Tag: main course
Penne Pasta with Huancaina Sauce
Penne Pasta with Huancaina Sauce
Huancaina is a popular Peruvian creamy and spicy cheese sauce made with aji amarillo paste. It is used on a lot starchy carbs such as potatoes, rice, and pasta. The preparation is really simple. All of the sauce ingredients get puréed in a blender, then heated with milk. I chose to mix in penne pasta and top with parmesan and parsley.
Equipment
- Blender or food processor
Ingredients
- 1 lb dry penne pasta prepared according to package directions
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1/2 medium red onion chopped
- 4 garlic cloves minced
- 1/2 cup evaporated milk
- 1/4 cup aji amarillo paste
- 1 cup queso fresco diced
- 4 soda crackers
- 1 1/2 cups whole milk
- salt to taste
Garnish
- parmesan cheese
- parsley chopped
Instructions
- Heat up cooking oil in a large sauté pan over medium high heat. Sauté the onions and garlic for 5 minutes.
- Add the evaporated milk, aji amarillo paste, queso fresco, soda crackers, and sautéed onions and garlic to a blender or food processor. Purée until smooth.
- Pour the sauce and whole milk into a large deep sauce pan over medium heat. Simmer for 6-8 minutes, stirring consistently.
- Add in the cooked penne pasta. Mix to make sure it is evenly coated. Cook for 3-4 more minutes.
- Turn off the heat. Garnish with parmesan cheese and chopped parsley.
Spiced Green Beans
Spiced Green Beans
Most Indian cuisine seems like it has a million ingredients and takes a lot of time to prepare. A lot of it does. Here is a great example of a dish that isn’t that. Spiced green beans is a simple dish that has only a few ingredients and takes 10 minutes to cook, but has tremendous complex flavors. Serve the green beans with a dollop of plain yogurt and some flaky parathas.
Servings: 2
Ingredients
- 1/2 lb green beans trimmed and washed
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 1 pinch asafoetida
- 1 tsp mustard seeds
- 3 dried Kashmiri chilies
- 6 curry leaves
- 1 tsp ground coriander
- salt to taste
- 1 tbsp lime juice
- 1 tbsp cilantro chopped
Instructions
- Bring a pot of salted water to a boil. Add in the green beans. Boil for 2 minutes. Drain and rinse under cold water. Set aside.
- Heat up cooking oil in a sauté pan over medium heat. Add the mustard seeds and asafoetida. Cook for 1 minute.
- Add in the dried chilies, followed by the curry leaves and green beans. Sauté for 2 minutes.
- Season with salt and the ground coriander. Stir. Place a cover on the pan and take off the heat. Let sit for a couple of minutes. Before serving, add in the lime juice and chopped cilantro.
Smoked Stuffed Pork Loin
Smoked Stuffed Pork Loin
I’ve wanted to make this recipe for quite some time. It started to get cold outside and I had a lot of basil in garden to use up. I took a pork loin and butterflied it open, hammered it thin, and brined it for a day. Then I stuffed it with mozzarella, sun dried tomatoes, red onions and my basil. Then it got rolled up and tied, then smoked. Once the pork reached an internal temperature of 150 degrees, I pulled it from the smoker and let it rest for 20 minutes. I sliced the loin into 1” thick pieces, resulting in a pinwheel effect of stuffing in the pork loin.
Equipment
- Meat Mallet
- Butchers Twine
- Electric Smoker
- Probe Thermometer
Ingredients
- 4 lb boneless pork loin roast
- 9 slices mozzarella cheese
- 2 cups Italian basil leaves
- 8 oz sun dried tomatoes
- 1/2 medium red onion thinly sliced
- 1 tbsp paprika
- 3 tsp black pepper
- 3 tsp garlic powder
Brine
- 1/2 gallon water
- 1/2 cup sea salt
- 1/4 cup sugar
Wood Chips
- 2/3 hickory wood chips
- 1/3 applewood chips
Instructions
- Mix together the brining ingredients. Set aside.
- Place the pork loin fat cap side up.
- Slice a third of the thickness of the pork loin horizontally almost all the way through. You are almost butterflying the loin, except you are cutting into only a third of the thickness instead of in half.
- Butterfly open the thicker side of the pork loin. It should look like you have 3 sections wide open of pork loin.
- Using a meat mallet, hammer down the pork loin all over until it is equal thickness; about 1”-1.5” thick.
- Placd the pork loin in a gallon sized storage bag with the brine. Squeeze out any air. Brine for 24 hours.
- When ready to stuff, pat dry with paper towels. Lay out the pork loin flat.
- Place the mozzarella across the entire pork loin.
- Layer whole basil leaves and sun dried tomatoes on top of the cheese.
- Cover with sliced red onions.
- Carefully roll up the pork loin.
- Using butcher’s twine, tie up the pork loin. I start by tying in the middle, then 3 ties on each side of the center. Then tie up the loin once horizontally. Let the pork loin sit at room temperature an hour before smoking. Season the outside with paprika, black pepper, and garlic powder.
- Preheat your smoker to 250 degrees. Placd the stuffed loin in the smoker.
- At the 3 hour mark, take the temperature with a probe thermometer. Continue smoking until the internal temperature reaches 150 degrees.
- Let rest for 20 minutes before slicing.
