Justin's cousin Mike was visiting us from St. Louis and we'd had all these amazing things we wanted to cook for him, but it was his first visit to Northern California and we stayed busy (and lazy and purple hazy) and hadn't made anything after several days into his visit. So I brainstormed some things I'd been craving and was originally going to make stuffed chicken breasts with a pesto ricotta, cheese, sun dried tomatoes, and olives. Then Mike kindly reminded me how his mother's side of the family was Italian and his mom could make some mean Italian food. I'm going to admit it... I chickened out of the challenge, at least part of the way. What if after all the recipes he's seen, I try to make something "Italian", but really it comes off as a pathetic botched American version?! Could I stand for him to go back to St. Louis and tell his mom?! I wasn't sure. So I compromised and changed it up to a little coastal crab stuffing! Something he wouldn't get a lot of in the midwest, so it'd be both appropriate for his visit and it'd be something I'd been wanting to make for a while (crab stuffing). But I was bound and determined to show him that I wasn't too much of a slouch in the ethnic cooking arena, and I kept the Pesto-Alfredo sauce.
Didn't take too long to cook for as "fancy" as it might have sounded, and it was delicious! And we ate the hell out of it! Oh! And got some crab cakes out of it, too, the next night! Sadly, we were too busy enjoying our company and food to take some nicer plated pictures. :)
I don't even remember what we were listening to when we made this. But I love the band Against Me!, and this song is so great, albeit the acoustic version. No matter how many times I hear this line, "...and we'll dance like no one was watching... with one fist in the air," I get chills. Actually the whole damn song gives me chills. Though I'm still trying to get behind their more recent sound, I really love their earlier years. Good band. Good song. Good food. -jen
CRAB-STUFFED CHICKEN THIGHS
8-10 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 cup shallots, diced fine
1 cup mushrooms, diced fine
1/4 cup sun dried tomatoes, diced fine
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning
2 tablespoons minced garlic
1 pound crab meat
3/4 cup green onions, chopped
1.5 cups panko bread crumbs
1/2 cup finely shredded mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup finely shredded parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In a large skillet, heat olive oil on a medium-high heat. Add shallots, mushrooms, sun dried tomatoes, thyme, and Italian seasoning. Cook until shallots and mushrooms are tender, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and crab meat and cook for another 3 minutes. Turn off heat and stir in bread crumbs and cheeses. Season with salt and pepper, to taste. Set aside.
Place chicken thighs between two sheets of plastic wrap and pound until 1/4" thick. Place 1/4-1/3 cup stuffing into each thigh and fold over like a taco. Place in a lightly oiled baking dish and bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes, or until chicken is thoroughly cooked.
PESTO ALFREDO SAUCE
12 tablespoons (1.5 sticks) butter
1/3 cup shallots, diced finely
2.5 cups heavy cream
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 cup grated Asiago cheese
1/2 cup mozzarella cheese, finely shredded
3 heaping tablespoons pesto
In a medium-sized sauce pan, melt butter on medium-high heat. Add shallots and cook for 3-5 minutes, until tender. Add heavy cream and bring to a boil. Turn heat to a simmer and cook, stirring constantly, until cream becomes to thicken. Add a small handful of the cheeses and stir until cheese is entirely blended in before adding another small handful. Continue until all the cheese is incorporated. Then stir in the pesto and remove from heat.
So, when we did the crab stuffed sole, we had some canned, lump crab left over and were trying to decide what to do with it. We "kicked" around a couple of ideas regarding croissants, avocados, Swiss cheese, and other accoutre mounts, but settled on a crab bisque since we both love soup and had been craving creamy, savory goodness for some time. This was another amazingly simple meal to throw together with the crab on hand and took about 40 minutes to do, total. Include some bread to sop up soup with, and maybe some steamed or roasted veggies, or a carb like rice or potatoes, and you're all set.
I was enjoying some Dropkick Murphys, live on St Patty's Day, 2002, as I made the bisque since they are the quintessential, east-coast punk rock Irish band. And their ode, "Boys on the Docks" only seems all too appropriate for this recipe. This is a later video but that's okay because how would you like to be this close to the stage in such a small venue for the Dropkicks?! - justin
Add the olive oil to a medium saucepan that's heated to medium-high heat. Add shallots and cook until golden brown. Add garlic and lemon zest and cook 2 minutes. Add flour and butter and cook 2 more minutes. Add crab and parsley and cook 3 minutes, scraping, making sure the mixture doesn't stick to the pan. Add chicken broth and sherry, cover partially, and simmer for 20 minutes. Add cream, cayenne, and white pepper, and add salt to taste.
Bread is a must for this soup! This is rich and savory and creamy. Some sourdough or crusty Italian bread will do nicely! The sourdough is a nice accent to the richness of the soup and the Italian style loaves tend to be dryer and more absorbent.
So, growing up here in California in general, and more specifically the North Coast, I've always been exposed to awesome seafood. From fresh snapper, to abalone, to salmon, my family and I have always enjoyed the fruits of the Pacific. I caught my first catfish at 8 and my middle brother caught his first mackerel in the open Pacific at 9. I've fished bluegill, rainbow and brown trout, steelhead, small mouth bass, lingcod, and a myriad of other fish since my childhood. While I rarely fish anymore, I love to cook seafood here at home for Jen and myself. Living in Eureka, one of the old fishing capitols of California, affords us the opportunity to get fresh seafood at an affordable price almost anytime of year, from a variety of outlets and vendors.
When Jen moved out to Cali, she'd only been exposed to seafood in the Midwest and was not much of a fan at all. I don't blame her. After living here a couple of years, she started falling in love with sushi, fresh pan-fried catfish, all kinds of shellfish, and basically any kind of crustacean (i.e. crabs, lobster, shrimp, etc.), many of which she had liked before but rarely had fresh. Since then we've made it a regular part of our menu. Recently, we'd wanted to do some seafood and she suggested stuffing some whitefish with some crab. Since I'm no moron, I said, "Of course!" I decided to do something simple and easy, some canned crab, as opposed to fresh, as it involves much less prep and it tastes awesome regardless.
As I made the dish, I was listening to an all time classic of one of my favorite bands, Primus, "Fish On". Though this song is not punk rock, per say, it is none the less a part of my musical repertoire from earlier days and I happen to love Les Claypool's bass action, especially in their earlier years. Since he happens to reference San Pablo Bay, which is located in the north eastern part of the Greater San Francisco Bay, it seemed perfectly appropriate for me to use as I grew up in what San Franciscan's refer to as the North Bay, but the rest of us call Ukiah.
This is a simple dish that can be a perfect meal to serve to company as it seems far more complicated than it is. We served it up with some steamed broccoli and used wild Dover sole for the whitefish, but you could substitute your your favorite mild, whitefish or garden veggies very easily. The sauce is simple to put together and takes no time at all so it really is a snap to prepare as long as you have the ingredients all chopped and measured out ahead of time. -justin
WILD DOVER SOLE STUFFED WITH CRAB
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons minced yellow onion
2 tablespoons minced mushroom
2 tablespoons minced green onion
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 cup crab meat (I used canned, lump crab but you could use whatever you prefer)
2 tablespoons grated Gruyere cheese
2 teaspoons lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon white pepper
1 teaspoon Mexican oregano
salt to taste
ground black pepper
6 fillets of wild Dover sole (or whatever whitefish you prefer)
Preheat oven to 400F degrees. Put 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a 3-quart sauce pan and heat to medium-high. Add the yellow onion and cook until golden brown. Add mushrooms, green onion and garlic and cook for 2 minutes. Pull vegetables from heat and transfer to a large mixing bowl. Add the crab, Gruyere, lemon juice, white pepper, and Mexican oregano and mix thoroughly. Add salt to taste. Lay out fillets and salt and pepper both sides. Divide filling evenly among the fillets and roll them closed over the filling, using toothpicks to secure the ends of the fish fillets. Place evenly spaced on a lightly oiled sheet pan, brush tops lightly with 1 tablespoon olive oil, and place in the oven. Cook for 25-30 minutes or until tops are starting to brown. Serve with the following sauce which can easily be prepared while the fish is baking:
LEMON DILL SAUCE
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 cup diced shallots (or onions)
3 cloves minced garlic
1/2 cup white wine
juice of one lemon
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1/4 cup fresh chopped dill
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon black pepper
salt to taste
5 tablespoons sweet cream butter
Add the olive oil to a small sauce pan heated over medium-high heat. Add shallots and cook until golden brown. Add garlic and cook 2 minutes. Add wine and cook 5 minutes. Add lemon juice and zest, dill and Dijon and stir until combined. Add heavy cream and black pepper, taste and add salt ass needed. When properly seasoned, add butter 1 tablespoon at a time, making sure each is melted and incorporated before adding the next.
We served this with steamed broccoli, as I mentioned before, as the sauce goes with it beautifully. One could also use cauliflower, asparagus, or artichokes, etc.
