Thursday, April 29, 2010
Monday, April 26, 2010
Garden Me
It's spring time here at Boilermaker Kitchen, which can only mean one thing. A garden! Yep, it's my first spring in an actual house since I left the desert air of Arizona behind. I had some summer gardens in Connecticut while I was there, but this will be my first all season plot. I'm a little excited, and a lot freaked out. I joined the Lafayette gardening online community to get some tips and hints with this part of the country. My main goal is to not over water my plants (this is because in Arizona you water your garden twice a day thanks to the blistering heat).Friday, April 23, 2010
Beef Stroganoff

Stroganoff is one of those dishes that I grew up making one way, only to find out you can make it an entirely different way only a short time ago. Beef tenderloin as the meat source? That still boggles my mind, as I would never use such an expensive cut of meat in a dish that I consider old fashioned home cooking. But maybe that's just me being cheap. I also tried the revamped recipe from Cook's Illustrated, which used sirloin tip (a somewhat cheaper cut), but surprisingly I did not like their recipe at all. Odd, I thought to myself, rarely do I not enjoy a recipe from ATK. Well, as it turns out, it just was not for me.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
A Reason to Eat Pears

Monday, April 12, 2010
The Chile Relleño Omelet
During my recent trip to Vegas, I discovered a restaurant serving what I consider to be one of the better breakfasts I have eaten, a chile relleño omelet. Never one to simply have something once, I decided to give them a go at home.
There are some obvious differences when cooking at home compared to what you are served at a restaurant. For example, I never cook omelets with four eggs, but that (or three) is pretty much the standard at a restaurant. Big deal? Not usually, but I was planning on stuffing a pretty good amount of stuff into this omelet. I'll be honest, my first one completely fell apart (I ate that one and gave the nice one to my wife). I believe this is more about patience than anything, having the omelet set up really helps you manipulate it as needed.Monday, March 29, 2010
My Time in Vegas (or That Time I Got Married) Part 2
More on the Vegas trip-
Freed's Bakery
Vegas seems to be all about deception. Go on the strip, see the glitz, and be overwhelmed. Go off the strip and see another simple desert city. But while the strip is hiding price gouging and mediocre food, the area off the strip is hiding some just plain amazing restaurants (like The Egg and I or Donna Maria's). Well, we went for the wedding cake off the strip for this occasion. Rachel Ray had visited Freed's a long time ago for wedding cake by the slice, and I figured it was worth a shot. What a deceptive décor though! Located in a strip mall, the sign is simply a banner hung from screws flapping in the wind. No fanfare, nothing. But this place has been Zagat rated and mentioned in all kinds of publications all over the world. Their pastry counter looked amazing, and the éclair my mom tried was outstanding. The wedding cake, as you can see in the picture, was just stunning. A "Mad Hatter" cake with angled layers, beautiful decorating, and so much detail I cannot even begin to explain it all. It was quite tasty too, if a bit heavy on the filling. If you ever have a sweet tooth, I strongly recommend stopping by.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
My Time in Vegas (or That Time I Got Married) Part I
I finally did it. Em and I got hitched last weekend (on Pi Day!) in Las Vegas. I highly recommend it. We even took our parents with us and they had a great time. And of course, as with all of my travels, there was a lot of emphasis placed on food. This is my second trip to Vegas in about 4 years, and I am very happy to say I fared much better this time around. Word of advice, next time you travel, take some time and do a little bit of research. I plowed through a lot of sites, including Frommers and TripAdvisor, and I found a lot of useful information, not to mention ways to save money.
But before I get to talking about food, a wedding picture :)
Yes, we had a lot of fun. It's so easy to get married in Vegas. Now on to the food!
Friday, March 19, 2010
Egg Tostadas with Black Beans and Salsa
Again with the leftovers! Well, when you buy tostadas, you usually have some leftover. If you don’t want to make chips with them, I would suggest breakfast. Yep, pick up and eat breakfast tostadas. It reminds me of the days I used to eat huge breakfast burritos at Viva Burrito in Tucson, a warm, spicy breakfast that kept me full well into the day.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Enchiladas from Leftovers
With the pork tostadas I made the other night, I certainly had leftovers. And I was feeling something a bit different. Emily suggested enchiladas. Now, I have to give a small amount of background here. I always have ingredients for enchiladas at hand (the same goes for a chocolate cake, you can never be too careful). Why? Because enchiladas offer a lot of versatility and can easily be made into dinner. Take some tortillas, wrap it around a nice warm filling, place it in a pan, pour sauce and/or cheese over it, and bake until bubbly. Boom, dinner. And you can put so much into an enchilada, that's why I like them so much. I put leftover shredded meats, rice, beans, whatever I can find that sounds good together. You could even make them for breakfast.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Tamale Pie Redux
I had some interesting comments on my aforementioned post. So while I was making this dish last night for dinner, I did alter a few things as well as clarify. Plus, this gives me a great oppurtunity to put another picture of Molly (almost a year!) on my blog. A few points.

