Posted on

Southwestern Eggs Benny with Tomatillo Sauce

It’s the holiday weekend, so it’s time to cook.

in anticipation of the weekend, I spent some time reviewing my collection of cookbooks to get some ideas. I came across a great idea for Green Chile Eggs Benny in The Essential Southwest Cookbook (available at Amazon.com https://tinyurl.com/y4r3tdeb).

My Sweetie has a sensitive stomach, so I revised the recipe to make it less spicy. It looked and tasted great.

The original recipe calls for English muffins as a base for the Eggs Benny. I decided to mix it up a bit and use sourdough biscuits instead. We also added some homemade tomatillo sauce, which brings a robust smoky flavor to the meal.

We started off our weekend with a Southwestern breakfast for dinner. Try it, you’ll like it.

Southwestern Eggs Benny with Tomatillo Sauce

  • 2 cups cooked black beans, rinsed
  • 2 cups sweet corn
  • 3 green onions, sliced (white and green parts)
  • 2 Roma tomatoes, diced
  • juice of one lime
  • kosher salt
  • freshly ground pepper
  • 1 cup Mexican crema
  • 1 roasted Hatch chile, peeled, seeded, and diced
  • zest of one lime
  • 1 teaspoon chile powder
  • 8 poached eggs
  • cotija cheese, crumbled
  • tomatillo sauce

Combine the black beans, corn, green onions, tomatoes, and lime juice in a medium saucepan. Heat the mixture over medium heat until the beans and corn are heated through. Reduce the heat to low, and keep the mixture warm. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the crema, the diced chile, lime zest, and chile powder. Season with salt and pepper.

Poach the eggs.

Split four English muffins or biscuits and set them on your serving plates. Spoon the bean and corn mixture onto each half of bread. Gently place a poached egg on each half. Spoon tomatillo sauce and crema onto each egg. Top with cotija cheese.

Learn how to make tomatillo sauce here: https://legalchow.com/tomatillo-sauce/.

Posted on

Grandparents Birthday Party

Photo by James Besser on Unsplash

When my mother passed away in November, I simultaneously became a 59 ½-year-old orphan and the oldest living member of my immediate family. It is sobering to think of my ongoing responsibilities to extended family members in this dual role.

I am the oldest of five siblings. My brother and I are the bookends of the brood, with 12 years and three sisters in between us. I call him my “favorite” brother; he (lovingly) refers to me as his “only” brother.

My father passed away before my brother’s two teenage sons were born, so they will know their grandfather only if we teach them about him. And they need to know the great heritage that he left them.

My father is the finest man I have ever known. He was kind, hard-working, and trustworthy. He behaved the same way in public as he did at home. I never saw him say or do anything inappropriate, nor did he ever raise his voice in anger. If I can be half as good a man as he was, my life will be a success.

And my mother was his equal. She was a writer, a poet, and a teacher, whose passion for perfection led her on a life-long quest for learning. But most of all, she had an unlimited capacity to love. If Mom decided that you were worth loving (and very few people were not worthy in her estimation), she would love your fervently and unceasingly.

My four siblings live within 15 minutes of our home. Nearly all of our children live within a stone’s throw as well, which means that we have regular opportunities to get together for extended family celebrations.

So we gathered together recently to celebrate my father’s (July 7) and mother’s (August 15) birthdays. We had 34 adults (my parents’ children and grandchildren) and 12 children (their great-grandchildren) present; we missed those who were not able to attend because of illness or distance.

And food! We had lots of food. I smoked nine racks of St. Louis style pork ribs, which we slathered with homemade cherry barbecue sauce. We made mac and cheese and served it with cornbread. Everyone else brought food to match our BBQ theme.

The only thing better than eating good food is eating good food with people you love. We laughed, loved, and ate until we could eat no more.

We may have started a new family tradition.

Smoked Pork Ribs

  • St. Louis style pork ribs
  • ½ cup brown sugar
  • ¼ cup kosher salt
  • ¼ cup ground black pepper
  • 2 tablespoons smoked paprika
  • Tart cherry juice

Remove the ribs from the refrigerator about one hour before you begin cooking so that they can come to room temperature. Heat your smoker to 250*.

Mix the brown sugar, salt, pepper, and paprika thoroughly. Pat the ribs dry with a paper towel. Remove the membrane on the bone side of the ribs. You may need to use pliers to get a grip on the membrane.

Season both sides of the ribs with liberal amounts of the rub. Put the ribs upright in a rib rack. Place the ribs into the smoker.

The ribs need to smoke about 5 to 6 hours. Check the ribs hourly to monitor their progress. Spray the ribs with tart cherry juice each hour to keep them moist and to infuse them with flavor. The ribs are done when they are dark brown and crusty, with the meat pulling back a bit from the tips of the bones.

Cherry BBQ Sauce

(Adapted from Steven Raichlen’s Best Ribs Ever)

  • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1 medium onion, chopped
  • 2 cups fresh or frozen sour cherries
  • 1 ½ cups tart cherry juice
  • ½ cup ketchup
  • ½ cup cider vinegar
  • ½ cup brown sugar
  • 2 tablespoons honey
  • ¼ cup cherry preserves
  • 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
  • Kosher salt and  ground pepper to taste

Melt the butter in a heavy saucepan over medium heat. Add the onions, and cook until they are translucent. Add the cherries and cook until the mixture is soft.

Add the cherry juice, and increase the heat to high. Let the mixture simmer until the liquid is reduced almost by half.

Reduce the heat to medium. Add the remaining ingredients. Let the sauce simmer for about 6 minutes.

Remove the pan from the heat and let the sauce cool. Puree in a blender. Taste the sauce, and add additional salt and pepper if needed. Makes about 3 cups.

Posted on

Carrot Cake Bites

 

As a boy, I thought my mother was crazy when she talked about carrot cake. Carrots? In a cake? What could be more absurd?

And then I tried it. Ummm. Yes, carrots belong in a cake.

In all candor, it was the cream cheese frosting that initially won me over. But over time, I have come to appreciate how the frosting interplays with the spiciness of the cake. Carrots keep the cake moist and provide a subtle crunch that is amplified with pecans and shredded coconut.

The hot debate in baking circles is whether raisins belong in carrot cake. I ignore that debate by leaving out raisins and, instead, add dried cranberries, which add a tart sweetness to the cake. Or if I’m feeling adventurous, I add another dried fruit, such as cherries, blueberries, or mangos. Dried fruit adds an intense jolt of flavor that elevates the medley of tastes. When combined with the light citrus flavor of Molly’s Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting (see below), the cake bursts into a chorus of flavors that will leave you wanting more.

And so carrot cake has become a tradition at the Gibson home. Most recently, I made carrot cake bites for a dinner party with 40 friends from across the country who were in town for an employment law seminar.

We make carrot cake bites as part of our gift boxes of sweets that we give our neighbors each year at Christmas time. These mini cupcakes are the perfect size for a quick treat.

.

And a single batch makes 150 mini cupcakes, so they are easy to share.

The recipe is versatile. I made a carrot cake as a sheet cake for Molly and Matthew’s wedding reception.

From time to time, I hear that such-and-such restaurant or the whatyamacallit bakery makes a great carrot cake. And so, with high hopes, I try the cake. Almost always I’m disappointed. The cake typically is dry and the flavors are mundane.

That’s why you need to try my Carrot Cake Bites.

I won’t tell you that this recipe is the World’s Best Carrot Cake. But I will tell you that it is the best that I have eaten. I hope you like it as well.

Carrot Cake Bites

  • 2 cups flour
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1 tsp. baking powder
  • 1 tsp. baking soda
  • 1 tsp. salt
  • 1 tsp. cinnamon
  • 1 tsp. ground ginger
  • 3 cups shredded carrots (about 3 large carrots)
  • 1 cup vegetable oil
  • 4 eggs, lightly beaten
  • 1 cup chopped pecans
  • 1 cup dried cranberries
  • 1 cup shredded coconut
  • Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting (recipe below)

Preheat the oven to 325*.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, soda, salt, cinnamon, and ginger. Add the carrots, oil, and eggs. Beat with an electric mixer until combined. Mix in the pecans, cranberries, and coconut.

Line a mini-cupcake pan with paper liners. Fill the liner about 3/4 of the way full. Bake the cupcakes for 22 to 25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean. Cool the cupcakes on a wire rack.

Use a pastry bag to frost the cupcakes with Molly’s Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting.

Makes about 150 mini cupcakes.

Alternative Instructions to make a full-sized cake

 

Preheat the over to 325*.

Mix the batter per the instructions above. Grease and lightly flour two 9-inch cake pans.

Divide the batter into the two cake pans. Bake for 40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the pan comes out clean. Cool the cake on a wire rack.

Frost the cake with Molly’s Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting.

Molly’s Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting

  • 8 oz. softened unsalted butter
  • 8 oz. softened cream cheese
  • Zest of 1 lemon
  • 2 Tbsp. lemon juice, or to taste
  • 1 tsp. vanilla extract
  • 6-8 cups powdered sugar

Beat the butter with an electric mixer until it is smooth and creamy. Add the cream cheese and beat the mixture until the mixture is smooth.

Add powdered lemon zest, lemon juice, and vanilla and stir to combine. Add powdered sugar one cup at a time until the mixture is light and fluffy.