www.roanoke.com

Some ribs on my dad's smoker.

I am excited to announce the winner of "Grill It! Recipes. Techniques. Tools" by Chris Schlesinger & John Willoughby is Julie! Julie was the winner by random drawing, and only one of her comments counted toward the drawing. So, way to go Julie!

Reading about all of your delicious grill creations was a superb way to spend a few cold, rainy days. I know the serious grillmasters never let the weather stop them, but some of us find it hard to get motivated to cook outside with an umbrella and a winter coat. Spring is about to be sprung, though! So here's a recipe from "Grill It!" that we can all enjoy! It's for grilled "super-fiery West Indian" chicken breasts with a sour orange mojo sauce.

It calls for Scotch bonnet peppers, the small, bright orange ones. And WHOLE ones, at that, seeds and all! If you aren't big on super hot food, I suggest maybe de-seeding those bad boys before you put them in the blender. Or use less than four. And don't touch your eyes while working with them, whatever you do. If you're not careful, you might light your arse on fire!

Julie, e-mail me at lindsey.nair@roanoke.com with your mailing address and I'll put this book in the mail for you. Thanks for playing, everyone!

Read more »

www.amazon.com

I'm going to the beach for a long weekend soon and can hardly wait to see the ocean. I know it probably won't be warm yet, but summer is close enough to put on jeans and a t-shirt and make the most of some time away.

This particular group of friends is a special one. We try to meet up annually on the shores of North Carolina, and my husband always makes his specialty, filet oscar. Howard is just about the finest griller of steaks I've ever known. On top of the filet, he piles lump crab meat, freshly steamed asparagus and hollandaise sauce.

I've made dessert in the past, but usually the gut just can't take anymore.

Filet oscar season is almost upon us. I must give away a cookbook honoring the beauty of a rich chunk of meat on the grate of a roaring grill. How about "Grill It! Recipes. Techniques. Tools" by Chris Schlesinger and John Willoughby?

If you're interested in winning this cookbook, send in a comment describing your favorite meal off the grill. Deadline is Tuesday at 9 a.m. The winner will be randomly drawn.

Have a VERY LUCKY St. Patrick's Day weekend!

A full plate

We Roanoke Times staffers don't mess around when it comes time to throw a potluck. And we've been throwing potlucks at Christmas and on odd occasions for several years.

Lately, we've been having big potlucks on the Fridays before our Monday furlough days. The company is closed for a furlough on Monday, so today was the day. Last time we didn't have a theme, but this time we decided to do brunch. And boy, did we do brunch. There were ham quiches, ham and egg casserole, French toast casseroles, sweet rolls, coffee cake, bagels, shrimp and grits, muffins and all other manners of breakfast food.

After the jump, there are a few more pictures of the big spread, as well as the recipe for Party Potatoes, which was my contribution to the potluck. The recipe came from my husband's stepmother, Ann Swank.

Stay tuned later today for details on the next Cookbook Giveaway!

Read more »

This morning, a reader named Jeff sent me a delicious-looking recipe for a venison chili made with beer. He had read my column about cooking with beer in yesterday's paper and decided to send that along.

On top of that, I got a copy of "The Ultimate Beer Lover's Cookbook" in the mail yesterday. So I thought this would be a good opportunity to pass along John Schlimm's recipe for St. Patrick's Day Stew, just in time for this weekend's St. Patrick's Day parade in downtown Roanoke! Heck, by the looks of the weather forecast, it might be a better day to stay inside and make stew than stand on a street corner waiting for the dalmations to come by.

On the other hand, either this chili or the stew would be a nice warm-up AFTER you support the biggest St. Patty's parade in the Mid-Atlantic. Cheers with the green beers!

Do you have a favorite recipe with beer?

Read more »

-- Tomorrow night at Roanoke College, the series "Knowing Vietnam" continues with poetry readings by John Balaban and Michelle Tran and samples of Vietnamese food. The event is free to the public. It starts at 8 p.m. in the Wortmann Ballroom in the Colket Center on the Roanoke College campus.

-- On Friday, March 27, the Peacock Harper Culinary History Friends group is meeting at the Blacksburg Country Club banquet hall for a luncheon event called "Souptacular: A Chef's Historical Perspective on Soup." The presentation, which begins at 11:30 a.m., will include lunch and a hands-on demonstration with country club chef George Kruse. The cost is $35, which includes a $5 donation to the Peacock Harper group. Lunch consists of chicken corn chowder, rolls, a garden salad, lemon squares and non-alcoholic beverages. For information on how to register, go to the Peacock Harper Web site.

-- Town House restaurant in Chilhowie is offering a dinner and transportation package for parties who are interested in visiting the restaurant but are daunted by the drive. "From Your House to Town House" offers two packages, one for folks living in Abingdon, Va., Bristol, Va., Bristol, Tenn. and all points in between and the other for residents of Roanoke and Wytheville, VA and Kingsport and Johnson City, TN and all points between.

First, you have to get together a group of at least eight people who can leave and return to the same point. The Abingdon/Bristol package is $95 per person and includes round-trip transportation, a five-course dinner (more courses can be added at $10 apiece) and snacks for the ride home. The Roanoke/Wytheville/Kingsport package includes the same things for $125 per person.

For more info about food events, don't forget to check our Foodie Calendar in every Thursday's issue of Inside Out. And if you have a food event you want to get in the paper, you can e-mail those to nona.nelson@roanoke.com, jennie.tal@roanoke.com or lindsey.nair@roanoke.com. Or better yet, e-mail all three of us!

I had to stay overnight in Lexington Friday night for a journalism conference at Washington & Lee. It seemed like a great time to have dinner at Red Hen, the little local food restaurant that opened there almost one year ago.

Since I was alone, I sat at the three-stool bar, which looks directly into the kitchen where Chef Tucker Yoder and Sous Chef Mike Perry were working. I peppered them with questions ("annoyed them" might be a more accurate term) while they filled orders. They were good sports.

The photo above is from my first course, an appetizer of beef short rib and scallops with a creamy celeriac sauce and a sweet balsamic drizzle. The short rib came from a farm in Buffalo Creek and was expertly seared, yet tender. The scallops were some of the best I've ever had, well-seasoned and seared on one side but extremely soft otherwise. I jokingly told the chefs I'd take about 24 more of those.

Read more »

I'm not sure what motivated me to make jambalaya, but I've had the ingredients sitting in my refrigerator and freezer since LAST weekend, so I decided it was about time to whip some up before my green pepper turned into a green prune.

Now, before you start thinking I was industrious enough to make real jambalaya from scratch, allow me to stop you -- this was a fairly easy slow cooker jambalaya that took only about an hour of my time, all told. It's a great option for a week night or a busy weekend day when you haven't got all afternoon to stand in the kitchen.

This recipe came from Food Network. It calls for chicken, andouille sausage and shrimp. I didn't buy any andouille and planned to skip it, but at the last minute I found some turkey sausage in the freezer and decided to slice that up. The flavor was great, but the sausage wasn't firm enough to hold up to an entire day of slow cooking. So next time I'll go with a denser sausage like andouille or smoked sausage.

One other tip -- this calls for one 28 oz. can of diced tomatoes with juice. Make sure you buy the big can, because I bought a can that was too small and wanted more tomatoes in the finished product. I'd also recommend doubling (or tripling) the amount of hot sauce, depending on your personal taste. Otherwise, this was a well-seasoned and delicious dish. I'd recommend it.

Read more »

Our Southwest County, Botetourt and Salem community tabs are working on a big "best of" list for each of their respective territories. From what I understand, they'd like to hear about everything from your favorite place to drink iced tea to the best place to go after the game.

If you live in one of these areas, I know you can help them out! You guys are the food experts of these communities. So if you've got a second, head over to the SWoCo blog, the So Salem blog or the Botetourt View to vote for your favorite places!

www.rangebuzz.com

Pasty [PASS-tee] - Originated in Cornwall, England. A savory turnover consisting of a pastry crust surrounding a filling, usually made up of beef and potato. Other vegetables and meats are sometimes used. Pasties were once the standard lunch of tin miners in Cornwall. Sometimes the cook would put apples at one end and savory fillings at the other, so the miner could eat lunch with dessert all in one fell swoop.

This is the definition of a pasty, adapted from my trusty Food Lover's Companion. Pasties are delicious food. Not to be confused with a "pastie." If you don't know what that is, Google it and don't blame me if you are offended.

Giggles aside, I've had the pleasure of tasting a pasty made by a real Englishman from his family's secret recipe. It was filled with mashed potatoes and a ground meat mixture, all very deliciously seasoned. He refused to share the recipe with me. But NOW I have a pasty recipe of my own!

I came across this bad boy on Epicurious. It's a fancy pasty recipe, with caramelized onions and Stilton cheese. But it occurs to me that with the basic crust recipe, one could experiment quite a bit with the fillings, leaving out the cheese or creating a vegetarian version with seasoned mashed potatoes and root veggies.

Also, if you want to be lazy like me, you might be able to use refrigerated pie crust. But a real Englishman might be offended by that idea.

Enjoy!

Read more »

The ground is still white outside my office window, but I'm thinking about all things green.

On the first warm weekend, I'm going to build a raised bed for my vegetable plants. It's also time to choose what I want to plant so I can start the seedlings indoors, getting them ready for when spring rolls around.

Last year, the task was much easier. I knew I wanted tomatoes and I knew I wasn't quite ready for a full garden. So I went with two cherry tomato plants and two Better Boy plants in pots on the deck.

This year, I'm dreaming of yellow tomatoes for sure. The rest is a world of possiblities almost too difficult to cull. Gourmet radish blend? Broccoli? Italian or otherwise? Heirloom zucchini? What if the neighbors bring a bunch of zucchini again; do I really need my own? Pole beans or bush beans? Jalapeno peppers or Thai peppers? Do I dare try watermelons or cantaloupes in my first official garden?

The answer to all of these questions can probably be answered by looking at the small size of my garden space. Not everything that I want can be crammed in there, so with a little research I'll figure out which varieties will fit in the space, what plants compliment each other and what can be preserved for later in the year.

Holly Scoggins, a horticulture professor at Virginia Tech, gave me a list of her favorite seed companies. If you don't see your fave on this list, let us know. What are you planting this year?

Read more »