Lekker: Bacon Braised Collard Greens

As you may recall, I was born and partially raised in South Africa--hence the "SouthAfricanBokkie" tag that shows up here, and elsewhere. "Bokkie" is a South African slang word for "darling" or "sweetie". After my family moved to the States, though, we settled in Florida and I grew up absorbing some of what it is to be a "Southern girl." My best girlfriends Lilypad and Tiny Bird emulate this infinitely more than I ever could, especially Lilypad with her pearl necklaces and sweet, preppy sundresses and sorority sisters, but a few things did stick--sweet tea, church on Sundays (well, sometimes), country music and a STELLAR pair of boots. I've been known to slip into my Southern drawl from time to time, as well, especially when sweet tea vodka is involved!

I was feeling rather in touch with my Southern-girl side this past weekend and craved some good old fashioned comfort food, this time taking the form of these bacon braised collard greens. EVERYONE down South knows how to prepare these 'dam good eats', and now you will, too. 

Oh, and ladies? If you've never dated a true Southern gentleman...FIND ONE. Trust me. Just trust me.

 South African by birth, Southern by the grace of...a green card? Close enough.

Bacon Braised Collard Greens
serves 4

What You Need
1 bag (16 ounces) collard greens, pre-cut and pre-washed because I am lazy and the child of American convenience
8 ounces applewood smoked thick cut bacon, chopped (I used Trader Joe's "Ends and Pieces" since they are the thickest cuts of bacon I can ever find)
1 large onion, sliced
4-5 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes, plus a pinch more for finishing
1 dash cinnamon (trust me on this)
1 1/2 cups low sodium chicken broth
1/4 cup apple cinder vinegar
S&P, to taste

What You Do
1. In a large pot (collards will wilt way down as they cook, but at first they're pretty huge and you'll want to make sure you have enough room to stuff them all in there) over medium heat, cook the bacon, stirring often, until most of the fat has rendered out and the bacon is crisp. Remove the bacon using a slotted spoon to drain on some paper towels.

2. In all that delicious bacon fat, toss in your onions and cook for about 5 minutes or until they're soft and golden. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, about a minute or so. Add the red pepper flakes and cinnamon and stir well to combine. Now's the time when you stuff in all those collard greens and stir constantly until they turn bright green and are well immersed with the onions and bacon fat. Turn the heat to low and add the chicken broth. Cover and simmer at a bare simmer for about 15-20 minutes, stirring often.Monitor the liquid content as you go; you don't want it to dry out, but if it's looking too liquidy, just take the cover off to evaporate some.

3. When they're tender to the bite and dark green (and smell AHMAZING), add in the crisped bacon and the vinegar and stir all together to combine. Turn off the heat and let it sit covered for about 5 minutes. I find that the sodium of the bacon and the chicken broth is PLENTY salty, but feel free to taste and adjust at this stage.

I am so mad about these I just want to eat a whole big bowlful for dinner with a couple of slices of toasted, buttered bread--but you can also serve this with those Perfect Mashed Potatoes we talked about, and sausage or two.

Lekker: Perfect Mashed Potatoes

I'm going to cut straight to the chase here: I HAVE DISCOVERED THE SECRET TO PERFECT MASHED POTATOES. 

Ready?

It's baking powder. Wut.

The few people to whom I have divulged this secret thus far have greeted me with skepticism, confusion, and befuddlement. Yes. I know. It's totally weird. Nonetheless, somehow I found myself on this webpage the other day featuring an old recipe for "French Mashed Potatoes" from a Better Homes & Gardens Cookbook that does in fact call for one teaspoon of baking powder. I couldn't wait to give it a try, to see if this really WAS the Holy Grail of mashed potatoes, for my dinner last night of Bangers 'n Mash with Bacon Braised Collard Greens (recipe for that coming soon).

The verdict: yes, it really does make a difference. Yes, they really were fluffy clouds of comfort food. And ya know, I know this is legit, because I didn't do anything else differently this time except adding the teaspoon of baking powder! I'm curious to know how it works, because baking powder is a chemical leavener that contains both the acid and the base required to create a release of CO2 gases that then create that fluffiness, but you'd think that potatoes wouldn't have enough "liquid" in order to make proper use of that theory...hmm. In doing some research on the topic this morning, I stumbled across this hilarious thread of people fighting about mashed potatoes on the Internet. Because apparently that's a thing that people do. I can only assume that it ended with the brandishing of beaters at the computer screen.

Anyway, what follows is what I have defined as my go-to, do-it-in-my-sleep classic mashed potatoes recipe. I've included options at the end for ways to change it up, as well as my just-as-delicious dairy-free version, but if you've yet to master this beloved side dish give it a shot!

Alright well fine they don't look as good as they taste here but we've already established I suck at photography and besides food is for eating anyway. So just...eat it.

Perfect Mashed Potatoes
serves 4

What You Need
4-6 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled (The type of potato you use *IS* important! Don't just go picking up any bag, and don't assume that Russet potatoes are the gold standard. They are not. Gold potatoes are the gold standard. No but seriously, certain potatoes are better suited for certain purposes according to their "waxiness": hardy red skinned potatoes typically hold up well for potato salad but make a very starchy and heavy mashed potato; Russet potatoes are excellent for baking; and Yukon Gold [or other "gold"] potatoes are the creme de la creme for whipping into mashed potatoes.)
4 T salted butter
1/3 cup light cream
1 teaspoon baking powder (powder, not soda)
1/2 teaspoon salt
Dash of ground black pepper

What You Do
1. Peel and dice your potatoes into chunks about 1/2 inches big. Doesn't have to be scientific, just try to get them all a similar size. Dump them into a medium sized pot and cover with cold water, salting the water well. Bring to a boil, then down to a simmer for about 20 minutes or until the potatoes are fork tender. Try not to let them overcook to the point where they're falling apart in the water, as they become waterlogged and soggy that way.

2. Once the potatoes are done, drain them well of water and add the butter, cream, baking powder, salt, and pepper. Beat with a hand mixer for only about 2 minutes or until well beaten and fluffed. If you don't have a hand mixer, mash them up as best you can with a potato masher and then whip vigorously with a whisk. It's a good arm workout. Ta-dah! You're done!

 There are a zillion ways to jazz up your mashed potatoes if you're bored of the classics:

• Boil the potatoes in chicken broth or stock instead of plain water.
• Beat in some snipped fresh chives or spring onions to add colour.
• Make indulgent cheesy mashed potatoes by adding half a cup (or more lol) of shaved Parmesan or cheddar cheese.
• Crispy bacon pieces on top. Duh.
• For tangy Southern potatoes, switch in buttermilk in place of the light cream.  
• Stir in some oven roasted garlic for garlic mashed potatoes. Instructions for how to roast garlic can be found in my previous blog entry for Roasted Tomato Garam Masala Soup.
• To make dairy free mashed potatoes, use Earth Balance "butter" in place of regular butter and swap out original coconut milk (NOT flavoured obviously) for the light cream.

Lekker: Grilled Bananas with Chocolate & Peanut Butter Sauce

I am not a HUGE dessert person. I used to be, used to have a huge sweet tooth just like my Dad for cake, brownies, cookies, the works. I *had* to have a bite of something sweet after dinner. I'm not sure if I've grown out of it as my taste buds have matured, or if I simply have more control over myself (that'd be a first) or if I just subconsciously make up for lost time when I'm PMSing (likeliest scenario.) However, there's just something about the classic flavour combination of bananas and chocolate I've always loved, and in my "younger years" that meant spooning Nutella on top of a banana and calling it dessert. I'm certainly not above that now, but I desperately try to keep Nutella out of the house so that when I DO succumb to a chocolate craving, it's not half-a-jar's worth via spoon, in classic white girl style.

Too bad I discovered chocolate sauce on my most recent "cravings hunt" through the pantry.  DAMMIT! Curse you, PMS.

Since I am participating in this societal farce of pretending to be an actual sophisticated grown up, I decided to put a minute bit of effort into making my dessert this night. I think it took me all of 7 minutes to put together, and the simple act of grilling the bananas and whipping up an easy peanut butter sauce elevated these humble ingredients to something I would totally serve to guests. Have you ever smelled a grilled banana? It's incredible. The natural sugars in the fruit become carmelised over the high heat and become so sweet and delicious I could happily eat them plain--did, often, as a child, though sometimes with some brown sugar sprinkled o'er top--but given my aforementioned "condition"...these were doused in chocolate.

Grilled Bananas with Chocolate & Peanut Butter Sauce

What You Need
It's easy to duplicate this recipe for multiple people if you use your head; I've written it as if you are #foreveralone/saucily-single-by-choice (however you'd like to rationalise *that* on any given day) like me, and/or just extremely selfish over your dessert...also like me.

1 banana
A small schmear of butter, salted or unsalted, whatever spread you normally use (I use Earth Balance, which I am batshit crazy about because it's the best non-dairy spread I've ever tried that is not full of scientific synthetic garbage...but that is the topic for a different rant-y blog post)
1 T creamy peanut butter
~1/2 tablespoon milk, cream, or half-and-half, whatever you have on hand, hell I don't care if you use coffee creamer
1 T chocolate syrup (HAHAHA let's be real here, if you're PMSing you know it's going to be more)

What You Do
1. Ready? Okidoke, so if you're like me and it's about as cold as my bitter frozen heart outside (that's 30 degrees, to be exact) there's no grilling going on because you're not insane. Instead, you have a grill pan inside, (which everyone should have, they are awesome!) usually a cast iron skillet with little grill-like thingies on the bottom. I don't know the technical term for it. "Grill ridges"? Just look at the picture in a second! Heat that sucker up over medium high heat.

2. Slice your banana down the middle, lengthwise, leaving the peel on. Butter the cut sides a bit. Press them facedown onto the hot grill pan and let them sizzle for a few minutes.

3. Meanwhile, in a teeny bowl whisk together the peanut butter and whatever dairy mixer you chose to make a sauce. Adjust the amount of dairy depending on how thick or thin you want your sauce to be. This is totally your show. It's nice to be in control of things, isn't it?

4. Rotate the bananas a bit so you can get some appeeling (hahahaha) alternating grill marks on the bananas for a few more minutes.

When they're ready, flip them over and grill peel side DOWN for just about a minute. Transfer to a plate and drizzle your peanut butter sauce and chocolate sauce all over, and CHOW DOWN on those bad boys.

Then, if you're like me, immediately get up and make another serving.

Lagniappe: A Small Tattoo With Meaning

Accurate.

Lekker: Slow Cooker Red Beans & Rice

So with all my salads and lean soups I've been having here lately I began craving some protein, especially since I'm back to my regular workouts at the gym and gotta feed those muscles! (Hah. Hah.) Beans are awesome because when combined with brown rice they're a great complete source of protein (although this recipe amps things up by adding sausage, because yum) and they're inexpensive and easy to prepare. Plus, I was feeling hella lazy and wanted to put my slow cooker to work overnight so I would have a yummy meal ready to take to work and share with a hard-pressed coworker. Wins, all around!

With this much protein and fiber to fill you up in one bowl, you don't need much to be satisfied--perfect for sticking to that New Year's diet and still indulge in some bangin' comfort food.

Slow Cooker Red Beans & Rice

What You Need

1 1/2 pounds smoked pork sausage, preferably andouille (don't be a lazy ass, just look at the packages there, I'm sure you'll find some; just make sure it's smoked and not raw)

1 green bell pepper, diced

1 medium onion, diced

4 celery stalks, diced (we're going for equal proportions here, see?)

3 cloves garlic, minced

2 T Creole seasoning (Tony Chachere's rules the roost in my house)

1 pound dry red beans, picked over for debris and rinsed in a strainer

6 cups low sodium chicken broth (sausage has enough salt guys)

2 bay leaves

Hot cooked BROWN OR MIXED WILD rice, to serve (Quit it with that flavourless white shit, it's boring and bad for you and brown rice has way more flavour and fiber. These days there are zillions of "cooks in 90 seconds" microwavable bags to choose from.)

This is so easy it's stupid.

What You Do

1. Slice the sausages lengthways down the middle, then crossways into little half-moons. Fry in just a touch of oil over medium heat in a large skillet until well browned, then scoop aside onto a paper towel lined plate to drain. In the residual sausage drippings, fry up the bell pepper, onions, celery and garlic until just lightly soft and golden.

2. Throw everything into the slow cooker, stir, and cook on high for 6 hours or on low for 8. Good luck swallowing all the saliva you'll be drowning in as your kitchen smells better and better and better. Don't worry about the liquid content until the very end. If it's too watery for you, just crush up some of the beans with a potato masher to act as a thickener. Voila! Serve over hot cooked rice.

Lagniappe: Happy Birthday, Dad.

Today is my Dad's birthday, and he is my best friend in the whole world.

See, I had this lightbulb moment the other night. I didn't really grow up in a "foodie" family, and no one is as crazy passionate about it like I am. My Dad does love photography though, and he likes detail, and he likes colours and patterns. So he often texts me pictures of food he eats or makes--largely because a couple of years ago I introduced him to the Food Network show Chopped and he became obsessed with the concept of plating. "PLATING! Look at this wonderful PLATING job I've done here Gracie!" is the caption that comes through with a snap of a salad he's constructed. It's basically the sweetest thing in the world.

This kind of enthusiasm isn't really new, though. One of my most precious memories was as a young teenager helping my Dad assemble a salad for dinner (we're big on salads where I come from, apparently) and whilst slicing a beautiful red juicy Roma tomato, he suddenly tossed down the knife and exclaimed, "My God, Gracie, just come and look at this. Look how beautiful this is! It's just gorgeous, so perfectly designed and deep red with the seeds all arranged just so in each slice...I tell you, this is proof to me that there is a God. GOD IS IN THE TOMATOES, MY SAUSAGE!"

Yes. "Sausage." That's what he calls me. 

My first instinct was to check him for a head injury of some kind, but failing that, I just laughed--because this is my Dad, and this is what I learned from my Dad: to see the beauty in simple, small things. To appreciate that a humble tomato can be a source of magnificence and design, and is worthy of a prayer of gratitude for its blessing, however small. Once you realise how many components actually go INTO a salad, it becomes pretty evident that in one white bowl lies the proof that we are SURROUNDED by amazing, inspiring, beautiful things and we have more to be thankful for than we know what to do with.

So when I'm standing in the farmer's market, shaking with excitement over finally finding the most perfect, melt-in-your-tongue goat cheese coated in mineral ash and exploding with creamy richness, or I'm getting near teary-eyed at the rows upon rows of beautiful, BRIGHT, fresh green lettuces and greens--I am not batshit crazy, as my poor friends looking on and watching this escapade would assume--I am, simply, my father's daughter.

Happy Birthday, Dad. I love you to the moon and back.

Lagniappe: Women Belong in the Kitchen

TGIF, y'all.

Liquor: The Weasley

One of my goals for this year is to figure out how to add some coding and widgets and gidgets and whatever to this blog so that people can Pin recipes directly to their Pinterest boards and e-mail certain entries to their friends, etc. Unfortunately I seem to have magically forgotten everything I learned when I built my first few websites--I blame vodka induced amnesia (and lack of recent practice!). Or...in the theme of today's entry, did someone Obliviate me?

What's the perfect drink for staring at HTML coding until your eyes cross? ALCOHOL! But more specifically, whiskey, since that's what I like to drink these days. And because I am on a ginger kick as of late (that started with the ginger infused broth of whiffy wonder in my Thai Chicken Noodle Soup) and also because I am a HUGE geek, I present to you...

THE WEASLEY. 

 In my mind, of the 'Fred & George' variety.

You've seen this kind of thing from me before.

My thought process: "Hmmm...whiskey....firewhiskey...and ginger, like THE quintessential gingers...but if it's going to be like firewhiskey it should also have a tiny bit of a spicy kick to it...but still sweet...and of course, it should also be HOT. Because, obviously."

Just a head's up, this recipe does require a wee bit of advance planning as you should let the whiskey infuse with the ginger for a night or two. The longer you let it go the more ginger flavour you'll get, but I wouldn't let it infuse past two nights.

The Weasley
this recipe makes two drinks; I split it up so that each would have a different whiskey


What You Need
Whiskey, about 1/2 cup per drink, brand of your choice: for one drink I used Jack's Tennessee Honey since I figured the sweetness would be offset with the ginger and lemon and spice, and I was right. I used Maker's Mark in the second drink and that was also lovely. Obviously, you don't have to do two different brands; just pick one and go with it!
1 medium piece of fresh ginger, about 4-5" (Fresh ginger packs quite a punch, so if you're not familiar with it, take a little lick/taste of the raw peeled ginger so you can get a feel for it and then decide how much you want.)
1 lemon
4 dashes ground ginger, so 2 per drink

2 pinches (and I seriously do mean a PINCH) red cayenne pepper, so 1 per drink (optional, really, since ginger can be pretty spicy, though it's a different kind of spice)
Smidge of honey, optional, to taste (if you're not using Jack's Tennessee Honey)
Club soda or tonic water, optional, to top off (I don't enjoy whiskey neat)

What You Do
1. So, here we go! First, carefully peel your fresh ginger root with a vegetable peeler or by using a spoon to scrape off the skin. Ugly thing, isn't it? But spicy and fresh and sharp and lovely. Dice it up into small pieces (you can see one floating in my drink, above) and make sure to trim off some of the rough, stringy outer edges. Toss it into your whiskey of choice, about 1 cup or so in a Mason jar, and let it infuse for 1 or 2 nights.

I assure you, that waiting time only happened because a) I got too busy to mess around with cocktails and b) I found a bottle of wine I forgot I had in the meantime.

2. So two days have passed and you're back; or, alternatively, a few hours have passed and you're impatient. Whatever. Strain out the whiskey or just fish the ginger pieces out and pour into two glasses. Slice the lemon into quarters and squeeze one quarter into each drink. Add two dashes of ground ginger to each drink, plus the pinch of cayenne pepper if you're brave, and the honey if you want. The nice thing about this recipe is that you can mess around with the proportions to basically whateverthehell you want depending on what you like--sweet, sour, spicy, whatever. This is your party.

3. Microwave for about a minute each until piping hot and smelling utterly boozy and wonderful. Top off with club soda, if desired, garnish with the leftover lemon and maybe a piece of ginger if you want, (I thoroughly enjoyed chewing on a couple of the pieces of ginger whilst drinking) and let the honey-whiskey-spicy-lemony-gingery goodness warm you from the inside out.

Warm you from the pain of losing Fred.

*sob*

Cheers, mates.