Simple Side Salad - Raspberries

If you don't want to make anything fancy, but like the feel of a fancy salad, you can always get some lettuce mix and throw raspberries on top. This isn't even a recipe, but if you put together the salad dressing posted earlier, it'll feel like something special. And it looks beautiful!

Chipotle and Cheddar Mashed Potatoes

Finally some photos! Exotic and so delicious. I made my own adobo sauce (see below) and the cheese here is amazing. So enjoy this as a side, or alongside some sautéed green beans, like we did. I made a lot of extra, assuming this would be a nice leftover for tomorrow. Potato size is not so important. The important part is that they are cubed into pieces that are all about the same size.

3 large and 2 medium potatoes, cut into cubes
3 cloves garlic, broken by placing them under the flat side of a knife and pushing down until they pop
1 cup grated or crumbled cheddar cheese, the sharper, the better
2 tablespoons chipotles in adobo sauce (or one chile and one tablespoon adobo)
salt and pepper to taste


I like potato skins, so I cut my potatoes into pieces that have nice-sized squares of skin. If you want to skin the potatoes, I recommend cooking them whole, running them under cold water, then peeling them. The skin will almost fall off of cooked potatoes and you don't waste so much. That goes for sweet potatoes, too.

Boil the potatoes and garlic in enough water to cover them for about 30 minutes, or until tender when forked. Drain, add milk and butter, and mash roughly. Return to head and add cheese and chipotles, mashing until desired consistency is reached. Serve 'em up.

This epicurious recipe is nice for mashed potatoes and this recipe. I also liked this recipe.

Note: I like little chunks of cheese rather than grated cheese that's been well blended into the potatoes. If you are like me, wait to add the cheese and chipotles until the potatoes are mashed well. Then stir in the chess and chipotles with a wooden spoon over low heat. Yum.

Simple, Delicious Garlic Green Beans

Sometimes we just eat green beans for dinner, because they are so good. If you can figure out how to get a wok or frying pan hot, and at just the right heat, you can use butter and scald the crap out of some beans and garlic. This is what you want. It took me a long time to figure it out, so I can say from a place of experience: err on the undercooked side. Raw green beans are edible, burnt green beans are not. It all starts with a very hot pan, and if you've got some oil that doesn't burn until a very high heat you're on your way. I use butter and olive oil. I love the olive oil flavor, and the butter raises the burn temperature just enough. If you can be patient and just let your pan heat up, then add the oil/butter for just the minute it takes for it to get really hot, then add the beans, you'll make something really delicious. Good luck!


Serves 2 hungry people:

2 handful of beans, tipped and toed (chop the ends)
2 table spoons butter
1 teaspoon olive oil (as I said, pick your oil as you will)
2 cloves garlic, chopped finely


Heat your pan. And let it get really hot. Add the butter, and it should immediately start to bubble and melt, like true frying butter does. Drisle over your oil, so it mixes with the butter. Once the butter is completely melted, but don't let it brown, add the green beans. Be careful! If they are at all wet the whole thing will sputter and try to burn you with little flecks of very hot oil/butter/water. Ouch. Use the longest handled wooden spoon you've got to stir the beans, but allow them to settle for a minute at a time so they get that wrinkly skin you want. They should cook for less than 10 minutes, more like 5 - depending on the heat you've worked up.

At 3-5 minutes (or 1 minute before they're done) add the chopped garlic, and continuously stir for 30 seconds or 1 minute. Let the garlic brown a bit. A little bit of burnt bean skin is okay. But the brilliant thing about these is that they will stay crispy in a way. Having trouble getting this? Comment and let me know what happened. I'll do my best to help.