Cooking 116 ~ The Corn Porn Addiction

The Corn Porn cooking class was nothing but good clean fun, peppered with a few dirty jokes, of course. Daughter #1, The Know-It-All, the one who has no filter on her brain, nor her mouth, was up from Colorado and when she's in the house it's a safe bet that certain things will happen:  1) she will say something to shock anyone who claims to be un-shockable  2) someone will blow liquor out of their nose, from laughing; Or from shock,  3) something with get broken, probably something glass 4) and when she leaves she will leave something behind (bra and earrings). Check, check, check and double check.

The Know-It-All and Connor, her old high school party til you puke drinking buddy.

Here was the menu:

We noshed on three kinds of popcorn, which I made just prior to class: a Sushi inspired one, made  with soy sauce, wasabi paste, sesame oil, ginger and wasabi peas; Buffalo Popcorn that I made by mixing some wing sauce in with melted butter and then tossed it with the popcorn along with blue cheese crumbles and celery slices and leaves, and finally a Brown Butter-Lemon-Sage.  This little corn teaser put us all in the mood. For corn.

For our appetizer course we grilled these unbelievably easy and delicious corn, zucchini and goat cheese quesadillas. The beauty of them is that the veggies all go in completely naked so very little time or prep is involved. Kind of a whan-bam-thank-you-ma'am quesadilla.
     The salsa, made with tomatoes and basil gets an unexpected kick from the jalapenos. Click here for the recipe or go the "Sandwiches, Pizzas & Quesadillas" page.

Chefs June and Linda, on quesadilla duty.
By the way, they are just faking it with the salt and pepper.

Chef Tom put a perfect sear on our sexy red chile scallops, which we paired with a charred corn salad. You can find the recipe by clicking right here or under the "Seafood" tab.

I'm already craving the corn fritters again. These babies were all corn...no dry corn meal filler here! We spanked 'em with a little Sriracha butter and served them with some blue corn fried chicken. The recipe is right here or under the "Side Dishes" tab.

My plan was to do something with grits, so I could cover all the corn bases. I made a grit pudding recipe that I found online, which was bland and boring and mostly tasted like hot grits. 

     On my second attempt I decided to show it some love by sweetening it up with some maple syrup and adding a heavy streusel topping. Since the calorie count on this dessert was already over the limit I threw caution to the wind and decided to top it some hot and steamy heavy cream and a generous drizzle of salted caramel syrup. Good call! Everyone was blown away by the fact that grits could be so naughty, causing them to roll their eyes and make their O faces. Need proof? We did not get ONE picture of the finished product because everyone was French kissing their bowls. Sick I know.

Chef Tom, multi-tasking: reading the recipe and stirring the grits

Chef Emily did double duty too, making the salsa and the streusel

Chef Scott - the Corn Porn King, showing off his big ol' corn salad.
Chef Vicki, spicing things up.

The Corn Lovers!

It was another fun night, thanks ya all for coming!

PRINT RECIPE:  Corn, Zucchini and Goat Cheese Quesadilla with Tomato-Basil Salsa

PRINT RECIPE:  Red Chile Scallops with Charred Corn Salad

PRINT RECIPE:  Corn Fritters Spanked with Sriracha Butter

Cooking 115 ~ Tex-Mex Comes to Town

Well here I am, two months late in sharing some recipes from our Tex-Mex Cooking Class. The Sauce du Jour Chefs knocked out some mighty tasty fare that night.
This was the menu:

Gringo Salsa with Homemade Tortilla Chips with Ancho Dust

This salsa is a wonderful combo of sweet, tangy and creamy goodness (from the avocados).

Click here for the recipe or go to the "Appetizer Page."

BBQ Onion and Smoked Gouda Quesadillas 

Served on a Bed of Baby Greens with a Tabasco Dressing

Cowboy Rib-Eye with Pinto Bean-Wild Mushroom Ragout

Topped with Red Chile Onion Rings and Pico de Gallo

Chef Tom, putting his touch on the Rib-Eyes

Jalapeno, White Cheddar and Pepper-Jack Biscuits

with Red Chile Honey Butter

OOPS...No Picture

Margarita Ice Cream

Toffee Tortilla Chips, Chocolate Ganache and Candied Jalapenos

When planning this menu I was determined to use jalapenos in the dessert and I was originally thinking along the jalapeno ice cream lines. Then I got the brilliant idea of doing a Margarita Ice Cream and using candied jalapenos. (This, people is why I make the big bucks. *wink-wink*) 

     The beauty of the ice cream is that you don't need an ice cream maker to make it...it sets up in the freezer. (The recipe is a variation taken from Nigella and tweaked for this class.)

     I brainstormed with my friend, Karen, who is a great baker, and we came up with the idea of doing a homemade corn tortilla chip, topping it with a toffee and a drizzle of chocolate ganache and finally some chopped up candied jalapenos.

     I have to tell you that is was nothing short of AMAZING! Really. And I'm not a Margarita drinker or an ice cream eater, but this was THE BOMB! 

Click here or go to the "Desserts" page for the recipe.

Note: If you don't want to go to the trouble of making the chips, toffee and ganache, make the ice cream and use store bought bought corn tortilla chips, toffee and chocolate.  Store bought toffee and chocolate won't set up like ours did, but you'll still get the idea. 

Thanks again to Kitt for all the great pix!

 

Gringo Salsa

PRINT RECIPE:  Gringo Salsa and Homemade Tortilla Chips with Ancho Dust

PRINT RECIPE: Margarita Ice Cream, Toffee Tortilla Chips, Chocolate Ganache and Candied Jalapenos