Nate Elston | nate elston

Recipe Review: Bacon-Sage Meatballs with Buttermilk Gravy

By Nate Elston Posted on November 5, 2009 Posted in Recipes No Comments

Bacon, pork and sage what more could one ask for, but all together these three ingredients make a startling pleasant and extremely tasty meatball. Now drench those same meatballs in a tangy-thymey gravy and BAM, Olive Garden better head for the boarder there is a new sheriff in town.

I had originally found this recipe along time ago and had yet to make it, with an impending potluck this coming weekend I thought I would make them ahead only to discover yesterday that a pound of pork doesn’t go to far so I decided to eat them tonight piled high on a bed of rice. I was not disappointed, thought I feel sorry for those of you who could have sampled them on Sunday.

This recipe is headed for the recipe box, it may become a frequent favorite. You can find the original recipe over at Apartment Therapy.

Tagged with: bacon, meatballs, pork, recipe, sage

Chipotle Pomegranate rice with Chicken

By Nate Elston Posted on November 4, 2009 Posted in Recipes, What's for dinner No Comments

Needed a quick lunch today so I decided to bust out the rice cooker, the most versatile cooking machine I own. Starting going through the fridge and cupboards to find what I could throw in to make a tasty lunch, here is what I ended up with.

Ingredients
White Rice
Chicken Breast
Pomegranate Seeds
Ground Chipotle
Ground Smoked Spanish Paprika
Old Bay (lets face it old bay makes everything better)
Parsley
Soy Sauce
Worcestershire Sauce (just a hint)
Onion
Garlic
Lime Juice
Whole Grain Mustard
Water

Instructions
Threw all that in the rice cooker and let it do its magic. And it is magical.

Tagged with: chicken, chipotle, pomegranate, rice

Pomegranate Ginger Muffins Recipe

By Nate Elston Posted on November 4, 2009 Posted in Recipes No Comments

As I was paging through the ads for the grocery store this week I noticed that Pomegranates were 5 for $5 so I decided, I had best find some recipes to make something with Pomegrantes. And while scouring the web I found several recipes for pomegranate muffins some of which included ginger, digging through my cupboard I found I had some crystallized ginger tucked away and began to look the recipes and again create one uber recipes from the wealth of recipes available on the web. And it delivered on really tasty batch of muffins.

In fact these muffins were so tasty my wife was the first to try one, before I even got a chance once they had cooled down.

Here is the recipe I used to create these gems.

Ingredients
2 c flour
2/3 c sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1 pinch salt
1/3 minced crystallized ginger
1 tsp grated lemon peel (approx)
1 c milk
1 large egg beaten
1/4 c melted butter
1 1/4 c pomegranate seeds

Instructions
Mix dry ingredients well, adding in ginger, lemon peel and pomegranate seeds

In a separate container mix wet ingredients

Combine wet ingredients with dry ingrediants until just mixed together well.

Pour into 12 greased muffin cups evenly

Bake at 425 for approximentaly 16 minutes until done.

The one complication I did have was getting the seeds from the pomegrantes, as they were unwilling to give them up without a fight. So I ended up quartering the fruit and in a bowl of water using my hands to tear apart the husk and massage the seeds off. It worked quite well and in the water the husk floated and the seeds sank so it was easy to seperate them.

This went well and with any luck I will be making pomegranate rice for lunch so check back later for that posting.

Tagged with: baking, ginger, muffins, pomegranate, recipe

Cheese Broccoli Soup

By Nate Elston Posted on October 31, 2009 Posted in Recipes 1 Comment

Every time I head out to Pantera Bread or Russ’ ( a local dutch shop ) I always end up getting the Cheese Broccoli soup so finally I decided to make my own, I gathered together a list of recipes online and concocted one uber recipe and here it is.

You thought there would be something left?

Ingredients
1 tbsp butter or margarine (for sauteing onion)
1 medium onion chopped
1/2 c melted butter or margarine
1/4 c flour
1 qt half and half
1 qt chicken stock or broth
1 pound fresh broccoli (2 stalks in my case)
1 c carrot shredded
salt and pepper to taste
1 lb grated sharp cheddar
nutmeg to taste (optional)

Instructions
Saute onion in butter. Set aside. Whisk together melted butter and flour over medium heat for 3-5 minutes. Add in half and half then chicken stock stirring constantly. Simmer for 20 minutes.

Add in broccoli, carrots and onions. Cook over low heat tell veggies are tender and soup has thickened, about 25 minutes. Add salt and pepper. Optionally pour soup into blender in batches to puree before adding cheese.

Add cheese and nutmeg stir until well blended.

A word of caution my roux became volcanic when I turned my back on it for even a brief second, be careful not to turn the heat up to high.

Another note next time I will most likely be using 1/2 lb mild and a 1/2 lb sharp cheddar as the soup was a little sharp for my taste, but good none the less.

Tagged with: broccoli, cheese, soup

Your steakhouse burger ain’t got nothing on my chicken breast

By Nate Elston Posted on October 28, 2009 Posted in What's for dinner No Comments

Piled loftily atop my pan fried chipotle chicken breast lies: 1 slice of pepper jack, 2 slices of bacon, a hand full of pepper fried mushrooms and a this coat of mayo….lunch was tasty.