Fake Ginger

fried

Zucchini Fritters

A few weeks back Brandy contacted me about being a part of a cookbook review for Faith’s new cookbook, An Edible Mosaic. Stoked doesn’t begin to describe how I felt about this opportunity. An Edible Mosaic is a Middle Eastern cookbook which is my alltime favorite cuisine but it’s not something I ever really cook at home so this book is perfect for me!

Over the next few weeks I’ll be sharing some recipes from An Edible Mosaic and giving a full review of the book. A full list of bloggers participating can be found here. Get excited, y’all! I know I am!

The first recipe we were asked to make was Zucchini Fritters which I’m sure everyone has had at least once in their life. But these are different from the traditional fritters we’re used to here in the US. These are more of a savory pancake with zucchini throughout. They were absolutely delicious! My husband loves zucchini so I’m excited to make these for him when he comes home.

They were also very simple and quick to make. You guys know that I don’t enjoy frying but this was no more difficult than making regular breakfast pancakes.

More Zucchini Recipes

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Yield: 6 servings

Zucchini Fritters (A Mid-East Feast)

Zucchini Fritters (A Mid-East Feast)

from An Edible Mosaic

Ingredients

  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 onion, diced
  • 3/4 lb 350 g zucchini (about 1 medium), grated
  • 2 large cloves garlic, crushed in a mortar and pestle with 1 teaspoon salt
  • 4 large eggs
  • 4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 bunch fresh parsley, minced
  • Pinch of freshly ground black pepper
  • Canola oil, for frying

Instructions

  1. Heat the olive oil in a medium skillet over medium heat; add the onion and cook until it starts to soften, about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the zucchini and cook until softened and the water has evaporated, about 8 minutes, stirring occasionally; add the garlic and cook 1 minute more, stirring constantly. Cool slightly.
  2. Lightly beat together the eggs, flour, parsley, and black pepper in a medium bowl. Stir in the zucchini mixture.
  3. Add enough canola oil to a large nonstick skillet to lightly coat the bottom; heat the oil over medium heat.
  4. Drop the batter into the hot pan using a small (about 2 tablespoon) or large (about 4 tablespoon) scoop. Fry until set and golden on one side, about 2 minutes; flip and cook until set and golden on the other side, about 1 minute.
  5. Transfer the cooked fritters to a paper towel-lined plate to drain any excess oil, and cook the remaining egg mixture the same way, adding more oil to the skillet as necessary.

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Nutrition Information:

Yield:

6

Serving Size:

1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 144Total Fat: 10gSaturated Fat: 2gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 8gCholesterol: 124mgSodium: 403mgCarbohydrates: 8gFiber: 1gSugar: 2gProtein: 6g

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© Amanda Livesay
I was sent a copy of An Edible Mosaic for review but was not compensated in any other way.

Chicken Club Egg Rolls

Chicken Club Egg Rolls – the most delicious egg roll recipe! Filled with chicken, bacon, avocado, and cheddar cheese. Plus, an amazing avocado ranch dipping sauce! 

Chicken Club Egg Rolls - the most delicious egg roll recipe! Filled with chicken, bacon, avocado, and cheddar cheese. Plus, an amazing avocado ranch dipping sauce!

It’s always exciting for me to receive a blog I already know for my Secret Recipe Club assignment.

This month I got Erin of Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts. Erin organized that Colorado Fires fundraiser that I participated in and I’m happy to call her a friend.

When I sat down to pick a recipe from Erin’s blog, I had brownies on the brain and knew Erin would have the perfect recipe for me.

Buuuut as soon as I opened her blog, my 2 year old spotted these and started shrieking “THAT ONE! THAT ONE! THAAAAAAAAAT ONE!”

So yeah, I made her Chicken Club Egg Rolls.

…

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Fried Pickles

Fried Pickles

One last Superbowl idea for you!

I don’t usually like doing fried foods when I’m entertaining. They take a lot of time and since you can’t really do them ahead of time, you wind up spending most of your time standing over the stove.

But as we all know, fried foods are almost always crowd-pleasers! These fried pickles take no time at all so they’re perfect for cooking up right as your guests are walking through the door

And umm… fried pickles? One of man’s greatest inventions!

(I am never going to get rid of that Natural Light that my husband’s friends left in my fridge. I’ve been cooking with it at least once a week but it seems to be multiplying. Send beer recipes.)

Fried Pickles

5 from 1 vote
Print
Fried Pickles
Ingredients
  • 2 cups pickles drained and patted dry
  • 1 egg
  • 1 - 1¼ cup beer
  • 1 cup flour
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • oil for frying
Instructions
  1. Pour oil into a heavy pot, a couple inches high. Heat over medium-high.
  2. Whisk together egg, 1 cup beer, flour, and salt until smooth. If batter is too thick, add in the other ¼ cup beer.
  3. Once oil is hot, dip pickles, one at a time, in the batter. Allow excess batter to drip off and then drop the pickles in the oil. Fry until golden brown, about 2 minutes on each side.

Fried Pickles

Falafel

Last night when I was making our little falafel balls, I got to thinking about how easy meal prep is when the meal is meatless. There’s no meat to worry about, don’t have to stress over expiration dates (don’t tell me I’m the only procrastinator here), don’t have to pull anything out of the freezer, etc. I just opened the cabinet, grabbed a can of chickpeas, and was ready to cook.

To make this recipe even simpler, I went ahead and processed everything but if you don’t have a processor, just diced your veggies and use a fork to mash the chickpeas. You don’t want a smooth paste so mashing works just fine.

I’ve made these twice in the past 2 weeks. That’s saying something because you know I hate frying things. (I burnt my eyelid last night, thanks for asking.)

We love this recipe, obviously. Sometimes I make pita to go with them and sometimes we make lettuce wraps with broken up falafel, tomatoes, and yogurt sauce. It’s good just about any way you can think of.

Print
Falafel
Ingredients
  • 1 15 ounce can chickpeas (garbanzo beans), drained
  • 1 onion quartered
  • 1 tablespoon dried parsley
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 1 egg
  • 2 teaspoons ground cumin
  • 1 teaspoon ground coriander
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 dash pepper
  • 1 pinch cayenne pepper
  • 1 teaspoon lemon juice
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 cup panko bread crumbs
  • oil for frying
Instructions
  1. In the bowl of your food processor, add chickpeas, onions, parsley, and garlic (I have a very tiny processor and just did this in 3 batches). Process until pieces are small but haven’t turned into a paste. You want it a little chunky. Pour into a large bowl and add egg, cumin, coriander, salt, pepper, lemon juice, and baking powder. Stir together to make sure everything is evenly distributed. Add bread crumbs and combine.
  2. In a large, heavy bottomed pan, heat about 1 inch of oil over medium high heat. When oil is ready shape falafel into balls or patties and fry until golden brown, just a couple minutes per side. Drain on paper towel lined plate.

Fried Green Tomato BLT

My husband and I talk about food a lot. What he wants me to make. What I want to blog. What we wish we were eating right this second. Our last few conversations have centered around tomatoes and how they’re usually too mushy for us. So this past Friday night when I was grocery shopping (too much excitement for you, right?) I sent him a text saying I picked up some green tomatoes and his response was… well, not appropriate for a family friendly blog such as this. ;) Let’s just say he was scared.

As soon as I saw the tomatoes I knew what I wanted to do with them. BLTs are one of our favorite meals and I thought a fried green tomato would kind of shake things up a little bit without adding much work to the simple meal. And they did exactly that. They added a whole new texture with the crispy cornmeal crust that just really put the sandwich over the top. I’m not sure we’ll be able to go back to eating regular BLTs after this!

Fried Green Tomato BLT

Fried Green Tomato BLT

Ingredients

For the tomatoes:

  • 2 large green tomatoes, sliced
  • 1 egg
  • 1/4 cup milk
  • 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1/4 cup cornmeal
  • 1/4 cup Panko breadcrumbs
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon pepper
  • about 3/4 cup canola oil, for frying

For the sandwiches:

  • Kaiser rolls
  • mayo, mustard, any other condiments
  • bacon, sliced in half and cooked
  • iceberg lettuce

Instructions

  1. Pour oil in a heavy-bottomed pan; heat over medium-high heat.
  2. Whisk egg and milk together in a medium sized bowl. Set aside.
  3. On a plate, stir together flour, cornmeal, Panko, salt, and pepper.
  4. Once oil is heated, dip tomato slices one by one in egg and then flour. Make sure tomato is coated in flour mixture and then place in oil. Fry 3 or 4 at a time, making sure not to crowd the tomatoes. Fry for about 3 minutes or until the crust is a golden brown; flip and cook other side until golden. Drain on paper towels.
  5. Assemble sandwiches and enjoy!

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© Amanda Livesay


Funnel Cakes

Our fair comes to town every October. When I was younger, it was the highlight of my year. I never understood why my mom chose to stay home while my dad and I practically made ourselves sick on the rickety rides and fried food. I get it now. It’s lame, it’s crowded, and it’s overpriced. Spencer and I went for the first few years of our marriage and every year we’d walk away mad at ourselves that we spent the money. The one thing we never regretted? A funnel cake.

Funnel cakes are just fried dough, like a misshapen doughnut covered in powdered sugar. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen them outside of a fair until yesterday when I fried up a couple in my own kitchen. You know I don’t like to fry things often but sometimes you just want a funnel cake.

They were so much simpler than I expected! The dough was a snap to put together and since there’s no rising, you can fry them right away. It took me no time to whip these up. They were the perfect extra-special afternoon snack. Crisp on the outside but nice and soft on the inside. Everything a funnel cake should be, pretty much.

A couple notes: I don’t own a funnel so I used a pastry bag with the end snipped off. It worked fine but I recommend only adding a cup at a time to the bag because the dough will leak out of the bag while you’re working. I also don’t own a thermometer so to test the oil I just dropped a teeny bit of dough into the oil. If it floats to the top pretty quickly, that means the oil is ready.

Print
Funnel Cakes
Servings: 8 6-inch cakes
Ingredients
  • 6 cups vegetable oil or shortening for frying
  • 1 1/2 cups 12 ounces milk
  • 2 large eggs
  • 2 cups 8 1/2 ounces all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 2 tablespoons 7/8 ounce sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 3/4 cup 3 ounces powdered sugar
Instructions
  1. Heat oil or shortening to 375F in a very deep, heavy pan with at least 3-inch-deep sides.
  2. In a large bowl, beat together the milk and eggs. Combine the flour, baking powder, sugar, cinnamon and salt. Stir into the egg mixture until smooth.
  3. While covering the funnel hole with 1 hand, pour in 1 cup of batter. Star from the center of the frying oil and, in a swirling motion, pour batter in concentric and overlapping circles to make a 6- or 7- inch round.
  4. Fry on both sides until golden brown. Remove and drain on paper towels Sprinkle with powdered sugar and serve warm.

Cheyenne Burgers

Last week a huge box of Nature’s Pride buns and rolls showed up on my doorstep courtesy of Foodbuzz. There was only one thing to do with all that bread: a burger party!

I’m not going to lie, I didn’t cook the burgers. It was my birthday and I don’t really enjoy cooking burgers so my husband was nice enough to do that part for me. I did make the BBQ sauce, onion rings, and pickles though.

The burgers were great! The meat itself was just seasoned with salt and pepper since there was so much extra goodness going on. The BBQ sauce was smoky and spicy thanks to the chipotle pepper. The bacon added more smokiness and along with the onion rings, provided a great crunch. And the sharp cheddar? Can you really go wrong with sharp cheddar?

Now let’s talk about the onion rings.

In my world, there are 2 types of onion rings. Fast food onion rings and diner onion rings. The fast food ones are limp, soggy, and almost feel like they have a bread crumb coating. The diner ones are fresh, crispy, and the epitome of amazing. These onion rings are total diner rings but better. If I had known how easy it was to make great onion rings, I wouldn’t have been making late night Burger King runs when I was pregnant.

I was going to take better pictures of the rings but by the time I got the baby asleep and made it back into the kitchen they were gone! So you get my “draining on a paper towel” picture.

All in all, a delicious burger. Too much BBQ sauce though. It made a bowl full and we hardly put a dent in it.

Print
Cheyenne Burgers
from Bobby Flay
Ingredients
For the burgers:
  • 2 teaspoons olive oil
  • 2 pounds ground beef
  • salt & pepper
For the onion rings:
  • 2 cups canola oil
  • 2 large onions sliced into rings
  • 2 cups flour
  • 1 cup buttermilk
  • salt and pepper
For the smoky barbecue sauce:
  • 2 tablespoons canola oil
  • 1 onion chopped
  • 3 cloves garlic chopped
  • 1 cup ketchup
  • 2 tablespoons ancho chile powder
  • 1 tablespoon paprika
  • 1 heaping tablespoon dijon mustard
  • 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 chipotle chile in adobo chopped
  • 2 tablespoons dark brown sugar
  • 1 tablespoon honey
  • 1 tablespoon molasses
  • Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
Instructions
To make the burgers:
  1. Heat oil in a large pan over medium-high heat. Season ground beef with salt and pepper. Shape into 8 burgers. Cook about 5 minutes per side or until cooked through. Top burgers with bacon, sharp cheddar cheese, onion rings, BBQ sauce, and any other toppings you desire.
To make the onion rings:
  1. Heat oil in a large pan to 360 degrees.
  2. Put flour in a bowl and season with salt and pepper. Do the same with buttermilk in a separate bowl.
  3. Dredge onion rings in flour, dip in buttermilk, and then dredge in flour once more. Fry until golden brown, turning once or twice, about 4 minutes. Drain on paper towels. Season with salt.
To make the smoky barbecue sauce:
  1. Heat the oil over medium-high heat in a heavy-bottomed saucepan. Add the onion; cook until soft, 3 to 4 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute. Add the ketchup and 1/3 cup water, bring to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the remaining ingredients (except salt and pepper); simmer for 10 minutes, or until thickened, stirring occasionally.
  2. Transfer the mixture to a food processor; puree until smooth. Season with salt and pepper. Pour into a bowl; cool to room temperature. Spoon on burgers

Tempura Fried Asparagus

I have been saying that I wanted to try making tempura fried vegetables since the first time I had it at a sushi place 3 years ago but my hatred of frying has kept me from doing it. I had some asparagus on it’s last leg this week and decided to just get it over with.

Tempura batter is a mixture of flour and cornstarch and then seltzer is used as the liquid. It’s a really light batter that gets super crispy and delicious. It’s great on just about anything but sweet potato and asparagus are my favorite. The sauce is a honey mustard but next time I think I’m going to make some kind of wasabi sauce. For some reason, spicy really works with the tempura batter.

I doubled the recipe and could have easily eaten more. It was kind of ridiculous how much I ate. It was really, really good.

Print
Tempura Fried Asparagus
from Rachael Ray
Ingredients
  • 1/4 cup yogurt
  • 2 tablespoons mayonnaise
  • 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
  • 1 tablespoon honey
  • 4 cups vegetable oil
  • 3/4 cup flour
  • 1/2 cup cornstarch
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 cup seltzer at room temperature
  • 1 pound asparagus
Instructions
  1. In a small bowl, stir together the yogurt, mayonnaise, mustard and honey.
  2. In a large saucepan, heat the oil over medium-high heat until the temperature registers 375° on a deep-fry thermometer.
  3. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cornstarch, salt and baking soda. Whisk in the seltzer until smooth.
  4. Add the asparagus to the batter and turn to coat. Transferring one piece at a time, add about one-quarter of the asparagus to the hot oil and cook, turning, until golden and crisp, 1 1/2 to 2 minutes. Drain on paper towels. Repeat with the remaining asparagus, allowing the oil to return to 375° between batches. Serve hot with the dipping sauce.