Tuesday, May 06, 2003

 
I'm falling a little behind, it seems. I have this bad habit of opening links from my email at work without checking to see if my current browser window is being used. Not usually a problem, but kind of a pain when you are in the middle of writing out a post and it gets reset because of opening a new site in the same window. I've done this twice now with this post.

So anyways, on Sunday I made Corn Pudding from the book Mexican Light and Chile Rellenos from Cooking Light magazine. I've noticed that the recipes from Cooking Light seem to be a major pain in the ass to prepare. Of the two I've tried so far, both have taken twice as long to prepare as to cook. Fortunately, this one turned out pretty good, unlike the pastitsio fiasco from ealier in the week.

The corn pudding was super easy and turned out really good. Basically, just blend together 4 cups of corn kernals (I used frozen) and about 2/3 cup of 1% milk. The recipe called for that and of course we had to try to substitute fat-free half-and-half, which was too thick for the blender, so I ended up adding another 1/3 to 1/2 cup of milk to it and that worked fine. Also, add about 4 cloves of toasted garlic, which is just whole, unpeeled cloves toasted in a pan on the stove (just like toasting nuts or seeds) until they start turning brown on all the sides. It takes about 10 minutes, then peel them and add them to the blender. Then, mix up 3 eggs with some salt and pepper, add the corn mixture and another cup of whole kernals and stir until blended all together. Add the mixture to a casserole dish that's been lightly oiled (or sprayed w/ Pam) and bake in a water bath (put the casserole in a baking pan that's half-filled with water) at 350 for about an hour or until the top starts to brown. Mine took about and hour and 15 minutes, but I kept opening the oven door, so that probably had something to do with it taking longer.

The chile rellenos were more of a pain. First you have to roast the poblano peppers. This takes about 10 minutes under a broiler. Then you have to cool them for 15 minutes in a plastic bag. Then you have to peel and de-seed the peppers without cutting off the top or slicing it in half. This part took forever and was harder than it sounds. I was having Leah chop the veggies up for this filling while I was peeling and de-seeding, but it ended up taking so long that she pretty much chopped, seasoned and sauteed the filling while I finished the peppers and started the white sauce. The filling consisted of green onions, red bell pepper, corn, toasted pine nuts and some queso fresco, then adding some whole and some smashed black beans. I made the white sauce by melting 2 tbsp of butter (yes, real butter) with some cumin and nutmeg. I added 2 tbsp of flour and it was supposed to cook for 5 minutes, but I got impatient and probably only cooked it for 2 or 3 minutes, so it didn't thicken as much as it should. The I added 2 cups of 2% milk ( I didn't try to substitute this time...learned my lesson) and cooked over medium-high heat until it started to thicken, which took a good 10-15 minutes, I would say, since I didn't cook the roux long enough. Stirring continuously, I might add, so that it was hard to do anything else at the same time. Then I let the sauce cool a little (and thicken up some more) while I stuffed the peppers and placed them in a baking dish. I added some salt and squeezed about a tablespoon of lime juice into the sauce and poured it over the peppers and then sprinkled about 1/2 cup of breadcumbs mixed with 1/4 cup of queso fresco over the top and baked at 350 for 20 minutes, until the sauce was all bubbly. The I stuck it under a broiler for a couple of minutes til the breadcrumbs browned and it was done.

While the peppers were baking, I made some salsa fresca. Basically, I just cut up some tomatoes, avocados and red onion and mixed the chunks together with some fresh chopped cilantro, salt and a squeeze of lime juice. Couldn't be easier. We had the leftover peppers and corn pudding for lunch yesterday and since I had class last night, we had the leftover filling from the peppers with some rice and grilled chicken that Leah seasoned up w/ chile powder and some other tasty stuff that I can't quite place.



Jacki 5/06/2003