Creamy Shrimp with Corn and Bacon, followed by Chipotle Shrimp and Salad

I'm not sure who cooks up the recipes that appear in Real Simple magazine, but here's more of the tried and true favorites from there.


Cook 1 cup dry Jasmine rice according to whatever recipe/directions yields your best rice. I put 1 cup of rinsed Jasmine/Basmati rice in 2 cups of water with a teaspoon of salt and a tablespoon of olive oil. I let it sit 20 minutes, then turn the heat on High until it boils, then reduce the heat to a slow simmer until the water is gone.

While that's in the works, cook a package of bacon by whatever method yields your best bacon. I pan fry, slowly. You'll need 8 slices for this recipe. Put the remainder in the refrigerator for other recipes. What's the sense of cooking half a package of bacon, ever? Set the eight pieces of bacon for this recipe aside for now.

With a little of the bacon fat left in the pan, saute 1 large, chopped white onion. Cook it until it's translucent and soft, about 4 - 6 minutes. Add 1 cup of dry white wine and cook until it's reduced by half - about 2 to 3 minutes. Add 1 1/2 cups of heavy cream and bring to a boil.

Stir in 2 pounds of large shrimp, peeled and deveined, and 1 pound of frozen corn. I like to use PictSweet Frozen Baby White Corn in this recipe. It's sweet and tender, and is flavored perfectly for this dish. Simmer all together for about 4 - 6 minutes. Ladle the soup over bowls of warm rice, and garnish with crumbled bacon.

Serve with garlic bread made with thick slabs of Italian bread slathered with butter, pureed garlic and a liberal sprinkling of Cotija cheese.



Here's my OTHER favorite Shrimp dish from Real Simple.

Chipotle Shrimp with Radish and Jicama Salad (except I don't use Jicama)

The recipe calls for one small jicama (about a pound) that is peeled and cut into 2 inch matchsticks. I substituted Granny Smith apples when I couldn't get jicama at my local grocery store, and it is every bit as delicious. You can also mix the apple with julienned celery, although I wasn't quite as impressed with that as using just the apples.
8 radishes sliced into thin half-moons
1/2 of a bermuda (red) onion, sliced thin
A bunch (about 1/2 cup) of fresh cilantro, chopped
1/3 cup of golden raisins
Mix together with 2 tablespoons of olive oil, 1/4 cup lime juice (fresh is best) and salt and pepper.

Cook 2 pounds of large peeled and deveined shrimp in Old Bay according to the Old Bay package directions (only takes about 4 minutes.) Drain the liquid, and add 1 tablespoon of olive oil to the shrimp in the pan, and sprinkle liberally with chili powder, and toss in pan until fully coated. Do not cook more than 1 minute. Serve with the salad.

I serve this one with Saffron rice, and Vera Cruz corn, chips and guacamole for an all out feast.

The Vera Cruz corn is corn, either cooked on the cob or off (again, I defer back to that PictSweet Baby White Corn...PictSweet vegetables are fabulous time savers in so many of these recipes, and they are excellent quality.) If you use corn on the cob, coat the cob with a liberal portion of mayonnaise. Yep, I said mayo. Roll the cob in Cotija cheese that has been finely grated. Sprinkle with Cayenne pepper and serve with fresh wedges of lime. If you use the frozen bagged corn, stir in a few tablespoons each of mayo and Cotija cheese. Sprinkle with Cayenne and lime juice.

My Guac, as made by Caliente Cab Company in NYC...an avocado, mashed. A small onion, chopped. A tomato, chopped. Juice of 1 fresh lime. Half a bunch of fresh cilantro, coarsely chopped. Salt and pepper to taste. Lots of blue corn chips for color and taste.

Dos Equis, or Corona on the side, Pearl if you are lucky enough to find it.

Best savored with your best bitch girlfriends.

Memphis Soul Pork and Beans

I love to cook...because I love to eat. I've decided to blog some of my favorite recipes. I have to admit they aren't original, and in fact, most of my favorites are either family recipes adapted somehow to suit my taste, or from Real Simple magazine. So, giving credit where credit is due...here's the first. This one is an adaptation from a prepackaged kit. I just didn't want to buy the kit anymore, because I knew it could replicate it. I can't remember what it was called, but I call it Memphis Soul Pork and Beans.

You'll need:
2 large fresh sweet potatoes - not to be confused with Yam, which is the common name for some species in the genus Dioscorea, and can grow up to 2.5 meters in length[2] and weigh up to 70 kg (154 pounds). Cut into 1" cubes

1 cup of dried pinto beans, rinsed and picked over

approximately 3 pounds of pork - I like to take a roast, and cut it into 1" cubes. It's easiest to cube the meat while it's still partially frozen.

1/2 cup of barbeque sauce - I prefer a sweeter molasses based sauce

1 package of onion soup mix

14 oz can of diced tomato, or the equivalent of fresh, chopped (about 2 medium)

6 cups water

cumin - about a teaspoon
ancho - about a half teaspoon
chili - about a half teaspoon

Arrange the cubed pork in the bottom of a crock pot or dutch oven. Next add the pinto beans, then the cubed sweet potatoes. Dump in the can of tomatoes. Mix the package of dry onion soup mix with the barbeque sauce and 6 cups of water and pour it over the pork, beans and sweet potatoes. Add cumin, chili and ancho spices to taste. We love cumin, so I use a rounded teaspoon, and about a 1/2 teaspoon of chili and ancho. Cover and set crock pot to low, or place dutch oven on stovetop and simmer LONG and slow - for at least 6 - 8 hours.

Serve it with cornbread and your favorite Elvis CD.

In case you haven't already heard or read about the six year old boy who was suspended from school for bringing his boy scout utensil - which happened to include a knife, to school, here's the link to The Early Show on CBS. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/10/13/national/main5382972.shtml?tag=cbsnewsTwoColUpperPromoArea Now, I've got to tell you, I am NOT happy about this at all. Let me start by saying that I believe all Zachary Christie learned is that if you make enough noise, you can be relieved of your responsibility to own your transgressions. Not a great lesson to teach a six year old.

While I believe the 45 day suspension was probably not commensurate with the crime, and for an otherwise good kid to be placed in juvenile detention isn't the answer, what Zach Christie's family did was clearly wrong. His parents KNEW the school had a zero tolerance policy for knives. Maybe Zach isn't the kind of kid who would ever hurt anyone with a knife, but did his parents ever think they still were breaking the rules when they allowed him to go to school with the knife? Did they ever think what might have happened if another child had taken possesion of the knife and been hurt, or hurt another, either accidentally or intentionally? And what would they have felt had the schoolboard not reversed it's decision and sent Zach to juvenile detention for 45, or even ONE day?

If his parents disagreed with the rule, why didn't they petition the school board to review the policy, instead of breaking it and then complaining it wasn't fair. Would they have petitioned the school board as strenuously as they did had another child been subjected to the same disciplinary action under the same terms? Would they have championed the cause had another child been injured, even unintentionally?

I don't like rule breakers. If you don't like a rule, the best way to change it is from within. You honor it, you petition it, you march against it, you demonstrate, but you don't break it because you don't like it or think it's unfair. There are a lot of rules in this life that are unfair and seemingly arbitrary. That does not give you the right to break those rules, nor does it give you the right to endanger anyone else as a result of your not following the rules. Keep the knives at home folks. They don't belong in school...not even if you're a Boy Scout.