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Stir Fried Shrimp and Cilantro, Courtesy of Yumsugar.com
How many of you had the gumption to Bring Your Own Bag today? We love to cook, but for us getting together a good homemade lunch for Monday can sometimes be a tall order. We’re through with the sandwich, made the night before only to achieve a gross gooeyness by the next afternoon. The spaghetti? It doesn’t travel so well in our bags on the bus. After a bit of research we found a great article on Yumsugar.com titled “Brown-Bag It: Leftover Lunch Delights” recipes for dinners that are twice as good the next day. What?!? While we can attest to the greatness of just discovering the article, we want you to stay tuned. We will be trying some of these recipes throughout the week and will report back. First up – Simple Stir Fried Shrimp and Cilantro, hmmm. Our mouths are already watering…
Do you brown-bag it to work or school?
Shrimp, Cilantro and Rice Noodles
From Fine Cooking
Ingredients
Kosher salt
6 oz. 1/4-inch-wide dried rice noodles (pad thai)
2 medium limes, 1 juiced and 1 cut into wedges
1-1/2 Tbs. packed light brown sugar
2 tsp. soy sauce
1 tsp. fish sauce
3/4 lb. peeled and deveined large shrimp (31 to 40 per lb.)
3 Tbs. canola or peanut oil
1/2 tsp. ground coriander
Freshly ground black pepper
2 medium red bell pepper, cored, seeded, and finely diced
1 medium jalapeño, seeded and finely diced
1 large shallot, finely diced
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
Directions
- Bring a medium pot of well-salted water to a boil. Add the noodles, lower the heat to a gentle simmer, and cook, stirring occasionally, until the noodles are just tender, 5 to 7 minutes. Transfer to a colander and run under cold water to cool slightly. Drain well.
- In a small bowl, combine the lime juice, sugar, soy sauce, and fish sauce; set aside. In a medium bowl, toss the shrimp with 1 Tbs. of the oil, the coriander, 1/2 tsp. pepper, and 1/4 tsp. salt.
- Heat the remaining 2 Tbs. oil in a 12-inch nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering hot. Add the red pepper, jalapeño, and shallot, sprinkle with 1/4 tsp. salt, and cook, stirring, for 1 minute.
- Add the shrimp and cook, stirring, until it turns pink and is almost cooked through, about 2 minutes. Add the lime juice mixture and cook, stirring, until the shrimp is cooked through, about 1 minute more.
- Add the noodles and half of the cilantro; toss until the noodles heat through and pick up the sauce, 1 to 2 minutes.
- Serve sprinkled with the remaining cilantro, with the lime wedges on the side for squeezing.
We woke up this morning to see that the Chef’n DishGarden Dish Rack had sprouted up in an article in The New York Times. We just love it when our innovative products catch people’s eye. Our DishGarden was featured alongside some of the industry’s best kitchen tool manufacturers and we are honored to be in such great company! You can read the full article here. Chef’n DishGardens can be purchased at http://www.chefsresource.com.
Real Simple, 869 New Uses for Old Things
We are huge fans of Real Simple magazine. So when we heard they were coming out with a book called “869 new uses for old things”, we knew this was one new volume we would be adding to our book shelves! This got us thinking about the reduce, reuse, recycling age we live in and how everyone is trying to save a little money. Creativity is of the essence at Chef’n and we wanted to share some of the ways we reduce and reuse in our kitchens. “I use my cookbook stand to hold up my Ipad while looking for recipes,” says Jessica. Some of Chef’n’s tools can be reused too; the Stem Gem is usually used on strawberries, but it’s perfect for hulling tomatoes as well. Has anyone tried using their GarlicZoom to mince fresh ginger? It’s great! What ways do you try to incorporate the three R’s in your kitchen?
Happy National Potato Day Everybody! The potato is the stuff of myth; a vegetable that grows under the ground simply by throwing old potatoes in a hole, can be cooked in countless ways, and has inspired everything from toys and cartoons to popular idioms like “couch potato.” Speaking of being inspired, read the recipe for restaurant-style hashbrowns from allrecipes.com below, and we’ll let you decide what you’re doing with your Saturday morning.
Emily’s Famous Hash Browns From allrecipes.com
Ingredients:
2 Medium Russet Potatoes, shredded
1/4 cup all-purpose flour1/2 medium onion, finely chopped
1 egg
1 cup oil for frying, or as needed
salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
| 1. | Peel and bowl potatoes. Use your Chef’n FreshForce Potato Ricer to shred potatoes to perfection. Rinse shredded potatoes until water is clear, then drain and squeeze dry. Place shreds in a bowl, and mix in the onion, flour and egg until evenly distributed. |
| 2. | Heat about 1/4 inch of oil in a large heavy skillet over medium-high heat. When oil is sizzling hot, place potatoes into the pan in a 1/2 inch thick layer. Cover the whole bottom of the pan, or make separate piles like pancakes. Cook until nicely browned on the bottom, then flip over and brown on the other side. It should take at least 5 minutes per side. If you are cooking them in one big piece, it can be cut into quarters for easier flipping. |
| 3. | Remove from pan, and drain on paper towels. Season with salt and pepper and serve immediately. |
Never heard of a potato ricer? Check out our How To Video
Like mashed instead of hashed? Try the Chef’n FreshForce Potato Masher
We asked a question on Facebook today “Can salad be a meal, or is it better as a side?” Overwhelmingly the answer was, well, both. Chef’neers posted great answers but our favorite was from Jeanne who said “Salads actually make some of the best meals…perfect “Happy Meal” for me!” Including salad in more of your meals is a great way to eat healthy and Chef’n has a great line of salad tools. Whether as a centerpiece or side dish, Spin-Shred-Slice-Season-Serve your way to salad infamy this summer!
As you can imagine, we at Chef’n love food. Raw foods, sweet foods, homemade foods or freshly prepared dishes at our favorite restaurants, you name it.
Recently Seattle has been opening new restaurants left and right, which only makes sense to us foodies. But often times we can’t even keep track because there are just too many! A few of us like to have a convo every couple of days, “have you been here yet?”, “did you know this place just opened?”, “oh man you have to try this new restaurant”. And we are grateful for the recommendations from each other. But even collectively we can’t keep them all straight.
Thankfully we were introduced to Eater, a website that tells you the latest and greatest about openings, closing, new trends, events and more, and its ALL FOOD related. Wohoo! Eater.com is perfect because you can either learn all about food on a National level or just what’s going on in your area. Right now they have blogs for Seattle, Portland, NYC, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago, Houston, Washington DC, Atlanta, Dallas, Austin and San Francisco.
If you like being in the know about food in your area, then we definitely recommend checking them out HERE.
What other blogs or websites do you use to keep up with what’s going on in your area?
Say what! Bon Appetit magazine has a very interesting article about cooking classes on Google Plus! This is a definite must read. This could be very interesting. Read all about it here!
Lunch Prep
It has been awhile, but we finally had another Lab Lunch last Friday. For those of you who aren’t familiar, Lab Lunch is when we cook a delicious meal to share in our product development test kitchen and we sit together and eat as a family. This week sliders were up and boy did we enjoy grilling on such a beautiful Seattle day! Check out the photos of our awesome meal!
Sliders getting toasty on the grill
Our grill master. Nice apron!
The result! Bet you are jealous right now!
Yikes! Time for cleanup on aisle Chef'n!
Photo: John Autry, http://www.cookinglight.com
While the weather in Seattle has been rather mild, especially for summer, we know we can’t really complain as the news continues to report temperatures over 100 degrees across the country! While we can’t convince the sun to simmer for you all, we thought we would share a few recipes for some tasty Popsicle we found on Cooking Light’s website (a fav!) to help keep you cool!
Chocolate Pudding Pops
Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups 2% reduced-fat milk
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- Dash of salt
- 1 large egg yolk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 ounces bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
Preparation
- 1. Combine the first 6 ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat, stirring well with a whisk. Cook for 8 minutes or until thick and bubbly, stirring constantly.
- 2. Remove pan from heat. Add 1 teaspoon vanilla and chocolate, stirring until smooth. Transfer the mixture to a bowl; place bowl in an ice-filled bowl. Cover surface of pudding directly with plastic wrap; cool completely. Spoon chocolate mixture evenly into 6 (4-ounce) ice-pop molds. Top with lid; insert craft sticks. Freeze 4 hours or until thoroughly frozen.
Jackie Mills, MS, RD, Cooking Light
AUGUST 2011
Sparkling Strawberry Pops
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup water
- 6 cups sliced fresh strawberries (2 pounds)
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 2 teaspoons light-colored corn syrup
- 1 1/4 cups chilled Champagne
Preparation
- 1. Combine sugar and 1/4 cup water in a microwave-safe bowl; microwave at HIGH for 3 minutes or until boiling. Stir until sugar dissolves, and cool. Combine berries, juice, and corn syrup in a food processor; process until smooth. Strain through a sieve over a bowl, pressing to extract juices; discard solids. Combine the sugar syrup, strawberry mixture, and wine. Divide mixture among 8 (4-ounce) ice-pop molds. Top with lid; insert craft sticks. Freeze 4 hours or until thoroughly frozen.
Julianna Grimes, Cooking Light
AUGUST 2011
Now here is an idea that we would want to get every last drop of! Gilt Taste, a popular new website from the fashionistas over at Gilt, have a great article on how to make your own flavored sodas! We definitely recommend checking it out: click here!
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