra hash left over, but I have plans for that, so no worries on that front.

See, just a bit of hash left over. I think that will be a nice side dish for dinner.

They turned out rather well, don't you think?

Meanwhile, I had put the Foodie Daughter and her boyfriend to work on the BBQ Bacon Krab Bites.

We decided, quite by accident, that a bit of the barbecue sauce with the Bacon Cups with Sweet Potato Hash was pretty good eats.

Oh, and the only thing spoiling our appetites? Sandra Lee* and her "Money Saving Meals". I'm still not sure how it saves money if no one will actually eat the food. Isn't that "Money Wasting Meals"?

*Click on the picture for the full effect.

And now you see the down side to having your daughter being the manager to her old high school's football team. Too bad they haven't invented smell-ernet. You'll just have to believe me when I tell you that the "aroma" from dozens of sweaty teenage boys wafts throughout the entire house. *Gack* *Cough* *Choke* *Gasp* *Errk.....*

Gratin, Grazie

I was very happy to find a package of Turkey breast tenderloins at my local grocery store the other day. Unfortunately for me, though turkey cuts are becoming more common at the grocery store, the cuts available in the stores vary from week to week and sometimes I find that no turkey is to be found at all. Sometimes it sucks to be me.

At least this time I was able to find a different cut of turkey and I even had a dish in mind.

A couple of weeks ago my local Sam's Club was giving out samples of their jarred pesto. Now I am a sucker for pesto and as my basil has suffered along with my tomato plants in the unseasonably cool and rainy weather this summer, I knew I wasn't going have enough basil to make my own pesto. I did check out the ingredient list on the jar and I was pleasantly surprised to find that the ingredients were all natural, with no preservatives or hard-to-pronounce things lurking inside. Okay, I could get this with no guilt involved.

I also have sliced mozzarella cheese and sliced ham.

I cut down the center of one of the tenderloins until I was about 1/2-inch from the bottom edge.

Plastic wrap covered the tenderloin and I proceeded to gently pound the meat down to a 1/4-inch thickness.

Mission accomplished.



Though not necessary, I opted to remove the vein from the center of the tenderloin. Just slide the knife underneath the vein and then slide it along the length of the vein until it has released from the meat.




The pesto has been spread evenly on the turkey.

Then some slices of ham go on top of that.

And finally some mozzarella cheese goes on top of that. Then, beginning on one long side, tightly roll the entire thing into a neat roulade.

Lay this seam-side down.

This went back into the refrigerator for several hours. Remember, there is little need to secure the roulade with bands or toothpicks or twine if the meat has had a chance to rest in the fridge for some time before it cooks.

Heat a tablespoon of extra-virgin olive oil in an oven-safe pan on the stove. Salt and pepper each side of the turkey roulade and sear over medium-high heat. Place in oven for about 20 minutes to continue cooking or until internal temperature reaches 150 degrees. Cover with foil and allow to rest for 10 minutes.

And now it's time to move on to one of the side dishes for tonight's dinner. This is a dish that Melissa D'Arabian demonstrated in her The Next Food Network Star pilot episode. The thing that I really like about this recipe is that I can make each person's gratin to their personal tastes. For instance, the Foodie daughter only likes mozzarella cheese and my husband doesn't like rosemary. Uh-oh, if you clicked on the link above, you've already noticed that I've changed the recipe. Was there ever any doubt?

At any rate, the mise en place consists of:

heavy cream

grated mozzarella cheese

grated English white cheddar cheese

red-skinned potatoes

fresh chopped rosemary

fresh chopped chives

black pepper

sea salt

After spraying the muffin tins with non-stick cooking spray, I began layering the cups with potatoes that had been sliced with a mandolin.

Chopped chives were next.

Then cheese. The layers were repeated until the cups were filled.

A splash of heavy cream and some black pepper and salt on each cup finishes off the dish. The oven was preheated to 375 degrees. Following recipe directions, the muffin tins were covered with foil for the first half of the cooking process and then the foil was removed. After 40 minutes the potato gratin cups were removed. Or, if you are like me and forget to cover the muffin tins with foil at the beginning, you can cover them at the end and call it even. Whatever. Hey, it's not rocket science.

Run a table knife around the edge of the cups and carefully invert on a plate.

While I worked on the meat and the potatoes, my husband took care of the peas. He was more than happy to oblige as I am apt to overcook peas. Go figure.

The potatoes were good. I happen to love rosemary with my potatoes, and I got to have rosemary with my potatoes without bothering anyone else with my 'weird' tastes.

And this turkey is just too good for words. Moist, succulent, flavorful. The pesto gives a good punch to this mild-tasting meat.

As it was, I got resounding accolades for this dinner. Sometimes it pays to play loose with the rules.

As Seen on Food Network

My faithful readers will recall that while I don’t necessarily have an aversion to eating at chain restaurants, I do prefer to frequent the independent restaurateurs. This is especially true when we are traveling.

This does, however, create its own set of problems. Will the quaint diner in the small town on route to our destination deliver an inspired meal or will we be ordering a side of gastric indigestion? Are we walking into a cheerful restaurant filled with delightful and friendly characters or a grease pit populated with angry naked mimes ? In short, just choosing a diner at random is a form of culinary roulette. Sadly, this dilemma is exactly why the ubiquitous fast food chains are so very successful. Like it or not, they promise consistency in the food, even if that means that the food is not going to be all that good or memorable. An interesting tidbit of information is that Duncan Hines of cake mix fame first made a name for himself by writing a book that recommended good places to eat for the wary traveler. Duncan Hines was a salesman who was apparently tired of stumbling into greasy spoon diners and began to take notes of the good places on the road to eat. Some time later he got the idea that others would appreciate his list and published the book Adventures in Good Eating.*

*The Foodie daughter requested that I expand upon the section about Duncan Hines.

Today we have the Internet and can research places to eat along the way and once we reach our destination. Restaurant reviews can help to guide the traveler to the best places to eat in a given location. Yes, this is a bit of work, but the results can be outstanding.

Case in point: my husband and I were traveling to Lexington, Kentucky for the annual Indiana Scottish Rite Council of Deliberation. While we could have made the three hour trip without stopping, I knew that this was finally the chance to try out a restaurant in Louisville, Kentucky that I had first heard about on the Food Network show Throwdown! with Bobby Flay. Bobby Flay had shown up to challenge Lynn’s Paradise Café owner Lynn Winter to a breakfast throwdown. Happily, Lynn rose to the challenge and won handily.

To my great surprise, I found that I had no trouble at all in convincing my husband to stop there for lunch on our way to Lexington. At that point all that was left to do was to print out a map from the Internet and plot our course there.

Lynn’s Paradise Café was everything and more that the Food Network had promised. From the moment we saw the colorful building and the full parking lot, we knew this was a place to be. A sign at the rear of the parking lot directed us to another lot down the alley. On our way we passed an empty lot with several signs warning that only their customers could park there and promising that all others would be towed. After parking in the correct lot we walked through the sweltering heat to get a taste of the food that was good enough to beat an Iron Chef.

Owner Lynn misses no opportunity to interject fun and color in and on the building.


Even the parking lot is decorated.


The entire front section of the building was dedicated to selling merchandise, most of it as quirky and eclectic as the restaurant looked to be. Everything from wacky hats to toys to gag gifts filled the area.

Did I mention eclectic? Lynn’s Paradise Café is all that and more. In fact, this place enthusiastically embraces eclecticism and takes it to a whole new level. An odd assortment of thrift store lamps grace nearly every table, with one even hanging upside down over a table like a pendant light.

Two large dead trees stand in the center of the space with colorful kites suspended in the limbs of one, while faux foliage winds among the branches of the other. Color, bright and seemingly chosen at random, is everywhere. Crossed mannequin legs, attired in various slacks, protrude from the wall above the windows and figures of animals pop up in the strangest places in the restaurant.

Surprisingly, given how busy the place was on a Thursday afternoon, we were able to be seated immediately, though our table was in the back corner near the restrooms. I’m afraid that my dear husband had to sit in the seat that afforded little view so that I could have the better seat. But such is the life of a blogger’s spouse.

Lynn invites guests to place a dot on the large map to show their hometown.

Well, my husband did get to watch people go in and out of the restrooms. Lucky him.

What a busy place!

The waitress arrived and took our orders for drinks: unsweet tea with a lemon on the side for me and a sweet tea for my husband, before leaving us to peruse the menu. The very first item on the “Breakfast and Lunch Specials” menu was one of the winning dishes from the Throwdown. Of course I had to have that. My husband also ordered the dish, though he later decided that perhaps he should have ordered a different dish so that we could have shared and compared.

After waiting a bit, watching the other diners and attempting to make some sense out of what is by its very nature nonsensical, our food arrived. The Bourbon Ball French Toast consisted of thick slices of cinnamon swirl bread, dipped in a vanilla nutmeg batter. That was grilled and topped with homemade bourbon vanilla custard, chocolate syrup, fresh strawberries, sugar spiced pecans and freshly whipped cream.

On second thought, we really should have only ordered one dish for the both of us. Each serving could have fed a small village. Oh my, no wonder this dish sent Bobby Flay packing back to New York City. This is heaven on a plate.

After eating all that we could, and believe me, we both tried, we paid our bill and left. We later realized that we had left a bit of ourselves behind as my husband left his IU ball cap at the restaurant.

Sadly, though I looked, I didn’t catch sight of the elusive owner while we were there. I was really hoping to meet this interesting woman. Perhaps we will return one day and try the other dish that beat an Iron Chef’s best dish.