Yard House BBQ Beans

Ingredients :
1/4 cup olive oil.
2 tablespoons minced garlic.
1 cup chopped green onion.
1 to 2 jalapeños, minced, or to taste (seeding the jalapeños will minimize their heat)
4 cups cooked pinto beans (from about 1 pound dry, or about 3 drained 15-ounce cans)
2 cups chicken broth or 2 cups of pinto bean liquid from boiling
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup prepared barbecue sauce (Bulls-Eye brand works well)
2 to 4 tablespoons puréed chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, or to taste
2 teaspoons Tabasco, or to taste Salt and pepper, to taste

The Preparation:
1. Heat a medium heavy-bottom pot over medium-high heat until hot. Add the olive oil, garlic, green onions and jalapeño and sauté,stirring constantly, until the garlic is aromatic and golden, about 2 minutes.

2. Stir in the pinto beans, chicken broth, brown sugar, barbecue sauce, puréed chipotle peppers and Tabasco sauce. Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring frequently to avoid burning the mixture, then reduce the heat to a simmer.

3. Continue to cook just until the beans begin to break apart, about 15 to 20 minutes. Taste the mixture and adjust the seasoning and heat as desired. Smash some of the beans slightly with the back of a spoon and stir to thicken the texture. The beans will keep, covered and refrigerated, for up to 4 days.

Service:  6-8

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Green Around the Gills

Substituting the portobella mushroom for a beef patty is nothing new. And why wouldn't it be? It's easy and quick. If you feel you eat too much red meat (which I and much of North America does), portobella is an excellent alternative to a burger.

Last post, I was discussing everyone's favourite fungus, the mushroom. But there is way too much to cover and so I had to cap it off.

What many people may or may not know is that the common white mushroom, the cremini and the portobella mushroom are basically the same thing. What differs them from one another is the maturity level. I imagine many of you can figure out which mushroom has been allowed to grow the longest. That's right! You guessed it. It's the portobella. Or is it the portobello? Oh, whatever. You get what I mean. Because the portobella has been allowed to mature and grow, the gills can bleed quite extensively. Some chefs I've worked for would cut out the gills while other chefs couldn't be bothered. In my opinion, I leave them in for most recipes and will cut them out for only a few recipes. For example, Mushroom Polenta or Cornbread. The gills bleed and makes the polenta very grey looking and very unappetizing. Or maybe a chowder or a cream sauce where I want to retain the white colour. As you can see, I determine it for the sake of appearance. Not so much for texture or flavour.

Then again, many of you may not care about the appearance. But, I think, to a certain degree, everyone does. Every time we go grocery shopping, we are bombarded with magazine covers where the dishes look ridiculously delicious. Or on T.V. where these chefs seem to make these gorgeous dinners in less than half an hour. And because of this, can it not be said that we start to want our own food to look this good all the time? Appearance matters. When you buy beef, do you normally base your judgment on the redness of the beef? Even though the colour can be very deceiving. Sure, grey beef is not usually a good thing, but just because the alternative is red, doesn't mean it's fresher. With a quick flash of carbon monoxide, that meat can stay red much longer after it's gone rancid. Scary. How about produce? If you see two red peppers where one is a perfect shape and other looks curled over and slightly disfigured. Which do you buy? If you said the perfect one, why? Will it taste better?

Anyways, appearance matters whether we like it or not. So, keep the garnishes coming!

Grilled Portobello Mushrooms on a Foccaccia

6 Large Portobello Mushrooms, washed
1 Red Pepper
100 ml Balsamic Vinegar
100 ml Oil
2 Garlic Cloves, crushed
Drizzle of Honey
1 Package of Arugula
Small Package of Blue Cheese (Gorgonzola is good), crumbled
6 Foccaccias
Salt and Pepper to Taste

Score the cap of the mushroom with two cross hatches.

Marinate mushrooms in oil and balsamic vinegar and two cloves of crushed garlic.

Coat red peppers with oil and grill peppers until blackened on the outside. Place in a sealed bag and close. Steam through for 10 minutes. Remove and let cool. Peel skin away and discard innards. Keep flesh of peppers.

In a hot grill pan or on the BBQ, grill mushrooms for 3 minutes per side. Remove and cut in half.

On a foccaccia, rub last clove of garlic on the inside. Place arugula, peppers and mushrooms in panini. Add desired amount of cheese.

Makes 6 sandwiches.

A Humble Chef's tip: if it's winter time, cook your peppers in the oven at 400 for 30 min. Less smoke will emit if you roast them.

Variation: Goat's Cheese over the blue if you don't like blue cheese.

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I Yam What I Yam. A Sweet Potato.

Now that the weather is warming up, it is time to leave the kitchen and start burning propane. When comfortable, you can cook more than burgers and chicken on a stick on your outdoor grill.

Generally speaking, there are three overall methods of cooking: dry heat, moist heat and n0-heat. Within those are all the ways we cook. For instance, dry heat is roasting, grilling, sauteing, deep frying (yes, deep frying is considered a dry heat method) and broiling. Moist cooking is blanching and braising. No-heat would be curing and pickling and these sort of things.

If you can remember that the BBQ is just an oven that is outside, then sky's the limit. Once you have the mindset, you can do braises on your BBQ, or roast beef or chicken or whatever, standard grilling foods like meats and vegetables and even some starches. Heck, desserts aren't even out of the question if you're brave enough. If you have some cedar planks, then you can really treat your BBQ like any oven.

It is unfortunate that sweet potatoes aren't as popular as they should be. Not to be confused with the yam, sweet potatoes are a distant cousin of the common potato we all know and love. Yet, sweet potatoes are high in fibre and complex sugars. Virtually opposite to the delicious cousin. So, why don't we eat more of it? I'm not sure why but I do know that many people I talk to about cooking are often afraid that they are higher in carbs than other potatoes which couldn't be further from the truth.

So stop being a Sweet Potato hater and make the switch. It is brilliant mashed, in a soup, roasted and, of course, grilled. Yum.

Grilled Sweet Potatoes with a Honey Tarragon Glaze

2 Large Sweet Potatoes, cut into 3 cm slices
50 ml Liquid Honey
Small Bunch of Fresh Tarragon, chopped
Juice and Zest of 3 Limes
Salt and Pepper to Taste
Drizzle of Oil

In a sauce pan, combine honey, tarragon and lime juice. Reduce by half to a glaze. Remove from heat.

On your BBQ, heat one side to high and the other to medium low. In a bowl, toss sweet potatoes in oil, salt and pepper and zest. Grill potatoes on hot side and grill for 3 - 4 minutes. Turn sweet potato one quarter to make cross hatches and grill for another 3 - 4 minutes. Flip and repeat. Transfer potato to other side of BBQ and using a silicone pastry brush, glaze potato with reduction. Cook until tender. Usually 5 minutes depending on the thickness of the sweet potato.

Serve immediately.

Serves 4.

A Humble Chef's tip: you can lay down some foil on your cooler side of your BBQ to prevent burning.

Variation: Sweet Potatoes have an affinity with spices like cinnamon and clove and these sort of things. You can make a sweet glaze using the same method except omit the tarragon and substitute whatever spice you often use in apple pie.

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Chop! Chop!

Apples are great. However, they have a weakness: they are easily overpowered. When combining them with something else, they can get lost very easily. That is why apple sauce goes so well with pork chops: pork chops have very little flavour and the sweetness offsets the fattiness of the chop.

On the flip side, I've made Mulligatawny Soup (which apparently means "pepper-water") with grated apple to compliment the curry flavours. In the soup (which by the way is fantastic, if anyone wishes to know it, ask and I shall post it, if no requests then I won't bother) the flavour of the apples are lost if used too sparingly but the tartness adds a different dimension to the soup that is only noticeable when noted. Again, it is the building of flavours I've referred to in the past that I'm getting at.

This simple, simple, simple recipe is for the person who wants to make everything fresh but isn't complicated. Serve this with sweet potato mash or regular mash. Which, incidentally, was requested by my cousin to post because she swears I make the best mash she's ever had. Well, mash potatoes are as easy as it gets but maybe, just maybe, I know a trick about how to make mash potatoes better than average. Stay tuned.

One quick note on making apple sauce; I like using a food mill to puree the sauce. If you don't have one, you will have to peel the apples, remove seeds and quater them.

Grilled Pork Loin With Apple Sauce

8 Pork Chops, cut from the loin
2 Sprigs of Sage, finely chiffonade
Pinch of Paprika
Salt and Pepper to Taste
6 Apples, quatered
200 g Brown Sugar
Pinch of Cinnamon
100 g Unsalted Butter

Preheat BBQ or indoor grill pan. Marinate chops with sage and paprika in the fridge for ten minutes.

In a mid-sized sauce pan on medium high heat, throw in cinnamon, sugar and apples and cover. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and add water if too dry. Cook thoroughly until apples are mushy. Using a food mill, throw in cooked mixture and puree.

In a small frying pan, melt butter until it starts turning a little brown (this is called a beurre noisette) and fold into the puree. Keep hot until served.

On grill, sear off loins. After 2 minutes, turn one quarter and let sear for another minute. Turn over and repeat. After searing, remove from direct heat and let cook for 6-8 minutes depending on thickness of the chop. The interior should reach be a little pink but not fleshy looking.

Serve with Apple Sauce.

Serves 4.

Variation: You can even try this with peameal bacon, or back or Canadian or whatever you want to call it, using the exact same method. Cooking time would be reduce simply because peameal takes no time to cook since it has already been cured.

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