Smoked Salmon on Puff Pastry

For the potluck I hosted for Twinkie and the bridesmaids, I made a super quick appetizer.  I recently discovered puff pastry and I've seen the Barefoot Contessa use it often, claiming you can simply buy it in the grocery store rather than spend the time to make it fresh.  The frozen stuff is good enough!  For some ridiculous reason, I imagined the puff pastry to live with the frozen pie crust section of the grocery stores, and since I couldn't find it there, I figured my store didn't carry.  It wasn't until I was strolling along the frozen food section near the frozen veggetables and frozen whole pies that I found it.  Ugh. I can't tell you how annoyed I was with myself.  I instantly felt like that lame guy that won't ask for directions.  Why didn't I just ask someone earlier?  Anyways, puff pastry is a freezer staple now. 

This is a simple recipe that is easy to put together.  I love smoked salmon but instead of just serving it plain, I wanted to put them on cooked mini pastry to give it a little more substance without taking away from the great flavor of the fish. 

Smoked Salmon on Puff Pastry
1 pkg smoked salmon

1 sheet of puff pastry, thawed

capers

extra virgin olive oil

4 large spoonfuls of creme fraiche

1 lemon (zest and juice)

1/2 small orange (juice only)

1. Heat oven to 400 degrees. Roll out puff pastry and cut into small rounds or triangles, whichever you prefer.  With a fork, poke holes throughout each piece.  Put cut-outs on a parchment lined baking sheet.  Put another sheet of parchment paper on top and another baking sheet on top.  This is so the puff pastrys cook but don't rise significantly.  Bake for 10 minutes.

2. Once the puff pastry is done, let it sit and cool to room temp.  Take the creme fraiche and quickly whisk so it's smooth.  Add zest and juice of one lemon and half of a small orange.  Add some S&P and mix well.  Set aside. 

3. Assembly time! Take a puff pastry and pile on some good smoked salmon. I like to spray with a little bit of olive oil and sprinkly with S&P.  Put a small dollop of the creme fraiche mixture on top and then top off with a few capers and small squeeze of lemon juice.  I also like to sprinkle a little of the caper juice for a little extra acidity.  Serve immediately!

Proscuitto & Fennel on Rye

For Christmas 2010, we spent it up in Southlake at Hilda's and Eric's new home. Beside the food, time was spent cooking, eating, shopping and more importantly, playing with Baby Sophie, who is THE cutest baby ever.

As you can see from my previous post, I'm a little obsessed with fennel having found this new veggie just a few months ago.  This is a very easy appetizer to put together and serve for guests while they wait for the main meal to finish cooking.  I found this recipe on Real Simple and didn't do much to it. 

Proscuitto & Fennel on Rye
Makes about 15
Recipe adapted from Real Simple

1 roll of sliced rye bread (you can use a baguette if you prefer)

3 bulbs of fennel

S&P

1/4 cup olive oil

2 lemon

1 lb sliced proscuitto

1 bunch of parsley

1. Heat oven to 250 degrees. Slightly brush olive oil on the sliced rye bread and let these toast for only a few minutes.

2. Make the fennel salad. Clean and wash the fennel, slice and toss with a lemon vinagrette (look at previous post here to learn how) and the chopped parsley.  You can added freshly grated parmesan cheese but sister is on a no milk diet due to baby's allergies!  This made significantly more than you need for these appetizers but I love having this on the side as well for a light salad. 

3. Now to assemble.  After the rye bread is done toasting, slightly pull apart proscuitto and place a nice pile on top of each slice of bread.  Top this with the fennel salad and then sprinkle just an tiny, tiny amount of S&P. Beware, you can eat several of these so make sure to limit - or you won't be hungry for your real dinner!

Shrimp & Mango on Romaine

I pretty much love seafood and since shrimp is one of the cheapest to buy, I tend to cook it a lot. Whether it's shelled shrimp cooked with green onion and ginger, shrimp cooked with green asian squash, shrimp in pasta, shrimp ceviche or shrimp in udon soup, I'm pretty much a happy camper.  How bad do I have it? At restaurants, Ross can almost always predict what I'm going to order simply because of those six little letters.

This is a quick and easy appetizer.  The longest part was peeling, cleaning and cooking the shrimp and letting it cool a little bit.  Otherwise, this is done in just a few chops and mixes!  The original recipe calls for endive instead of romaine lettuce, which I was hesitant to purchase because folks, endive sure isn't cheap!  Also, make sure the mango is ripe, juicy and sweet. The one I bought was a tad too under riped and while it was okay, it could have been sooooo much better. 

Shrimp & Mango on Romaine

Adapted from Real Simple

1/2 lb shrimp (peeled, deveined, cooked and cubed)

1 large mango, cubed

3 tbsp olive oil

1 lime, zest and juice

1 lemon, zest and juice

4 tspn grated ginger

S&P

8-12 Romaine leaves

2 large grab-fuls cilantro, chopped

1 small handful of mint, chopped

1. Heat oven to 400 degrees. Peel and de-vein the shrimp. Pat dry the shrimp and put on a baking sheet.  Lightly toss with salt, pepper and 1 tbsp olive oil.  Bake for roughly 8 minutes - check through oven window and when they are pink and opaque like the below picture, they are done!  Don't over cook.  Take out to cool and then chopped up into small cubes.

2. Start chopping! Chop the mangos, mint and cilantro. In a bowl, zest the lime and lemon. Add the juice of both. Add in the grated ginger, salt and pepper, olive oil, mint and cilantro.

3. Add the chopped mango and shrimp to the liquid mixture.  Quickly taste to make sure you have enough salt or lemon juice.  Scoop mixture into individual romaine leaves and serve! 

Shrimp & Crab Ceviche

I love seafood. You're not part of the Tso or Hung family if you don't - especially since our folks ingrained in us at every meal that fish would make us smarter and our vision better. Which, btw, don't trust because even with of all the fish I ate growing up, it didn't do a darn thing for me. 28 years later and I have almost legally blind vision. Awesome.

Anyways, while at a party hosted by my Twinkie, I met one of her friends who brought some ceviche and boy, oh boy, was it good. Prior to this, the thought of serving family and friends "raw" fish (yes, I know it's 'technically' cooked with the lemon/citrus juice but still....) and potentially giving them food poisoning gives me a little heartburn. So this ceviche with only shrimp and real lump crab was good enough for me to try! I made it for our christmas dinner one year and it was a hit. Very simple and with a few odd ingredients, like V8. I think I will try plain tomato sauce/puree the next time I make this. Regardless, the taste is pretty delicious that I think this gives my guacamole a good running. Hrm, maybe I should have a guacamole and ceviche showdown?

Really important for this is to use good quality lump crab. Don't you dare use the crab in the can where you find the tunafish. Go to the fresh seafood section and ask for their lump crab - or you can look at the refrigerated section next to them where they should have fresh lump crab in the sealed plastic containers. I don't personally like the claw meat and end up paying the 15 bucks for the good lump meat.

As for the shrimp - again, don't you dare use the frozen cooked shrimp or shrimp in the can. Buy fresh shrimp (headless) and right now, they seems to be a great deal. I saw at Kroger the other day, large shrimp for 3.99 a lb! What a steal!

Shrimp & Crab Ceviche
Serving: This make a TON. When I say ton, I mean I can fill 4 quart containers of this stuff. If you're not serving this for a party, cut the recipe in half.

7-8 jalapenos (seeded and diced)

7-8 plum tomatos (diced)
1 bunch of cilantro (chopped)
1 medium yellow onion (chopped) --> You know me. I don't like raw onions so I omitted this.
2-3 limes (juiced)
2 lemons (juiced)
Zest from one lemon and one lime (make sure to zest before juicing)
7-8 cloves of garlic (minced)
6 avocadoo (large diced)
1 lbs. lump crabmeat
1-2 lbs. boiled shrimp (large diced)
24 oz. V-8 vegetable juice --> I use about half, taste and then add more.
1 jar of cocktail sauce with horseradish
S&P

1. Wash the raw shrimp. Boil water and add a good spoonful of salt - v. similar to cooking pasta. Add the shrimp and let it cook for only a few minutes. These things cook fast! They should have an opaque pink color when they are done. Take it out and put under colder water or in an ice bath - to stop it from cooking anymore. Who wants overcooked shrimp, right? When it's cool enough to touch, peel and chop into big chunks.

2. Start cutting and dicing all the ingredients. This is the longest part.

3. Then mix everything together in a large bowl (EXCEPT for the crabmeat and avocado). Add some S&P to taste - make sure to taste before you add more. If you want to add some dashes of hot sauce here, you can. Then, lightly fold in the crabmeat and the avocado. I like to let this sit in the fridge, covered for at least an hour to let the flavors mesh. Then serve with chips!

Watermelon, Tomato & Basil Skewers

This will be a short post since this receipe was almost too easy. Driving home on Friday and was so thirsty that the thought of eating cold, juicy fruit made me take a side trip to the grocery store. Lots of great fruit in season including lychees at my local HEB...and they are surprisingly so very fresh and delicious. I couldn't resist getting a watermelon as well. Grocery stores are sneaky - they load boxes of great looking watermelon right when you walk into the door so it's impossible to miss and then to make it more appetizing, they 'display' the red-ish, juiciest watermelon halves so that you always believe whichever melon you pick, it's going to be just as good. So back to the appetizer. While cutting the watermelon into cubes, noticed I had some tomatos as well. Hrm...they look pretty together so they must taste yummy together! I lucked out, I was right. Well, I couldn't do just that.....why not grill! I also couldn't resist pairing them with basil and with my new basil plant that has been growing like crazy, seemed like a perfect combination. These made a great complement to a bbq dinner or could just be a fun appetizer to enjoy while your entree is still cooking.

Watermelon, Tomato & Basil Skewers

Skewers:

16 cubes of watermelon (roughly 1.5 inch)

1 - 2 tomato cut into big chunks (or you can use cherry tomatoes)

12 fresh leaves of basil

Salt

Dressing:

2 tablespoon Basalmic vinegar

2 tablespoon good olive oil

pinch of salt

pinch of sugar

1. Make sure to soak your wood skewers in water for a few minutes so they don't burn on the grill (like mine did...I didn't follow directions.) Alternate a watermelon, basil, tomato on a skewer. I put two of each on one skewer and made roughly 8 skewers.

2. Sprinkle two sides with salt.

3. Grill! Should take about 4 minutes for each side. I grilled only two sides.

4. For the dressing, pour basalmic vinegar into a bowl. Whisk and slowly pour in olive oil until dressing gets a little thicker. Add salt and sugar. Taste and add more as you need. I also chopped up basil.

5. Drizzle the dressing over the skewers. Eat as soon as they come off the grill so they are still warm!