blue artichoke

Museums, gardens and attractions are all fine, but when I travel, I like to sight-see in the aisles of local grocery stores or farmer's markets. I like browsing through food, noting regional differences in brands or offerings and examining unfamiliar products. My mom and I went on a grocery-tour through Norway several years ago, and I still have packets of pudding mixes and bags of dried edible flowers. Gone are the reindeer sausages and jars of cloudberries and lingonberry jam (lingonberry jam is now available here).

Every spring when we go to Mexico, I make sure to include a stop to the local grocery store and downtown markets to see what new treasures I can find. The first year, I came back with about a dozen packets of powdered juice mixes in exotic flavors, such as hibiscus, guava, coconut, tamarind and cinnamon. Last year, I brought back several bars of guava paste, a bag of vanilla sugar and a bag of cinnamon sugar. The vanilla sugar is almost gone; I haven't opened the cinnamon sugar yet. I've been hanging on to the guava paste, wondering what the heck to do with it, and finally found a recipe for guava-glazed grilled pork. My recipe yielded 12 servings; sometimes I would make the full recipe to save the copious leftovers for fast weeknight meals. Unsure of how I'd like guava glaze, though, I scaled back the recipe to use just one 1# pork tenderloin. I still had leftovers, but not 10 servings worth, which is a bit of a shame because the pork was fantastic!

It charred a bit on the outside and looked all dried out, but that was just the spice rub. Inside was moist and tender, and once brushed with the glaze, the dry outside soaked in the glaze and was nicely spicy-sweet. The flavor was rather unusual, but pleasing. I'm now regretting a little bit that I don't have a freezer full of leftovers. I do, however, have lots of guava paste leftover; I used only 3 of the 21 ounces. This morning I searched Cooking with Google for more recipes that use guava paste and found recipes for cakes, pastries, bars and savories. GC and I are about to embark on a guavadventure!

Though I got this guava paste in Mexico, it is available in some large grocery stores in the international food aisle, or in smaller international markets.

The original version of this recipe is from Cooking Light. What follows is the scaled-down and tweaked version I used.

Pork Tenderloin with Spicy Guava Glaze

1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1 1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon ground coriander
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 (1-pound) pork tenderloin, trimmed
2 teaspoons salt
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
2 tablespoons orange juice
1/3 cup water
2 teaspoons cider vinegar
3 ounces commercial guava paste
1 garlic clove, minced
1/3 jalapeño pepper, minced
Cooking spray

Prepare grill.

Combine first 6 ingredients in a small bowl. Sprinkle pork with 2 teaspoons salt, and rub pork with the garlic powder mixture.

Combine onion and remaining ingredients except cooking spray in a small saucepan over medium heat; bring to a boil. Cook 4 minutes or until guava paste dissolves, stirring constantly. Reduce heat, and simmer 4 minutes or until thickened, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat.

Place pork on grill rack coated with cooking spray; grill 20 minutes or until a thermometer registers 160° (slightly pink), turning pork occasionally. Brush guava mixture over pork. Let stand 10 minutes before slicing into 1/2-inch-thick slices.

Yield: 3 servings (serving size: 3 ounces pork)

CALORIES 195(19% from fat); FAT 4.1g (sat 1.4g,mono 1.8g,poly 0.4g); PROTEIN 24.4g; CHOLESTEROL 74mg; CALCIUM 17mg; SODIUM 467mg; FIBER 0.8g; IRON 1.7mg; CARBOHYDRATE 14.2g
Cooking Light, SEPTEMBER 2006

Getting to Know All About You: What's your favorite thing to grill?

Posted by Blue Artichoke at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday didn't lend itself to fancy cooking, so we will wander to Costa Rica tonight and I'll post the results tomorrow. Last night we had Latin-Style Flank Steak and Argentinian Grilled Eggplant leftovers from Saturday night, for the first time I can remember serving leftovers the day after serving the original meal. I did make a new side dish, though, so it wasn't a complete repeat meal. Using the extra corn I had grilled, I made Creamed Grilled Corn. The steak and eggplant were pretty good too, so I'll share all three recipes.

Latin-Style Flank Steak

Steak had a really nice flavor, but I overcooked it somehow. I grilled for ~15m and it temped 137 in the thickest part; removed it from the grill and let it sit for ~10m. It was well done in the thinner part and medium-well in the thick part. Next time, I'll check it after 10m. Flavor was really good, though, and it was easy to prepare. Chipotle butter was good on the steak (and in the omelet I made the next morning). I have a lot left over; so halving the butter would be better. It’s pretty hot, even with decreasing the amount of chipotle.

Rub:
2-½ T. ground cumin
1 T. chili
1 T. ground coriander
1 ½ t. freshly ground black pepper
½ t. ground cinnamon
½ t. dried oregano
Steak:
1 ½ - 2# flank steak, trimmed of any excess fat and membrane
1 t. olive oil
1 t. kosher salt
1 recipe Chipotle Butter*

Rub: Mix all in a small bowl.
Grill: 30m before grilling, coat the steak with the oil and pat on all of the rub, coating evenly. Heat a gas grill to med high (you should be able to hold your hand 2” above the grate for 3-4s) or prepare a med-hot charcoal fire. Sprinkle both sides of steak with salt. If your grill has a hot spot, position the thicker end of the steak near the hottest spot. Grill until med-rare, 12-15m, turning steak every 3-4m to ensure even cooking. The thickest part of the steak will register 135-140 on an instant-read thermometer. Transfer to a cutting board and let rest 3-5m. Slice as you like. Portion onto dinner plates. Immediately cut the chilled butter into ¼” slices and set a slice or two on each serving while the steak is warm, using a scant T. of butter per serving.

Serves 4-6.
Serve with beer, such as pale ale.

*Chipotle Butter:
¼# (1/2 c.) unsalted butter, completely softened at room temp
2 canned chipotle chiles in adobo, stemmed, seeded and minced
2 T. fresh lime juice
Scant t. ground cumin
½ t. kosher salt; more to taste

In a small bowl, cream butter with a wooden spoon ‘til smooth. Add rest, blending until evenly incorporated. Taste and add more salt if needed. Using plastic wrap to shape and smooth, mold butter into a log ~1 ½” in diameter. Wrap well in plastic and transfer to the fridge (or freezer if in a hurry) to firm.

Yield: ~8 T.

Use leftover chipotle butter on hamburgers, grill pork tenderloin and corn on the cob.

Fine Cooking, June/July 2003

Argentinian Grilled Eggplant
Used one white and one purple-and-white-speckled eggplant from the farmer’s market. Good. Had too much spice blend; should have halved it, but the eggplant grilled well, didn’t stick to the grate and wasn’t oily tasting at all. Omitted hot red pepper flakes because I was serving the eggplant with Latin-Style Flank Steak with chipotle butter. Thought hot red pepper would be too hot with the chipotle butter too.

2 cloves garlic, minced
3 T. olive oil
1 t. dried oregano
1 t. dried basil
½ t. dried thyme
1 t. hot or sweet paprika
½ t. hot red pepper flakes (optional)
3 eggplants, cut crosswise into ½” slices
Salt and pepper, to taste

Preheat grill to high.

Mix minced garlic with oil in small bowl. Mix herbs, paprika and pepper flakes together and set aside.

Brush one side of each eggplant slice with garlic oil and place oiled side down on grill. Brush top side with oil. Cook slices until browned, 3-5m; turn. Sprinkle eggplant with herb mixture and add salt and pepper to taste. Cook another 3-5m. Serve hot.

Serves 6-8.

Creamed Grilled Corn

Active time: 30 min Start to finish: 50 min (includes preparing charcoal grill)
I used skim milk and 4 ears of fresh farmer’s market corn, grilled and cut from cobs the day before. This dish comes together really quickly. I used my Magic Bullet blender to puree the corn with the milk, so it didn't make a lot of dirty dishes. Excellent. Really sweet, but naturally so; rather light and refreshing. I love corn.

4 ears corn (2 lb total), shucked
1/2 cup 2% milk
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh basil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper

If using a charcoal grill, open vents on bottom of grill, then light charcoal. Charcoal fire is hot when you can hold your hand 5 inches above rack for 1 to 2 seconds. If using a gas grill, preheat burners on high, covered, 10 minutes.

Grill corn on lightly oiled grill rack, uncovered, turning, until kernels on all sides are tender and browned in patches, 10 to 15 minutes total.

Cut corn off cobs (discard cobs) and purée 1/2 cup kernels with milk in a blender until smooth. Pour purée into a 2-quart heavy saucepan and stir in basil, salt, pepper, and remaining corn kernels. Cook over low heat, covered, stirring occasionally, until heated through, about 5 minutes.

Cooks' note:
•If you aren't able to grill outdoors, cook corn ears in a hot lightly oiled well-seasoned ridged grill pan over moderately high heat. Each serving contains about 96 calories and 2 grams fat.

Makes 4 servings.

Gourmet, August 2003

Posted by Blue Artichoke at 03:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)