Burritos!

I was thinking about what to make for dinner the other night, and burritos seemed like a great idea. It was pretty hot out, and I love that type of food in this weather. I decided I'd class it up a bit by making my own salsa and own refried beans for the recipe, so that's what I'm going to share with you.

Now, there are MANY ways to make salsa, and I'm just going to give you the way that I made it. You can vary any ingredient and add pretty much anything you want. For the refried beans, the same goes. These recipes are really just basics that you can change in any way to meet your tastes.

So, we actually need very few ingredients for this, there's a lot of overlap.

For enough for three burritos you'll need one tomato (any kind you like: I chose plum), a shallot (or small onion), one jalapeno, a line, a small can of black beans (or red kidney if you prefer), and some fresh cilantro.

The first step is to dice up the tomato, using a serrated knife. I showed you this in the tomato fresco recipe a few weeks ago.

You could make this a "peach salsa" if you diced up some peaches (or mangoes) and threw it in now as well.
Next up is dicing up about a 2 teaspoons of shallots and throwing those in.

At one point I was thinking about making little crescent moons of shallot for a nice presentation, but I decided to dice instead. At this point the in the dicing, where you're getting everything in to small bits, it's important to keep the tip of your knife on the board. It will stop the knife from slipping and save you some trips to the emergency room. (Other than that tip, my knife skills are meager)

Finally, some heat! Dice half of a jalapeno (I had a small one) in to little bits. First, remove the seeds. So, slice it open and you can just pull out the pith and seeds with your fingers.

I've told you once, and I'll tell you again: WASH YOUR HANDS after handling any sort of hot pepper. I was sweating a little bit and rubbed my face and basically set it on fire. NOT PLEASANT.

Okay, to dice a jalapeno, I cut the pepper into matchsticks like below then turn the sticks and cut small squares.

Throw this in the bowl with a half teaspoon of grated garlic and the juice of half a lime. Then add about a teaspoon of salt, a tablespoon of cilantro and put it in the fridge to allow the flavors to marry. Let it sit for about an hour, but more time is even better.

The colors are really pretty. You can't see the pretty little purple bits that well, but it's mostly my photography that's failing here.

Now it's time for some refried beans. I found a recipe for them in Mark Bittman's "How to Cook Everything", which is a veritable bible of home cooking.

Start with a few (like two) tablespoons of oil in a pan over medium heat. When the oil is hot, add in about two a tablespoon, maybe more, of diced shallot.

Let this cook for about five to eight minutes over medium heat, until the shallots start to brown.

See the bunch near the bottom of the photo, that's the color we're looking for. Then add in the rest of the jalapeno, diced again and let cook for a minute or two. (You can add the rest of the clove of garlic from before at this stage also. I actually forgot while I was doing it). Add about two teaspoons to a tablespoon of ground cumin and let it go at this point too, until you can smell the cumin in you kitchen.

Now the fun part. Add the beans and give the pan a stir. Find a fork or masher and go at it.

Sorry it's blurry, my left hand was a little shaky. You get the idea though, you want to mash most, but not all of the beans. When you're done it should be a pretty dark purple and look like mush. Add in salt (to taste, about a teaspoon) and some more cumin (about half a teaspoon, but again, to taste) and transfer to a bowl.

See the consistency? Mushy, but you can still make out some whole-ish beans.

Now, you can do anything with these two. I made chicken burritos by sauteing some chicken in a skillet, and making saffron rice. Really, you could do anything, but I think that rice is a must.

So many colors in a burrito: beans, rice, chicken, cheese, salsa, lettuce, cilantro. It's a beautiful taste party. I think I'll make these again soon.

Quick Salsa
1 Plum tomato, diced
2 teaspoon shallot, diced
1/2 jalapeno, diced
1 tbsp cilantro, chopped
2 - 3 tbsp lime juice
1 tsp grated garlic
1 tsp salt

Combine ingredients in a bowl, cover, and let sit for at least one hour.

Refried Black Beans
1 small can black beans
2 tsp - 1 tbsp shallot, diced
1/2 jalapeno, diced
1 tbsp ground cumin
2 -3 tbsp olive oil
2 tsp grated garlic

1. Saute shallots in a pan over medium heat until just brown.
2. Add in jalapeno and garlic and saute for just a minute or two. Finally, add in most of the cumin and saute until fragrant.
3. Pour in black beans, stir and let warm for just a minute.
4. Using a fork or masher, mash the black beans in the pan until they form a paste with some beans still visible.

Enjoy guys, and remember, you can alter these recipes in a thousand different ways!

Chicken in a Balsamic Cream Sauce

Holy crap, I really didn't post for the entire month of March. To be honest, I was having trouble coming up with new recipes to try, and I had some pretty bad failures. Mostly, there were problems in executing actually decent ideas. I did, however, manage to make this little gem. It combines the acid of balsamic vinegar with the smoothness of cream to make a delicious sauce, which doesn't curdle!

Anyway, start by taking two chicken breasts, salt and pepper them and pan fry them.

I feel like so many of my recipes start this way. Anyway, while you're waiting gather these ingredients.

Oh, and butter... I forgot the butter. When the chicken is done, melt the butter in your pan (the same one you just took the chicken out of) and then add in your flour. For a good roux, you typically want about equal parts flour and butter. BTW, that's what we just made, a roux.

You want to cook the roux for about two or three minutes, just to get the raw flour taste out of it. Once that's done, add in your balsamic vinegar. It looks like I used about a tablespoon.

Stir it all around and try to get some of the chickeny goodness off the bottom of the pan. Then let it cook down for about a minute. We just need to allow the acid to cook down a bit. It will stop us from curdling the cream later. The fat may also do that... I'm not a chemistry person.

Perfect! Now it's time for the chicken stock. About a quarter cup will do. This is why we made the roux, so that we can get the chicken stock in our sauce to tighten up. See, it all makes sense... right?

Stir that all up and allow the stock to cook down for around 2 minutes.

Look how dark is got after that little amount of time. The balsamic is really integrated in. Now it's time for the good stuff... heavy cream. Just a tablespoon or two is probably good. I may have done three, I don't remember. Cream makes my memory hazy.

Stir all that cream in, and you will end up with something that is a brown-ish color. Not ugly brown though, smooth brown. At the end, I threw in around a half teaspoon more of balsamic, just to give it a bit of vinegar bite. It was worth it.

Damn, I love balsamic vinegar.

Something possessed me to warm up some tortillas and serve this over rice. It was a momentary thing. So, I warmed up the tortillas in the toaster. Just a minute or two on a low temperature.

Hi Mr. Toaster, it's been too long.

Then serve it up.sa

It's just my bad photography: I promise that the sauce is much more appetizing in person.

Here's the recipe so that you can enjoy this too.

Chicken in Balsamic Cream Sauce

2 chicken cutlets
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp flour
2 tbsp + a dash balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup chicken stock
3 or 4 tbsp heavy cream
Salt and Pepper to taste

1. Salt and pepper chicken cutlets and pan fry in olive oil.

2. Remove the chicken and add butter and flour. Allow to cook for about two minutes.

3. Add balsamic vinegar, deglazing the pan, and allow to cook down, about one minute.

4. Add chicken stock and stir vigorously. Allow to reduce by about half (2 minutes)

5. Add heavy cream and stir again. Add salt and pepper to taste. Return cutlets to the pan and then serve as you would like.