Be Yourself!

A funny Jackie Mason video with a great message.  Be yourself!

Your Food should be genuine as well

Many believe your food should be real too, and I generally agree.  Clean Eating Magazine is full of great ideas on how to eat better.  The website has some good info, but to get the whole deal you need to buy the magazine.  You can pick it up at Whole Foods or Sunflower Market (a cheaper version of Whole Foods where we shop).  The general idea is to stay away from processed foods and to cook using fresh ingredients.

It's difficult to do 100%.  For example, how do you make your own corn chips to go along with your freshly-made pico de gallo?  For those food items you must purchase, they give you tips on the healthiest choices.  For pasta dishes, they recommend the whole wheat variety.

Chiles are a great healthy addition to any meal, and the New Mexico, or Anaheim, variety are a great choice for grilling.  They are meaty and not hot.  I enjoy grilling them and them stuffing them with good food.

Canoas Verdes Recipe

* 1 pot of borracho beans:  Canned beans drained of that syrupy stuff and rinsed.  Cooked in a pot over a fire with a can of beer and your favorite southwest spice mixture

* Chiles:  Cut a slot out of them and take out the seeds and veins if you want them to be less hot.  Chop up the pieces you cut out of the chiles and add them to the beans, along with some onions

* If you want to add meat to the recipe, fix it up and grill it!

* Roast the chiles on the grill.  A second rack up off of the main grilling surface works best.

When the chiles are roasted to your taste, fill them with the beans and the chopped up meat and enjoy!

Have a happy Sunday!

Fajitas on the Grill

Summer is on the way.  Time to grill!

Actually, I grill all year 'round, but I thought I would share a complete grill meal with you.





Fajitas is a fun backyard meal.  You'll need:

- Package of tortillas
- Fresh onions and bell peppers, sliced in big fajita-sized strips
- 2 cans of beans, drained and rinsed
- Chicken breasts
- Cheap cut of beef
- Spices and or marinades of your choosing

It's really hard to mess this recipe up.  Any kind of tortilla will do, even if you mistakenly get the little corn tortillas that look like drink coasters.  A common thing at parties hosted by Mexicans is to have the fixin's out in bowls and the tortillas warming, and invite guests to help themselves throughout the night.  When you take a tortilla off the warmer to eat, you throw a cold one on.

Anyway, in the upper left, I have a vegetable basket that I put the chopped up peppers and onions in.  Before cooking, I add my own seasoning mix to them and shake them up in a bag.  I also take one of those tenderizer hammers with the spiked head and pound the beef and the chicken breasts.  They take the spices or marinate better that way and they cook quicker.

You can marinate or spice up the meat.  For prepackaged marinates, I like those Weber packets.  One "Mexican" or "southwest" flavored one and one chile lime packet makes a good combo.  You can also look for spice recipes at Spices Inc, or other cooking websites and come up with your own concoction.

For the beans, I rinse them and then do them my way, which usually involves my own spices mix, some roasted chiles, onions, a can of beer and Stubb's bbq sauce (the official favorite of the Silverfiddle household.)  I've never met Mr. Stubbs, but he has my undying admiration.

Put the beans on first, since they take the longest to get the liquid to cook off.  Throw on the basket of onions and peppers next, along with the chicken, and lastly, the beef, since it takes the least amount of time to cook.

When everything is done, chop up the meat and wrap it in tinfoil, and put each of the ingredients in a separate bowl, grab the tortillas and invite everyone to dig in!

Tortilla chips and salsa or guacamole makes a nice accompaniment.

You can wash 'em down with homemade Lynchburg Lemonade (Jack Daniels and lemonade), Margaritas, or your favorite beer (a Ranger IPA from New Belgium Brewery goes nicely).

What do you like cooking on the grill?