Tag Archives: Recipes

Corned Beef and Cabbage

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As you all know, if you read this blog regularly, I was in Philadelphia for St. Patty’s Day this year.  While it was a traditional St. Patty’s Day with beer and bagpipes, I did not get to enjoy the traditional corned beef and cabbage.  One of my friends, who went to Philadelphia with me that week suggested that we get our own and use her families recipe for the corned beef.  So, last week, while I was in the grocery store, I saw a row of packages of corned beef that were tossed aside, not used, rejects from St. Patty’s Day.  So I bought one of the discounted corned beef’s, brought it home and planned on cooking it.  My schedule got so crazy last week that it didn’t end up happening, so instead I had my friends over last night.

First I boiled the corned beef.  I have a confession to make, I’m a chef and I use google all the time.  I googled how long you should boil a corned beef and I found a site that said 1 hour per pound.  This little baby was around 2 pounds.

While I was boiling the corned beef I made a glaze with 1/2 cup of sugar, a tablespoon of dijon mustard, and some ground cloves.  The recipe called for ground cardamom but I couldn’t find it in the store.  Once I finished boiling the corned beef I took it out and cut some of the fat off the top of it.  Then I lathered it with the glaze, put it in a pan with some aluminum foil on top and then put it in a three hundred and fifty degree oven.

You cook it for 1/2 hour and it comes out all nice and glazed.  While the corned beef was in the oven I cooked potatoes and cabbage in the same pot that I cooked the corned beef in.  Once done I sliced the corned beef, drained the potatoes and corned beef and enjoyed it!  The glaze had saturated the whole corned beef and it was sweet and salty.  

We all sat down in the living room to watch ‘The Voice’ and enjoy our dinner.  Even Zoe snuggled up in a blanket!

Dad’s Corned Beef Brisket

1         Disposal aluminum pan (11 x 9 x 2)

1         Flat cut corned beef brisket (boiled, about 5 lbs)

Vegetable cooking spray

 1/2 cup         Brown Sugar

1 tbsp         Dijon Mustard

1 tsp         Ground Cardamom

1/4 tsp         Ground Cloves

Instructions to glaze fork-tender boiled corned beef brisket.

Lightly coat disposable pan: arrange Corned Beef in disposable pan; whisk Glaze in a small Bowl, brush over Corned Beef; cover pan with aluminum foil. Poke holes in foil with fork.

Set pan on center rack. Bake 30 minutes @ 350º, or until Corned Beef is knife tender. Remove foil until Glaze is caramelized.

Meanwhile, boil Vegetables in salted water.

Slice into thin slices across grain to serve with Vegetables.

To recipe or not to recipe, that is the question……

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I just finished cooking for a workshop of hungry actor’s who were training at a month long intensive in Shakespeare.  Sunday night, as I was sitting at the bar soaking in the end of our time together, I was approached by one of the participants who said “I find it fascinating that you didn’t use any recipes during the workshop.”  I’ll tell all my blog readers a secret.  I don’t believe in recipes.  It’s not that I don’t believe in them but I have the voice of many culinary instructors in the back of my mind saying “A recipe is just a guideline.”

Truly, a recipe is a guideline or a map, if you will.  I will often google a recipe to get a basis for how I want to make something and then make it my own.  When you see recipe’s on this website that’s mainly for your benefit.  Often, when testing a recipe for you all, I have to stop what I’m doing, write it down and it makes the process much longer.  Working without recipes and creating something by tasting it and changing it is what creates the magic that I love in the kitchen.

That being said baking is completely different.  When you make you have to use a recipe because the measurements are so precise.  So in this new year I urge you all to be a little more free with your cooking.  Add something sweet to a salty recipe.  Find something in the fridge that needs to be used up and create a recipe around it.  Cooking can be as much fun or as much of a chore as you want.

Sweet Potato Corned Beef Hash

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I can’t remember the last time I ate a regular white potato.  As I’ve gotten older they just seem to have gone out of fashion.  Maybe it’s the years of being told not to eat anything white, sounds racist to me, white bread, white potatoes, white flour, etc.  My housemate is out of town for the holidays, I’m not happy about this at all, wink.  I’ve been enjoying some down time having the house to myself.  The reason I bring her up is because she is not much of a meat eater, actually she will only eat fish.  So I went to the grocery store the other day and perused the meat section knowing that I could cook as much meat as I wanted without a scented candle being lit to hide the smell from her.  I noticed some corned beef and decided to get it.  I cooked it Sunday evening and then when I woke up on Monday I had this incredible urge for corned beef hash and poached eggs.  I didn’t have any regular idaho potatoes, which is what I would usually use, but I did have a sweet potato so with reckless abandon I decided to go for it.

I got a huge yellow onion, cut about a quarter of it away and put the rest back.  I sliced it and then put it in a sauté pan with some olive oil.  

My goal was to caramelize the onions, which I do by two methods.  One, you can turn the heat on high and make sure you stir or shake the pan constantly.  Two, you can turn the heat on low and cook them for a long time.  I often go with number one but the trick is that you have to keep moving the pan around because if you don’t your onions will burn.

Then I diced one whole sweet potato and added it to the pan, I turned the heat down to a lower temperature and then covered the pan to let the sweet potatoes steam for a little while.  They didn’t take as long to cook as I thought they would.  While they were cooking I diced up about 3/4 cup of corned beef.  Once the sweet potatoes were cooked I added the corned beef and a little tiny dash of balsamic vinegar and dried thyme leaves.  The corned beef seemed very salty to me, saltier than usual, so I thought the acid would counter balance that.  That’s it!

 

 

I poached some eggs and put them on top.  Nothing like eggs and corned beef hash!  I almost wish that I had fried them but I only have one sauté pan!

 

 

Ron’s Sweet Potato Corned Beef Hash

Serves 2

1/4 Large Yellow Onion, sliced

1 Sweet Potato, Diced

3/4 cup diced corned beef

Thyme Leaves

Olive Oil

Salt and Pepper

1.  Slice onion, put in sauté pan with olive oil and slightly caramelize

2.  Dice potato and add to pan, cover and cook until tender.

3.  Add diced corned beef to the pan.  Cover again and cook until corned beef is warmed through.  Add a dash of balsamic vinegar, thyme leaves and taste.  Add more salt and pepper if needed.

Ron’s Rum Balls

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I don’t know why but I’ve been on the theme of things with two words that I love. If you saw my newest video you saw the pasta alla vodka. If you know me at all you know that I love pasta but really love my vodka. I mean really love my vodka. One more time, I really love my vodka. You get the picture.

Anyway, the other day I was watching a video from another chef on a dessert that has two of my other favorite words in it, rum and balls!!! I, being a chef not a pastry person, don’t do dessert very much but thought to give this a try. Here is the link to the recipe.

I kind of followed the recipe but not really. I got a box of fudge brownie mix, Duncan Hines, made the recipe and then added 1/3 cup of rum. I mixed it around and then made balls and put in the freezer. I then melted some dark chocolate and dipped the cold balls in the chocolate. Then put them back in the fridge for a little while. They were the awesome compliment to the dinner party I had last night.

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A Foodie’s Life- Episode 6, Pasta Alla Vodka!

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This week on the show I include two of my favorite ingredients, pasta and vodka!  I really do love my vodka, some nights too much.  I made this for a dinner party about a week and a half ago.  I’m actually having more people over tonight and they’ve asked for the same thing, so I’m making it tonight!

Anyway, here you go!  Enjoy it!