Stuffed Flounder with lemon Butter

Stuffed Flounder

For Flounder:
1 nice size Maryland crab cake (should be at your seafood counter)
3 flounder fillets (about 3/4 lb to a lb total)
Salt and pepper
Butter

For Sauce:
1 stick of unsalted butter
1 Tbsp lemon juice
Salt and pepper

                                Get one crab cake.

Crumble it up in a bowl. Set it aside.

Get some Flounder Filets

Lay them out on a cutting board, sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Leaving two filets whole, cut the third into 4 strips.

Remember your bowl of crumbly crab cake? Take it now and pile it on top of the two filets.

Now use the four strips to form a sort of pocket on top of each filet for the stuffing. 

Place the "stuffed" fish onto a sheet pan, sprayed with Pam. Crumble a little bit of fresh butter on top to help brown it up.

Put in preheated oven - 450 - and cook about 7 minutes, till fish is all white (not transparent looking) and stuffing is hot all the way through.

While fish is in oven, make your sauce.

Here's what you'll need:
 One stick unsalted butter, 1 Tbsp lemon juice; salt and pepper

Chop butter into cubes, put into a saucepan with lemon juice. Add a touch of Salt and pepper mix. Place over medium heat and start moving the pan around, slowly swirling the mixture till all the butter is melted to create an emulsion.

Serve fish with sauce.

Glop

Glop is my mom's recipe. It was Hamburger Helper before Hamburger Helper existed. It's comfort food for me. And easy to over-eat...

1 lb. ground beef
1/2 lb egg noodles (about half of a regular size bag of noodles. You may want more.)
1 can cream of mushroom soup (if you like it creamier, you might want 2 cans...)
1 can diced tomatoes (or stewed tomatoes or whatever you like)
1/2 onion (any kind, but I use a sweet onion - yellow)

Cook noodles according to package directions. Drain.
Small dice the onion.
Heat a tablespoon or two of vegetable oil in a large-ish pan (a pan big enough to hold the meat, soup, and noodles....) over medium heat.
Add your diced onion.
Let it sizzle for a minute, just till the onions get a little bit soft but not brown.
Add the ground beef.
As the meat cooks, use a spatula or spoon or something to break it up into smaller pieces.
When the meat is all browned, drain off the excess fat (there will be a lot if you used regular hamburger meat, less if you used ground sirloin or something low in fat).
Put the pan back over the heat. Add your mushroom soup. Then fill the can about halfway with water and stir that in, too. (If you used more soup do not increase the water.)
Open your can of tomatoes and drain them well (I open the can and use the top to press down on them - over the sink of course - so most of the juice gets gone. If you don't do this, your glop will be pink.)
Add the drained tomatoes.
Stir.
Add the cooked noodles. (You can add as much or as little as you like.)
Heat through. Add salt and pepper to taste.

If you want, you can add mushrooms. Or more soup. Or more tomatoes. Or bell peppers. You can use turkey instead of ground beef. You could add a can of corn that you've drained. Or anything else you like. Experiment. Mom would be proud.

Peanut Butter Fudge

Butter                                        2 oz
Brown sugar                              7 3/4 oz
Granulated sugar                        1 3/4 oz
Sweetened condensed milk         2 oz
Oatmeal                                      3 oz
   (Like Quaker quick oats - the kind in the cardboard cylinder box - NOT the envelopes of instant oatmeal)
Creamy peanut butter                    5 oz
Vanilla extract                               1/2 tsp

Take an 8 x 8 inch baking pan and line it with foil. Butter the foil fairly generously and set it aside.
Put butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar, and sweetened condensed milk into a saucepot. Heat to rolling boil. Boil for exactly 2 minutes.
Remove from heat.
Beat in oatmeal.
Then beat in vanilla extract.
Beat in the peanut butter last.
As soon as the peanut butter is all dissolved and distributed through the mixture, pour into prepared pan.
Let sit at room temp till solid. Refrigerate till firm.
Serve, cut in small squares.

Chocolate Mousse

You can make this with white or dark chocolate. You can choose any type of alcohol you like, or if you prefer a non-alcoholic version you can use orange juice in place of the liquor. It's quick and easy and oh so yummy!

Sugar                                                                4 oz
Rum (or Bailey's or whatever liquor you like)        4 oz
Chocolate                                                          9 oz
Heavy cream                                                     4 oz
Heavy Cream                                                     1 quart

Put sugar and alcohol in a sauce pot. Put the pot over medium heat and melt sugar in the alcohol, stirring frequently (making a simple syrup). Set aside to cool while you do the next step.
Melt chocolate over double boiler (you can just put chocolate in a bowl, then set the bowl over a pot of boiling water and let it heat while you stir it up every now and then. The chocolate will melt in the top bowl nice and gently. DO NOT just melt the chocolate in a pan on the stove. You can melt the chocolate gently in the microwave if you like).
Pour the 4 oz of heavy cram into a bowl.
When the syrup (the alcohol and sugar mixture from above) is finished, stir it into the bowl of cream.
While that mixture cools off, whip up the quart of cream in a large bowl till it looks like whipped cream (OK, till it IS whipped cream).
Fold the syrup (sugar/alcohol mixture) gently into the whipped cream.
Refrigerate.
You can serve this in small chocolate cups (like the picture) or in small bowls or whatever you like.
**This picture is of the recipe made with white chocolate and  Bailey's Irish cream and then piped into chocolate shells. The chocolate decorations are just melted chocolate piped into swirls. And it is divine!**

Creme Brulee French Toast

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons corn syrup (or honey)
• 2 loaves plain French bread
• 5 large eggs
• 1 1/2 cups half and half
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon orange zest
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup walnuts

Toast the walnuts (put them on a sheet pan and put the in a hot oven for about 2 or 3 minutes.. just till they give off their aroma and start releasing oil a little).

Put butter, brown sugar and corn syrup in a medium size sauce pot and cook, stirring often, till the butter is pretty well incorporated into the sugar and the mixture is smooth (the sugar won't melt all the way).

Meanwhile, slice French bread into 1 inch or so slices. Remove the crusts.

Spray a 9 x 13 pan with cooking spray - don't forget to spray the sides. 

When the sugar mixture is ready, pour into the sprayed baking pan. Spread around to cover the bottom evenly. Sprinkle the sugar with the walnuts.

Arrange the bread pieces over the top of the sugar and walnuts to cover.

Mix eggs, cream, vanilla, salt, and orange zest. Pour over top of the bread evenly.

Cover. Refrigerate overnight (or 8 hours or so).

The next morning, or whenever you're ready to cook it, remove it from the refrigerator and set on counter till it comes to room temp (or close to it...).

Preheat oven to 325. Bake for about 40 or 45 minutes till puffed up and kind of browned on top.

Remove from oven.

Invert casserole pan over platter or baking sheet and let sit, upside down, till the french toast releases from the pan. Then remove the pan from the top. 

Serve immediately! (It gets uglier as it sits)

Roasted Chicken

 

a whole chicken

fresh rosemary and thyme

fresh garlic, minced

kosher salt

extra virgin olive oil

crushed red pepper

Preheat oven to 450.

Rinse chicken and pat dry.

Truss (tie together the legs).

Put on a rack on top of a cookie sheet.

Loosen the chicken's skin by pushing fingers underneath it. Do this on breast, thigh, legs... Anywhere that you can get your fingers under the skin.

On cutting board, chop herbs, add red pepper, minced garlic, salt, and oil.

Smush up and mix to make a paste.

Place the herb mixture under the skin, coating all the meat that you can.

Then spread the paste on the outside of the bird.

Put him in the hot oven, close the door and immediately reduce heat to 350.

Roast for 20 minutes per pound of chicken.

Remove from oven. Let stand for 10 minutes before serving!

Take off string. Remove from wire stand. Carve and serve.

Poached Egg

Use a smallish nonstick frying pan. Put about 1/2 - 1" of water in it. Sprinkle in some salt. Bring to a boil. Reduce to simmer.
Carefully crack egg into the water. Gently shake the pan back and forth over the burner to prevent the egg from sticking to the bottom.
Some of the white will spread out, becoming kind of lacy. Don't worry about that part - you won't serve it. As the main part of the white begins to cook, use a spoon or your spatula to splash the simmering water over the top of the egg, cooking the yolk and the white both.
Continue the gentle shaking throughout the cooking process.
Use a spatula or slotted spoon to remove the egg.
Serve on toast, if you like.