Food Maker, Chef, and Traveling Diner
The first part of this adventure is here. Enjoy 🙂 We then waited until hunger struck again, which ended up being around 9:00 p.m. and headed over to downtown Santa Barbara to La Super Rica. This is a very famous restaurant in SB. They are …
So much for all things October, it’s already over?!?! Can you believe it? I really can’t. Well, I hope everyone had a delicious and sinfully sweet holiday over the whole weekend. Mine was spent with my family, including my little niece, and unfortunately, a horrible …
Sometimes great ideas just come to us. There we are, faced with a fridge full, or maybe not so full, of food and we decide there’s something that has to be done about it. Like the culinary super minds we all can be, sometimes things just happen to the best of their abilities. That’s when I realized, I like corn and goat cheese risotto, so why wouldn’t I like corn and goat cheese stuffed peppers.
Goat cheese and I have a funny relationship. I used to pick a piece up, eat it and wonder why I was even eating it–tangy, strange, exceedingly creamy and a slight chalk appeal. I couldn’t decide if I liked it or I didn’t. Well, I really do like it, but it just took me about two years of picking through possibly spoiled pieces of goat cheese that weren’t lending a hand in making me want to eat it. And now that I’ve overcome the battle, goat cheese and I are on the same side, so here’s an elegant veggie meal or side dish, if you want to cut the peppers in half, instead of stuffing just whole ones, that would work as well.
Enjoy.
Saffron Rice, Corn and Goat Cheese Stuffed Peppers
3 large green peppers
1 cup long grain rice
ÂĽ cup goat cheese crumbles
Salt
Pepper
2 ears of corn, cut from the stalk
ÂĽ cup minced shallots or red onions
1 teaspoon garlic powder
2 teaspoons minced parsley
1 sprig thyme, taken off the stem
4-5 strands saffron 1 small pinch or Omit
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 cups vegetable stock or water
Heat oven to 400 degrees.
Cut tops off of bell peppers and clean out the seeds and core. Rinse off peppers and any excess seeds with water. Place on a baking sheet. Place 1 tablespoon of oil on hands and rub into the outside skins of bell peppers. Use more oil if necessary, then add salt and pepper. Cook in oven about 15-20 minutes until bell peppers begin to brown on the outside and become softer to the touch. I tend to keep peppers still a bit crunchy because I like that texture so increase time if you like softer peppers.
In a small sauce pan, place 1 tablespoon of oil at the bottom and heat on high, then add rice to pot and continuously stir, so that the rice begins to toast and brown slightly. Turn off pan at about 5 minutes and take off of heat. The rice will continue to brown a little, so keep an eye on it. Browning the rice should take about 5-7 minutes total, creating a toasty warm brown color–not dark and not all grains have to be even.
Meanwhile, in a medium-sized sauce pan, place 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil on medium-high heat, then add minced shallots in pan and cook stirring continuously, until shallots begin to caramelize about 5 minutes, then add corn to mixture and cook for an additional 5 minutes.
Add parsley and thyme leaves to mixture and incorporate well.
Add stock or water to pan. Mix together and taste. Add desired seasoning to the water or adjust stock seasoning with saffron, garlic powder, salt and pepper. Makre sure you can taste the salt in the water if using water or that your veggie stock is seasoned well because this is what gives flavor to the peppers.
When the liquid comes to a boil, add toasted rice. Reduce heat to simmer and cover, then cook for about 15-18 minutes, depending on the type of rice you are using (refer to packaging of the rice being used this may also decrease the amount of stock or water if using a different type of rice). Turn off heat and keep covered for 5 minutes. Fluff rice with a fork and add 1/2 the goat cheese crumbles while mixing.
Then fill bell peppers with rice and sprinkle with the rest of the goat cheese. Cook in oven for about 5-8 minutes till cheese is browned and melted.
Depending on how big your peppers are, you will probably have extra rice left over.
I hope these find you well.
Cheers
Unrivaledkitch
Along the freshly stale, glam, grunge tourist accommodations of higher proportion on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood, California lies Asia de Cuba. A restaurant concept close to my heart and well done at that, with a deep affinity for Asian and Latin cultures. These plates depict …
If you missed Catering in Lake Tahoe Part I please review here. Thank you! After we got everything out of the Jeep, we finally got a little sleep in time to wake up and make it to the property for the walk through. During a …
This is a simple showing of beautiful, undying love. The fact that life changes and you have to change with it, if those changes can sustain a relationship, that’s when you know you have true love. My parents have been married 31 years today. They are my biggest support, love and inspiration and I’m eternally grateful for their everlasting encouragement. This is a short photo montage of dishes that are in my arsenal of delicious insight that they have given me. I love you Mom and Dad.
Slow cooked Pot Roast
Spanish Rice
Enchiladas with Fresh Pinto Beans
Beef Teriyaki skewers
Cream of Chicken Rice Casserole
Japanese style beef bowl and Chicken Chow Mein
Cheers
Unrivaledkitch
About eight hours away from where I live in the San Fernando Valley, lays the beautiful serene nature of a large hidden lake. Somewhere atop misty mountains and a forest of pine is the quaint lake side country backwoods of Lake Tahoe. North Lake Tahoe …
Life is a funny thing–just think about it. When we think the same hum drum happenings couldn’t get any worse, they do; and when we decide life is peachy as a whipped trifle on a sweet summer day, it sometimes is. I love that I’m …
I woke up from a morning of face stuck-to-the-pillow exhaustion and opened one eye to wink at my phone, to see who was texting me. Of course, it was a welcomed text from my good friend Joanna, telling me, “It’s a beautiful day. What are we going to do?” I decided quickly that it was time to take a little adventure to the Westside and see what kind of fun we could have in the beautiful reminiscence of the California summer sunshine.
We made our way through Laurel Canyon and decided on the El Capitan Theater to see “Beauty and the Beast” in 3-D as our main adventure, but we’d also have several other ones along the way. We took a quick walk to Boho, which is a gastro pub located in an outdoor mall on Hollywood and Highland. I would say the atmosphere is very Jumanji study meets lounge; definitely interesting and eclectic. The bar is set up nicely and they have a number of beers on tap and other sections of cocktails and wine. We opted to have a quick afternoon cocktail—at ten bucks a piece we limited ourselves to one. I ordered the Apple St. Germine and Joanna ordered the Fizzy Pink. We ended up swapping drinks because the fizzy pink was too tart for Joanna’s liking, but that was fine by me because the elderflower in the St. Germine was a bit sweet for my taste buds.
We decided that we’d go buy our tickets for the show and then head over for a cheap happy hour at Hooters . Classy I know, we ordered greasy bar food, like loaded tater tots and boneless chicken wings, to go with our drinks. We chatted, watched a bit of football and then made our way over to the movie. I’m a Disney fiend; to say the least. I love everything associated with old-school Disney movies. The singing and animation just remind me of a carefree time in my life that I always wish to go back to. Having my little niece is great, because now I get to share all my Disney love with her as well. The movie was great, but the theater itself was even better; it was so much fun to see the curtains drawn up with all the lights and huge stage.
We made our way back to the valley and as we were passing Sherman Oaks, I drove by The Local Peasant, which I mention I had wanted to go to, and Joanna said, “Well, we’re here. Why don’t we go?” So I turned around and we found a good parking space and stopped in for a drink. The Local Peasant has the staple old-school cocktails, some modern reinvented ones, a large selection of beer on tap, and wine in the bottle, as well as on tap for their house selections. The atmosphere is dark for the most part, as with most of these types of pubs. One side of the restaurant is lined with mirrors and white tiles reflecting the diminishing sunshine from a late evening sunset, there are communal tables as you walk in, a growing trend in the restaurants these days. The Local Peasant has no significant signage except for plain letters on the front door. The bar is large and positioned at the back of the restaurant, seating about 15-20 guests. Joanna had the Cellopeno, which is a mixture of spicy green jalapenos, Ventura County limoncello, vodka, lemon and rosemary. This small cocktail packed a punch of spicy sweetness with a sort of burning warmth as it was sipped. I ordered the Fox Barrel Pear Cider, which was light and refreshing. The clientele is older, but still interesting; a mix of people just getting off of work and having a beer on a Monday night. Our service was wonderful and I look forward to going back for dinner or a cheese plate another night.
After our cocktail we made our way over to Reseda to Pho 999, this Vietnamese restaurant is humble and family style. The restaurant was still pretty busy for a Monday night at 9 p.m. I ordered Bun Cha Gio Thit Nuong, which is a cold noodle dish with fresh vegetables and barbecue pork and eggrolls. It’s a delicious option if you don’t want hot soup that day; otherwise, pho is always an excellent choice. The addition of fish sauce makes the whole bowl delightful and refreshing. Joanna ordered a kind of Vietnamese very small grain rice that had barbecue beef on it, a mixture of Vietnamese pressed meat and vegetables and a type of tripe that’s a very strange texture, yet still delicious. The whole plate was so different and interesting. It was a great meal to share and a wonderfully full day of food and drink adventures.
 
Cheers
-Unrivaledkitch
often find myself checking out the fridge because I’ve forgotten that I should eat something. I know most people don’t do that, but I think it’s the reminisce of chefdom which occasionally peak it’s head out of the shadows and stops me from eating even …