Tasty Bits

Since we're back in our former home town, San Diego, for the first time since we became full time RVers, we've been doing a LOT of entertaining. Gotta show friends and family our cozy new home, you know!

All that entertaining means I get to do a lot of one of my favorite things: cooking! Here are a couple of recipes we've enjoyed recently:

First off is a wonderful Cranberry Orange Chipotle Compote. This thick and chunky sauce is not too sweet and has just a tiny little kick from the chipotle. You could certainly kick it up a notch with an additional chipotle pepper. So far we have loved this sauce at room temperature on grilled pork tenderloin and on ice cream and even on Norwegian lefse with gjetost...talk about a multi-purpose sauce! I am positive it would be just as delicious on poultry or a mild white fish.

And here is a spicy Potato Cauliflower Curry. This vegetarian (or vegan if you leave off the yogurt topping) curry is hearty and warming on a cold winter evening, served over rice along side a good red wine.

The curry is especially nice made with fresh cooked chickpeas which are worlds better than canned. Dried chickpeas just need to be soaked overnight, then thrown in a crock pot the next day with fresh water on low setting. At the end of the day they'll be done and ready to use in curries or hummus immediately. Plus, they are easy to freeze for future use at a moments notice, just remove from the freezer and add a couple of rinses of cold water to the container and they are ready to go.