Author Archives: Parker

White Girl Can Cook Wings

Wings and Rings…

Back in 2008, I was cooking for a friend of mine for the first time. She and her now hubs, had just introduced me to JP, and I was making the meal so we could dish about my new man. (Talk about blind date success!) Little did I know, before dinner was served, she’d had a quick convo about whether she’d need a real dinner after my meal…It went something like this:

“White girl cooking chicken wings? You better have something ready when I get home.”

There apparently was some doubt that this black soul food queen trapped in the body of a white girl could throw down in the kitchen…Let’s just say, not only was she pleasantly surprised, but since then, I have catered her wedding shower, her rehearsal dinner and her baby shower….AND, I have officially been dubbed by her friends and family, “White Girl Can Cook Productions.”

It’s a title I wear proudly!

Oh, and those delish looking onion rings shown in the pic? Here’s THAT recipe.

Ingredients:
2 shallots
4 garlic cloves
2 Tb butter
1 chopped jalapeño
1 1/2 cups BBQ Sauce (I use Sweet Baby Ray’s)
1 cup Buffalo Wing Sauce (I use Frank’s Red Hot Wings)
1/2 cup chili garlic sauce (I use Sriracha Hot Garlic Chili Sauce, aka “Rooster” sauce)
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 Jack Daniel’s Bourbon
1 family pack of chicken wings
flour for dredging

Wings: Preheat oven to 425. Dredge chicken wings in flour and place on a well greased pan. Bake for 30 minutes and flip over. Continue baking for 20-25 more minutes until crispy.

Sauce: Saute shallots (substitute a medium onion if you need to) and garlic cloves in 2 TB butter on medium heat until soft but not browned, about a minute. Add chopped jalapenos and saute for another minute. Add the rest of the ingredients and stir until well combined. Let simmer on stove top on low heat until wings are done. Dip wings in sauce after they come out of the oven and serve immediately with additional BBQ sauce on the side.

**Mix some fresh crumbled blue cheese with full-fat sour cream, a squeeze of lemon juice and a pinch of salt and dip wings if you’d like…

Easy to make and your friends will be blown away by the delish factor! (Especially if you’re a white girl!)

Salsas “del Toro” and Celebrity Free Passes

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Refreshing and Delicious Mango Salsa

I posted these recipes on my Facebook page over the summer, but these are great year round! Mango salsa is da bomb on fish tacos and the black bean salsa packs a flavor punch to burritos. Think Benecio del Toro on a plate. Is it getting caliente in here, or is it just me?

Delicioso

Benecio is my ‘celebrity free pass,’ by the way…any hot, rugged man with a last name that means “of the bull” is hawt. I won’t go into my personal thoughts about JP’s celebrity free pass choice of Megan (can’t act but sure has cute fake boobs) Fox.

It’s prolly no coincidence that Benecio actually looks like a Latino version of JP– with those brooding, hooded green eyes and full luscious lips. *sigh.

Pretty boys just don’t do it for me.

What’s on Parker’s Plate….

Hungry yet? I am!

MANGO SALSA

2-3 mangos diced

2 pinches of fresh chopped cilantro

1 jalapeño chopped (no seeds)

2 Tb red onion

Squeeze ½ lime

Mix together and top on tacos or eat alone as a mango salad

BLACK BEAN SALSA

1 can of Black Beans drained

½ red bell pepper chopped

2 pinches of fresh chopped cilantro

1 jalapeño chopped (no seeds)

1-2 cloves fresh garlic

1 tsp chipotle chili powder

Sprinkle of sea salt or kosher salt

Mix together and serve hot as a side dish or cold as a salsa. Combine with mango salsa too, for double the delicious!

And Benecio, querido, cariño, lemme know if you ever need a homecooked meal….

No Bake Pumpkin Cheesecake

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No baking required!

I love everything pumpkin– from pie to yogurt to muffins. I make a scrumptious no bake cheesecake with the combo of Cool Whip and cream cheese with some sugar and vanilla or almond extract, so it got me thinking, “What about adding pumpkin?”

Bam.

If you want to make this sugar-free and/or gluten free, substitute sugar-free whipped topping and a 1/4 cup of truvia for the real sugar. You can also make a crust similar to my Guilt-Free Lemon Cheesecake with ground almonds or pecans.

Ingredients:

1 8oz package cream cheese

1 tub all natural whipped topping (like Cool Whip)

1 can pumpkin

¼ tsp nutmeg

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

½ tsp cloves

1 Tb vanilla extract

¼ cup white sugar

¼ cup brown sugar

Directions:

Bring cream cheese and whipped topping to room temperature so they’re easy to mix. Blend together all ingredients in mixer. Pour into pre-made graham cracker crust and freeze for 2 hours. Take out of freezer 30 minutes before serving.

Top with whipped cream and ground nutmeg.

If you have extra filling, pop it into some cups and serve with graham crackers drizzled with chocolate. Pumpkin Mousse. Your welcome!

Guilt-Free Lemon Cheesecake

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Guilt free, sugar free….and did I mention DELISH on a plate??

Stressed about holiday pounds? Fuhgeddaboutit….Try this lemony, creamy, guilt-free decadence. Gluten free, sugar free and NOT missing any delicious!

Crust

12 oz almonds ground up in food processor
4 Tb melted butter
Mix almonds with melted butter and press into a springform pan.

Filling

Blend in mixer:
Three 8oz blocks of full fat cream cheese
One pint sour cream
Juice from 2 lemons
Zest from one lemon
3 eggs
1/2 cup Truvia
1 Tb vanilla

Mix together until smooth and pour into pan over almond crust. Bake at 350 for one hour. Chill in fridge for several hours before you top with the lemon curd.

Lemon Curd

5 egg yolks
4 lemons juiced and zested
1/2 cup Truvia
1 stick full fat butter cut into pieces

Whisk together in a bowl over a pot of simmering water (or in a double boiler) until the mixture thickens– about 8 minutes. Whisk constantly during those 8 minutes! Turn heat down and add pieces of butter one at a time and stir until the whole stick has been melted and whisked in. Lay a piece of saran wrap ON the curd and chill for 2 hours.

Top chilled cheesecake with lemon curd just before serving.

I’ve served this many times at parties and people are shocked that it’s sugar free and gluten free!

Chili-laya

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Turn up the heat, baby!

This Culinary goddess has won a major award for her chili recipe. (I can’t help but think of one of my favorite scenes from A Christmas Story: “It’s a Major Award! I won!”

2 awards in fact! Let me brag on meeeeeeeee for a minute: I placed in the Roswell Chili Cook Off last spring and also won a Ford Owners competition a few months before that and took home, yes, A Major Award!

It’s a MAJOR AWARD!

It’s tough to mess with perfection, but the weekend was winding down and JP and I started talking about coming up with a new chili recipe. The weather is getting cooler and there’s nothing better than a pot of chili simmering on the stove on a Sunday afternoon. He had a brilliant suggestion: Chili Meets Jambalaya.

It’s Chili-laya, y’all!

Ingredients:

1 pound ground chuck

1 pound ground sirloin

1 pound spicy ground sausage (like Jimmy Dean)

1 package of spicy smoke adouille sausage (I like Ragin’ Cajun brand) sliced

1 Tb Grade B Maple Syrup

1 Tb butter

1 Tb olive oil

1 can tomato sauce (15oz)

1 can drained kidney beans

1 can diced tomatoes

2 Tb brown sugar

1 Tb honey

2 cups Guinness beer

2 cups beef stock

2 jalapeños diced

1 poblano pepper diced

1 red bell pepper diced

1 habanero pepper diced (optional)

1 sweet onion chopped

2 garlic cloves chopped

2 celery ribs chopped

3 Tb chili powder

1 Tb coriander

1 Tb paprika

1 Tb onion powder

1 Tb garlic powder

1 Tb black pepper

1 Tb basil

1 tsp kosher salt

2 Tb fresh thyme

Chopped cilantro for garnish

Smoked Gouda (this cheese is the shiznittabam) shredded for garnish

Sliced avocado for garnish

Directions:

In a large, wide rimmed frying pan, saute ground chuck, ground sirloin and spicy ground sausage on medium heat until browned. Do not drain. Put meat in a large soup pot and set aside. In the same frying pan, toss in 1 Tb butter and when butter gets bubbly, add the chopped andouille sausage and cook through. When andouille is browned, add 1 Tb Grade B maple syrup and stir to coat. Keep the heat on medium and let the syrup get caramelized on the sausage– try not to eat it all before you’re finished. It’s soooooo good. Add maple encrusted andouille to the rest of the meat.

Now, time to saute your veggies. I use the same pan, just add about 1 Tb olive oil and saute onion, garlic, celery, and all of the peppers. Be very careful when you’re chopping up the habanero and the jalapeños — get that hot stuff under your nails or in your eyeball and it’s not fun. I sometimes put on kitchen gloves– or just toss them in the food processor and pulse for a few seconds. Then scoop them into the mix. No need to brown the veggies– just soften them in the pan on medium heat for about 10 minutes. Add veggie mix to your pile ‘o meat.

Next, add in all the canned yummies. The tomato sauce, diced tomatoes, the beans, the beer and the stock, sugar, honey, and all those spices. Mix it all together and keep on a low simmer for 1-2 hours (if you can wait that long!)

Spoon it out and top with chopped cilantro, smoked gouda and sliced avocado. Serve with Jalapeño Cornbread for maximum Chili-laya satisfaction.

Chili-laya and Cornbread “GetinmymouthRAWTnow”

It might be the best chili that has never won a Major Award….YET!

Raspberry Bourbon Crepes

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Melt-in-your-mouth DELISH…

Friday night got a little foggy….Wake up with Jack? Check. Booze with breakfast? Check.

These crepes are melt-in-your-mouth delish and fancy enough to serve to brunch guests if you feel like entertaining, or to appear goddess-like to the dude who stayed over last night. Make sure you make the filling first, because you’ll need to let it sit out for about 30 minutes before stuffing the crepes. The crepe batter cooks quickly, so you can fry those up last.

Fillling: In small sauce pan, melt down on medium heat:

1 jar of seedless raspberry jam

1 cup fresh raspberries

1 tsp Jack Daniels (or your favorite bourbon)

1 8oz package of full fat cream cheese.

Once filling is smooth and melted down, take off heat and let sit out for 30 minutes to thicken.

Crepe Batter: *I don’t mix dry then add wet ingredients, I just pour it all in and mix it up– but feel free to mix in any order you feel like…

*Mix together until smooth:

1 cup flour

2 eggs

1 cup milk

1/4 cup water

3 Tb melted butter

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp vanilla

Heat up a small omelet pan on medium/high heat and spray with cooking spray. Let the pan heat up before you spoon batter in– I usually do about a 1/4 cup per crepe. Inevitably, I make the mistake of pouring more in and they get too thick. Always do a tester to ~~get those carbs in to help your Saturday morning hangover~~ check the consistency and flavor!

After the filling has cooled for 30 minutes, spoon several Tb of filling into center of crepes and fold with seam side down. Drizzle more of the sauce on top of the crepes and top with fresh raspberries to garnish.

Brunch is served! And now you can take your bourbon, er, Jack, back to bed with you…

Jalapeño Cornbread

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Jalapeño Cornbread Deliciousness

The only cornbread I grew up eating was the sweet, muffiny kind, lovingly made by my New England bred mother. It wasn’t until I moved down South that I really experienced TRUE cornbread– the crunchy, savory kind that requires a cast iron skillet and bacon fat.

JP’s Mom is an incredible cook and she taught me how to do cornbread right. Mine never quite tastes as good as hers, but it’s pretty darn close. You can eliminate the jalapeños if you don’t want added heat, but I don’t recommend it!

Ingredients:

6 slices bacon

2 cups Cornmeal Mix (not plain cornmeal! I use White Lily’s Buttermilk Cornmeal Mix)

2 1/2 cups Buttermilk

1 tsp salt

2 jalapeños chopped up with seeds (optional)

1 egg

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400.

In a large bowl, mix together buttermilk, egg, salt, cornmeal mix and chopped jalapeños. It should be about the consistency of pancake batter.

Make sure the bacon fat is smokin’ before you pour the batter in!

In a cast iron skillet, cook 6 bacon slices on medium high heat until they’re crisp and all the fat is rendered in the pan. Take out the bacon and turn up the heat until the bacon drippings start to smoke. Pour cornbread batter into the skillet immediately. (The hot bacon fat makes a decadently crispy crust to the cornbread.) Then put the skillet in the oven uncovered and bake at 400 for 40 minutes.

Split the cornbread open and slather on some butter….It’s awesome served with chili or soup.

Halloween Rat Cheesecake

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Rats on a wheel of cheese…cake

Happy Halloween! Ready to sink your teeth into some Rat cheesecake? I thought so…

I can’t tell you guys how proud I am of this ridiculously delish Rodent dessert! I saw the idea of a rat cheesecake in Redbook magazine and decided to incorporate my own recipes into the design. This is a Grand Marnier Orange Zested cheesecake with Oreo Truffle rats….It’s as scrumptious as it is adorable. The cheesecake stands on it’s own, but it’s so super cute if you incorporate the rat truffles! I brought this cheesecake, Halloween Pumpkin pops and my Ultimate Dude Dip to a Halloween party last weekend and they were all huge hits!

So here’s the recipe….

Oreo Truffle Rats

1 package Double Stuff Oreos

1 8oz package full fat cream cheese

Dark chocolate melting wafers

Red hots (for eyes)

Sliced almonds (for ears)

Slivered almonds (for teeth)

Twizzlers cut in half (for tails) *if you can find string red licorice, even better!

I used the same recipe for Halloween cat truffles using 1 package of Double stuff Oreos and 1 8oz package of full fat cream cheese. Just whip together in the food processor and put the truffle batter in the freezer for about 2-3 hours till it gets hard enough to shape into rat bodies.

The Oreo truffle batter can be shaped easily into the rat bodies

I used sliced almonds for the rat ears.

Then, melt dark chocolate wafers in a double boiler (you can see that process in my Halloween Cat video) and dip rat bodies with the ears into the chocolate. The chocolate dries quickly, so put your red hot eyes on and then the slivered almond teeth. Last, pop on the licorice tail. I couldn’t find the string licorice so I just cut a red twizzler in half.

Sliced almonds make the perfect rat ears

Rat teeth in a bag!

Chocolate covered rodent? Totally edible!

Grand Marnier Orange Zested Cheesecake

3 packages (8oz each) of full fat cream cheese

1 pint full fat sour cream

3 eggs

1 Tb vanilla

1 cup sugar

2 Tb Grand Marnier

Juice from one orange

Zest from 1/2 orange

1 tsp of yellow food coloring (omit if you’re just making the cheesecake without the rat truffles…the yellow food coloring gives the cheesecake a lovely cheddar hue!)

Crust

2 cups of graham cracker crumbs

1 stick of butter

1 Tb brown sugar

Sour Cream Topping

1 cup full fat sour cream

3 Tb sugar

1 tsp vanilla

12-15 drops of yellow food coloring

Crust: Melt the stick of butter and mix with the brown sugar and graham cracker crumbs. Press into the bottom of a springform pan.

Cheesecake filling: Preheat oven to 350. Mix together ingredients until smooth and pour into crust. I don’t bother mixing dry first then wet– I just put it all in my mixer and let it go on medium for a couple minutes. Super low maintenance. Bake for 1 hour.

Sour Cream Topping: Mix sour cream with sugar and yellow food coloring drops. Spread over top after cheesecake has cooled.

So, the best line of the night was when I was slicing the cheesecake for the party guests– everyone wanted a piece of rat with their cheescake, naturally. I handed out plates to my friends and then served the below plate to JP last…

I said, “Honey, don’t ever say I don’t give a rat’s ass about you.

I’m GIVING a rat’s ass TO YOU.”

I give a rat’s ass!

Chipotle Beef Burritos with Whipped Avocado Cream

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Smoky, crunchy, creamy and hearty….

I salivate over the smoky heat of chipotle peppers. They come in that tiny can in the “Mexican” section of most grocery stores– the adobo sauce is what the peppers are in. If you really want to spike the heat in this, blend in an actual chipotle, but the adobo sauce is really all you need.

Check the International or Mexican section of most supermarkets for these hotties

This is the kind of dish you can make ahead— get the filling sauteed and stash it in the fridge until you’re ready to eat. Then stuff and heat your burritos– and stuff your pie hole. It’s a winner.

Ingredients
2 pounds ground beef
1 Tb canola oil
1 medium onion or 1/2 large onion
1 cup beef broth
1 can Rotel tomatoes regular (drained)
1 can black beans (drained)
3 Tb adobo sauce from chipotle can
Palmful of cilantro chopped
Grated Mexican style cheese

Spice Mixture
1 Tb chipotle chili powder
1 Tb paprika
1 Tb cumin
1 Tb coriander
1 Tb dried minced onion (in spice section)
1/2 Tb garlic powder
1/2 Tb onion powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp kosher salt (more to taste if you prefer)

Saute 2 pounds ground beef in a Tb of canola oil until cooked through. Drain meat. In same pan that you used to brown the meat, sauté 1 medium chopped onion (I prefer Vidalia). After 5 minutes of sautéing onion, add meat back to pan and stir to combine. Add spice mixture with 1 cup of beef broth and simmer on medium/low for 15 minutes. Add 3 Tb adobo sauce, drained rotel tomatoes and drained black beans.

Stuff meat mixture into a tortilla and sprinkle cheese in. Fold seam side down and top with more cheese. Bake at 400 until cheese gets bubbly and browned on top (about 7-10 minutes) or broil for a few minutes. Pull out of oven and top with chopped cilantro, whipped avocado cream, jalapeño and more cheeeeeeeese if you pleeeeeeeeeease.

Whipped Avocado Cream
Mix in food processor:
2 avocados
2 fresh garlic cloves
2 Tb cilantro
1 Tb sour cream
1 tsp honey
juice from 1/2 lime squeezed
pinch of kosher salt

Top avocado cream on your burrito!

Thai Green Curry with Shrimp, Lime Zested Coconut Rice and Sesame Asparagus

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Light, creamy, spicy all in one bite…

JP and I love spicy food– the more heat, the better. You’ll often find us chowing down on 3-alarm dishes as we alternate between the slurp and the wipe….slurping down the goodness, wiping down the forehead! Make me sweat, baby, it’s goodferya!! Thai food is one of my favorites, and since there are no good delivery joints in our neck of the woods, I had to improvise at home when a Thai craving hit.

In this dish, I love the creamy smoothness of the coconut milk with the layers of flavor created with the ginger, garlic and lemon grass. I’m also including the recipes for coconut lime zested rice and sesame asparagus. It’s a great dinner that packs heart healthy flavor with all the heat! If you’re not into spice, omit the jalapeños.

Ingredients

Green Curry Sauce:

1 Tb olive oil

2 shallots chopped

3 garlic cloves chopped

2 Tb Green Curry Paste

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp coriander

1 Tb fresh ginger

1 Tb fresh lemongrass (I use Gourmet Garden’s Lemongrass and Ginger Paste)

Super easy solutions so you don’t have to chop up ginger or lemon grass!

2 Tb soy sauce or Tamari

2 Tb brown sugar

1 Tb fish sauce

Juice of one lime

2 jalapeños chopped or Thai Chilis

2 cans of full fat Coconut Milk

Chopped fresh basil (about a large palmful)

Shrimp Seasoning

1 pound of medium sized shrimp

1 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp curry powder

1 Tb butter and 1 Tb olive oil for sauteeing.

Once you peel the shrimp, toss in ginger and curry powder before sauteeing.

Coconut Lime Zested Rice

1 can full fat coconut milk

1 cup jasmine rice

1 Tb butter

Juice and zest from one lime

Sesame Asparagus

2-3 cups chopped asparagus

2 garlic cloves chopped

1 Tb sesame oil

1 tsp kosher salt

1 tsp toasted sesame seeds (optional)

Directions:

Green Curry Sauce: Saute the chopped shallot and garlic in olive oil on medium heat in a wide rimmed frying pan or large sauce pan for one minute. Add in the curry paste and stir around to mix in with the shallots and garlic until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add in the coconut milk and all of the other ingredients. Stir to combine and simmer on low/medium heat until ready to serve.

Rice: While sauce is simmering, make your rice. Bring the can of coconut milk to a boil and add in the 1 cup of jasmine rice with 1 Tb butter. Squeeze the lime in and bring back to a boil. Cover and turn down heat to low and cook for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, zest the lime and stir the zest in to the cooked rice.

Asparagus: Chop off the woody ends of the asparagus (about 2 inches) and chop the rest of the stalks into bite size 1 inch pieces. Add sesame oil to a frying pan and heat up on med/high heat. Toss in the garlic and stir for a minute, then add in the asparagus and saute for 7 minutes stirring occasionally. Feel free to sprinkle some toasted sesame seeds on top– just stir them around in a dry pan for a couple minutes on medium heat to toast them up. Don’t ya hate soggy asparagus? Problem solved. Cutting it up into bite size pieces seals in the flavor and still keeps the crunch.

Shrimp: This should be your final step so the shrimp don’t sit out and get tough. Peel and clean your shrimp, dry them off with a paper towel and toss with the curry powder and ginger. Heat up 1 Tb butter and 1 Tb olive oil in a frying pan on medium/high heat and wait till butter is bubbling. Test out the temperature by putting one shrimp in the pan. If you don’t hear a *sizzle*, wait a bit longer. Don’t crowd the shrimp in the pan– cook in several batches. (You will need to add more butter and olive oil between batches).

Cook shrimp on 3 minutes on one side– DO NOT MOVE THE SHRIMP AROUND IN THE PAN! (YES, I’M YELLING!!) Just let them sit there in that buttery goodness and get seared. I always use my timer for this because it’s so easy to overcook them. Flip after 3 minutes and cook for 2 minutes on the other side. Why less time on the other side? Cuz they’ll be done by then. Trust me! Remove shrimp from the hot pan and put on a plate so the shrimp don’t continue cooking. I always toss on a small pinch of kosher salt to the shrimp when they’re done.

To serve, top coconut rice with green curry sauce and shrimp. Serve with asparagus. Then sprinkle some fresh basil on top and get ready for scrumptious…