Last night I made chiles rellenos and documented the whole thing, here are the instructions step by step.

Get 2 chiles poblanos per person. Wash, pat dry, spray with oil and broil for about 12 minutes turning once.

Take blackened chilies and put in plastic bag. Close and let them cool off.

While chilies are cooling off, prepare filling and sauce. I used the typical tomato sauce used for a lot of Mexican food: in blender put fresh tomatoes, onion, garlic, cilantro, veggie bouillon. Blend until liquified.

Cook sauce in 2 tbsp vegetable oil, for about 10 minutes. Salt to taste and season with bay leaf, oregano, garlic powder, cumin and pepper while it’s cooking. Let boil to thicken a bit.

For refried beans: finely chop onion, cilantro, jalapenos and garlic. Use one can of black beans.

Heat oil in pot, saute chopped ingredients for 4 minutes. Add the undrained can of beans. After about 8 minutes, mash beans with masher.

Chilies are now cooled. Peel skin off, make a side slit and take the seeds off as well as any veins.

Once peeled, seeded and deveined, fill chilies with refried beans. Careful, the flesh is very soft and delicate.

Serve sauce on top of chilies, with a side of rice and fried plantains. The sweetness of the plantains goes very well with the flavour of the poblano chilies.

Enjoy!

This recipe has been cross-posted with Garlicster.

How to make a creamy soup when no milk or cream is to be added? I found a few recipes but they all said to mix everything with the blender, but then the leeks would not be visible. I wanted the soup to be creamy but the leeks to be recognizable within the soup. To make this recipes you need to prepare the leeks and the potatoes in separate pots, this will allow to puree the potatoes and leave the chopped leeks to add chunky texture to the soup.

I used:
4 cups potatoes, peeled and chopped
2 large leeks, chopped (there are 3 in the picture but I only used 2)
3 cloves of garlic, chopped
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 cups vegetable broth or water (or more depending on how thick it is and/or how liquid you like it
1 teaspoon curry powder
1 teaspoon chopped ginger
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:
In a large pot brown the garlic in the olive oil, add the potatoes and sautee until lightly browned. Add the broth to the potatoes and boil until softened.

In a separate pot, sautee the leeks in the olive oil for 2 minutes.

When the potatoes are cooked in the broth, puree with the hand blender, the texture will be that of a vichyssoise. Add the leeks and simmer for 2 minutes for flavour.

Add the chopped ginger and the curry powder to the soup. This will make the soup look a bit yellow, not the usual white, but will give it a distinctive flavour of deliciousness. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Serve and enjoy!

Yesterday I tried this delicious recipe and a totally new thing for me, I knew that the dish existed because I saw it once on the Food Network, but I had never thought of trying it. I was trying to come up with original veggie ideas for grilling and that’s when I remembered the lettuce. I did not follow the recipe on the Food Network, but I followed the technique and main idea.

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons sesame oil
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon minced ginger
4 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon honey
3 heads of romaine lettuce

Instructions:
To make dressing, combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix well.

Slice each head of lettuce in two, lengthwise.

Brush the lettuce with the dressing.

Grill the lettuce on both sides for 5 minutes total. Brush with the dressing when turning around. You don’t want to grill it for too long or it will wilt. You want it to be warm and grilled, but not soggy and wilted.

Here is the grilled lettuce. The picture is not very good, but I can assure you it was crunchy and soft at the same time, and it had nicely absorbed the delicious Asian-inspired dressing. Each person ate a whole half of lettuce and other veggies as well.