BARBECUE SEASON: Salads

Spring is here!  And with Spring, comes nice weather.  With nice weather, comes spending more time outside.  And with spending more time outside, comes that unmistakable scent in the air that you can smell coming from backyards and balconies of apartment buildings.  The scent of barbecue season!

Ingredients for Chef Nairby's Cheesy Vegetable Medley

That smell, of course, comes from the meats being fired on the grill.  Hamburgers, hot dogs, sausages, steaks, chicken, pork, ribs and so on.  But one mainstay of the typical barbecue that is often overlooked when we think of that time of the year are the salads.

When I was growing up, every barbecue had three 'default' salads: coleslaw, macaroni salad and potato salad.  Almost always bought from a grocery store.  But sometimes you would have someone who would also make a great big batch of something homemade.  Usually a tuna and macaroni salad.

Cheese Sauce!

While I liked and grabbed a portion of the grocery store default salads, I would always favor the homemade batch.  Homemade salads for the barbecue have always had their own unique flavor to them, and because there was always a lot more available compared to the store-bought salads, I would always eat more of the homemade stuff.  But as good as the homemade salad tasted, it never seemed to measure up in flavor when compared to the salads from the grocery store.  And the reason is simple.

For lack of a better term, people half-assed their homemade salad.  In the case of the barbecues I always went to, the homemade salad was always tuna macaroni.  And it was always the same.  A bunch of eggshell macaroni mixed with tuna, mayonnaise and onions.

Love the colors!

I can't help but think that the reason people did the minimum with their homemade salads was because they figured that they were more of a garnish for the protein than anything else.  Like the parsley on a plate that is only added to give a dish some color.

Cheese sauce added.  One more step to go before oven-ing!

Top with more cheese!  Who doesn't love cheese!

Out of the oven!!!

I say screw that!  If you are going to make a homemade salad to bring to a barbecue, why not give the protein some competition?  When you think about it, the flavor of the protein at a barbecue depends on what it is marinated with, and because of that, a lot of the proteins taste the same every time and every year.  If you really want to make a memory, try having everybody at the barbecue wondering who made the salad, wanting the recipe and excited for the next Spring and Summer get together because maybe your memorable homemade salad will be there!  And making a great and memorable salad for a barbecue is not hard to do.  You just need to think outside the eggshell macaroni, tuna, onions and mayonnaise box.

Chef Nairby's Cheesy Vegetable Medley!

CHEF NAIRBY’S CHEESY VEGETABLE MEDLEY

This vegetable medley is packed with flavor, creamy cheese and awesomeness!

INGREDIENTS

-4 Avocados, separated (3 for the cheese sauce, 1 chopped for the medley.  (Soft, but not too soft.  We’re going to mash the ones for the cheese sauce up nicely!)

-1 TBSP butter

-300g Goat cheese, separated (3/4 for cheese sauce, the rest for topping and baking)

-1 cup milk

-2 TBSP plain yogurt

-4 Zucchini, chopped into bite sized pieces

-2 cups sliced mushrooms

-1 pint (about 2 cups) grape/cherry tomatoes, sliced in half

-450g grated cheddar, separated (half for the cheese sauce, half for topping and baking)

-1 19oz (540ml) can of dark red kidney beans, drained

-1-2 TBSP fresh chopped dill

-Salt and ground black pepper to taste

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 375.

2. Using an electric hand mixer or food processor, mash up the avocado until fluffy like mashed potatoes.

3. On low to medium heat, melt butter in a medium-to-large sized pot or sauce pan.  Add milk when melted.  Stir until combined.

4. Raise heat to medium.  Add ¾ of the goat cheese.  Stir gently until combined and creamy.

5. Add half of the grated cheddar cheese.  Continue stirring until combined.

6. Add the mashed avocado, yogurt and chopped dill.  Continue stirring until combined.

7. In a large bowl, toss zucchini, mushrooms, tomatoes, chopped avocado, kidney beans, salt and pepper until nicely mixed.  Add the cheese sauce and stir gently until all nicely combined.  Empty into a deep baking pan that has been sprayed with non-stick cooking spray.

8. Top with other half of grated cheddar and remaining ¼ of goat cheese, broken up into chunks and scattered.

9. Bake in oven for 10-15 minutes.  Remove from oven, empty into a large pot or bowl, mix and serve.  Can be served warm or cold!

Chef Nairby

MOTHER INDIA AT HOME

I have been a lover of Indian food for several years now.  But for as long as I have loved to eat it, actually making it was something I avoided for most of those years.  I would do like a lot of people do and look for the pre-made sauces in a jar, add a protein and call it Indian food.  I was content.  But as my love for cooking entered a more serious level in 2015 and I quickly ditched the pre-made ingredients wherever I could, I knew in the back of my head that I would eventually enter the world of cooking my favorite cuisine the proper way.  I kept avoiding it, though.  I knew enough to know that Indian food is not like making your own pasta sauce from scratch, and it was important for me to go into it with a decent amount of experience of proper cooking.

As luck would have it, my mother works for an Indian restaurant in Glasgow, Scotland, and the owner is not your typical businessman with a love for the restaurant business, but an actual Chef.

Chef Monir Mohammed, owner of Mother India restaurant in Glasgow, had just recently released his recipe book, "Mother India at Home".  My mom suggested to me that perhaps I would be interested in a copy.  I said yes and Chef Mohammed was kind enough to send me a signed copy, via my mother, of his book.

Chef Monir's Butter Chicken fresh out of the oven!

I received the book in short time and quickly discovered that this was not the typical kind of cookbook that I was used to, simply filled with recipes and pictures of the dishes.  This book is also a biography with pictures, not only of the dishes, but of family, friends and kitchen brigade.  As someone who has had a love for cooking ever since cooking classes in 7th grade, this cookbook was a welcome experience compared to the few others I had in my possession.

An inspiring story of growing up in a small 4 bedroom flat with 9 people, eventually being forced out because of dangers of literally falling into a hole in the ground because of the age of the structure, Chef Monir's is a tale of struggling through tough times, fighting adversity and going from peeling a bag of onions at his brother's restaurant one day to owning 5 restaurants of his own.

Chef Mohammed started at the bottom with peeling onions and worked his way up, from doing dishes and cleaning, to making salads.  His experience in all levels of the restaurant business is something that a lot of restaurant owners lack and why a lot of them end up going under.

Serve with Basmati rice, Naan bread or eat as is!

Chef Monir was not particularly a fan of Indian cooking growing up until he traveled and spent some time living in the Punjab which changed the way he looked at one of the best cuisines out there (THE best, in my opinion).  He took his new found love for South Asian cuisine, added his own special touches and brought it back to Glasgow, Scotland where he transformed it into a successful restaurant business and an excellent biography/cookbook.

I have gotten so much use out of my copy of Chef Mohammed's "Mother India at Home" biography and recipe book that it has suffered a bit of wear and tear.  As a result, Chef Monir was kind enough to send me another copy with my mother when she came to visit me for my 40th birthday in 2014, along with an authentic Chef's jacket courtesy of Chef Mohammed and his wife, Smeena, who also has a recipe or two of her own in this excellent book.

I made Chef Mohammed's outstanding Butter Chicken for my mom when she visited and she loved it.  This book is packed with excellent recipes, pictures and stories.  It is an excellent read and a great guide for those who love Indian food but are apprehensive.  I can confirm that once you try just one dish in this book, you will go back for more!

Chef Monir Mohammed's, Mother India at Home:

Amazon

Mother India Restaurant

Checkout my latest tutorial video on how to make Chef Monir's Butter Chicken!

CHEF MONIR'S BUTTER CHICKEN
INGREDIENTS 30g Ghee (Clarified Butter) 1 medium onion, finely chopped 3 green chillies, finely chopped 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped 1 knob of fresh ginger, chopped 6 cloves 5 green cardamom pods 1/2 teaspoon roasted cumin seeds, crushed 1/2 x 400g tomatoes 1/2 tablespoon tomato puree 1 tablespoon plain yogurt 1 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon red chilli powder 1/2 teaspoon ground tumeric 1 tablespoon sunflower oil 4 chicken supremes (chicken breasts with the wing portion still attached) 300ml double cream, plus a little extra to finish 20 whole almonds, shell off salt and black pepper


INSTRUCTIONS 1.  Heat ghee in a pan large enough for the chicken to fit into and add the onion.  Cook gently for 5 minutes. 2.  Add green chillies, garlic and ginger.  Cook on low-to-medium heat for 5 minutes. 3.  Add cloves, cardamom pods and cumin.  Stir thoroughly and cook for 5 minutes. 4.  Add tomatoes and tomato puree.  Cook for 5 minutes. 5.  Add salt, chilli powder, tumeric and yogurt.  Cook for 3-5 minutes, adding a little water if the mixture starts to stick to the bottom of the pan. 6.  Preheat the oven at 190 degree celcius or 375F. 7.  Heat a non-stick frying pan and add the oil.  Once it's hot, add the chicken and sear on both sides until the outside is golden brown, then season with salt and black pepper. 8.  Add chicken to the pan of sauce and cook for 10 minutes, then stir in the cream and cook for an additional 5 minutes. 9.  Decant everything into a roasting try or oven-proof dish and scatter with the almonds.  Place in the oven and roast for 12 minutes, or until the juices from the chicken run clear. 10.  Serve with plain Basmati rice, with a splash of double cream over the almonds.

Chef Nairby

BRANCHING OUT

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  Based on that saying, a lot of people are afraid of even borrowing ideas from others and adding their own twists.  I see nothing wrong with borrowing ideas from other cooks and applying my own additions and takeaways.

When I started taking my cooking more seriously in 2014, I solely relied on the recipes of others to try myself.  The more I did this, the more I became accustomed the flavors of the ingredients I was using, especially ingredients that I had never tried before and fell in love with.

My fudge journey began with Skittle Doodle Fudge

As my palette expanded, I would make a dish that I found online or in cookbooks and afterwards ask myself, "What if?"

What if I took Chef Monir Mohammed's Butter Chicken recipe and replaced the chicken with cauliflower and broccoli to make a vegetarian alternative?  So I did, and just like the Butter Chicken, the "Butter Vegetables" turned out great.

After my second attempt at Skittle Doodle Fudge was a success, I thought of using the same basic method, but featuring a different featured ingredient.  That led to Oreo Fudge, Mint Chocolate Fudge with M&M's and Chocolate Peanut Butter fudge with Reese's Pieces.

Using the same basic method from Skittle Doodle Fudge, I changed
a few key ingredients and made Mint Chocolate Fudge with M&M's!

As more time went on and I became more familiar with how certain ingredients and spices taste and cook, I began coming up with my own dishes from scratch.  I will sometimes come up with a possible idea and search the internet to see if it has been done before and will find nothing.  In those cases, you can quit before starting or you can go with your gut.

It might not always turn out like you thought it would (Froot Loops & Grape Juice!), but you never know unless you try.  Even if you are sketchy about an idea, there is always the option of doing a test on a smaller dish and using the same ingredients.  You can easily turn a basic macaroni and cheese into a Greek or Indian version by trading out some spices and swapping one cheese for another.

Ingredients for Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge with Reese's Pieces.  Same
technique as Skittle Doodle, different key ingredients.

A main ingredient is a mannequin.  Don't be afraid to dress it up however you please.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge with Reese's Pieces.

PEANUT BUTTER CHOCOLATE FUDGE WITH REESE'S PIECES

INGREDIENTS

-3 cups milk chocolate chips

-14oz Sweetened condensed milk

-1/2 cup peanut butter AND 1-2 Tbsp peanut butter, melted, for drizzling.

-4 51g boxes Reese's Pieces, divided (3 boxes for fudge mixture, 1 box for topping)

***I know there are 5 boxes in the picture but I only used 4***

INSTRUCTIONS

1.  Combine chocolate chips and condensed milk in a small saucepan.

2.  Melt over low to medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture is completely melted.

3.  Stir in 1/2 cup peanut butter.  Stir constantly until melted and combined.

4.  Stir in 3 boxes Reese's Pieces.

5.  Pour mixture into 8 inch square pan lined with parchment paper, or a pan or container of similar size (mine was a rectangle Tupperware container.  Don't forget that parchment paper!).

6.  Randomly scatter last box of Reese's pieces on top.

7.  Melt 1-2 Tbsp peanut butter in microwave (or stove top, whichever you prefer).  Drizzle on top of fudge.

8.  Refrigerate or freeze until firm.  (I put mine in the freezer overnight.  It is a lot easier to cut into sharp edged pieces the firmer it is.  Cut into squares and eat them because they taste great!

Chef Nairby

SAY CHEESECAKE!

Most of us love cheesecake, but a lot of us will not dare try to make cheesecake.  It's not like you can walk the baking supplies aisle of the supermarket aisle and find a box of cheesecake mix and jar of icing like you can when making a simple cake.  Cheesecake requires work and effort, right?

Well, that is what I always thought.  That is up until, yet again, I stumbled across a recipe for a cheesecake on the internet and all of my assumptions were debunked.

Ingredients for Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Skor Cheesecake!  Minus Dr. Lecter.

Sure, more work goes into making a great cheesecake than simply dumping a package of powdered mixture, eggs and milk into a big bowl and mixing., but not that much more work.  And just like I mentioned a time or two in previous Blog posts, the extra effort is worth it.  In the case of this cheesecake recipe, it is barely that much extra effort.

Most people, when they think of cheesecake, one thing that enters their mind is a graham crust.  That is all fine and good, but is also generic.  I guess you could say that I have become spoiled and a bit of a food snob after trying the chocolate chip cookie dough method.

That's right!  I said chocolate chip cookie dough!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough bottom!

Cheesecake filling mixture with chocolate ships and Skor bits inside!

Those ready-to-go graham crusts you can buy in those little pans for cheesecake are all fine and good, but they limit you with their littleness.  And cheesecake does not belong in a typical pie-shaped form.  It belongs in a springform pan.  Those cool little pans with the sides that you can detach.  Those are where the mighty cheesecake belong, so sayeth Chef Nairby!  They are inexpensive and can come in packs of 3 or more, like mine did, with different sizes.  And you get many uses out of them.

I bought a 3-pack of springform pans about a month ago and have already used one of them 4 times in 4 weeks.  With this Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Skor Cheesecake recipe and its simplicity, I don`t blame myself.

Fresh out of the oven and makes the house smell great!

Simply get a package of your preferred cookie dough, spread it out evenly on the bottom of the springform pan, pour in the cheesecake mixture, bake and done!  It is that easy.

"But what about the mixture, Chef Nairby?  Isn't that where all of the work is?"  Yes.  Cream cheese, sugar, 3 eggs, sour cream and vanilla extract.  Whatever you decide to add to it, chocolate chips and Skor bits in this case, is up to you.  The electric hand mixer does all of the work.  And the baking process makes the house smell great!  Once you try making this cheesecake once, you are likely to want to make it again shortly thereafter with a different combination of ingredients!  Perhaps some butterscotch chips instead of chocolate.  Maybe some crushed Oreos.  It's up to your imagination.

Topped with Skor bits after cooling at room temperature for about 10 minutes.

Melted chocolate drizzled after more cooling and ready to spend the
night in the fridge!

As I like to say in my rebuilding posts, "Don't tell ME that YOU can't do it!"

After a night cooling in the fridge.  Ready to devour!

CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIE DOUGH SKOR CHEESECAKE

WHAT YOU NEED

Springform pan

Non-stick cooking spray

Electric hand mixer

3 8-oz packages of cream cheese, softened

1 package chocolate chip cookie dough

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup sour cream

1Tbsp vanilla extract

3 eggs

3/4 cup of Skor bits, seperated into 1/2 cup and 1/4 cup

3/4 cup of milk chocolate chips, seperated into 1/2 cup and 1/4 cup

INSTRUCTIONS

1.  Preheat oven to 350F.

2.  Spray inside bottom and edges of a springform pan with non-stick cooking spray and spread cookie dough evenly to cover the bottom.

3.  In a large mixing bowl, mix cream cheese and sugar using an electric hand mixer until combined and fluffy.

4.  Add sour cream and vanilla extract.  Mix until combined and smooth.

5.  Add eggs, ONE AT A TIME, mix until combined and smooth each time.

6.  Add 1/2 cup of chocolate chips and 1/2 cup of skor bits.  STIR WITH SPOON.

7.  Pour mixture into the springform pan and bake for 1 hour 10 minutes.  The cheesecake will rise and appear as though it will overflow and spill out of the pan.  Don't worry.  It won't.

8.  Remove from oven and let it cool at room temperature.  Top with 1/4 cup of Skor bits.  Melt 1/4 chocolate chips and drizzle on top (or forgo melting them and simply sprinkle on top if that is your preference).  Refridgerate overnight.  Remove from springform pan the next day and eat until eaten!

Chef Nairby

GREATNESS BY ACCIDENT

Sometimes cooking something new doesn't go as planned.  Especially when you use your experiences from previous recipes and try coming up with your own creation.

A recipe that you followed and turned out excellent will inspire you to use similar methods to try making something different.  If it worked then, if should work now, right?  Not always.  And sometimes when things don't go as we thought it would, our natural reaction a lot of the time is to throw in the towel.

But just because your original idea didn't work, it doesn't mean that you were not on to something.

Sure, there are times when you substituted an ingredient for something similar and it turned out to be a disaster.  In the early stages of when I started taking my cooking a lot more seriously, I had made a homemade pasta sauce from a recipe I found and it turned out great.  It turned out so great that the following week I decided to make it again.  Unfortunately, none of the supermarkets near me had fresh basil, which the recipe called for.  So I turned to dried basil that you get in your typical spice aisle.  BIG mistake!  The sauce was ruined.

But there are also times when a dish is still salvageable.  You just need to change the game plan.

Previously made Pesto Pasta.  Perfection.

Last year, I had an idea to make a pesto dish using broccoli and cauliflower instead of pasta.  A pesto pasta recipe I made a few months prior turned out great and I figured replacing the pasta with broccoli and cauliflower would be simple enough.

I went back to the pasta recipe to remind myself of the ingredients I needed to make the pesto sauce and the basic instructions to make it.  The sauce called for cashews soaked for a few hours, some basil, garlic, lemon juice, grated Parmesan and extra virgin olive oil.

I bought the ingredients and started with soaking the cashews first.  I used more cashews than the pasta recipe called for, thinking I was going to make a large batch of pesto broccoli and cauliflower and therefore needed lots of sauce.

Once the cashews had soaked for a few hours to soften them up, It was time to put them in my food processor and periodically add everything else.  Unfortunately, the mixture was not creating any kind of smooth consistency.  It was becoming more like a ball of dough than anything else.  Adding a little extra olive oil wasn't helping.  I had made the mistake of using too many cashews, and if I wanted to get the mixture smooth, it would have meant adding a lot more olive oil which I didn't want to do.

When my attempt at a Pesto sauce for a Broccoli & Cauliflower dish didn't work, I came up
with Plan B: Operation Salvage.

I stopped the food processor and looked for a minute at what I had.  It looked more like a stuffing you would have with turkey than any kind of sauce.  I decided to give it a taste and it tasted excellent!

I decided that I needed to change my game plan as I had stumbled on to something.  I still had the broccoli and cauliflower, but I also had some grape tomatoes, half a brick of mozzarella and an extra red pepper leftover from the previous days' creation.

I roasted the red pepper, cut the grape tomatoes in half and grated the mozzarella.  I kept some grated mozzarella to the side and put everything else into a large bowl with the cauliflower, broccoli and cashew mixture.  Mixed it all up, put it in a baking tray, topped with the remaining mozzarella and some pepper.  Baked at about 400 degrees for 15 minutes and out came my Cheesy Baked Cauliflower and Broccoli with Pesto Stuffing!

Greatness by accident!

CHEESY BAKED CAULIFLOWER & BROCCOLI with PESTO STUFFING

INGREDIENTS

4 cups of raw natural cashews.

1/4 cup fresh chopped basil.

3-4 cloves of garlic, chopped.

1 Tbsp fresh lemon juice.

2 Tbsp grated parmesan.

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil.

4 cups broccoli florets.

4 cups cauliflower florets.

1 pint grape/cherry tomatoes (about 20 of them), sliced in half.

1 red bell pepper, roasted and chopped.

4 cups grated mozzarella.  Put aside 1 cup for topping.

1 tsp ground black pepper.

INSTRUCTIONS

1.  Soak cashews in water for about 3 hours.

2.  Preheat oven to 400 degrees after the cashews are done soaking.

3.  Mix cashews, basil, chopped garlic, lemon juice and parmesan in a food proccessor while slowly adding the olive oil during the mixing process.  Continue mixing until it has a stuffing texture throughout.  Process will take close to 10 minutes depending on how powerful your proccessor is.

4.  Put stuffing mixture in a large mixing bowl and add the broccoli, cauliflower, tomatoes, roasted red pepper, only THREE cups of the mozzarella and the ground pepper.  Mix and combine in the bowl.

5.  Put the entire mixture into a baking pan line with non-stick cooking spray.  Top with the remaining mozzarella.  Bake for 15 minutes.  Serve.

Chef Nairby

THE SLOW COOK KING

I love my slow cooker!

I don't remember exactly how I obtained my first slow cooker.  I am tempted to say that an old friend of mine told me about them about 15 years ago and I decided to buy one and give it a try.  I still have that first one and one larger one which was a Christmas present a few years ago.

I was blown away the first time I used one.  I made a beef stew.  I believe I found a slow cooked beef stew recipe online and followed it.  I bought some stewing beef, potatoes, carrots, celery, corn, beef broth powder and some seasoning salt.  I chopped the stewing beef in cubes, seasoned them, chopped everything else up and threw it all into the slow cooker with the beef broth mixed with a cup of water.  Cook on low for 8 hours.

Fresh tomatoes, chopped and added to the mix for Slow Cooker Lasagna Soup!

As it was my first time, I could not help but check on the slow cooker every once in a while.  The world of slow cooking sounded too good to be true and my main concern was throwing everything in raw, including the beef, and letting it cook.  So I kept checking.

After almost two hours, it seemed like everything was cooking.  An hour so so later, it SMELLED like everything was cooking.  As the 8 hours started dwindling down, I grew more excited, not because of what I was seeing through the glass lid because the steam and condensation didn't leave much to see, but because of the smell.  And it was everywhere in my tiny one bedroom basement apartment.  My landlord came down to do laundry because the washer and dryer was in the basement, and she even acknowledged that it smelled really good down there and it could be smelled upstairs!

Building awesomeness!

Needless to say, I was beyond surprised with the results.  I was in love with my new slow cooker instantly and began searching online for more ideas, but in the beginning I would mostly stick to the beef stew, because I'm a man, and man love meat!

I love that, "set it and forget it" feel of the mighty slow cooker!  It wasn't until I recently took my cooking more seriously that I finally expanded my slow cooking world to more than beef stew.  I started relying less on searching online for ideas and more on simply picking up ingredients on instinct, prepping them and tossing them in.  And it has come out perfect every time.  It's like the slow cooker cannot go wrong.

Everything added and ready for a slow cookin'!

My slow cooker has never let me down.  I will still cruise the slow cooker aisle every now and then at department stores just to see what latest fancy functions have been added to newer models.  Despite the fact that I have two of them, I am always on the lookout for one with a built-in timer.  I have come close many times but then I stop myself as my oven has a built-in timer on it which I use.  But I still can't help but be tempted.  I sometimes fantasize about having at least 5 slow cookers going at once, but as a single guy, that's not really logical at the moment unless I'm cooking for others.  But I am always on the lookout for the next member of my slow cooker family.

Who knows.  Maybe it will be bigger than my big one.  Or maybe it will be one of the itty-bitty single portion ones which I have seen on shelves.  Have one nice slow cooker family in my collection!  That's not crazy, is it?

8 hours later!

Slow Cooker Lasagna Soup!

SLOW COOKER LASAGNA SOUP

INGREDIENTS

1 lb ground beef (or vegetarian crumble)

3 cups of beef broth (or vegetable broth to make vegetarian)

4-5 cloves of garlic, minced

1 TB dried parsley

1 TB dried basil

1/2 cup chopped onion

1, 28 oz can of diced tomatoes (I used fresh tomatoes because that's how Chef Nairby rolls!)

1, 6oz can of tomato paste

1 cup V8 (or any vegetable drink)

2 cups uncooked shell pasta

1/4 tsp pepper

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup of water

Optional topping- shredded cheese

INSTRUCTIONS

1. First mix together the can of tomatoes, and tomato paste in slow cooker.

2. Next add broth, beef, garlic, parsley, basil, onion, V8 and salt/pepper.

3. Cover and cook on LOW for 7-8 hours or on HIGH for 4-5 hours.

4. When 30 minutes are left of cook time, add in the 1 cup of water and noodles. Stir to combine. Put lid back on and continue cooking for 30 minutes.

Chef Nairby

FEAR OF COOKING

A lot of us avoid cooking certain cuisines because a lot of them have many excellent classic dishes that require a rather large number of ingredients.  As a result of this reluctancy, many go with the option of buying premade sauces to add to a protein or vegetables.

One cuisine that seems to strike fear in a lot of hearts, as it did with me for many years, is Indian cuisine.  I LOVE Indian food!  I have been around it for just over 20 years.  When I was a kid, I would not go anywhere near even tasting it.

Every now and then when I was a little Nairby, my mom would order Chinese takeout, and one of the things she would order for herself was a chicken curry.  My brother and I would want nothing to to with it.  We were fine with the typical fried rice, chicken balls and egg rolls, thank you very much.  It wasn't until I was 16 years old when I finally gave curry a shot as my mother insisted it tasted great.  And it did.  And it was simply a premade frozen chicken curry but I loved it and wanted it more and more.

Gift arrived in the mail for Chef Nairby!

Fast forward many moons and I started working for a South Asian television company.  The sight and smells of Indian food was everywhere, and I loved it!  The co-owner of the company would always bring me Indian food that she made at home.  I thought the premade frozen stuff was great, but Indian food cooked the proper way?  No comparison!

But as much as I loved and still love Indian food, I was always hesitant to make it outside of maybe buying a jar or premade Butter Chicken sauce and dumping it on top of some cooked chicken breasts.  I was content, but nowhere near satisfied after experiencing the real thing.  But I knew enough to know that the world of REAL Indian cuisine was not for anyone who liked cooking simply as a hobby.  The amount of spices alone that go into a classic Indian dish like Butter Chicken is enough to make most anyone settle for what they can buy in a jar at their local grocery store.

Ingredients for Chef Monir's Butter Chicken

After I had finally spent a good amount of time improving my culinary skills, I decided it was time to upgrade and enter the danger zone.  My mother works for a well known Indian Chef in Glasgow, Scotland.  Chef Monir Mohammed.

Chef Monir had released his own cookbook filled with life stories and recipes.  "Mother India At Home".  My mother talked to Chef Monir and he was kind enough to send me a copy of his book last year.  There was no turning back now.  A free copy of his life story and amazing dishes, and signed to boot.  The first thing I looked for was Butter Chicken.  I saw the list of ingredients that went into Chef Monir's dish and I was not deterred.  It was time to step my game up!

The journey is worth the destination!

I followed the instructions word for word.  I quickly got into a groove as I measured out the proper amount of each spice I needed and put them into their own separate little muffin cups.  When all spices were measured, all veggies were chopped and all pots and pans were ready to go, it began.

Slowly, my house started smelling freaking amazing!  Once again, it became just as much about the journey as it was about the destination.  I waited with excitement as 5 minutes passed and it was time to add the next spice!  I stirred as required and waited.  Ten minutes later and it was time to add the tomatoes!  The aroma in my house was intoxicating!  Everything was coming along beautifully.  It was like watching the birth of something amazing from beginning to end.

Premade has nothing on the real thing!

Chef Monir's Butter Chicken did not turn me off of exploring Indian cuisine, it turned me on!  As a wannabe Chef, there is nothing like creating a dish the way it was meant to be made.  Sure it is more time consuming than going with the premade stuff in a jar, but if you just give it a chance, you may realize that you have more time to create than you thought you did.

I have since used Chef Monir's "Mother India At Home" cookbook so much that it is not as pretty looking as it once was, but I was fortunate enough to have him send me a second copy!

Creating great food trumps missing out on the next episode of your favorite TV show any day.  Don't be afraid to try new things because you are intimidated by the amount of work involved or because you think you don't have time.  Time is best used being productive.  Being productive with your time creates memories.  More than spending hours watching television or playing video games will ever create.  Use your time to invest in the unknown.  There is nothing to fear.

You can't get this from a jar!

Click here for more information about Chef Monir Mohammed's "Mother India at Home" Cookbook

Happy cooking, and have no fear!

Chef Nairby

MAKE YOUR OWN PASTA SAUCE

Quick!  You are going to make a basic pasta dish for dinner tonight.  What do you need?

Think about it for a second....

Did the term, "jar or can of pasta sauce" squeeze its way into your list of ingredients?  Why?  Convenience?  Do you know how easy it is to make your own sauce?  It is as simple as tomatoes, tomato paste and your imagination.  And this is not coming from a professional Chef.

Maybe it is a price issue.  A jar or can of sauce is ready to go and cheaper than buying the ingredients, right?  Not exactly.  One jar of standard, simple pasta sauce can cost up to $4 or more.  And you're lucky if you get two servings out of it.  Meanwhile, buying fresh ingredients in bulk might cost a bit more, but you can create a sauce that not only blows anything from a jar or can away, but also yields enough to last several meals and is not filled with preservatives.

Homemade pasta sauce is all about the tomatoes and whatever else you choose to put into it.

A simple homemade pasta sauce does require extra effort and time to make, but the final product is worth it.  AND you can experiment with different ingredients and create your own signature sauce that your friends and family will go crazy for.  You can make that special homemade sauce that has people saying, "If I was on death row, I would want YOUR pasta sauce for my last meal!"

A homemade pasta sauce starts with the tomatoes.  Lots of tomatoes.  Whatever kind you choose.  Chop them up, throw them into a big pot, stir occasionally and watch as they become the base of your sauce.  Add your favorite chopped veggies, spices, red wine....THE SAUCE IS YOUR OYSTER!

Lots of tomatoes, some spice and veggies.  Add meat if you want!

Set a date aside for some homemade pasta sauce-making and experiment.  If you're like me, you will never go back to pre-made in a jar again!  If you're like me, you will soon realize that you have more time than you initially thought to experiment with cooking for REAL.

Effort and hard work are worth it.  You have a food artist locked inside of you that is aching to get out!  You will quickly start to enjoy the process of creating something of your own as you not only create food art, but memories as well.  Those are things you cannot get from a jar.

You cannot get this from a jar!

Check out another "How-to" video from Chef Nairby!  "Make Your Own Pasta Sauce", with special guest, Dr. Hannibal Lecter!  Music by Sergei Gavriliuk.

EASY HOMEMADE PASTA SAUCE

INGREDIENTS -Lots of tomatoes, chopped.  Base how many tomatoes you need on the size of the pot you will be making your pasta sauce in.  Use enough tomatoes that would almost fill the entire pot. -3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped. -2 medium sized cans, or one large can tomato paste. -4 cups of sliced mushrooms. -1/2 cup fresh chopped basil. -2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil.


INSTRUCTIONS 1.  Heat olive oil in your large pot.  Add chopped garlic and cook on medium heat for 5 minutes. 2.  Add mushrooms and stir.  Cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Mushrooms will give off liquid.  Good! 3.  Add chopped tomatoes, tomato paste and chopped basil.  Stir.  Cover and cook on medium-high heat, stirring occasionally.  The tomatoes will turn into a thick sauce over time.  How thick you want your sauce depends on your liking, so use your eyes and nose to determine when sauce is ready.

**If you choose to add more vegetables to your sauce, such as celery, carrots, onion, etc, add them step 2.  If adding meat, such as ground beef, cook the ground beef in a separate pan and add AFTER the tomatoes, tomato paste and basil stage.

Pasta with homemade tomato and mushroom sauce.

Chef Nairby

CARAMELIZED TEARS OF JOY

Onions.  They are a key ingredient in a lot of our food.

We put them on our burgers, hot dogs, submarine sandwiches.  In our soups, stews and chilies.  So many uses.  Many different varieties.  And yet if you are like I USED to be, you either avoided cooking with them or did not get the usage out of them to justify the big 5 or 10 pound bag you bought, and if you were lucky, you threw them out before they grew those lovely tentacles.

I only recently discovered the awesomeness of perhaps the most versatile and longest lasting version of the mighty onion......the CARAMELIZED ONION!

One weekend recently, I made a very tasty tomato soup in a cheesy baked bread bowl.  I posted a picture of it, as I usually do, and mentioned how I was so blown away with how it turned out, that I had to try other cheesy bread bowl ideas.  An old school friend of mine had some suggestions, one of which being a soup with caramelized onions.

I had never made caramelized onions before, and if you were to ask me, I would have told you that along with a few onions, you also need some kind of sweetening ingredient, maybe some soy sauce for color and who knows what else.

Caramelized onions can be as simple as just two ingredients!

I took to Google and searched, "How to make caramelized onions".  Every result sang the praise of the caramelized onion.  I got a bit intimidated but clicked one of the first links and could not believe what I saw....

Caramelized Onions Ingredients:

Onions

"And???????" I thought to myself.

Start.

And nothing.  I read the instructions and immediately wanted to kick myself.  Why did I not look this up before?!  I then took to Youtube to search for videos on making these things.  The search results were right.  Onions.  Pretty much.  You can add some salt, maybe some pepper and some Balsamic vinegar for flavor, but just onions.

Cover and cook on medium to high heat for 10 minutes.

I quickly went out and headed to the supermarket right across the street which has a produce section so pleasing to an aspiring Chef, that I will still go over there just to walk around and look at everything!  I picked up about 10 onions, as the recipe I chose to follow on Youtube stated that you need to get a good number of them when making these things because they shrink.  So I picked up about 10 sweet onions and some Balsamic vinegar.

After 10 minutes.  Keep uncovered
for the rest of the process while cooking, stirring every 10 minutes..

I should have picked up some goggles, too.  Chopping one or two onions can burn a bit.  Chopping about 10 of them can feel like a forest fire is happening in your eyes!  But is it worth it?  HECK YA!!!

20 minutes.

Caramelized onions take about an hour to make and they create a scent in your house that you just wish you can put in a can and use as an air freshener!  But maybe that's just me.

40 minutes.

When it comes to cooking, I enjoy the journey just as much, if not more than the destination.  I LOVE making caramelized onions!  LOVE IT!  The smell that builds up.  The slow changing of color and texture.  I love all of it!  I mentioned it in my very first Blog post....if I was a contestant on Hell's Kitchen, I would probably secretly throw some of the competitions just to stay behind and do prep work.  If I was on Hell's Kitchen and my team won a challenge where the losers had to chop and make caramelized onions in preparation for that night's dinner service, I would be very tempted to stay behind!  Maybe fake an injury.  Claim a fear of heights or a tummy ache.  I would.  Surely that would impress Chef Ramsay and not get me eliminated, right?  Screw my teammates!  I want to make some onion stuffs!

Chef Gordon Ramsay.
Courtesy, "Hell's Kitchen".

Caramelized onions can keep in the fridge for a very long time.  Some have even said that you can store them in the freezer for up to six months!

Buy a 10 pound bag of onions, caramelize them and you've got a special ingredient you can add to just about anything for a while.  Put some in your pasta sauce.  Add some extra awesomeness to a grilled cheese sandwich.  Top a salad with them.  Heck, eat them as they are!

50 minutes.  At this point, add 1-2 Tbsp of Balsamic Vinegar or whatever else
you planned to add for extra flavor.  Or just leave as is!  Still tastes great!

You can buy onions in bulk for a very reasonable price at any supermarket.  In my area, a 10 pound bag goes for $3-$4.  I can make two batches of caramelized onions with one of these bags and have that awesome extra ingredient to spoil myself for the next one year if the six months in the freezer thing is true.

Give them a shot.  All you need is onions!

1 hour!  Done and ready to be put to work!

Perfection!

SIMPLE CARAMELIZED ONIONS

INGREDIENTS

LOTS of onions, chopped!  I use half of a 10lb bag.  The onions shrink quite a bit during cooking.

2 Tbsp Extra virgin olive oil.

1-2 Tbsp Balsamic vinegar

DIRECTIONS

1.  Heat olive oil on slightly over medium heat in a large skillet (Preferably one that has a cover).

2.  Put all chopped onions into skillet and lightly stab at them a little bit to separate.  They will eventually get easier to separate as you cook them.

3.  Cover and let cook for 10 minutes.

4.  After 10 minutes, uncover and stir.  Leave the skillet uncovered for the remaining cooking time.

5.  Cook for another 40 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes.  The onions will produce dark burnt looking pieces.  This is good!

6.  After 40 minutes (50 minutes total), add Balsamic vinegar and stir.  Cook for 10 more minutes, stir and serve or store in fridge or freezer.

My Research has shown that caramelized onions can stay good for up to 6 months in the freezer.  I haven't tried it yet, though.

Eat them as is.  Add them to salads as a great alternative to dressing.  Have a ball!

Grilled Goat Cheese and Caramelized Onion Sandwich.

Goat Cheese and Caramelized Onion Pizza with Grape Tomatoes and Fresh Dill.

Caramelized Onions in a Cheesy Baked Bread Bowl.

Chef Nairby