Friday, December 30, 2011

Salmon with Chutney

Seems like all I'm doing on here lately is good recipes collected through the years from friends & family & especially from places we've visited. Here in Florida (fish country) I dug out some of the recipes we have enjoyed in fresh fish area's especially, and things grown here like the huge beautiful Florida Avacoda's, etc. Today we ate Florida Salmon with Chutney, the influence of the English at Victoria Island across the Bay from Port Angeles, WA.

Make Chutney 1st - Peel 1 large or 2 small Pears finely chopped. Do the same with a large Mango that is slightly soft when pressing with your fingers. Sprinkle the two fruits with 1/8th tsp. ginger, pinch of cayenne pepper, 1/4 cup sugar. Mix together & serve over cooked Salmon.

Now to cook the salmon. Fry 2 nice size, but not real thick. Fresh Salmon Fillet's in a skillet, on the stove. in butter/olive oil (2 Tab. each). Brush the meat side of the fillet's lightly with chili powder. It takes away the fishy smell & taste yet you do not taste it when you eat it. One of the boys we worked with at Olympic Natl. Park shared the way his mother fixes fresh salmon. 1st his mother (after salting) brushes the meat side with brown sugar against the the way the meat lays. (if I was sewing corduoy I'd say against the grain). Coat it well and fry with the skin side UP with lid on skillet about 5 minutes on med. heat till brown on the under side. Turn over and easily peel off the skin with a fork, brushing that side with brown sugar & turn back over to brown on that side. It does not take long to cook fish. Over cooking it will make it dry. Serve this delicious salmon with the chutney on top. It is SOoooo good!! Lunch today for two.

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Another Seasonal "Local Ingredients" Recipes

I didn't get this recipe here. It's an old, old recipe I & another lady figured out the ingredients when we ate it at a restaurant in Missouri. Our husband's were Dairy Board Members for their areas and they all met in KC for a monthly meeting. Sometimes they met with other area board members from differnt areas which was this meeting. Well, now that I got that over here it is.
Lake of the Ozarks Shrimp Salad
Line a large dinner plate with lettuce. Through the years I've discovered I like the good old cut lettuce (like the kind I raised in the garden) that is much taller than I ever let mine get but it is a beautiful dark green and delicious. I cut out the hard lighter part in the middle of the leaf.which allows you to open the leaf up and will line the plate nicely. Now take 2 dinner knives and make a (+) plus, laying them across each other. Now you have 4 equal sections. Fill in each with the
Following:
1. orange sections, or Mandarin Orange slices, drained are very good. [11 oz.]
2. Crushed pineapple, drained [small can]
3. English Walnut, pieces [amout desired]
4. Small shrimp or cut up into pieces.[amount desired] You can remove the knives now.
1 [8.75 oz.] can of Fruit Cocktail, juice and all, blend till mush
add: 4 Tab. Miracle Whip
4 tsp. Marashino Cherry Juice
I add 2 tsp. Splenda because when I grew up all canned fruit was in a heavy sweet syrup & now they are in their own juice, which is great but just not as sweet as I am used to. Blend all together with a hand whip. A SPOONFUL OF SUGAR MAKES ANYTHING GO DOWN BETTER.
Serve the dressing poured over the 4 sections. I love it, and cover each of the 4 fruits VERY well.
Hope you enjoy it as much as I just did for my evening meal. This amount serves 2 very well.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

DECEMBER - BACK IN FLORIDA

It's almost hot today 80 degrees high. Wonderful breeze so we don't need to use the air-conditioner. DisneyWorld at MGM (now Hollywood) Studios Park Sunset Blvd. (one of the 4 parks in DisneyWORLD). We worked there 3 days a week Jan., Feb., & Mar. 1998 & 1999 after retirement. After 14 years we came down for the winter last year to see it again & how much it had changed. It was so nice to be in this beautiful weather all winter while Kansas is freezing, snowing, raining, etc. we came back again this winter. This time we are not visiting Disney except for FREE Downtown Disney. It has a wonderful restaurant, Fulton's Crab House and we have reservations to eat there at noon on Christmas Day. I've ate Ham or Turkey for Christmas in Kansas my whole life. We are spending our time (after I spent hours & hours on Google & picking up brochures, maps, etc. at the Visitor's Center as we crossed the border coming down. We have already seen some great places here in Central Florida we hadn't seen before. We didn't plan to get out on the highway this week before Christmas but I found a couple things close by that we had to see before Christmas and one was only on that day. We go to church on Sunday at Haines City (15 min. south of our campground) and after church last Sunday at 2pm was "Music in the park" & the 1st Calvary church had a "Walk through Bethlem" at 6:30pm.
We found a wonderful place here in the past, on the way back home from church on Sunday to our campground (Mouse Mt.). The wonderful place called Manny's owner is an old timer like us but always at the door to greet everyone lined up on both sides of the entrance door to the end of his bldg. I've tryed to get him to open one up in Topeka, KS but haven't got the job done yet. Not only is the steak exactly how you want it. Medium is really pink but no blood running & TENDER. But what keeps us all flocking back Sunday after Sunday is his wonderful dinner rolls & butter which (I think) has cinnamon & brown sugar in it. REAL BUTTER!!! Our church gets out at 11am & he doesn't open till 12pm but usually (with those long lines waiting) he opens about 10 min. till. 12pm all of us that have been sitting in the car in the parking lot start for the line about 15 min. . I walked up last Sunday and (of course) started talking to the couple next to me. When we were let in, the couple of us were seated almost across the aisle from us. Half way through our meal he came over and invited us to follow them when we finished eating and come to their house just down the road about 4 miles out of the city. There we were in 10 acres of beautiful fruit trees filled to overflowing with fruit. They looked like oranges but are really Murcott - Honey Tangerines. They peel like a tangerine but look and tast like an orange. Delicious orange!!!! His wife went and got the golf cart and we drove out into the beautiful fruit grove of trees. He pulled out 3 - bushel mesh fruit bags and started picking. I got to pick some, too. When he told us he was giving them to us and started filling the second bushel bag we pleaded with him to stop because we can't eat that many before they might go bad. He said,"Then past them out to your neighbors & friends at the park." Then he grabbed the 3rd bag and we drove back to their driveway where he has planted a few pink grapefruit trees & yes, we got a bushel of grapefruit, too. He would absolutely not hear to it that we pay for them. They are a gift. So we tryed to send some to our family back home but Florida will not let us mail them out. Post Office said, NO NO. So we started doing what he told us and pass them out to neighbors & friends we've made in the park since we got here Dec. 1. There just isn't anything like a fresh tree picked fruit.. Not gased at the Orange Plant so they are a beautiful orange color for the public. When I gave them out to people from Minnesota, Michigan, Massachusetts, Up-State New York, etc. I tell them next year at this time start bugging their grocery store to get some wonderful Murcott Honey-Tangerines. I am trying to help out Jerry's price for his fruit Marketing Marketing --Supply & Demand. As farmers in Kansas we know how we have no control over what we will get paid for our products. Two men that grew up as kids on farms, one in Florida in Orange Groves & one in Kansas -corn, wheat, alfalfa, dairy, beef, pigs, chickens, etc. had such a wonderful time comparing experiences. We learned so much from each other. Why doesn't everyone talk to strangers? I have learned & seen so much in my life because I talk to strangers. Next page I'm going to tell you some of the places we have gone to and plan to go to while we are here. Tourist stuff.