Grilled Shrimp and Citrus

Shrimp, like any seafood, is great when combined with some form of citrus acid to cut it's fishiness. We used lime to marinate a pile of grilled shrimp tonight, and served it with a garlic herb couscous and an arugula salad.

We started off the evening by cleaning and peeling the shrimp, carefully reserving the shells, which we added to some vegetable stock to impart their rich flavor. After simmering for 10 mins, we strained out the shells and used our stock in place of water for the couscous.

Our shrimp marinade consisted of lime juice, olive oil, rice vinegar, garlic, salt, pepper and chives. We grilled  hem for 3 1/2 minutes per side on skewers (soak your skewers if you're using wood or bamboo or they may catch on fire like ours did!)

For the salad we added supremed oranges, shaved asiago, and arugula, tossed with a light vinaigrette of red wine vinegar, olive oil, salt, pepper, lime juice, orange juice, and chives. A bottle of Rioja completed the arrangement nicely. Magnifique!
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Cloud 9 in a Cup

If you've ever tasted good coffee, you've probably proceeded to notice that there is an appalling scarcity of it. Call me a coffee snob, but to me well made cappuccinos are one of the most amazing things in life and I will go to lengths to acquire one. Maybe its just that my neighborhood has only recently progressed in its transformation from an industrial area to an artist enclave, so I'll give it time. For now it winds up being easier to employ the old adage 'if you want something done right, do it yourself'.

There are many, many factors that go into brewing a spectacular home-made cup of joe, but none so fundamental as this one: Buy whole beans and get yourself a grinder. 'Burr' type grinders are best.

Grinding your beans just before you brew makes for the boldest, fullest possible flavor. Coffee's distinct aroma and taste is mostly attributable to the oils contained within the bean, so if you get pre-ground coffee and let it sit around, the oils will interact with the air and get stale, resulting in off-flavor coffee. If this happens your cappuccino will most definitely loose its chutzpah, and when you're as passionate about coffee as I am, chutzpah is key.
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Yummy Time

Voila - a broiled pork loin marinated in dijon with rice pilaf and garlic parmesan mashed potatoes.

This is my first blog post ever. Everyone's always been telling me to fire up a cooking blog to document my work so I finally decided to give it a try. In case you don't know, a toque blanche is the french name for the white hats that chefs wear. Toqueblanche and latoqueblanche were taken, so here we are.

I'm not posting a recipe of this dish I made last week, just a quick photo for the sake of posterity. Pork loin, I miss you already. Don't worry, I make this a lot so I'll post it again with instructions somewhere down the line.

So, come back soon if you like to cook and shoot me an email or add comments if you like what you see.
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