Mint Sesame Red Snapper

It was way better than the picture makes it seem...

10 Minute Meal #1: Snapper and Greens

Eat my dust Rachel Ray

Here is a 10 minute meal. Its balanced, nutritious and not half-baked from an effing can. Paleo can be rapid as well. 3, 2, 1, go...

Take 3oz of water and boil with salt and pepper. Heat on high until steaming, not boiling. Add about 8 leaves of cut up collard greens. Cover and only turn once in 7-10 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat a pan to semi-high heat with olive oil, dehydrated onion, and a little lemon juice. Salt and pepper some red snapper. Add a couple scoops of capers while cooking. Cook in pan for 3 minutes per side, do not over do it.

Strain greens, place fish on top. Garnish with capers and the juice of a half lemon. Sub 10.

Time...

Anaheim Stuffed Peppers with Peach Puree

I thought about calling these puppies Paleo Enchiladas, but, nah

The goal here was to make a delicious peachy-spicy meat filled dish, but it just wasn't peachy enough. There is a lot to be learned from this, so even though it didn't come out the way that I wanted it too, I'll share the journey and you can make awesome food from learning where others have failed.

I wet-chopped about 8 cremini mushrooms, and sauted those with a very thinly sliced onion and a pound of spicy Italian sausage. This was the major mistake of the day, the pre-spiced Italian sausage dominated every other flavor I could throw at this dish, and if I could have found ground pork (or even if I had defrosted some grass fed ground beef) it would have turned out much the way I had envisioned. Lesson: season your own meat. This is much like making you own salsa, or mayo, or anything. Make your own shit, its not hard and its way better.

Anyway, meanwhile, roast about ten Anaheim/Hatch chili peppers in a 400F oven for about 10-15 minutes or until they blister. Also meanwhile. puree two peaches in a blender until extremely smooth with skin either pulverized or removed (depending on blender). Here is another flailing attempt: peach flavor does not dominate food like peach candy does. Two solutions: add sugar, or reduce for hours. I added some peach puree to the meat/mushroom/onion mix and simmered for 15 minutes. Cool meat mixture. Cool peppers in cool water.

Cut the tops off the peppers, remove seeds, and stuff with meat mixture. I recommend not taking the skin off of the peppers for this enterprise. Most foodies want you to remove it because it is harder to eat, but those people normally do not stuff skinny long peppers (normally it is for sliced bell peppers or for rellenos). If you want to remove them before services, do it carefully. Re-bake for ten minutes and cover in peach puree and garnish with cilantro.

Very easy, could be amazing, but I missed the mark. Not peachy enough.

Amazed

Kristin Clever and Iceland Annie, the two fittest women on Earth (www.crossfit.com)

Little can be said about the CrossFit Games 2010 that will do it justice. I could use words like 'amazing,' 'unbelievable,' 'awe inspiring,' 'savage,' 'brutal,' and 'heroic' but none can truly convey the feeling that was left in all of us by watching these athletes tough it out through nine events in less than 48 hours.

Only an absolute monster could even make it to the Games, and only the very best of the best have a realistic shot at winning. It becomes impossible to explain how hard these events are to a mortal who has never done a WOD, or tried to finish one. But even those of us who do hard work outs and can appreciate the scope of skills and athletic prowess of these athletes can hardly imagine anyone rising to the heights of these athletes. The two women pictured (Kristin Clever, 1st place, and Annie Thorisdottier, 2nd place) were the most fun to watch, and my favorites of the 2010 Games.

Kristin won 5 events and got 3 runner ups out of 9 events. Annie won the other 4, and got second and third in two other events. The picture above had the crowd roaring during the Pyramid Double Helen: after a 1200m run, 63 kettle bells, 36 pull ups, 800m run, 42 kettle bells, 24 pull ups, and a 400m run Annie had a 20m lead as she stepped over her kettle bell and took three or fourth breaths. Kristin ran straight to her kettle bell, turned and faced Annie, picked up her bell and started swinging. The race was on. Annie and Kristin were swinging in unison as they struggled to finish an epic event. Annie won by a small margin, and then Kristin, 90 seconds later, won the third event by jerking #205 from behind her head. Unbelievable.

There were two other events that went Annie's way with Kristin right behind, but in the end, Kristin blew Annie out of the water on all of her wins for the over all title. Watching the two together was my favorite part of the Games and it is something I will never forget. It was one of my favorite weekends of all time, and Kristin and Annie became my new heroes.

WWRDD?

What would Raw Dog do? Raw dog that sh!t, obviously. Get your's for $20.

Hit that shit raw dog

Lemony Yellow Zucchini Soup

Yeah, the zucchini is yellow too

Again, www.vitamix.com, can't say enough good things about that company's flagship product.

Take five yellow zucchinis and cut stem and end off and cut into quarters. Cut an onion into eighths, and cut two carrots into halves. Simmer with bay leaves, a cup of water, a lot of olive oil, a restrained amount of red pepper, the juice of a whole lemon, salt, and pepper for 10+ minutes.

Blend on high for 4 minutes, adding olive oil as needed (imagine anticipating that need!).

Meanwhile, slowly heat extra virgin olive oil, about a T of anchovy paste, and three or four slices of lemon rind. Simmer that for as long as you can. I might actually advise to use a lot more lemon rind and to saute it till it is edible, slice and then serve it inside the soup.

Anyway, return soup to heat after blending for 10 minutes on simmer. Serve with oil drizzled over it. It is really good.

The drizzled oil makes it

Island Thai-napple Chicken Wings

The secret is in the pineapple

When stuck on some god forsaken island chain in the heartless, ice-blue, tropical hell called Hawai'i, one results to cooking things with island themes. Two island themes in this one: Asian things, and pineapple. This earned me a top chef spot at an imaginary Dive Bar where there are jazz musicians and scuba equipment for sale. Literally.

Make a rub of ground ginger, salt, pepper, and dehydrated onions. Rub it all over the wings and grill them to perfection.

Here is an interesting way to get great pineapple flavor: from a pineapple. Cut a pineapple up into disks and remove the outer shit, you know what I mean, but I don't know what it is called, you know, that artichoke fish scale of prickly things? Anyway, save the slices in a big bowl to collect juice. Grill the pineapple and then return to dish to catch even more juice.

Then toss the wings with the pineapple juice, fish sauce and cayenne red pepper sauce (1:4 ratio at least) and sprinkle cilantro on it. Supplement with pineapple chunks as required.

Turkey Chicken Wings

I got this idea from a Turk named Ilker

I made some Island Thai-neapple Spicy Wings while traveling to foreign lands and got inspired to make something weird from another country, Turkey.

Make a rub in mortar and pestle of:

• 2t dried dill
• 2t paprika
• 2t salt
• 2t pepper
• 1/2t celery salt
• 1/2t dried basil

Rub it all over about 40 wings, grill and serve with green onion mayo. Amazing alone, even better together.

Love that blender.

Green Onion Mayonnaise

Who knows if this is good for anything except what comes next...

This is a pretty decent mayo on its own, in my humble opinion, oniony and lemony. I would imagine you could make this with lime juice and that might rad too.

Green Onion Mayo

In a blender, combine three egg yolks, the juice of a large lemon, 1/2t of ground mustard, 1 t salt, and black pepper. Blend and add 6 green onions, then slowly pour in a cup of extra light olive oil.

This is to be served with Dill-Paprika chicken wings. Awesome combination.

Island Onion Mango Salad

This is bizarre to me, but everyone loved it

This dish was inspired by a successful food experience at the Blue Water Shrimp and Fish Market where a mango salsa featured prominently on their plates and worked well with virtually everything that they served (I'll talk about that restaurant later in a review). So I thought to myself, self, if it works well with everything there, why wouldn't it work well with everything here?

I contemplate profound issues.

Also, I am not allowed to use tomatoes when making food that will be eaten by Alex (same Top Ramen Alex from earlier), so the salsa dish needed to evolve somewhat.

Island Onion Mango Salad

Slice a red onion into thin rings and quarter (alternatively, quarter the onion and slice into thin arcs), also thinly slice two serrano peppers into thin rings. Sauté on medium heat for 10 minutes in extra light olive oil, not extra virgin (huge difference). Meanwhile, dice three fairly large mangoes. After the onions are fairly tender, reduce heat to low and stir in mango chunks. Simmer this for a minute and then remove from heat to cool to room temperature. Squeeze fresh lime juice on it and enjoy.

Island Cabbage Maingot Salad

Even Alex eats these veggies

I think this is the fourth version of this Cole slaw we have seen on keep your fucking chest up dot com, and this one got two Gas Station Eaters to mack it down and come back for more.

• 1/2 shredded cabbage (can be shredded in a blender in less a second, FIY)
• 3/4 julienned red bell pepper
• 1 diced mango
• 4T chopped cilantro
• 3 thinly sliced scallions
• 2 minced red jalapeños
• Extra light olive oil
• Apple cider vinegar

The only reason this recipe gets posted a fourth time is simple: multiple technical knife cuts. Look them all up.

I can't believe I just gave Paleo SAT words to blog readers to research... Anyway, if you want to learn to cook, look it up.

Island Poke Avocado Salad

Excellent fat, excellent protein, excellent taste

I think this is easy: take delicious raw Ahi tuna, a little chili pepper, a little green onion, a little toasted sesame oil, some macadamia nuts, some avocado, mix it together then raw dog that shit. Kat mixed this little beauty up and we had to cover it and put it away because we would never stop eating up.

Island Smoked Paprika Ribs

The food in Hawai'i has been not amazing

I think I like the carrots out here, but the food has been shitty. I've thrown away three meals in four days, so I gave up and we started making our own food. This rub is rad and since we are rocking the propane in a ridiculous anti-paleo household (think 40 pack of Ramen noodles, instant hot chocolate, etc.) this is a fantastic way to raw dog it.

The Smokey Paprika Rub

3T Dried onion

3t salt

3t smoked paprika

1t ground mustard

2t black pepper

2T ground sage

Now what I did was put these puppies in the oven for two hours at like 255-300F (started hot, cooled after 40 minutes). Then, finished then on a gas grill. Amazing. Take that HI food!

I Climb Buoys

Do the snorkel and mask make me look really white?

I like that Alex looks like she is only wearing flippers.

And don't call them fins. They're flippers.

Frog

Thai Pesto Chicken

I have this lying around in my kitchen on a Wednesday

This is a fantastic chicken sauce, marinade, or even a bomb pasta sauce. It combines the ideals of pesto sauce, with the flavors of great Thai food, with the American values of grilled chicken. It gets spicy, sweet, sour, salty, grilled, creamy, cheesy, etc. Its really good.

C'mon you didn't think I'd go on vacay without creating something to get rid of my stock piled food, did you?

Marinade slash Sauce slash Baste

First make the sauce thing. You can use this as a marinade if you plan ahead, but if you are like me you needed this spur of the moment, and you can use it like a baste. Also, if you have meat to dip, you can use this as a sauce. Its fairly re-donk.

In a blender, combine:

• 1 bunch of Thai basil leaves, no stems
• 4 garlic cloves
• 3 Serrano chilies
• 1T fish sauce
• 1/2c water
• 1 celery stalk
• 2T olive oil
• Juice of 1 lime

It should look like Fig. 2.

Figure 2. What it should look like. Blender needs to be fast to make it this green.

Dismember a chicken (61 seconds, no PR but still 10 seconds faster than my PR from a week ago). Coat in salt and pepper. Grill for 30 out of a planned 40 minutes for a chicken (let this requirement dictate heat levels). Once almost done, baste like in Fig. 3.

Figure 3. Basting in the glory

Toss and then re-grill that shit. Flip and re-baste. Cook the sauce onto the chicken and you have a freaking spicy, delicious Thai Pesto Chicken.

So Close to Ruben's Salsa

Its important to have goals, but salsa goals are especially important

This journey of matching Ruben's Burrito's salsa has continually amazed me in how simple their recipe must truly be. This version is super tasty, super simple, and gives great insight as to what they actually must be doing.

Fresh Version of Ruben's Salsa

• 5 Tomatoes, medium, red, ripe tomatoes
• 4 Unseeded Serrano peppers (mine were green, but red work too)
• 1/2 t Granulated garlic
• 1 T Plain white vinegar
• 4 Big pinches of salt
• 1 t Crushed red pepper
• 2 t Organic tomato paste

Notice: absolutely no cilantro. None needed, none used by Ruben's. Here is a realization I came too as I had to supplement my fresh design with dried peppers and tomato paste to match the color: Ruben probably cuts huge corners by using things like canned, crushed tomatoes instead of fresh, and if I had to bet, some cheap garlic salt that may contain MSG (because the cheaper they are, the more likely they are to have nasty chemicals, and their salsa is so effing addictive).

My Ojai constituency tells me that, though this is too tomato-y it is super close to Ruben's, and I concede that yes, it is too tomato-y, but that is a function of the tomato paste to match the color.

Next time: canned tomatoes and then rolling into Ruben's with a ketchup bottle of this stuff to have a taste off with the employees.

Paleo Baked Almond Pork Chop

For easing back off of junk food, shake and bake style

I am in love with this dish. Maybe it is because I have been eating so much beef recently and anything not beef will make me drool, but I think I really like it because of the taste. The idea is to make a fairly crusty, yet moist, fatty and delicious pork chop. Sorry about the lack of precision here, it really makes no difference, but just make sure you can taste what you add, or what is the effing point?

I recently dried an entire bunch of fresh sage, and I used the vast majority in this dish. In a mortar and pestle, add the majority of a dried bunch of sage with a couple pinches of super coarse sea salt. Grind smooth, take out all large stems. Throw that into a shallow baking dish with (i'm guessing) 1/2c of almond flour. Then, since I also dried some fresh thyme, add some dried thyme! Also add cayenne pepper, dehydrated onions (which are awesome), black pepper, and maybe a little granulated garlic, if that is what you are into.

Drege chops, rinsed but not dried, through the mix on both sides. Bake for 15 minutes at 400F. These were thin chops so you have to adjust according to height, heat, fat rendering desires, quantity, etc.

Fantasticly good, paleo common

For me, the fat was crispy enough, the meat was moist, the flavoring was spicy, sage-ee and most importantly, delicious. I just gave a chop to my roommate to eat with chili. I ate it alone, and then later with soup covered in chorizo. Both were amazing. Although this recipe is far from anyone's consideration of gourmet, it is very good for comfort food.

My dad hates non-conventional foods (for the most part). He loves things like spaghetti, chicken wings, garlic bread, subway sandwiches, cheese, baked beans, and potato salad from the deli counter. All of those things are very very easy to make. In fact, they are so easy to make that you can make them, freeze them, sell them, thaw them, cook them, and then eat them off of paper plates.

My dad would love this dish. There are some hard nuts to crack for pro-paleo eating, and this might be the right hammer to bring.

Two Kinds of Salsa

Blenders like this make rad salsa, authentic restaurant style

Salsa in mexican and Eye-talian, means sauce. These sauces are great and I am currently using them for salad dressings, dips, and crock pot stew juice for a pork shoulder.

Here is the low down on good salsa: it is effing simple and should be simple. Generally, there is truly one consistent ingredient in salsa: tomatoes. There are three secondary ingredients that are almost universally applied in combinations of one, two, or three with tomatoes. Here is a short list of notables with these Super 4:

• Pico de gallo: Tomato (fresh), Onion, Cilantro, Peppers


• Tomatillo: Tomatillo (green tomatoes, fresh), onion, cilantro, peppers, garlic and vinegar


• Pace Picante: Tomato sauce (canned), tomatoes (canned), onions (?), peppers (?)


• Traditional hand cut home made: Super 4 + salt + vinegar + citrus

Salsa is very very easy to make and should be made at least 6-250 times per year depending on usage. If we look at what these salsas above and see what they work with we can learn tons about how to make useful salsa.

• Pico is good for chips and cheap shitty burritos. It is also a decent start for ceviche.


• Tomatillo is very diversely popular for everything from enchiladas to pork roasts to rices to chips. Very very useful.


• Pace is about as bad as I can imagine. Pace is the purpose of this post.


• Traditional tastes like what we are trying to accomplish. Almost universal in application.

Knowing the Super 4 and seeing some examples can give you an idea of how salsas can be tailored. I would contend that cilantro is the dominant flavor that people associate with mild salsas, where hot salsas do not really need that much of the Chinese parsley, nor is it missed or noticed. I would also note that some people do not like onions (which makes them horrible food critics, I would say).

Anyway, I have made two salsas in the recent days and here is how and why I did what I did.

Chasing Ruben
For more than a decade Ruben's Burritos has had the best burrito salsa I have ever tasted. Here is my first attempt. I missed on a lot of fronts to match Ruben's, but next time I'll get it closer.

Blend 5 cubed fresh tomatoes, 2 jalapenos, a cubed onion, 10 stems of cilantro, garlic powder, salt, pepper, apple cider vinegar.

Result: too much cilantro, too much vinegar, maybe needs more garlic powder and way more heat. Consistancy was too watery. Appearance was too green. It was fairly rapidly devoured for its high content of delishisness. Changes to come, I think I'll have it in two or three more trys, and then we move for patents.

Chipoltee
Take a few chipotle peppers and add to blender with one onion, one tomato, a cup of water, salt and pepper, and a little cider vinegar. I used this to marinade and then crock for 30+ hours a pork shoulder. People loved it. It was very very similar to the tabasco brand chipotle sauce they sell at the stores.

More salsa to come.

Oyster Mushroom Sardine Soup

This is a way to test your ideas (a very simple example)

The soup made yesterday on keep your fucking chest up dot com was epic. Though many thought that surely I could not have made my best dish out of asparagus and dried anchovies, I tried an experiment to give credence to my contentions that it truly is epic.

The Challenge: Make a better soup using the same fundamental ideas, with slightly different ingredients. Asparagus yesterday, fresh oyster mushrooms today. Dried Asian anchovy yesterday, dried Asian sardine today. All else was a wash.

The Conclusion: That asparagus shit was seriously, a home run. This mushroom dish was fine, but you should go heavy sardine, heavy sardine soaking oil, lemon squeeze required. Would be better with heavy cream (Almost Paleo).

Sardines were by far the best part, but too big for small bites.