New Ingredient-Sorghum Syrup

I have finally finished reading Michael Twitty's book, The Cooking Gene, and in order to try out some of the recipes featured in the book, I had to get my hands on an ingredient that turns out is pretty much impossible to get your hands on in Seattle. I scoured every grocery store in my vicinity, and even made a special trip to Whole Paycheck Foods to look for it there, but with no luck. The only thing that could be done, was to order it online. I finally did, and it arrived last week in a super cute jug. I had no idea what it tasted like or how to use it, but I had a couple recipes to try and also have this handy guide called the internet to refer to for answers.

I had a roasted salmon recipe that calls for sorghum syrup, and decided to try it out last night. The recipe is from Cooking Light, and can be found here. The first thing I noticed when I opened the jug, was how sticky it is. It's super sticky. I'd say it's halfway between molasses and maple syrup in thickness. It got on everything, including things I swear I hadn't even touched. Be prepared to clean extensively when you're finished!

 This is the salmon with the sorghum-mustard glaze on it, waiting to go into the oven. After a discussion on twitter last night, I would say that using tofu would be an excellent vegetarian option for this. Please note, that the recipe doesn't call for salt, so you might want to add some anyway, or make sure to season properly before eating. Especially if you end up using tofu. I didn't have lemon zest on-hand, so I just threw in some lemon juice instead. It worked fine.

Here is the post-roasted, post-broiled salmon. I probably could have broiled it longer, but the glaze on the pan was getting really burned and I was afraid of it smoking too much, so I took it out. You can see the edges are nice and browned.

This was really tasty! Sorghum is hard to describe. When you initially taste it, there's an explosion of flavor in your mouth. There's an almost tart/sour flavor up front, but it quickly dissipates into a round, sweetness. It's less harsh than molasses, which I'm not terribly fond of. It's not mapley like maple syrup or like sugar. It really is its own, unique flavor. I was impressed, and ended up keeping the extra glaze to use again on some more salmon.

I found some other recipes to try, a cookie recipe and a cake recipe to try. I am also going to try out some of the recipes from The Cooking Gene, so I'll try to update when I try them out.

If you live in a region where you can easily access sorghum syrup, take a moment to appreciate it! It might not be special to you, but it's not something everybody can easily access. And for those of you wondering about ordering it for yourself, go for it! A little goes a long way, so it will last you a long time and make the cost worthwhile.

Cooking Light Weekend

I did two recipes this weekend and they both turned out great. The first was Peanut Butter Cup Blondies and this turned out to be amazing. I have always had good luck with the baking recipes I do from this magazine. This one didn't disappoint. It was simple and quick and very worth the time. I'd definitely do it again.


The next recipe was Chicken with Pepperoni-Marinara Sauce and I was very excited to try this one. Most pepperoni is made with a mixture of pork and beef, unless you use the turkey kind, which I don't care for. Since I don't eat red meat it has left pepperoni out of my diet for about three years now and I sure missed it. Until I discovered Applegate Farms pepperoni which is all pork. This stuff is soooo good. Since the recipe doesn't specify what size of pepperoni slices to use and I only had about 6 slices of mine, but it was the larger size, I just used the rest of that and called it all good. I think it had plenty of pepperoni deliciousness too. Make sure you use a really big pan to cook the chicken. I didn't and ended up having to do it in two shifts. This made a fun play on spaghetti sauce that I'd definitely make again as well. 

Cooking Light Night

Tortilla Meatball Soup

I tried this out the other day and really liked it. It definitely was time-consuming, but it made a lot of leftovers for me to freeze, so I forgive it. The recipe called for ground sirloin, but since I don't eat beef I used ground chicken, which I think made it even less fat than what the original numbers are. Also, I used Egg Beaters instead of the egg for the meatballs, which cut out all the cholesterol from that as well as more fat and calories.

I would recommend you start this in the afternoon rather than at dinnertime to make this or you'll be eating very late. Also, after you open the can of chipotle chiles in adobo and only use one of them, you may be asking yourself, what the heck will I do with the rest of it? Try out this handy tip: Take a baking sheet and cover it in a sheet of parchment paper. Line up the chiles so they aren't touching each other and then spoon some of the sauce over each one. They will look like weird mounds, but that's not important. From here, place the baking sheet in the freezer for a couple hours until they are frozen. They will peel off the parchment paper and you can put them in a freezer bag or container and put them back in the freezer. You can take one out each time you need one for a recipe and not have to buy a new can each time or waste the can. This is definitely a good idea, imo.

Cooking Light Roundup

I've been sick with the flu since last Friday so I haven't exactly been cooking a lot. But I had a whole pork roast thawing prior to getting sick so I had to use it or lose it. I cut it in half and did a traditional roast pork meal for the first half. It's easy, I like it, I was sick, so I went with it. But for the second half, I made this: Soy and Cola-Braised Pork Shoulder

I didn't follow the recipe exactly, but I modified it for the slow-cooker. I think it worked really well this way. The night before I made the sauce, adding the sesame oil to it instead of using that to brown the meat. I never brown meat when using the slow cooker because it takes too much time and I have never really noticed a big difference in flavor and texture when I do. I threw it all in the slow cooker and came home to dinner made. I bought some ciabatta rolls to serve it in, pulled the pork with forks, and strained the sauce into a pan to let it reduce further. It was really easy and really delicious. I chose to spend more money on an organic cola that used cane sugar instead of corn syrup and thought it turned out great. There wasn't any Chinese 5-Spice powder in the mix but it ended up tasting like it was there anyway. I would definitely make this one again.

Cooking Light Roundup

This weekend I tried a couple recipes. Friday night I tried their suggestion for oven fries. I love oven fries but they always get overdone. Their suggestion was to soak them in water first and then drain them before going on as usual. So I did. They still got overdone, unfortunately, but I think I'm on the right track. I think they just cook for too long. Instead of a half hour I'll try 20 minutes and see how it is next time.

Saturday for lunch I tried making fish tacos. I need to eat more fish in my diet since it's so heart-healthy, so I tried an easy one. I bought some frozen tilapia fillets at the store and was a bit scared to use them. I don't usually cook fish so I am not very skilled at it yet. It's expensive, it smells for a long time after you cook it, and I'm a bit scared that it will taste really fishy. Well, this stuff didn't taste fishy, thankfully, but it did taste...oceany, if that makes any sense. It'll take a bit of adjusting but I think I'll get there.

The tacos were pretty good, especially since I figured out how to steam the soft corn tortillas with the basket from my rice cooker. The toppings were ok, not highly flavorful, but it is March, tomatoes and avocados are hardly at their peak right now. I think I need to try cabbage and green onions, it definitely needed something crunchy.

Here's the recipe: Blackened Tilapia Baja Tacos