Anyway, at this Mediterranean bar, I found Peruvian sweety drop peppers (which are the size of caperberries with the flavor of a sweet pepper.) I also am familiar with Peppadew peppers, which are sweet pickled peppers. So, I thought, this is it. I must make a butter with these, garlic, herbs and lime. Then this recipe was born! But don’t worry, if you can’t find Peruvian sweety drop peppers, jarred pimentos, Peppadew peppers or just fresh sweet red peppers also work great here. I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I do!

The post Chicken Schnitzel with Sweet Pepper, Garlic, Herb Lime Butter appeared first on Dining with Skyler.

I absolutely adore carbonara. It’s simple, elegant and decadent. Lots of people know carbonara to be a creamy pasta, but lets establish right now that there’s actually no cream involved in carbonara!! If you post a photo of a cream based pasta and call it carbonara, someone’s Italian family member is going to put you on their hit list. I’m sort of kidding.

 

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Anyway, let’s talk about carbonaraaaa. AKA “bacon, egg and cheese” pasta. That creaminess that I mentioned above? That’s caused by eggs and cheese being whipped together with starchy pasta water. The result is silky, creamy and even kind of custardy.

Do I actually use bacon?

The traditional meat to use in carbonara is guanciale, which is pork jowl (cheek.) You can probably find this at the butcher, but if you don’t have a butcher close by and you don’t have a car, feel free to swap this for pancetta or bacon!

What cheese should I use?

From what I’ve seen, it’s usually Parmesan or a blend of Parmesan and Pecorino Romano. I personally like just Parmesan and I like my Pecorino for my Cacio e Pepe.

Do I have to use spaghetti?

Spaghetti is the traditional pasta used in carbonara, but use whatever pasta YOU like or have in your home!! No one is going to judge you…unless you post a photo or video online, then you’ll end up on the Hitlist I mentioned earlier.

Making a sauce with raw eggs scares me…what should I do?!?!

I recommend using the highest quality eggs here and if you are extremely nervous, feel free to pasteurize your eggs as well! Google is a beautiful place and I am sure you can find tutorials so that you *know* you are safe.

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Love lobster tails, but what if I want the whole lobster?

I don’t recommend poaching the claws, knuckle, etc. in butter because this particular meat is delicate and could fall apart in the butter and absorb too much fat. However, I do recommend poaching the entire lobster for 2-3 minutes (just as I do for the tail in this recipe) then, remove the tails. From here, follow the lobster tail recipe that’s below. For the claws and knuckles, continue poaching in the water until fully cooked. Once the claws and knuckles are cooked, remove that meat from the shell. Plate the tails and then put the claws on the side of the tail. Drizzle a big puddle of the sauce onto both the claws, knuckle meat and the tail and plate like the image below. That’s what I did on Christmas Eve for our family dinner and it was a hit. It’s easier for me to source lobster tails at the store, so that’s why I made the adjustment to this recipe. You are more than welcome to make this sauce and enjoy it with the whole lobster.

 

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I’m gluten-free, can I still make this sauce?

Of course! Sub the all-purpose flour with a gluten-free starch or flour of your choice. If going for a starch, I would start with 1 tsp to thicken. If it needs to be thicker, add another tsp. It shouldn’t need more than that.

What kind of butter should I be using?

Usually I would say: “the best kind!” but we are infusing it with so much flavor that I would just go for any unsalted butter. Don’t use a cultured butter here because that’s going to yield way more milk solids than a regular butter. Of course, Irish butter is spectacular here….

What kind of seafood stock or broth should I be using? Can I make my own?

I’m not sure if any of you are really asking this question, but I wanted to throw this in here because it’s important!! You can *easily* make your own lobster broth and use it in the recipe. All you do is boil your own lobster tail shells in the poaching water (from the first poach) as you continue to move forward with the rest of the recipe. By the time you get to the sauce, the broth will have enough lobster flavor to add a light touch of it to the sauce. If you go this route, your sauce will be light and bright, but also rich with the butter. If you go with store bought seafood stock, your sauce will have a deeper flavor, since the stock is highly infused with many different kinds of seafoods that will contribute to your sauce. I personally liked this store bought version more, but regardless, it’s going to taste amazing. To be honest, everything else in the sauce is just a guest at the butter’s party.

The post Herb-Infused Butter Poached Lobster Tails with a Creamy White Wine Butter Sauce appeared first on Dining with Skyler.

My obsession with large cookies started after I made my DIY Levain cookies 3 years ago, and since then, I’ve loved to play with this recipe and see what else I can do with the big cookie “format.” I was going to make chocolate molten lava cakes for Valentine’s Day, but I quickly realized …. I don’t really have ramekins lying around to whip up molten lava cakes on a whim. Like,  I do have them in the basement in my random item stash that I keep for work, but if I didn’t do this for a living, would I actually have ramekins hanging around? And would the average person have them in their kitchen? I’m not sure but my guess was “no.” So that’s when I thought, “what about chocolate molten cake….in a big, monstrous, gooey cookie,” anddddd now we’re here.

A few things I want to note before you get cooking!

Let’s talk filling! A little info on chocolate ganache and other filling options.

Chocolate ganache sounds fancy…and it is decadent….but it’s just so easy to make that it doesn’t deserve to seem fancy and intimidating anymore. We are making a super simple ganache with heavy cream and semi sweet chocolate. You could also use dark chocolate, but milk chocolate won’t really fly here. If you decide to go milk chocolate, just put a little Hershey’s Kiss inside the dough and it will melt as the cookies bake! If you like hazelnut and chocolate, you could use Nutella in the center of the cookies. I would still freeze it to firm it up a bit, then follow the same steps. If you prefer white chocolate filling, follow the same steps with some white chocolate chips! You can also swirl raspberry jam in there for some extra deliciousness.

MAKE AHEAD TIPS! 

You can make the chocolate ganache up to a week ahead, leaving it in the freezer. You can also assemble the cookie dough balls and freeze for a few days before making them as well. So long as they are covered and stored properly, you can make them up to a week ahead. If they are uncovered, they could stand a night in the freezer without tasting like…well, a freezer. Use your judgement!

Not into the Valentine’s Day theme? That’s fine! Use sprinkles that fit your vibe… I think using your favorite team colors for the Super Bowl would be a great thing to do. Or, you could always go classic funfetti rainbow.

Free cooking class is also here so you can watch and learn!

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The only thing that didn’t really work out was that I wayyyyyy overestimated the amount of meat I would need to feed only five people. Turns out, 4.5 lbs was WAY too much meat, and when you make beef tenderloin, you only need the Chateaubriand cut from the center of the tenderloin, and you don’t need the whole tenderloin. You have to trim the tails off. Needless to say, I was left with a lot of beef tenderloin meat leftovers and I was determined to cook with every oz. of it after Thanksgiving. Beef tenderloin roasts are expensive! You want to make sure you eat it all at all costs. Speaking of beef tenderloin roasts, check out my simple beef tenderloin roast recipe below and tutorial on how to get it absolutely perfect.

How-To: Beef Tenderloin Roast 

Anyway, this recipe stemmed from playing with those leftovers…and wow. I surprised myself with this one! This was a creation that stemmed from a lazy day off, where I planned to not worry about remembering a recipe while I was cooking, and instead, just cook. BUT it was so easy and delicious that I had to post it.

Let’s talk about the flavor/subs/swaps, etc. Yes, it’s very obvious at this point that I used beef tenderloin here, lol. You can 10000% make this sauce with  any cut of steak, so long as you prepare it by searing it in a pan. This would be delicious with skirt steak, flank steak or sirloin, to name a few.

I usually like to use ginger when I’m making an Asian-inspired sauce. I was bummed when I realized I didn’t have it in my pantry, but since I didn’t plan to make a recipe, I just rolled with it. I did have mirin (a sweet Japanese rice wine commonly used in cooking,) soy sauce and looooots of garlic. Those are the 3 ingredients that make up this sauce, and it turns out, you don’t even miss the ginger! If you have ginger, feel free to add it, though of course.

 

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My final note here is that this recipe calls for mirin, which is a sweet rice wine. You can actually sub it for rice vinegar or apple cider and just add a little, tiny bit of honey or agave nectar to bring some sweetness. However, I recommend using mirin if you can! Linking a few options below to get on Amazon. Something else I am loving for searing my steaks lately is this ghee oil which I’ve also linked below!

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