How can this be a family recipe? Brazilian? Connie joined our family almost a year ago as I joined hers. Our children married. Connie’s family is originally from the Azores but lived in Brazil most of her youth. She has shared with me her recipe for feijoada. I’ve made a few minor changes to ingredients but will include her version and mine. And the cooking method was changed slightly.
If I haven’t captured your attention … It’s hard to be passionate about beans BUT not for me! Portuguese Black Beans doesn’t fully describe this recipe. This is an amazingly delicious meat stew with beans. Served with rice and collards.
Sounds a bit like a few of my romantic relationships. But it’s really about food! A Portuguese lamb marinade used for chicken thighs. Use this marinade for your lamb shanks or shoulder. Or if you have a family not too fond of lamb try it on chicken. Thighs vs breast meat? Thighs have a higher fat content. Seemed a better choice. This recipe can easily be used for your barbecue chicken and lamb. Delicious!
-BARBECUED LINGUICA “HOT DOGS” WITH HOMEMADE BUNS
-PORTUGUESE WHITE BEANS (BAKED BEANS)
-CLASSIC BEST FOODS POTATO SALAD – MY VERSION
These Portuguese Rolls are the perfect bun for my linguica hot dogs. The ease and success of this recipe will have you and your family smiling.
Another Perry Family Recipe, Portuguese White Baked Beans. About 10 minutes to prep and some hours in the oven and you will see why our family is still talking about this recipe 50 years later. Thank you Margaret. Enjoy, Danny and Leonard!
The secret of good bread making beyond the ingredients … Don’t be afraid to use a little muscle in the kneading. No one made bread better than my grandmother. She often made 20 loaves at a time. That’s some kneading, or more correctly a lot of muscle. Yep, her arms were strong, and she had well formed deltoids before it was in vogue.
This morning I enjoyed a generous slice of this bread with coffee my grandmother’s way, cream and sugar. Yep, she was from the East Coast!
Just Perfect!
This recipe requires no condiments to enhance the flavor. Eat it hot from the oven. You’ll see. It’s amazing!
This looks like a sandwich you eat while watching or discussing the game, football to be exact. This is true. BUT I’ve also heard this sandwich with fries is a traditional lunch around the Porto area in Portugal. OK maybe it doesn’t look like this exactly.
There are two schools of thought about the origin of the Francesinha. One suggesting this was first seen around the 19th century. And the second that this was developed as a take on the French croque monsieur around the 1960’s. Whichever, it was fun to recreate.
This recipe is mine and concocted from suggestions of what is often used in the little frenchie. The list of ingredients is endless. I chose some favorites. Actually, the whole list was from my favorites but I wasn’t looking to make a foot long sandwich! As it turns out this sandwich is easily two servings. So, what is on this suggested list! You’ll see!
Piri Piri is the name given by the Portuguese for the African bird’s eye chili. This little chili pepper is commonly made into a sauce to be used with chicken and sometimes fish in Portuguese Cuisine. The chili rates about a 7 on a heat rating scale of 1-10, 10 being the hottest.
I suggest making the sauce at least a day ahead to give it time to intensify flavors. Do keep it refrigerated unless you are going to use it the day you make it. The chili peppers are hard to find in your local grocery store but here are some substitutions; Pequin, Cayenne and Tabasco. The heat of all these are about the same. Amazon does have Piri Piri but I purchased Pequin from a local grocer.
Doesn’t it make a nice presentationhere with my roasted chicken. This recipe can be taken to the barbecue. I teased the idea but favored the oven instead … This time!
Hockey Puck … This is commonly used to describe this sweet pricey mollusk when it’s overcooked. My description, too, with my first cooking experience.
So much was working against the perfect outcome back then. First, my Mystery Man preferred welldone everything especially seafood. Yep, even well done tuna sashimi. That’s an oxymoron! (Don’t tell him but fresh scallops can actually be eaten raw.) This well done thing, and no ingredients ready before placing the scallops into a too cool skillet converted the potentially tender juicy treat into a choking hazard! Since then I’ve learned much about this treasure of the sea.
So, here are a few simple suggestions for cooking the perfect sea scallop.
-Have everything prepared before you begin cooking the scallops … Not only the ingredients going into the scallop dish but any side you plan to fix. Keep in mind cooking scallops takes only minutes. Have the rice ready or nearly so.
-For best results use searing to cook the scallops. I like to use a very hot cast iron skillet. Use an oil that tolerates high heat and be prepared for a little bit of a mess with splatter.
-Cook in batches to keep the skillet from dropping too much in temperature when the scallops are added. Spread out the scallops in the pan.
-Let the scallops cook for about one minute before turning them over. Check to make sure the bottom is cooking nicely, browning but not burning. After a minute the scallop is less likely to stick to the skillet because it is now seared. Turn to sear the additional side.
Our weather today was a bit gloomy … time for Chicken Soup. This soup is Portuguese cuisine influenced … Really meant for rabbit. Yep, I’ve been informed hare was on the family menu. My brother couldn’t bring himself to eat rabbit … And if I did, it was purely not knowing. My brother and I were fond of these animals but not for dinner.
We hope you will enjoy this recipe for chicken soup. It can easily convert to a vegan recipe. It has so many delicious full of flavor vegetables! And beans too!
The ingredients in these two favorites, Mexican Wedding Cakes and Portuguese Almond Cookies, make a perfect marriage, Almond Wedding Cake Cookies. They’re rich and densely packed with almonds. To make it vegan I suggest vegan butter. I have substituted almond butter for half of the cup of butter called for in the recipe. This I do not recommend. Substituting no more than 1/4 cup of almond butter plus using 3/4 cup butter is doable.
But this is Swiss Chard! Already picking this from my garden! As a child I would rather have greens over most vegetables and over all fruit. My children laugh when I say it must have been a nutritional need! These greens are amazingly packed with nutrition!
Years ago the variety of greens at the grocer’s was minimal if not because of availability then just because they were old and unappealing. Today, I still have a time finding fresh turnip greens and sometimes turn to the freezer section. It doesn’t matter if it’s fall when they are in season or not.
Turnip greens were often used in my grandmother’s cooking. Kale was hard to find. These two are the most often called for in Portuguese cooking. For the following two simple recipes you can use kale, swiss chard, turnip greens, mustard greens or even spinach. Of these the most bitter are swiss chard, turnip and mustard greens. Blanching the swiss chard may reduce bitterness but this is not recommended for the other greens. Mustard greens, kale (except for the stem) and of course spinach are more tender. Kale and spinach are delicious in fresh salads.
