Chili Garlic Hot Sauce

We go through hot sauce in this house like nobody's business. Adam is a spice fiend, and it's rubbed off on me to the point that I now have preferences from dish to dish. I'll eat a fried egg with a healthy dose of Frank's, a burrito with a splash of Tabasco, or a side of Adam's breakfast potatoes with a sprinkle of Cholula. Speaking of which, somebody remind me to tell you about Adam's breakfast potatoes at some point, because they are gooood.



A couple of Saturdays ago while Adam made potatoes to go with our eggs, I browsed my google reader and came across Melissa Clark's Good Appetite column on homemade hot sauces. I loved the idea of a chili garlic sauce sweetened with sweet peppers instead of sugar, and we had a heap of sweet red peppers coming ripe in the garden. Plus, habaneros are crazy cheap, like a quarter a piece, so this huge jar of sriracha-like sauce cost us a buck plus pantry ingredients. And hey, it was fun!



Chili Garlic Hot Sauce
adapted from Melissa Clark in the New York Times


I know everyone is always saying you should wear plastic gloves when chopping hot peppers. For milder chiles like jalapenos, I don't usually do so (oooh, living on the edge!). In fact, I don't even have plastic gloves. But when chopping four habaneros, I thought it was good advice, and I improvised by sticking sandwich baggies on my hands before I got started. A little goofy looking, but it worked. Oh, and try not to breath in chili-vinegar fumes, that stuff will sting your sinuses like no other.

4 hot chili peppers, preferably habanero
3/4 pound sweet red peppers (2-3 red bell peppers or similar)
3 huge or five regular garlic cloves
3/4 cup white vinegar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt


Roughly chop the chilis (wear gloves or baggies, please!), sweet peppers and garlic. Combine in a medium pot with the vinegar and salt, and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Simmer for about 10 minutes or until peppers are tender. Transfer carefully to a blender, or use an immersion blender, and blend the sauce until you have a mostly smooth puree. Pour into a jar (I got a little more than a pint) and stick it in the fridge. 


The original recipe says to wait three days before eating, but we ate some the night I made it and loved it.


Makes about 2 cups (one pint, though I got a tiny bit more than that), and should keep in the fridge for at least a month.



Plus, look how awesome my timing is: September first is sweet and hot peppers day and the first week of Fall Fest 2010! Did you play this week?

Baked Beans with Honey and Dill

After the glorious weather we had this weekend (it was 70 degrees and sunny on Saturday!), it's rather difficult for me to come back to you with this recipe. I want to tell you about spring breezes, runs in the sunshine, and the crab cakes and asparagus we ate on Sunday! I want to tell you that we planted our first seeds this weekend: tomatoes, eggplant, basil, and hot peppers, which will live indoors getting a head start for the next 8 weeks or so. I want to tell you about the amazing surprise of my two best friends showing up at my door on Friday night from Atlanta and New York to spend the weekend hanging out and helping me pick out a wedding dress!


Alas, today the weather is back to true New England spring: rainy and cold. Delicate little salads and spring vegetables are not quite what I want to eat after I've slogged home in rubber boots, fighting with my umbrella. Instead, I want something warm and stewy, preferably something that I can sop up on a piece of bread. These baked beans with honey and dill from the New York Times fit the bill nicely.

Greek* Baked Beans With Honey and Dill

I used Rancho Gordo runner cannellini beans for this, and soaked them for a few hours but not overnight. Rancho Gordo beans almost always cook up faster for me than grocery store beans, but regular old white navy beans would work well here, too.

1 pound dried white beans, soaked for 4-6 hours or overnight, drained
1/4 cup olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
1 28-ounce can chopped tomatoes (I used a quart of tomatoes I canned last summer)
1 bay leaf
3 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1/4 cup red wine vinegar or sherry vinegar
Salt and pepper
1/2 cup chopped fresh dill (I used 3/4 of a cup, but I loooove dill)

In a large dutch oven (you want something ovenproof with a lid), combine the drained beans and enough fresh water to cover by a couple of inches. Bring to a boil over high heat, allow to boil for 5 minutes, then reduce heat to low, cover, and let simmer for 30-60 minutes (I'll explain how to check if they're done in a second). You want a couple of bubbles breaking the surface every few seconds, adjust the heat accordingly.

Preheat the oven to 375. In a skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat, and saute the onion for 10 - 15 minutes or until lightly caramelized. If onion is browning too fast, lower the heat. Remove from heat.

Check the beans: If you lift a few out on a wooden spoon and blow on them gently, do the skins peel away? They're ready for the next step. Drain the simmered beans, then return them to the dutch oven. Add the rest of the olive oil, the tomatoes and their liquid, the bay leaf and honey, the onion, and enough water just to cover the beans. Bring to a simmer over medium heat, then cover and place in the oven. Bake for an hour, stirring every 10 minutes and adding water if the level gets below the top of the beans. (You could also do this on the stove top over very low heat, but then they're not technically "baked" beans and it may take a little longer.)

After the beans have been in the oven an hour, take the pot out and add the tomato paste, vinegar, and salt and pepper. I started with a teaspoon of kosher salt and a half teaspoon of black pepper.

Cover and simmer on the stove top for another 30 minutes, until the beans are tender and the stew has thickened.

Stir in the dill, and let sit off the heat for 15 minutes. Taste the beans; they may need more salt. Serve with bread for dipping.

Serves 6.

*I put Greek in quotation marks because I don't know how authentic this recipe is. I don't actually care, because it's quite tasty, but just because it's got honey and dill doesn't make it Greek. Sort of like adding salsa doesn't makes something Mexican and adding peanuts and lime doesn't make something Thai.

Fried Chickpeas with Sausage and Spinach

I have a thing for garbanzo beans. I eat them at least three times a week in soup, or salads, or as hummus, and I'm always on the lookout for a new way to use my favorite bean. When I saw Mark Bittman's Fried Chickpeas with Chorizo and Spinach in last week's New York Times I put it immediately into rotation.

I followed the method and the main ingredients of the recipe, but I did make one pretty big change. Instead of chorizo, I used spicy chicken sausage that I squeezed out of the casings and broke it into bits as it cooked. I wanted to stay true to the flavors of the original, so I added a scant half teaspoon of smoked hot paprika (pimentón de la vera) as the chickpeas and sausage cooked, and I think I could have been more generous with it.

Finally, I forgot the sherry. Oops! I didn't have any in the house, but I had thought it through and I was going to use dry vermouth or maybe a splash of vinegar to cut some of the oil a bit, and while I LOVED this the way I made it, it was missing that added depth that wine gives a dish. When I make it again (which will be very soon) I will not be so forgetful.

Fried Chickpeas with Sausage and Spinach
adapted from Mark Bittman at the New York Times
serves 3-4

Don't skip the drying off the chickpeas step, or they won't get crispy and browned, they'll just stay sort of mushy. I like mushy beans just fine, but that's not really what you're going for here.

1/4 cup olive oil
1 can (or two cups) cooked chickpeas, rinsed and patted dry with paper towels
3 links spicy chicken sausage, casings removed (1/2 - 3/4 lb)
1/2 teaspoon hot smoked paprika
salt and pepper
10 oz spinach (if you use grown up spinach, remove the tough stems and tear the leaves into smaller pieces)
approximately 1 cup bread crumbs (I used panko, but homemade breadcrumbs -sandwich bread whizzed in the food processor - would be ideal here)
1/4 cup sherry, dry vermouth or white wine OR a splash of wine vinegar

Heat the olive oil in a large ovenproof skillet over medium heat. When hot, add the chickpeas in one layer and cook, shaking or stirring occasionally, for five minutes. Then add the pimentón and chicken sausage, breaking it up in the pan with a wooden spoon. Cook for another 5-10 minutes until the sausage is cooked through and the chickpeas have taken on some color. Remove to a bowl using a slotted spoon.

Add the spinach and sherry to the oil remaining in the pan and saute until the spinach is thoroughly wilted down and liquid has evaporated, 5-8 minutes. Season with salt and pepper, then add the chickpeas and sausage in one layer on top of the spinach. Turn on your broiler.

Sprinkle the dish with the breadcrumbs, drizzle with a little more olive oil if you like, and stick it under the broiler for a couple of minutes until the breadcrumbs brown.