Tag: lime

The first thing I made for Tapasgeddon, in order to get me in the mood for the rest of the cooking, was a white sangria. This one is loosely based upon this recipe, but I felt the need to make a few flavor additions:

• 3 Pears, cubed
• 2 Apples, cubed
• 2 Pinot Grigio
• 2 Ginger Beers
• 1 oz. Mint, lightly chopped and macerated
• 2 Tbsp. Lime Juice
• 1 Tbsp. Lemon Juice

In true slacker fashion, I basically chopped stuff up and threw it all together.

So far, it's good. I can't wait to taste it after it mellows a bit.

We have this big bag of chicken breasts in the freezer. Not the good, boneless, dinner-in-ten-minutes kind, but the genetically enhanced, buffalo-breast, bone-in stewing kind. Tonight, I figured I'd try the bake-and-broil method to cook it.

I started by sweating some onions and garlic over medium-low heat, then increasing the heat to medium and dumping in:

1. A glazing liquid. (I used half soy sauce and half molasses; you could use honey, or heck, even mango syrup). About 1/2 cup.

2. One green herb. I used a little mexican oregano; thyme and/or rosemary might have been better, but I didn't have any.

3. One egg yolk. Just to make it more glaze-y.

4. Some small additions. For me- pepper, a spritz of lime juice, one crushed dried red pepper, and a little salt (not much- soy sauce, remember?)

After all this, I had a thick brown liquid that smelled like pureed awesome. I folded a long piece of aluminum foil into thirds, dumped in one breast, made a pouch, and slathered it with sauce. (Two breasts total, so I split it among both).

Next, the bake-then-broil. While the pouches of aluminum foil are closed, bake on 350 degrees for about half an hour- then, open the tops and broil on full blast for three-five minutes until the onions start to caramelize.

It was wonderful. The foil kept the chicken from drying out, and the glaze, once broiled in, was enough to make this dish a repeat customer.

(Editor's Note: For some reason, Food Mime was logged into my box. I have sentenced him to scrubbing random vegetables. For the good of mankind. )

Hobo fortnight continues, as Vitamin A scrounges around her computer for something of Lost-Ark significance- my Recently Paid Credit Card.

Finding money in my account, through the magic of FINANCIAL ALCHEMY, I quickly ran up my total at the nearest grocery store, buying the cheapest food I could get my grubby insane little hands on. (Editor's Note: Teleolurian has freakishly long fingers. This would be a lot of food.)

Part of my purchase was plantains. I've mentioned them before, in a bananas article. I wanted to make some tostones. So I followed what few instructions I could remember without actually having to follow a recipe. Because I hate recipes with all my cold, Korean heart.

First, I tried to peel them. Ladies and gentlemen, peeling a plantain like a banana is fool's work. Plantain skins are like alligator handbags. They don't just fall apart, you gotta have something sharp to get at the tasty/valuable insides. For this, I used my favorite EXTREMELY SHARP HOLY CRAP chef's knife, which of course went through it like (1) hot butter, (2) cold air, (3) so many tortured screams of joy at my shiny awesome knife.

Once I'd made the incision, the skin came off like a prom dress. Next, I cut the plantain (which NOW finally looks like a banana, and not the Cousin-Itt version of one) into half-inch diagonals. Ladies? Gentlemen? If you spend money on one thing in your house, make it a 10" knife.

Next, I dumped obscene amounts of shortening into the smallest skillet I owned. It looked like Antarctica.

Once that all melted over medium-high, I dumped in just as many plantain chips as would cover the bottom. Now, as we should know from reading this site, tostones are plantain chips that are (1) fried (2) flattened (3) fried again. For your assistance, here is a small MSPaint diagram:

So, I scorched them all brown. Cross reference: chicken.

Next, I 'flattened' them. How I was to do that I wasn't sure, but in the absence of a meat tenderizer I used a fork. Squiggly maggots of white plantain flesh came up between the tines. (Oh, did I ruin your appetite?)

Next, I refried them. Now, I had two options:

Brown Sugar And Orange Juice: After taste testing, I REALLY wanted to candy them. Unfortunately, brown sugar wasn't on my menu.

Lime Juice and Salt: BINGO. I had some wonderful tostone-chips. They tasted like fried superawesomeness. I can't begin to describe them. WHAT ARE YOU DOING SURFING THE WEB? GO BUY PLANTAINS!!!

When one reflects on the banana as food, several key foods come to mind- banana bread, bananas foster, and the king of sundaes, the banana split. South of the United States, plantains are an important part of Cuban, Puerto Rican, and Latin American fare. Whatever the origins, bananas and plantains are far too versatile to be ignored in the kitchen.

Cavendish No More?

Picture a banana in your head. More likely than not, that mental image is of the Cavendish banana, a cultivar bred for durability (and not particularly for taste). The Cavendish is a polyploid breed- it has extra chromosomes in its genetic makeup, making the plant more durable. However, the Cavendish will most likely not be the most common banana in the near future.

In the 1950's, the most common banana export was the Gros Michel; however, a banana-unfriendly fungus known as Panama disease wiped Big Mike off the map. A new strain of Panama disease, called tropical race four, has recently begun to attack the Cavendish cultivar. Since Panama disease is resistant to fungicides, the Cavendish may soon be replaced by a different type of banana in world trade.

Cooking with Plantains

The plantain is starchier and less sweet than your everyday banana, making it less suitable for raw eating (unless very ripe) and much more suitable for use in cooking.

If you've never done yourself the favor of trying Carribean cuisine, you'll be amazed at what can be done with a single ingredient. Plantains can be cooked at any stage of ripeness, and the difference in flavor between a fried green plantain and a fried ripe one is subtle and fantastic.

Preparation is very simple. Tostones are green plantains, cut into one-inch diagonal slices, and fried in oil until brown; then they are flattened and fried again. Without further addition, these are delectable; however, traditional Dominican tostones are topped with sour cream and red or black caviar. The Venezuelan version, called patacones, are treated more like tostadas and are covered with shredded meat, cheese, and chopped lettuce.

Maduros, on the other hand, are very ripe- so ripe that the skin of the plantain is brown to black- and the slices are fried once until golden brown. Traditionally, these are served plain.

You can also slice green plantains very thin and deep-fry them to make chips; I find these superior to potato chips (especially with a little lime juice and salt).