Welcome to my eulogy series, mourning the loss of Taco Bell menu icons all across the country. Neither God nor the Taco Bell CEO will save our favorites, so its up to us to do it ourselves. Wednesday night, I put up a poll asking my readers what they would like me to recreate this weekend: the Grilled Steak Taco, or the Loaded Grillers. By Friday July 24th, eleven of you voted for me to recreate the grilled steak taco.
Let’s face it. Making a grilled steak taco isn’t exactly hard. You grill a steak. You cut it up. You put it on a tortilla. Boom, bang, done. The actually interesting part of the Taco Bell Grilled Steak Taco is actually the Avocado Ranch ON the chopped up steak. It's easily the reason this taco is disappearing from Taco Bell Menus soon since their steak remains for steak chalupas. I attempted the taco with both a flank steak and a cut referred to as ‘charcoal steak’ which was significantly cheaper, and I don’t believe it makes much difference beyond your comfort as a cook. My husband vastly preferred the taste of the flank steak, so do what you like. The grilled steak on the actual Taco Bell version is also cooked straight up well since its meat that comes to them in a bag. I advise you cook your steak how you would normally like to eat it, if not slightly more done so it's not bleeding through your tortilla. You can find the recipe for my version of the Avocado Ranch here to get yourself started on your mourning feast of Grilled Steak Soft Tacos. I recommend you make the ranch at least an hour before you plan to serve. The time in the fridge helps the flavor of the herbs seep into the fats.
0 Comments
My friends. The root of the problem with the Grilled Steak Soft Taco at Taco Bell is not the steak-- but the Avocado Ranch. We know that other steak items remain on the menu, so it must stand to reason that something else is leaving…. And my heart tells me it is the Avocado Ranch. To prepare you for both Grilled Steak Soft Taco and the absence of the sauce, I have put together my own Avocado Ranch to fill the hole in your heart. We've had it in the fridge since Sunday, and the flavor has only improved. I wouldn't recommend keeping it longer than week with all of the dairy product in there. The Lemon juice helps preserve the avocado a little longer. Recipe under the cut Based on a ‘baked egg hash’ from the 1942 Cookbook ‘Thrifty Cooking in Wartime’, I made breakfast on July 12 with products mostly from my own garden or the Saturday Morning Farmer’s Market. Market Meals will be a new segment now that the growing season is in full, beautiful swing. We may even get more than one out each week. This Pie Plate Hash is NOT a pretty breakfast, but it is a yummy one. We’ve tried it with several different flavor combinations since I started cooking from my vintage books, but this iteration came out the best. It's a satisfying breakfast that you can pull together quickly to feed two to three people. The two vendors that primarily supplied this redo of an old recipe are Cold Climate Farms, one of my favorite growers this season, and Full Circle Community Farm. Check them both out on Facebook, and if you’re in the Green Bay Area, at the Saturday Morning Market on Washington Street. Ingredients:
These potstickers that I have self deprecatingly named ‘White Lady’s Fried Dumplings’, are in no way meant to be authentic. These dumplings are a great way of using up produce in your fridge that is on their way out, as long as you can maintain a meat mixture with some stickage. Normally, corn flour is used as a binder. I had potato starch. A single package of gyoza wraps can make you close to fifty if you are careful while filing them. There are certainly more authentic recipes out there, but if you want to play around with your own mixture fillings, this is a good base to work from. They are best served with a shoyu tare dipping sauce, but my husband and I also enjoyed them on top of a noodle soup the next day. Enjoy! Ingredients
Is it barbeque if you make it in the oven? I won’t make that decision. Barbeque is one of those American cuisines that can be as divisive as it is unifying. Most of us love a juicy piece of meat slathered in sauce or crusted in dry rub, but we all have opinions on how it should be done. So, if you think baking ribs in the oven is not barbeque, don’t call this barbeque. Call it cheating. These ribs are both dry rubbed and sauced over the course of what can be a four hour prep time. I like to take the ribs out of my fridge about an hour before I apply the dry rub to allow them to come to temperature, and then let the dry rub sit for another forty-five minutes to an hour on the meat before cooking. The sauce we put together is very vinegar forward, so I would not recommend it for anything other than slathering the ribs. The sourness of the sauce is best employed as a glaze coating on the ribs. It will seem like too much when you taste it independently. Originally posted 12/7/19 in the Archive I have been on a roll this last month! Not only did I make my own chicken stock, I made my own mushroom stock and then I made risotto with that mushroom stock. MMMMM. I’ll admit that I’ve had mixed results trying to make risotto in the past, mushroom based risotto included. The first time I ever made it, it may have actually been the first dish I ever made that my husband rejected outright. Let’s just say this one did not suffer the same fate. Like a lot of risotto recipes, this can take awhile. Buckle up if you want to attempt this, probably on a long evening rather than a week night. I’ve got all the time in the world on weeknights right now-- not everyone does. It went great with the lamb chop that we made that night. The broth-wine combo that we use to bulk up the arborio rice comes in very earthy, so it’s a lovely pairing for red meat. Let’s start with the broth:
Originally posted 12/19/19 in the Archive I’ve had so much time on my hands the last few weeks that today, I bring to you yet ANOTHER recipe. It’s a good time to be checking in to Eating Normal regularly if you’re looking for new things to try with me. Prior to the holiday weekend, I had a pound of ground beef/pork mix that needed to get used. I had defrosted it for pork bao buns the day prior, and with those buns made from the first half of that meat, I needed to do something. We’re still on a kick about food waste around here, after all. So, I opened the fridge. I had some whole lettuce that I impulsed purchased during a raid on another new grocery store, a pack of four different varieties in fact. I chose the sturdiest looking leaves out of the three lettuce heads and decided to try and make something a little healthier than the plate of nachos I embraced for lunch the two days prior.
Originally posted 5/20/20 in the Archive The time of the budget has risen across America in a way rarely seen in our history, so allow me to introduce the first of our budget meals: Leftover Fry Hash, a quick and easy way to use up the potato product of a previous night’s take out order. I thought I was a fucking genius when i woke up at 6 am and thought, oh my god what if I use my fries for a hash? Turns out, I was a genius. It’s one of the few times I’ve cooked breakfast for myself and had to turn out a second plate for my husband when he woke up an hour later. Looking for a meal that costs less than two dollars per individual serving? This Leftover Fry Hash is for you. The below recipe is for one serving. You may multiply as needed for the number of mouths you have to feed. If you don't have leftover fries from a recent take out order or restaurant visit, feel free to use any type of frozen potato product you have on hand. Allow proper time for cooking according to the package. Ingredients & Cost:
Final Cost by Whole Items: $7.19 Final Cost Per Serving: $1.57
|
Archives
February 2024
Categories
All
|