Lambwich!

Some leftover lamb, forgotten bread and a little herb mayo and voila! A LAMBWICH!!!! Dig those Santa Fe peppers! Enjoy!

How much goes in...?

I've never been able to measure. One of the reasons I had a hard time with design school was because of my lack of meticulous detail when it came to paste-ups and mechanicals. For those of you in the 20 something age bracket, that's what we did back when I went to design school. There was barely an Internet and certainly not related to graphic design back in the day. I had an easier time eye balling spatial relationships when it came to my layouts, and they were accurate half the time. And NO I'm not that old. I was not at Woodstock. I don't even remember Nixon getting impeached. I was only 3 then!

I'm relieved today that we have all these crutch tools when it comes to getting things "lined up". What the hell does any of this have to do with blackberry, banana pancakes? I don't measure. I eye ball. Eye eye captain and ahoy mates!



These light and lovely pancakes were so good that my daughters were talking about them days later. A little guilt went into these pancakes, but they didn't taste that. They tasted the love that went into them though. The guilt was the haste in which I made them before the little one got into the kitchen to try and help. It can be fun, but unfortunately I'm not the type to enjoy cooking with the kids all the time. I find it stressful half the time with flour being dumped onto the floor, eggs being tossed across the room, etc. Do I sound cruel? I don't mean to be. Just being honest. My older daughter (5), however is great at kitchen participation. She's a skilled pan stirrer, egg beater and adept at a number of other kitchen duties. The younger one (2) just likes to party. I'll wait til she's a little older. For now I'll give her a ration of flour she can spill.

So pretty easy. Some banana slivers and whole blackberries into the batter. Flour, oil, milk, yogurt and eggs...and a bit of apple juice (shhh) into the flour, salt, sugar and baking soda.

Careful. The blackberries flatten as you cook them, but could start to smoke a bit. They'll give off a burning smell, but in the end turn out fine. Just don't over do it. Flip when they're ready to flip! I used maybe 2 cups of flour, 2 (or was it 3) eggs? See I don't even keep track. Sometimes I'll use 2 and other times 3. Depends on what I think I remember. They always turn out great and always a little different. Now that's jazz in the kitchen!

Dark Horse Cassoulet..er..uhh..Stew!

I made something called cassoulet a few months ago, which really wasn't casoulet because cassoulet is called cassoulet for the pot it's cooked in, which happens to be called a cassole. I don't have one. I'll call it a stew. How's that?

Today I made a "stew", which I'm tempted to call Dark Horse Cassoulet, but I'll call it Dark Horse Stew. I call it Dark Horse Stew because it's made with this dark beer of the same name sans the stew and it happens to be amazing! It's a dark Danish beer brewed in Oerbaek on the Island of Fyn. People on Fyn tend to be friendly so maybe I should call it Friendly Stew instead! I'll just stick with Dark Horse because it sounds cooler and works for this. I'll save "friendly" for another recipe.

This hearty stew of the day started with some leftover chicken fat and some olive oil in a pot. In went some lamb in one pot and some large bacon pieces into another. The meat browned on both sides and the lamb went into a bowl off to the side for a bit. In went garlic, chili pepper and onion into the lamb pot along with some dried licorice sausage I'd been saving for just the proper occasion. The bacon remained in the other pot and in went white beans I soaked over night with water. NO SALT at this point.

The lamb went in over the garlic and stuff along with some of the bacon from the bean pot and in went a large bottle of dark horse beer. Covered it and let braise for a while. Meanwhile the beans cooked away on simmer.

After about an hour or two the beans got soft and salt was added. Then the 2 pots merged ingredients and continued to cook in two pots. Beans and all the meat married and lived happily ever after.

After about another hour came some happy potatoes to join the love. Why the hell not?

In the end the beautiful stew thickened from split beans and the lamb was falling with joy off of the bone. The bacon smoked it's way throughout the dish and all the ingredients enjoyed an orgy of flavor into one pot.

What to call this???

In the end it came out like a thin, sweet mole sauce. This is an example of what this show is all about. Throwing something together based on available ingredients and a whimsical palate. This dish was born based on the idea of browning and braising not too far from the Copenhagen ribs.

I'm absolutely in love with this dish. I love simple, quick dishes that take no time at all, but I really do prefer some process. Quick and easy feels good of course, but there's nothing like food foreplay and a multi level build up of flavors, methods and a little alcohol in the mix. Just be safe! Wear oven mits;)

The chicken (dark) browned on both sides with salt and pepper. I removed the chicken and rubbed it with paprika, cocoa, sugar, salt, cayenne pepper and a pinch of cinnamon.

I threw garlic, chili peppers, ginger and lime into the fatty chicken juices and got those started. Then back went the chicken and a bottle of Corona. It all simmered for about an hour. Chicken came out and remaining sauce was left to reduce. The result was this incredible brown sweet mole sauce. I used 2 whole legs and served with yellow rice.

Enjoy!

Pheasant Pizza!

Well hello! Fancy meeting you here. Come on in...I have something I think you might like. It's pizza topped with pheasant tomato sauce, bufala and fresh basil. Oh...and sliced, tender pheasant. Here's a little briefing on what the hell I did to get here. The hardest part was the hunting for pheasant. It took a trip on my bicycle, unarmed to enter the supermarket and find a package of pheasant breasts. No I didn't literally hunt for it. You're not gonna get me to shoot one of those things. I'd rather pay for someone to do the little fucker in. Anyway, here goes...

I started by marinading these little fellas in balsamic vinegar, salt, lemon, water and basil earlier in the day. Then I browned these supple breasts on both sides for a couple of minutes with some salt and pepper. I removed the browned breasts and threw some garlic, onions and tomatoes into the fatty juices and sautéed them.

I then threw the breasts back in to simmer for a while in the marinade with the juices and the root veggies/tomatoes. I removed the pheasant and let the broth reduce for a while with the marinade and the fatty pheasant juices.

I sliced up the pheasant and let the pieces soak in some olive oil and balsamic.

I added tomato paste to the reduced pheasant broth and let the moisture cook out a little leaving a fuckin' kick ass sauce flavored with the gamy pheasant juices, a hint of balsamic, and textured with fresh root vegetables, fresh tomatoes and basil!

Took a simple pizza dough that I prepared in advance...

Let it start in the over on high heat...

Spread that sauce atop with some bufala mozzarella and distributed the sliced pheasant on top of the cheese. I the oven until cheese is melted...

Then out! I placed some fresh basil on top...

Sliced it up and served! Enjoy!

Heady Pepper goes to Copenhagen!

This guerrilla cooking video was shot in a tight kitchen with a race against the clock and a build up of guests battling the focus of someone who has trouble chewing ribs and boiling potatoes at the same time. Some of the details are left out and the end is a Blair Witch style blur in the dark followed by a middle of the night omelet and a few jolly beer drinkers.

Thanks to all of you who made my pre-birthday celebration an absolute smash hit! It was one of the best birthdays ever!

Enjoy...if you can follow!