Monthly Archives: January 2011

Curry – Fried Rice

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There are just some things that say comfort in the winter, and a bit of spice in anything not only kicks up the flavor a bit, but also adds some needed nutrients to help fight off the winter yukkies.

We like fried rice for a simple meal here in the big city and this one just really suits our taste buds. (Wish I was as good as Danielle about remembering to take photos before my kids devour the food!)

Ingredients:

4 – 5 cups cooked white rice – left overs are best (always cook extra, it never goes to waste)

2 tablespoons oil
1 minced clove of garlic (two or three if you love garlic)
1 small diced onion
2 small diced carrots
1/2 cup frozen peas
3 fresh farm eggs
1 tablespoon ground curry powder
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 tablespoons soy sauce
salt to taste

(Optional: 1 jalepeno pepper minced small)

Directions:

Pour oil into hot wok or skillet. Add garlic and onion, stir fry about one minute. Add carrots (and jalepeno), stir fry 1 – 2 minutes more. Move to side. Scramble fry three eggs. Add peas and rice to hot pan, keep cooking. Add seasonings and stir all to mix, heat through and serve.

You can add some cooked chicken or shrimp to this, but we like it without meat.

Warms up a cold winter afternoon and keeps you feeling cozy for hours. Try it will a little pepper sauce or sweet and sour on top.

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Recipe by Jan Verhoeff

Be sure to leave a comment, I’d love to hear how your Fried Rice dish turned out!

Chicken and Red Pepper Medley

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It seems red peppers are showcasing for January on SECO Recipes.

My reading shows that red peppers are actually a green bell – but riper.  Only about 25 calories, red peppers donate vitamin  C, vitamin A , iron and fiber to our diets.  Did I mention how yummy they taste?  But you already knew that little tidbit.

On to the good part – the cooking and eating.

RECIPE

  • 3 cooked chicken breasts (or other chicken meat of your preference)
  • 1 pkg. red pepper medley frozen vegetables (red peppers, carrots, onion, water chestnuts)
  • 2 ripe red peppers, thinly sliced
  • 1 red onion, chopped
  • 1 C cooked Jasmine rice (use organic chicken and vegetable broth instead of water)
  • sprinkle of parsley
  • minced garlic salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, garlic powder and garlic powder
  • Parmesan & Asiago graded cheese

-Saute the onion, sliced red peppers and frozen medley in your favorite oil (I used safflower).

-Add chicken and spices – saute about 5 minutes.

-Stop cooking; let medley set for about 5 minutes to blend flavors.

-Serve on top of bedded rice.

-I sprinkle some parsley and an unhealthy amount of Parmesan/Asiago cheese on the platter before serving.

This recipe for Chicken and Red Pepper Medley sits lightly on your stomach.  Try itlet us know what you liked about it and how you might change it to suit your family’s tastes and needs.

If you reside in southeast Colorado, send us your favorite recipes and we’ll post them on your SECO Recipe site. daniellesimone0@gmail.com.

As always, Nature prevails.

Pasta Plus: peppers rock!

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Peppers 'n Pasta, Photo and recipe by Danielle Simone

Peppers ‘n Pasta

For all you pasta lovers out there, here’s a quick recipe. It uses everyday ingredients you probably already have in stock, and can be made – start to finish, in about a half hour. A quick recipe for a weekday when time is stretched.

Ingredients:

* -2 Italian sausages
* -2 to 3 slices meaty bacon
* -3 peppers; 1 each, green, yellow and red
* -1 large onion (type of your choice)
* -2 to 3 cloves garlic
* -1 lb cooked pasta (bow ties present well)
* -seasonings; salt, crushed red pepper, garlic and onion powder (your     choice of amounts), sprinkling of parsley flakes
* -Parmesan and Asiago graded cheeses
* -approx. 1/4 C. Safflower oil
* -approx. 1/8 C. Olive oil

-Fry the 2 meats till done to your liking. Drain all meat fat and set aside.

-Cut up and stir-fry veggies in Safflower oil til tender (to your liking).  We like them ‘aldente’ like our pasta. I cut the peppers in long strips and then in half and dice the onion fairly coarsely.

-Stir in cooked pasta and minced garlic cloves. Cook together on medium heat for a few minutes to blend flavors.

-Add olive oil and parsley flakes, mix all ingredients thoroughly and remove from  burner.

-Let everything set together, covered, for a few minutes to set the flavors.

-Serve with your favorite Parmesan and Asiago cheeses.

Try this recipe and let us know how you liked it, and if you changed it in any way to cater to your particular family’s tastes. (DH does not like the bacon, says sausage is enough).

As always, Nature prevails.

Paccherri Pasta, straight from the Big Apple

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I dedicate my first posted recipe to Oris George, SECO (SouthEast Colorado) author, (his new book is an AWESOME read), historian and friend.

The first recipe is Pasta (what else?!)  Not one I made – YET, but since this comes with a YouTube demonstration from the gardenfork website; thought it would fit our site’s promise of  pretty pictures.

I discovered the gardenfork website a few weeks ago.  It’s a down-home feel with Nature-related presentations.  Here in SECO, we are down-home, country-oriented folks, so thought this site would fit right into your lifestyles.

Below is the text recipe, which is directly copied from just below the gardenfork video presentation.
*********************************************

Paccherri Pasta with Poppy Seeds : GardenFork.TV

  • -1 lb of Paccherri or other big round tube pasta
  • -1 medium onion  sliced thinly from top to bottom
  • -1 cup  chicken broth  – you need high quality broth for this
  • -2 tablespoons butter-
  • 2 tablespoons poppy seeds
  • -small handful of basil leaves, sliced thinly
  • -1/2 cup mix of Romano and Parmesan cheese – not the stuff that comes in a round tube
  • -olive oil for cooking
  • -add 2 glugs of oil in a saute pan
  • -over low heat, sweat the onions in the oil, you do not want the onions to brown, but  you want them wilted nicely
  • -add the chicken broth and allow it to reduce, toss the onions in the broth a few times while this cooks.
  • -when the broth has thickened a bit, take the pan off the heat and add in the butter, stir it lightly
  • -add in the poppy seeds, toss to mix
  • -then stir in the basil and cheeses

**********************then eat************************************

Enjoy!  And please give this a try and comment with feedback.  We’d Love to hear from you.

I’m sure the gardenfork folks would like your opinion as well. Eric’s e-mail: eric@gardenfork.tv  “Gardenfork.tv is the original web video show about cooking, gardening, and other fun stuff.” (Eric)

As always, Nature prevails.

Writer Recipe

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• Pick a topic you’re interested in
• Think about the topic a lot
• Think about it some more
• Develop your own unique theory about what it all means
• Just do it – go out and test your theory
• Write a book about it
Roy Williams has said that anyone can be a bestselling
author. This is his recipe.

“Thought you would enjoy this recipe!” Oris George sent this recipe over. Can’t resist posting it.

Recipe Reviews; Revving up

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‘Thought a run through some recipe sites, before I got serious here, might get my creativity blooming.  Oh my, yes.

Found a yummy bread site, the author is obviously totally steeped in food and all its myriad of joys. My best cooking hours involve flour – of some kind (noodles, bread, etc), so I drooled as I surfed ; enjoy.   http://betterwithbutter.com/bread-week-day-4-challah/

Curiosity took me to this next site.  Being…over 30, I was taught to knead bread doughs till they howled.  So this new method intrigues me.  Any one used this no-knead method?  Would Love to hear your results.
http://steamykitchen.com/168-no-knead-bread-revisited.html

Okay, you’re in a hurry, kids coming through the back door, hubby just called – traffic’s not too bad – he’ll be waltzing in within the hour.  The soup in the crock pot is way ready and your quickest bread recipe takes 2 hours!  Time to try a ‘quick bread’ recipe. Here’s a site that makes this food route look quick and easy.  Confession time; I have never created a quick bread! Been down the muffin road, maybe it’s not too different? Any food fans out there with some experience in this area, please let us know your results.
http://muffinandbreadrecipes.com/QuickBread.html

A flour recipe trip must include at least a quick peek at pies.  The chef on this video below is easy to understand.  I may spend a few minutes there myself ( my first pie crust , many moons ago, could have doubled as a blunt-trauma weapon, I’m embarrassed to admit).
http://www.howdini.com/howdini-video-6637927.html”

Life is simply not life – without a perfect Pasta recipe! (notice the capital P..). Did I mention I’m Italian.  Anyway, here’s a site that uses a Pasta cutter.  As our blog progresses, I’ll post a completely from-scratch pasta recipe that shows how to use just your hands and a knife; nothing expensive to buy or difficult to operate.  But, my old pasta maker did grind out many yummy plates of varying noodle shapes and thicknesses before its sad demise. If noodles are your passion, let’s hear from you – your favorite pasta recipe could premier here and fill many a tummy.
http://forkableblog.com/?p=1059

That’s our trip down flour-lane for today.  What’s your best kept flour recipe secret?  Did your grandma/granddad have a special pie or bread recipe they passed down with Love?  Let us know.

As always, Nature prevails.

Southeast Colorado Recipes

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Do you enjoy following new recipes as well as your tried-and-true ones ?  Or maybe, as an ‘out-of-the-box’ cook, you thrive on creating new tastes and pretty table presentations as your creativity leads you. Does your daily routine grind to a screeching halt as Lydia or Emeril or Rachael come to life on the tele?

Some of us derive simple and sometimes deep pleasure from good food!   A rare steak, or a heaping plate of home-made chicken and noodles.  On a hot summer evening, after a hard day in the garden chasing  too many stubborn weeds, a recipe for a cool, tasty combination of fresh-picked tomatoes, crispy cucumbers and maybe a sweet onion, all topped with your favorite salad dressing, makes way more sense than a bathtub filled with Calgon.

No matter how we play with recipes, or enjoy our food, it graces our existence, satisfies our taste buds, brings us amongst friends and generally takes up a fair amount of our time on planet Earth.

Jan Verhoeff , owner of this website, and myself, Danielle Simone, will endeavor to build this recipe website with southeast Coloradans in mind. In addition to posting our own recipes – sometimes complete with pretty, step by step pictures, we encourage your recipe submissions.  Maybe your Granddad had a killer chili recipe that taught you the value of a quick, cool glass of milk at a moment’s notice!  Or maybe your 9 year old has mastered a mouth-watering cookie recipe. Does your husband show his creative hand at your summer barbecues with a barbecue sauce recipe that entices every neighbor with a nose, to your garden gate around dinner time?  Just maybe, you have a tried and true recipe of your own, passed down 3 or 4 generations that already holds its place in your family scrapbook?

Whatever your food fancy, stay-tuned as Jan & I begin to build a list of recipes that are free for the taking – and your enjoyment; or maybe not! Your job is to keep us on track, try what we post, let us know if your family asked for seconds…or maybe only picked out the raisins. We promise to respond to every e-mail and will endeavor to try the suggested recipes we receive.

As the site grows and expands, we hope to create recipe contests with coupon prizes for local restaurants and grocers in the Arkansas valley. Maybe we’ll gather enough southeast Colorado recipes to produce an e-book; maybe even a hard-bound jewel for sale.  Time will tell – as will the participation of our audience.

If food is your fancy, start rooting through your cookbooks; surf the cooking websites; talk to your grandparents, parents, neighbors and friends in the valley; help us create a fun and tasty website specially geared to the high-prairie tastes of southeastern Colorado – home of Nature‘s strongest winds, brightest sunshine and most glorious sunrises and sunsets in the country!

SECO Sunset, Hasty, CO, Fall 2010 By Danielle Simone

Grab your frying pans, your napkins and your taste buds; SECO Recipes is born.

As always, Nature prevails.

Contact e-mail: daniellesimone0@gmail.net