Chopped! Round One

So, for my first article, I want to share the weekend we had. Karyn and I have recently become quasi obsessed with the show Chopped! on the Food Network. We decided we would go about implementing our own Chopped! challenges in our home, although with some slight modifications. The modifications are necessary because we do not have the pantry they have at their disposal (if you see the show you will know what I mean), and we do not have a kitchen with 2 ovens and a massive 6 burner range. So the actual cooking would be next to impossible in the home.
Here is how we changed it:

1) After receiving your basket we go right out the door to the local grocery store. We have 30 minutes in the grocery store to buy all of the ingredients we will need to complete our meal.
2) there is only one round, or goal and that is to make dinner with the ingredients in the basket, no appetizer - entree - dessert round.
3) you have one hour to cook the meal, from beginning to end. Set up is allowed, in that you can get water boiling if needed (they have that on the show) you can get bowls, pans, utensils and so on out, but as soon as you handle the food, time starts.

Now, you might think having watched the show that an hour is a long time. I assure you it is not, and having completed one basket each we can attest to how amazing it is that the chefs on the show make anything in 30 minutes.

Now, round 1 was my challenge and it went like this. I opened my bag and found the following:
Ground Bison
Lime Juice
Whole Milk Mozzerella
Avocados
Sweet and Sour Pickled Beets

My trip to the store, my purchases were Vigo Yellow Rice (love it!) pablano peppers, a spanish onion, and whole grain tortillas.

Now, there is an additional challenge here because, due to my wife's diet, I have to try to keep everything as low fat, low carb as I can while still delivering the protein.

The final result of my basket was a Bison Taco with a sweet and sour pickled beet salsa, homemade guacamole, and a mexican take on a caprese salad served in an avocado shell with lime balsamic dressing.

Taco meat:
3 lbs of ground bison
1/2 Spanish onion
3 tbsp minced garlic
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper
Ground Cumin

Place about 1/4 cup olive oil into a large skillet. Heat until it starts to smoke. Add in onion and garlic and saute until they start to get nice and brown. Add in Bison, and seasonings, to your taste, chop up as fine as possible while browning. *Note: The bison is a very lean meat, so there is not a lot of grease or liquid and alone it can be dry. It was my intention to make a lime/greek yogurt sauce for the tacos to combat this, but time did not allow. They were delicious anyway. You could certainly use this same preparation for any meat and it would be just as good.

The Salsa:
~ 20 Sweet and sour pickled beets (from our Giant Eagle, I am not sure where else you could get them)
2 pablano peppers, chopped
1/2 spanish onion, coarsely chopped
6 Garlic cloves, chopped
Olive oil
Lime juice
3 tbsp Fresh Cilantro, chopped
Cumin
Salt and pepper to taste

For this salsa, heat a skillet with olive oil, then add the onions, garlic and pablano. They should just start to turn brown before removing from heat. Pour into a good sized mixing bowl. Dice the pickled beets and mix into the onion/garlic/pepper mixture. Splash lime juice over the mixture and stir. Add the chopped cilantro, some cumin, salt and pepper to taste. The color of this salsa is amazing, and the beets makeup for the lack of tomatoes with their sweetness and tang from the pickling. Everyone in my house loved this salsa even the youngest that will not eat veggies. Served on the taco the flavor was just perfect.

The Guac:
3 avocados peeled, pitted and sliced or diced, does not matter they will be mashed anyway.
Lime Juice
Dried Cilantro
Olive oil
Ground cumin

Nothing special here, mash the avocado, sprinkle with lime juice (about 2 tbsp), salt, cumin, and pepper and about 1 tsp chopped dried cilantro. Mix well. Add Olive oil to improve the consistency of the Guacamole, I used about 2 tsp. What I will say is I will never buy Guac again, Homemade is light years better, and fairly cheap to make in comparison to store bought.

Mexican spin on Caprese Salad
Avocado peels (from Guac) for plating.
1 lb of Heirloom grape and cherry tomatoes
Whole milk Mozzerella (about 1/4 to 1/2 lb will do)
Lime Vinagrette dressing (store bought, kind of a copout on my part, but time constraints made anything else impossible)
Fresh Cilantro

Caprese Salad is an italien thing, and as you can see in the picture above a beautiful dish. I wanted to keep the pretty colors while using my ingredients, so this is how I made it. Cut 1 Handful (7 or 8) of the grape tomatoes in half. Cut an equal number of roughly 1/2 inch cubes of the mozzerella (about 16 cubes for the mathematically challenged, balance is important.) Mix the tomatoes and cheese cubes together and place in the avocado shell. Drizzle lightly with the lime vinagrette (normally a Caprese is drizzled with balsamic, but I chose the lime to go with the overall theme of the meal). Coarsely chop some of the fresh cilantro (A real Caprese would have basil leaves) and sprinkle on the salad and serve.

So assembling the tacos went like this, a nice sized spoon of the meat in the middle of the tortilla, followed by a spoon of the red beet salsa, a swish of the guacamole and some of the mozzerella shredded right onto the taco. I will admit that the Mozzerella was a bit lost in the taco, but I think it was made up for in the Caprese, which also went on the plate next to the taco and rice.

The whole meal was served with a helping of yellow rice, not because it needed it, but in our house we do like to have a starch with our dinner.

Next Post: Karyn's First basket!