BBQ Jackfruit Burrito

I recently my friend Galga Runner posted a link to an article about 21 food things only a San Franciscan would understand. The cover picture to the article was a humongous, gorgeous burrito, overflowing with fillings. The picture made me drool. It also made me want a burrito. Now. While I do live in Texas, I rarely go out for Tex-Mex food. The closest taco place is, in my opinion, no bueno. In a similar manner that I feel perverse pride in never having eaten a Krispy Kreme doughnut, I feel that same strange pride that I have never been to Chipotle. What's a girl to do? Raid the pantry.

Beans of some sort? Check. Rice? Leftover in the freezer, check. Avocado? Half of one in the fridge, check. Something meaty and BBQ-like? *stops short while sifting through my mind palace* Nope. Much to The Aussie's dismay, I've started eating a LOT less meat. What to use? Then I remembered. I have a can of jackfruit in the pantry. I bought it a while ago after hearing about jackfruit being used as a meat alternative because it cooks down and shreds like pulled pork. Why the heck not. I grabbed the can, my bottle of BBQ sauce, a few other goodies and got cooking.

Irony of all ironies, I didn't have any flour tortillas in the freezer so I had to run out and get some. Oh, and I forgot to use the avocado too.

BBQ Jackfruit Burrito

1 can of jackfruit (packed in water not syrup) drained, and roughly chopped
~ 1/2 cup BBQ sauce
2 T ketchup
dash of liquid smoke
1 t chili powder
1 t garlic powder

In a pan over medium heat, lightly saute the jackfruit. Pour in the BBQ sauce and ketchup, stirring to coat the jackfruit. Add a little water if it's too thick. Add the spices, stir, cover and reduce heat. Simmer until soft, stirring occasionally. This took about 30 minutes. When it was soft, I mashed it with my potato masher. It really does look like pulled pork!

While the jackfruit was cooking, I sliced up half of a bell pepper and half of an onion and sauteed until soft. Since my pressure cooker was busy, I opened a can of pinto beans (I used the kind with jalapeno) and heated them up along with the brown rice and some corn I had in the freezer. The slaw topping I used is the veggies from an Asian chopped salad kit I got at Costco and some coleslaw dressing. The cilantro and crunch of the cabbage really added to the burrito.

I have never made anything like this, but I will again. It was filling and delicious. I was so excited to eat it that I forgot the avocado and cheese. It didn't need it. Yum.

Paleo Shepherd's Pie - Yes, I'm doing Whole 30 again

Happy June. It's hard to believe that it's already June. We've had so much rain and so many stormy days this spring, I thought we'd never have sunshine and heat. Not that I'm looking forward to 100+ degree weather, but cold and rainy is strange for May in Texas.

So, I have gotten a bit off track with my eating recently. Yeah, right. I totally have derailed. My hip is better, thank goodness, so I'm not in pain all of the time anymore. The Airrosti doctor did a fantastic job on my hip and hamstrings. Not a painless treatment method, by any stretch of the imagination, and I was left with some interesting bruises after my sessions, but I'm not in chronic pain anymore. Yay!  The pain did a number on me mentally. I couldn't work out, I couldn't run, even sitting became painful after a while. Did I watch what I ate? No. Unless you counted watching it disappear in to my mouth. I have no excuses for what was available to eat. I do the grocery shopping and the cooking, after all. If there are Doritos in the house, I let them in. When The Sisterhood mentioned that they were starting a Whole 30 on June 1st, I took it as a sign to get back on track. This thought was reinforced by seeing how round I look in pictures. (We got our picture taken with two of the guys from Firefly at a recent fan con.) That's life. Time to move on.

Back to the Whole 30. When I tried this a couple of years ago, I went a bit crazy on the coconut oil wagon. Bad mistake. It does not agree with me in the slightest. I had so many strange reactions that I quit halfway through the 30. I am committed to following this at least through Fitbloggin. Hopefully I'll be back on track enough by then that I don't get too crazy.

Part of following this plan is thinking about what I'm eating. I can't rely on having some cheese when I get hungry or having a sandwich for lunch. I can't even rely on sauces or salad dressings to spruce things up because so many commercial foods have sugars and starches in them. That leaves me with a bunch of whole food ingredients, standing in my kitchen, trying to figure out what to make to eat that will make me happy. Today, it's shepherd's pie.  I was going to call this post "everything but the kitchen sink..." shepherd's pie, but then I thought, no, if the kitchen sink is paleo, it's going in there, too. It was more of a clean out the fridge shepherd's pie. I had half of a large box of mushrooms that needed to be used, a head of cauliflower, a partial bag of green beans, part of an onion... you get the picture. I think the only vegetables I didn't use were the beets, zucchini and the clam shell box of "power greens."

Paleo Shepherd's Pie (serves 6 generously)

1 T olive oil

8 oz mushrooms, sliced

2 carrots, peeled and diced

4 celery ribs, sliced

¼ cup diced onion

1 cup fresh green beans, chopped

1 20 oz package lean ground turkey

1 T garlic powder

1 t ground thyme

3 T tomato paste

1/2 c chicken stock

1/4 t cayenne pepper

1 T no-salt seasoning mix

1 T parsley

1 t marjoram

salt/pepper to taste

Thickener: 

1 T kudzu (you can use cornstarch if you aren't making this paleo)

1/4 c chicken stock

Topping:

1 head of cauliflower, chopped and steamed

1 sweet potato, chopped and steamed

1 T ghee

salt/pepper to taste

drizzle of olive oil

parsley flakes

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Heat a medium sized skillet over medium high heat. When pan is hot, drizzle in the olive oil. Saute the mushrooms until soft. Add in the ground turkey, using a spoon to break it in to small pieces. Cook for about 10 minutes, stirring frequently, until meat is no longer translucent. Add in the carrots, celery, onion, green beans, tomato paste, spices and chicken stock, stirring well to combine. 

In a small bowl, combine the kudzu and chicken stock, stirring until there are no lumps. Add this to the mixture in the skillet and stir. 

Let mixture simmer for 15 minutes to let the vegetables soften. While this is happening, chop your cauliflower in to florets and peel and dice the sweet potato. I use Ziploc steamer bags to cook my veggies in the microwave. Follow cooking times on the bags. When these are cooked, place the cauliflower and sweet potato in bowl, add the ghee and salt and pepper. Mash with fork or use a stick blender until fairly smooth.

Spoon turkey mixture in to an 8x8 baking dish, making sure the vegetables are evenly distributed and that the ground turkey doesn't have any large chunks.

Spread the mashed cauliflower/sweet potato mixture on top, smoothing the surface with the back of a spoon. Top with parsley, black pepper, and a drizzle of olive oil. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes. 

When it's piping hot and lightly browned on top, it's done! This really hit the spot today. I wanted something creamy, but I couldn't rely on dairy. It's meaty, but not too meaty, and it's full of really tasty vegetables.  This is so good, I'm kind of glad The Aussie isn't a turkey or veggie eater! More for me!

Rich and Hearty French Onion Soup

I recently visited my "happy place" aka Costco and a HUGE bag of onions followed me home. It must have weighed as much as the bags of dog food. Not only was the bag huge, but the onions themselves were gigantic. What better thing to make with monster onions than a monster batch of French onion soup. While the pressure cooker (yeah, there I go again, going on about how wonderful my pressure cooker is) makes it quicker than cooking on the stove, it's just as flavorful as slow cooked French onion soup that you have to keep an eye on. 

French Onion Soup

1 T Butter

1 T olive Oil

2-3 large Yellow Onions, thinly sliced (4-5 cups) a mandolin makes this easier

1 big pinch sugar (helps the onions caramelize)

1/2 t salt

¼  cup of dry red wine

6 cups Stock (beef and/or chicken)

Salt/pepper to taste

Roux: 

2 T butter

1 T Flour

To Garnish: 

French bread slices – about 1” thick, toasted for each bowl

thinly sliced swiss, gruyere or provolone cheese for each bowl. I used Sargento thin sliced provolone.

DIRECTIONS:

In the pre-heated pressure cooker, on medium-low heat, add the butter and oil. Soften the onions, stirring occasionally in the pressure until the onions become translucent (about 15 minutes). Then, turn down the heat to low, without a lid, add the salt and sugar and stir frequently until the onions have turned a uniform brown (about 10 to 15 minutes).

When the onions are a deep brown and are soft, deglaze the pan with the red wine and let it cook down until the wine evaporates. This burns off the alcohol so that you taste the wine, not the alcohol. 

Next, add the stock. Isn't this a thing of beauty. If you aren't a chicken, that is. I have gotten in to the habit of making stock every week and store it in jars in my refrigerator.

Close and lock the pressure cooker, set to high pressure for 10 minutes.

While the soup is cooking, in a small sauce pan, melt 2T of butter over medium heat. When the butter has melted, stir in the flour so that there are no lumps. Stir frequently until it turns a light golden brown color. Be careful it does not burn. Take the roux off of the heat and set aside until the pressure cooker has finished.

When time is up, turn off the heat and use the quick release method to release the pressure in the cooker. When the pressure valve has dropped, open the cooker and remove the lid. To thicken the soup, take a cup of the stock from the pot and stir it into the roux until it is smooth, then pour this mixture back in to the cooker and stir. Ladle the soup in to individual serving bowls, top with your thick toasted bread slices. Cover each bowl with a slice of cheese and broil in the oven for 2 minutes or until the cheese has golden brown.

Words can't describe how delicious this was.