Spicy Barbecue Sauce

Oh yeah! Barbecue sauce is a lovely thing. Homemade is even more lovely. Whenever I've bought prepared barbecue sauce I've always had to "dress it up" before I was satisfied with the taste, so I figured why dress up something when I can just make it myself? Plus I like the control of what's going into my food. When I read the ingredients on so many prepared condiments, I'm a little frightened of the weird unrecognizable things they contain.

I searched online for basic barbecue sauce recipes and found some pretty simple ones to use as a base. This is what I did for my go to sweet and spice sauce.

Ingredients:

1 can crushed tomatoes, no spices or flavoring added

1 tbsp tomato paste

2 tsps Worsterschire Sauce

1 tbsp lime juice or lemon juice, fresh squeezed, you can use vinegar instead

2 tsps garlic, minced

1/4 cup onion, minced

1 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp dried basil

Minced red chili to taste, I use 2 tsps

1 tbsp dark brown sugar

1 tbsp olive oil

Salt to taste

Directions:

In a saucepan over medium high heat, place olive oil and tomato paste. Stir constantly for 5-7 minutes and then add garlic and onion, stirring constantly for another 2-4 minutes until you smell th fragrance of the garlic and onion rising over the tomato paste. Drain som of th liquid from the canned tomatoes nod add to the saucepan. Turn down the heat to medium. Add 1/2 of the minced chili and the remainder of your ingredients and turn th heat to low and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally so it will not stick. The sugar from th ingredients will cause it to thicken.

When the sauce is complete, remove from heat and stir in the remainder of your minced chili. I like to have little bites of spice in my sauce.

This sauce is sweet and spicy and goes well on chicken or meats. It's also really cool on small cocktail meatballs. It can last for about 1 month in an airtight container kept in the fridge.

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Midnight Beauty Grape Jam, Pic Pop!

I made homemade jam for the first time!! Woohoo!!
I used these beautiful Midnight Beauty Grapes and I must say, I am happy with the results. Where's the peanut butter, baby?














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Gindungo! Well, the Teedy Version...(Photos)

I've made several trips to Angola, Africa to preform with the Norwegian band Gumbo. When we go there, we always have beautiful meals. A condiment that's a staple there is a very spicy chili sauce called Gindungo.
It makes me happy! It's very spicy, so can be used sparingly over cooked meals of any kind, fish, seafood, meats or poultry. It can also be used in marinades. It's thinned out for use with a neutral oil so as not to affect the flavor.

I decided to ask the restaurant manager of the hotel, Epic Sana in Luanda, where I could purchase some to take home. He said I may be able to find some  ready made in a store but it was something that everyone makes at home, including the restaurants. He told me he could write down everything I needed and that it was easy to make. Depending on the kind of chilies you use, it can be mild or set your face on fire hot. The hotel used a mixture of cayenne and scotch bonnet chilies.

I live in a small town and there are no scotch bonnets in our local store so I used red and green cayenne.

I used 12 red and 6 green cayenne chilies. Left in tact with stems and seeds.
2 heads of garlic cut through the middle, skins on
2 small red onions, cut through the middle, skins on
sea salt
vegetable oil
2 teaspoons white vinegar

I line a baking dish with baking paper and place the peppers, garlic and onion, sliced side down. Sprinkle with sea salt and drizzle well with vegetable oil. Roast in the oven at 180C for 40 minutes. Remove from oven and let it cool enough to handle. USE RUBBER GLOVES!! The chili oil will get deep into your skin and will burn your eyes and naughty bits, even if you wash your hands thoroughly!!

Gently pull the stems  off of the chilies leaving the seeds inside of the roasted pods/ The garlic and onion should easily squeeze/slide out of their skins. Drop everything into a food processor and add the oil from the roasting pan. Add 2 teaspoons of white vinegar. Flavored vinegar will change the flavor, so don't use apple cider or balsamic. The vinegar is a preservative so that your sauce keeps well when refrigerated. Pulse well in the processor until it becomes a beautiful paste.

Put your sauce into a sterilized air tight jar and refrigerate. To use as a condiment, put a few teaspoons into a small bowl and add vegetable oil to make it a consistency you can easily drizzle onto food. For use in marinades, use as is. Thanks so much to the guys at Epic Sana Luanda for the guidance with this lovely, spicy sauce!

Now...

Go, eat!!

If you enjoy the recipes, please share my blog with your friends. If you have a recipe you'd like to share in Friendly Foods, please send it in. Photos are also appreciated! teedycooks@gmail.com

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Fish Tacos with Mango Salsa & Spicy Yogurt Sauce

SO! Its been a while since I've posted to my cooking blog. Life has been super busy with my "real" job, singing and touring. This is a good thing. Now, don't think I haven't been cooking up a storm, because you can look at my robust figure and see that I most certainly have been!! HA!

My best friend and the piano player that I've collaborated with for almost 20 years, Paul David Longstreth, has been staying here in Norway with Peto and I, working on playing more in Europe and writing original music. He is very interested in learning more about cooking for himself and for friends and family. So, when we're not working on music, he and I have been having little workshops on how to prepare delicious meals.

I am not a chef. I am a vocalist who loves to cook almost as much as I love to sing. I don't claim to have the knowledge of a chef. I know how to make food that tastes great to me, my family and my friends and over the years, they have truly enjoyed the meals I've created. I've learned tips and tricks from REAL chefs to help me with being a better cook. When Paul asked if I could teach him to make good food, I knew this was something I could do!

This past Tuesday, after a trip to the mall and to have an oil change done on my car, we had to make something quick, but tasty for dinner. I decided that the lesson for Paul would be to make fish tacos!

Now, this sounds super simple and it is, but its SOOOOOOOOOOO delicious!!!! I made mine with salmon, but you can use a fish of your choice.

The first thing is to prepare the Mango Salsa. Mango is light and delicious and pairs beautifully with fish. I also find that peaches and nectarines also work well, so if you don't have access to mango, you can use fresh peaches or nectarines.

Mango Salsa

1 large mango, peeled and diced

1 medium red onion, diced

2 toes garlic finely minced

1/4 cup minced cilantro

1/4 cup minced curly leaf parsley

The juice of 1/2 lime

1/2 tbsp ruby red grapefruit juice (optional)

1 medium tomato, seeded & diced

1 cucumber, diced

Salt to taste

Red pepper flakes, to taste

Mix it all up in your bowl, cover with plastic film and refrigerate.

Voila! You're done with the Mango Salsa

Now for your fish! I used salmon, but you can use any type of fish that you'd like for your tacos or you can use shrimp. I sautee the fish in a pan over medium high heat with a small splash of vegetable oil. I season with salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder and 1 tablespoon minced cilantro with a squeeze of lime juice. Don't overcook your seafood!!!! You don't want mushy fish sitting in the bottom of a soft taco shell. After the fish is cooked, cover and set aside.

I make a basic guacamole to go with this taco but I also like to add something creamy to my taco. Instead of using plain old sour cream I like to make a quick and delicious sauce to spoon onto my tacos.

Spicy Yogurt Sauce

This is so easy it can be prepared if you're half asleep!!

1 cup Greek or Turkish Yogurt

2 tbsps prepared, chunky salsa

1 tsp lime or lemon juice

Salt to taste

Mix it up and pop it into the fridge.

See, simple!

Its time to build your taco.

I prefer to use soft flour taco shells, but if you like crunchy corn shells, its entirely up to you. I warm them in the oven for a few minutes and then spoon in fish, top with some Spicy Yogurt Sauce, Guacamole, Mango Salsa and then sprinkle with the shredded cheese of your choice, I like white cheese with fish. Monterrey Jack is an awesome choice. Then you eat as many as your belly can hold!!!!!!!!!!!! Ole!!

photos courtesy of Paul David Longstreth

Now...

Go, eat!!

If you enjoy the recipes, please share my blog with your friends. If you have a recipe you'd like to share in Friendly Foods, please send it in. Photos are also appreciated! teedycooks@gmail.com

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Vatican's Homemade Mayonnaise (Friendly Foods)

Eddie Cox and Vatican Lokey are two of my most favoritest people in the whole of the wide, wide universe. (I am aware there are grammatical and spelling issues in that sentence. It's intentional.) They have been true and amazing friends for many, many years. I grew up around them and watching them on stage helped me learn how to be a performer, not just a singer.

Eddie and Vatican are also very good friends with my mom, whom I call, Shorty Cupcake. I call her that because she's super sweet and stands only 4 foot 11 inches tall. They visit her often and look out for her since I'm on the other side of the Atlantic.

 

Vatican & Eddie!

Vatican is great in the kitchen and he has contributed some recipes to Teedy Cooks. He sent me a mail today with one of those tasty lovelies! You'll find the mail with his recipe for Homemade Mayonnaise below...Hi Sweetie,

Eddie suggested I send you the recipe for Shorty Cupcakes' favorite homemade mayo.

It looks more complicated than it really is.

The most important things to remember:
All the ingredients MUST be at room temperature.
The key to good mayo is patience at the beginning.
Each egg yolk can take up to but no more than 3/4 cup of oil. Any more than that will cause the mayo to separate and be ruined.

I look at mayo as more than just a condiment. I see it as another part of the total nutrition package we should be getting everyday. My recipe is not the basic, but I have worked to refine this recipe for maximum nutritional efficiency.

All the oils I use are cold-expeller pressed.

Tools
Spatula, Bowl, Electric mixer, tablespoon

Base
Yolks of 3 free range organic chicken eggs
1 Tbs dry mustard or 2 Tbs stone ground or spicy brown prepared mustard

Oil Mixture
1 3/4 cups canola or safflower oil
1/4 cup each toasted sesame oil and extra virgin olive oil
Blend thoroughly.

Acid Mixture
3 Tbls. Unfiltered Apple Cider Vinegar
1 Tbl. Balsalmic Vinegar or Salata Salad Vinegar
1 Tbl. lemon juice
1Tbs. Liquid Amino Acids (or comparable amount low salt soy sauce)
2 tsp onion powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1/8 tsp stevia extract powder
2 Tbs. nutritive yeast flakes, dissolved in mixture (optional)
Mix these together thoroughly and set aside.

Final Ingredient
3 Tbs. boiling hot water

Start the water boiling now. On the highest speed possible beat the egg yolks for at least a full minute or until they get lighter and more viscous. Add the mustard and beat again for another minute. At this point begin adding the oil to the mixture one tablespoon at a time. (IMPORTANT! You cannot stop adding the oil for any reason until you have added at least a third of a cup. If you stop before that point the mixture collapses and you have to start all over again.) Constantly push the splatter back into the mixture to ensure even distribution of the oils. After the 1/3 cup has been added you can add the acid mixture by single tablespoons and mixing well in between doses. Be careful with the acids to oil ratio. Too much acid makes the mayo thin.

Once you have used up all of the oil and have the consistency you like, add the tablespoons of boiling water to the mayo one at a time. The boiling water sets the sauce and prevents it from separating.

Place into a clean jar with a good seal and refrigerate for at least an hour before using.

You will be very, very surprised at how good fresh homemade mayo can be. With time the process becomes second nature. I have not bought prepackaged mayo in the stores for over two years, and I even give batches to friends on a regular basis.


Now...

Go, eat!!

If you enjoy the recipes, please share my blog with your friends. If you have a recipe you'd like to share in Friendly Foods, please send it in. Photos are also appreciated! teedycooks@gmail.com

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