Monthly Archives: February 2009

Grilled Swordfish Steaks topped with Roasted Eggplant Caponata

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Light, healthy and intensely flavorful thanks to the roasting.

Ingredients:

  • 2 swordfish steaks about 1″ in thickness
  • 1 Tbs extra virgin olive oil
  • Salt and Pepper to taste

Caponata:

  • 1 medium eggplant, peeled and cubed
  • 1 pint cherry tomatoes
  • 1 medium white onion, chopped
  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 orange, red or yellow bell peppers.
  • 3 Tbs red wine vinegar
  • 1/4 tsp nutmeg
  • 1/4 tsp oregano
  • 1/4 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
  • 1/4 tarragon
  • 1/4 cup capers
  • handful fresh basil, chopped
  • 1/4 cup kalamatas (about 10 olives), chopped
  • 4 Tbs extra virgin olive oil

Directions

  1. Preheat your oven to 450°F
  2. Heat a skillet over medium-high heat and add in 2 Tbs extra virgin olive oil.  Season with salt and pepper and saute for about 5 minutes or until the onions begin to break down and become slighty translucent.  Add in your garlic and saute 2 minutes more.  Remove from heat and set aside.
  3. Grab two cookie sheets and line both with aluminum foil.  Add your tomatoes and peppers to one and drizzle with a few Tbs of extra virgin olive oil and a few generous pinches of salt and pepper.   Toss with your hands to coat.  Spray the other sheet with non stick cooking spray and add your eggplant.  Drizzle with a few Tbs of extra virgin olive oil and a few generous pinches of salt and pepper.   Toss to coat.  
  4. Roast the tomatoes and peppers in a 450°F oven for about 10 minutes and the eggplant for about 15 minutes total. 
  5.  In a large bowl combine your onion mixture, eggplant, tomato mixture, capers, kalamatas, tarragon, crushed red pepper flakes, oregano, nutmeg, red wine vinegar, salt, pepper and basil.   Mix and sort of break up the eggplant and tomatoes a bit and set aside.
  6. Season your swordfish with salt, pepper and olive oil and place on your grill.   Grill about 2 minutes per side.
  7. To serve, top your swordfish with a generous helping of your roasted caponata.

James – Techie

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I’m James, and I’m the photographer and general techie behind the Fashionable Foodie.  My duties (tee hee, I said dooty) include mangling WordPress, screwing up PHP code and maintaining no real understanding of CSS.  I also take pictures of the food, misspell words and occasionally contribute a recipe or two.  I went to school for filmmaking and I now work for a gigantic government contracting company providing specialized support to an agency of the Treasury Department in Washington DC.  I live in northern Virginia with my wife Gretchen and our two dogs, Nugget and Sylar. 

I keep a photography blog over at ishotalot.com and you can check out all the articles I’ve written for the site here.

Favorite food to cook:

Chili.  There’s something about the long and methodical method of cooking chili that is comforting and soothing.  I always forget how much time it requires, but I also always end up loving the resulting pot of spicy, meaty goodness.  Cut open a snack bag of Frito’s, spoon in some chili and top with fresh onions and some cheese and you’re riding a rocket to tummy heaven.

Favorite item of clothing:

If money were no object, my wardrobe would look very different then it does today.  I love Kenneth Cole’s menswear and shoes, I feel most comfortable in a great pair of jeans and more then anything, I love to have a huge variety of shoes.  I guess my all-time favorite piece of clothing would probably be an ancient pair of Robucks Jeans I have (yes, that’s the Sears store brand).  They’ve been patched and repatched, but the cut and color are really unlike anything else I’ve ever found.

Guilty pleasure:

Outback Steakhouse cheesefries, Geno’s wiz wit, and Grimaldi’s Pizza.  I certainly love an elegantly composed plate of food, but my inner pig always wants something covered in a deep glaze of cheese.   Outback’s cheesefries take the cake for the most unhealthy and deliciously disgusting thing you can eat, Geno’s wiz wit is the best cheesesteak I’ve ever had and Grimaldi’s Pizzeria at the bottom of the Brooklyn Bridge is the best pizza in the world.

Soundtrack to your life:

I’ve got AA Bondy’s American Hearts and The National’s Boxer in heavy rotation right now.  I’ve also been known to rock out to Sheer Terror or Damnation AD one minute and chill out with some John Prine or Randy Newman the next.

The 70′s called, they want their eggs back

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You’ve been waiting for years to finally show your grandma up.  Here’s your chance!  Deviled Eggs topped with scallions and crispy pancetta.  A new spin on an old favorite!

 

Ingredients:

  • 6 hard boiled eggs, cooled, halved and de-yolked
  • 1 scallion, finely chopped
  • 1 tbs yellow Mustard
  • 1 tbs Dijon Mustard
  • 1/4 cup Mayo
  • 1 tsp Paprika
  • 1 tsp Celery salt
  • 1/4 tsp pepper
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1/4 tsp Cayenne
  • 1 pack of pancetta, usually yields about 5 slices

Directions:

Place your eggs in a medium saucepan and fill with enough water to cover the eggs and go about 1-2″ above them. Here comes the weird part…I learned this from the gorgeous, domestic goddess herself, Nigella Lawson. Take a match, light it, blow it out and place it in your pot with your eggs and put them on to boil. Evidently, this was an old trick she learned from her grandmother, the idea being that the match somehow prevents the eggs from cracking. Well, I’ve done this for years now and I haven’t had an egg crack since!

When your eggs come to a rolling boil, turn off and remove them from the heat. Cover the pot and let them sit for 12 minutes. I find that setting a timer here is crucial as I’ve all too often ended up with over done eggs. After 12 minutes, place the eggs in a colander and run under cold water for a minute or two. Allow them to cool about 20 minutes before peeling them.

While eggs are boiling, heat a small pan over low-medium heat and add in about 1 tbs of olive oil. Cube your pancetta and add to your pan. Pancetta is basically Italian style bacon that hasn’t been smoked. It has a much lower fat content than traditional bacon, thus it needs a bit of oil to start. Cook your pancetta until most of the fat has rendered off, and you’re left with crispy little bits of pork goodness. Remove with a slotted spoon and drain on paper towel.

In a medium bowl place your yolks, mustards, mayo and spices and mix to combine. Now you can get fancy here if you want and pipe the filling into your egg shells or just carefully spoon the mixture in. To serve, top with your scallions and crispy pancetta.

 

Tips:

  • If you do in fact want to go the fancy route and pipe the mixture into your egg shells, you can easily make your own piping bag out of a plain old Ziploc! Spoon your mixture into the bag and push it down. Snip off one of the bottom corners with a pair of scissors, but take care to only snip a very small piece off so you don’t end up with huge blobs of egg mixture coming out. Point the snipped corner at your hard-boiled whites and gently squeeze the bag to fill. Voila, instant piping bag!