• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content

Food Charmer

Make every bite count: adventures in food, recipes, eating out & love

  • About
  • Recipes
  • Drinks
  • Food & Dining
  • Wine
  • Travel
  • Healthy Eating
  • Newsletter
You are here: Home / Archives for Beef

Beef

Luscious Leftovers: New Year Bloody Mary Meatloaf

Luscious Leftovers: New Year Bloody Mary Meatloaf

by liz · Jan 1, 2019

New Year’s Bloody Mary Meatloaf

After a long New Year’s weekend, we had a fridge full of leftovers and a craving for comfort food. My friend the Comedienne thought up this recipe as she rummaged through a fridge-full of delicious dinner, snack and cocktail-mix remnants.

It’s great after the holidays or any time you have a lot of leftovers in the kitchen. Caramelize some onions and garlic, then add any delectable tidbits you have in the fridge: roasted potatoes, chicken and fennel sausage, figs, stuffing or other side dishes and casseroles. Blending these additions before mixing them into the ground beef spreads the flavors throughout the loaf. And after the holidays, the time is right for a unique, home-made catsup using spicy Bloody Mary mix, something we had plenty of on New Year’s Day. Perfect for curing hangovers and filling bellies.

New Year Bloody Mary Meatloaf

Ingredients:

2 T olive oil
2 onions, chopped
1 garlic clove, chopped
2-4 gourmet sausages (jalapeño mango, chicken fennel or any other gourmet grocery variety)
Any amount of other leftovers (stuffing, figs, tomatoes, vegetables, gravy, etc.)
1 pound ground beef
Freshly ground salt & pepper
4 T fresh basil, chopped
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups bread crumbs (fresh)
1/4 cup milk
Spicy Bloody Mary mix
Leftover cheese (we used Carmody, but anything will do)
5 slices pancetta

Directions:

Warm the olive oil in a large saute pan over medium heat. Add the onions and garlic and cook until slightly browned/caramelized. Remove sausages from their casings, and blend along with other leftovers until smooth (if you’re using a larger amount of leftovers, reduce sausages to 2). Add half the onion/garlic mixture and blend in.

Add this blended mixture to the ground beef. Add salt, pepper, 1 cup spicy Bloody Mary mix, 2 T fresh basil, eggs, breadcrumbs and milk. Mix thoroughly.

Oil a large baking pan with sides. Lay the meat mixture in the pan in long thin layer. In the middle, lay down a strip of cheese – however much you like, we recommend a lot – and roll sides of loaf up and over the cheese (like a jelly roll). Put the meatloaf in the fridge to set and preheat the oven to 350.

Put reserve onions/garlic in small stockpot and add 2-3 cups spicy Bloody Mary mix. Add 1/4 cup red wine leftover from the night before (if you were all big drinkers the night before, you can substitute with balsamic vinegar). Cook over medium heat until reduced by half. Turn the heat off.

Place meatloaf on prepared pan and top it with a layer of the reduced Bloody Mary mixture, then lay the pancetta on top. Cook for 45 minutes or until meat is cooked through. Garnish with remaining fresh basil and serve with Bloody Mary catsup.

Obviously, this meatloaf pairs very well with both leftover red wine and – you guessed it – spicy Bloody Marys. You’ll feel better almost immediately.

Filed Under: Comfort Food, Main Dishes, New Year, Recipes, Winter Tagged With: Beef, Bloody Mary ketchup, Hangover, meatloaf, pork, prosciutto, tomatoes

Summer Grilling Recipes: Ribs, Rubs & Chicken Galore

Summer Grilling Recipes: Ribs, Rubs & Chicken Galore

by liz · Jun 2, 2011

Coffee-Spice Rubbed Ribs recipe

When the weather gets warm, I head outside to cook. Grilling season is here! Recently I’d eaten an entire meal of grilled food in Spain. And Memorial Day is a good time to pull off the cover and blow the dust away. The grill is your new best friend.

Grilling meat may seem daunting if you’ve never done it, so rest assured you can use a grill almost the same as you would an oven. Many recipes have directions for both an oven and a grill, and you can also use rubs, sauces and marinades to season any type of meat: beef, poultry, pork, lamb and more. All it takes is a little research and recipe hunting.

I started my summer grilling by using this Coffee-Spiced Rub recipe, which is perfect on ribs as shown in the recipe. But I wanted to grill a whole chicken using this rub, so I modified the cooking time since chicken has a lot less fat than ribs.

Coffee-Spiced Rub

(covers 4 pounds meat, shown on ribs at top)

Ingredients:

  • 2 1/2 teaspoons packed brown sugar
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons NESCAFÉ TASTER’S CHOICE House Blend 100% Pure Instant Coffee Granules or NESCAFÉ CLÁSICO Pure Instant Coffee Granules
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons sea or kosher salt
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons garlic powder
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons ground coriander
  • 3/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • 1/4 teaspoon NESTLÉ® TOLL HOUSE® Baking Cocoa

Directions:

COMBINE sugar, coffee granules, salt, garlic powder, coriander, pepper and cocoa in coffee or spice grinder; cover. Process until smooth. Lightly rub meat with oil. Sprinkle with rub mixture, pressing gently to help it adhere to the meat.

To learn how to grill a whole chicken, I turned to YouTube; it looked so easy! I had a whole chicken and some beef brisket as well, and I still wanted to use this recipe’s method of first slow cooking the meat over beer or wine, then grilling it to perfection at the end. Plus, I was dying to use a handcrafted pecan beer I got at the local beer festival – in the South – to perform this duty.

Coffee-Spice Rubbed Ribs or Chicken recipe

Since I was cooking chicken and brisket, the meat only needed about an hour in the oven at 250 (it made the house smell so good!) then I put it on the grill to finish the cooking and crisp up the outside. The leftover beer plus drippings in the bottom of the oven pan smelled so good, I used it to make a sauce.

Coffee-Spice Rubbed Ribs or Chicken recipe

For the sauce:

Pour the liquid from the pan under the meat through a sieve into a sauce pan. Bring to a boil and add a bit of butter. Cook until it reduces by about half and serve alongside the meat.

For my next backyard dinner, I decided to marinate and grill a whole chicken. The marinade in this Chardonnay Marinated Chicken recipe captured my heart and I set to work. I doubled the amount of chardonnay to almost cover the chicken, and created a custom herb mix made from every herb growing in the garden around my house, including rosemary, thyme, parsley, lavender and mint. I also used good, local olive oil and large sea salt. Turning the chicken in the marinade a few times during the evening made me lick my fingers! I couldn’t wait to eat it.

Chardonnay Marinated & Grilled Chicken recipe

To grill, I followed my handy YouTube instructions, and it turned out perfectly cooked. 15 minutes before the chicken was done, I added zucchini, asparagus and broccolini to the grill. I also made a warm spicy-vinegar potato salad and mini lemon tartlets to fill every last bit of space in my guests’ tummies.

My grill is now the most popular kid in town.

Links:

  • Coffee-Spiced Ribs
  • Get a Taster’s Choice coupon
  • Get a Toll House coupon

Related Grilling Recipes:

Skewered Sesame Chicken recipe
Skewered Sesame Chicken (oven or grill)
Grilled Pound Cake with Seasonal Berries and Apple-Ginger Syrup recipe
Grilled Pound Cake with Berries & Apple-Ginger Syrup

Filed Under: Healthy Stuff, Main Dishes, Recipes, Summer Tagged With: barbecue, Beef, Chicken, Father's Day, grilling, spicy, summer, summer grilling recipe, Vegetable

The Best Meal I Ever Ate: Etxebarri, the Grill Master & the Baker

The Best Meal I Ever Ate: Etxebarri, the Grill Master & the Baker

by liz · Jun 1, 2011

I’d heard and read so much about Etxebarri from Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations (he also said it was the best meal of his life) to Chez Pim’s journey there, it was a must on my recent eating/drinking tour of northern Spain. Like Pim, I was grateful to get to eat at various starry restaurants on this trip, but this place doesn’t even have 1 star – quite possibly because the folks at the Michelen guide couldn’t find it.

Etxebarri is notoriously hard to find. The Baker and I had explicit directions in our guide book, which were as good as any, but didn’t show any distances or what the “turns” actually looked like. We also had a British GPS, but Jane/Gayle was a little crazy (as we drove on the freeway, going the correct way, she would suddenly direct us to take off onto the Spanish fields alongside). And, we had Pim’s post open on our laptop as well. And it actually took all 3 devices to get us to the tiny town of Axpe, right on time, after allowing double the driving time to allow for the Baker’s slow driving, and for getting lost.

Although the town was only 15 minutes from a bustling suburban area near San Sebastian, it felt as remote as Heidi’s mountains. A small cluster of stone buildings, sheep grazing in the mountain fields full of wildflowers, and mama sheep with babes in front of every small farm along the way had us wondering if we were in the right place.

Asador Etxebarri Restaurant, Spain

And then we saw it! The typical Basque facade shown above looked over a tiny village square, awaiting our arrival, to fill our bellies with chef Victor Arguinzoniz’s grilled masterpieces until late in the afternoon. He is known for cooking with fire (like the Baker), over coals and wood, and for pairing different foods with the correct type of coal or wood that suits it best. He even makes his own coal to get the best pairing! This was going to be good.

Etxebarri menu

First things first, we ordered a bottle of white wine called Txakolina to go with the seafood we would eat first on the tasting menu.

Etxebarri chorizo

Then the amuse bouche arrived: Arguinzoniz’s famous house-made chorizo shown above and fire-baked bread.

Etxebarri handmade goat butter

The first course was handmade goat butter on grilled bread, topped with setas, spring mushrooms from the local hills, and charcoal salt.

Etxebarri goose barnacles

Second course shown above was goose barnacles, something I’d never eaten before. We had to peel off a gray layer of interlocking fibers resembling fabric, which squirted orange ocean-flavored juice onto our table and eyeglasses, exposing the delicious neck of the crustacean.

Etxebarri prawns

Next up was grilled Palamós prawns, the best-tasting and largest prawns in the area. And the most beautiful I might add.

Etxebarri sea cucumber

The next course was again something I’d never eaten: sea cucumber, shown above. These sea animals are related to sea urchin and starfish, but look a bit more like a slug. It tasted, however, more like a scallop, but meatier and tastier. This one was grilled and served with baby fava beans and a fava flower.

Etxebarri baby octopus

I was unprepared for the next dish to be the best of the day, grilled baby octopus served on a bed of onion confit and charcoal paste. Sweet and smoky and tender and so pretty too.

Etxebarri grilled anchovy

A classic Spanish dish, grilled anchovy, was next. This was perfectly cooked, barely seasoned and served with an arugula salad, shown above.

Etxebarri grilled fresh chorizo

Next was grilled fresh chorizo on a polenta cake. This was seared; not cooked! It was really really good. We also ordered a Rioja Crianza to go with this and the next meat dish.

Etxebarri grilled beef on the bone

And finally, a glorious piece of grilled beef on the bone shown above. For a girl from Oklahoma, this was a fitting climax to the meal and also perfectly cooked.

Etxebarri fresh sheep cheese ice cream

The first of two desserts came next: fresh sheep’s cheese ice cream with a wild fruit infusion. This ice cream tasted like the strongest, sharpest sheep cheese..you know, the one that smells a bit like the Zoo? It was stinky and heavenly, and the wild fruit infusion played the perfect complement. I got to eat two portions since the pungency was too much for the Baker (he can dish it out, but can’t take it).

Etxebarri smoked milk ice cream & torrija

The last course was a Basque cake, torrija de pan y nuez (a cross between French toast and tres leches cake, if you can imagine that) served with smoked milk ice cream, shown above. This ice cream tasted like a vanilla, creamy campfire!

Etxebarri coffee & muffins

As the late afternoon started to wink at us through the trees, our happy bellies wanted nothing more than to take a long nap into the night. So, coffee was in order for the Baker and me, along with lovely muffin pastries, to make it to our next bedding destination after this four-hour indulgence in the Spanish mountains.

A perfect meal for a perfect day in Spain by the world’s Master of the Grill, Victor Arguinzoniz. Can’t wait to come back!

Filed Under: Food Adventure, Restaurants, Spain, Spanish Food Tagged With: Beef, Cheese, Etxebarri, Ice Cream, sea cucumber, Seafood, Spain, Spain - Basque

Copyright © 2021 · No Sidebar Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

  • Contact
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
  • Cali Coast Wine Country