Nourish Network » Meat

Last Minute From-Scratch Corned Beef

Lia Huber — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 19:11:14 +0000

Yes, you can have from homemade corned beef the same day the lightbulb goes off that it’s Saint Paddy’s Day … TONIGHT. Just pull out your pressure cooker and this from-scratch corned beef (which is better than any store-bought version you’ve tasted, and blissfully free of all those preservatives they’re soaked with) can be on the stove in under ten minutes and on the table in less than three hours.

1 cinnamon stick
10 cloves
10 juniper berries
10 allspice berries
2 bay leaves
1/2 onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, smashed
1-inch piece of ginger, smashed
12 ounce bottle amber beer
1/4 cup cider vinegar
1/2 cup kosher salt (if you can find red salt–like Hawaiian red salt–substitute at least some for the kosher salt and your corned beef will take on the familiar reddish hue)
1/2 cup brown sugar
4 cups water
3-1/2 to 4 pound beef brisket, trimmed of major excess fat (don’t trim is all off though)
2 pounds red new potatoes

Put cinnamon stick, cloves, juniper and allspice berries, bay leaves, onion, garlic, ginger, beer, vinegar, salt, sugar and water in the pressure cooker. Stir to combine and submerge brisket in liquid. Seal cover and bring up to high pressure (two rings). Adjust heat to maintain high pressure and cook for 70 minutes.

Release pressure naturally, remove cover, and add potatoes to the liquid with the meat. Cover again, bring heat back up to high pressure and cook an additional 15 minutes.

Remove meat and potatoes to a cutting board, cover with foil and let rest for 5 minutes. Slice meat across the grain and arrange on a serving platter with potatoes.

Serve with creamy horseradish sauce (I like to mix a couple tablespoons raw horseradish with 1/4 cup sour cream) and Warm Brussels Sprouts Slaw with Bacon and Juniper Berries.

Serves 8

Pork and Squash Enchilada Bake

Lia Huber — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 17:31:40 +0000

Think of this recipe as a template for whatever leftovers you have in your fridge … sauteed greens, squash or root veggies, beans, pork or chicken. They all adapt beautifully to this dish. Enjoy a small slice for breakfast topped with a fried egg, or for lunch or dinner with a dab of sour cream and salsa and a dribble of hot sauce. It’s a GREAT gathering dish!

2 cups roasted squash, mashed to a puree (you could also use canned pumpkin)
2 teaspoons canola oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon cumin
Nonstick cooking spray
2 cups prepared red enchilada sauce
12 (6-inch) corn tortillas
3 cups shredded chicken or pork
1 recipe Sauteed Swiss Chard (or other leftover greens)
5 ounces monterey jack cheese, (1 cup, shredded)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Mix squash with canola oil, garlic and cumin.

Spread 1/2 cup sauce in the bottom of a 9×13 baking dish coated with cooking spray. Top with 4 tortillas, tearing as needed to fill in any gaps. Top with 1 cup squash, half the pork and chard, 3/4 cup sauce and 1/3 cup cheese. Top with 4 more tortillas, remaining 1 cup squash, remaining pork, 1/2 cup sauce and 1/3 cup cheese. Top with remaining 4 tortillas, sauce and cheese.

Cover and bake at 400 F for 20 minutes. Uncover and bake an additional 10 minutes, or until hot and tortillas are golden brown around the edges. Let stand 5-10 minutes before slicing.

Serve with sour cream and salsa, if you like.

Serves 6-8

Kitchen Sink Fried Rice

Lia Huber — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 23:41:22 +0000

You’ll see this fried rice come up every few months in Nourish Weekly Menus, always in a different guise. Sometimes with cabbage, sometimes with bok choy, sometimes with shredded pork, sometimes with spicy shrimp … you get the picture. Feel free to use add basic recipe to your rotation with anything calling from your fridge.

½ cup low sodium chicken or vegetable broth
2 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon oyster sauce
2 teaspoons reduced sodium soy sauce
2 teaspoons rice wine vinegar
1 teaspoon chile paste
1 teaspoon cornstarch
2 tablespoons canola oil, divided
6 cups savoy cabbage, thinly sliced
sea salt
½ cup onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups cooked brown rice, break up any chunks
1 large egg, lightly beaten
2 cups cooked shrimp or shredded meat
4 cups cooked bok choy, greens or mushrooms
1 cup frozen peas, (optional)
¼ cup cilantro, roughly torn

Whisk broth, water, oyster sauce, soy sauce, vinegar, chile paste and cornstarch together in small bowl and set aside.

Heat 1/2 tablespoon oil in a large wok or non-stick skillet over high heat. Add cabbage and a pinch of salt and saute for 5 minutes, until wilted and charred. Remove to a plate. Swirl in remaining 1-1/2 tablespoons oil and saute onion for 3 minutes, until softened. Add garlic and cook another 30 seconds, until fragrant. Add rice and stir-fry 2 minutes, until softened and separated. Push to one side of pan and pour in egg. Let egg set for 30 seconds and then chop coarsely with spatula.

Stir in meat, veggies, cabbage and peas and toss everything together to combine. Give sauce a stir to mix and pour into pan. Toss rice to coat. Cook 5 minutes longer or until heated through. Spoon onto serving dish or into bowls. Sprinkle cilantro over top and season to taste with additional soy sauce.

Serves 4

Improv Cassoulet

Lia Huber — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 05:56:41 +0000

There are so many things I love about cassoulet … one of them being its versatility. Be creative with your leftovers–beans, roasted meat, stale bread–and see what it becomes.

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
4 thick slices bacon, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
3 links italian sausage, cut diagonally into 4 pieces
4 cloves garlic, minced, divided
¼ cup dry white wine
2 cups low-sodium chicken, vegetable or turkey stock
14-ounce can tomato puree
4 cups leftover turkey, duck or dark-meat chicken, shredded
(2) 15-ounce cans white beans, drained
1 bay leaf
2 sprigs thyme
2 cups course bread crumbs
2 tablespoons parsley, minced
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 tablespoons melted butter

Preheat oven to 350. Heat olive oil in a large Dutch oven and saute bacon and onion over medium heat for 12-15 minutes, until bacon is semi-crisp and onion is browned. Add sausages and 1/2 of the garlic and saute for 4 minutes, until slightly browned.

Add wine and scrape up any bits stuck to the bottom of the pan. Add stock, tomato puree, turkey, beans, bay leaf and thyme. Taste and adjust seasoning accordingly. Bake in the oven uncovered for 30 minutes, adding additional stock if necessary to keep moist.

Mix bread crumbs with remaining garlic, minced parsley, salt and pepper in a medium bowl. Toss with melted butter until moistened evenly and sprinkle on top of cassoulet. Bake for another 20 minutes. Push down breadcrumbs so they are slightly moistened and bake another 20 minutes, until top crisps.

Serves 8

Sausage and Grape Skewers

Lia Huber — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 20:46:02 +0000

This recipe, my slightly off-kilter ode to harvest, was adapted from Micol Negrin’s gem of a book, The Italian Grill.

1–½ pounds Italian chicken sausage links, (fully-cooked, like al fresco brand) cut into 36, 3/4-inch slices
1 pound red table grapes, (approx 72)
2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
freshly ground black pepper
Equipment: 12 long metal skewers (if you use bamboo skewers, soak in cold water for 30 minutes before threading)

Preheat grill to medium high.

Thread one piece of sausage onto a skewer, followed by 3 grapes. Repeat once more and end with another piece of sausage. Repeat with the rest of the skewers.

Brush (or spray) the skewers with olive oil and sprinkle with pepper. Grill 4-5 minutes per side, until sausage is heated through and grapes are just starting to collapse.

Serves 4

Smoky-Sweet Tri Tip

Alison Ashton — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 05:31:43 +0000

True barbecue involves indirect heat and smoke, and dedicated barbecue aficionados invest in a smoker. But you can set up a standard charcoal or gas grill for smoking, which works fine for tender cuts like tri tip, seafood or poultry. Tri tip (also called triangle roast) is a lean, quick-cooking cut of beef sirloin that’s an ideal introduction to smoking. It’s the cut used in Santa Maria-style barbecue in California’s Central Coast. I’ve added a touch of brown sugar to the spice rub for a little flavor of the Deep South. The result is smoky, spicy, subtly sweet, incredibly tender and, as my husband says, very “more-ish.” Serve this with our Santa Maria-Style Beans, corn or flour tortillas and your favorite salsa. Sometimes I’ll serve it with our Roasted Red Pepper Romesco Sauce (only I’ll put the veggies on the grill to smoke with the meat). Leftovers make divine sandwiches for lunch!

3 cups wood chips (applewood, hickory or oak)
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon ancho chile powder
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon garlic granules
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 (1-1/2 pound) tri tip steak, trimmed
Canola oil

Place the wood chips in a large bowl. Add water to cover, and let the chips soak for an hour. Drain.

While the chip soak, combine the salt, brown sugar, ancho chile powder, black pepper, garlic granules and cayenne in a small bowl. Rub the spice mixture all over the meat. Let it stand at room temperature 30 minutes.

Set up the grill for indirect heat. Preheat grill

For a charcoal grill, arrange the hot coals on one side of the grill. Add the drained wood chips directly to the coals.

For a gas grill, place the drained wood chips in a smoker box, in a disposable foil pan (poke a few holes in the bottom) or wrap the wood in heavy-duty aluminum foil (also poking a few holes in the foil). Whichever arrangement you use, set the container of wood directly over a heat source while the grill preheats.

Brush the meat with oil. When the wood starts to smoke, place the meat on the heated side of the grill. Cook 5 minutes on each side. Move the meat to the unheated side of the grill. Cover, and cook 25-30 minutes or until meat is 130 degrees F (or until desired degree of doneness). Remove meat from the grill and let it stand 10 minutes before slicing it across the grain.

Serves 4-6

Buffalo Carbonnade

Alison Ashton — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 17:00:43 +0000

Carbonnade is the Belgian version of French boeuf bourguignonne, only the meat is braised in dark ale instead of red wine. Our interpretation uses bison (buffalo) stew meat, which you can find online and in many health-food stores. Ounce, for ounce, it has about 20% fewer calories and half the fat of beef. Serve over egg noodles or our Celery Root, Potato and Apple Mash.

2-3 tablespoons canola oil, divided
1 medium onion, thinly vertically sliced
1-1/2 pounds bison (buffalo) stew meat, cut into 1-1/2 cubes
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups dark ale (such as Chimay Bleu)*
1 cup beef stock
1-1/2 teaspoons brown sugar
2 thyme sprigs
1 bay leaf
Chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley, for garnish

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.

Heat a Dutch oven with a tight-fitting lid over medium-high heat. Add 1 tablespoon oil to pan. Add onion and saute 5 minutes or until tender. Remove onion from pan.

Pat meat dry with a paper towel. Sprinkle meat with salt and pepper. Place flour in a shallow bowl. Dredge meat in flour, shaking off excess. Heat 1 tablespoon oil. Add meat to pan and cook 4-5 minutes, turning to brown on all sides. (Brown the meat in batches, using extra oil as needed, so you don’t overcrowd the pan.) Remove meat from pan. Add ale to pan; scraping the pan to loosen any browned bits. Cook 2 minutes or until until ale is reduced by half. Return onions and beef to pan. Add stock. Stir in sugar. Add thyme sprigs and bay leaf. Bring to a boil. Cover and place in the oven for 2 hours and 15 minutes or until meat is fork-tender. Discard thyme sprigs and bay leaf. Adjust seasoning. Garnish with chopped parsley.

Serves 6

*Belgian ales like Chimay typically come in large, 750-ml bottles. If you substitute a dark ale sold in standard 12-ounce bottles, just use 1 bottle in this recipe and increase the stock to 1-1/2 cups.

Super Succulent Five-Spice Pork Shoulder

Lia Huber — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 23:02:38 +0000

This ridiculously simple dish is a riff on Carnitas de Lia, another of an endless variation of “dry braises” you can make with your own mix of spices. I like to top bowls of Simple Udon Soup with a generous mound of shreds, or serve an Asian take on fajitas with scallion pancakes, plum sauce and griddled scallions.

2-1/2 tablespoons five spice powder
1 tablespoon coriander
½ to 1 teaspoon ground Szechwan pepper
2 tablespoons kosher salt
3–4 pound boneless pork shoulder roast

Preheat oven to 275. Mix together spices and salt in a small bowl. Take pork out of its netting and rub the spice mixture all over, getting it into the nooks and crannies.

Place pork in a Dutch oven, cover and bake in the oven for 3–1/2 to 4 hours, until pork falls apart with the touch of a fork.

Serves 12

Note: If you’d like to crisp up either medium-sized chunks or fully-shredded meat, saute in a bit of the pork fat or canola oil.

Spiced Pork Roast

Lia Huber — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 19:15:52 +0000

This dish is supremely delish with Roasted Winter Veggies. Choosing heritage pork will mean even more flavor. I love leftovers in a sandwich slathered with mustard and dotted with Spicy-Sweet Pickled Cucumbers.

3 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
sea salt and freshly ground pepper
2 tablespoons fresh thyme
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice
2 teaspoons ground fennel
1 teaspoon ground coriander
2 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil, divided
2-1/2 pound boneless pork loin roast

Pound garlic to a paste in a mortar and pestle with a pinch of salt and grind of pepper. Add thyme and fennel and continue to pound to a paste. Mix in remaining spices and 1 tablespoon olive oil and rub all over pork. Cover and refrigerate for at least 3 hours (or overnight).

Preheat oven to 400. Rub pork with an additional pinch of salt.

Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat and swirl in the remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil. Sear pork on all sides, about 3-5 minutes total, and transfer pan to oven. Roast for 25-35 minutes, until a thermometer poked into the thickest part reads 150.

Remove from oven to a cutting board, tent with foil, and let rest for 15 minutes before slicing.

Serves 6

Short Rib and Cremini Ragu

Ginny Mahar — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 18:00:59 +0000

Back home in Missoula, Montana, on the search for local meat, I met Scott Barger of Mannix Brothers’ Grass Finished Beef, a fifth-generation cattle rancher in the Blackfoot Valley. He said that cuts like short ribs often end up going into their ground beef, simply because folks don’t know how to use them. Like many tougher cuts, short ribs require a longer cooking time for the connective tissues to melt. When they do, the meat becomes fall-apart tender, infusing the sauce with an incredible richness. This ragu can be served two ways: with the rib portions intact over our Creamy Corn Polenta, or you can remove the ribs from the sauce, and once cool enough to handle, shred the meat, discarding bones and excess fat. Toss the meat sauce with a long pasta noodle like fettuccine or tagliatelle.

1 medium yellow onion, roughly chopped
2 ribs celery, roughly chopped
2 medium carrots, roughly chopped
6 ounces cremini mushrooms, roughly chopped
3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
3 pounds bone-in beef short ribs, English cut
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup dry red wine
1 (28-ounce) can crushed tomatoes
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1-1/2 cups low-sodium beef stock or broth
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon dried basil
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
Pinch chili flakes (optional)
2 bay leaves
1/4 cup half-and-half
Chopped Italian parsley, for garnish
Shaved pecorino Romano, for garnish

Pulse the onion, celery, carrots and mushrooms in a food processor until finely minced., Heat 1 tablespoon of the oil in a 5-quart oven-proof pot with a tight-fitting lid over medium-high heat. Add the vegetables, and cook until soft and most of the liquid has evaporated, about 15 minutes. Remove vegetables from pan and set aside.

Pat the short ribs dry. Trim most but not all of the thick layer of fat from the ribs. Sprinkle liberally with salt and black pepper. Place flour in a small bowl and coat the ribs on all sides.

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.

Heat the same pot over medium-high heat. Add remaining 2 tablespoons oil. Brown meat on all sides, 3-4 minutes per side. For best browning, avoid crowding the pan, working in batches if necessary. Try not to rush this step, as it adds a lot of flavor.

Remove meat from pan, and immediately add red wine, scraping up any browned bits from the pan with a spatula or wooden spoon. Simmer until liquid is reduced by half. Add vegetables, meat, tomatoes, tomato paste, stock, herbs, chili flakes (if using) and ½ teaspoon salt. The sauce should just cover the meat. Bring to a simmer.

Cover and place in oven for 3 to 3 ½ hours or until meat is fork-tender. Remove from oven and before stirring, skim fat from the surface. Stir in half-and-half.

Garnish with parsley and cheese.

Serves 8-10