Meet Leroy

Chicken Leroy

So I asked the Old Guy how he wanted tonight’s chicken. The answer I got was chicken Leroy. So I Google chicken Leroy. A whole bunch of crap came up. You see I got a smart ass answer. Surprising isn’t it.

Well, damn it I made chicken Leroy.

Chicken Leroy:

half a chicken with Cajun seasoning rubbed on it

brown chicken in a pan, add Leroy, Leroy will melt with the heat

cover and cook till done, skin side down so it gets brown *

Leroy:

1/4 C honey, life is much easier if you warm the honey up so it’s really liquid

red wine vinegar, about 2 Tbl

hot chili pepper, I used half a ghost pepper-the hottest pepper on Earth, the chili is optional**, ***

some red onion

thyme or whatever herbs you like

*I cooked this on the stove top on low heat because I forgot to put the potato in the oven before starting the chicken. When the potato was close to being done I turned up the heat. Yeah, I need to plan better.

**Holy crap! I managed to burn my nose with the ghost pepper. I washed my hands after chopping, went blow my nose (allergies!). Well, the next time I wear gloves. Thankfully I didn’t have contacts in.

***Holy crap on a monkey stick! I went to wipe something away from my eye. It burns. But seems to be much better now. But, damn, my mascara still looks good!

craptastic picture take while cooking, no finished picture, just imagine the rabbit being browner

While browsing my local Asian Mega Mart I came across frozen rabbits. They were a good price something like $2.99/lb. They are about $20 at the local Yuppie Mart. I decided to buy the cheap bunny to test the waters.

Then came the trying to figure out what to do with the thing. I’ve never eaten it before. So I have no idea how it should taste.

After spending a day looking up recipes on the internet with no luck. Seriously, the internet failed me. Maybe I didn’t to look hard enough. I did find an interesting sounding one that hailed form Spain. It used chocolate. But the Old Guy said no.

I had to turn to books. After flipping through some Julia Child, Galloping Gourmet and some Time Life (yes Time Life, they belong to the Old Guy) I found what I was looking for.

In Bistro Cooking by Patricia Wells there are two rabbit recipes. The first, rabbit with mustard sauce, and one for rabbit with green olives. I decided to combine the two. I find it impossible to use a recipe.

It worked! The rabbit was tasty, it was easy to make, it was fairly inexpensive. Everything I could hope for.

Here’s what I did:

cut rabbit into pieces

salt and pepper rabbit

brown rabbit in a Dutch oven, set aside once browned

in the same pan sauté an onion and some garlic in the rabbit fat

put rabbit back in the pan

now I added some white wine with about 2 Tbl some Dijon mustard mixed in

then a bay leaf, tarragon, thyme and some green olives go in

cook covered for about 30 minutes, then uncovered for 15 minutes

If you follow on Twitter, you know I burned the chicken. It was still tasty.

This is an easy marinade that would work well with fish and pork as well. I believe it would be too light for beef and lamb. With duck it would work well for the legs. It’s too acidic for the breasts and wings.

For the most part the ingredients are easy to come by. Pomegranate concentrate maybe harder to find in some places. I suggest looking at a Persian market if you have one. The brand I buy is made by Sadef and I find it at my local Asian Mega Mart. They cater to a diverse demographic.  If you can’t find the concentrate a store like Whole Foods should have straight pomegranate juice.

Lemon Pomegranate Marinade:

crushed garlic cloves to taste, I like garlic so I used most of a head

the juice of 2 large lemons

a couple of dashes of pomegranate infused red wine vinegar

1/4 C of pomegranate concentrate

a handful of thyme

a pinch of rosemary

hot chili peppers to taste, I use 2 red Korean peppers from the garden

salt

You don’t need much liquid to marinate, you just need to turn the chicken (or whatever) every so often. So don’t worry if it doesn’t look like enough.

This is rather acidic, so it works best with some skin and fat. If you insist on using meat with the fat and skin trimmed completely off add some olive oil to the marinade.

Like most things the longer the meat marinates the better it will taste.

Avocado, tomatoes, feta, olive oil, salt and pepper.

The tricky thing is remembering to squeeze lemon or lime on the avocado so it doesn’t go brown, and getting the OG to cut and plate nicer.

Yeah, blurry, I need to use my real camera

You want duck but you don’t have a lot of money. Duck wings and legs are your answer. Far cheaper then the breast (why are the breast so expensive?). The wings are gamey and closer in taste to the breast. The legs are rather light tasting, good for the person that is afraid to try duck. You get more meat on the legs. But wings are really tasty. Nice and ducky. I paid less than $3 at the local Asian Mega Mart for my package of wings. It was enough for two people with no leftovers.

In a heavy bottom pan add 3-4 cloves of crushed garlic, the wings, salt and pepper. Then add the cherries. I used about a 1/2 pound. You can pit them or not. I got lazy 1/4 of the way trough and stopped pitting them. Put the pan on a medium high burner and cover until done. It will depend on the meatiness of the wings.  I left mine go for about 40 minutes. It’s pretty hard to over cook.

And yes, I promise to update both blogs. I swear.

So I really wanted to call this tortured baby cow, but decided to be correct. The veal came from Whole Foods! How could it have been tortured? Whole Foods only has happy tasty animals. You might be wondering how this qualifies as a cheap meal. But it was I promise.  The veal was on sale, it was $4.31. I love the fact Whole Foods has lowered their prices.

On to the veal…

It was a chuck roast, so not the greatest cuts of meat. But still tasty and it has been a long time since veal had been bought and consumed.

I wanted to see the quality of the veal, so I purposely didn’t do much to it. I simply seasoned it with salt, pepper, rosemary and lavender. I cooked it on a cast iron pan with garlic and potato over an open fire.

I realize high quick heat is not the ideal way to cook chuck roast. But it worked. The veal was flavorful and reasonably tender. Yes braising would of been ideal, but it’s been 800 degrees out. I’m not using an oven.

Overall it was a really nice dinner, and really cheap.

old photo, a little burnt in spots

Here’s how I make the easiest bbq chicken on the planet. All you do is marinate your chicken in balsamic vinegar, honey, pepper and rosemary. That’s it. Salt it before you cook it. Cook it any way you want to, but it wouldn’t be bbq without the grill.

The balsamic vinegar isn’t too acidic so you don’t need to add anything else. It’s not going to be tangy. You can marinate for as long as you want. You can add as much honey as you want. Hell, you can leave the honey out. It’s that fool proof.

Trying to use up leftovers is usually a failure for me. Which is why I try not to cook more than we need. This week was different. The only pork I found on Monday was a large piece. So, there were leftovers, and lots of them. Plus I had a pound of sauce to use. So large was the only way to go.

Now that there is a mountain of pork in the freezer I have to use it.

First way: An uninspired stir fry! Also a great way of using veggies that are, well on life support.

A hunk of frozen pork was taken out of the freezer and thinly sliced. Then it was re-marinated in soy sauce, sambal and hoisin. Just for kicks and giggles. Once defrosted and at room temperature it was ready to cook.

For veggies I used cabbage, carrot, onion, long hot green pepper, ginger, burdock, diakon and peas.

The marinade for the pork is enough liquid. If you feel like you need more go ahead and add more!

I used quinoa in lieu of rice. You know, because it’s healthy.