G4G Chicken Tortilla Chowder

G4G Chicken Tortilla Chowder

A few months ago I posted a recipe for chili that was inspired by memories of my mom’s cold weather comfort foods. It was only 40 degrees in Las Vegas that day and the recipe seemed appropriate. Today I’m sitting in my home in Colorado staring out the window not quite inspired by the thought of going out and shoveling 11 inches of snow off my drive. In fact I’m much more inspired to go into the kitchen and whip up a steaming pot of my famous Chicken Tortilla Chowder. I’m not really sure where the tortilla part came from but it sounds good so I’ll keep it.

But before I head for the kitchen let me share one of Grubdom’s best kept and most delicious comfort food secrets. If you never try another one of my recipes you can’t miss trying this one! This chowder is so flavorful you’re not going to believe it can be achieved Grub For Guys style. Just open some cans, combine the ingredients below, and turn up the heat. Now drink a couple of beers then dish it up. That’s it!

G4G Chicken Tortilla Chowder Ingredients

2 13 oz. cans of chicken breast (drained)

1 12 oz. can of evaporated milk

1 14 oz. can of green enchilada sauce

1 cup water

1 cup of Tostitos medium salsa con queso

½ cup sweet corn

1 tblsp. Cilantro

Premium corn chips

1/8 tsp pepper to taste

I serve as chowder over chips, as gravy over all kinds of burritos, as a sauce for chicken enchiladas. Sometimes I even thicken it and use it as a party dip!

Prep Time: 2 Beers

Serves up to 6 drunk and dedicated Grubbers.

By: The Grubmaster

Hunters Breakfast

Hung over? Me too. But that’s beside the point. It’s breakfast time! And when you’re hung over at breakfast time you need several things. You need liquid. You need quiet. You need Tylenol, and you need hot, wholesome Grub! And by hot I don’t mean warm. I mean spicy! Burn that sickness from your body! You can’t be a sissy girl now or you’re gonna spend the rest of the day lying around whining!

This recipe is easy but very filling. And it includes plenty of protein and carbs to get your energy level up quick.

¼ Cup oil

1 Tablespoon butter

¼ Yellow onion (chopped)

1 large bell pepper (chopped)

4 large garlic cloves (finely chopped)

1 Jalapeno (finely chopped w/o seeds)

1/2 pound (2 cups) chopped cooked ham (bacon or sausage or both work great too)

2 Cups frozen “Southern Style” hash browns

6 Large eggs

Salt and Pepper to taste

Heat one half of the oil in skillet over medium heat. Add meat and cook well (until golden brown). Lower the heat on skillet to low. Using a large fork or slotted spoon take the meat from the skillet and set aside. Remove any excess oil from the skillet leaving about 2 Tablespoons.

Now melt the butter in the skillet and add chopped pepper. Cook for 5 minutes or until soft. Add chopped onions and garlic and cook for a few more minutes. Now use the fork or slotted spoon to take these from the skillet and set them aside with the meat.

Add the remainder of the oil and bring the heat back up to medium high and add the potatoes. When the potatoes are golden brown lower the heat to low and add the meat and veggies back into the skillet.

Now add the eggs and cook over low heat stirring occasionally until done. Salt and Pepper to taste and Grub!

Goes great with Picante or smothered in green chili!

Prep Time Bloody Mary or 2 Beers (Red of course!)

Serves 4

Breakfast Grub

Breakfast is an interesting time for Grub lovers. If it’s a weekday we tend to fall into one of two categories. The guy that skips breakfast or the guy who hits his favorite greasy spoon. If you fall into the first category you probably spend little time contemplating food and in the end just hit the coffee pot hard and get on with what needs to be done while looking longingly toward lunch. If you fall into the second category you typically take time away from your morning tasks or you get up early and throw back some greasy meats and undercooked eggs. And if you’re like me you may use both strategies on any given weekday. The point is; although we spend the entire week in a somewhat routine approach to breakfast… the weekend is when the true Grubber shines!

Ahh the weekend! That magical time when our habit of rising early pays off. You know what I’m talking about! How many times have you snuck off early while the rest of the family sleeps soundly through the morning? There is almost no end to the wonder or mischief you can find before momma or kids or neighbors for that matter even open their eyes. And if there is no wonder or mischief to be found, what do we do? Cause some! Man I love coming home from an early morning car wash hungry as a bear and torturing my family into the light of day. Full of exciting plans and exaggerated promises of adventure, I go from room to room eliciting curses and screams until it becomes quite obvious that sleep time is officially over in this house. With my wake up plan nearing full swing and gaining momentum… I head for the kitchen. Ah the kitchen, where all the magic really begins! Weekend breakfasts have no equal in my family’s culinary experience. Soon the wonderful aromas of fried eggs, toast, coffee and bacon are wafting through the house, working steadily into every possible nook and cranny.

It doesn’t take long before this luscious airborne assault on the senses brings my reluctant family shuffling from their various places of nocturnal retreat. By the time they begin to congregate in the den or dining room my latest breakfast offering is nearing completion. I have to say with as much humility as I can muster; I may be the absolute king of breakfast! For some reason unknown to me the first meal of the morning always brings out the true culinary explorer in me. Don’t get me wrong! I really don’t invent anything new! But I excel at shuffling existing foods around a bit, adding a twist here and there and presenting a brand new dish for my family to enjoy! Weather I’m preparing scrambled eggs or a complicated soufflé I always push the boundary of conventional cooking.

Stick with me while I relate some of my own personal breakfast recipes and anecdotes in the following pages. I’m convinced you will emerge from the experience with a whole new perspective on breakfast!

Grub For Guys Beef Chili

When the weather began to turn cold my mother always seemed compelled to cook. Not that she didn’t cook when the weather was warm but summer months were filled with salads and fried chicken. Good foods but somewhat light and easy to prepare. The cold months always brought a change to the type of foods coming out of my mom’s kitchen. Warm hardy dishes full of deep flavor and texture.

One of my all time favorites was my mom’s beef chili. Full of big chunks of beef and tomatoes this dish would simmer all afternoon tempting a house full of us boys to try sneaking a bite when mom wasn’t looking. By the time supper rolled around that huge Dutch oven full of chili didn’t stand a chance, and for the next couple of days neither did our shorts!

Over the years whenever I had a craving for my mom’s beef chili I would go through all the traditional steps for preparation and wait hours for the results, mired in the knowledge that the flavor could never be duplicated Grub style.

News Flash! I finally overcame my fears and tread those hallowed culinary grounds to bring this fantastic dish to the Grub Nation! Just don’t tell my mommy………

1 pound ground beef
1 15 oz tomato sauce
2 15 oz can of water
2 15 oz cans of pinto beans in chili sauce
2 tablespoons Worchester sauce
2 tablespoons minced dried onions
2 tablespoons canned diced jalapenos
1 ½ tablespoons chili powder
1 teaspoon minced dried garlic
Salt and Pepper to taste

In a 5qt sauce pan brown the ground beef over medium heat, adding Worchester sauce and salt. When ground beef is nearly browned add the onions. Cover and cook for approx. five minutes. Drain off excess fat and return ground beef to the sauce pan.

Combine the rest of the ingredients in the pan and bring to a slow rolling boil. Reduce the heat to low and simmer for 20 minutes.

This hot and hardy dish feeds five sober guys and two chicks or six drunks.

Can do another review

I decided to try the B&M canned raisin bread today. The bagger at the store spotted it and was somewhat bemused. The cashier said it was good stuff. When I said it would be good for camping she said “heck, yeah!”

Crank open a nice can of bread

Today we have a field report from a fellow grubworm. Read about his experience with canned bread.

~

Bread in a can? You bet! And it’s good stuff.

B&M Canned Brown Bread. (http://www.bgfoods.com/bm/bm_products.asp)

I kept seeing this in the grocery stores in NY and MA. Finally, I broke down and bought a can. It’s fascinating stuff. It’s baked right in the can, so it’s very moist. It’s definitely not sandwich bread. Nothing light and fluffy here. It’s so moist, it’s almost like a cake. A very heave cake! And it’s a bit crumbly. Like European brown bread, it has a strong taste. If it’s possible for bread to have a faint black licorice smell, that’s what it reminded me of – but don’t worry, it dosen’t taste like licorice!

It goes very good with beanie weenies! Would be good with chili, or bean soup, too, in place of corn bread (you do like to crumble a piece of corn bread into your chili or bean soup, right? If not, what’s the matter with you?!).

This would be an excellent addition to camping or survival grub, as it has a long shelf life since it’s hermetically sealed even before it’s cooked! I can’t wait to try some fried up in a cast iron skillet over a bed of coals. Bliss!

If your store doesn’t stock it, you can get it here: http://mainegoodies.com/gourmet/cannedbrownbread.shtml

Grub out!

Ramen Chicken Piccata

Piccata, what’s Piccata? I couldn’t tell you what Piccata is but I can tell you how to cook it….Grub Style! That’s because it was Piccata that inspired me to take Ramen noodles to the next level. This in turn led me to develop Grub For Guys and eventually the Ramenation itself!

Back in the 70’s my family used to visit a small Italian diner in Littleton Colorado known as Romanos. Run by a large Italian family this unique little establishment featured an atmosphere that made you feel like you were part of the kitchen staff and offered a great view of the food as it was prepared.

My favorite Romanos dish just happened to be Chicken Piccata. Every time we visited I would order chicken piccata and watch as Papa Romano prepared it. I was always amazed that such a wonderful dish was so easy to prepare and I was inspired to try my hand at cooking it. Believe me when I say that the subtleties of a great dish eluded me for many years. But as my mother always said; practice makes perfect. And it did! By the time that Nobel Sysco truck delivered Top Ramen noodles to my mother’s pantry in the late 70’s (see “Ramen Recipes”) I was ready to put it all together!

From that moment to this I have dedicated a good portion my time daydreaming or developing recipe’s that build complicated culinary master pieces into easy to prepare Grub. This was my first and still remains my favorite.

Ingredients:

1 Package Chicken Ramen Noodles
1 12-13 oz Can white chicken breast (Drained)
1 1/2 cup water
1/4 cup dry white wine
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/4 cup drained capers
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley

Prep:

In a 10 inch skillet melt 1 tablespoon of butter over medium high heat then add drained chicken breast. Let the chicken brown stirring carefully so you don’t break up the chicken, about 5-8 minutes.

Push the chicken to one side and stir in the the wine, scraping the bottom of the pan. Now add the remaining tablespoon of butter and capers to the skillet and let heat this heat for about 5 minutes. Once this mixture is reduced slightly add water, lemon juice and the contents of the Ramen package. Bring to a boil and cook for 5 minutes.

Remove the skillet from the heat, add the parsley, give it a quick stir and Grub!

Ramen Recipes

Ramen Noodles. What can I say? Never in the history of packaged foods has there been a product developed that more fits the “Grub For Guys” lifestyle. Remember that line, and quote it often because someday it will be synonymous with a great new movement in contemporary cooking!

I know. I get carried away sometimes. But if you remember from the introduction, a spur of the moment Ramen recipe is what inspired me to seek the real meaning of grub. And that in turn is what led to the development of Grub For Guys, the next great culinary experience. But to get to the beginning of my love affair with Ramen noodles we have to go back to my teenage years.

I still remember as if it where yesterday. One morning, fresh off an outing of breaking curfew and substance abuse laws, my good friend Sonny and I decided to raid my mother’s legendary pantry. Now when I say legendary I mean it. My mom’s pantry was the size of a small bedroom. And if you took the time to dig around you could find anything from pickled eggs to fancy preserves. Don’t get the wrong idea here. We were far from well off but my mom came from a German farming family and from what I can gather these folks could put away some grub. Looking back I’m sure that my mother would stock the pantry before she paid the electric bill. And with a house full of eight or ten boys I suppose that was the only way she maintained order (full bellies do take the edge off?).

As it turned out the Nobel Foods man had just made a delivery the day before and much to our surprise it included little packages of something called Ramen Noodles. Like true dedicated “Grubbers” we checked the directions to make sure it was quick and easy to prepare. Talk about surprised! I was beside myself! And you could have knocked sonny over with a weak left jab (as usual!) Right there on the label the cooking time was estimated as 5 minutes. 5 minutes!? Wow! This was too good to be true! So we cooked up a couple bags of Chicken Ramen Noodles. The experience was unbelievable. In just five minutes we had two bowls soup that were second only to home cooking! It was so good we had to try the Beef Ramen. We cooked up a couple of bags and it was even better! We decided right then and there that this Ramen phenomenon had to be explored further. So vowing to resume the carnage in the morning, or afternoon as it were, we stumbled off, bellies full for a sound nights sleep.

Looking back now, I realize that this was the beginning of a lifelong passion for me. That wonderful chicken soup taste! In 5 freakin’ minutes! From that moment on I was driven to take every traditional recipe I enjoyed and transform it into a Grub dish. Many of the great dishes my mother and aunts fed me while I was growing up have found their way to my Grub cookbooks, many in the form of Ramen recipes.

I have over 250 Ramen recipes in my personal collection. 250! And those are just the one’s I wrote down. I have never found a recipe that could not be adapted to include or be built around Ramen noodles. From Beef Bourguignon to Pollo Picatta you can enjoy the best of dishes Grub For Guys Ramen style.

Be sure to visit often because I have decided to dedicate the next few weeks on the “Grublog” to some of my favorite Ramen stories and favorite Ramen recipes.

To kick off this tour of my World of Ramen, my Ramenation, I give you: Ramen Chicken Piccata!

~ Grubmaster

Grub for Guys Enchilada Meat Loaf

So, we have a thing for Enchilada!

You know, sometimes, at the end of a long day you want a meal that feels hearty and home cooked. Something besides the usual can of “whatever”, slightly heated and randomly mixed with nacho flavored Doritos.

There’s just one problem. You’re way too lazy to do anything beyond opening a can (Beer). So you end up drinking the contents of this can and then opening another before you reach into the cupboard to find a can of Spaghetti O’s.

Well I have a solution for just such a problem! This meat loaf recipe only takes about10 minutes to prepare. Then you just stick it in the oven and drain about three more cans before you sit down to a nice hearty meal. And the beauty is? Nacho flavored Doritos go great with this baby!

Ingredients:

1 ½ lbs. ground beef
1 egg
1 jalapeno pepper (remove pith and chop finely)
½ cup chopped yellow onion
4 cloves garlic (crushed and finely chopped)
1 cup red enchilada sauce
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
½ cup rolled oats
½ tsp black pepper
¼ tsp cumin

Prep:

Pre heat oven to 350 degrees. Now mix all of the ingredients together. Make sure you mix them well. Press mixture into a 8”x4” ungreased pan pop it into the oven for 1 hour and munch!

Lazy and full? God I love Grub!!

Prep Time:

4 Beers
Serves 8

Dennis’ Tuna Sandwich Grub Style

I once had a good friend named Dennis. We were very tight, which is a little odd because Dennis put together more class in one sentence than I could put together in a week. Even though he was an obvious gentleman of position Dennis could “Grub” with the best of us. As a matter of fact this recipe was inspired by a late night raid of his wine cellar and subsequent tour of the pantry. The contrast of crispy toast, smooth tuna salad and tangy horseradish make every bite a surprise.

Ingredients:

2 Cans of tuna packed in water
2 Eggs
2 Tbsp. miracle whip
1/4 Tsp. Celery salt
Drained hot horseradish
Old Bay Seasoning
Black pepper to taste

Grubby Musing:

Canned tuna is a staple for any dedicated Grubber. And this recipe is straight forward, easy and quick. If this isn’t the best tuna salad sandwich you ever tasted then you don’t know tuna salad!

Prep:

Hard boil and dice the two eggs (throw out the yolk). Open and drain the tuna in a strainer. Now add the eggs, miracle whip and celery salt together and mix thoroughly.

Now toast the bread and spread on horseradish and tuna salad. Sprinkle liberally with old bay seasoning and pepper to taste.

Prep Time:

1 Beer
Serves 4