Skinny Broccoli Goat Cheese Soup

2—3 Tbsp Olive oil

1/2 Medium sweet onion, coarsely chopped

12 oz Briccoli florets

1/4 cup Flour

4 cups Chicken broth

2—3 oz Goat cheese

Salt and black pepper to taste

In a large pot, sauté opinion in olive oil over medium-high heat until translucent. Add broccoli and cook until soft. Remove broccoli from pan and set aside. Add a little more oil if needed and then add the flour, stirring constantly. Heat until flour is light brown. Slowly whisk in chicken broth. Add broccoli back into pan and use and immersion blender to purée. Simmer until thickened. Whisk in goat cheese. Season with salt and black pepper to taste. Serve hot and enjoy—Makes a great healthy, savory snack on a chilly fall day! 

 

 

More Heat!

Ghost peppers drying for Muy Caliente Fire Powder.

Ghosts and Habaneros in the second stage of making fermented pepper mash.

 

 

Homemade Sriracha

SRIRACHA SAUCE

2 cups assorted fresh red chiles (jalapeño, cayenne, serrano, habanero, etc), stemmed and seeded
5–6 garlic cloves
4 tablespoons white wine vinegar
2 teaspoons sugar, plus more to taste
1–2 teaspoons salt, to taste

Combine all ingredients in a food processor and pulse until well blended. Taste for salt and pepper and adjust if desired.

Transfer mixture to a small nonreactive saucepan and simmer over medium heat for about 5 minutes, or until sauce loses its raw vegetable smell.

Let cool and pour into a bottle or jar.

Hot Sauce Day!

We had our biggest hot pepper harvest of the year this week — ghost peppers, habaneros, Roatan pumpkin-habaneros (mild habaneros that hail from Honduras), jalapeños and a couple cayennes.

Today I made a Sriracha sauce with ghosts and habaneros (wish I had made more... It is flaming hot but Delish!), a Puerto Rican style Pique vinegar, a pumpkin habanero sauce and a jalapeño sauce. I also set out a pound of ghosts and habaneros for a fermented pepper mash. (More on this once they dry for a few days and I start the fermentation process. :)

Passion Fruit (Lilikoi) Jelly

 

2 cups passion fruit juice (about 5 pounds of fresh passion fruit) or bottled unsweetened passion fruit nectar

1 3/4 cups water

6 cups sugar

6 ounces liquid pectin

Prepare canner and canning jars.

Combine juice, water and sugar in a large, tall pot.  Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring constantly.  Immediately add liquid pectin and bring to a full, rolling boil.  Boil rapidly for 1 minute, stirring constantly.

Remove from the heat, skim off foam using a small fine mesh strainer, and pour into sterilized jars leaving 1/8 – 1/4 inch space between the jelly and rim of the jar.  Secure 2 part lids and follow basic canning procedure.

Makes 8 half pint jars

Caprese Steak & Brown Rice Bowl

Leftover NY Strip with sweet grape tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, brown rice and fresh basil from the herb garden... Instant gourmet lunch!
 

Fried Chicken!

The secret, you ask? Season the chicken with salt, pepper, garlic, thyme and cayenne... Keep it cold until ready to fry... Dredge seasoned chicken in plain flour just before frying and voila! 
 

2014 Hot Sauce... so it begins!

We collected our first harvest from the back yard chili pepper garden last night and have created the first batch of Cullen & Steph's Muy Caliente Sauce! We've got a mild, green jalapeño sauce and a flaming hot ghost pepper-habañero sauce! Oh yea!!! Now it's time to design the new labels and bottle it up!

 

 

Spicy Turkey Pita's with Taziki

Last Nights Dinner with the Ghost Pepper—Spicy Turkey Pita Pockets! Seasoned with garlic, onion and ghost pepper and served with homemade cucumber-yogurt Taziki, feta crumbles, brown rice and while wheat pita bread. Healthy and yummy with a kick! 

Ghost pepper tip: For 1.25 lbs of meat, I used 1 ghost pepper, diced very fine and seeds discarded and the heat was perfect! 

 

Ghost Peppers are ready!

About to try our first ghosts pepper from the garden!

 

Getting Back to the Heart of It!

Things have been very busy in our lives lately... We've been traveling, we bought a classic sail boat that we are restoring, and work (very thankfully) has been busy for us both. Life is good!

I've been using the excuse of a busy life for too long now as I have been neglecting my blog, but I hope to change that FOR REAL this time and get back to the heart of my writing and cooking by using a mobile app to write and post pics and recipe ideas on the fly.

Hopefully I will also soon be unveiling my full website as well as a second blog chronicling the travel and everyday adventures of me and my loves — Cullen, Chloe the wonder-dog and Fernando the ninja-Kat ! :)

Stay tuned, much more to come soon...

Love!

Stephanie