0 Smoked Eye of Round Roast

It is really simple recipe but it will take about two hours depending on how you take care of charcoals inside smoker. I always love to smoke the meat during really nice day with cooling wind. Love to irritate my lovely neighbor who live next door with my Indian signals--she's nice looking lady who tried to keep her place smell nice but I don't care when it come to barbecuing. Well, that's my dinner, not hers.
Like to go to grocery store and start my primal instinct to hunt for nice and fresh meat in meat department. My wife couldn't stop me from doing some scavenger hunt there. She knew that I will find best meat with good price and always make sure that we have enough meat to feed my family.

Here is a simple recipe:

Eye of Round
Montreal Seasoning
8-12 garlic cloves

Trim the fat off the meat or optional, leave the fat on meat. Take a sharpest paring knife and make incision on meat for garlic. Halve the garlic clove and put half of garlic into an incision. Continue all over meat until you run out of garlic cloves. Seasoning the meat and rub it all over the meat. Wrap the meat with saran wrap. Refrigerate overnight to allow the flavors blend with garlic and seasoning.



Preparing your smoker according to your smoker instructions. Unwrap the meat, put it on grill and cover. About 20 minutes, check your meat and turn it over. Another 20 minutes, turn it over again. Smoking until the internal temperature registered at 140 F or more depending on your preference on doneness.

0 Braised Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic

Pretty long time ago during late afternoon, I went to a small restaurant (I forgot what's name of this place, it was middle eastern origin name,) on one of streets that are not that busy. I walked in and looked around--a restaurant looked so empty to me. Greeted by a middle eastern man and guided me to a table. I read their menu--not so much to read, only one page with small paper--list of beverages. I ordered Half Chicken with 40 cloves of Garlic along with iced tea. I was informed that I will wait for chicken for about 45 minutes. I told him that I am fine with that. My iced tea arrived. It tasted good.

I decided to get up and looked around the dining area. It was pretty small--size like my two of bedroom. This place will seat about thirty according to my estimated counts of chairs. Whiff of garlic reached my nose, I started to notice how strong it was as it cooked. My stomach growled, you know. Hanged out there for while, still no customers coming in.

Young man walked and refilled my iced tea. He come by and asked me if I want to smoke the hash... I was shocked about that, I asked him what is the hash.... He went out and brought the kind of vase with five cords. He gave me the demonstration of how he do with it. Observing he put something in a little pipe bowl. He lighted it. It smell me like other kind of tobacco and something nice--I think it was kind of clove cigarette but nice aroma. I took one cord and take a smoke. It tasted better than my cigarette, it is not a drug because I am not sure about hash...I knew the hash and I had been got high from smoking hash when I was young adult. I decided to smoke with that guy and enjoy the aroma of smoke.

Finally my chicken arrived on my table while I almost finished my smokes. The food presentation looked nice to me, it is kind of rustic--cloves of garlic with skin on, rosemary, and other herbs on chicken. It smelled nice to me. I tasted garlicky Half chicken for first time. I don't know how to describe its delicious taste. It tasted better than I tried to do my chicken with garlic.

Today, I, sometime, wondered why a middle eastern restaurant served the chicken while other restaurants (French, American and Mexican) served the chicken like this. I don't know why but very interesting that I found few recipes like Chicken with 40 cloves of Garlic and they looked similar to me with little variation of ingredients. The variation didn't bother me so much since the garlic is second main ingredients in the dish.

Here is the recipe:

Braised Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic

3-1/2- to 4-lb. chicken
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
One-half lemon
1/4 tsp. sweet Hungarian paprika
2 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil
40 cloves unpeeled garlic, separated and any loose papery skins removed (about 2 large heads)
1/2 cup dry white wine
2 sprigs fresh thyme
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
2 sprigs fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 cup lower-salt chicken broth
Toasted baguette slices for serving

Position a rack in the lower third of the oven and heat the oven to 400°F.

Trim any excess fat from the cavity of the chicken. Pat the chicken very dry and season inside and out with 2 tsp. salt and 1 tsp. pepper. Squeeze the juice from the lemon half and set the juice aside. Put the juiced lemon half in the chicken’s cavity. Cross the chicken legs and tie them together; tuck the wings under the chicken. Using a small sieve, dust the breasts and legs with the paprika.

Heat the oil in a 3- to 4-quart Dutch oven (large enough to fit the chicken snugly) over medium-high heat. Add the chicken, breast side down, and cook until the skin is browned, about 2 minutes. Turn and cook the back and sides until browned, 2 to 3 minutes per side. Transfer the chicken to a plate and pour off and discard the oil left in the pot.

Return the pot to medium-high heat. Add the garlic and wine to the pot, stirring to deglaze the browned bits from the bottom. Return the chicken to the pot, setting it breast side up on top of the garlic. Add the herbs to the pot, pour the broth over the chicken, and bring to a boil. Cover and transfer the pot to the oven. Cook, basting the chicken every 20 minutes, until an instant-read thermometer inserted in the thigh registers 160°F, 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Uncover and continue to cook the chicken until the thermometer registers 165° to 170°F in the thigh and the juices from the thigh run clear when the thermometer is removed, about 10 minutes more. Transfer the chicken to a cutting board and the garlic cloves to a serving platter; cover both loosely with foil to keep warm.

Strain the braising liquid from the pot into a small saucepan; discard the herbs. Tilt the pan so the juices collect in one corner and spoon off and discard as much of the fat as possible. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Simmer until reduced to 3/4 cup, about 5 minutes. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and some of the reserved lemon juice.

Carve the chicken and transfer the pieces to the serving platter with the garlic. Serve with the sauce and the baguette slices.

From Fine Cooking 92, pp. 62

0 Jalapenos Scare

I just thought about the jalapeños scare in the news. In past weeks ago, I was told to throw the fresh jalapeños out to garbage and started to use the pickled jalapeños from cans for making the salsa. The taste is not so much same because there are little trace of spiciness in salsa with pickled jalapeños. I like fresh ones but have to follow what my boss told me. I think it is good for our own safety. I guess I have to wait until FDA cleared all scares and let us use the fresh hot peppers.

There are nothing to be afraid of USA-grown jalapeños but need to avoid Mexican-grown peppers. Pretty hard to find one in store--I guess many people don't want to buy or retailers don't have the guts to sell them. I settled on canned chillies for while to make my own homemade salsa.

Last time I heard some news from FDA about fresh tomatoes, and now, jalapeños. I found few and read:

WASHINGTON - Government inspectors finally have a big clue in the nationwide salmonella outbreak: They found the same bacteria strain on a single Mexican-grown jalapeno pepper handled in Texas — and issued a stronger warning for consumers to avoid fresh jalapenos.

But Monday’s discovery, the equivalent of a fingerprint, doesn’t solve the mystery: Authorities still don’t know where the pepper became tainted — on the farm, or in the McAllen, Texas, plant, or at some stop in between, such as a packing house. Read More: Salmonella found in Mexican-grown jalapenos

WASHINGTON - Call it the smoking jalapeno. After nearly two months of mystery, the Food and Drug Administration has finally identified a piece of produce—a jalapeno pepper—that is contaminated with the same strain of salmonella that has sickened more than 1,250 people in 43 states, the District of Columbia and Canada.

The bad pepper was grown in Mexico and found at a packing company in McAllen, Texas, a few miles from the Mexican border.

It's the first piece of produce the agency has found that carries Salmonella Saintpaul, a rare strain of the food-borne bacteria. The hunt for the salmonella proved so frustrating that Monday's announcement was characterized by Dr. David Acheson, the associate commissioner for foods, as "a significant break in the salmonella investigation."FDA: Salmonella found in Jalapeno

Southern California grocery stores reversed themselves Tuesday and started pulling jalapeno peppers from their shelves.

The move comes a day after they left the peppers on the shelves even after the Food and Drug Administration said Monday that the produce could be linked to a national Salmonella Saintpaul outbreak. The moves also highlighted the conflicting messages that the nation's mostly voluntary food safety network sends out at times like this.Grocers stop selling jalapeno peppers after salmonella discovery

Very interesting articles about the reactions that affected the sales of jalapeños. Stores have to remove them from the shelves and the production companies started to lose their money because of the tainted jalapeños. I guess I will wait for more news from FDA. In my opinions, I started to think that FDA tried to help and destroy what the Americans are trying to build--but for safety reasons, we need to protect ourselves from something that will make us so sick after eating one piece of whatever vegetable or meat. Only one question: how do we know which one that caused us to get bad illnesses? I don't know when I will be sick unless I found out from sitting on toilet. The toilet will tell you the tale of what you are eating--I am not kidding! I better stop talking dirty.

Think about it and you decide.

1 Kofta Kebabs with Tzatziki

I have to write something as I hope that will help you to understand the kind of recipe with helps from slideshow. I got some inspirations from other blogs with their photos, videos and the big thing: slideshow. I started to think about something, started to work on the photography of food preparation. I hope that it won't scare you off. Once you tried a recipe for first time, you will feel comfortable on second attempt. Depending on what you like to do, I rather grill my meat for dinner. Here is the recipe:

Kofta Kebabs with Tzatziki
Recipe courtesy Food Network Kitchens Cookbook, Meredith Books, October 2003
Show: Sara's Secrets
Episode: Butcher's Basics


Whether it's Indonesian satay, French brochette, or Turkish kebab, food on a stick is just plain fun. "Kofta" refers to kebabs made with ground rather than cubed meat.

Kebabs:
4 cloves garlic
1 tablespoon kosher salt, plus a pinch
1 pound ground beef chuck or lamb
3 tablespoons grated onion
3 tablespoons chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 tablespoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
Freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil, for brushing the grill
Tzatziki, recipe follows
Grilled flat bread

Smash the garlic cloves, sprinkle with a generous pinch of salt, and, with the flat side of a large knife, mash and smear mixture to a coarse paste. Mix the paste and the remaining 1 tablespoon salt with the meat, onion, parsley, and spices.

Line a pan with aluminum foil. Divide the meat mixture into 28 rough balls. Mold each piece around the pointed end of a skewer (if you use wooden ones, soak them in water for
15 minutes before threading them), making a 2-inch oval kebab that comes to a point just covering the tip of the skewer. Lay the skewers on the pan, cover, and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes and up to 12 hours.

Heat a grill pan over medium heat or prepare a grill. Brush the pan lightly with olive oil. Working in batches, grill the kebabs, turning occasionally, until brown all over and just cooked through, about 6 minutes. Transfer to a serving platter and serve with tzatziki and flat bread.



Tzatziki: Yogurt Sauce (Greek yogurt and cucumber sauce)
2 cups plain whole milk yogurt or 1 cup Middle Eastern-style plain yogurt
1 medium cucumber, peeled, halved, and seeded
2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus a pinch
1/2 clove garlic
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon dried mint, crumbled

If you're using plain whole milk yogurt, line a small sieve with a coffee filter. Put the yogurt in it, set it over a bowl, and refrigerate 12 hours. Discard the expressed liquid and put yogurt in the bowl.

Grate the cucumber on the large holes of a box grater into another bowl. Sprinkle with the 2 teaspoons salt and rub into the cucumber with your hands. Set aside 20 minutes, then squeeze the cucumbers to express as much liquid as possible.

Smash the garlic, sprinkle with a generous pinch of salt, and, with the flat side of a large knife, mash and smear the mixture to a coarse paste. Stir the cucumber, garlic, olive oil, lemon juice, and mint into the yogurt. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour before serving.

Yield: 1 1/4 cups
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 25 minutes
Inactive Prep Time: 1 hour
Ease of preparation: easy

2 Making of Beef Stew

0 Chimichurri Recipes

In past weeks ago, I had been looked for Chimichurri sauce and found myself little confused but not serious at all. Just wondered about the variety of recipes that have little different ingredients to make a sauce. One recipe asked for sherry wine vinegar, other one for white wine vinegar and other one for red wine vinegar. After all reading the recipes, I started to understand little more about the sauce. There are no standard recipe for this, since there are so many recipes from regional areas, from other countries, and from some cookbooks that claimed that it is authentic recipe. I had made one chimichurri sauce (this recipe went with New York steak) for a banquet party, this have tomatoes, parsley, garlic, little cayenne, paprika and other seasonings. I tasted it--I can not describe this flavor, it is excellent taste.
There are several variations to Chimichurri sauce, I think it is best for me to leave that to big BBQ Guru, Steve Raichlen. I had made the sauce, almost similar to this recipe in his cookbook and it still tasted great!

Chimichurri
(Argentine Parsley Garlic Sauce)
(Barbecue Bible, Sauces, Rubs, and Marinades by Steve Raichlen)

1 large bunch of fresh flatleaf parsley, washed, stemmed, and dried
8 cloves garlic, peeled
3 Tbsp minced onion
5 Tbsp distilled white vinegar or more to taste
5 Tbsp water
1 Tsp kosher salt (or sea salt)
1/2 Tsp dried oregano
1/2 to 1 Tsp hot pepper flakes or to taste
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 Cup extra virgin olive oil

Finely chop the parsley and garlic in a food processor. Add the onion, vinegar, water, salt, oregano, pepper flakes, and black pepper and process in brief bursts until the salt crystals are dissolved. Add the oil in a thin stream. Don't overprocess; the chimichurri should be fairly coarse. Correct the seasoning, adding salt or vinegar if needed. Chimichurri is quick to make, so I usually prepare it as I need it. If you do choose to store it, transfer to a jar, cover and refrigerator. It will keep for several weeks, but it loses its bright green color in a day or two. Be sure to taste and reseason before serving. Make 2 cups.

Chef Red Hawk's Notes: With this sauce, I add diced tomatoes for just of beauty on steak. It is one of my favorite sauces for any cut of beef, pork and chicken. Very excellent.


Sirloin with Chimichurri Marinade
Recipe from: Grill!
by Pippa Cuthbert, Lindsay Cameron Wilson
Cookbook Heaven at Recipelink.com

1 cup (250ml) extra virgin olive oil
2 Tbsp chopped thyme
2 Tbsp chopped oregano
2 Tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley
1 Tbsp chopped rosemary
1 chipotle chilli in adobo sauce, chopped
1 Tbsp sweet Spanish paprika
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
3 Tbsp red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1lb 50z (600g) top sirloin steak about 1 in (2.5cm) thick

1. Heat the olive oil in a medium-sized saucepan until hot. Remove from the heat and set aside.
2. Add the remaining ingredients, except for the steak, stir, and leave at room temperature to cool and infuse for 1 hour.
3. Pour one quarter of this marinade into a dish and add the steak, turning several times to coat. Reserve the remaining marinade to serve with the cooked steak. Cover and refrigerate for 1 hour.
4. Remove and leave at room temperature for 30 minutes.
5. Preheat the grill or grill pan to very hot and cook the steak for 2 minutes on each side for medium-rare. Transfer the steak to a chopping board and loosely cover with foil. Allow it to rest for 5 minutes before thinly slicing across the grain.
6. Serve with the reserved marinade.

0 Strawberry-Mustard Sauce

I have Lazy Saturday morning, and skimming through a cookbook. Found something unique and thought you might like to try a recipe, called Strawberry-Mustard Sauce by Fruit Cookbook by Nicole Routhier. (Well, this cookbook is out of print but still there are handful of used cookbook. I tried to look for this cookbook to see if they still published but none. Good prices on used cookbook, better hurry to get you one!)

In my opinion, I enjoyed this cookbook and sometime, I used this as reference for something fruit sauce to go with pork or game recipes. I always liked little of fruit to enhance the flavor of meat. I had added some recipes to my files like fruit salsa for pork tenderloin, strawberry and pineapple salsa for cedar-plank salmon, pineapple-red pepper salsa for grilled halibut. So many fruit recipes to count but I have fine point of creativity when come to use the leftover fruit up for something.


Strawberry-Mustard Sauce
Yield: About 1 Cup

Sauce are good with grilled chicken or with roast pork or duck. Keep the sauce in a covered plastic container or clean covered glass jar in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.

1/2 cup strawberry preserves
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
2 teaspoons horseradish
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme, crumbled
2 teaspoons fresh lime juice

Place all the ingredients in a small bowl and stir until well combined.

0 How much caffeine you know in your soda?

This blog got me little scared when I thought of seeing a woman gave a can of coke to her small kid few days ago while I stopped at red light, watching the people waiting for bus. I wondered, how much caffeine in soda that the kid swallowed? I don't give my food for thought so much but I had seen many young people drank soda, whatever energy drinks and whatever Gatorade, started to think about how much I drank when I was young kid without second thought about how will it affect my behavior. My personal observance of young people started to open my eyes to see beyond what's normal and acceptable things that they did to themselves.

Few years ago, I started to cut the soda down due to the taste. I don't know how to explain the taste since most soda tasted almost same to me. Started to drink water, coffee and tea as my main beverages, beside beers, wines and whiskey. Occasionally, I drank soda.

Since the morning, I decided to goggle caffeine in soda and found this blog. I thought you might like to know how much caffeine in your soda. You might want to think twice about giving something to your children.

My last "Food for Thought" column noted that elderly women may keep their wits longer by drinking lots of caffeine. In that study, the women derived their caffeine from coffee and tea. A new study offers some guidance for Golden Girls who eschew the standard caffeinated brews but still want to reap some benefit from the stimulant. Many soft drinks contain caffeine, but how much of a jolt they deliver is seldom printed on the label. Read More:Measuring Soft Drinks' Jolt

2 Blueberry Liqueur recipe

Few days ago, I went to local grocery store and smelled nice odor from blueberries in produce dept area. Suddenly, I thought about doing blueberry liqueur again so it can be ready by Christmas as kind of gift to give away. No heck, I will drink all to myself so I can smell like blueberry when I slept on bed with my wife. I went and bought few pints of blueberries for my snack, and sharing with my dog. He love blueberries. Now, he had enough of berries after I saw he pooped--ok, I am not going to explain how it look, to you.

In past years ago, I had made this recipe and tried the liqueur. Found that it tasted so good than anything that was bought from liquor store. Yea, better than Blackberry brandy. Sometime the homemade stuff tasted better than store-bought stuffs. I still have the book but not sharing with other chefs for some reason: I don't want to lose this valuable book as a reference when I need a recipe. Few time one of Chefs tried to pry into my secret files, I have to give them big hell and destroy their hats.

Right now, my book is safe with me since Chefs can goggle the liqueur recipes online--but it is not going to taste same as I have tasted my recipes. I checked some recipes online and can tell that a recipe is good or bad by quick glance.

Occasionally I used one of recipes from a book to try a new liqueur out and taste it for myself.


Blueberry Liqueur

4 cups blueberries, rinsed and drained
3 cups 80-proof Vodka
1 cup water
1 1/2 granulated sugar
2 thin strips lemon peel

Place berries in aging container and mash with the back of a wooden spoon, ( or an old-fashioned potato masher works very well). Add alcohol to the berries, stirring to combine. Cover container with lid or plastic wrap and let stand at room temperature or cooler for two weeks. Stir every few days.

*Tip: If weather is very warm, berry mixture may be put in the refrigerator.

After initial aging, strain mixture over a large bowl through a colander or coarse wire mesh strainer. Discard fruit residue. Clean out aging container to remove all sediment.

Bring 1 cup water to a boil and pour over sugar and lemon peel. Stir well to completely dissolve sugar. let cool to room temperature. Remove lemon peel and discard. Pour cooled sugar-water mixture into again container, add strained blueberry liquid. Stir to combine. Cap and let age 1-1/2 months more.

After second aging, strain mixture again through fine strainer, wire or cloth, to remove all sediment. Re-strain as needed until clarity is reached. Bottle and cap as desired. May be used now for cooking but serving as a liqueur age at least 1 more month, improves with additional time.

5 Deaf KFC in Cairo Egypt Video

Here is the real Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde of Chef Red Hawk. I established my new other blog, Red Hawk's Deaf Musings for some reasons that I felt that I don't want to mess with Deaf Chef at Large blog with different subjects instead of the recipes or Deaf Chef subjects. I had read many news from many Deaf communities and other sources that leave me to pondering about, and I felt that I should write something different than just food.

Please take your time to visit my other blog. Please welcome the other side of Chef Red Hawk to blog sphere. Be prepared for any mind-twisting, head-bending thinkings from me, thank you.

0 Happy Fourth of July

Sometime, I spent my time on thinking about the Independence Day. I have my pride as A Deaf Native American who appreciate all independences that were given by our Founding Fathers--no matters how lousy it is, but I appreciate most is the freedom that I can do what I want to do. I had read some histories about that day with my unbiased mind and noticed that the patriots risk their lives for the freedom so we can have liberty. I appreciate how much our present soldiers work so hard for our liberty from terrorism, tyranny, and unnameable enemies, that we may live with possession of freedom.

By the way, Remember the soldiers. Happy Independence Day!