Recipes

Voodoo Jalapeño Poppers

We've had a bumper crop of jalapeño peppers from the garden this year, and that means POPPERS! Autumn is chile season, though jalapeños are readily available at the grocery store year round. The flavor buzz from these was well worth the effort of seeding all those little suckers, but do wear gloves! The warm bite of jalapeño with smoky paprika in the cheese and the Voodoo sprinkle on top of these poppers goes down well chased by a rich porter. Enjoy a whole platter by yourself while you watch the game like we did, or serve them up at your next fall fête.

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Pink Chili Crisp Sundae

3 min

Imagine this: the cool, creamy embrace of vanilla or chocolate ice cream, its classic sweetness a familiar comfort. Now, picture this serenity disrupted in the most fiery way. A drizzle of Pink Chili Crisp. A riot of textures and flavors. The heat of the chili, a subtle, seductive whisper against the cold creaminess. The crunch of the crisp, a playful counterpoint to the smooth ice cream. It is a marriage of opposites. This is not merely a dessert; it's a sweet and salty and umami filled experience.

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Limón-Chile Tomato Salad

10 min

Introducing our vibrant Limón-Chile Tomato Salad—a delightful summer dish that bursts with flavor. Sliced steak tomatoes form the base, adorned with thin radish, jalapeno, and cilantro layers. A drizzle of lime juice and olive oil adds tanginess. Sprinkle on crumbled queso fresco, Limón-Chile, and Pacific sea salt for a crunchy, juicy, and refreshing experience. Vegetarian by default, easily vegan without the cheese. No tossing required—simply assemble and enjoy! For perfectly sliced veggies, a mandoline or Benriner works wonders. Experience the essence of summer on your plate with the unique blend of three chile flakes and fruity tartness from sumac in Limón-Chile—it'll elevate your summer veggies to new heights!

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Achiote Paste

Fun alert! Spices offer so many ways to play with flavor and texture, and making achiote paste is a great one. Made with a combination of annatto seeds, spices and a little bit of liquid to bind it together, the paste can be used in a variety of rubs, marinades and sauces. Annatto seeds are the star and they provide an earthy flavor and deep red color to your food. The seeds are very hard and most easily ground in a high speed blender or electric spice grinder. Alternatively, you can put some elbow grease behind your mortar & pestle or molcajete to get the job done. Use the paste made fresh, keep it in the fridge or freeze in ice cube shapes so you'll always have some of this fantastic flavor on hand. The paste is traditionally formed into a brick for easy use.

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Aji Pimento Cheese Crackers

These little crackers combine a range of delightful chile flavors into every bite and will add a unique twist to your snacking or appetizer lineup. The mild pimento cheese is complimented with Aji mirasol chile peppers. They are mild and fruity with hints of tamarind and tomato. The pickled jalapeño on top adds a kick- but not too much. Orange zest brings the flavors together nicely.

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Flour Tortillas

It's no secret that flour tortillas are champions of versatility! You can top them with anything, fill them with anything, and they work great for snacks or for meals. What's less well known, however, is that they're also incredibly easy to make! Really! And nothing beats a fresh, warm tortilla.When making tortillas at home, use the opportunity to be creative! By using different spices or flours, you can inject a little flair into your recipe, and make your tortillas truly unique! In this recipe, we use Saffron and Butterfly Pea Flower to give our tortillas unique and distinctive colors. You can substitute a portion of the all-purpose flour for other flours, too, for more flavor and texture variety.Recipes such as this one traditionally use lard, but we've found that vegetable oil makes a perfectly suitable substitution. It's easy to double or triple this recipe, and they'll keep in your refrigerator in an airtight container for a couple of weeks. Homemade tortillas are best when fresh, though, and we don't think you'll have any problem finding ways to use them!

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Mary’s Salsa Roja

This is my Mom's recipe. The smell of this sauce perfumed my childhood weekly. Native to Chihuahua in Northern Mexico, this salsa roja is the base for many staple dishes in Mexican cuisine. Guajillo chiles are the foundation and they get seasoned with garden herbs like Mexican oregano, thyme, bay leaf and garlic. If you've never played with whole chiles, this sauce is a great staple to learn.

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Southern-Style Pork Vindaloo and Green Bean Verakka with Cardamom Cornbread

If you've never had vindaloo, you don't know what you're missing. From My Two Souths and Chef Asha Gomez, we get this recipe for a Southern-Style Pork Vindaloo and Green Bean Verakka with Cardamom Cornbread. Tangy, spicy, garlicky pork goes perfectly with the Cardamom Cornbread. The Green Bean Verakka is the perfect flavorful complement to both dishes. If you're not one to eat pork, lamb will also work perfectly as a substitute. Here's one dish that you'll make over and over again. From the author: "Vindaloo is a recipe that best represents Kerala's diverse culinary influences, and it also reflects many of my own. My first encounter with tongue-searing pork vindaloo served in many Indian restaurants in the US was a bit jarring. I remember thinking how vastly different it was from the pork vindaloo I grew up eating in Kerala. Like many dishes traveling across the seas amid many interpretations, I feel vindaloo got lost in translation. Vindaloo was originally inspired by a Portuguese dish, carne de vinha d'alhos (meat with wine and garlic), with the wine substituted with palm wine vinegar. This dish was introduced to Kerala and Goa by Portuguese who stored chunks of meat in wine barrels on the ship; the wine would turn to vinegar and thus preserve the meat for long journeys. When they got to shore, the sailors would add local spices to the meat and cook a stew. This dish has many nuances: your palate experiences the tang from the vinegar, sweetness from the sugar, heat generated more from garlic than chiles, and a touch of bitterness from ground mustard seeds. Here, sugar, hot paprika, and a generous amount of garlic transport the pork roast to a faraway land. Choose a nice fatty pork shoulder, or Boston butt, to ensure lusciousness. I particularly enjoy the flavor of the rich sauce once it seeps down into the Cardamom Cornbread. Serving it this way brings to the plate a little something extra; my Louisiana friends refer to this as lagniappe."

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Smoky Hazelnut Chocolate Cookies

From My Two Souths and Chef Asha Gomez, we get this recipe for Smoky Hazelnut Chocolate Cookies. Her singular recipes are rooted in her love of Deep-South cooking, as well as the Southern Indian flavors of her childhood home in Kerala. This was one of the first recipes we tried. We're thrilled to share it with you. From the author: "I have no doubt that, if I allowed him to do so, Ethan would eat a jar of Nutella in one sitting. To ensure that this creamy hazelnut spread wound up as an ingredient rather than the main course, I realized I had to come up with a Nutella recipe for my boy. Given his well-practiced sweet tooth, a cookie was the obvious and easy direction to take. But, as you may have gathered, my son is his mother's boy: Ethan loves spice in every form and shape as I do. When I added a hint of sugared, smoked paprika to Nutella cookie dough, I knew I had hit it out of the park. These are now Ethan's favorite cookies, and he won't even give them time to cool before snatching them up. I think my kid has a rather grown-up sense of taste for a ten-year-old. I wonder where he got it? My favorite part of this recipe is mixing the dough with my hands, and Ethan loves to roll up his sleeves and get in on the action."

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