It's the first food post of my new blog. I've spent the last week sick with a cold and stomach bug so I haven't eaten a real meal in awhile. Now that I'm feeling better I was anxious for a good dinner. I should start by saying that I rarely make a recipe as written. Sometimes I make pretty minor changes and other times I change so much you could call it my very own. Anytime I use someone's recipe I'll either link to the original or give credit and then talk about what I did different. In this case, I'm using a recipe from thekitchn.com (which is a great cooking blog). This recipe calls for brisket... I went to the butcher and told them what I was making and they suggested I use a nice select beef roast instead... so I had them cut me a 5 pounder. The first thing I did was slice it in half, then sear each piece on both sides in a skillet. While it was searing, I put together the sauce. I combined the chipotles (and sauce), onion, garlic, cloves, cilantro, salt, lime juice, and cider vinegar in the food processor. I pulsed it until combined, added it to the crock pot and put the meat on top, then added 4 cups of beef broth. I let it cook for 8 hours on low then shredded the meat.
Here's a little side note: I knew I was making pico de gallo and didn't buy enough limes for it, so before squeezing the juice from the limes for the barbacoa, I zested a few of them for use later in the pico.
A few hours before the meat was done I started on the pico. I used equal parts tomato, white onion, and cilantro. I added half of the fresh zest then some lime juice from one of those squeezer bottles. Since I also forgot to buy jalapenos, I added a half diced red bell pepper. For a little heat I added a few drops of Spontaneous Combustion hot sauce. The pico was finished off with a bit of sea salt and oh my it was delicious!
Earlier in the day, I was cleaning out the garden beds - getting ready for spring planting. I ended up pulling 10 pounds of carrots (and there's still more out there!). As a snack while waiting for the main event, my husband suggested a carrot salsa... so here's what we came up with:
4 medium to large carrots, diced (we had 3 different colors)4 roma tomatoes, diced
1 tablespoon cilantro, chopped (could use more, but it's all I had left)
1/2 large onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, finely diced/minced
1/2 red bell pepper, diced
1/2 to 1 teaspoon lime zest
juice from one lime (or equivalent from a squeeze bottle)
couple drops Spontaneous Combustion (or 2 jalapenos)
Salt, to taste
For the burritos: Flour tortilla, plain greek yogurt (instead of sour cream), shredded lettuce, shredded cheese, barbacoa meat, pico. It was FABULOUS!Changes I would make: next time I will use a little less ground clove and less broth. I will stick with the roast instead of brisket and 5 chipotle peppers instead of 4.
