November 7th, 2014

Masaharu Morimoto: "Don't be afraid to do whatever you want. Cooking doesn't have to have rules."

So we had a super busy week, going out of town for a weekend is like not getting a weekend at all, so we are happy it's Friday!!!  This week we continued our process of watching every movie that has ever won an Oscars for best picture in history.  We watched How Green Was My Valley (1941) and Mrs. Miniver (1942), we're around the start of WWII so a lot of these movies are based around the war, at any rate, both were pretty good.  Mrs. Miniver actually has the guy that played Clarence from It's a Wonderful Life (the best Christmas movie of all time!).   

Okay let's get down to business!  It's Friday Night in Winslow and time for our thirteenth Mystery Bag Challenge!  It's my turn to pick the mandatory ingredients and Damon's turn to cook.

Recap: The rules are simple; whoever is cooking has to make dinner using each of the mystery food items that the other has put into the mystery bag.  We can also use other items that we have in the fridge and pantry, but MUST use some of each item from the mystery bag, and MUST be ready to plate-up dinner before 1 hour has passed after seeing the ingredients for the first time.  We agreed to turn it up a notch and start thinking more outside the box for the mandatory ingredients we'd be picking for the other!

And here's what Damon ended up with for tonight!

 

Damon didn't looked pretty scared (before the photo op), he got chicken breast, corn tortillas, canned corn, and sweet Bavarian mustard.  I thought I was being a little too easy on him since I thought up a couple things to do with everything but the mustard was my last minute addition. Still, I think that could be used as some kind of sauce for any of my ideas.

He's ten minutes down and he thinks he's going to go for a baked chicken taquito with a corn and pepper relish/salad on the side and of course some dipping sauces.  He's starting out by cleaning and slicing up the chicken and tossing them with some canola oil, lemon juice, and spices (cumin, chili powder, and garlic powder) to marinade for a minute.  He's got the oven pre-heating, a skillet warming and begins to cut up his onions and sweet peppers.

I don't think I brought Damon to calling uncle, DAMN!!!!! I knew I was being too easy on him!  Twenty minutes down he changes his plans for the corn and now he thinks he might puree the corn, peppers, and onion with a little salt and cayenne pepper, along with the sweet mustard and use that as the dipping sauce.

Damon Has just under thirty minutes and he's got his chicken cooking, his puree done to his satisfaction, and is now pacing the floor about something....That's just how Damon rolls in the kitchen, I think he's got this on lock!  The chicken looks and smells good!!

Alright, he's down to about twenty-three minutes and he's filling his tortillas, after dreading them in oil (to help them crisp up when he throws them in the oven) but when he went to fold the first one it broke on him so on the next he tries no oil.  He's putting chicken, diced up pickled jalapeno, and shredded cheese inside them.

 

The tortillas were frozen and they are giving Damon some trouble. We don't usually care for corn tortillas so I don't know if this is why they are being finicky or if it's because we had them frozen? At any rate, he puts them in the oven with thirteen minutes to go. Damon starts cleaning up his station and figuring out his plating. 

And with only five seconds to spare, Damon presents me with my dinner.  

Damon did a great job, the enchilada/taquito was full of yummy chicken, cheese, and jalepeno and you can't go wrong there.  He topped them with plain Greek yogurt and diced jalepeno, and he served his corn puree as a side and also provided some smokey/hot salsa.

A reminder of our scoring system...  

being done on time = 0-1 point

dish presentation = 0-2 points

dish creativity / originality = 0-3 points

dish flavor = 0-3 points

portion size = 0-1 point. 

We did our scoring and in the end, Damon ended up with an average of 9 points.  While I thought everything tasted good on its own and some things tasted better than other things together, I wish the corn puree was a little more flavorful and was served hot instead of cold so I counted him off 1 point.

Damon = 60.5, Christina = 50.5, and that keeps Damon in the lead!

Now that were done with dinner, we're off for one more best movie, the classic 1942, Casablanca.  We've seen this before but it's a classic, a good movie, who doesn't love Humphrey Bogart, and we decided that we would watch all the movies in order (if we can help it) regardless of whether we'd seen them before or not.  If you haven't seen this one, you're crazy or just don't give a lick about classic movies in which case you're still crazy!

Next week is my turn to cook and Damon's turn to pick what I'm cooking!  Until next time.....