fiery fish tacos with crunchy corn salsa

I adapted this light and easy to make recipe from allrecipes.com.  I used snapper fillets instead of tilapia and flour tortillas instead of corn. I left out the jicama and didn’t miss it. I had a lot of the fish taco spice left over so I recommend reducing the amount or spooning out what’s needed and putting up the rest. I also recommend substituting chopped avocado or chopped tomato instead of the jicama. To me, a taco isn’t fiery unless you add chilies to it so in went half a habañero (Scotch bonnet in Jamaica). This turned out to be a tasty meal, light but satisfying, zesty and full of flavor.

Prep Time: 30 Minutes
Ready In: 40 Minutes
Cook Time: 10 Minutes
Servings: 6

INGREDIENTS:
Corn Salsa
1 cup corn
1/2 cup diced red onion
1 cup peeled, chopped jicama, optional
1/2 cup diced red bell pepper
1 cup fresh cilantro leaves, finely chopped
1 lime, zested and juiced
1/2 Scotch bonnet (habañero) pepper with seeds, finely chopped, optional

Tacos
1-2 tablespoons cayenne pepper
1/2 -1 tablespoon ground black pepper
1-2 tablespoons salt
6 (4 ounce) tilapia or snapper fillets
2 tablespoons olive oil
12 corn tortillas, warmed
2 tablespoons sour cream or nonfat Greek-style yogurt, optional

DIRECTIONS:
1. Prepare to cook. Preheat grill for high heat. Or, preheat broiler at 450˚F and spray a broiling pan with cooking spray. Set pan aside until ready to broil fish.

2. Make the corn salsa. In a medium bowl, mix together corn, red onion, jicama (if using), red bell pepper, cilantro, and the scotch bonnet pepper (if using). Stir in lime juice and zest. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

3. Season the fish fillets. In a small bowl, combine cayenne pepper, ground black pepper, and salt. Brush each fillet with olive oil, and sprinkle with spices.

4. Grill and serve. Arrange fillets on grill grate, and cook for 3 minutes per side. In the broiler, arrange fish fillets on the prepared broiling pan and broil for 2 1/2 minutes on each side. For each fiery fish taco, top a corn tortilla with fish, sour cream or yogurt (if using), and corn salsa. Roll up and eat!

strawberry shortcake with grand marnier whipped cream

Strawberry Shortcake with Grand Marnier Whipped Cream

Strawberry shortcake  is a really easy summer dessert to make, so delicious with cool whipped cream! Good news. The whipped cream can be dressed up with Grand Marnier, an orange liqueur. I made this for lunch today, having made the scones for the shortcake the night before in the Temperamental Oven. The browning was uneven and the scones were a tad dry, but the macerated strawberry juice took care of that.

This is one of my two favorite scones recipes.  When I want a savory scone I make Stilton Bacon scones. This one is sweet and can be served with cream and jam. I decided to make it the base for this version of strawberry shortcake.

Scones (adapted from: joyofbaking.com)

2 cups (280 grams) all-purpose flour
1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated white sugar
2 teaspoons (10 grams) baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup (76 grams or 5 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon ) cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup (120 ml) whipping cream or milk

Glaze:
1/4 cup cream or milk

Prepare to bake. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) and place the rack in the middle of the oven. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

Combine ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Cut the butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. The mixture should look like coarse crumbs. In a small measuring cup combine the 1/2 cup whipping cream or milk, beaten egg and vanilla. Add this mixture to the flour mixture. Stir just until combined. Do not over mix.

Prepare to bake the dough. Knead dough gently on a lightly floured surface. Roll or pat the dough into a circle that is about 1 inch high. Then, using a 2 1/2 inch (6.5 cm) round cookie cutter, cut the dough into rounds. Pat scraps together and cut into additional rounds. Place the rounds on the prepared cookie sheet, spacing a few inches apart. Brush the tops of the scones with a little cream. This helps to brown the tops of the scones during baking. A low-calorie option is to spray the tops with cooking spray.

Bake scones. Bake for about 15 – 18 minutes or until nicely browned and a toothpick inserted into the center of a scone comes out clean. Remove from oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool. They can be made a day ahead for strawberry shortcake. When they are cool, wrap airtight and place in a zipper lock bag. Store at room temperature.

Strawberry Filling

2 pounds fresh strawberries, washed, stemmed, and sliced
1/2 -1 cup powdered sugar

Put the sliced strawberries in a large bowl and toss with powdered sugar to coat. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to use. Do this a couple of hours before serving to allow the berries to macerate in the sugar. Any longer and the berries  will become  soggy and  soft.

Grand Marnier Whipped Cream Topping (from epicurious.com)

1 cup whipping cream (35-36% milk fat)
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon Grand Marnier or any orange-flavored liqueur

Put all ingredients in a large bowl and whip until stiff peaks form. The alcohol will soften the cream and give it a slight tang.

Ah! Dessert

Jamaican mint-ginger tea

When I was a girl in Jamaica, my mother used to make this tea. I had forgotten how good it is because it’s not the same as a peppermint tea, which I abhor. I had a bunch of mint sitting in the fridge. After chiffonading a few of the leaves for a tzatziki sauce I was left with the problem of what to do with the rest. Solution: mint-ginger tea!

2 cups fresh mint leaves with stems, washed and picked over
1 1/2 inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and crushed
4 cups boiling water
sugar, optional

I cut off the brown tips on the leaves and trimmed the stems. Then I put the mint and ginger in a one-quart saucepan. After pouring boiling water all over the leaves and ginger, I covered the pan and heated it over medium high heat.  When it came to a boil, I turned off the heat. I strained the tea into a tea pot.  You can sweeten it to taste if you wish. The leaves and ginger can be used again. Not sure how many times they can be re-used but I got two pots of tea out of them!

Jamaican Mint-Ginger Tea

coconut bread

I tried this recipe in the Land of Coconuts earlier in the year, but could not get it right. This recipe uses dried unsweetened coconut, which was not available in the supermarkets although I could get fresh young coconuts, tins of coconut milk, and cartons of coconut juice. Apparently the Thai do not bake with dessicated coconut, or if they must, they prepare it from scratch.  I wanted something simpler! I had to go back to New York to get dessicated coconut for this recipe in Chinatown. This recipe for coconut bread comes from Bill Granger in Australia. It is a quick bread so it is simple to assemble the ingredients, mix them, and bake them.

Coconut Bread

2 eggs
1 1/4 cups (300ml) milk
1 teaspoon vanilla essence/extract
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 cup caster sugar or superfine sugar (U.S.)
1 1/2 cups (150g or 5.29 ounces) dried unsweetened shredded coconut
6 tablespoons (75g or 3 ounces) unsalted butter, melted

1. Preheat oven to 350˚F (180 degrees Celsius) and grease and flour one 9”x5” loaf tin (or 9 inch square baking dish). Melt butter in a glass one-cup measure in the microwave and set aside.
2. Sift the flour and baking powder together into a bowl and add the cinnamon, sugar and coconut. Stir to combine and make a well in the center.
3. Whisk the eggs, milk and vanilla together and pour into the flour mixture and mix until just combined before adding the melted butter.  Stir until the mixture is smooth, being careful not to over mix.
4. Pour into the prepared loaf pan and bake for 1 hour and up to an additional 10 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean.  Leave loaf in the pan to cool for 5 minutes before removing and placing onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Half Loaf

The bread turned out to have a moist texture and a fine crumb with a delicate coconut flavor. Up close you could see little white specks of grated coconut. The crust was hard and brown because the oven I’m using is being temperamental (It needs calibrating, Hugo says.) and browns the outside before cooking the inside. Lorraine and Hugo said it was good that way, like a crusty French bread.