Older Bolder Life

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the Older Bolder Life Friday Feast: Grilled Rosemary Lamb Chops

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Like many of you, when thinking about the Easter table we often think of lamb or ham as the centerpiece protein; this year my lovely wife called for a Greek inspired meal featuring a perennial favorite – Grilled Rosemary Lamb Chops.

Last Easter’s Merguez Sausages were damned tasty, and I personally think this Ancho Leg of Lamb hung the moon, but lamb chops won the day this year.

Lamb chops are easy to source, quick to grill, and as always provide incredibly flavorful meat right off the bone. My only real complaint about them over the years has been that given that most lamb chops are cut fairly thick, sometimes there’s a bit more char outside after grilling given the time needed to make sure the deepest meat is a perfect medium rare.

This year I decided to sous vide the chops (130, 90 minutes) after rubbing with a bit of olive oil and a fresh cut garlic clove, with the chops then loaded into BPA-free bags with several sprigs of fresh rosemary.

A Quick Sidebar on Sous Vide and Texture…

As an aside, while we still use the sous vide method around our camp with some regularity, I am as I’m sure you are aware of a growing backlash against sous vide (nothing to do with the somewhat tired BPA discussion), but instead focusing on texture.

There are a number of talented chefs and home cooks who continue to report that they find proteins that spend time in a sous vide bath, while often cooked to perfection from a temperature / doneness perspective have a different texture than say thick-cut, bone-in ribeye cooked using a reverse sear technique. (Interesting my son Jake and I have had a very similar discussion a couple of different times this winter, and both find we’re leaning to the texture of the reverse sear method).

The other texture issue with sous vide has to do with pre-salting proteins before they’re placed in the water bath; some folks feel that doing so can make some proteins taste “rubbery and hammy”; there’s been a fair amount written on the subject, and we don’t salt red meats pre-sous vide, particularly if they’re going to be held for hours or a day or two before grilling, but still lightly salt chicken breasts for cold chicken salad (for example) before their time in the bath.

You make the call…

Back to Our Grilled Rosemary Lamb Chops

All the chops needed then was a quick turn on the grill to caramelize the surfaces and we were good to go, with this delightful Greek Salad, a recipe of homemade tzatziki, and crumbled feta on board.

These chops are delicious cold as well or heated gently prior to serving; cook a big batch when these come up in rotation.

Enjoy.

the Older Bolder Friday Feast: Greek Chicken Breast Sauté

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As my lovely wife and I have been wrestling ife back under control post our recent move, I came across one of our favorite old cookbooks that’s now out of print. It’s one of two collections of recipes from chefs working in and around Santa Fe and neighboring areas in New Mexico.

We’ve harvested literally dozens of great recipes from these cookbooks over the years, tweaking them to be healthier with cleaner ingredients, and marveling all the while at the flavors that the tri-cultural melting pot that is New Mexico has produced over the years.

If you’ve never made it to Santa Fe, go visit sometime, soak up the history, hike in the nearby hills (they call them mountains – the terrain is gorgeous, but more hilly than mountainous), and enjoy some of the culinary treasures of the region. And by all means, you have to do breakfast at The Pantry on Cerrillos.

Back to today’s recipe, this Greek Chicken Breast Sauté is an incredibly simple, easy to prepare, and quick from prep to table recipe that has been a staple around our camp for over 20 years.

We’ve served it to high brow company, enjoyed it many times around a relaxed family dinner table, and even cooked it a few times on the road or river while camping.

I’ve left it to you to choose your flour of choice to dust the chicken breasts; I’m not convinced that any of the alternative grain / gluten free flours brown as well as conventional wheat flour, though you need to experiment yourself. To be honest, I often season the chicken well and sauté it without any flour at all, though we do miss the good crust it makes now and again.

Finally, this is one of those recipes that is better with really good olives, though you don’t need to break the bank buying insanely expensive ingredients – it works really well with the basics too.

4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 cup seasoned flour of choice (salt, pepper, spices)
1/4 cup olive or avocado oil
1 and 1/2 cups dry white wine
1 cup fresh tomatoes, peeled, seeded, chopped
1/2 cup capers
2/3 cup black olives, pitted, sliced
2/3 cup green olives, pitted, sliced
1 tbsp fresh rosemary, chopped, or two fresh rosemary sprigs

Dredge the chicken in the seasoned flour (see comment above) and shake off the excess.

Heat your oil of choice in a large skillet over medium high heat, then sauté the chicken for 3 minutes per side until golden (but not cooked through). Add the wine and simmer for 5 – 6 minutes until slightly reduced, then reduce the heat to medium.

Now add the tomatoes, capers, both olives, and the rosemary; simmer for another 4-8 minutes until the sauce has slightly thickened and the chicken is just cooked through.

Serve immediately on warmed plates with the sauce spooned on top.

Enjoy.

the Older Bolder Life Friday Feast: Greek Marinated Grilled Flank Steak

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As I shared on Monday when chatting about our favorite tzatziki recipe here, my lovely wife and I came a bit late to enjoy Greek cuisine as much as we do today.

We both come from families who, from a home cooking and menu perspective, ate fairly routine American fare during our years at home decades ago; we both grew up in Texas so adventurous dining back in the day was typically either barbecue or Tex-Mex. Heck, I’m not even sure there was a Greek diner or restaurant in my panhandle home growing up…

Later my wife and I lived in Salt Lake City for years, which happens to host a surprisingly robust Greek community, and one of my former business partners and mentors introduced us to the wonders of cooking (reasonably) authentic Greek cuisine at home – and this wonderful Greek salad we’ve served for years (including again this past week!).

A couple of weeks ago we had occasion to eat at one of our favorite Greek eateries here in the DFW metro to celebrate a small but meaningful life victory, we enjoyed a dish we’d not savored in a while – a simple but incredibly delicious marinated and grilled flank steak.

I of course pestered the restaurant team for their recipe, and while they didn’t provide all the details, it was enough to guide my research, which included time on the phone with friend and Chef Libby in Austin.

After a bit of experimenting and tweaking, this is the recipe we’ve dialed in for this Greek Marinated Grilled Flank Steak.

Living in Texas as we do, I often reach for skirt or hanger steaks when preparing fajitas (which granted we enjoy often); it’s been a pleasure to cook with flank again as well – flank shares the same deep, beefy flavor as skirt (and hangers), the same robust tooth when cooked just so, and yet is delightfully tender when thinly sliced across the grain. And compared to some of the other cuts we’ve posted recipes for over the years, grass-fed flank can feel like a true bargain too.

Plan ahead for this one as you’ll really want to let the flank marinate for 24-hours, though 8 works in a pinch. And you can argue if you must, but this one begs to cooked to just medium, rested for 8 to 10 minutes, and thinly sliced across the grain.

2 to 3 lb flank steak
1 cup EVOO or avocado oil
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup coconut aminos or tamari
2 tbsp fresh chopped mint
1 tbsp lemon zest
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
2 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp dill weed (dried)
1 tsp fresh ground pepper
1/2 tsp salt

This one couldn’t be easier.

Whisk the marinade ingredients in a medium bowl, pour over the flank (I prefer to cut our flank into 3 to 4-inch wide pieces prior or marinating) and place in a resealable bag or your favorite non-plastic marinating container.

Marinate for preferably 24 hours, but at least 8, turning the flank occasionally to make sure all sides are well coated and exposed to the marinade.

Fire the grill, drain the flank while the grill is preheating, then grill to your desired finish – though flank begs to be cooked just medium rare, rested for 10 minutes, and then sliced thinly across the grain.

Great hot or cold, make sure you have tzatziki on hand for your Greek feast.

Enjoy.

the Older Bolder Life Sauce Monday: A Quick, Easy, and Delicious Home Tzatziki Sauce

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For reasons that I still can’t honesty account, my lovely wife and I came to appreciate Greek cuisine, relatively speaking, a bit later in life. It probably had something to do with us both growing up in the South during our formative years, and coming from families that simply weren’t the most adventurous when it came to exploring foods from other cultures and locales.

We’re huge fans of Greek cuisine these days, finding its spice array and emphasis on (for the most part) simple ingredients prepared very well deeply satisfying and delicious.

I’m sure that’s part of our long-standing appreciation of various Mediterranean cuisines, but there something about Greek flavors that my wife in particular just loves, with admittedly Tzatziki Sauce being right at the top of the list of her Greek favorites. Other faves include a slab of salty, fresh, Greek feta, drizzled in olive oil and sprinkled with fresh oregano, with a pile of Kalamata olives alongside and freshly prepared, olive oil-drizzled hummus too.

But a Greek meal just wouldn’t meet her standard without a tub of tzatziki sauce alongside. Tzatziki is a flavor-packed sauce based on Greek yogurt, bursting with vegetal and herbal notes from chopped or grated cucumber, garlic, dill, lemon juice (or vinegar), and occasionally mint.

Neither of us were fortunate enough to have a Greek grandmother working magic in the kitchen to teach us the secrets of Greek cuisine, though after several years of fiddling, we’ve settled on this as a base recipe to work from when making tzatziki at home. My wife prefers the herbs and spices pretty much as written, though left to my own devices, I’d always add more garlic, dill, a bit of finely minced mint, and acid (preferably fresh lemon juice).

We just enjoyed a batch of fresh tzatziki with a Greek marinated flank steak I’ll be posting for this week’s Friday Feast…

1 medium cucumber, peeled, grated (or diced), salted, and drained
2 cups full fat Greek yogurt
1-2 garlic cloves, grated or minced
2-3 tbsp fresh minced dill (may include some mint)
1-2 tbsp EVOO
1-3 tsp lemon juice or vinegar of choice
1 tsp salt, divided

Peel and grate or dice the cucumber (I prefer to grate on the large holes of a box grater), then salt with 1/2 tsp of kosher salt and set in a colander for at least 15 minutes to drain. When ready to stir the sauce together, compress as much water as possible from the cucumber before combining.

Stir the remainder of the ingredients together, stir in the drained cucumber, and taste – adjust the seasonings to suit your palate, and add more EVOO or lemon juice to adjust the texture as well.

Will keep for several days in the fridge, covered of course, though we seem to never have any leftovers after a Greek feast at home.

Enjoy.

the Older Bolder Life Sauce Monday: Turmeric Tzatziki

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I’m not sure where or how it came to be actually, but my wife is crazy about tzatziki.

We came to appreciate authentic Greek food in early adulthood, and while she’d traveled and lived internationally (North Africa and Switzerland), she’s never been to Greece and experienced the wonderful cuisine on the ground there. Her family did live and work in Algeria for a while, in a fairly multicultural setting, and there they were exposed to all sorts of Mediterranean delicacies.

No matter what the history, she loves tzatziki.

I was talking with a friend about dips to serve at an upcoming party she was hosting, and we somehow came around to this wonderful Turmeric Tzatziki, one of my wife’s recent new favorites. Blooming the turmeric in the hot oil is a genius step, and this dish really pops with a wonderful burst of lemon (using both fresh juice and zest), ginger, garlic, and of course the essential grated cucumber.

Classically made with greek yogurt, we think this is just as good (maybe even better) when made with sour cream. It’s delicious with a plate of crudite, and a perfect complement to any Greek-spiced protein. And for the bonus today – if you’re handy in the kitchen, this one will talk all of ten minutes to put together (ok, maybe 15).

And don’t forget the fresh ground pepper; you need those pepper based compounds (piperines) to optimize absorption of the curcumin in your turmeric. And is just tastes good…

1 to 2 tsp good ground turmeric
2 tbsp avocado oil (or EVOO)

2 small cucumbers or 1/2 English hothouse cucumber
1 tsp good salt

1 cup Greek yogurt or sour cream
1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1-2 garlic cloves, grated
1-2 tsp grated fresh ginger (peeled)
1 tbsp chopped fresh mint (chiffonade), or more
1/2-1 tsp fresh lemon zest, grated
1/2-1 tsp fresh ground pepper
Good salt to taste (see note)

Stir the avocado oil (or EVOO) together with the turmeric in a small saucepan over medium heat; remove from the heat when it just starts to bubble, stir again, and set aside to cool.

As the oil is cooling, grate the cucumber coarsely, spread on a clean dishtowel on a plate, and salt with 1 tsp of good salt. Let rest for 10-15 minutes, then wring out as much water as possible from the cucumber, add to a medium bowl.

Now add the yogurt or sour cream, lemon juice, grated garlic and ginger, mint, lemon zest, fresh ground pepper, and the turmeric oil. Stir well to combine, and correct the seasonings, including salt as needed.

Best served promptly, will keep covered in the fridge for a bit.

Enjoy.

the Older Bolder Life Vegetable Wednesday 2 January: Fasolakia (Greek-Style Green Beans)

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I’m almost ashamed to admit that my lovely wife and I had never truly tasted genuine Fasolakia (Greek-style green beans) until a couple of years ago, at a then newly discovered wonderful little family-owned Greek place in a nearby town.

The tender green beans, coated with a rich, tomatoey, and well-spiced sauce became a favorite and often were part of a Greek gyro salad dinner for us in the months following our discovery. The restaurant is owned and managed by a charming Greek immigrant in his late 70s; he’s working every single day we venture in, and always welcoming and chatty.

I finally pestered him for the spices used in their version of this dish, and he rattled off the list below, including the admonition to use “lots of garlic and oregano”, and to not forget the spritz of fresh lemon juice at the end.

We also follow his technique of simmering for 15 minutes on the stovetop and then braising in the oven to finish, though you’ll find lots of recipes that complete the entire process on the stovetop. And while we most often prefer to use fresh vegetables, this is one recipe where frozen green beans work like a charm.

1.5 lb fresh green beans, or bout 8 cups frozen green beans (2 small bags)
1/4 cup + 1 tbsp avocado oil or EVOO
1 medium onion, trimmed, grated
4-5 cloves garlic, minced
1 and 1/2 tbsp good dried oregano (maybe a bit more)
2 tsp ground cumin
2 14.5-ounce cans organic diced tomatoes
3 tbsp organic tomato paste
1 bay leaf
Good salt to taste
Fresh ground pepper to taste
Lemon juice (1/2 lemon)
Optional: 1/2 cup fresh parsley leaves

Preheat your trusty oven to 300.

Heat 1/4 cup of your oil of choice in a dutch oven or oven-proof skillet over medium-high heat; add the onion (and any onion juice that’s collected while grating). Sauté for 5-6 minutes until the onion has softened and is just beginning to color and the liquid has reduced a bit.

Sprinkle in the dried oregano, cumin, and the garlic, sauté for another minute or so, then add the green beans, diced tomatoes, tomato paste, along with at least a teaspoon each of salt and pepper.

Bring to a gentle simmer, then cook (uncovered) for 15 minutes, stirring several times. Now cover and pop into the oven for another 30-40 minutes (check halfway through to see if you need to a little water). When the beans are tender, stir in at least another tbsp of oil, 2-3 tbsp fresh lemon juice, and the parsley. Adjust seasonings and serve hot.

Enjoy.