Crispy Roasted Potatoes

Potatoes – especially buttered potatoes – are hard to beat as a side dish, especially when they’re so easy to make with a minimum of ingredients.

You really should try this recipe out.

Ingredients

• YUKON GOLD POTATOES, 2 pounds
• UNSALTED BUTTER, 4 tablespoons, melted
• FRESH THYME, 1½ teaspoons
• SEA SALT, 1½ teaspoons
• DRIED CHILI FLAKES (Optional), ½ teaspoon

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375°F.
2. With a sharp knife or mandoline, slice the potatoes into ⅛"-thick pieces.
3. Brush the bottom of a 10" oven-safe fry pan with 1 tablespoon butter. Arrange the potato pieces in the pan vertically, but at a slight angle, in a circular pattern.
4. Brush top with remaining butter. Sprinkle with thyme, salt and chili flakes, if using.
5. Bake for 1 hour or until the potatoes are tender and the edges are crispy. Let sit for 10 minutes before serving.

Home-Style Shrimp Curry

 

This is a yummy dish and simple recipe. The only humbug thing was setting up the food processor and taking it apart to clean afterwards.

At first, I thought there was too much onion. That opinion changed. Next, I thought it looked like marinara and would taste as such. That changed too. Finally, I thought the yogurt would make it too sour. Again, I was wrong.

And you know what? The curry blended in well with the sauce and I could hardly taste it (add a lot more if you're a curry lover), and the jalapeño became really mild, so mild that even the wife (who's an chili-phobe) didn't mind. I omitted the cilantro (because I don't like it) and the Italian parsley (because I couldn't find any at the supermarket).

It was great over hot steamed rice.

Ingredients

 

• CURRY POWDER, 1 teaspoon
• SALT, 1 teaspoon
• VEGETABLE OIL, 3 1/2 tablespoons
• ONION, 1 medium, quartered
• GARLIC, 3 cloves, minced
• GINGER, 1 two-inch piece, peeled and minced
• DICED TOMATOES, one 14.5-ounce can
• (Optional) CHILI PEPPERS, 1 to 2 serrano or jalapeños, halved and seeded
• SHRIMP, medium, 1 pound, peeled and deveined
• PLAIN YOGURT, 1/2 cup
• CILANTRO or FLAT-LEAF ITALIAN PARSLEY, fresh, 1/3 cup, chopped
• SWEET RED PEPPER, 2 Tablespoons, chopped or slivered fine, for garnish

Directions

1. Fine-chop the onion in a food processor, drain and reserve the excess liquid. Set the onion aside.
2. Combine the garlic and ginger and set aside.
3. Puree the tomatoes with the can's tomato liquid plus the onion juice and enough water to total one cup.
4. Heat the remaining 3 tablespoons oil in a Dutch oven or deep skillet over medium-high heat.
5. Add the onion and cook until golden, about six minutes.
6. Add the garlic-ginger mixture, chilies (if using), salt and curry powder. Stir-fry until slightly browned, a couple more minutes.
7. Add the tomato puree and simmer until thickened, about 8 minutes.
8. Add the shrimp, cover and cook over medium-low heat until the shrimp are just firm, 3 to 4 minutes.
9. Remove from the heat, then stir in the yogurt and half the cilantro (if using).
10. Serve over steamed rice and garnish with the remaining cilantro (if using), and the red peppers.

Cheesy Sausage Biscuit Muffins

I got this simple recipe from Facebook.

It called for flaky layered biscuits, which I couldn’t find, so I substituted Pillsbury's jumbo biscuits, using half of each biscuit dough per muffin.

It also called for plain sausage, but I’d bought a huge amount of Italian sausage at Costco (you know how that goes), so that’s what I used.

Then, instead of just using cheddar cheese, I mixed in Mozzarella because after all, the muffins had morphed into Italian.

These are so easy to make, and so delicious.

Ingredients

• PILLSBURY BISCUITS, 1 ten-count can
• ITALIAN SAUSAGE , ½ pound in casings
• MOZZARELLA CHEESE, ½ cup shredded
• CHEDDAR CHEESE, ½ cup shredded

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400.
2. Mix uncooked sausage and cheese gently until well blended. Shape into 20 balls of equal size.
3. Remove biscuits from cans and separate each biscuit into two layers, making 20 total biscuit layers. Press one layer of biscuit into cup of lightly greased mini-cupcake pan. Repeat with remaining layers.
4. Place sausage-cheese ball in each biscuit cup. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes or until biscuits are browned and sausage balls are bubbly.