Pepperade - You're Gonna Love It!

Sorry for the long silence.  Tank had his tonsils out last week.  I greatly underestimated our ability to do absolutely nothing but eat popsicles and watch cartoons for 5 days.  But before I spent an entire week being lazy, I made this.  And it was fabulous.  I made it one night with chicken.  Because I had never made it before, I threw it in with a couple other sides to just have "a little extra".  The next night, it was the star of the show!

I got a bunch of sweet peppers at the farmers market....if I had known how good this would be, I would have gotten more. 

*The picture below is a mix of the bigger sweet peppers I got from the market and a few small ones I got at the grocery store.  I like using the bigger sweet peppers; they're meatier.

Ingredients

5-6 Sweet peppers

3 cloves garlic, minced

2 Tbsp olive oil

1/3 cup white wine

Salt and pepper to taste

Clean all of your peppers.  Cut them in half and pull out stems, ribs and seeds.

Cut into thin strips.  *Aren't they beautiful!?!?!?!?!?

Heat olive oil in pan over medium high heat.  Add garlic and saute 3-5 minutes.

Add the peppers.  Stir occassionally. 

After about 5 minutes add in the white wine.  Allow it to cook uncovered for about 10 more minutes (to cook off the alcohol).  Notice how they're getting a little brighter and softer?  They're starting to break down and become G-O-O-D!

Stir, add a little salt and pepper (just a pinch of each), cover and reduce heat to medium.  Let cook until the peppers are soft, about another 18 minutes.

See how much they cook down?  They're all soft and sweet and yummy now!!!

You can eat these alone, or with meat.

I'm betting it would be GREAT over cream cheese as a dip.  Or on quesadillas, corn cakes, tacos, ice cream (just making sure you're listening).  I'm pretty sure there's an endless list of ways to use these.  They're REALLY good.  Did I say that already? 

Get the printable here

Garden Fresh Salsa

If I were to hand one of my children a tomato slice as a snack, they would swear they don't eat those.  Put them in a chip-and-dip format though, and they're all over that!  Whatever works, right?  They love 'chip sauce' {salsa}!  They ask for it like candy.  This is the one I've been making lately.  You should try it.  It's the best condiment there is!

*If you're not a big fan of chopping, you can do this in a blender or food processor.  You'll probably have to do it in batches though, 'cause it's a lot.  Or you could just chop it.  I chop because I like my salsa chunky.*

You just need these guys:

Ingredients:

6-7 medium tomatoes (3 heaping cups diced)

1 jalepeno pepper

1 red onion (1 cup diced)
5 cloves garlic
3 Tbsp cilantro
2 Tbsp lime juice
2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp chili powder
1 tsp salt

Here we go....................

First you char the pepper.  I put mine right over the open flame on my stove.  That's a cooling rack over the burner...because without it the pepper would fall into the flames.  You can also do this under your broiler.  Just let it hang out and get all black (don't be alarmed when it pops and hisses) then roll it over and make the other side match.



Now throw it in a baggie (use tongs) and let it sweat.



Meanwhile, chop your tomatoes; scoop out and discard the seeds.

Throw the tomatoes into a large bowl (you should have 3 heaping cups of dieced tomatoes, if you like to measure...but you're good to just eyeball it, too.)

PUT ON GLOVES:  Just a little note here.  When working with chile peppers of any kind, you should use gloves.  They can really burn.  I got some under my fingernail once.  For at least 2 whole days I kept looking to see if I had cut myself, it hurt so bad.  It's a seriously un-fun feeling that gloves quickly solve.  Like my pink gloves?  They're sassy!

Rub all the skin off the pepper.  It should slide off pretty easily.  Cut it in half from stem to tip.



Discard the seeds, ribs and stem.

Chop it up....teeny tiny.

Throw it in the bowl with the tomatoes.

Chop up the garlic, and throw that in...

Then the onion.  You can used white or yellow, I just love red ones.  The color and the flavor.  Isn't that a pretty bowl???

I guess I'm easily amused...back to the salsa...

Chop up some cilantro

 Add in the lime juice and spices

And stir it all up



!Fiesta!

Get the printable recipe here.