The Comfort is Always Here

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Crab Cakes with Garlic Aioli

Meat - No Comments » - Posted on May, 16 at 2:02 pm

Crab CakesWhat could be better this time of year but the crab cake? Well, I am sure you could come up with many things such as barbecue, salads, and plenty more, but trust me, before you move to make those other things, try these crab cakes. These cakes pack a ton of flavor and are just too easy to make. Did I tell you that the aioli is to die for as well? Trust me, this combination is awesome

Serves 3
Prep time: less than 15 minutes
Cook time: 7-9 minutes

Crab Cake Ingredients:

Heat a large skillet with a couple of glugs of olive oil, roughly 3 tablespoons. Bring this to a light smoke, and add the garlic and onion. Cook this mixture down for roughly seven minutes. In the meantime, add your bread to a food processor and pulse this down to a nice fluffy breadcrumb. In a large bowl, combine the breadcrumbs, crabmeat, egg white, mayonnaise, cilantro, and lime juice, and cooked onion and garlic. Mix this until it is well blended, then season with salt and pepper. This is where it gets messy, and fun.

Take a handful of the mixture and form into a small hockey puck and place on a large plate. Continue this with the rest of the mixture. Now take your plate and put it in the freezer for a few minutes. The goal is to have the cakes firm up a bit before cooking them.

While the cakes are firming up, lets make the aioli. If you have never made aioli before, it is very similar to mayonnaise, but in my opinion, it is much better.

Aioli Ingredients:

To make the garlic puree, take the garlic and mash it down. Now sprinkle a bit of course salt over the garlic and with the edge of your knife, begin massaging the garlic down to a paste. This process will take a few minutes, but is it ever worth it!

Now, in a bowl, add all of your ingredients, and mix really well. Stick this in the refrigerator until you are ready to plate the crab cakes.

Heat a large skillet with a 1/4 cup of olive oil. Bring this to a medium to high heat. Remove the cakes from the freezer and put as many cakes as you can fit, comfortably into the skillet. Once these are in, do not poke and prod at them, just let them cook for roughly 4 minutes on its side. When you are ready, get a thin spatula, and carefully flip over, cooking another 3 minutes. That’s it. Plate them up with a nice tossed salad, lemon wedges, and aioli on the side. Trust me, just trust me on this one.

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Saturday Morning Breakfast - Chorizo and Eggs (Chorizo con Huevos)

Breakfast, Ethnic, Meat, Pork - No Comments » - Posted on May, 9 at 7:53 pm

Chorizo and eggsThis is one of those easy morning recipes that I truly love. I first encountered huevos con chorizo while living in Dallas, Texas, and it seemed to be a staple at the time, not only because it tasted awesome, but it was also extremely inexpensive.

I really never knew what chorizo was, as growing up, it was never really served in our kitchen. As I learned more about chorizo (there are many types ranging from Portugal, Mexico, and the Philippines), the type I have stuck with for breakfast is the mexican type of chorizo. You can find these seasoned pork-filled tubes in your local grocery store, however I find that the best chorizo is found at your local latino supermercado. The chorizo does have a bit of a spice, however the eggs really provide a great balance. Let’s get started.

Prep time: 2 minutes
Serves: 1

Ingredients:

Chorizo and eggsBring a small to medium non-stick pan to a medium to high heat. Add your chorizo and begin to break this apart with your spatula. Let this cook for a few minutes before adding your eggs. Crack your eggs on top of the partially cooked chorizo and let them rest for nearly a minute. With your spatula, begin stirring the egg and chorizo, combining the two. You will be amazed about how this comes together, and it does this quite quickly. Continue to fold over the mixture until the eggs are cooked through.

Serve with warm, fresh tortillas, or use this mixture with quesadillas, tacos, or burritos. Enjoy.

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Stuffed Shells

Ethnic, Meat, Pasta, Sauce - No Comments » - Posted on May, 1 at 5:53 pm

Stuffed ShellsAs I noted that Spring was finally here, I might have spoke a bit soon as I had to make one more of those comfort dishes that we might typically make during our hibernation period in Wisconsin, and that is stuffed shells. These pillows are stuffed with delicious cheeses, and topped with a garlic and onion tomato sauce that will get you coming back to the plate. This is also a great dish if you are looking to do a one pot meal, feed many, and want a pick me up from any of those blues you might be having. Did I mention it only takes about twenty minutes to prepare? Let’s get started

Prep Time: 20 minute
Cook Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

Stuffed ShellsBegin by bringing a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook your noodles until al dente. When the noodles are done, drain and rinse with cool water. While the noodles are cooking, cook your ground beef (if adding), and if not going with the ground beef, add about a tablespoon of olive oil to a pan, throw in the onions and garlic and cook for five to seven minutes. In a separate pot, simmer your sauce, then throw in the (cooked and drained ground beef) cooked onions and garlic, cover and let it simmer.

Now, lets get the cheese mixture moving. In a large bowl, add the ricotta cheese, parmesan cheese, eggs, salt, and a 1/3 cup of your mozzarella, can combine well. Remember those shells? Well now it is time to put the “stuff” in stuffed shells.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

With a medium spoon, take a spoonful of the cheese mixture and begin stuffing each shell. When done with a shell, place in a large casserole dish, and line them accordingly. Now, take the sauce and place over the top. I completely cover the shells, however you can put as much or little as you like. Now use the rest of the mozzarella and scatter along the top of the sauce.

Cook for 30 minutes. Let rest for a few minutes before cutting into the shells. You talk about delicious….

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Rostisserie-Styled Beef

Beef, Meat, Sandwiches, Sauce - No Comments » - Posted on April, 30 at 11:57 am

Rotisserie Style Beef Spring is in the air! When Spring is in the air, that means a few things; yard work, more yard work, and getting the grill ready. My parents were kind enough to purchase a rotisserie attachment for my grill as a Christmas present. Trust me, I have been eager to use this attachment since December! Last week provided me the opportunity to do something with the rotisserie attachment. Thoughts were going through my head (chickens, cornish hens, turkey), however I decided to go with a beef roast. I went with the beef because my parents made something similar on my last visit to Nevada, and that was a cut of tri-tip beef. Now that was good, but I am thinking that this one was better. Let’s get started.

Please be mindful that if you do not have the attachment, you could slow roast this in the oven and it would turn out just as good!

Prep: 5 minutes, plus marinading time of 4 hours
Cook time: 3 hours

Rotisserie Style Beef Ingredients:

Rotisserie Style Beef Take your beef, and cut slits into it to stuff garlic slices into, doing this around the entire roast. Then rub the roast with olive oil, salt, pepper, and rosemary. Place in a large ziplock bag and let it get marry for four hours or more. Here is the cool thing. Take the rotisserie sword, and the meat hooks and stab the meat and form a solid connection with the hooks. Preheat your grill on medium, and insert the sword into the box. Let this cook for 3 hours. If you have a meat thermometer, use it, otherwise, do what I did and use your thumb to determine the wellness of the meat. Carefully remove the meat from the sword, and let it rest for nearly ten minutes.

When you are ready, cut thin slices, against the grain, and serve with Hawaiian dipping sauce.

You know it is good when you bring in a tupperware full the following day and your coworkers eat it for breakfast. :)

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