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Rachel

Hello Tumblr friends!

I’m loving all the questions coming in. 

Keep them coming!

Also, I have a few posts coming up!

Hope you like.

Rachel

Alright, I’m bored. Send in your food questions!! I’ll be waiting! 

TIME’s Tumblr is trying to find the favorite Tumblr blogs out there. Go and pick your favorites, but don’t forget about me (if you DO like me, that is)!!! 

http://timemagazine.tumblr.com/post/15581443721/call-for-submissions-whats-your-favorite-tumblr

Much love!

Rachel

I love a nice crunchy, gooey, bacon-y sandwich. :D

Rachel 

A lot of you guys asked for my mother’s Spanish Chicken recipe, so I asked if she would be willing to share and she said ‘of course’! Here’s the recipe in her exact words. Enjoy! 

SPANISH CHICKEN

4 cups cooked chicken - cut bite size
2 cans Cream of Chicken Soup
1 large chopped onion
1 sm can Pickled Jalapeno Peppers + Juice (to your taste)
1 can evaporated milk 

1 dozen soft corn tortillas
4 cups shredded cheddar cheese
Flour tortillas (OPTIONAL)


Fold the first 5 ingredients together in a bowl.

Spray a deep oval casserole dish with cooking spray, then I start out with the thinnest layer of chicken mixture that I can and smear it on the bottom of the dish, then a layer of corn tortillas, then a layer of cheese. Top that with another layer of chicken mixture, corn tortillas, and cheese, and finish with the chicken mixture.

Bake at 375 for 55 minutes, then top with more cheese and bake it until it’s bubbly, another 10 minutes. 

Good as a main dish or rolled burrito style in flour tortillas!

<3 Rachel and Susie

Today is my parent’s 23rd Anniversary! I thought I would show you the food that they cook. My mother is from Texas and my father is from Arizona. I’m used to eating a lot of delicious Tex-Mex type food. Nowadays I can contribute my own recipes (like my guacamole!). Spending the whole night cooking with my family is some of the best memories I have. Here’s what they make that is DELICIOUS!

This is my mother’s Spanish Chicken. It’s layered with lot’s of tortillas, creamy cheeses, peppers and spices. I can eat plate after plate of it!

My dad recently started making these enchiladas after he discovered that he likes black olives. Lot’s of good flavor in this dish. I want to try it again soon!

These are my adorable parents cooking together. He always wears one of our many aprons. 

Congrats to my loving folks! Without them I would be a disaster :-p

Rachel

Hey! I hope everyone had a great holiday season! Mine was full of family and fun times. Graduating right before winter break was perfect. I didn’t have to worry about anything but spending quality time with the people I love. On Christmas day I made a great dinner for my whole family! I thought I’d share a few of my favorite pictures from the day. 

This is the start of my 6-hour meat sauce. I take roughly a pound each of ground beef and sweet sausage and brown it with a couple of sweet onions and many cloves of garlic.

Army of herbs! Basil, thyme, oregano, and parsley. I also threw in a couple of whole sprigs of basil along with my chiffonade.

So many recipes call for diced or crushed tomatoes. I trust whole peeled plum tomatoes. Leave them whole! As the sauce cooks the tomatoes will break down some. 

Lot’s of fennel seed required in this! I think I may also try fennel bulb next time.

I roasted some portobello mushrooms with olive oil, salt, and herbs. I like portobellos because you don’t have to wash the tops, you can just peel the skin off. They say that water is bad for mushrooms, which is why they tell you to wipe them with a damp towel. This skips that time-consuming step.

This was the beginning of the balsamic dressing I made for my caprese. I don’t measure anything, but combine the following ingredients to taste: balsamic vinegar (from Modena!), extra virgin olive oil, honey, sugar, salt, and freshly ground black pepper. My parents both said it was the best balsamic vinaigrette they have had!

I had some spent lemon halves, so I braised them in my tomato sauce for a little acidity. Worked wonders!

Heirloom tomatoes! These tasted great even though they were out of season. I knoooow! But I can’t get away from caprese. 

Antipasti with three salamis, prosciutto di parma, parmigiano reggiano, my roasted red peppers (how-to on my last post!), and roasted herb mushrooms.

There’s my gorgeous pasta and sauce! I also made a meyer lemon rosemary bread. I combined room temperature unsalted butter with minced fresh rosemary, lemon juice, salt, and pepper. Then I roasted it at 400F until it started turning golden around the edges. The meal was a bit hit! Very happy to impress my family. 

I am back in New Jersey for now! Dan and I are going to see Phish at Madison Square Garden for New Year’s Eve! We both can’t wait to take this trip. Hope you all have a safe and happy New Year celebration! 

Rachel

Happy Holidays to all!!! I hope everyone is having a safe and wonderful break. It’s very busy over at my house. We have my mom, dad, three sisters, brother, brother-in-law, two nieces and two nephews at the house. Tomorrow night I am cooking an incredible Italian Christmas dinner!

Here’s a sneak peek at the menu: 

• Caprese Salad with Heirloom Tomatoes
• Antipasti Plate - Prosciutto, Salami, Parmigiano Reggiano, Sicilian Olives, Braised Artichokes, Roasted Red Peppers with Garlic and Herb-Roasted Mushrooms.
• Garlic Soaked Baguette
• My Incredible Meat Sauce with Fettucini. I simmer the meat sauce all day long. My Mom requests it every time I’m home! 

Tonight I am doing a little prep work. I started with roasting the red peppers. I used an open flame to char every side of the pepper, then transferred them to a bowl and covered them with plastic wrap for a half hour. The plastic traps the steam, which helps the peppers cook completely and will help loosen the skin from the pepper. Meanwhile I made a garlic olive oil to store the peppers in. I slowly simmered 15 smashed garlic cloves in olive oil until the garlic began to caramelize. I let it cool while the peppers were cooling. Then I removed the skins from the peppers, sliced them, and combined them with the oil. Pretty easy and fun little snack! They are pretty orgasmic—like candy. Try it out sometime! Great in salads, on sandwiches, pizza, pasta, or on their own! Here’s a couple pictures!

Soon I will be making big, soft, chewy gingerbread cookies with my nieces and nephews. But for now I am off to enjoy my mom’s pork roast with gravy! 

Merry Christmas to those celebrating!! 

Happy Holidays to everyone! Be safe but have fun!

Rachel

Today on December 21st, 2011, I graduated from the GREATEST culinary school in the world! It’s hard to believe that only two years ago I came to school nervous, intimidated, and extremely unexperienced. I pushed and pushed and pushed myself to the greatest limit so I can be where I am now. I feel like I have grown into a person with confidence, intuition, and knowledge that I never even knew I could achieve. If it weren’t for pure passion, I would have never made it in this school. I feel lucky that I found it as young as I did, and will cherish every skill and technique that I have learned. Times were hard every once and awhile, but I owe my education to The Culinary Institute of America and the incredible chefs that I met along the way. I should also thank you, my readers, for all of the e-mails telling me to keep pushing for my goals and reaching my dreams. Now that I have graduated I have so many new goals to achieve. I can finally live my dream. I’m totally ready to start. 

Thank you, every one of you (by the way ‘you’ are now over 20,000 dedicated followers) for standing by the side of a stranger, listening to my rants (or advice!), and commenting the way you do. All I want is to cook amazing food for others, teach other people how to cook, and stay at the level of happiness that I am right now. 

If you think that this journey is over, it’s not! I am ready to cook my soul into oblivion. Stick around! Also, please send your food questions to me! I still answer as many as I can!

Love,

Shesalty a.k.a. Rachel

This whole last month has been the end of my teachings at The Culinary Institute of America. I graduate on December 21st, and after that I get to spend a week with my family in Minnesota. I wasn’t going to decorate my apartment, since I was going to be leaving before Christmas. But I really just couldn’t help myself. I love the scent of pine needles. I love candy dishes around the house. I love seeing lights at night. I really wanted the spirit this year.

Last year I was on my externship in New Jersey. I spent Christmas alone. Completely alone. And though it was a bummer, I still made myself Christmas. So I decided that since my roommate has graduated and left for now, I might as well make it happen!

So, welcome to my apartment. A.k.a. My Baby Christmas Wonderland…

Yep!—My tree is almost as funky cool as me. Gingerbread cookie post soon (also, Chicken Marsala that I actually messed up?!)!!!! I hope you can handle it. 

Rachel

A lot of you ask me why I came to the CIA. Where does my passion come from? How do I know so much now? As I end my first journey at the CIA (btw thanks for following!), I thought that I should tell you all my story. I know this is kind of lengthy, but a fun story nonetheless! 

In just three weeks I will get my first diploma from the Culinary Institute of America. Some of you have been following me since the very beginning. What a mess I was, right? I decided to go to the CIA with no prior cooking experience and thought I could handle it. At first I felt very discouraged. Everyone was faster than me, better than me, and smarter than me. 

When I came here, I didn’t even know IF cooking was right for me. As a lot of you know, I come from Minnesota. I am currently 22 years old and I went to the University of Minnesota - Mankato right after high school for one year because I had no idea what the hell I wanted to do. In every single class—even art class (!) I had no motivation at all. I flunked out. Towards the end of my year there I was feeling really stressed and worried about my future. I had many passions, but nothing that clicked with me. 

During that time I started having dreams…about food! I started seeing myself in my own kitchen cooking. Sometimes I would dream up recipes, too. I would wake up in the middle of the night and write them down. Several times I actually got myself up, even at 3am just to go to the 24-hour grocery store to test my recipe or cook whatever I was dreaming about. After about a month of that I started reading a lot of books about food and started teaching myself to cook every day. Then I started looking at culinary schools and had a friend who went to the CIA and recommended it to me. So I came here and…everything just worked. The motivation that I was looking for in college was instant at the CIA. And my dedication has always stuck with me. My passion has only grown, even with all the hard work and crappy days I had here and there. I strive to become the absolute best I can.

And you’re probably wondering how this is all connected to a bowl of soup. 

My very first Chef at the CIA was Chef Corky Clark in Fish & Seafood Identification and Fabrication. I remember one day specifically when he said,

“You can’t cook unless you can make a perfect soup.”

Soup was one of the first things we learned how to make in Skills One. I remember that my lentil soup could have been seasoned more, and my cream of broccoli soup could have been silkier. Skills class is the very backbone of my education. My only experience beforehand was in a pizza shop back home. 

So I thought about that quote the other day and thought about how absolutely little I knew then compared to what I know now. That’s when I decided that I needed to make a perfect soup. 

Without a recipe. Without a plan. Just me, some basic skills, some basic knowledge, and a little soul. 

I picked up about two and a half pounds of plum tomatoes. Roasting seemed like the best option. It infused the flavor of the herbs perfectly. I just halved the tomatoes, seeded them, drizzled them with olive oil, a generous sprinkle of salt and pepper, and chopped basil and thyme. I roasted them at 450F until they looked like this—

Beautiful, aromatic, and caramelized. Cooked completely through with the skins barely holding on.

I took skin off the tomatoes and added them to a pot of onions.

I sweated them until translucent and added the roasted tomatoes. I let that cook down for a few minutes before putting everything in a blender and blended until absolutely smooth—like silk (unlike my rookie attempt at cream of broccoli). Then I added some chicken broth and salt to taste. Everything was perfect, the tomato flavor was there, I added a little tomato paste for color, the seasoning was there, I added a little more basil, but it needed something else. Everything was right there, but it needed a little…life. After a brief ponder I spotted a lemon in our fruit basket and Ah-ha! It needed acid. So I squeezed a whole lemon’s worth in and there it was. A symphony of flavor. A harmony of herbs. Crescendo!!! That single balancing note—the tomatoes—the smell of roasted tomatoes brings me back to childhood, it reminds me of my mother, of comfort, of peace and contentedness. I couldn’t wait to enjoy. 

At first I was going to make grilled cheese with it. But then, I remembered—this was supposed to be a PERFECT SOUP. A grilled cheese would almost make that the star, but it wasn’t. I still made my roommate Brian (www.brianthony.tumblr.com) one because he loves them. But for me I made some cast iron toasted rye bread with a little sprinkle of salt. 

And this is the result. As we were eating we sat mostly in silence at first. Then Brian told me that it was absolutely amazing and I felt accomplished…maybe even serene.

We spent the rest of the meal marveling over this basic soup and how something can be so simple, yet I worked so hard to get there.

Again, I can’t thank you guys (my readers) enough for sticking with me these past 2 years. Can you believe it? I will have 20,000 followers before I graduate. And I’m graduating as a whole new person. An adult, a hard worker, a passionate person, and a girl that can make herself a beautiful soup—even when she is sick as a dog (I am by the way!) I really appreciate that so many of you message me with questions and comments. It’s an amazing thing to hear that I’ve inspired so many people about cooking. Keep those questions coming! I am loving it.

Also, I still have food dreams almost every night. Sometimes I wake up in the morning thinking I just spent 12 hours in the kitchen!

I hope you enjoyed my story! Three weeks until graduation!

Sincerely,

Rachel