Cajun Meatballs

 Cajun Meatballs

 Ingredients:

1lb ground beef 1 1/2 tsp Jump Up & Kiss Me hot sauce  2 Tbl Cajun Seasoning Tbl Worcestershire Sauce 1 Tbl Dried Parsley 1/4 cup minced onion 1/4 cup plain bread crumbs 1/4 cup skim milk 1 egg

Glaze:

• 1/2 cup Corky’s Original Barbecue Sauce

• 1/2 cup apricot jam

Directions:

1.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees F
2. Grease baking sheet with oil or cooking spray
3. In large bowl combine all ingredients except for the glaze.
4. Form mixture into golf size balls. Place on baking sheet.
5. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until there is no pink left in the middle.
6. In a small bowl combine glaze ingredients.
7. Toss meatballs in glaze when they are finished baking.
8. Serve immediately or keep them warm by putting them in your crock pot on a “keep warm” setting.

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Barbecue Goat Boat Sandwich

Delicious goat sausage seasoned with Billy Bones Original barbecue sauce combined with some extra sharp cheese and fresh baked bread;  made a delightful sandwich for our Sunday afternoon picnic lunch.

Ingredients

• 2 Tbl butter
• 1 large onion
• 1lb goat sausage
• 1/2 c Billy Bones Original Sauce divided
• 1/4tsp garlic powder
• 1 Tbl parsley
• 1/2 tsp fresh ground pepper
• 1/2 tsp salt

Directions

• Sauté onions in butter in a large skillet until translucent
• Add sausage, 1/4cup of Billy Bones Sauce, and rest of seasonings to the onions and brown.
• Towards the end of cooking the meat, add the remaining 1/4c of Billy Bones sauce.
• Cover & simmer until meat is done approximately 150°F.
• When meat is finished cooking, take a loaf of bread (I used Whole Wheat Challah) and slice it in half.
• Scoop out some of the center so there is room to fill it.
• Place slices of Extra Sharp Cheddar Cheese on top and broil until melted.
• Fill with sausage, sprinkle with parsley, garnish with tomato, and serve!

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More Fancy Food Show Chocolates

I’ve had a variety of chocolates in my life, many flavored with things like rum, cherry, raspberry, orange, or mint. At this year’s Fancy Food Show in New York City I tried some chocolates flavored in ways that are new to me and maybe to you as well. In a previous post I wrote about sea salt flavored chocolates. In this post I’d like to talk about chocolates flavored with spices not typically associated with chocolates or even other types of sweets or confections.

I had some chocolates flavored with things like lilac and thyme. Now when I think of thyme I normally think of a pasta dish or maybe a roasted meat. I don’t think of sweets. The taste experience is different from the sea salt chocolate in that it is a very mild sensation. Not only can you taste the thyme you can smell it In fact the thyme fragrance overpowers the smell of the chocolate.. However, the lilac flavored chocolates had almost no discernible difference in taste when compared to similar chocolates (i. e. other dark or milk chocolates). However, the aroma was intense. The closest I can come to describing the experience is to imagine yourself sitting in the middle of several lilac bushes on a hot day. The lilac perfumes every breath you take. Now put a piece of dark chocolate in your mouth. As the chocolate melts in your mouth take deep breathes through your nose so you can smell the lilac and taste the chocolate at the same time. That is what it was like for me.

I like the smell of lilac and I enjoy thyme in a variety of dishes. The combination of thyme and chocolate or lilac and chocolate is not impressive enough, for me that is, to skip the more traditional raspberry, orange, or mint flavors. Don’t take my word for it. Go try some!

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Pomegranate at the Fancy Food Show

As a child I used to love to sit outside and eat pomegranates and see how far I could spit the little seeds. It was also a real kick to spit them out machine gun style. At this year’s Fancy Food Show in New York City pomegranate was everywhere. In chocolates, energy drinks, tea, coffee, bar-b-q sauce, hot sauce, caramels, jelly beans and probably some other foods I missed. Pomegranate is a reddish fruit filled with hundreds of seeds. It’s really more like a pea pod than a grape or orange. Each seed is encased in a clear sack that is filled with a deep red colored liquid that is more tart than sweet. The seeds are packed together in sections of the pomegranate and must be gently pried out of the leathery container or you’ll squirt the precious juice all over yourself and anything around you. To get the maximum amount of juice you have to gently grind the little seed sacks between your molars. This is not the type of food to give to your children when they’re sitting close to anything white. It’s also not good for people who can’t use their tongue to separate the seeds from the flesh.

Recently a variety of companies have been producing pomegranate extract in bottles, Pomegranate juice is heavy, tart, and mildly sweet. My son and I really like to mix about 4 ounces of pomegranate juice with about 12 ounces of 7 Up or Sprite. I’ve also mixed it with Dr. Pepper for a quirky tart-dark taste. We liked the caramels and bar-b-q sauces with pomegranate. I thought the jelly beans were too sweet for me but I’m sure kids will love them.

Pomegranates are supposed to be good for you. Everyone was tauting its value as a source of beneficial antioxidants. Frankly, I just like the way a pomegranate tastes. If you have older children or grandchildren with sufficient mouth dexterity and some old clothes please consider buying them a pomegranate, if you can find one. In my opinion, it should be a room temperature and eaten with your feet hanging off a deck or pier. Some people say you can eat the seed. I never did. Enjoy the fruit and the juice but spit out the seeds – machine-gun style if you can.

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Chocolate at the NYC Fancy Food Show

Last week we went to the Fancy Food Show in New York City. What a great experience. It was a wonderful opportunity to review specialty food products for Iron-Q. Some members of our team focused on bar-b-q sauces, hot sauces, tea, or coffee. Of particular interest to me were the chocolates.

I’ve always liked chocolate. As a kid I liked milk chocolate and hated dark. As an adult, I prefer dark but still enjoy milk chocolate from time to time. However, I have run into more than one food bigot who thinks that one chocolate is better than another. While I do agree that there are differences in quality between chocolates most people confuse quality and taste. I remember talking to one person in particular who made the comment, “.. but I like good chocolates, not that Hershey’s crap.” There’s absolutely nothing wrong with the Hershey’s milk chocolate that you can get in any grocery store, convenience store or gas station in the U.S. It is wonderfully consistent, especially when you consider its low price. It is a very good milk chocolate for about 65 cents a bar. If you want a better chocolate you’ll need to pay more. You won’t find a 70% cacao dark chocolate bar in a gas station for 65 cents.

One chocolate that I came across, that was new to me and quite a surprise, was a salted chocolate. I wasn’t sure what to expect. I took a small bite of a 1 inch square chocolate truffle style candy that had large salt crystals on top (maybe 20 of them). The grittiness of the salt was the first sensation, immediately followed by the intensity of the large salt crystals. It was a major wake-up call for my taste buds. Then came a soothing flow of chocolate that calmed the sea-storm of salt. The salt, which was initially overpowering, enhanced and contrasted the chocolate flavor. I found it a delicious departure from the typical chocolate truffle-style candies I normally find.

Back to the quality and taste issue mentioned earlier. Is the artisan sea-salted chocolate truffle better than a Hershey’s milk chocolate bar? I would say not necessarily. If you’re looking for a consistently made, inexpensive chocolate snack then it is hard to beat a 65 cent Hershey bar at about 43 cents per ounce. On the other hand if you want to really treat yourself or make an impression on someone else (a lover perhaps), then spending about $4.20 per ounce on the sea-salted chocolate is definitely the way to go. In my opinion, the taste of the more expensive chocolates is definitely better. I will buy and savor the expensive chocolates. However, I’ll probably keep buying Hershey’s forever.

Chocolates, like people, come in a variety of flavors. Savor the ones you enjoy and don’t judge the ones you don’t.

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