BLT Benedict!

Bacon.  Poached Eggs.  Avocado.  Fresh, sweet, summer cherry tomatoes.  Tender baby lettuce.  Sliced sourdough bread that has been brushed with olive oil and toasted outside on the grill until it is just the right amount of charred.

You're with me, right?  Yes, this is Eggs Benedict meets BLT meets Guacamole...it's the perfect mash-up of some of my favorite comfort foods, all on one lucky plate.  You want to soft cook the poached eggs so they are just the right amount of runny, because they are going to take the place of the million calorie and tricky to make hollandaise sauce that usually goes on Eggs Benedict.

Meantime, you are going to marinate those gorgeous baby tomatoes and the avocado in a little dressing of garlic, fresh chopped basil, olive oil and a teeny bit of wine vinegar.  That's where you get just a little of the guacamole taste...not exactly the real thing, but a close cousin.

Now send someone reliable out to the grill to toast up the sourdough bread...or any other substantial bread that you have on hand.  One slice per person, because this is an open-faced sandwich.  (I'm going through an open-faced sandwich phase this summer.  I love them.)

You cook up the bacon and the poached egg in the meantime.  Or do it in any order you like - one of the great things about this sandwich is that you can make the other stuff ahead of time and have it at room temperature and save cooking the egg for the very end.

Now the assembly: spread a little mayo on the grilled bread, then layer on some some lettuce, then the bacon, then some of the tomato mixture.  Pop an egg on top and break it just enough for the yolk to spread over the whole thing.  Drop a few more tomatoes on top.   It's going to be the one of the best things you ever tasted, I promise.  Almost as good as a practically empty jar of peanut butter.

Almost. 

Here's the recipe!

BLT Benedict! adapted from My Recipes via Southern Living

• 1 cup halved grape tomatoes
• 1 avocado, diced
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar, divided
• 6 large eggs
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• 6 slices sourdough or other hearty sandwich bread, brushed with olive oil and grilled until toasted (or if you MUST, you can put them in the toaster!)
• 3 cups baby lettuce
• 12 thick bacon slices, cooked

1. Combine tomatoes and next five ingredients and 2 1/2 tsp. red wine vinegar in a small bowl.
2. Add water to depth of 3 inches in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil; reduce heat, and maintain at a light simmer. Add remaining 1/2 tsp. red wine vinegar. Break eggs, and slip into water, 1 at a time, as close as possible to surface. Simmer 3 to 5 minutes or to desired degree of doneness (but the runnier the better for this recipe!). Remove with a slotted spoon.
3. Spread mayonnaise on one side of each bread slice. Layer each with 1/2 cup lettuce, 2 bacon slices, some of the tomato mixture and one egg. Top with remaining tomato mixture.

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Cucumber Wrap Salad with Bacon and Blue Cheese

Okay, so I have to state for the record right here that this is EXACTLY the kind of recipe I usually run away from as fast as possible.  It looks hard to make, and it involves inserting little strips of carrots into the center just so, and the cucumber-made-into-a-bowl part looks fraught with peril.   

But those two strips of bacon.  They kept calling my name.  And finally one day I gave in to temptation and purchased a cucumber.  There's only so much one woman can take before the bacon wins, and so I put it on one of our Friday Night Lights menus.

And guess what?  This was pretty much as easy as it gets.  You peel thin strips of the cucumber with a vegetable peeler or a mandoline...make the strips as thin as you can, because the thinner they are the easier they will turn into these little bottomless bowls.  I have an OXO Good Grips Mandoline Slicerand I love it...just be SUPER careful if you are using one, because those babies are sharp.  The moisture of the cucumber will make the ends stick together once you have fashioned them into these little bowls, which will take you about 2 minutes.  I used two strips per bowl, just for sturdiness.  

In the meantime, cut some bacon in half and cook it up however you like to...I always cook bacon for about 10-12 minutes in a 400 degree oven and it comes out just perfect.  Yes, you do have to cut up a carrot into little strips, but with bacon on the horizon, I was willing to cut up carrots.  Tear up some lettuce and toss it with your favorite dressing (a balsamic vinaigrette works great with this recipe), some crumbled blue cheese and some chopped pecans.  Or walnuts...or whatever catches your fancy.  Now take your favorite tongs, scoop up some of the lettuce mixture and nestle it into your cucumber bowls.  Fill them right up.  When you are done, stand two pieces of bacon and some of those carrot strips into the lettuce mixture.

Now stand back and look modest. 

The moral of the story: Never try and resist bacon.  It always ends up happily ever after.

Cucumber Wrap Salad with Bacon and Blue Cheese, adapted from My Recipes

• 2 tablespoons chopped pecans
• 2 medium cucumbers, peeled
• 3 cups mixed baby greens
• 2 cooked thick-cut bacon slices, halved
• 1/3 cup shredded or matchstick carrots
• 1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese
• Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
• Salad dressing to taste (any sort of vinaigrette will work great)

1. Place chopped pecans in a single layer in a shallow pan.

2. Bake at 350º for 8 minutes or until lightly toasted, stirring occasionally. Let cool 30 minutes or until completely cool.

3. Using a mandoline slicer or a vegetable peeler, cut cucumbers lengthwise into very thin strips just until seeds are visible. Discard cucumber core.

4. Shape largest cucumber slices into 4 (2 1/2- to 2 3/4-inch-wide) rings. Wrap evenly with remaining cucumber slices. Stand rings upright on 4 serving plates.

5. Fill each cucumber ring evenly with mixed greens, next 3 ingredients, and toasted pecans. Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste. Drizzle each salad with vinaigrette.

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Lobster BLT Salad...and the Stonewall Kitchen Cookbook Winner!

If I ever had to make the agonizing decision between lobster and bacon, I'm not sure what I would do.  They are two of my favorite taste sensations in the entire world, and so when I read about the Lobster BLT Salad that is on the menu at the Stonewall Kitchen Cafe, I just had to take a whack at it.  Someday I am going to make it up there to Maine to try the real thing, but for now I had to be satisfied with doing my own imitation of it.  The menu description went like this:

Cafe Lobster BLT Salad - Local lobster meat, tossed lightly with mayonnaise & chopped celery served on a bed of chopped baby iceberg lettuce. Topped with crumbled cherrywood-smoked bacon, slices of vine-ripened tomatoes and housemade croutons. 

So I sent the Southern husband off to the store to pick us up a couple of steamed lobsters (because I am a complete sissy when it comes to cooking my own lobsters.  I'm sorry, but it's true.).  I had some nice farmer's market tomatoes, and of course you know I had bacon in the house already.  I used romaine instead of iceberg, although I'm sure iceberg would be perfectly fine.  A leftover hunk of French bread turned into some lovely croutons.  The restaurant menu says that their BLT salad is served with the dressing of your choice -- I found that the lobster salad provided enough "dressing" taste for the salad, but go for addition dressing if you like.  I'm sure the original is even better, but for a New Jersey version, this was pretty dang good.

Meantime, thank you to EVERYONE who commented on the giveaway post for STONEWALL KITCHEN FAVORITES, the amazing cookbook from my friends at Stonewall.  What a great group of suggestions for summer favorites!  My menu for next summer is now completely figured out!  As usual I went to Random.org to pick out the winner, since I can't bear to choose on my own, and the lucky winner of the signed-by-the-authors cookbook is Holly, who commented that marinated flank steak is one of her favorites.  YUM, me too!

Here's the recipe, and onward to fall...

Lobster BLT Salad, inspired by the Stonewall Kitchen Cafe

• Two lobsters, cooked, shelled and torn into pieces
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• 2 ribs of celery, chopped
• freshly ground pepper to taste
• One head romaine lettuce, torn into bite sized pieces
• 4 slices of bacon, cooked and crumbled
• 2 large tomatoes, sliced into bite-sized pieces
• 1 cup large croutons

1. Mix lobster, mayo, celery and pepper together.
2. Place lobster mixture in large bowl with all other ingredients and toss gently until well mixed.
3. Add your choice of dressing (if desired - we didn't use any) and toss again.  Serve at once.

Click here for printable recipe

Shrimp in a Jar

Okay, so I know this particular dish is half novelty and half supper, but honestly, the whole thing made me just ridiculously happy, and how often can you say that about a Tuesday night supper?

This all started with a trip to Costco, where the Southern husband (who THINKS he has more self-control than I do at Costco but really doesn't) not only bought a huge bag of shrimp but also a Costco sized bag of avocados. Now, the shrimp can be sub-divided into many freezer bags and stored away for future meals. The avocados? Not so much. It was use-it-or-lose-it time, avocado-wise. And since I am a girl who loves a challenge, I spent a week making many avocado-based things while still trying to keep it interesting. We had:

Chilled Avocado Cucumber Soup

BLA's (Bagel with Lox and Avocado)

Lots of guacamole

And...Shrimp in a Jar, which is basically layers of chopped lettuce, fresh tomato salsa, cooked chopped shrimp, mashed avocado with lime juice, all topped with crumbled tortilla chips. But the beauty part is the jar. Why? I have no idea -- but for some reason it was just so much fun! I picked up these little wide-mouth jars at The Container Store, and once you have finished eating your supper out of them they make GREAT little storage devices. They are currently lined up on my counter with four different types of cookies in them.

I'm already thinking up new possibilities for what the Southern husband is already calling "jar food." In the meantime, here's the recipe.

Shrimp in a Jar, adapted from Epicurious

• 2 medium tomatoes, chopped
• 1/4 cup chopped white onion
• 1/4 cup finely chopped cilantro or parsley
• 1 to 2 teaspoons chopped fresh jalapeno
• 2 tablespoons ketchup
• 2 to 3 tablespoons fresh lime juice, divided
• 1 pound peeled cooked shrimp, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 2 firm-ripe avocados
• 2 cups shredded lettuce (I used iceberg)
• 1/2 cup coarsely crumbled tortilla chips

1. Stir together tomatoes, onion, parsley, chile, ketchup, 1 tablespoon lime juice, and 1/2 teaspoon salt.

2. Stir in shrimp and season with salt and pepper.

3. Mash avocados with remaining 1 to 2 tablespoons lime juice and 1/2 teaspoon salt.

4. Divide lettuce among jars and layer shrimp mixture, avocado, and crumbled chips on top.

Click here for printable recipe

Savory French Toast BLTs

We are french toast FANATICS in my house. The teenager has said to me more than once that when she comes home from college it is going to be to see me and her dad and to eat some of my homemade french toast. (Not necessarily in that order, I'm guessing, but she is too sweet to put it that way.)

Anyway, I am always trolling for new french toast recipes and up until now they have all been variations on the sweet breakfast version. Until the other day, when I ran across this one, which is definitely a dinner version. It's the same basic concept -- bread soaked in egg and fried -- but oh, man...this time with chives and fresh ground pepper in the egg, and with a BLT topping.

I am getting heart palpitations just reliving it.

I don't think I have anything more to say about this one, except, please go make it right now, so you understand what I am talking about.

Savory French Toast BLTs, adapted from Everyday Food

8 slices bacon
4 large eggs, slightly beaten
3/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup chopped chives, plus more for garnish
coarse salt and fresh ground pepper
4 slices bread
4 lettuce leaves
8 slices tomato

1. Cook bacon using your preferred method, drain on paper towels, set aside.

2. Whisk together eggs, cream and chives. Lay bread slices in single layer in shallow dish and pour egg mixture over. Soak for 3 minutes, turn bread over and soak for 3 minutes more.

3. Heat butter in large skillet over medium heat. When butter sizzles, add bread and cook until golden, about 3 minutes per side.

4. Layer lettuce, bacon and tomato on each slice of french toast, garnish with chopped chives and serve.

Click here for printable recipe.

Chipolte Chicken Salad

I love this salad. It's right up there for me with my favorite taco salad -- one of those "chop up a bunch of those things that you like, toss them all together and voila! a scrumptious dinner" type of recipes. I will be perfectly honest and say that the original recipe for this dish, which I found in my new favorite Cooking Light cookbook, called for black beans, and if you like black beans you should feel perfectly free to throw them on in there. But in my house, I am sorry to tell you that black beans are the enemy, along with: mushrooms, eggplant, lima beans and cilantro. I wish I could like all that stuff, and so does my mother, who keeps getting me to "just try them." But I have, and I don't, and I gotta be me.

But everything else in this recipe was A-okay with me -- chicken, corn, tomato, avocado, lettuce, all tossed with a spicy sour cream dressing and served with some nice tortilla chips on the side. Which leads me to ask you about one of the great searches of my life: the quest for the perfect tortilla chip. I am looking for suggestions, folks...I still haven't landed on a brand that makes me stop and sing. So if you have, please share in the comments section? And in the meantime, here is my black-bean-less version of this nifty chicken salad. Yum.

CHIPOLTE CHICKEN SALAD, adapted from The Essential Dinner Tonight Cookbook

Dressing:

• 2/3 cup sour cream
• 4 teaspoons lime juice
• 2 tablespoons minced chipolte chile in adobo sauce
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Salad:

• 4 cups shredded romaine lettuce
• 2 cups cooked shredded chicken breast
• 1 cup halved cherry tomatoes
• 1 peeled and diced avocado
• 1/3 cup sliced red onion
• 1 cup corn

1. Combine all dressing ingredients and mix well.
2. Combine all salad ingredients and toss. Drizzle dressing over salad and toss again. Serve with your favorite tortilla chips...whatever they are.

Click here for printable recipe

Meatloaf Sandwiches

You know, I really wondered about this one. I found the recipe in one of my favorite places, the Everyday Foods magazine, and at first I thought, this sounds like a fun use for leftover meatloaf. And then I read it more closely and realized that the recipe called for making the meatloaf specifically for the sandwiches.

Hmm. Meatloaf-making is not a short process. It's not hard, but it's not short. So in my house, that automatically turns it into a Sunday dinner. So I did a little bit of agonizing about serving the family sandwiches for Sunday dinner. We are a little fast and loose about where and how we eat during the week (eat dinner on the couch while watching Glee? Sure, we can do that!) but on Sundays I do insist on the dining room, the candles, all family members present and accounted for, etc. So...sandwiches? The dog promised me it would be okay, so I went for it.

And oh my goodness. This meatloaf is laced with both horseradish and shredded cheddar cheese, so it is already way ahead of most of its meatloaf brethren. The recipe calls for letting it sit for abut 15 minutes after it comes out of the oven, so by the time it makes it into the sandwich it is still plenty warm, but firm enough to stay intact as you lay it upon some nice country bread and anoint it with ketchup, thin sliced dill pickles and a layer of romaine lettuce.

Meatloaf Sandwiches. It's what's for Sunday dinner. Oh yes.

MEATLOAF SANDWICHES, adapted from Everyday Foods

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 1/2 pounds ground beef chuck
• 1 cup crush saltines (15 crackers)
• 1 cup grated cheddar
• 3 eggs
• 2 tablespoons horseradish
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• Country style bread
• Lettuce
• Sliced dill pickles
• Ketchup

1. Preheat oven to 375.

2. Heat oil in skillet over medium heat and add onions. Cook 5 minutes until softened. Add tomato paste and stir constantly for 3 minutes.

3. In large bowl, combine beef, onion mixture, crackers, cheese, horseradish, Worcestershire, salt and pepper.

4. Line a baking sheet with parchment and shape beef mixture into a 9 inch loaf. Bake unti cooked through, about 45 minutes. Let rest for 15 minutes.

5. Cut into thick slices and place on bread with pickles, lettuce and ketchup.

Click here for printable recipe

BLT Salad

I should start by saying that the major item that I have in common with the dog is a deep and abiding love for bacon. I totally feel her pain when I am cooking up a skillet of bacon and then don't turn around and put it in her dish. She always looks like she can't quite believe I'm not making it all for her. In my next life I think I will invent a completely bacon-flavored kibble and make a million bucks.

In the meantime, I always pause on any recipe that has bacon in the title. And of course, if the title also has the word "salad" in it, I feel like it is a healthy bacon recipe. This is my own little fantasy world that I have created, so please don't try and talk sense into me. So when I saw BLT Salad as an entry in Mark Bittman's new book KITCHEN EXPRESS, it was only a matter of time...a very short amount of time...before it ended up on our plates. As with all dishes in this book, there is no actual recipe, so I put together my own. It's a nifty little salad with a scrumptious avocado dressing, and since the book doesn't tell you specific amounts for all the ingredients, MY version goes a little heavy on the you-know-what.

This is probably a good time to tell you that I gave the romantic Southern husband chocolate bacon truffles for Valentine's Day last year, and oh, my my. Take a look:

Bacon and Chocolate


But if you want to stick with bacon health food, try this salad.

BLT SALAD, adapted from Kitchen Express

• 4 slices thick bacon, cooked until crisp and cut into bite size pieces
• 1 avocado
• 1/4 cup fresh basil leaves
• 1 clove garlic
• 1 lime
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• Salt and pepper
• 1 head romaine lettuce
• 2 ripe tomatoes

1. Puree avocado, basil and garlic in food processor until smooth. Juice the lime and add to the avocado mixture.

2. With the processor running, slowly pour in the olive oil until blended in. Season dressing to taste with salt and pepper.

3. Tear up lettuce and add to salad bowl. Chop tomatoes and add to bowl along with chopped bacon.

4. Add dressing and toss. I like to add the dressing gradually and taste as I go along to make sure the salad is not "over-dressed."

Click Here For Printable Recipe

Caesar Salad with Poached Egg

I do love a good Caesar salad. I love them plain, I love them with grilled chicken, I love them with shrimp. I am brimming with love for Caesar salad. I am also brimming with love for poached eggs, as those of you who have read this blog for a while already know. So when Caesar salad meets poached eggs...heaven.

This recipe calls for a couple of slices of bread as the base, and luckily I had a few slices left over from my baguette baking, but you can use any kind of country-ish bread you have on hand. Next comes layers of romaine lettuce, and unlike the standard Caesar salad, I leave these whole, just because it looks so fancy that way. Next...oh happiness!...comes the poached egg. There is one in the picture above but if you want to go really crazy, you can use TWO! Drizzle with the quick Caesar dressing in recipe, then grind some pepper over the top, and finally finish with a scattering of really nice Parmesan cheese. One of my friends gave me a big wedge of Parmesan that she brought me back from her vacation to Italy, and it is so unbelievably good that I am practically doling it out shred by shred. I'm not sure what I am going to do when it is gone and I have to go back to my usual Parmesan cheese, now that I have been so incredibly spoiled. That's the cheese I used for this recipe, because a great Parmesan makes a big difference in this one.

Anyway. That's all there is to this one, but it makes a great light meal, and if you poach the egg just right, when you cut it open the egg will mix with the dressing, and you will eat the whole thing with a blissful smile on your face. I promise.

CAESAR SALAD WITH POACHED EGG

Serves 4

• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• 1 minced garlic clove
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan
• 1/2 cup olive oil plus extra for drizzling
• 4 slices country bread, lightly toasted
• Romaine lettuce leaves
• 4 to 8 poached eggs, depending if you are using one or two per salad

1. Put mayo, garlic, lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce and 2 tablespoons cheese in food processor and blend until smooth. Add oil in a steady stream until creamy and emulsified. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

2. Lay bread on plates. Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.

3. Lay lettuce leaves on top of bread, and top lettuce with egg or eggs.

4. Drizzled dressing over all. Grind pepper on top, and scatter remaining cheese over eggs. Serve immediately.