Recipe: Kallaloo

I don't know how much you know about me, but I spent a good chunk of my life in the islands. We are from the Caribbean and for New Years, we tend to make Kallaloo! It's my favorite stew/soup. Since I'm still visiting my mom, I figured that I could get the recipe from her. I told Annie that I would post more island recipes.



Kallaloo
1.5 pounds salt beef, ham bone and pig's tail
1.5 pounds fresh fish, cleaned
3 pounds spinach or mixed greens
2 crabs (backs removed and cleaned)
1 corned conch
12 okras
a piece of hot pepper



Soak meat overnight in cold water. Boil meat and conch until tender in three quarts of water. Add cleaned fish and cook for a few minutes. Lift out fish with slotted spoon. Remove bones and flake. Return fish to meat mixture, add crabs and continue to cook.

Wash greens and put through grinder with okras. Add greens and hot pepper to cooking mixture and boil rapidly for about 30 minutes. The addition of vinegar prevents the appearance of slime, but this is optional. Do not skim while boiling. Serve with fungi.

That's the recipe that I got from my grandmother's recipe book. I kind of do it like this but we simplified it. We wait until after the holidays that we have a ham because we do use the ham bone. We boil the ham bone all day. Then we take it out and take apart the pieces of ham and place it back into the water. We boil ham hocks and boil down until they soften up. You can let it boil until the meat falls off the bone or just until it's soft enough to eat off the bone. Then I add the seafood. I'm just a bit lazy, so I use a frozen seafood mix and frozen fish filet. I throw that in and cook that off. And then I throw in frozen chopped spinach and frozen chopped okra. Cook it down and voila!

Recipe: Filipino Spaghetti

I love pasta. My favorite is Filipino spaghetti. It's a sweet spaghetti with hot dogs. I make it every once in a while and it's always gone within hours. This last time I made a couple of pounds and it still disappeared.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb of spaghetti
• 1 can/jar of sauce
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 onion
• 1 lb of ground need
• 1/2 lb of hot dogs
• 1 jar of banana sauce
• 1/8 cup of sugar
• 1/4 cup of water
• Dash of Tabasco (optional)

1. Make your spaghetti as told to by the instructions on the box. Drain and leave in sink.
2. Using same pan, pour in some olive oil, chopped onions and chopped garlic.
3. Once the onions are translucent, throw in the ground beef.
4. Brown the ground beef, season with salt and pepper.
5. Pour in spaghetti sauce, sugar, water and banana sauce. Simmer for 5 minutes.
6. Add in hot dogs and the dash of Tabasco sauce. Cook for 3-4 minutes.
7. Serve over the spaghetti.

(This is the banana sauce. I normally use a jar that's about 15 oz and not hot. If you do grab hot, don't add the dash of Tabasco at the end of the recipe.)

Some people make it with ground pork as well. I don't, but you can. If it's too spicy, add a little but more sugar. If it's too sweet, add a little bit more hot sauce.

Recipe: Cole Slaw

I've had the weirdest obsession with coke slaw lately. I order it when we go to restaurants and I've made it a couple of times for barbecues this summer. So I decided to share my recipe. It's really simple.

Ingredients:
- medium sized cabbage
- shredded carrots
- mayonnaise
- sugar

Chop/shred the cabbage and throw into a large bowl. Mix it as much of the shredded carrots as you want, it all depends if you like carrots in your cole slaw. Mix a cup of mayo into the mixture. Stir. Mix in a cup of sugar (or less, to taste) and stir. Refrigerate and eat!

Super simple!

Recipe: Perfect Hard Boiled Egg

I love hard boiled eggs for breakfast, especially when I'm on the go. I also love them in my salads when I get a chance. My mom mentioned that I always make the perfect hard boiled egg, no matter what. It's never overcooked or undercooked. So I figured that I would share the recipe.

1. Put eggs in a pot.  Fill with water so that the eggs are covered and there's an inch of water over the eggs.


2. Put the pot on the stove to cook. Once the eggs come to a rolling boil, let boil for 1 minute and then turn off the stove.


3. Put cover over the pot and let sit for twelve minutes.


4. As soon as the twelve minutes pass, immediately get rid of the hot water and run cold water over the eggs for a few minutes.

And tada! All done!