Salmon & Spinach Stuffed Ravioli

My poor poor blog! I’m so sorry, really. This past month or two has been ridiculously stressful with running out of money, and finding a new job, and then starting that new job! Phewf! I promise, now that I am all settled again and have the money to cook like I love to… You will not be undeserved!

Yesterday, I prepared a delicious hand crafted Salmon Ravioli with the help from one of my best friends! Sous-Chef Drew! [Which translates to Under-Chef… Which I like better ;]

Under-Chef Drew’s parents went to Paris for the week, so his girlfriend Erin and our mutual friends Gwenn and Kaitlin all got together to watch Jurassic Park and play Monopoly! The women sat in the living room, as the men slaved away in the kitchen…

Now this recipe is all by hand, and if Under-Chef Drew didn’t have a fancy hand crank pasta maker… This would have never came to be. So unless you can use a rolling pin better than [insert famous french pastry chef here], I would suggest not trying this at home ;}

Ingredients for Dough

• 4 eggs
• 3 cups of flour
• 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
• 2 to 3 minced garlic cloves
• .25 cup of chopped chives
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper
• squeeze of a full lemon
• zest of half a lemon
• 2 egg yolks to set aside, for binding the ravioli together

Combine all the ingredients with your hands in a large bowl, you’re gonna get sticky and gross… So have fun with that! I left my Under-Chef to do all the hard grunt work… But he wasn’t allowed to add the flavorful ingredients, just cracking eggs and leveling cups of flour. I suggest you put your significant other to work, or a friend who claims they can’t cook! Makes the lowly peons feel accomplished you know? Haha!

Set aside for half an hour, and cover it with a warm wet paper towel. Not drenched, but rung out almost completely.

Ingredients for Salmon Filling

• 1 pound of smoked salmon, or regular salmon if too expensive!
• 1 cup of heavy creme
• 2 garlic cloves
• quarter of a small onion
• squeeze and zest of a full lemon
• dash of basil
• dash of lemon pepper
• a large handful of shredded gruyere cheese
• a small handful of parmesan cheese
• 1 cup of ricotta cheese
• handful of chives
• dash of fleur du sal! [flower of the sea… SEA SALT… haha]
• handful of fresh spinach

Now one of the most important things about fleur du sal is that you must promounce it like a snooty french aristocrat while using it in your dishes! We had much fun doing this, or at least… I did.

If you can’t afford smoked salmon, which I couldn’t… Cause it’s packaged by like, 6 ounces and is 8 dollars a package or something? Crazy! I just got my local Price Chopper to get a nice pink meaty chunk from the pretty display freezer. The lady was super nice, and though she said she would skin it and rub it with lemon pepper before she wrapped it up… She forgot to skin it. And skinning salmon is not something I like doing, cause it feels gross and nasty and the sound makes your head shake.

You can tell fresh salmon by how pink it is, most of it is dyed before it gets to the store to make it appear fresher. But once you see that the pink has gone muddled and less vibrant, make sure you don’t get that one! The bad ones stand out like a dead rat next to a live rat when you see them next to each other. You can’t mistake it!

Puree the salmon meat and heavy creme first for about 2 minutes or until light and fluffy, then add all the ingredients except for the spinach and chives. Puree until smooth and blended, then add the spinach and pulse a couple of times. Make sure you don’t over puree, the greens should look a little chunky. You could even just break the spinach up by hand if you like.

Set that aside and it’s time to roll out your dough! Set up your machine and pre-flatten the dough as much as you can. Pre-Flour all your work surfaces first, the machine too! Put the machine to the largest pasta setting and feed it through in four equal separate batches. Drew’s pasta machine had 6 settings, so from high to low - big to small, I pulled through each batch at the largest -6- to a medium thickness -4- and then again to a -2-



For two of the batches I went to the thinnest setting, which was 1 or 0 I believe? and for two batches I went to a 2. The latter are a little thicker, so I used those as the base or bottom of the ravioli. The thinnest roll outs I used for the top.



Place a thicker roll out on a floured surface, and spoon in filling equally spaced apart. You don’t want to overstuff them, but you don’t want to understuff them either! Once you have a bunch of little mountains of salmon and cheese puree, your going to trace the outsides with a brush of yolk. Once every little hill has their specific outline, you take a thinner rollout of dough and drape it overtop. Press firmly from center to outer reaches, trying to get as much air out of the ravioli as possible.

Cut around the edges and trim them if you like, but I didn’t trim them… Didn’t see a need to. Each one is so different and unique, it’s precious. Some were big and some were small, some had a ton of extra foreskin and some didn’t, hahaha. It takes all sorts and shapes right? ;P

Let them sit for a good 5 or 10 minutes so they have time to bind to themselves. Boil some water with fleur du sal! And boil for about 6 minutes. Be very gentle when putting them in the water and taking them out! Use a mesh scooper if you have one, or a large ladle with slots in it. Place them in a colander and rinse with cool water, then use a little olive oil so they don’t stick together.



Line a tray with aluminum foil, turn your broiler on to low, and pour on some heavy creme, extra gruyere chunks, parmesan, extra chives, pepper, salt, and chunks of butter. Put the tray in the oven so everything melts, then put the ravioli on top of that and add more cheeses. Wait till they’re perfectly brown and voila! About 6 to 8 minutes, depending on the intensity of your broiler! WATCH THEM CAREFULLY. Once they start to brown they brown quick!



It took us forever, but that was partially because I was drinking my summer ale and making Under-Chef Drew do all the work… Haha. Hope you guys enjoy it, this makes a hefty meal… Each person had maybe 4 or 5? There were extra so we put some in the freezer before we even boiled them so they’ll stay nice and fresh.



Crispy, crunchy, smooth and creamy! I wish I had some friggin’ more… Damn…

Till next time food lovers,
I’ve got a bunch of recipes waiting for yah ;}
Justin Francis Kane
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Mushroom, Bacon, & Spinach Crêpes with Chicken & Asparagus Risotto

I am so sorry for being absent the past week or two! I’ve been job hunting and also trying to get into shape, and with my cooking… You can’t really get fit with all the heavy crème, butter, and carbs I use ;}

It was recently my housemothers 57th birthday this past weekend! So my best friend Norah, who I live with, cooked her favorite meal. She only requested crêpes, but she also loves the risotto I make and I’ve been promising you guys that recipe for a while… So I thought why not kill two birds with one stone and give you two amazing recipes! Especially since I’ve been so inactive ;P We’ll start with the risotto, then lead into the crêpes.

Ingredients for risotto:

• 1.5 bushels of fresh asparagus
• 3 tenderized chicken breasts cut into cubes
• 4 to 5 garlic cloves, minced
• half a small onion
• half a stick of butter
• 2 cups of Arborio rice (very important that it’s Arborio!)
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper
• 2 lemon squeezes
• dash of balsamic vinegar
• 32 oz of organic chicken broth, or stock
• dash of heavy crème
• 1 to 2 cups of shredded Parmesan cheese (The good stuff! Not that imitation white powder crap, haha)

Now this recipe has the perfect balance of asparagus, chicken, and rice. It will also feed your whole family of 4 to 6 on it’s own! But this was a special occasion so we went a little overboard on the food front.

Cut your asparagus into 1-inch spears on the diagonal and set aside. Cube your chicken and cook with the garlic, onion, a squeeze of lemon, a dash of balsamic, salt, pepper, and a quarter stick of butter. Make sure the juices run clear, but also don’t overcook the chicken! It’s going to be thrown into the risotto the last ten minutes so any soft pinkness still in the chicken will surely cook out, don’t worry! Set that pan aside as well and make sure to not strain the juices, those are important!

Melt the rest of your butter in a very very big skillet or shallow pot. The one we use is easily 2 feet in diameter… So if you don’t have big enough kitchenware, maybe halve the recipe? Throw your two cups of rice into the simmering butter and cook for about 3 to 5 minutes, or until the grains start to turn translucent. You may need to add a little extra butter.

Throw in your asparagus and a cup or two of the chicken stock. You’re going to end up using all of it, but don’t add it all at once. As the rice absorbs it, slowly add more and pay attention. You have to constantly keep stirring this otherwise your rice will burn. It’s a little tedious but worth it I promise.

Once the asparagus is in with the rice, turn on your timer for 25 minutes. I’ve timed this out exactly, so you shouldn’t have any problems. Once the 25 minutes is up, you should be out of chicken stock; this is when you dump the rest of your precooked chicken and all its succulent juices into the mix! Stir, and then add a dash of heavy crème, 1 to 2 cups of grated Parmesan cheese and cook for an additional 10 minutes. Voila!



Ingredients for crêpes:

• 2 eggs + 1 egg yolk at room temperature
• .75 cup of milk
• .5 cup of water
• 1 cup of flour
• 3 tblsp melted butter
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper
• dash of oregano
• squeeze of lemon

Be very careful with this! We remade this better at least 3 times because of stupidity. Mix all your liquid ingredients together slowly, SLOWLY. You want to make as little air bubbles as possible. Do not whisk, I repeat… Do not whisk! This batter is very delicate and very liquid, so if you have a very low setting on your mixer use with caution. We stirred and folded by hand and strained the batter to get the lumps out which worked perfectly the third time around… Add the flour slowly, and afterwards cover it and let it stand for at least an hour for any bubbles you did form to release.

We had a trusty crepe maker that you just dip into the batter and it forms the perfect crepe, good luck to those of you with a skillet. All I can suggest is don’t use too much oil or butter to grease the pan and be careful!

Ingredients for filling:

• 1 box of frozen spinach, squeezed and patted dry
• half a small onion
• quarter stick of butter
• 2 large portabello mushroom heads, sliced thin
• 6 strips of cooked bacon, crumpled
• 1 cup of heavy crème
• dash of milk
• dash of chives
• dash of dill
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper
• squeeze of lemon
• 1 or 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• dash of Parmesan cheese, grated
• dash of flour

Start caramelizing your onions and then browning your mushrooms extra butter and remember not to overcrowd them! If there’s one thing that movie about Julia Child taught me, it was that! Throw in everything except for the milk and Parmesan and stir. Slowly add just a little bit of milk and then add the Parmesan. Cook for about 15 minutes more on low heat. If it’s not thickening up, add a little bit of flour slowly but surely and that should do the trick.

Spoon the filling into the crêpes, fold and set on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper. Sprinkle extra Parmesan or provolone on top and broil for about 3 to 5 minutes on low, watching very carefully so they don’t burn! As you can see from my photos, I was almost a second too late with those edges haha.
Phewf, what a long post! Sorry about all that rambling guys, but I hope you enjoy it! And I’ll try to be more active.

Later Food Lovers,
Justin Francis Kane
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A little lost...

I have an overwhelming feeling of being lost at the moment... I haven't been cooking, or baking. But mostly this is because I have something like seven dollars in my bank account. I'm unemployed, and my shoe-in of a job that I applied for last week says they'll call me for my second interview tomorrow... But I'm scared.

It's a very busy place, and I feel as if I should call to keep in touch with them because my message could be lost in the shuffle. But I've already called once, and they said they would call me back. So do I wait in misery all day tomorrow and call back on Tuesday if they forget? Or do I keep pestering? It's a catch-22, but I guess I'm making this into something it's not. I'm sure they'll call tomorrow. I'm sure of it.

I need to do something constructive with all this free time I have. But I'm down in the dumps. I was supposed to go see my Dad tonight for dinner, that would have been nice. But my ride got sick... Oh, did I tell you I also don't have any mobility if it isn't my friends carting me around?

I look back at leaving new york city as a blessing and a curse... It was so easy to have a life without a car payment and insurance to deal with. But I was losing it, I needed fresh air and grass. I wish the spring would just get here already and if I never saw winter again I think I would be happy.

Trying to stay positive, maybe I'll post an old recipe later. Sorry for the rant. Sometimes you just have to get it out though, ya know?

Pasta Carbonara

This recipe is great if you want something really delicious in a short period of time, well… Shorter than most of my recipes, haha. My friends once again, say they will never let me leave because they demand I cook for them every evening.

Ingredients:

• 1 box of bowtie pasta
• 2 cups of thawed frozen peas
• .5 a package of bacon, or one of the mini packages
• .5 of a yellow onion
• 4 cups of heavy crème
• 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts, cleaned and cut into cubes
• .5 stick of butter
• a few cloves of garlic
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper
• dash of oregano
• squeeze of lemon

Start off boiling the pasta, cause that always seems to take forever. Look right at the directions on the back of the box, they’re always right. So just set a timer and there you have it. Always make sure to rinse with cold water; otherwise the pasta will continue to cook even if it’s not in the boiling water anymore! Duh, and throw a tablespoon of olive oil on them and swish them around so they don’t stick together.

Cook your bacon how you normally would, let it dry and cool on a paper towel to remove the access oil. Once it’s cool enough to touch, chop your bacon into bacon bits! NO, you may not substitute bacon with bacon bits. We do not live in a double wide… Well, you might. In which case I empathize. My mom downgraded once I left for college, not a pretty site.

Next you’re going to take your onion and garlic and caramelize them in the butter. Your chicken should already be cleaned, tenderized, and cut by now. So you’ll throw all of that into the pot with the onions and garlic and simmer, stirring occasionally. Once you see that all the juices have really left the chicken, [I always just scoop out an extra piece to be sure it’s not pink in the middle] you can add the crème , peas, and crispy bacon to your chicken.

Add the spices slowly but surely, tasting occasionally to see if it needs more of one thing over another. You shouldn’t need too much salt because the bacon is really salty already.

The thing that’s great about heavy crème is that it doesn’t curdle when it touches heat, and it’s way easier than making a béchamel sauce from scratch. I’ve made quite a few mistakes where I thought just throwing in flour and milk would make this beautiful fancy white sauce, WRONG. It curdles and ruins everything, it’s very frustrating and takes a lot more consideration. So just stick to the heavy crème okay simpletons? Hahaha ;}

I had one too many glasses of champagne last night… Ugh. How is everyone elses day going? Anyone want to ask me to make something specific? I’d love a challenge tonight!

Yours forever Food Lovers,
Justin Francis Kane
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Seared Chicken with an Onion & Peach Glaze

So the other night my friend Norah and I went to visit my father and his girlfriend Kim up in Queensbury NY. I wanted to try something a little different, so I came up with this Onion and Peach Seared Chicken Glaze. I hope you guys like it, it was a huge hit!

Ingredients:

• 2 large boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• 1 stick of butter
• 4 very ripe peaches
• 1 small yellow onion
• 4 cloves of garlic
• splash of dry white wine
• dash of rosemary
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper
• dash of sugar

• jasmine Rice, 1 cup of rice to 2 cups of water.

First take half the stick of butter, dice the onion and garlic, and caramelize. Cut your peaches in half, and core out the center. We’re not trying to gnaw on those killer pits. Place the peaches cut side down, and cook on low for about 30 minutes. Remember to cover them with a lid so the moisture doesn’t escape. If it looks like they’re drying out, add a little water.

While that’s going, you’re gonna clean and tenderize your chicken, and I cut them into nice meaty chunks. Sprinkle on the rosemary, salt, and pepper and wait for the peaches to be done.

Throw the chicken in with peaches and let them cook till most of the juices run out, but not completely! Then remove the chicken onto a plate and wait.

Take 3 or 4 of the peach halves and set them aside to use as garnish later, they should be nice and mushy and the skins should be just about able to fall off. Pour the rest of the peaches and onion mixture into a pot on the back burner, add a good full cup of wine and let them simmer and bubble till it starts to thicken. Should take a good 15 minutes or so. Add a dash of sugar if it’s not sweet enough!

Use the skillet from before and use the rest of the butter, then throw the chicken back in. Leave it on high heat and let the sides of the chicken get nice and roasted toasted. Golden brown is what you want! Once they’re done, you can start plating the chicken.

You’re gonna strain the sauce from the back burner through a sifter or a colander if you have one, otherwise… Good luck, I hate chunky glaze. The sauce should be pink, and be very fragrant of onion and peach! Duh…

For the main staple I made some Jasmine rice, and also a nice bitter vegetable like asparagus with lemon pepper and white vinegar [Basically just my caramelized asparagus recipe, which as you can tell i'm very fond of!]. Brustlesprouts wouldn’t be a bad choice either! But it was nice to counterbalance the sweetness of the peaches. And for a starch filler, I pumped out some jasmine rice... Hope I don't need to explain how to cook that since you just need to follow the instructions ;P

Drip the sauce over the rice and chicken and voila! This was a great experiment, and I look forward to using other fruits like apples and pears. Have a good one guys! I've gotta run to the DMV today and see why the hell my license is suspended, oh the woes of me! Haha.

Later Food Lovers,
Justin Francis Kane
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Lemon Breaded Chicken with Caramelized String Beans

I haven't cooked anything in about a week! It's been driving me stir crazy. But this is a really simple recipe that's super inexpensive at the same time. And your family will just eat it up lickety-split!

Ingredients:

• 5 chicken breasts
• 4 or 5 cloves of garlic, pressed and minced
• squeeze of two full lemons
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper
• dash of rosemary
• 3 to 4 eggs
• splash of milk
• bread crumbs
• fresh oats
• drizzle of extra virgin olive oil

I started off cooking my beans because they really take the longest. Snap off the ends, throw them in a pot, and cook away! I'm just gonna link you to the recipe since I already did it with asparagus last week or so. >>> Here. I got that recipe from my mom, she used to always make string beans like this almost every meal. I just saw her this past Sunday for her birthday party and I've really missed her since I haven't seen her since Thanksgiving.

Next you're gonna prepare the chicken, tenderize the hell out of it and cut it to your liking. I did about 1 inch strips, kind of like chicken tender size. If you want to make them bigger by all means! You're going to be frying these in oil on the stove, and 5 chicken breasts cut up super small can take 3 to 4 big batches. And that's a lot of handiwork.

Put the chicken in a large bowl and squeeze in your lemon, pepper, salt, rosemary, and garlic. Remember, a little rosemary goes a long way! Squish it all around with your hands to make sure everything is spread evenly.

Mix up your eggs and dash of milk in a bowl big enough for you to dip the chicken in. On a plate next to that, pour your bread crumbs and a large handful of oats. So from your left to right, you should have the bowl of chicken, the egg mixture, the crumbs and oats, and then a separate clean plate to place your breaded chicken! Like a little assembly line.

Once you've got that all set, get a large skillet on medium heat and pour in a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil. Let it heat up for a second and start throwing on your chicken. The chicken should only need 2 minutes on each side... Depending on how thick you cut it. You can tell when one side is ready because the chicken will start to puff up and turn white around the edges. Flip it over and it should be nice and golden brown on one side. Use tongs, it makes it easiest. Test a little piece of each batch you do, you don't want to overcook the chicken... But you don't want to undercook it either. It should be super moist and delicious, not dried out and sandy.

Each batch you do you'll want to scrape off the extra bread crumbs that fell off from the previous batch into the garbage, and use a fresh drizzle of oil! Otherwise you're gonna start burning your chicken and that's no fun is it? So I hope you guys like it! This makes a ton of chicken, there were four of us and we had a lot of leftovers. But we didn't have a starch besides the bread crumbs, so we made up for it in extra chicken. And we didn't have a lot of beans! They cook down pretty good, so make sure you get a hefty bag of them. Oh, and don't forget to squeeze a little fresh lemon juice over the top when you're done!

I'm off to stretch and work out... Ugh, I love doing it... But just getting the motivation really sucks doesn't it? Haha,

Later Food Lovers!
Justin Francis Kane
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Chicken Tacos with Apricot Salsa and Fresh Guacamole

So I hope all my new followers love this recipe! I put a lot of though and hard work into these tacos, and they turned out so beautiful I almost cried at how delicious they were, not because they were super spicy… Thank God I didn’t put the Habaneros in! :X This recipe definitely has a lot going on, so I’ll break it down into sections. I made the guacamole, salsa, peppers, and chicken all separately so it’s a bit of busy work and a lot of prep! Easier if you’ve got two people cooking for sure!

Ingredients:

• 2 skinless boneless chicken breasts
• tortillas, or anything else you prefer to roll them up in!
• 3 apricots, halved and cored
• 1 large yellow onion
• .5 stick of butter
• 2 avocados, nice and ripe!
• 4 to 6 cloves of garlic
• 3 to 4 tomatoes
• 3 limes
• 2 to 3 jalapenos
• 2 to 3 red chiles
• 2 large green chiles
• 1 bag of blue corn chips
• dash of salt
• dash of pepper

First you want to prepare your salsa, that has to cool in the fridge for an hour and marinate nicely beforehand. What I did was take 2 cloves of garlic, 2 jalapenos, and 2 chiles [make sure you remove the seeds!] and dice them up nice and small. Set that aside and wash your hands quickly cause the red chiles tend to burn if you get the juice on you. DO NOT TASTE THIS, unless you wanna burn your mouth off or trick your friend haha.

I was in a huge rush, so I used a food processor to do all of my dicing. Just makes it easy, though I do like hand chopped better because the salsa comes out chunkier. Throw in your apricots, a little less than half the onion, and 2 tomatoes. Pulse and stop before they turn to mush! Pour in a bowl and sprinkle in a little salt and pepper, also a squeeze of lime. This is where it gets tricky, depending on how spicy you like your salsa; I like it spicy, so I threw in 2 tablespoons of the spicy stuff I told you to set aside. You might wanna try half or a quarter, start slow and work your way up. Or just make two batches, one mild and one hot! It makes a lot of salsa, you’ll be eating it for a few days, unless you’re throwing a party.

Put it into the fridge and then start with the guacamole! Guacamole is super easy, two avocados, half an onion, one or two tomatoes depending on how you like it, dash of salt, dash of pepper, and a whole squeeze of a lime. Mash it up or put it in the food processor like i did! If you wanna throw some spicy into you, add a little of the spicy stuff! Normally you could put cilantro, but I think it tastes like dish soap, gross. A good trick to keep it from browning is to save the pits and put them in your guacamole! I don’t know why but I think the mashed up avocado still thinks it’s a fruit and not about to be eaten… It works, so just do itttttttt.

Next I diced the large green chiles, which are basically just weird shaped peppers that aren’t spicy at all. I sauteed these covered in a skillet with just butter, and a super tiny pinch of salt and pepper. Once they’re basically soft, I removed the lid and turned it up to high heat to give em a nice charred edge look. I love the taste of burnt vegetables. Not completely burnt, but just around the edges! Set aside.

For the last part of actual cooking I just tenderized the chicken, cubed it, sauteed it in a little butter, onion and garlic and there ya go. Squeeze some fresh lime over it and tadah! Once the juices run clear, you know the chickens done.

Now you take all your ingredients, grab the sour creme and jack cheese at this point! And stuff your tortillas. A little letchuga, as the spanish say and you’ve got yourself some damn good tacos. The left over guac and salsa can be put on the table and munched on for hours! Or in my case, the whole entire time you’re actually cooking the food… To the point where you get full even before you eat the tacos and then stuff two of them down your throat and go into a food coma, haha.

What’s next? I dunno, I was watching Top Chef all day today and I heard about a lot of shit I need to do research on because I have NO IDEA what it is! Learning is fun, and I’m sure my next thing is gonna be Squab or some other crazy french thing ;} And what the hell is Molecular Gastronomy? What is the world coming too, just another food fad I guess. Anyways, it’s nap time!

Peace out girl scouts,
Justin Francis Kane
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