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, Wyoming
Thanks for visiting Sauce du Jour. Feel free to share a great recipe, leave a comment, or make me dinner. I'll bring hors d' oeuvres and the wine! To visit my website go to www.tamaralittrell.com Thanks for visiting the Sauce ~Tammi

Aug 22, 2013

My Fifth Date With Bobby

Yeah I might be just a little obsessed with white truffle oil. My daughter, The-Know-It-All shook her head and rolled her eyes at me the other day when we went to the movies and I pulled a bottle of white truffle oil out of my purse, leaned over and whispered, do you want some truffle oil to drizzle on your popcorn? Then she had the nerve to call me crazy when I pulled the Parmesan cheese out of my purse. Let me point out that batshit crazy or not, she passed me her bag so I could drizzle and sprinkle the goodness on her popcorn too. 
So when I see a recipe that says, "and white truffle oil", what I really see is something that has my name written all over it. Yes, I could be tempted to whip up a horse turd souffle if the recipe called for a drizzle of that liquid gold, so when I came across my boy Bobby Flay's Wild Mushroom Quesadillas with Red Chile Jack Cheese and White Truffle Oil, you know I was all over it!


So I cooked down a mixture of Shiitake, Trumpet Royale, Hen-of-the-Woods, Hon-shemeji and Crimini mushrooms. (Exotic mushrooms: one of the perks of living next to a Whole Foods☺) After re-hydrating the ancho chiles, Bobby said to reserve some of the soaking liquid and add it to the chopped anchos and the shredded Monterey Jack, thrus making it "Red Chile Jack Cheese."



Even though Bobby didn't tell me to, I dusted mine with a bit of ancho chile powder before popping them in the oven. Then I added the crumbled cotija cheese on top.

I baked them for about ten minutes and they came out of the oven nicely browned and looking like that. ↑ 

In my under-paid opinion Bobby skimped on the cheese a bit, so if you make these be more generous with the Monterey Jack than what the recipe calls for. The drizzle of rich, white truffle oil added on top elevated these quesadillas from decent to decadent.  Thanks Bobby, love ya, call me, mean it! ♥


Although this is under the "Appetizer" section of Bobby's  Mesa Grill Cookbook, The-Know-It-All and I had it as an entree. It's filling enough that it can go either way. If you aren't a fan of mushrooms skip this recipe, but do take your bottle of white truffle oil to the movies next time. 
     Click on the Appetizers tab to see the recipe. 
                                        














Aug 14, 2013

My Fourth Date With Bobby

I had been drooling over the picture (below) of Bobby's Grilled Shrimp with Smoked Chile Butter and Tomatillo Salsa, so it had been next on my Flaydar.  And speaking of butter; me and Bobby practically fell in love over butter. And salsas, and seafood, and sauces and I'll shut-up now.
      The Big Guy's taste buds are still a bit screwed up from chemo, so tangy flavors just haven't been sitting too well with him so at the mention of Tomatillo Salsa he made that face. It's the the same one that the dogs make when I try to feed them a heart worm pill. It's the if-you-force-feed-me-that-I'll-pee-on-your-pillow-to-get-even-face. I know the look well so I just quit pimping the dish and went with Plan B.


Plan B: Nobody in this house with a pulse and/or an unclogged artery passes on butter, so I decided to deviate from the recipe a bit and skip the tomatillas but make the Smoked Chile Butter and serve it over salmon. For some reason chemo hasn't managed to mess up Big's taste for fish and since I had some nice salmon in my freezer, I decided to make the Smoked Chile Butter and glaze the salmon with it.
     I seared the salmon and then topped it with the butter during the last couple of minutes of cooking.  As it melted into the fish and browned in pan it left that distinctive nutty brown butter taste along with that delightful chile/lime flavor that Bobby is known for. A little shake of the pan and the underside picked up the delicious brown butter taste too. Win-win, right? 


Someday I will make the tomatillo salsa so I will try this dish again with the shrimp, but in the meantime I have had some of the butter leftover so I've been using it to spunk up grilled corn on the cob. It took the corn from so-so to so-so fabulous!
     Check out the entire recipe under the "Seafood" tab.  Thanks Bobby, love ya, call me, mean it! ♥

Aug 5, 2013

Shish-Kaboobs ~ Because Some Men Can Never Get Enough

I have a loyal reader who mentioned that he wished I would talk more about boobs, yeah he said that. He said that he was "disappointed" that I hadn't mentioned boobs in my last post, and since here at the Sauce we aim to please, this post is for you Billyboob Billybob Cornfed. 

As you know, besides adoring The Big Guy I have a thing for Booby Flay. I ♥ him and I try to keep abreast of all his latest recipes. If mammary serves me right, my boy Booby has a "Build-Your-Own-Shish-Kaboob" recipe so I was thinking that with summer and grilling and all, that this would be a perfect time to make some ka-boobies. (Click on this link for the recipe.)

Getting ready to go on the grill

Confession to make:  A lover of the ka-boob I am not. Because some of the items tend to be overcooked while others are undercooked, I'm really not a fan. For example, throw a steak ka-boob on the grill and in five minutes the beef is still mooing but the mushroom is so far gone that there is no nursing it back to life.
     On the udder hand a shrimp will curl up and turn into a charred, shriveled up titty-bitty thing, but a cherry tomato, at first bite will spit enough hot juice at you to burn your lip and stain your shirt. Is it chest me or have you had the same experience with ka-boobs? And worse yet ~ sometimes no matter how you turn the ka-boob, the peppers spin on the skewer and turn black on side A, while side B stays uncooked. Anyhow for me, ka-boobs are kind of a bust.


That is why dear ka-booby lovers, I like to do it this way:  I choose a smoked meat such as sausage ~ chicken, beef or pork will all work well. Next pre-cook the hearty ingredients, such as the po-tata and the corn on the cob (yes they can go on a ka-boob). Soft, fast cooking stuff like mushrooms, zucchini, and cherry tomatoes can go on raw. Peppers swing either way and no recipe is really needed.


If you are using wood skewers soak them in water for at least thirty minutes before you put the ingredients on. Then heat up your BBQ grill until it's hooter than hell, because you'll want to cook these puppies pretty fast so that they don't dry out, but yet still get those pretty grill marks. Do it this way and you'll end up with a tasty mouthful!


For a super fast and easy appetizer, put tomatoes, mozzarella, and basil on a skewer and then perk them up with a drizzle of olive oil, a splash of balsamic vinegar and some sea salt. An udder easy option for the ka-boob loving men in your life is to put some pre-cooked meatballs on a skewer, add a cooked tortellini or two and some manly-man veggies. Grill them for just a few minutes ~ or long enough to warm them up and then serve with Marinara sauce.



But really if you ask me I think you should forgo the shish-ka-boobs and do what I prefer to do. I get The Big Guy to throw some ribs on the BBQ and then I open him up a beer, pull up a chair beside him and just sit back and enjoy the evening while he nurses that beer and keeps an eye on that rack...of ribs.
 


So there you have it Billyboob Billybob, I hope this post has ta-taught you something and satisfied your request. Sauce du Jour...pleasing peoples appetites, one reader at a time!