Chicken Hash topped with a Fried Egg and Hollandaise Sauce

Sunday morning was fun in the kitchen.  What started off as a chicken omelette so I can use up the shredded chicken turned into something completely different.

I started to do some prep work on some ingredients, and started brain storming.  I diced some potatoes, onion, red and green bell peppers. and garlic.

I got the potatoes started first because that was going to take the longest part to cook.  I tossed it with paprika, onion and garlic powder, salt, pepper, and oregano and tossed it in the pan with some of the garlic oil from my jar of garlic confit.

For the chicken, it was some left over shredded chicken from a couple days before that was not seasoned with much.  I wanted a garlicy chicken so I added some more of the garlic oil and added in the chicken and fresh garlic and added some chicken broth to let it cook down a bit.  This was sauteed with the bell peppers and onion.  The mushroom was sauteed on the side for presentation purposes.

As for the fried egg.  This will be my first go around with it.  I was inspired by a homechef on Instagram for the fried egg.  The most difficult part of all of this is cooking the egg.  I had soft boiled the egg and this has to be done pretty precisely because too little time, the egg white is too runny to peel and too much then it turns into a hard boiled egg.  There really is no way to know how it looks on the inside until you cut into it so I just hoped for the best.

Like anything that is breaded and fried, I rolled the egg in some flour then into a egg wash and then into some panko.  I quickly fried it.

After looking back at my plate and realizing that it is too "dry" looking, I decided to make a hollandaise sauce real quick.

Ladies and gentlemen...here we have it...Chicken Hash topped with a Fried Soft Boiled Egg and Hollandaise Sauce!

Red Wine Braised Braised Short Ribs with Parsip/Potato Mash and Roasted Brussels Sprout

This dish was created for a couple reasons.  I recently discovered the short rib and have been in love with it since.  And two, I had a bottle of Cabanero which is a habanero infused red wine that I had purchased to drink and did not care for it as something to drink.

Anyways, the night before, I had marinaded the short ribs in the wine with onion, garlic, celery, and carrot.  The next day afterwork, I let the short ribs sit at room temperature for a bit.  I seared all sides of the short ribs and added in the marinade to begin the braising process.

I braised it for about 3 hours and pulled it and stuck it in the oven to keep warm while the red wine reduces.  While the short ribs was braising, I went ahead and started preparing the sides.

This would be my first go around with parsnip and decided to mix it with potatoes to make a mash.  I mashed it with some milk that I had simmered with butter and infused with garlic and parsley.  The brussels sprouts were simply treated with salt and pepper, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar and roasted.

My first time with parsnip was a very positive experience.  I love the flavors that it gives to the potatoes.  To me, it reminded me of Christmas which paired well with my red wine reduction and short ribs.  Unfortunately, the heat was cooked out of the wine.  The wine itself had a nice little kick to it that I was hoping would have carried over into the sauce and short ribs.  The brussels sprouts ended up having crispy outside layers which was a big plus!.

Banh Mi Platter to Banh Mi Sliders

Dinner was suppose to be simple the night I had prepared this plate.  We had a long weekend and last thing I wanted to do on Monday evening is cook (shocker...I know).

We had all items to make a pretty decent banh mi.  I had a Vietnamese fried ham (cha chien), the pate I had made recently, cilantro, cucumber, and of course the bread.  The only thing I had to make was the pickled carrots (do chua) which was simple and a Sriracha aioli.

The second I started to slice the ham, I had the urge to want to turn it into something else.  Yes...a regular banh mi would have been awesome, but it is just a sandwich and so plain.  So I decided to make a banh mi platter...basically banh mi deconstructed.

Do not ask why.  I thought it would have been fun and it was.  But as I was eating it, I found myself building little "sliders".  This lead to another idea that I thought would have made a great looking picture and think outside of the box kind of plating.  

I ran back into the kitchen starving to the point that I was shaking, but I had an idea and I had to execute it.  Next thing I knew it, I stood back and realized, I had banh mi sliders! ( pictured above).

Pork Belly Confit Steak

I had a great time preparing and cooking the pork confit the week before.  It was a long drawn out process, but definitely worth it in the end.  

When I order pork belly at restaurants, it seems like it is never enough and it is always sliced pretty thinly.  So I wanted to prepare a "healthy" portion of pork belly and decided to serve it as a steak.  When I prepared the pork belly for the confit process, I had cut them in 4 inch squares.  

When I got home from work that evening, I took the pork belly out of the fridge and let it get to room temperature so I can scrape it out of the lard that it is sitting in.  

As I did this, I realized I needed a starch on my plate.  I had a gold potato and a sweet potato sitting on the counter. I cut those up into little dices so it cooks quicker, and steamed it.  I went ahead and heated some milk and butter and infused it with garlic and parsley and just let it steep in the milk.  I put the steamed potatoes through a potato ricer and whipped it with the milk.  

As the lard gets to room temperature, it makes it easy to get the pork belly out of it.  Keep in mind that the pork belly is very fragile and can be easily torn apart if not taken out of the lard carefully.  I scored the fat and let it render fat side down in a hot pan for a little while until it turned a golden brown and started to crisp.  I finished it off in the oven.  

For the sauce, I poured out some of the fat in the pan and sauteed some onion and garlic and deglazed it with some red wine and reduced it.  

To finish off the plate, I prepared some garlic confit to top it all off.