Chicken & Corn Tacos with Quick-Pickled Radishes, and "Meat in a Supporting Role"

I read this NY Times Mark Bittman article, "Meals with Meat in a Supporting Role," a few months ago and liked the "supporting role" for meat concept. It's basically a reminder that, even if you're not a vegetarian, changing your attitude about meat, and how much you eat of it, can have positive effects and be worth the extra effort. For instance, you'll decrease your impact on the environment since you'll be eating less meat per day.

 

I like to think about this concept as finding ways to stretch meat farther. Although other recipes would take that concept even farther, I think this chicken and corn tacos recipe is a good example of how to spread meat a little thinner by adding more vegetables. You make quite a few more tacos by adding corn in a substantial quantity, so the meat plays less of a central role.

The chicken and corn preparation is pretty standard, but what really takes these tacos to the next level are the additions. I decided to get even a bit more ambitious with the vegetables included by adding pickled radishes, and made a really simple quick recipe (they're basically instant - you can refrigerate them if you have time, but it doesn't have to be for long). I'd been wondering what it would be like to add a pickled vegetable, like you have in Vietnamese dishes, as an addition. If you like sour or vinegar-flavored things, they're delicious and super, super easy. They make the tacos taste punchier, and play off the cheese and avocado nicely.

Everything is rounded out by a salty cheese (see note below on the type), cilantro, and creamy avocado, so don't skip the toppings!

Chicken and Corn Tacos with Pickled Radishes
adapted from smitten kitchen and this pickled radish recipe
Makes about 8 tacos

Chicken and corn tacos
4 ears corn
2 T sriracha sauce
2 T apple cider or white vinegar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 t crushed red pepper
1 medium white onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1- 1.5 pounds skinless boneless chicken breast, cut into large pieces
1 T olive oil
juice of 2 limes
1/2 cup queso fresco (or another salty, crumbly cheese such as feta)
1/4 teaspoon chili powder
6-8 medium tortillas
salt to taste
1/2 T chopped cilantro
1/4 t chili powder
about 2 avocados

1. Mix sriracha sauce, vinegar, 1/2 t salt, juice of one lime, and crushed red pepper in a large bowl. Add chicken and stir to coat.You can marinade this ahead of time if you have time.
2. Brown chicken in olive oil for about five minutes, then add the chopped onion and garlic on medium heat. Turn heat to medium low until chicken cooks through. As chicken cooks, break up the chicken into bite-sized pieces.
3. As chicken is cooking, cut the corn off the cob.
4. Once chicken is cooked through, add remaining lime juice, corn, chili powder and salt to taste. Cook all for 3-5 minutes, until corn is tender but not mushy. Remove from heat.

Pickled Radishes
1 C chopped radishes
1/4 C water
1/2 C red wine vinegar
1/2 t salt
1/2 t sugar

Mix all ingredients in a glass jar or bowl, and refrigerate until ready to use. Once ready to eat, drain extra liquid from radishes.

Assembling tacos: Put chicken/corn mixture in tortilla, and add pickled radishes, chopped avocado, chopped cilantro, and queso fresco as desired.

Note on cheese: if you live in DC, check out Best World on Mount Pleasant Street for queso fresco.

Thai Market in Silver Spring

I've had a Thai cookbook for the past year or so which I've been meaning to try some recipes from, but I got stalled every time I did because I couldn't find all the ingredients at my typical grocery stores. Luckily, there are a few specialty grocery stores in the DC area that sell Thai groceries, and one in Silver Spring a short walk from the Silver Spring metro, called Thai Market.

 

As a huge food nerd, I thought this was a lot of fun. It was exciting to walk around a store with such a variety of unusual (to me) ingredients and pick things to try. In general, they have much more dried and canned items than fresh foods, but I found almost all of what I was looking for. And for really good prices. 

I bought: a couple types of dried red chiles, fresh green chiles, dried shrimp, jarred shrimp paste, oyster sauce, fresh lemon grass, fresh Thai basil, cardamom pods, garlic, dried kaffir lime leaves (which smell amazing), soba noodles, and several packages of really awesome-looking rice noodles for making Pad Thai and Drunken Noodles later.

I wanted to buy, but didn't want to carry home, one of their huge bags of jasmine rice.

They also had several types of coconut water and juice and lots of types of soy sauce and fish sauce... and a lot more.

I spent $50 on all of this, which I feel like is a really good price for the number of things I bought, especially since spices and sauces are usually expensive at regular grocery stores. I've been having fun trying out some of the things I bought, and will have a lot on hand for a while, so this is definitely a good place to go and stock up. And I'm sure I'll be back.

Breakfast Burrito Sauce

Some successful dishes are based on reading a recipe, being inspired by an idea you wouldn't have thought of, and perhaps having a new experience. Alternatively, others are based on a random flash of a thought that illuminates a hole in your food world and makes you crave an inexplicable food experience, or even emotion, and trying to create a recipe to fill that void.

This recipe is in the later category, as a couple of weeks ago I became obsessed with the idea of making a sweet but also spicy breakfast burrito sauce. I was thinking of making a homemade breakfast burrito sauce, and all of a sudden had a very specific image come to mind of a sauce that would combine different elements from a breakfast plate (picture maple syrup mingling with the huevos racheros). I ended up starting with a smokey tomate-chipotle sauce, and adding in maple syrup, cinnamon, and fruit preserves to try achieve this savory-sweet goal.

This recipe included an ingredient that I've been curious about, but haven't used before, canned chiles chipotles en adobo. They're basically a very smokey-tasking canned chile. The flavor is definitely kind of strong, so I would use them sparingly, but I liked the flavor.

I was really happy with how this sauce turned out; this is mostly a spicy sauce, but the sweet and fruity flavors come through, making it a more complex addition than the typical sauce to whatever you put it on. Honestly, I envisioned this as a breakfast burrito sauce, but I mostly ate it with fried eggs and cheese on toast. And it was pretty amazing, especially after sitting for a few days. I think pretty much how I pictured.

Breakfast Burrito Sauce

Adapted from Rick Bayless's Essential Quick-Cooked Tomato-Chipotle Sauce

Makes about 2 cups

3 canned chiles chipotles en adobo

4-5 garlic cloves

1 1/2 lbs (4-5 medium) tomatoes 

1/2 t salt

1 T olive oil

2 T apricot preserves

1 T maple syrup

1/4 t ground cinnamon

1. On a heavy, ungreased skillet over medium heat, roast the unpeeled garlic, turning occasionally, until blackened in spots and soft, about 15 minutes. Cool, slip off the papery skins, and roughly chop. 

2. Lay the tomatoes on a baking sheet and place about 4 inches below the top of the oven with the stove set to the broiler mode. When they blister, blacken and soften on one side, about 6 minutes, turn them over and roast on the other side. Cool, then peel, collecting all the juices with the tomatoes. 

3. Scrape the tomatoes and their juices into a food processor and add the canned chiles and garlic. Pulse the food processor until the mixture is nearly a puree. 

4. Heat the oil in a medium-sized saucepan over medium-high heat. When hot enough to make a drop of the puree sizzle, add the mixture from the food processor, as well as the apricot preserves, maple syrup, and cinnamon, and stir for 5 minutes as it sears and concentrates to an earthy, thickish sauce. Lastly, add the salt. 

Keeps for at least a week in the refrigerator.

Roasted Tomato - Jalapeno Salsa

July/August Theme: Homemade summer

Well, Readers, summer, and "homemade summer" here on the blog, are both coming to an end. I've tried to come up with some creative ideas for food items to make yourself over these last two months.

And while I think all of them turned out to be really interesting and are recipes that I'll continue to use, I will say this: if you decide based on this series to start making only one thing from scratch, I think it should be salsa. Because aside from all of the environmental reasons for cooking from scratch previously discussed, homemade salsa is just so much better tasting than store-bought salsa. I feel like the two should not even really be in the same category.


When I make my own salsa, I usually make a really simple tomato, onion, and cilantro salsa, but I decided to try and do something more ambitious. This recipe has pretty much the same basic ingredients, but you roast the tomatoes, garlic, and jalapenos before blending them in a food processor. This brought up a couple of new techniques for me: broiling tomatoes in the oven to roast them, and roasting unpeeled garlic along with jalapenos until they are blackened.

The result?

The roasted flavor is really good - it adds a lot of complexity to the flavor of the salsa - and I am also now questioning whether or not there is that much that smells better than garlic being roasted over a flame in its papery skin. So you don't want to miss that.




I made a double batch of this and after five days or so of eating it, mixed it with two avocados (so one avocado per recipe as below) to make a pretty amazing guacamole.

Lastly, I forgot to commemorate this at the time, but the blog was one year old as of July! The first post also happened to be a do-it-yourself recipe just like this one: homemade honey-mustard-ginger vinaigrette salad dressing.


Roasted Tomato-Jalapeno Salsa
From Rick Bayless's Mexican Kitchen: Capturing the Vibrant Flavor of a World-Class Cuisine 

Makes about 2 cups

1 pound (2 medium - large round or 6-8 plum) red, ripe tomatoes
2 large fresh jalapeno chiles
3 garlic cloves, unpeeled
salt, about 1/2 t
1/2 small or 1/3 medium white onion, finely chopped
1/3 C loosely packed chopped cilantro
1 1/2 t apple cider vinegar
juice of 1/2 lime

1. Cut the tomatoes in half, and lay on a baking sheet and place about 4 inches below a very hot broiler. Roast until blistered and blacked on one side, about 6 minutes; with a pair of tongs, flip the tomatoes and roast on the other side, about another 6 minutes.
2. While the tomatoes are roasting, roast the chiles and unpeeled garlic directly on an ungreased griddle or heavy skillet over medium heat. Turn occasionally until both chiles and garlic are blackened in spots and soft, 5-10 minutes for the chiles, and about 15 minutes for the garlic (remove the chiles from the pan once they are done). Cool, pull the stem off the chiles, and peel the papery skins from the garlic.
3. Once tomatoes are done: cool them, then peel the skins off, collecting any juices with the tomatoes.
4. In a food processor, grind the chiles (including seeds), garlic, and 1/4 teaspoon of the salt to a course paste, stopping to scrape down the sides of the bowl a couple of times. Add the tomatoes and pulse a few times until you have a course-textured puree. Transfer the salsa to a serving bowl, and stir in any reserved tomato juices.
5. Stir the finely chopped onion into the salsa, as well as the vinegar, other 1/4 teaspoon of salt, cilantro, and lime juice.

The salsa comes into its own a few hours after it's finished. Keeps in the refrigerator for at least a week.

Thai Stuffed Peppers

June Theme: International Food Issues & International Recipes



While I have to admit I can't completely vouch for the Thai authenticness of this recipe, I was drawn to it because of the mix of some interesting flavors for a stuffed peppers recipe, which I usually think of as being an Italian or all-American dish.



But the stuffed peppers have a completely different flavor in this case because of the cilantro, peanuts, and Thai flavors. I ate this with rice when I made it, because it does end up tasting like a lot of meat at once (so it could be interesting to add other vegetables to the pepper stuffing). Don't skip the fresh lime juice, which makes them taste really fresh!





Thai Stuffed Peppers

1 lb ground turkey
2 T Hoisin sauce
2 T soy sauce
1/2 C chopped peanuts
1 shallot, minced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 T fish sauce
1/4 t ground back pepper
1/2 C chopped fresh cilantro
1 T ground or fresh ginger
5-6 large sweet peppers (I used sweet cubanelle peppers)
Juice of one lime

1. Combine the turkey, peanuts, shallot, garlic, fish sauce, black pepper, soy sauce, Hoisin sauce, lime juice, and cilantro in a mixing bowl.
2. Cut the peppers in half lengthwise. Remove the seeds and membranes.
3. Stuff the turkey mixture into the pepper halves, mounding the mixture slightly.
4. Bake at 350 degrees F, uncovered, in a lightly-greased pan for 35-40 minutes, until meat is cooked through.

Adapted from Crossroads Cooking