So, you may recall that back in October I thought that this summer was going to be all about drinks made with fresh herbs.
Well, the summer is here and I’d like to give myself partial credit. Although it hasn’t been an overwhelming push, there have been a number of summer cocktails I have seen that incorporate herbs (mostly basil, some sage, a couple of others as well).
I was hoping to just collect them together and post them all at once. Instead, I am going to do one a day until I have them all posted, or at least a nice bulk of them, so keep an eye our for the “Herbal Remedies.” we’ll post over the next few days.
We’ll get you started with one I posted a few months back:
Basil Martini
2 oz DH Krahn Gin
1 oz Fresh lemon juice
3/4 oz Simple Syrup
3-4 Fresh basil leave
Put all the ingredients in a shaker with ice, adding the basil leaves last and shake hard to get the basil flavor in there nicely. Strain into a cocktail glass.
Nice and simple. We recommend DH Krahn Gin for this one because that is the gin we first had it with, and David Hughes from DH Krahn provided us with the recipe. We’ll also have a review this week of DH Krahn Gin. So this really works as a nice segue.
Yes, I have been MIA recently, I apologize about that, but when you are working extra long hours the last thing you want to do when you get home is sit down in front of a computer and bang out a post. I am hoping things calm down a bit here in the coming weeks so I can get back to my usual posting.
In the meantime, I’ve got a quick and simple recipe for folks to give a whirl. It’s just a little something I whipped up last night as a little snack, and that doesn’t take more then 10 minutes to make (even with the prep work). It was pretty delicious. You could also make this for breakfast or as an appetizer. There is an aspect or two that may sound a little difficult, but I assure you it is easy as pie.
Ingredients
1 egg
Small piece of steak (I used a bit less then a 1/4lb skirt steak. It cooks up pretty fast and is a nice size cut)
Truffle oil (I think mine is technically truffle infused olive oil)
Salt
Pepper
Piece of French Bread (I used a frozen French Roll from Whole Foods)
1/2 Tbsp butter (divided)
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But never really had a forum for it. Now that Josh has given me the ability to write to the world I can finally do it, I am going to follow up on Friday’s post and drop a recipe or 2 on ya’ll.
First up we have Potato Pancake’s with Manchengo Cheese (adapted from The Joy of Cooking)-
2 cups coarsely grated potato
1 tbsp finely grated onion
3 eggs
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 - 1 cup Manchengo Cheeses
4 tbsp canola oil
Start with 2 cups coarsely grated potatoes that have been patted dry and had all the excess moisture removed from them (I ring it all out between 2 paper towels). Add to the potato 1 tbsp finely grated onion, 3 eggs lightly beaten and 1/4 tsp salt. Mix it all together. Next add in a handful (about 3/4 - 1 cup) finely grated manchengo cheese and mix it all up. Now, I fried these puppies up in some canola oil until they got to be a nice brown color on both sides and then dropped them onto some paper towels to remove any excess oil. Finally I topped these with a dollop of creme fresh (though sour cream would work as well) and a few capers… These were a damn tasty starter if I do say so myself.
Next up we had a nice seafood Paella-
1lb bay scallops
1lb mussels
2/4lb small shrimp
2 Chorizo sausages
1 cup frozen peas & carrots
1/2 cup chopped red onion
6 cups chicken stock
1/2 cup white wine
3 cups rice
4 cloves garlic sliced3/4 tsp ground saffron
Ok, here we go, hopefully I won’t fuck up this recipe as I am going from my head here… if I do I will correct it, though since I have no idea if anyone is reading this it may not make a difference-
In a large heavy bottom sauce pan bring chicken stock, wine, garlic and saffron to a boil. Add rice, cover and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally to make sure the rice doesn’t burn. Add the shrimp, scallops and mussels and lower to a medium heat, continue to cook for another 3 minutes, while this is cooking dice the onion and cut the sausage into 1/4″ pieces. Add the sausage, peas & carrots and onion, stir together and continue to cook until rice is cooked through and has absorbed almost all of the liquid but still is very moist (about 2-5 minutes). Uncover and serve. I am not big on over spicing so I usually leave salt & pepper for people to add on their own. For people who like a bit of spice you can add a chopped chili pepper when you add the sausage and such, or if you are like me, just douse it with Tabasco when you have it on your plate. I may try to take a pretty picture of the leftovers this evenign to add to the post, but don’t hold your breath.
