Cheese-Stuffed Anaheim Chili Pepper

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The pepper crop from Concord Farms is rolling in, and we've been using them as fast as we can. We have pickled a bunch of jalapeños, used fragrant green bell peppers for the filling of a socca crepe, and been lit on fire by some unidentified pepper that looks a lot like a devil's horn.


We are pepper-rich these days with almost every kind of pepper you can imagine -- except poblanos.  No poblano, no problem-o. This is a dish similar to the ubiquitous "Chili Poblano" you will find on the menu at most Mexican restaurants.We used the light green variety of Anaheim peppers in the place of the poblanos with delicious results. 


Cheese-Stuffed Anaheim Chili Pepper

6 Anaheim peppers (about 5 inches long)
1/2 pound smoked Gouda (shredded)
1 cup canola oil (for frying)
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
Spiced Batter (recipe follows)
Chipotle Tomato Sauce (recipe follows)
sour cream 
Mexican crema (to garnish)
finely chopped pickled jalapeño (optional, to garnish)


Using a paring knife, make a slit all the way down the long end of the pepper without going through to the other side. Gently open the pepper and insert your knife in order to cut the seeds loose from the top of the pepper. Pull out the seeds with your hands. Stuff each pepper loosely with the Gouda cheese. Repeat until all peppers are stuffed. 


In a large frying pan over medium-high heat, heat the canola oil until it shimmers.


Dust each pepper in the flour in order to allow the batter to adhere to the pepper's slick skin. Roll each stuffed pepper one at a time through the Spiced Batter and make sure every surface is covered. (This will keep the cheese from leaking.)


Lay the pepper into the hot oil and allow it to cook for about 2 minutes before turning. Once all sides are golden brown, remove the pepper and place onto a parchment-lined baking sheet in a 350-degree oven to keep warm. It's best to fry the peppers in batches of 2 or 3.


To serve, place a spoonful of the Chipotle Tomato Sauce onto the center of a plate, top that with one Cheese-Stuffed Anaheim, and garnish with sour cream and pickled peppers. It goes well with rice and beans on the side.


Spiced Batter

1 egg (beaten)
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup water
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon finely chopped cilantro
sea salt and cracked black pepper (to taste)


Mix the egg, flour, water, garlic, cilantro, salt and pepper together in a large bowl. Use a whisk to work out any lumps. The batter should be thicker than pancake batter.



Chipotle Tomato Sauce 

2 cups chopped Roma tomato
1 smoked chipotle pepper (from a can)
1 cup sweet onion
1 teaspoon ancho chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cumin
2 tablespoons tomato paste
sea salt and cracked black pepper (to taste)

Place the tomato pepper, onion, chili powder, cumin, and tomato paste into the work bowl of your food processor and blend until smooth. Place mixture into a medium pot over medium heat and allow mixture to cook until thickened. Stir the mixture often to prevent the bottom from scorching. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.

eaTABLE Supper Club: June 24, 2012

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What a night! On Sunday, we cooked a 6-course dinner for 16 people under the stars in a beautiful outdoor kitchen. We couldn't have pulled it off without our wonderful hosts, the Fishes, and our friends Margot McNeely of Project Green Fork, who coordinated and decorated, and Jody Moyt, Executive Chef at Owen Brennan's, who kept things calm and moving forward in the kitchen.


This is the third eaTABLE supper club event presented by us here at The Chubby Vegetarian. (We did all-vegan comfort food last fall for comforTABLE. And our first one with a Latin theme back in 2010 was actually the first eaTABLE!) 


It's hard work to prepare and present so many dishes to so many people in an unfamiliar kitchen. It's usually an all-weekend event for us from menu planning to shopping at the farmers markets, to prepping the sauces and ingredients, and then packing, transporting, and unpacking. It's fun, but can be a little head-spinning. Why do we keep doing it? It's simple, really. This particular group of people are such an appreciative audience. They are there for the experience and to try something new, so that is what we wanted to give them.



We called the menu comporTABLE, which means 'appropriate and suitable'. Since we were eating poolside out in the heat, we wanted to keep the food fairly light. Here is what we came up with for the menu:



1. Banh Mi Spring Rolls
Local Shiitake Paté, Cucumber, Do Chao, Sriracha

2. Corn + Fennel Stuffed Squash Blossom 
Grilled Zucchini, Crookneck Sauce, Fennel Pollen


3. Grilled Watermelon Steak
Jewel Tomatoes, Goat Cheese, Honey-Lime Vinaigrette

4. Deconstructed Potato Salad
Truffled Grilled Potato, Five-Minute Egg, Pickled Mustard Seed, Greens


5. Chorizo Stuffed Pepper
Chipotle-Tomato Sauce, Corn Nuts


6. Buttered Baguette Ice Cream 
Peach Jam, Gianduja


We had a blast cooking and are so glad that we were asked to participate this time. In other news, we will have information for you this week about another upcoming TCV dinner at an East Memphis restaurant in late July; we would love it if some you would be able to attend!

Buttered Baguette Ice Cream + Gianduja, Peach Sauce, and Peach Leather

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I saw this idea for an add-in for store-bought vanilla ice cream in a great ice cream article by Tara Bench in LHJ and had to develop it from scratch as part of a summer version of fresh baguette with chocolate-hazelnut paste and peaches. It's one of those things you just have to taste to believe. Use some special butter like Plugra for the richest, crunchiest bits of baguette throughout the ice cream. Be amusing and top with what you'd usually put on baguette, like gianduja or a fruit sauce instead of jam.

Buttered Baguette Ice Milk
roughly 3 tablespoons Plugra butter15 1/4-inch slices of baguette bread2 tablespoons neufchâtel cheese1 1/2 cups 2% milk (like Whole Foods 365 brand)1/2 cup heavy whipping cream1/2 cup cane sugar (like Whole Foods 365 brand)1 tablespoon vanilla1/8 teaspoon Maldon sea salt flakes
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter both sides of the baguette slices and set them on a pan. Put it the oven for about 10-15 minutes until all start to lightly brown and become crunchy. Set aside on a plate for a couple of hours or even overnight. When it's completely cooled and crisp, pulse baguette slices in the food processor until you have fine crumbs. Set aside.
Whisk the cheese, milk, whipping cream, sugar, vanilla, and salt together. Put into your ice cream maker and let it spin for about 30 minutes; you'll know when it's ready when you see it start to fluff up and creep up the sides of the container as it goes around. At this point, spoon in the baguette crumbs. Once they're dispersed, immediately spoon ice milk into a container and place it in the freezer for at least 4 hours so it hardens. Top as you wish -- see above for tips -- or serve it plain. (Makes 1 quart.)

I love the ease and expertise in this video about making raspberry tuiles and wondered if the same technique would work with peaches. It does! It seriously tastes like a fresh peach Fruit Roll-Up. You can also cut it up into shapes or roll it into tiny cylinders as a part of this dessert.

Peach Leather

6 peaches (for peach purée)
2 tablespoons cane sugar
pinch of Maldon sea salt flakes

Preheat oven to 200 degrees. To make the purée, peel and pit peaches, and then put the flesh into a blender. Set it on high for a minute until there are no lumps. Into a bowl, strain out the pulp using a fine-mesh sieve. Rinse the blender and then add strained juice, sugar, and salt and blend on high for another minute.

Line a rimmed baking sheet with a silpat. Spread peach mixture in a thin layer across it. Bake for 2 hours. Lift it carefully using a knife to loosen the edges. Use scissors to cut sections of it from the pan. We rolled 1/2-inch strips into small, loose rolls as a pastry decoration and placed them on a plate to set.

Peach Jam / Peach Sauce

12 peaches (peeled and pits removed)2 1-inch strips of lemon zestjuice from half a lemonpinch of Maldon sea salt flakes
Mash peaches in bowl with a potato masher. Add peaches, lemon zest, lemon juice, and salt to a medium saucepan. Cook on a low or simmer setting for an hour. Stir occasionally, about every ten minutes. Let jam cool before you spoon it into containers. For a smooth peach sauce, strain the warm jam through a fine-mesh strainer or put it through a food mill. Store either in a jar in the fridge and use within a week or put up a jar in the freezer to enjoy later.

Gianduja

For my first time making this, I just followed this classic chocolate-hazelnut paste recipe to a T and added a small scoop of it plus toasted, finely chopped hazelnuts on the dessert.

For more fun with peaches, check out some of our other recipes:

Grilled Peach Ice Cream

Peach + Tarragon Pesto Pizza

Oven Roasted Peaches and Cream

Sweet Potato Pancakes with Peaches and Pecans

AMIK Pickled Mustard Seeds

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We were so excited to see that our article about pickling made the cover of the summer  issue of Edible Memphis. Ah, pickles: a subject near and dear to our hearts. We just love 'em in the summer when the produce is coming in faster than everyone can use it up: pickle it, freeze, it, dry it, can it -- just don't let it go to waste. That'd be a shame.


Pick up your copy of Edible Memphis at these places around town, and you'll see four of our pickling recipes with some unexpected ingredients. We also have this bonus recipe here that goes well with so many dishes. The cool thing about this particular preparation is that the yellow mustard seeds take on a quality not unlike caviar (!) when they soften. The chefs at Andrew Michael Italian Kitchen here in Memphis serve it on sweetbreads at the restaurant -- and at their recent all-vegetarian No-Menu Monday, it was on top of smoked eggplant crostini -- but it would be a great addition to a cheese plate as well. It's perfect for sandwiches, salads...really anywhere you'd normally use mustard. One of our favorite ways to use this recipes is on Grilled Muffuletta Pizza.
AMIK Pickled Mustard Seeds


(Adapted for home use from Andrew Ticer and Michael Hudman's recipe)

1/2 cup cane sugar
1 1/2 cups white wine vinegar
1 cup water
1 head roasted garlic (roughly chopped)
1 teaspoon black peppercorns
1 teaspoon coriander seeds
zest from 1 small orange
1 pinch red pepper flakes
2 teaspoon salt
1 cup yellow mustard seeds (only this type)

Add the sugar, vinegar, water, garlic, peppercorns, coriander, orange zest, red pepper flakes, and salt to a medium pot and bring up to a boil.  Boil 5 minutes and then strain the spices out using a fine-mesh strainer. Return the liquid to the pot along with the mustard seeds and simmer for 30 minutes. Transfer pickled mustard seed to small jars, and share it with your friends. (Makes 3 1/2 cups.)

Samosas + Raita Dipping Sauce

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This is a great recipe if you're looking for a dish to set out at a party. It's far more creative than chips and dip -- and it makes a ton. You can fry the samosas ahead of time and just warm them in the oven before you serve them. 


These also freeze well, so if you make the whole batch and you just eat a few, that's no problem. Just lay the unfried samosas on a cutting board in a single layer and stick them in the freezer for a couple of hours and then transfer them to a container until you're ready to use them.


If you don't want to use all of the potato mixture to make these little samosas, the mixture is great with some greens and tomatoes rolled up in a tortilla. It's like an Indian food burrito. If you're in a bit of a hurry, just serve it on rice with the raita, which tastes nearly as good but with a lot less work.


Samosas + Raita Dipping Sauce

1 tablespoon unsalted butter 
1 tablespoon canola oil
1 cup diced onion
1 tablespoon Maharajah curry powder (may substitute hot or sweet curry powder)
1 teaspoon coriander
1 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon granulated garlic
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 cups diced potato (about 3 medium, peeled)
1 can coconut milk (like Whole Foods 365 brand)
1/4 teaspoon green cardamom seeds (not the pods!)
1/4 teaspoon meti (fenugreek) seeds (optional)
1 cup frozen green peas (like Whole Foods 365 brand)
1 teaspoon cane sugar (like Whole Foods 365 brand)
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1/4 cup finely chopped golden raisins
sambal (to taste)
1 12-ounce package wonton wrappers
canola oil for frying
Raita Dipping Sauce (recipe follows)


In a large frying pan over medium-high heat, melt the butter and add the canola oil. Add the onion, curry powder, coriander, cumin, garlic, and salt. Cook while stirring constantly for about 4 minutes. Add the potato, coconut milk, cardamom, and meti seeds to the mix. Cook uncovered until potatoes are tender (about 10 minutes). Using a potato masher, mash the mixture. Add the peas, sugar, vinegar, and raisins to the mixture. Taste mixture and add enough sambal hot sauce to give it a little heat -- I used 1 teaspoon. Stir to incorporate. Set aside to cool.


Place 1 tablespoon of the mixture into the center of a wonton wrapper, dampen two edges with a tiny bit of water to help it seal, fold it into a triangle, and pinch the edges together to ensure a tight seal. It's best to use a small ice-cream scoop to transfer the filling, and it's very helpful to have a small bowl of water handy in order to help seal the samosas quickly.


In a large frying pan over medium heat, heat 1/2 inch of canola oil. Fry samosas in batches of 5 for just about 30 seconds per side or until golden and crispy. (Makes about 50.)


Raita Dipping Sauce

3/4 cup very finely diced cucumbers (peeled, seeded)
1 cup 2% Greek yogurt
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon cane sugar
1 tablespoon finely diced mint


In a medium bowl, mix the cucumbers, yogurt, salt, sugar, and mint until combined. Set aside in the refrigerator until ready to serve. (Double the recipe if you plan on serving all 50 samosas at once.)

M is for: Mint, English Pea & Fava Bean Salad

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Sometimes I make things really difficult on myself. I don't do it on purpose, mind you, but sometimes my ideas get a tad bit ambitious to execute.

Take this salad for example. It's a salad. Salads are supposed to be easy. But for some reason, I decided to pair two of the most time-consuming vegetables to prep: English peas and fava beans.

However, I do not want to scare you off from making this salad, because it's fabulous! Both English peas and fava beans are in season right now, and I love how fresh and bright this salad turned out with the addition of fresh squeezed lemon juice and fresh mint. Since I'm obsessed with sheep's milk feta at the moment, and had some leftover from the lamb sliders, I added some of that, along with some toasted pine nuts and green onions for texture.


Let's start with the English peas, also known as shell peas or garden peas. I actually remember these from childhood when my mom had a garden. I remember helping to shell them (which, thinking back, was a smart move by mom). A pound will only yield about a cup of peas, so plan accordingly. To shell them, just pull the string down the pod and pop them loose. It's not terribly difficult, just time consuming. Rinse them and then boil in about 1/2 inch of simmering water for 3-4 minutes until crisp tender. Plunge into ice cold water to halt the cooking.


Now for the favas (also known as broad beans). These little guys really make you work for them. But the results are definitely worth it. Like the peas, they come in a pod. But each bean is also covered with a second shell, so it's twice the work. You can use the same technique as the peas by snapping and pulling the string, but I usually just carefully slice open the pod with a paring knife. From there, you can remove the beans, which are a white or light-green color.

To remove the skin, you can either steam them or boil them in water for about 3-4 minutes and then put into a bowl of ice water to halt the cooking process. Supposedly, you can pop them out of the shell, but I usually just cut a small slit and get them out that way. (If you are going to be cooking them in a recipe besides a salad, you probably just want to boil them for only 30 seconds before shelling them and then cook them further after they are completely shelled. They are great in a pesto or puree or simply sauteed with leeks and garlic).


Once the grunt work is done, it's time to enjoy your salad! Toss the peas and beans with mint, green onion, feta, pine nuts and lemon zest, along with a little olive oil and fresh lemon juice. Season to taste with salt and pepper and enjoy immediately!

English Pea, Fava Bean & Mint Salad
by Jaymee SirePrep Time: 30 minutesCook Time: 5 minutesKeywords: salad gluten-free low-carb vegetarian english peas fava beans spring summer
Ingredients (1-2 salads)

• 1 pound English peas, shelled (about 1 cup shelled peas)
• 1 pound Fava beans, shelled (about 1 cup shelled beans)
• 1/2 spring onion, sliced
• 8 mint leaves, chiffonade
• 1/4 pine nuts, toasted
• 1/4 cup crumbled sheep's milk feta
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• juice from 1/2 lemon
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• salt & pepper, to taste

Instructions

1. Rinse shelled peas and then boil in about 1/2 inch of simmering water for 3-4 minutes until crisp tender. Plunge into ice cold water to halt the cooking.
2. Once fava beans are removed from outer pod, boil them in water for about 3-4 minutes and then put into a bowl of ice water to halt the cooking process. Remove bright green beans from white skin.
3. Toss the peas and beans with mint, green onion, feta, pine nuts and lemon zest, along with a little olive oil and fresh lemon juice. Season to taste with salt and pepper and enjoy immediately!

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M is for: Mission Bowling Club {Restaurant Review}

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First of all, I really need you in the right "frame" of mind for this post. (Hehe...See what I did there?) So, before you continue reading, please watch this hilarious video by clicking here.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

Funny/ridiculous, right?!?

Now that you've been thoroughly entertained and reminded that bowling can indeed be a thrilling and exciting group activity, let me tell you about a great new place to knock down pins in San Francisco.

Mission Bowling Club is much more than a spot where you can wear smelly used shoes and drink a beer. Yes, there is bowling. But there is also some fantastic food. I would go there for the burger even if I *wasn't* bowling. It's that good.


But before we get to the food, let's talk about the decor. I love the lofty, warehouse feel of the space. I love how they subtly incorporated bowling pins into everything from the table pegs to the menu configuration to the light fixtures. But I also love the local art that adorns the walls, the thoughtful drink menu, and outdoor space in the front. Basically, it marries local San Francisco hipster flare with traditional bowling alley in perfect matrimony.


But onto my favorite part: the food. Most bowling alley fare I've ever been subjected to usually involves something like microwaved frozen mozzarella sticks or nachos drenched in processed cheese. You will find nothing of the sort at Mission Bowling Club. The menu features bar food by name only. Yes, there are corn dogs and burgers and fried chicken. But it's probably the best burger and corn dog and fried chicken you will ever eat. The reason? Anthony Mynt (of Mission Chinese Food and Commonwealth fame) is the brainchild behind this fine establishment.

For starters, the fried chicken is battered in a mixture that includes chicken skin.Yes, you read that right. It's chicken. Fried. In chicken skin. It's also artfully served on a skewer that hovers over a blob of ranch dip, making it almost too pretty to eat. For those looking for something lighter, there's a 7 bean salad with fried chickpeas, that is equally as yummy. Home fries with dipping sauce will only run you five bucks. And the corn dogs? These aren't your run-of-the-mill weiners on a stick. The sausage balances sweet and spicy and is wrapped in a crunchy breading that is infused with sour cream. Like the chicken, they are served on a stick, perched and waiting to dive into the pool of spicy habanero crema waiting below (2 to an order, so we got 2).


OK, Let's talk burgers. Everyone at the table was drooling over the Mission burger. But in order to give you a more complete review, I sacrificed my order and got the Vegan Burger (thanks to Amanda for sharing her regular burger with me). The Mission Burger is undoubtedly the star of the entrees, but the Vegan version is hot on its heels with best supporting actor. It's a blend of chickpeas, kale and shiitake fried to a crisp and topped with guacamole, fennel slaw and sambal (a spicy chili sauce). It's served on thick sliced foccacia bread and I'm not BS'ing you when I say it was freaking delicious. The Montana girl in me loves red meat, but the California part of me really appreciates a good veggie burger.


However, if you do eat meat, you should not skip the Mission Burger. I'm sure there are other yummy things in the entree section, but you will just spend the entire night with food envy if you don't get this burger. If you are familiar with Mynt's other restaurant and street food ventures in the city, you've no doubt heard about this magical patty of meat. But in case you haven't, let me just say it's without a doubt one of the top 3 burgers in the city, if not THE best. Mynt's version is made with a 1/2 pound mixture of granulated brisket, short rib and chuck from Harris Ranch. It's seared in beef fat and topped with caramelized onions, jack cheese and caper aioli. It's buttery, it's juicy, it's everything you would dream a cheeseburger should be. (Side note: those are potato chips cut like fries...not actual fries, which is sort of a disappointment, but the burger more than makes up for it).



Quick behind-the-scenes of E is for Eat pic. You know how I'm always talking about my ridiculous iPhone "lighting" when I'm at restaurants? Well, here you can see it in action. This particular night, we had not one, but TWO iPhone flashlights going. Thanks to Colvin and Brodie for serving as the "lighting experts" and to Amanda for capturing the entire scene with her own iPhone.


The four of us shared the cinnamon crunchy toast for dessert, which is basically like a piece of crispy french toast served with vanilla ice cream on top. It was the proverbial cherry on top to a fabulous evening of bowling and food. Yes, it's a little pricey as you pay per hour and the prices increase as it gets later. (We paid $45 for one lane from 7:00-8:00, plus $4 each for shoe rental.) We were able to *almost* get in two full games, and I'm happy to report I bowled a career-best 143. ("Who do you think you are!?!? I AM). So if you're in search of the perfect double date spot, or just a great place to kick back and enjoy a fun evening of friends and food, take your bowling skills to Mission Bowling Club.