October Secret Recipe Club: Roasted Broccoli

Hello October! Yesterday marked six years of marriage for Bender and me. We spent a lovely weekend in Chattanooga, catching all the big sights like Ruby Falls, Rock City, and the Tennessee Aquarium. If you're a big fan of turtles and jellyfish, you must see the Tennessee Aquarium: they have tons of both!

Ruby Falls, Chattanooga, TN

Have you seen Rock City? (Lookout Mountain, GA)

We returned home during the late afternoon and I set about making dinner. On the drive back I found the absolute perfect recipe to make from my assigned blog for Secret Recipe Club. We called our friend Goose to come join us, which automatically meant I would be serving Baconated Cheesy Chicken. Goose will eat a whopping two vegetables: broccoli and green beans. When I saw Roasted Broccoli on I Am a Honey Bee, I knew it was meant to be.

I Am a Honey Bee is a great site, full of recipes, crafts, restaurant, and city reviews. If you are looking for a restaurant in the Boston area, be sure to check out Nicole's reviews!

But back to that yummy, crunchy, spicy, Roasted Broccoli.

Raw broccoli on a bacon-greasy pan.

Roasted Broccoli
minimally adapted from I Am a Honey Bee

3 small broccoli crowns, cut into florets
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp red chile flakes (to taste)
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp bacon grease

1. Preheat oven to 400F.
2. Toss together ingredients in a large bowl. Spread evenly on a baking sheet.
3. Bake for 15 minutes or until florets are browned and still retain a bite. Serve immediately.

THOUGHTS:
I've have roasted broccoli before, but this was the first time I felt like I nailed it. Yippee! For the bacon grease, I used leftover fat (and the pan so I got some crunchy brown bits too) from the bacon for the Baconated Cheesy Chicken. I roasted it alongside the chicken, for a low fuss, delicious, nutritious, side dish.

Nicole serves her roasted broccoli with fresh lemon juice. My gang tonight was not big on lemon, so I gave everyone the option to squeeze their own juice. No one took me up on it.

VERDICT:
Make-again: 3 votes

(Goose wanted me to let you know that he gives the dish 4.5 Geese out of a possible 5)

Nom nom nom.

Double Take: Risotto Primavera

Risotto Primavera

Since my first successful foray into risotto well over a year ago, I’ve taken to making it frequently, particularly when shell peas are in season! There is just something about sitting down with a big bag of peas, and opening each pod individually to get the green globes, all lined up and sitting pretty, out of their homes and into the bowl. Some might end up not making it to the bowl, but that’s okay. The risotto will still be yummy.

I’ve developed a bit of a carefree attitude to making risotto these days. If I’m just making a pea risotto, I’ll throw a cinnamon stick into the chicken broth for about 10 minutes to give it extra flavor. I no longer measure, but just go with what feels/looks right. Don't worry though, I've left the original recipe's measurements intact so you get a good reference for starting out! 

Double Take: Red Thai Duck Curry via The Pioneer Woman

Thai red curry with duck over jasmine rice

I don’t know what it is about Thai food, but I start salivating just thinking about it. What I would give to have a plate of spicy noodles from Thai Sawatdee in Winston-Salem or a bowl of green curry from Yum-Yum Thai in Tucker! Words cannot describe my love of these dishes. But alas, Thai food is quite different here in Germany, and I have yet to find something that really makes my taste buds sing. Since Bender doesn’t care for Thai food, I don’t make it much at home either. But he’s out of town. Woot! Which means I get to make whatever I want for myself for two whole weeks (I’m desperately hanging onto this silver lining. Our tiny apartment feels ever so empty right now)! So when Tabitha pointed out this recipe for Red Thai Duck Curry, I immediately jumped on it. I’ve waxed on about my love of duck before, so I won’t bore you with the details again, but that just added to my willingness to make the dish. I was slightly put off by the peppers, and even more put off by the pineapple, but at the last minute I decided to throw in both (Amazingly, I found a pineapple for 1€, so I didn’t feel like I had a good excuse not to include it.)

Double Take: Food o' del Mundo's Perfect Pizza Crust

Homemade pizza fresh from the oven. Does it get any better than this?

Welcome to Week 3 of the New Double Take Series! This week we feature something that should be a staple in every house: pizza crust! As you’ve seen before, I’m prone to buying the premade pizza crust because, well, I’m just a bit afraid of working with yeast. I’m fascinated by it, but I don’t have that much experience and haven’t gotten a ton of positive feedback on what I have attempted. So I haven’t been practicing. Somewhere, out of the blue a couple months ago, I got a tiny bit of confidence and decided to go for it. My first attempt was a bit, well, horrid. The dough tasted okay, but seemed to have the wrong texture. For some reason I had it in my head that I needed to knead the dough after it rose and before I put rolled it out. And of course, I didn't figure out that was what I had done wrong until Tabitha convinced me to try making pizza dough again.

Daring Cooks February Challenge: Cold Soba Salad and Tempura

This challenge made me very happy. I finally had an excuse to use purple potatoes!

Today is February 22, not February 14. Oops. I’m a little late posting this challenge, but it just seemed easier to make this one when Bender was out of town. I tried making it twice when he was in town, but my tasters kept bailing on me at the last minute (for very good reasons, not because they were averse to tasting it) and I wasn’t about to make this one for me and Bender only. So I decided to wait an extra week and make it for myself only when Bender was away at a conference. And boy, am I glad I did.

The February 2011 Daring Cooks’ challenge was hosted by Lisa of Blueberry Girl.  She challenged

Daring Cooks to make Hiyashi Soba and Tempura. She has various sources for her challenge including japanesefood.about.com, pinkbites.com, and itsybitsyfoodies.com.

Double Take: Roasted Vegetable Quesadillas (sort of)

Whilst everyone is gathered around the Thanksgiving table in the US today, I’m stuck at work. I’ve been reading facebook status updates all week: 3 days til vacation, 2 days, Today will feel like Monday and Thursday at the same time!, etc. Well, not me. I really can’t complain though, I had a wonderful week of vacation at the beginning of November, am taking a weekend trip to London soon, and will be spending Christmas with most of my immediate family (yay!). But on Thanksgiving Day, I went to work. And ya know what that means? It means I am incredibly lucky to have picked the field of environmental science when I got my bachelor’s degree. And even luckier that I decided I wasn’t ready for the real world so I went to graduate school for a master’s in biology. All of that led me to a point where, when Bender announced he got a job offer in Germany, I was able to get a job there too. I am thankful for the ability to work in a foreign country. This time last year, I knew I had a job lined up for me, but did not yet know when I would start. Tomorrow will be the one year anniversary of when I started my job. Today is a day of giving thanks, and I am thankful to be at this point in my life and to be able to call it good. And incredibly thankful that you are reading my blog so I’m not talking to myself over here!

Double Take: Creamy Southwestern Pumpkin Soup

Tabitha started getting excited about fall soups long before fall actually arrived in North Carolina. So I started looking at our “To Make” list that takes us into January and realized our mistake: we didn’t have a single soup on the list! I had already gone through the list, so I asked Tabitha to do the same. Would you believe that I had rated 28 recipes, but her two top choices I hadn’t rated at all? I didn’t rate them for a simple reason: there was no way Bender would even try them. She’d picked out two pumpkin recipes and Bender just doesn’t eat pumpkin. And I can’t buy canned pumpkin here. I couldn’t imagine that prepping the pumpkin for soup would be difficult, but it just wasn’t something I was terribly interested in trying if I were the only one eating it. So I picked one of Tabitha’s two recipes to make for our Double Take series and gave her my blessing to make the other one without me.

 I've been learning a lot about pumpkins since I moved to Germany. For instance, the rest of the world calls all winter squash “pumpkins.” I only thought something could be called a pumpkin if I could turn it into a jack-o-lantern. Boy was I wrong. And then I learned that Libby’s agrees with the rest of the world and that their canned pumpkin is generally butternut squash. Huh. I’ve never enjoyed pumpkin pie and my mom certainly did not cook with pumpkin, so it was never something I really thought about. So readers, what is your definition of a pumpkin?

Roasted pumpkin sure is pretty. 

Double Take: Smothered Enchiladas

I love fake enchiladas. And when I say fake, I mean I use flour tortillas instead of corn tortillas. I don’t know what it is, but I just don’t like corn tortillas. I’ve even had homemade tortillas made by someone who learned how to make them by watching his mother in Mexico. But I just don’t like them. So I always cheat and use flour tortillas. I assumed I’d have to do that with these enchiladas as well, but for some reason the recipe writers at Southern Living agree with me and both of their enchilada recipes call for flour tortillas. Yay!

Enchilada deliciousness! 

Double Take: Loaded Garlic Smashed Potatoes

This recipe has been on the back burner for quite some time. Tabitha wanted to make it back in the day, but that was before red potatoes were in season and I was unwilling to make changes to the recipe. Well, I’ve loosened up a bit and red potatoes came into season, and we decided it was time to make this recipe. And boy, am I glad I did.

I have always been a huge mashed potato fan. I can now make them in a way that hubby will eat them, but he never goes back for seconds. Me on the other hand, I generally go back for thirds, which probably isn’t the healthiest thing in the world for me. I even tried preparing Momma’s Holiday Mashed Potato Casserole for Hubby, but he still didn’t go back for seconds. I didn’t see how this recipe would be any different, but decided to make it anyway since we both love garlic and bacon. I failed to mention to Hubby that this recipe contained sour cream, and just served it up as potatoes. He went back for seconds. Twice.

Double Take: Green Bean Risotto

We've headed away from the sweet, fruity dishes and back into the land of savory, where I am much more comfortable. I enjoyed perfecting a pastry crust and learning about shortcakes, but I'm ready for something with a bit less sugar. Enter: Green Bean Risotto

Green beans boiling in a ridiculously tiny amount of chicken broth.

Daring Cooks Challenge: Nut Butters

When I saw the new challenge for this month, I wasn't quite sure how to react. The idea of making a nut butter has always been intriguing to me, but Hubby is not a huge fan of nut butters, so I wasn't sure how easily I'd be able to pull off the taste. But then I realized a holiday was near. And holidays means parties. Parties mean food. Plenty of food... which means I can make whatever I want on the side as long as Hubby has enough food. And oh boy, I went to town on this challenge.

The July 2010 Daring Cooks’ Challenge was hosted by Margie of More Please and Natashya of Living in the Kitchen with Puppies. They chose to challenge Daring Cooks to make their own nut butter from scratch, and use the nut butter in a recipe. Their sources include Better with Nut Butter by Cooking Light Magazine, Asian Noodles by Nina Simonds, and Food Network online.

Grilled Chicken and Pasta in Fresh Basil-Cream Sauce

Remember my Ravioli Double Take? The sauce had potential, but it just fell short of the mark (both in taste and quantity). After reading your comments, I decided that I really need to revamp the sauce and give it a chance. So I did. Thank you readers for convincing me to try this one again!

I knew I didn't want to try more ravioli, but I also wanted to stay away from my normal pastas: macaroni, tagliatelle, and spaghetti. And, surprisingly, I stumbled across orechiette when I was looking for a grill. Crazy, huh? I grabbed the orechiette and wandered over to the chocolate section. I found a bar of Lindt salted chocolate, and feeling adventurous, I grabbed it. Hubby has never been so surprised to like a chocolate before, claiming whomever came up with the idea to add salt to chocolate was a genius. I concur.

Double Take: Ravioli in Basil-Cream Sauce

 Mushroom Ravioli in Basil-Cream Sauce

EDIT: To see an updated version of this sauce, complete with recipe, check out this post!

Double Take: Vegetable-Quinoa Pilaf

This week’s Double Take is brought to you by the section “Meatless Mains.” I’m a little aggravated with this section. Why is chicken broth considered an acceptable ingredient in a section entitled “Meatless Mains?” I know that this particular dish is not labeled vegetarian, but you’d think in a section entitled “Meatless Mains” all the dishes would be labeled vegetarian. Grr.


I love quinoa, which is why I chose this recipe. I also haven’t cooked anything in almost a week, and I needed something fast and filling. This recipe easily works as a one-dish meal because you’ve got your protein (quinoa is a complete protein so it's great for vegetarians), fats, vegetables, fruit, and dairy all in one dish (we’re going on the my definition of fruit here: any plant part that encloses a seed, thus peppers count as fruit).

So colorful!

Double Take: Stir-fried Broccoli

We are making our rounds through the sections, and today's recipe comes from the "Side Dishes" section. Five recipes down, 1245+ to go!

The goal this week was to pick out a side dish that would come together easily and be enjoyed by all. We'd originally picked out a mashed potato recipe, but at the last minute we noticed that the recipe called for red potatoes, which aren't quite in season yet. So look for that recipe later this spring (or next year). Broccoli is available year round, so Tabitha picked out "Stir-fried Broccoli."