Preheat oven to 350 F and spray a 13×9 glass baking dish.
Place biscuits in pan in a single layer and press into the pen, joining them together, pressing the dough halfway up the sides of the pan.
Place pan on a baking sheet and bake dough in preheated oven for 15-25 minutes; checking every few minutes after 15. The dough should be very light brown where the edges are just starting to get color. Remove from oven and set aside, leave oven on.
Combine the browned ground beef with the taco seasoning and water, and cook according to packet instructions. Transfer cooked taco meat to a bowl and set aside. Wipe out pan.
Saute remaining onions and bell peppers on the taco meat pan until slightly tender.
In a separate bowl, combine sour cream, mayonnaise, half of the cheddar cheese, and half of onions. Stir well and set aside.
On top of baked biscuit crust, layer ingredients in the following order: taco meat, tomato slices, bell pepper and onion mixture, Jalapeno peppers, sour cream mixture and sprinkle with remaining shredded cheese.
Bake uncovered for 30-40 minutes or until edges of dough are lightly browned and cheese is melted.
8 chicken thighs, bone in, skin on
Olive oil
6 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
1 cup dry white wine
2 limes, juice of
2 cups chicken broth
1 bunch cilantro, stems removed, chopped; more for garnish
Olive oil
Spice mix:
1 tbsp seasoned salt
1 tsp hot paprika
1 tsp black pepper
1 tbsp garlic powder
½ tsp ground nutmeg INSTRUCTIONS
Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.
In a small bowl, mix the spices. Pat the chicken thighs dry, and season each thigh on both sides with the spice mix. Be sure to season underneath the skin as well. Let the chicken thighs sit in room temperature for about 15 minutes.
When ready, heat 1-2 tbsp of olive oil in a cast iron skillet or French braiser. Brown the chicken thighs deeply on both sides in the heated oil. Remove from the skillet and set aside briefly.
Lower the heat and deglaze the skillet with the white wine. Let cook to reduce and then add the broth.
Bring the liquid to a simmer then add lime juice and garlic.
Now return the chicken to the skillet; and toss in the cilantro.
Bring to a high-simmer for about 5 minutes or so. Cover the skillet and transfer to the 375 degree F-heated oven for 45 minutes or until chicken is cooked through.
Remove from the oven and let sit for 5 minutes before serving. Garnish with more cilantro, if you like.
A simple fattoush salad and a side of white rice, couscous or Greek potatoes complete this chicken dinner.
400g Brussels Sprouts
Pack of smoked bacon lardons, or 4 thick streaky rashers
30 – 50g unsalted butter
METHOD
Separate the sprout leaves individually, or shred each sprout very finely
If using bacon rashers, dice very finely
Fry bacon over medium heat until lightly cooked, then remove to a side plate
Add butter and 2 tbsp water to pan and heat until foaming
Add sprouts to pan
Reduce heat to low
Stir pan to evenly coat contents, then cover with lid
Cook for approx. 5 minutes, shaking pan (or stirring) every minute to prevent contents sticking
Stir in the cooked bacon, season with salt & pepper then serve
You can make this recipe faster and easier depending on how you choose to separate the leaves.
Heston’s Brussels Sprouts recipe on the Waitrose website and the Sprout recipe in Heston at Home both tell you to separate the leaves individually, so you end up with what looks like a tiny pile of miniature cabbage leaves.
This looks fancy, and it means you won’t end up eating the bitter cores of each sprout (they get thrown away). But it’s a very fiddly and time-consuming job. Also, as the leaves at the centre of each sprout are too small and tough to peel you do end up throwing away a lot of the veg you’ve bought. We estimated we threw away half the weight in sprouts with this method.
If you’re stood in front of a big pile of sprouts we recommend you test this method out with your first sprout. Cut the bottom off and start pulling the leaves away until you’ve separated as many as you can. You should be left with a tough sprout core of tight, knotty leaves.
Now look at your pile of sprouts and decide if you’d be happy doing that with all of them.
Faster and cheaper is a second technique that is also suggested in the Heston Sprout recipe from Heston at Home shred the sprouts very finely.
Note: for both versions of Heston’s Brussels sprout recipes make sure you discard the dirty outer leaves, unless you bought sprouts already washed and prepared.
Step 2: Cooking the Bacon
If you did decide to shred the sprouts finely we recommend dicing our bacon into pieces as tiny as you can, so they match up better. If you just separated the leaves then standard lardons will be fine.
Streaky bacon works best in Heston’s Brussels Sprouts recipe, as it has more fat – which means more flavour. You may find it best to slightly oil your pan to prevent the bacon from sticking. If so try to use butter or neutral flavour oil like groundnut.
Once the bacon is cooked it’s easiest just to tip it onto a small side plate so its handy for later.
Step 3: Cooking Heston’s Brussels Sprouts recipe
Now it’s time to add the sprouts themselves for the final stage of Heston’s Brussels Sprouts recipe. Add the butter to the pan and once it’s foaming tip in all your sprouts along with 2 tablespoons of water (about 30ml).
This water is essential, as it’ll turn into a steam inside the pan, which will help cook your sprouts to tender perfection. Be sure to keep the lid on to prevent the heat and steam from escaping!
Jostle the pan a few times during cooking to stop the leaves from sticking and ensure Heston’s Brussels Sprouts recipe cooks evenly and to perfection. (You can lift the lid and give them a quick stir if you like, but they might take a minute or two longer to cook).
Stir the bacon into the sprouts once they are cooked to your liking.
VERDICT
When we first made Heston’s Brussels sprouts recipe none of the people sat at the table would claim to enjoy any of the Christmas sprouts recipes they’d tried. After trying Heston’s Brussels sprouts recipe every single diner was converted.
Whatever it is Heston’s Perfect Brussels Sprouts recipe is one that we’ll be making every Christmas from now on. It’s so good that we simply wouldn’t prepare Brussels Sprouts any other way than the Heston Blumenthal way.
Pat the beef prime rib roast with paper towels to dry the meat before seasoning it. This way, the seasoning sticks to it better during the cooking process.
Place the prime rib in a roasting pan, fat side up.
Prepare a paste in a small bowl with enough oil, salt and ground pepper that you’ll use to cover the surface of your roast on all sides.
Add other rub flavorings, such as mustard seeds or freshly ground coffee, to achieve the taste you desire.
You can omit the oil if you want, but it does a great job of sealing in the juices of the meat during cooking.
Rub the seasoning paste into the meat all over.
If you’re going to use garlic to season your roast, cut a dozen or more 1”-deep slits in both the top and bottom of the beef roast using a paring knife.
Insert a sliver of garlic clove into each slit.
Let the prepared prime rib roast rest in the pan for up to two hours before placing it in the oven.
source: http://www.wikihow.com/Season-a-Prime-Rib-Roast
As the new year arrives around the globe, special cakes and breads abound, as do long noodles (representing long life), field peas (representing coins), herring (representing abundance) and pigs (representing good luck). The particulars vary, but the general theme is the same: to sit down and share a meal with family and friends to usher in a year of prosperity.
Where to see in the new year in style
Here are some of the common traditions around the world and a few hints about where to partake in them:
A major New Year’s food tradition in the American South, Hoppin’ John is a dish of pork-flavored field peas or black-eyed peas (symbolizing coins) and rice, frequently served with collards or other cooked greens (as they’re the color of money) and cornbread (the color of gold). The dish is said to bring good luck in the new year.
Different folklore traces the history and the name of this meal, but the current dish has its roots in African and West Indian traditions and was most likely brought over by slaves to North America. A recipe for Hoppin’ John appears as early as 1847 in Sarah Rutledge’s “The Carolina Housewife” and has been reinterpreted over the centuries by home and professional chefs.
The dish reportedly got its name in Charleston, South Carolina, and it is a veritable staple of Lowcountry cooking. So this is as good a place as any to eat it. Husk, the acclaimed restaurant of chef Sean Brock, often serves Hoppin’ John, as does Charleston institution Hominy Grill. Not heading south for the holidays? Seersucker in Brooklyn, New York, is serving Hoppin’ John from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on New Year’s Day.
Twelve grapes, Spain
While Americans watch the ball drop in Times Square on New Year’s Eve, Spaniards watch the broadcast from Puerta del Sol in Madrid, where revelers gather in front of the square’s clock tower to ring in the New Year. Those out in the square and those watching at home partake in an unusual annual tradition: at the stroke of midnight they eat one grape for every toll of the clock bell. Some even prep their grapes — peeling and seeding them — to make sure they will be as efficient as possible when midnight comes.
The custom began at the turn of the 20th century and was purportedly thought up by grape producers in the south with a bumper crop. Since then the tradition has spread to many Spanish-speaking nations.
Those spending New Year’s Eve in Madrid should head over to the Puerta del Sol before midnight. It’s a lively square, surrounded by bars, restaurants and shopping, so it’s a good place to be when the new year comes.
Tamales, corn dough stuffed with meat, cheese and other delicious additions and wrapped in a banana leaf or a corn husk, make appearances at pretty much every special occasion in Mexico. But the holiday season is an especially favored time for the food. In many families, groups of women gather together to make hundreds of the little packets — with each person in charge of one aspect of the cooking process — to hand out to friends, family and neighbors. On New Year’s, it’s often served with menudo, a tripe and hominy soup that is famously good for hangovers.
Those who live in cities with large Mexican populations shouldn’t have much trouble finding restaurants selling tamales to go for New Year’s Eve and Day. But gourmands who want the real deal should head to Mexico City, where steamed tamales are sold from vendors on street corners day and night. They can also be found at established restaurants like Flor de Lis or Pujol or tamale specialists like Los Tamales y Algo Mas.
Oliebollen, Netherlands
In the Netherlands, fried dough balls called oliebollen are part of welcoming the new year.
In the Netherlands, fried oil balls, or oliebollen, are sold by street carts and are traditionally consumed on New Year’s Eve and at special celebratory fairs. They are doughnut-like dumplings, made by dropping a scoop of dough spiked with currants or raisins into a deep fryer and then dusted with powdered sugar.
In Amsterdam, be on the lookout for Oliebollenkraams, little temporary shacks or trailers on the street selling packets of hot fried oliebollen.
Marzipanschwein or Glücksschwein, Austria and Germany
Austria, and its neighbor to the north, Germany, call New Year’s Eve Sylvesterabend, or the eve of Saint Sylvester. Austrian revelers drink a red wine punch with cinnamon and spices, eat suckling pig for dinner and decorate the table with little pigs made of marzipan, called marzipanschwein. Good luck pigs, or Glücksschwein, which are made of all sorts of things, are also common gifts throughout both Austria and Germany.
Vienna bakeries this time of year will be filled with a variety of pig-shaped sweets. Head to Julius Meinl, with more than three floors of gourmet food shopping, cafes and restaurants, to find the most impressive display of pig-shaped Champagne truffles, marzipan and chocolate in a variety of sizes.
Soba noodles, Japan
In Japanese households, families eat buckwheat soba noodles, or toshikoshi soba, at midnight on New Year’s Eve to bid farewell to the year gone by and welcome the year to come. The tradition dates back to the 17th century, and the long noodles symbolize longevity and prosperity. In another custom called mochitsuki, friends and family spend the day before New Year’s pounding mochi rice cakes. Sweet, glutinous rice is washed, soaked, steamed and pounded into a smooth mass. Then guests take turns pinching off pieces to make into small buns that are later eaten for dessert.
This New Year’s Eve, at Manhattan Japanese restaurant En Japanese Brasserie, the chef (and willing customers) will take part in the mochitsuki. The resulting mochi will be served as dessert later in the evening. The restaurant is also serving two kaiseki menus, both featuring soba noodles as a final savory course. At midnight, they will break open a barrel of sake to welcome the New Year.
King cake, around the globe
Variations on the king cake are embraced by many cultures. Some countries partake for New Year's, while in France galettes des roi are eaten on January 6.
Variations on the king cake are embraced by many cultures. Some countries partake for New Year’s, while in France galettes des roi are eaten on January 6.
The tradition of a New Year’s cake is one that spans countless cultures. The Greeks have the Vasilopita, the French the gateau or galette des rois. Mexicans have the Rosca de Reyes and Bulgarians enjoy the banitsa.
Most of the cakes are consumed at midnight on New Year’s Eve — though some cultures cut their cake on Christmas or the Epiphany, January 6 — and include a hidden gold coin or figure, which symbolizes a prosperous year for whomever finds it in their slice.
Cotechino con lenticchie, Italy
Italians celebrate New Year’s Eve with La Festa di San Silvestro, often commencing with a traditional cotechino con lenticchie, a sausage and lentil stew that is said to bring good luck (the lentils represent money and good fortune) and, in certain households, zampone, a stuffed pig’s trotter.
The meal ends with chiacchiere — balls of fried dough that are rolled in honey and powdered sugar — and prosecco. The dishes find their roots in Modena, but New Year’s Eve feasts thrive across the country.
Pickled herring, Poland and Scandinavia
In Poland and Scandinavia, herring is a typical dish for good fortune in the new year.
Because herring is in abundance in Poland and parts of Scandinavia, and because of their silver coloring, many in those nations eat pickled herring at the stroke of midnight to bring a year of prosperity and bounty. Some eat pickled herring in cream sauce, some have it with onions.
One special Polish New Year’s Eve preparation of pickled herring, called Sledzie Marynowane, is made by soaking whole salt herrings in water for 24 hours and then layering them in a jar with onions, allspice, sugar and white vinegar. Scandinavians will often include herring in a larger midnight smorgasbord with smoked and pickled fish, pate and meatballs.
Kransekage, Denmark and Norway
Kransekage, literally wreath cake, is a cake tower composed of many concentric rings of cake layered atop one another, and they are made for New Year’s Eve and other special occasions in Denmark and Norway. The cake is made using marzipan, often with a bottle of wine or Aquavit in the center and can be decorated with ornaments, flags and crackers.
