February 2011

Pilaf on a Tangent

In all my culinary adventures, I’ve never made rice pilaf. Sounds dumb, right? I’ve made steamed rice, fried rice, Spanish rice, risotto…but never plain old rice pilaf. Inspired by a Food Network show I watched this morning, I decided I needed it to survive the day. And once I get it in my head…well…. IContinue reading “Pilaf on a Tangent”

KKF Gets Schooled: Braises & Stews

I attended another cooking class today, this time on Braises & Stews at Whole Food’s Salud Cooking School. It was an aggressive menu for a three hour class: Braised Short Ribs, Beef Stew, Pot Roast with Vegetables, Lamb Ragu and Creamy Polenta. There were nine students in class and we were split up into threeContinue reading “KKF Gets Schooled: Braises & Stews”

Georgia Luau

When I was 18 I visited Hawaii with my mom. It was my first plane flight and, other than a weeklong trip to Ohio when I was a pre-teen, my first actual vacation. Our friend Emmette graciously gave us a grand tour of Kauai, the island he lives on. Part of this tour was theContinue reading “Georgia Luau”

How to Make Spouses Eat Collards

Collard greens are a Southern specialty and a seasonal winter vegetable. Being from Iowa, where winter vegetables exit only in the supermarket or in your deep freeze, I had limited experience (ok NONE) with collards before moving south. So after some experimentation, I discovered the perfect way to prepare this sometimes shunned green for the northernContinue reading “How to Make Spouses Eat Collards”

KKF Gets Schooled: Moroccan

Now that I’m done with school, the first thing I do is…sign up for more classes. Except this time I’m leaving finance far behind and indulging in some cooking classes offered by Whole Foods and Viking Cooking School. This past Sunday I got schooled in Moroccan cuisine! Here’s the menu we prepared: Orange Salad withContinue reading “KKF Gets Schooled: Moroccan”

Four-Alarm Tortillas

It was a bacon smokin’ Saturday yesterday so I decided I wanted something simple for dinner – tacos. As usual, my simple dinner grew and expanded into a monster. Before the pork sides were even snugly in the smoker, the menu had become grande. I started off with bean dip. Test Subject Bill loves Frito’sContinue reading “Four-Alarm Tortillas”

Meat Roll Up Hack Job (AKA British Burritos)

I attempted to make Jamie Oliver’s Ground Beef Wellington the other night, a recipe in his Food Revolution cookbook. It’s basically ground beef mixed up with sautéed vegetables, wrapped in puff pastry and baked. As most of my kitchen hack jobs start out, I was missing something and improvised… I didn’t have frozen puff pastry.Continue reading “Meat Roll Up Hack Job (AKA British Burritos)”