Work Photos

A small collection of my nightly dishes from my station at Arrillaga Dining Commons, at Stanford.

Eggplant Sliders w/Sweet Potato Fries

I made these delectable delights on the fly one night. I was originally intending to make ground pork sliders with roasted plantain, however at the last minute, I had to change my plans. I made the rolls using a white whole wheat flour and added jalapenos and plantains to the mix. I had Japanese eggplant, so it was easy to cut strips and saute them up with salt and pepper. Instead of dicing the roasted jalapeno as I had planned, to go into the pork meat, I cut them once and layed them out flat. I then added roasted red onion slices and plantain compote to complete my eggplant sliders.

The seranos that grow outside my kitchen window

These puppies are absolutely beautiful! They're a bit sweet, but still spicy and really juicy. They seem to taste better when I let them turn red on the plant. Whatever I can't eat, I let dry out. Next time I make tamales, I hope to use my dried seranos to make my chili paste. Awesome!

Bread Rolls & Turkey Burgers

It all started this afternoon when I made bread rolls. I took my normal bread recipe and rolled/balled it out in sections. Here's what I got.

Now orginally I was going to make pasta for dinner with Turkey-Basil Meatballs and these rolls. Then the idea morphed into Turkey Sliders and a pasta salad. Of course, I was too tired to make all this so again the idea morphed into turkey sliders and potatoes.


Of course like most people, I am not perfect and neither is my food all the time. Yes, these burgers came out perfect. You might notice the potatoes are not pictured... But here's another picture of the sliders!
Spicy Turkey Sliders: Freshly made bread, spicy turkey patties, rosted jalepeno, lettuce, tomatoes and onions. Everything made fresh by me, from scatch, today (8-9-11).

Double Chocolate White Chocolate Chip Cookies

I just wanted to share these with everybody! Yes they taste as good as they look!

Check Out Them Cookies

Trader Joe's has Sugar Cookie Mixes for 99 cents. The box comes with the sugar cookie dry ingredients, 4 sugar colors, 2 frosting packs and 3 cookie cutters. I used my own cookie cutters this time. Total Score! Try making ice cream sandwiches with you're sugar cookies and Trader Joe's Soy Ice Cream for all you lactose intolerants!

Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater

Over the course of the last week, I roasted and pureed three pumpkins. Here are the photos and the steps I took.

First I cut the skin off. Last year when I did this, I cut the pumpkin up first and then cut the skin off, based on some advice I got. Boy that was a bummer of a job. This year I thought, why not cut the skin off while the pumpkin is whole. Yeah, this method made all the difference. I recommend using a sharp knife for this.

Now this pumpkin is ready to be cut in to quarters and cubed. For this particular pumpkin, I started out the traditional way, by cutting off the top and scraping out the seeds. However, since I was going to be cutting it into halves then quarters, I found on the other two pumpkins, it was easier to scrape out the seeds later on.


After I cubed the pumpkin, I transferred the pieces to a sheet tray. Before putting the tray in the oven, I added enough water cover the bottom of the tray. The water keeps the pumpkin from burning and sticking to the tray. I roasted the pumpkin in the oven at 400 degrees for approximately 20 minutes or until pumpkin is soft to the touch.

When the pumpkin had cooled, I put the cubes in a food processor to puree it. The last time I did this I think I had to add water to be able to puree it. Of course I didn't have this bad boy back then.. (Shout out to KJ, thanks for the goodies!!) After pureeing, it may be necessary to boil the pumpkin in order to evaporate the excess water. I tried doing this with the first pumpkin I did, but it wasn't really runny. I didn't even bother with the other two. After freezing and thawing, I strain out the excess water before incorporating the pumpking into any recipe. If you skip this step, expecially for a pie, it will come out really wet. No bueno..

Of course I dropped the ball as far as picture taking goes and all I can show you know is the finished product, already bagged and frozen. Between 3 pumpkins (one was a sugar pumpkin and the other two were of the regular carving kind), I got around 8lbs of pumpkin puree. I prefer to bag my pumpkin in increments of 1lb (2c). This is the amount of pumpkin I need to make one pumpkin pie. Since I have so much pumpkin, I have already started experimenting with other recipes. Last Sunday (11/14/10) I made my first batch of pumpkin pancakes. They were pretty good. When I perfect the recipe, I'll send out the memo...

Pizzas from October

Wet your whistle with these:

Finally Pumpkin Eating Season IS HERE!

Yay! My favorite kind of pie, pumpkin!

Need a pie for your fall or winter holiday? Maybe just because? Well, you're in luck cause I can make that pie, assuming you can't... zofeone@gmail.com..

Breaded Cornmeal Sole w/Tarter Sauce and Brussel Sprouts

Mel and I made this beautiful dinner together. These are Dover Sole Fillets breaded with cornmeal and fried. The brussel sprouts are butter steamed and lightly sauted, veggie cous cous and a delicous tarter sauce made on the fly! Yum!

Beautiful Avacado

Mel got this and two other beauties from one of the guys that are also in her program. This was the first one I cut from the three. I couldn't pass up taking a photo. I've been trying to sprout the avacado seeds, but no luck yet. Someday, Mel and I hope to own some property of our own and have a wide variety of fruit trees and as well as an extensive garden. The avacado tree will no doubt be a part of this.

Burritos

I made these puppies last night! Oh and were they delicious. Tofu seasoned with chorizo in mind, spanish rice, whole beans, zucchini, onions, roasted garlic and jalepenos with fresh tomatoes and avacado. Oh yeah, you know it...awesome!

Lavash Wraps

I made my first wrap last night for dinner. As far as presentation goes, I could have arranged these differently for more eye appeal. In any case, the wraps came out really good. I started out with whole wheat lavash bread wraps, mayo, whole grain dijon mustard, hard and soft salami, smoked gouda cheese, mixed greens, onions and roasted jalepenos.

Grilled Peppered Pork Loin Sandwich with Carmalized Onions

This sandwich was pretty good. It actually took me two sittings to finish it. I like this photo, however in this picture the bread seems to better showcased than the sandwich or innards. That's okay though, you know why, because the bread is one of my jalepeno monster sourdough loaves. Awesome!

Stuffed Pork Cutlets

I made these babies last night. Cut from a pork loin and then stuffed with collards and garlic sauteed in a white whine. Delicious.

Grilled Pastrami and Swiss

I made these when I got home from Santa Rosa today. Grilled Salami & Pastrami and Swiss on Roasted Garlic Sourdough. Also, TJ's dijon mustard and homemade mayo with paprika and saffron. Awesome.

Raviolis From Scratch

For a while now I've been planning on making raviolis from scratch. It kinda started with the persimmons. My grandpa gave me a Trader Joe's size bag of persimmons late last year. I ended up making a bunch of persimmon breads, but for the most part I steamed some whole, some quartered and pureed some, all to freeze for later use. Next, I finally aquired a pasta roller and then all I had to do was muster up some motivation and make sure I had time, lots of time.

First I made the dough. I would have to let it rest for at least 30 min, so in the meantime I could make the filling. I doubled up on the reciped thinking that it would be enough. Not only was I wrong there, but I also totally messed up the first round of making pasta dough. I forgot to put a whole cup of flour out, so the well I made couldn't hold the 4 eggs I tried to put into it. The egg went everywhere and when I finally got it all together with the cup of flour I was missing, the dough ended up really hard. So hard that I couldn't even knead it. I tried to save it, but in the end I had to toss it. Bummer. Ok so I had to try again. The next time it came together, however I swore that the next time I make more, that I was using the mixer. For the third batch, I did use the mixer. Not only was it MUCH faster, it was much easier. Finally something was coming together.

I got the idea from a Martha Stewart book that my mom emailed me in PDF format. The actual recipe is, I think, somebody else's, but it was a MS book for Thanksgiving recipes. Cool. What it was, was a pumpkin ravioli with a pumpkin veloute. Subsitute persimmons for pumpkin. After making the persimmons insides for the ravioli, I rolled out the dough and began creating raviolis.
After making a bunch of persimmon raviolis, I had to make more dough, for the Italian sausage raviolis, that I was also planning on making. By the time I was done making the meat ones, I was starting to get a method down as to how to press the dough down around the meat to prevent any air bubbles. I haven't made pasta from scratch since I attend "Cooking for Teens" at CCA (SF), when I was 14. I have never made raviolis from scratch, so not only did this seem like a daunting task at first, I also had to develop my own techniques. I actually made quite a few mistakes. Next time, straining the persimmon mixture through cheese cloth, would be ideal, so that the mixture doesn't end up soaking the dough. After making each batch, I lined the raviolis on a sheet tray and put them in the freezer. This way I would be able to put them in a bag, without worrying about them coming apart. The meat ones I made, came out a lot better, both in shape and they were dryer.

Next I had to puree the veloute and strain it, before I could call it quits for this evening. It was almost midnight by this point and my back and feet were really hurting. After straining the veloute, I put it back on the stove to reduce it a little more. I did reduce it a little bit while I was doing dishes, but decided that I would save it and finish it today. Besides, I knew that the flavors would change and intensify over night as the veloute sat in the fridge.

All this work will come to fruition tonight as we host a dinner for our favorite friends and couple, the Mooneyhams. It's really cool that they are coming over. Usually we go to their house and cook dinner. It's cool when they come to our house because we can make the dinners more elaborate, since we have all our tools at hand. For tonights dinner, we will be having Persimmon and Italian Sausage Ravioli with a Persimmon-Curry Veloute, with a side of salad and an Orange Vinegrette and my Peppered Wheat Sourdough. To top it all off, we're all going to see a show afterwards. Boarhunter!