say hello to my little friend - or is that sey hallo tu maij leetle frend?

Rellenos are my buddies. Stuffed peppers baby, one of my favorites. If I go to a Mexican restaurant - and its rare that I do - I always order a chile relleno, I dont care how bad they are I always have to have a relleno. For the most part those rellenos are a roasted chile pepper stuffed with cheese and fried, a very good starting point, but I like to turn those babies upside down.

Most of you have probably seen a typical platter from a Mexican restaurant - entree, rice and beans with a little shredded lettuce and some diced tomato or a pico de gallo - pretty standard. What if you put those goodies inside of the pepper instead? It could work, a little protein substitution and bada bing bada boom.

For starters the chiles, poblanos in this case, need to be roasted and when I say "poblanos in this case" I am not singling these guys out, no - all chiles are better roasted unless you are making relish.

Stuff them in a plastic bag, a paper bag or put under a moist towel - or do what I did and tear a paper bag open and wet it before covering the hot roasted chiles.

After the chiles have cooled you can peel them under running water and the skins will slide right off, at this point stuff them. I stuffed them with house ground chicken, skin and fat and all, roasted and chopped poblano chile, a mix of grated mozzarella and cheddar cheeses, herbs and spices like green onion and salt and secrets galore with a nice base of toasty brown rice.

Flour them then egg them then flour them again.

Fry them to golden perfection. You are now ready to plate them up but before we do that I have a little contest and the winner will get a prize, if the prize is more important than the contest then you should disqualify yourself now but if you like a mysterious challenge then proceed. Modern decor didnt wake you up Bathroom cabinets meant nothing to you, why would a handful of baubles be any different?

What are these? (hint) they come in other shapes as well. [I didnt zoom in because I want this to be as easy as possible - there is one person out there that might know and I have to disqualify her before hand - sorry] The answer is one word.

Chiles rellenos they way I have grown to like them - fat and large and full of flavor.

Christmas Eve - stockings stuffed - traditions galore - bring on the abundance

No matter what I will never get tired of tamales. Tamale making is a big part, no a huge part of my cultural heritage and while we may not gather around in huge extended family groups here in New York City we still get the job done, well I get the job done. I am pretty fast at throwing together a couple dozen tamales and I do it often throughout the year but it is at this time of year that these little wrapped packages of chile goodness take on their magic. Modern decor can abound but the simple tamale will always shine in its perfection. How perfect is a corn husk wrapped around corn masa wrapped around your favorite filling?

When I was a kid in New Mexico my mom and grandmothers and aunts would get together and make massive quantities of these bad boys and because of the sheer volume of of tamales produced the "tamalada" was a big deal. (a tamalada is simply a tamale making party but you can google it for a more specific definition) As a result we all grew up thinking making tamales was a lot of work and it is when you are making enough for our huge clan - that translates into dozens and dozens and dozens and then dozens more.

Around these parts I make a couple dozen whenever the mood hits, 24 tamales is really no big deal and if you want to search "tamale" on my blog you will see how often I make them throughout the year. Did I tell you how much I love tamales? I think of my old friend Buffalo Dick now whenever I make them since he always thought making tamales was similar to climbing Mount Everest, complete with Sherpas and extreme conditions and I wish I could have had the chance to show him how easy it really is - Buffalo you will always be on my mind.

Nostalgia is a big part of the end of the year and I wanted to take the time to reflect back on what a wonderful year it has been. Sure there have been some setbacks and some loss but when it is all said and done the beauty and the hope always shines through. We have all grown as people, as bloggers, as writers, as artists, as cooks and most importantly as a community. What ever holiday you celebrate I hope it brings you joy and if you were anywhere near me you would be receiving a little tamale gift(s) because someone told me once that giving tamales at the end of the year will bring both the giver and the receiver a wealth of abundance so my virtual friends I give you ALL tamales! (vegan, vegetarian, chicken, pork and sweet - you can have your pick and just so you know how non traditional I keep this tradition the tamale plate pictured above is wild mushroom and queso de oaxaca with simple red chile sauce - vegetarian all the way and take out the cheese and its vegan). HAPPY HOLIDAYS and A PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR!

got mussels?

wierd spicy lemony broth and not a mollusk for the meek

We went to an all you can eat buffet in Nassau County, Harvest Buffet, and it was a doozy! There were things I have never seen let alone heard of and they seemed to be crowd favorites, but I guess thats the price you pay in a predominantly Korean neighborhood. The offerings were plentiful and fresh and refreshed often. So much sushi but we held back not wanting to fill up on rice, and all kinds of things in shells and salads made out of salad things I would have never thought of, grilled eel every way imaginable, carving table with crispy roast duck and tapioca pearls out the wazoo! We are totally going to go to this place again and again!



roll after roll and piece after piece



really tasty coconut broth with pasta and scallops and mussels and??



stuffed scallop that was so good you could only eat one, I tried a second at it was too rich



pumpkin, taro and date soup in coconut broth



one of many salad versions, mystery greens with grilled eel




tapioca pearls with cantalope and honeydew



mystery tapioca with mango -there was tapicoa and bubble tea galore!

We hardly scratched the surface of eating and I dont think repeated visits are going to be any different.

fancy food

What do most people like, fancy food or comfort food or comfort fancy food? Of course we want it to look good so then 'fancy' becomes subjective, of course we want it to taste good so then fancy has no purpose, of course we want quality and thats where fancy can share the stage with comfort. I think for most people its all of the above. I hop makes pancakes 'fancy', for example, and it works, they seem to taste better because they look better, put ice cream in anything called a 'terrine' and you feel fancy. I have a kid and he eats everything I offer him, he has friends who do not. His friends do not have the palate that my kid has because of their perceptions of what is 'fancy', you see to them I hop is the bomb but a crepe with honey and a mild chevre topped with fresh vanilla cream is not. Not that my kid is the Frank Bruni of kids because he is not it is more the point of learning to eat. I grew up eating anything that came from the farm and that included some funky cheese and goat parts that should have remained goat parts, plus the summer months of melons and tomatoes and cucumbers and all kinds of veggies galore (finally I get galore in there again) so I have no fear of food. Maybe this is a post about food fear? What about you? For a long while when I was young I did not eat squash (BUT I loved calabaza - google) because of its conjugations with 'squish' it sounded 'mushy' even though I did not know what it was. (turned out to be mushy after all) but I do like it now.

I guess I forgot to mention is that while I no longer live in the country, the country certainly lives in me. I like the exploration and I am thrilled and glad to have you with me.

Squash.... makes sense right? what if I offered you some vegetable called.......'broken'...some foul smelling green... and it actually tasted good, and in another language it was called 'creamy grass' or some word like 'pasto' and then it wasnt 'broken' anymore.... explain.

pascua

Free form.




Homemade basket





Its Easter Sunday and that only means one thing, thats so funny it means many things but one thing is the Easter Promenade on Fifth Avenue. Silly hats galore. We colored eggs. We made papier mache hats. We are ready to rock this joint. Later, when we get back, I will post pictures of all the fun. We went last year but the kid was out of town so he will see it this year and this will be the first time with us wearing hats!

Thinking

As I ponder a food challenge I google. I google 'grilled fruit' and grilled fruit galore is available for your viewing pleasure. Man oh man.





Mostly looking for ideas and inspiration and just to have a look then I google 'fried pickles' - who knew? I imagined the ripple cut but never the - long - the pickle spear. Looks like fried pickles even comes - varietal. I like the ripple cut since the spear seems too - juicy. Gear up we got a milkyway coco fruity avocado delight stewing.

Adore Galore

I have over 300 photos from our little excursion to New Mexico, Banana has about 400 and the Pup has around 200 so I have been mentally sorting through them to only bring the highlights, its not easy. We drove about 100 miles everyday in search of whatever it was we were searching for; and whatever it was we found it still didnt stop us from going ou the next day. It should be taken into consideration that my parents house is 30 miles from Albuquerque so going there and back is 60 already.



Winter wonderland at the SunGod Lodge



Rio Grande Gorge. This was scary as the bridge would vibrate and wiggle a little when the semis would pass and the narrow walking path on both sides was slightly elevated about 10 inches and covered in frozen snow.




Some New Mexico buildings are so damn photogenic.



Santurario de Chimayo (google it)




Postcard Perfect.



Gotta have some skeletons.



And some window displays.



The snow was in the mountains, in the valley it was nice enough to catch these big catfish. I fileted them breaded them and fried them and we ate them so fast you will have to imagine how good they looked and tasted.