Stone Crab

C and I took an amazing trip to Miami for a long weekend to celebrate our anniversary and to catch a Miami Heat playoff game. Ten years ago Miami would have been about clubbing and drinking...now I am all about the beach and eating. We were lucky enough to dine at Barton G and Ola for dinner, but our lunch at Joe's Take-a-way before the Heat game was equally memorable. I got the recipe for their famous stone crab sauce from Saveur and I was ready to recreate the experience at home.  My mom and I headed to the Kemah fish markets, where I knew I had seen stone crab on prior visits, but this time we visited five shops before we finally found some, I was about to give up.  Whenever I had gotten stone crab from the grocer, it has always been precooked.  And everything I ready on the internet seemed to suggest that is the only way it was sold, unless it was fresh off the boat.  Well...we got gfresh off the boat claws and I didn't realize it.   After a bit of a panic, we figured it out and dined on amazing crab claws, without the Miami prices.

Stone Crab

3 to 4 pounds stone crab claws, fresh or cooked

1 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons half-and-half
4 teaspoons dry mustard
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon A.1. Steak Sauce
Kosher salt and freshly ground 

black pepper, to taste

Is using fresh crab claws, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the stone crab claws to the boiling water and boil for 10 minutes. While the crab is boiling, prepare a large bowl of ice water, large enough to hold all the crab. After the crab has cooked, submerge each claw in the ice water bath and let sit for 5 to 8 minutes. Remove the crab claws from the ice water and refrigerate until ready to serve.

If using pre-cooked claws, serve chilled with the sauce.

Whisk mayonnaise, half-and-half, mustard, Worcestershire, and A.1. sauce in a bowl until smooth; season with salt and pepper and chill. Serve as a dipping sauce for the chilled stone crab.

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Steak Fajitas

I love fajitas. C much prefers enchiladas, tamales and anything else served in a TexMex combo plate to fajitas. Recreating a combo plate is a bit beyond my cooking skills, so when we eat at home, fajitas are what I serve. I adapted this recipe from I Was Born To Cook. For whatever reason, flank steak is pricy around here. I can get NY strip, sirloin or beef tenderloin for cheaper than a flank steak. So even though flank steak is what traditional fajitas are made with, I decided to make them with steak. And it was amazing! The beef is delicious and tender. Miss F devoured hers, though she added black beans in her tortilla. C ate the meat without a tortilla because he is never a fan of store bought tortillas. One of these days I will get around to making my own, but for now, store bought works fine for me.

Steak Fajitas

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
juice of 1 lime
3 cloves garlic, minced
½ teaspoon cumin
½ fresh Jalapeno pepper, seeded, rib removed, diced

1 NY Strip
½ onion, sliced
1 green bell pepper, sliced

Whisk together the olive oil, lime juice, garlic, cumin and jalapeno. Pour the marinade over the steak, turning to coat. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes. Wipe most of marinade off before cooking. Sprinkle with salt.

Heat a large grill pan for a minute. Add steak, frying each side for about 3-4 minutes for medium rare. Remove from pan, tent with foil and let rest.

Add the onion and bell pepper to the pan, mix with tongs until slightly tender.

Slice meat against the grain into thin pieces. Serve with shredded cheese, salsa, guacamole, and warm flour tortillas.

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BLT Carbonara

I love a BLT. I love Carbonara. When Tide and Thyme adapted my recipe for Spaghetti Carbonara with Bacon and Tomatoes to become BLT Carbonara, it was a stroke of genius. I changed the recipe to keep the tomatoes closer to their fresh state, more akin to what they are like in a real BLT. This pasta was a huge success. Miss F was a huge fan and I had the leftovers all week for lunch. Delicious! My next Carbonara quest is to recreate the Crab Carbonara at Reef. I think I would be completely fine with eating Carbonara every week, mainly for the fantastic lunch leftovers.

BLT Carbonara

3 egg yolks
¼ cup heavy creamy
½ cup Parmesan cheese
Fresh diced parsley or dried flakes
¼ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon red pepper flakes
½ pound bacon, cut into lardons
½ small onion, chopped
¼ cup white wine
12 ounces spaghetti
2 Roma tomatoes, chopped
1 cup baby spinach leaves

Whisk together the eggs, cream, Parmesan, parsley, salt and the red pepper together in a bowl. In a large non stick pan, fry the bacon until crisp and set aside. Drain all but on tablespoon of the bacon grease; sauté the onion for 3 minutes. Deglaze the pan with the white wine.

Prepare the spaghetti per package instructions. Drain the pasta and while still warm, add to the onions. Pour cream mixture into the spaghetti, and stir over low heat for one minute. Stir in the tomatoes and spinach and stir for one minute more over low heat. Top with bacon and serve with additional Parmesan.

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Pink Zebra Cake

When I saw this technique on Pinterest from My Cake School, I knew I wanted to try it.  I didn't want to fuss with two cake flavors, so I decided to make only the vanilla cake and dye half of the batter hot pink.  Much much easier than fussing with two cake mixes...I mean, if I am using a box cake mix, I want things to be easy.  Make sure to check out My Cake School's step by step pictures.  I was lucky this cake turned out at all considering all my issues that day, no way could I handle step by step photography on top of baking!

Pink Zebra Cake

1 box vanilla cake mix (I used Duncan Hines)
2 to 3 drops hot pink food coloring
1 recipe chocolate cream cheese frosting, recipe follows

Prepare the cake mix per package instructions.  Divide the batter into two equal portions.  Use the food coloring to color half of the batter.  Grease and flour two 8" cake pans.  Drop 1/4 cup of batter, alternating colors, in each pan until there are 8 to 10 concentric circles of alternating colors.  Bake per package instructions.  Cool and frost with chocolate cream cheese frosting.

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

8 ounces cream cheese, softened
¼ cup butter, softened
½ cup cocoa powder
4 cups confectioners’ sugar

Beat cream cheese, butter and cocoa powder until combined. Add the confectioners’ sugar ½ cup at a time making sure to incorporate it fully before you add the next ½ cup.

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