From the Farm Part 2: Jalapeños

Well, it's time for Part 2 of "From the Farm!" 

     Along with about 2 dozen apples and a dozen pears, we also became home to a little over a dozen jalapeños. While some of you wonderful readers may LOVE eating jalapeños all of the time, I couldn't quite imagine enough foods to eat jalapeños in before they went bad. 

     After a bit of research and formulation of ideas, I came up with a plan to at least preserve the jalapeños until it was time to make Fall/Winter chili. I will tell you about that first, but keep reading until the end, because there is also a quick and easy dip recipe at the end! 

You Will Need: (for preserving) 

* about 12 jalapeños

*1-2 teaspoons olive oil

*salt and pepper to taste

NOW- HERE IS YOUR WARNING!!!! When you work with jalapeños, I would highly advise wearing latex gloves (or any gloves for that matter). The minute you touch a lot of jalapeños with bare hands, your hands may react, but even worse will be when you accidentally touch your eyes or lick your fingers. WEAR GLOVES. 

     OK, now that that's over with, here we go. Begin by seeding your all of your jalapeños except for 1. Keep that one to the side until later. 

     Place the seeded and de-stemmed jalapeños in a pot of boiling water for about 10-15 minutes. It's crazy how even the steam from the boiling water caused some coughing effects! 

     The red peppers are jalapeños as well. That's what a mature and fully ripened jalapeño looks like! Now, from here I took all of the jalapeños and put them in my food processor. To that you'll want to add the olive oil, a tablespoon of the water the peppers were boiled in, and your salt and pepper for seasoning. 

     From here, I pulsed the food processor until I had a pretty decent puree. I didn't go too far, because the little flecks of red interspersed with the green looked lovely. 

     The puree was then transferred for my genius idea!! Wait for it..... ICE CUBE TRAY. Over the summer I read several magazines that had fun ideas of things to freeze in ice cube trays. Now, this comes with another warning. My suggestion would be to designate this tray for fun freezing adventures post jalapeños. Unless spicy water is something you're into... I am personally not EVER making regular ice cubs with this one again. 

    Voila! I have portioned amounts of jalapeño puree that can be pulled from the freezer and dropped into a crock pot of chili during the cold months! 

    Now comes the recipe you read to the end for! I cannot take credit for this recipe, but I can send a BIG thank you to my wonderful friend Becky for letting me watch while she made it! 

Ingredients: 

*2 blocks feta cheese

*3 seeded jalapeños (leave the seeds if you really like heat) 

*1-2 tablespoons olive oil

     The beauty in this dip is how easy it is. Plus who doesn't like spicy AND cheesy?!?! Dump all of the ingredients into a food processor and let it go until you have a creamy, pureed, slightly neon green dip. I swear I want to hug Becky an extra 3 times when she walks through the door with this dip. It works great with pita, or tortilla chips, or just your fingers. 

     Well, that's it for today's "From the Farm" edition. It's a wonderful Sunday night, there are Turkey burgers grilling, and I'm gearing up for another week with my classroom of goofballs. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend, as I did, and relaxed! As always, if you attempt one of my adventures please let me know how it goes! Or feel free to ask questions! 

               <3 

For When You'd Rather Eat Wings

Hey Friends,
        We're at T minus 15 hours to the first day of school! I am working on making sure that everything is ready (or as close as it's gonna be!).

         This recipe has been ready to shoot out to you for a bit now, and I'm excited to share it with you. Every so often I get the craving for wings and that kick of hot sauce. Of course, I very rarely have wings in the house, and they're not always the healthiest option for my hot sauce desires. Lucky for me, I found this method of dressing up veggies with the taste of wings!

You Will Need:
*one head of cauliflower
*2 tsp. olive oil
*1 tsp. garlic powder
*1 tsp. paprika
*1 tsp. chili powder
*1/2 tsp. kosher salt
*2 tbsp. hot sauce (or as much as you want!!)

     Let's get kickin'! Preheat your oven to 425, and get to washing that cauliflower. Once it is washed, break it up into little florets in a medium sized bowl. In a separate, smaller, bowl combine all of your spices. Apologies ahead of time; my mind went to La La Land and didn't get pictures of these first two steps.
   
     Believe it or not, you don't have many steps left. Drizzle your olive oil over the cauliflower florets and toss them a bit to make sure they are coated evenly. Next you're going to coat these florets with your spice mixture. It should look like this:

Voila!

          Pull out a cookie sheet that will be able to hold all of your kickin' florets! I like to cover my cookie sheets in tin foil so that the clean up is THAT MUCH EASIER! :) Spread your florets out on the sheet so that they are all in one even layer. 

    Pop these babies in the oven for about 25-30 minutes. They'll start to have some crispy, burnt edges to them when they're ready. When they come out of the oven, I like to dump them back into that original large bowl. That way, when you coat them with hot sauce, you pick up some of the extra spices that were left behind. You can't stop me from making sure there's LOTS of flavor.

    Pour in your hot sauce and mix to coat. Let's face it, I don't usually stick to my 2 tablespoons. I drown these suckers! It's all about how much spice YOU want.
     Ta Da!!! You're done! These things are so tasty and are a big hit for me and the mister. I think it might be the only way he's eaten cauliflower!

     Let's be honest, are these a complete trade for wings? Heck no. BUT, when you're looking for that spicy hot fix- they're great. Give it a try and let me know how you like 'em!

     To all you fellow teachers out there, get it started with a bang! I'm looking forward to meeting my new group of kiddos, and showing you my fabulous classroom. Much love to you all.

               <3