Jeff Smith

Chicken Fajitas

I’m not sure if these are technically fajitas or not, but they’re damn good regardless. (serves 2)

1. Start out by making your sauce/marinade. I don’t exactly remember the ingredients I used, but it was something along the lines of:
   * 1 cup ketchup
   * ground cumin
   * garlic powder
   * fresh cracked pepper
   * ancho chilli powder
   * ginger powder
   * dash of sriracha
   * a little chicken stock to thin out the ketchup
   * probably a few other items that I’m forgetting, just remember to keep tasting until you get something you like
2.  Cut up two chicken breasts into strips. Place in a large resealable freezer bag.
3. Add half the marinade to the chicken and coat chicken.
4. Place marinade and chicken into fridge for 3 or 4 hours to allow chicken time to pick up the flavour of the marinade.
5. 3 hours later…Cut up some vegetables e.g. peppers and onions into similar sized pieces and toss with the reserved marinade.
6. Fire up your grill to ~450F and get yourself a fairly large aluminum pan.
7. Toss the vegetables into the pan.
8. Remove the chicken from the marinade and toss the bag and marinade away.
9. Grill chicken and vegetables until cooked.
10. Toss a few tortillas on the grill heat them up (only a minute or so).
11. Throw some vegetables and a couple pieces of chicken on a tortilla along with your favourite toppings e.g. rice, cheese, sour cream, etc.

Rice with Grilled Vegetables

Another great, quick recipe to use as a side dish, or even as a main course.

1. Cut up some of your favourite vegetables into large pieces, big enough so they won’t fall through the cooking grates of your grill.
2. Coat your cut up vegetables with a bit of light cooking oil and season with salt & pepper.
3. Toss them on a nice hot grill and sear until soft, flipping once half way through the grilling time. The amount of grilling time will vary based on the vegetables used. I used red and green peppers, a white onion, and cremini mushrooms. The mushrooms took about half the grilling time of the rest of the vegetables (my vegetables took about 10 minutes on a 500ºF grill). If you don’t have a grill, you could toss your vegetables on a baking sheet and roast them in the oven on a fairly high heat (~425ºF). You won’t get the nice grill flavour, but you should get some nice brown bits on the vegetables that will add to the flavour of your rice.
4. While your vegetables are grilling, cook up some of your favourite type of rice. I prefer to use a long, whole grain rice rather than minute rice. I usually keep a bag of Dainty Time-wise Whole Grain on hand since it’s a pretty healthy rice, but it only takes about 15 minutes for it to cook. It’s also really easy to prepare, you cook it the same as you would cook pasta.
5. When your vegetables are done, set them aside and allow to cool for a moment or two.
6. When your rice is done, cut up your vegetables in smaller, bite-size pieces and toss into your rice.
7. You’re done! Eat!

Easy Breakfast Scramble

This is one of my favourite breakfast/brunch meals. Mostly because it’s so easy to put together, and you can use just about any ingredients you have on hand along with a few eggs. It usually takes me about 15 minutes from prep to eating, so this is a great one to throw together when you’re running short on time. So now you don’t have any excuses to eat a junkfood-filled meal when you’re running late.

Today I made it with onion, green pepper, celery, green onion, garlic, prosciutto, cremini mushrooms, and hash browns. I cheated today and used frozen hash browns, but you could easily dice up some potatoes, season them up and bake them off in the oven to use instead.

1. Start off by chopping up your vegetables and prosciutto (diced very thin).
2. Cook off your hash browns—I chose to bake mine.
3. Crack and whisk some eggs (2 per person).
4. Add some olive oil to a hot frying pan and put in your prosciutto. You could easily substitute bacon, left over ham, sausage, pretty much any kind of meat.
5. When the prosciutto is crisped up a bit, throw in your vegetables and sauté until they’re soft. Make sure to season here with some salt & pepper. Just a very small pinch of salt though because the meat will add quite a bit of salt on it’s own.
6. Push your cooked vegetables and meat to the side of the frying pan and dump in your whisked eggs and scramble over low heat.
7. When your eggs are ready, dump in your cooked hash browns (or feel free to serve them on the side) and mix with everything else.

I will often top each portion with a bit of good, shredded cheese. A few other ingredients that I’ll often use here are zucchini, spinach, tomatoes (with seeds and core removed of course so things don’t get watery). Fresh dill is also a great way to season the dish.

This is a great meal to have when you have guests coming for breakfast because it’s so easy to scale. If you have a large group to cook for, it’s probably a good idea to cook your vegetables and eggs in separate pans so you don’t run out of room. You can always toss them together in a big bowl after and serve them family style at the table.

Tuesday’s dinner: grilled pork chops, hand-cut baked fries, and wilted spinach with garlic. All of this washed down with a Propeller IPA.