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You always remember your first…

~ Gary Bechard ~ Leave a comment

There are all kinds of firsts; first car, first girlfriend, first kiss, etc., etc. but there is a first for a food blogger (I think that is what I am, at least part time anyway) and that is the restaurant review. I will preface this review with the fact that I have been a dishwasher, bus boy, waiter and wine steward for various restaurants where I have had the good fortune to be able to learn from folks that made restaurants their life’s business. What I witnessed and experienced at this restaurant pushes the boundaries of what these folks told me regarding making sure that the diner has a great experience. Please keep in mind that this is only one night and that it may not be representative of the restaurant’s overall performance. Now on with the review.

I am here in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina and we, as a group, decided to go to a place called Nacho Hippo. It has a very “beachy” vibe with a relaxed , laid back atmoshpere and lots of outdoor seating.  The volume of the music was a tad too loud for me because it made casual conversation with folks at the table a bit difficult but it could be overlooked since there were a large number of people (You might want to add that I am “old” too). The sign out front stated that they normally had live music which started around 7:00pm. The wait was typical for the beach during “in season”, about 40 minutes (we arrived at around 5:00pm so if you are going later be prepared).  Please note that the restaurant staff states that after 7:00pm the place gets “nuts”. The Hippo has a decent menu with some interesting items like their Fritter appetizer. The food offerings seem to be a fusion of Southern California, local South Carolina and American twists on nachos, burritos and tacos.  Service was decent but it appeared that they were a bit short staffed on knowledgeable servers since in some cases chaos and mixed up orders reigned supreme.  Plus, it is a long walk from the kitchen to the dining area so there may be one of the causes. The food tasted good with a nice mixture of flavors but the tacos arrived cool and the black beans and rice were one step above being removed from the refrigerator.

Based on the experience, I cannot wholeheartedly reccommend this restaturant but I will most likely give it another try and see how they do. You should too.

The Well Fed Cyclist

Unexpected Pairings?

~ Gary Bechard ~ Leave a comment

A funny thing happened on the way to the refrigerator.  I was looking for something that I could kind of have for dessert but did not want anything that was too terribly sweet. A current resident of the fridge was a sixpack of Strongbow Hard Apple cider and I was kind of wanting one of those after cleaning the house from the top to bottom but there were also those hyper thin, triple ginger cookies I got from Trader Joe’s.  I was almost ready to have either one or the other but, not being terrribly thoughtful about the process, I decided to have a stack of these nifty thin cookies AND a Long Bow over ice.  I was not quite sure that this was going to work or if I was way off the mark with regard to the flavors but the result was unexpected and amazing!  What a great dessert! The cool crisp of the hard cider combining with the sweet and spicy of the ginger was excellent!  A substitute for the Trader Joe’s cookies would be the Moravian ginger cookies from Old Salem (near Winston Salem, North Carolina). I highly recommend this pairing.

Enjoy!

There were the 300…

~ Gary Bechard ~ Leave a comment

And there were with Leonidas the 300 who fought to the death for Greece and Sparta.  Ah but there will not be that kind of carnage here in this space, unless of course the vegetables rise up against the proteins in mortal combat, but, I am really not expecting that to happen. This is more the story of a man cruising the aisles of Trader Joe’s stalking a jar of fire roasted artichokes.  For weeks, I saw them, pining to see what they had to offer in the way of taste but, I did not have a recipe in which to use them and to get them just to get them might be a waste.  What to do, what to do? As with most stories, the saga does not end there. This past week, tired of chicken and fish, I found some turkey tenderloins which looked pretty good and thought that I could treat them like a pork tenderloin and stuff them in a Mediterranean way but without the cheese. Having picked up a container of spinach and artichoke dip, I thought that if I were to combine at least the two major ingredients from the dip, everything would turn out okay and it did.  The result is this recipe.  I had great success with this and hope you get to try it too.

Spartichoke

(Mediterranean stuffed turkey tenderloin)

(makes 2 – 3 servings)

The Well Fed Cyclist – Gary Bechard

Ingredients:

1 – Turkey tenderloin, boneless, skinless

1 ½ – Grilled, marinated artichoke, chopped fine

1 ½ cups – Frozen chopped spinach, cooked

½ – Medium sweet onion, fine diced

1 ½ tsps – Lemon juice

1 ½ tsps – Coarse ground Kosher salt

1 tsp – Dried mint leaves

Coarse ground black pepper (to taste)

Greek seasoning (for the outside the roll)

Filling:

In a medium skillet, do a couple of turns around the pan with olive oil and over low/med heat sauté the onions until softened and become translucent being careful not to fully caramelize them. When these are done set them aside. Next cook the spinach. I used the frozen to cut down on preparation time and so that I could put them in a microwave for the requisite 4 minutes but you could wilt fresh in chicken stock, cool and then finely chop. In a large bowl put the grilled artichokes, spinach, roasted red bell pepper and sweet onion and fold together so that all the ingredients are evenly distributed. Next, add seasonings, lemon juice, salt, pepper and mint and mix until seasonings are evenly coating the mixture. When this is complete, place mixture in the refrigerator for a few minutes to try to get it to the same temperature as the turkey tenderloin.

Tenderloin Preparation:

Take the turkey tenderloin and place on some plastic sheeting, cover with plastic sheeting and gently pound with a meat hammer moving from the center (where the tenderloin is thickest) to the edges working the meat until it is about ¼ inch thick. Make sure not to break through the meat because then the stuffing would fall out. The tenderloin should end up being the size of a regular dinner plate. Note: you can always do a second tenderloin if you are making this for more than 2 or 3.

Construction Instruction:

Take the tenderloin and place on a large, flat area covered with plastic sheeting or a large dinner plate. Next take the stuffing that was created and spread this evenly over the tenderloin. Then, starting from one side, roll the tenderloin up to create a roll. When you have your roll take some 100 percent cotton string (the kind that can be used for cooking) and truss the roll to keep it together.

In a large skillet, do a couple of good turns around the pan with olive oil and put to medium heat. Next gently take the tenderloin roll and place in the pan and sprinkle Greek seasoning on the top. Brown all sides of the tenderloin and when complete take the roll and place in a baking dish in which there is 1/8 inch of water. (keeps this moist). Bake at 340 degrees for 40 minutes.

-Meal served with tomato and cucumber salad and baked rice.

Enjoy!

Back in the Saddle Again…

~ Gary Bechard ~ 1 Comment

It has been a long while since I posted last but I am hoping to change that with a slight change of direction for the blog. I will try to include musings, if you will, on some of the local food scenes I tend to visit, commentary on cooking and preparation or possibly some of the quirky ideas I have regarding food combinations. Don’t worry, I will still do recipes as I convert them from the scribblings of a “madman” (that’s me by the way) to electronic format.  How about that, I do have a recipe prepared for today. By way of an explanation regarding my absence from the blogosphere, I guess one might say that stress and being preoccupied with other aspects of my life took over and I am now deciding to take my life and what I enjoy back.  I hope you enjoy the new direction.  For me, this seems to be a comfortable way to proceed and get back on track with my food love affair.

“Ever eat a pine tree? Many parts are edible you know.”, as some of you older folks may know, Euell Gibbons used to ask this in his commercial for Grape Nuts (a fine cereal, in my opinion). He went on to explain that pine nuts were a part of the tree which could be eaten and then he began to expound on the virtues of the cereal. As you may or may not know, pine nuts are an integral part of pesto sauce but I have always found that the flavour was not as pleasing as some other types of nuts. The taste of traditional pesto, yes even the homemade, had a slight “varnish” quality that I could not get past.  I struggled with that for a long time but decided to substitute pistachio nuts and some other ingredients to change the taste.  The result was the my version of basil pesto. If you try this I hope you enjoy it and please let me know!

Pesto Chango!

(Basil pesto sauce)

Ingredients:

2 – Cups, packed basil leaves

2 – Cloves garlic, finely chopped

4 to 6 – Fresh mint leaves

1/4 – Cup roasted and salted pistachios

2/3 – Cup of extra virgin olive oil

1/2 – Cup finely grated pecorino Romano cheese or (if you have a lactose intolerant person in the house you can substitute 1 to 2 tablespoons of coarse ground kosher salt)

1 – Teaspoon lemon juice

Coarse ground black pepper to taste

1/2 – Tablespoon Lemon peel (grated)

Construction Instructions:

In a food processor, put the pistachios and pulse them several times to reduce them. Repeat the process with the basil, garlic, and mint. When this is complete, add the olive oil, lemon juice Romano cheese, pepper and lemon peel to the food processor and puree the ingredients together.

I use this sauce on chicken and salmon but it also works well with light pasta.

Enjoy!

The Well Fed Cyclist

Everyone needs a quest…

~ Gary Bechard ~ 1 Comment

First, I have to apologize for not posting last week.  I was not prepared as I had too many recipes which had not been converted to electronic format and the food notebook is well, for lack of better words, something that looks like the rants and scribblings of a lunatic.  The notes do not translate well (kind of like seeing Swahili for the first time) and are not electronic.

Now I believe that everyone needs a quest or something to strive for.  Is it wrong that my current culinary quest is to stuff  everything in the cabbage family?  I have been looking at Savoy cabbage for quite some time, not in an inappropriate way mind you, and have been wondering with what I could possibly stuff it. I wanted to have something lighter than regular stuffed cabbage which leaves you with that, I don’t know, feeling that you just ate a bowling ball. I decided on chicken because the boneless – skinless breasts take on flavors well and are easy to work with and frankly, I have already done the “shrimp thing”.  Finally, I cannot lay claim to thinking of the Frank’s Sweet chili sauce as a topper for these beauties because my wife came up with the idea during her heating them up for lunch the next day.  Without further delay, here is the recipe.  Mind you, this recipe is a bit labor intensive but so very worth the effort. I shared this with some of the ladies at work and they loved them!

Putting on the Savoy

(Chicken stuffed Savoy cabbage)

(Serves 4-6)

The Well Fed Cyclist – Gary Bechard

Ingredients:

2 – Chicken breasts, boneless – skinless, baked, shredded and fine diced (I went ahead and did 3 with one of them becoming an awesome chicken sandwich the next day)

1 1/2 cups – Basmati rice, about 4 servings (I used Uncle Ben’s for simplicity) prepared according to package instructions.

1 – Small head of Savoy cabbage

1/3 cup – Green onions, chopped (Stuffing mixture)

1/3 cup – Mushrooms, fine chopped, I used cremini mushrooms (baby portabellas) (Stuffing mixture)

For the roasting of the chicken:

1 tsp – Kosher salt

1 tsp – Coarse ground black pepper

1/2 tsp – Smoked paprika

6 sprigs – Thyme leaves

1 tbsp – Rosemary leaves, fine chopped

1/4 cup – Chicken stock

Preparation – Take the chicken breasts and place in a small baking dish in which you have put the chicken stock, season with the salt, pepper, smoked paprika, thyme and rosemary. Bake them at 350 degrees for about 35 to 40 minutes or until they are done (internal temperature 165 to 170 degrees) and set aside to cool. Note: you can always do the chicken a day ahead if you would like to cut down on preparation time on the day you are stuffing the cabbage.

While the chicken is doing its thing in the oven, core the cabbage head by taking a 3 to 4 inch deep cone around the stem of the cabbage. The cone should be about the same length as a good paring knife. Place the cabbage head in water topside down and boil for about 35 minutes (nifty it is the same amount of time as the baking time on the chicken, eh?) or until the leaves begin to soften. Once the cabbage head is done, take and set in a colander to drain and cool.

Construction Instruction –

Rice – I used Uncle Ben’s rice because it is easy and only takes 10 minutes. Cook the rice according to the package directions drain well and set aside.

Stuffing Mixture – Take your chicken and fork shred and fine dice and toss into a very large bowl. Next add, cooked rice, green onions and mushrooms. Now you are ready to fold everything together until all the ingredients are thoroughly combined.

 

Creating the stuffed leaves – First, make your “production line” in a pretty large working area of the kitchen with the colander that contains the cabbage, then the stuffing bowl, a large flat plate on which to stuff and fold the cabbage leaves then your baking dish. In the baking dish (a deep 9” X 13”) or similar dish (the one that I use is about 2 ½ “ to 3” deep) put about a ¼ inch (about a 1/3 cup) of chicken or mushroom stock in the bottom to keep the leaves moist during the baking process. Working from the outside of the cabbage head take a leaf and place on the plate with stem side toward you, spoon about a couple of tablespoons worth of the mixture in the center. The amount of mixture will vary with the size of the leaves.Then, take the stem side and fold over top of the mixture so that the end is at the edge of the pile of mixture, next, fold each side to the center and finally take the far end and fold toward you. Take the completed packet and place with the smooth side up in the baking dish. Repeat, this process until you have a layer of packets along the bottom of the baking dish. Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees and bake for 35 to 40 minutes.

 

Plating – I plated these 2 to 3 per person and allow each person to put the amount of Frank’s brand sweet chili sauce they desire on top. I served this with a double helping of stir-fried vegetables.

 

Enjoy!

The Well Fed Cyclist

 

 

Now THAT is the only kind of smoking I will allow…

~ Gary Bechard ~ Leave a comment

I am back after a brief but very sad interlude and that is all I will say about that.  As mentioned in my last post, I will be creating a recipe in my Father In-Law’s memory but at this moment I have not perfected it, so the recipe is a work in progress. Now, onto our regularly scheduled program.

Living here in western Pennsylvania is kind of like being in tobacco country back in the 1940’s.  More people smoke here than in Winston Salem (where I used to live) and geesh!, that is “where Camels come from”.  I will not launch into a diatribe about the hazzards of smoking or anything like that (Pennsylvanians you need to read the memo) but there is one kind of smoking I CAN get behind, and that is smoking meat! Or, you can do the same to fish or poultry, vegetables even or whatever else blows your dress up.  My wonderful children bought me a smoker for my birthday and I had the innaugural “smokfest” yesterday.  Since it was the smoker’s maiden voyage, I used a commercially available rub from McCormick Seasonings and a new kind of barbecue sauce (for me) called Charlie Staples Real Barbecue Sauce (very good by the way and I highly recommend it). The result was excellent!  I will be experimenting over the next few weeks with seasonings and sauces and will let everyone know how the food turns out.  In the interim, here is a post from the old site and it is in keeping with the pig theme here you go!

This little piggy went to…

From the title you can add your own ending but in this case the piggy went right into the baking dish where he belongs. Ah, the story for this recipe is about as mundane as they get. There I was with 2 pork chops, one apple and most of a large onion and with me was my son, home from college and hungry. Not wanting to head back to the grocery store (really, it feels like I am always there and for the most part I am. I can even name almost all of the staff. Sad right?), I decided to work with what I had and see if it turned out. Remembering the stuffing in my stuffed pork tenderloin recipe, I thought that I could do that (pretty much the same ingredients) but without the heavy chopping and such. I also wanted to duplicate baked apples without messing up another baking dish. And, I wanted something simple and not time consuming. Doing pork chops this was was the answer. You might wonder where the name came from and that is okay. It is not that I was on a “date night” with my son (that would be more than a bit freakish) but refers to the amount. A little while back, I converted several of my recipes to “date night” quantities for friends of mine who were older and did not have kids around anymore and the name kind of stuck. You can always expand on this to make it for more than two but then I would have to wonder what your “date nights” are like. (wink – wink, nudge – nudge, say no more, say no more ;-)) The recipe has simple ingredients and is kind of short but very delicious.

Date Night Baked Pork Chops
(or you can double the recipe and make it for 4)

Gary Bechard: “The Well Fed Cyclist”

Ingredients:

2 – Boneless pork chops, thick cut (1 inch to an inch and a half)
1 – Medium to large Granny Smith apple, cut into wedges (leave the skin on)
1 – Small sweet onion (or 3/4ths of a medium or large one) medium sliced into crescents
½ tsp – Cayenne Pepper (more or less to taste)
1 tbsp – Ground cinnamon
½ tbsp – Ground nutmeg
½ cup – Mushroom broth (or you can substitute vegetable stock or broth)

Construction Instruction

For these pork chops, I used a 9” X 9” baking dish that was about 2 ½ to 3 inches deep. First, pour the mushroom broth in the bottom of the baking dish. Next, on a separate plate, dust both sides of each pork chop with cinnamon and cayenne pepper and place into the dish. After this is done, cover the pork chops with the onion slices and then add the apple wedges. Dust the apple wedges with the remaining cinnamon and the nutmeg and bake in a 330 to 350 degree oven for about 40 minutes or until the chops are done. Note: I use a lower heat and tent the chops with aluminum foil to make sure they are cooking “low and slow”. You really want them to absorb the flavors of the seasonings.

The pork chops were served with a wild rice pilaf which had sautéed Portobello mushrooms and asparagus tips along with a vegetable side of cut green beans accented with roasted red bell pepper slices.

Enjoy!
The Well Fed Cyclist

Well there you go…

~ Gary Bechard ~ 1 Comment

Ah, a phrase I came to know and love in the different areas I  lived in the southeastern United States. It was kind of  a tacit acceptance of a situation even though parts of it may be contradictory. For example, Bubba shot a deer on a cliff but it fell on him and killed   him, “Well, there you go”.  I guess it takes the place of  the “oh well” you hear in other parts of the country. It ranks right up there with another common phrase I used to hear, “Y’all watch this” which was normally followed by an action so insane that you question the intelligence of the individual who is performing that action. (I once heard this phrase uttered just before a guy tried to jump from the second floor balcony of a motel to his tarp covered truck bed below. It did not end well.) But, I digress. I really had the intention of trying to post at least a few times a week with some of the 200 recipes I have in my food notebook but staring, not quite longingly, at a computer screen for up to 12 hours a day for work (this is play, by the way) is not conducive to firing up the computer at night and posting.  Well, there you go.

Today I thought that doing a double post would be a good idea.  Below, locked in the deep recesses of the ether you will find a relatively new recipe to the corral, Smoked trout turnovers and one of the follow on posts to “Burger Week” (you know kind of like “Shark Week” but instead of being eaten you are eating) which is one of my goto recipes as a side, my black bean and roasted corn salad.

This first recipe was thought of when I was cruising the dairy aisle and happened to have some smoked trout in the basket which I like to have on bagels sometimes. I always wanted to see if I could even do turnovers so, yes, this was an experiment.  It turned out great!  You will notice that there are no other seasonings, salt, pepper and the like because the smoked trout takes care of that.

Smokin’ T’s

Smoked Trout Turnovers

(makes 6 servings) (2 turnovers per person)

Ingredients:

16 oz – Smoked Trout filets, flaked, no skin

3 – Roasted Red bell peppers, diced

5 – Green onion greens, chopped

1/2 cup – Fresh Parsley, chopped

4 1/2 cups – Cooked Basmati rice blend (1 ½ cups dry yielded the cooked amount and I used Trader Joe’s Basmati rice blend)

3 regular containers – Pillsbury Crescent Roll sheets (or the crescent rolls if you cannot find the sheets)

6 – Eggs, done over easy (this will become your “sauce”)

1 – Egg, beaten (this will be your egg wash for sealing the turnovers)

Note: I have also done these with a white wine cayenne pepper sauce

Construction Instruction:

In a large bowl combine trout, roasted red bell peppers, green onions, parsley and cooked rice and fold together until the ingredients are evenly distributed. Chill this mixture for about 15 minutes so that it firms up a bit. Take the dough and cut into 4 inch sheets and lay on a cookie sheet sprayed with Pam or some other non-caloric cooking spray. Fill each of the dough sheets with enough filling to cover only half of each sheet and leave about a ¼ inch around the edges. Take the egg wash and with a small brush put egg wash on the edges of the turnovers and fold the top over and crimp the edges with the filling inside. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes or until the crescent rolls are a nice golden brown.

This was served with sautéed haricot vert in olive oil with sweet onion and mushrooms.

This second recipe has been a favorite since the first time I trotted it out as a side dish.  I have been known to make triple batches of this salad that never survived to become leftovers.

It’s the B.B.C! (salad that is)

(Black Bean and Corn Salad)

1 – Can of golden sweet corn (I like the yellow and white because it makes the salad more colorful) (regular size can, 15 oz))

1 – Can of black beans (regular size can., 15 oz)

½ – Red bell pepper (fine diced)

½ – Green bell pepper (fine diced)

¼ – Sweet onion (fine diced) (more if you like that sort of thing)

1 – Handful of fresh parsley (chopped fine) (dried works but you do not get the full flavor)

1 – Tablespoon coarse ground black pepper

1 1/2 – Turns around the bowl of extra virgin olive oil (a little less than ¼ cup, you do not want to drown the salad)

3 to 4 – Splashes of white balsamic vinegar

In a large colander, pour in can of beans and rinse with water. Then, take can of corn and pour over the beans and drain well. Add these items to a large bowl and lightly mix together. Next add red bell pepper, green bell pepper and onion. Mix these items together until all ingredients are evenly disbursed. Add parsley, black pepper and do the rounds with the olive oil, splash with balsamic vinegar and mix well making sure all of the ingredients are coated well. Chill in the refrigerator for about 2 hours and serve.

This is good as a salad but it also makes GREAT quesadillas. For this you will need some burrito size tortillas (I use whole wheat but white is fine. Whatever turns your crank) and about 2 cups of shredded sharp cheddar or mixed Mexican cheese.   Take a large cookie sheet and spray with non-stick cooking spray and place one tortilla down, layer some of the salad at about “one bean’s depth” making sure that there is one layer. (Note: on a normal size cookie sheet you can usually fit one large and a half and that is about it.) Take cheese and spread evenly over the top of the salad mixture. Make sure that the cheese in not overly thick. Add the next tortilla(s) to the top and place in a 350 degree pre-heated oven. Heat until you can see the cheese melting on the inside and serve.

As a side note, I have also been known to add shredded cooked chicken to make black bean and chicken quesadillas for your meat eating friends or serve as a warm entrée without the tortillas.

Enjoy!

The Well Fed Cyclist – Gary Bechard

Daughters can challenge you…

~ Gary Bechard ~ Leave a comment

This particular burger was the last one from “Burger Week” on the old site. I also included a bonus recipe for those who may be eating with you that may not really get into the whole meat and fish thing.  I hope you enjoy the burger and the sub as much as I did making them.

Ah the final installment of burger week. I hope those of you who have tuned in will try some of these recipes over the 4th of July and let me know how they turned out. On a final note for Burger Week, I wish I could say I had perfected the black bean burger but sadly I have not. There is something with the consistency that is giving me fits but that is neither here nor there. However, I wanted to make sure and include something that any vegetarians out there may like so this entry is going to have 2 recipes. One of these days I will conquer the BBB consistency challenge and will include it here hopefully in not too long a time.

As the title states, daughters can challenge you and mine did. She told me to try and come up with a salmon burger that would be on par with my other fish recipes and (no pressure here) could we have it for dinner tomorrow night? NO Problem! I really enjoyed this challenge and the result was terrific! However, I did have a fight with the blades of my new food processor during this burger’s creation…and lost. So be careful those things are sharp!

The second recipe is something I came up with during my kid’s high school days. A couple of their friends were vegetarians and usually showed up for barbecues at the house with their own cheese pizza (or nothing and ended up eating a bun) and they never really felt a part of the festivities. This recipe is for a grilled vegetable hoagie (grinder or sub depending on the part of the country you are from). My greatest satisfaction was having these vegetarian kids tell me that they had never eaten anything at a barbecue before and that they finally felt like they belonged to the group.

It’s So Damn Good For You Salmon Burger
(makes 6 – 8 servings)
Gary Bechard

2 lbs – Fresh salmon fillets (wild caught if possible) chopped fine (I put mine in the food processor)
1/3 – Red bell pepper (fine diced)
1/3 – Green bell pepper (fine diced)
1 ¾ inch slice – Sweet onion (fine diced)
1 handful – Fresh parsley (chopped fine) (about 2 tablespoons)
6 to 8 leaves – Fresh sage (chopped fine)
1 tbsp – Lemon pepper
1 tsp – Thyme leaves (fresh or dried)
2 – Eggs
½ cup (more or less) – Panko bread crumbs
½ – Lemon, juiced

Take salmon fillets, take skin off and put in the food processor to chop. A few pulses should get you there and what you want to see is the consistency of ground beef. Take salmon and place in a large bowl and add red bell pepper, green bell pepper, onion, sage, parsley, lemon pepper, thyme, eggs, breadcrumbs and lemon juice. Mix thoroughly making sure that all ingredients are distributed evenly. Form mixture into 7 to 8 patties and refrigerate for about 30 minutes.

I use a well lubricated (Weber’s Grilln’ Spray works well) stainless steel cooking sheet (perforated) and Cook the patties on a medium hot grill (400 to 450 degrees) flipping every 4 to 6 minutes until desired doneness. (about 35to 40 minutes)

Serve the burgers on a toasted bun with your favorite seafood (cocktail) sauce or make your own dill seasoned mayonnaise.

Here is the second recipe:

Yes You’re Included! Vegetable Hoagie
(makes 4 – 6 servings)
Gary Bechard

3 – Small to medium zucchini (halved and sliced thin)
3 – Small to medium yellow squash (halved and sliced thin)
1 – Red bell pepper (cut into strips about ¼ inch wide)
1 – Green bell pepper (cut into strips about ¼ inch wide)
1 – Sweet onion (halved and sliced)
Dried Italian seasoning
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
12 – slices provolone cheese
2 cups – shredded mozzarella
4 to 6 – 6 inch hoagie rolls

I use a well lubricated (Weber’s Grilln’ Spray works well) stainless steel cooking sheet (perforated) and Cook the vegetables on a medium hot grill (400 to 450 degrees) turning every 4 to 6 minutes until vegetables are tender. Brush the vegetables with olive oil and season with the Italian seasoning to taste. (about 10 to 15 minutes) When the vegetables are done place in a bowl and mix together. Take a couple of slices of provolone cheese and line the inside of the roll and place hot vegetables right over top put mozzarella on top and serve.

Who knows what lurks deep in the minds of moms?

~ Gary Bechard ~ Leave a comment

For me,  that it is probably unconditional love and support. First, Happy Mother’s Day to all! I wish I were going to be able to cook for my mom today but it might take me a while to get there (about 15 hours). However, I will be cooking but it is going to be spaghetti and meatballs with a nice smooth marinara, all fresh made of course.

I neglected to show a picture of the “Spiralized” salad yesterday so that is the cover shot for today’s post and I wanted to continue to add to the “Burger Week” post I did a while back with what was the second installment for that week. This was the first of the beef burgers and was mighty tasty.  I hope you try this and as always, Enjoy!

Burger Week Part Deux…

Welcome back campers to the second installment of burger week. Today is the first of the beef burgers and was recently created because SOMEBODY had to use the fresh sage. It might as well be me, is what I say. I also (play taps please) sacrificed one bottle of one of the best beers on the planet (in my humble opinion) for the betterment of burgerkind. However, at least I had the remaining 5 to assuage my guilt and remorse about my hoppy friend. I am not sure how many of you will remember the band, “New Riders of the Purple Sage” but this burger’s name is a play on that.

Have fun with this recipe and let me know how it turned out.

The Well Fed Cyclist

New Riders of the Fresh Sage Burger
(makes 6 – 8 servings)

2 lbs – Very lean ground beef (I do 96/4 or 93/7)
8 to 10 leaves – Fresh sage (chopped fine)
3, 3 inch sprigs– of rosemary (strip leaves and fine chop)
¾ bottle (9 oz) – Fat Tire Ale (drink the last ¼ bottle you deserve it. You ARE cooking after all.)
1½ tsp – Kosher salt
1tbsp – Coarse ground black pepper

In a large bowl combine beef, sage, salt, pepper, rosemary and the Fat Tire Ale. Mix thoroughly making sure all ingredients are distributed evenly through the mixture. Take and make into 6 to 8 patties (depending on who you have eating). Cook these on a medium hot grill (400 to 450 degrees) until desired doneness.
Serve the burgers on a toasted bun with a robust cheddar (I like Vermont white or New York sharp) or perhaps some smoky Gouda and some Heirloom tomato (if you want to).

Look deep into the spinning spiral…

~ Gary Bechard ~ Leave a comment

I am probably a latecomer to the Vegetti, and no it is NOT a gynocological instrument but it IS a simple kitchen tool that easily slices almost any vegetable into thin spaghetti like strips. I prefer to call it a “spiralizer”. My sister swears by hers and my daughter the same thing but me, nope, I like being the old fashioned curmudgeon, stuck in his ways and seem to bask in the toil that is julienning vegetables for interesting salads. I mean how else are you going to be able to elicit gratitude for the amount of time it took to make the meal? Well, not wanting any gratitude (I guess some gratitude would be nice) and being more than willing to do dinner last night, I decided to give the tool a whirl.

The dinner consisted of salmon, a mixed salad using the “spiralizer” and potato nests. You are most likely wondering what in the world is a “potato nest” but I got the idea from seeing a pasta nest in the grocery store and thought that the Vegetti could help me make that happen. The whole meal turned out fantastic!  and I ended up being very impressed with the Vegetti /”spiralizer”. Preparation time was only about 20 minutes and cooking time about 50 minutes. (It was a big piece of fish). I hope you try this and let me know what you think.

The salad consisted of “spiralized”, seedless cucumber (about a half), 1 small zucchini, 1 small yellow squash, half a Daikon radish (peeled), a large carrot (peeled) and the only things that were not run through the device, very thinly sliced onions and roasted red pepper strips. Combine these in a large bowl and lightly toss them together with  a light vinegar and olive oil dressing chill and enjoy.  I made my dressing with White balsamic vinegar (adds a bit of sweetness) 1/4th cup,  with 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, 1/2 teaspoons of dried parsley, celery seed, salt and pepper.

Now is the fun part. I took some regular russet potatoes (pick narrow ones) peeled them and ran them through the “spiralizer”. Then I piled them in loose heaps (kind of like pasta nests) on a cookie sheet that had been sprayed with Pam, added a sprinkle of salt and pepper, sprayed the heaps with Pam and baked at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes or until the edges of the strips start turning a little bit golden brown.

Below is the recipe for the salmon.  I have always said that fish should be treated simply because you never want to take away from the essence of the fish and trust me, each type of fish has its own essence.

Simple Salmon

Gary Bechard – The Well Fed Cyclist

(Serves 3-4)

Ingredients:

1.5 to 2 lbs – Salmon fillets (about 8 ounces per person, 4 fillets, preferably wild caught)

1tsp – Coarse ground black pepper

1 tsp – Sea salt

1 tsp – Smoked paprika

1 tsp – Dried Parsley

½ tsp – Thyme leaves

3 ounces – White wine

Construction Instruction:

Arrange the salmon in a ceramic baking dish in which you have put the white wine. Dust the top of the salmon with the herb ingredients and cover the dish with foil. Bake the fish at 350 degrees for about 35 to 45 minutes or until the fish starts to flake easily. (I always start checking my fish at the 30 minute mark because sometimes the filets are thin and take less time and you do not want to overcook them.) The idea here is to cook the fish slowly so that the flavors are infused into the fillets.

I served this with a mixed vegetable salad and potato nests.

Enjoy!