Cilantro-Lime Mayo

I started flipping through this cookbook and an hour later I had to force myself to put it down - it's so amazing and full of interesting recipes and equally interesting tidbits about eacha artist who contributed the recipe. I like all types of music, but I love country music. The first thing I did was look up all the artists I liked most and about died when I read Robert Earl Keen's Bacon-Wrapped Dove Breasts. The ingredient list is 12 dove breasts, teriyaki marinade, salt, pepper, fresh jalapeno peppers and 6 slices bacon. Doesn't that sound like a perfect recipe? Simple but full of BIG flavor.

Then I laughed out loud when I read Pat Green's recipe for Chicken Squares. His recipe actually reads, "Cook the chicken however you like: grill it, bake it, cook it in the microwave. Hell, it doesn't matter as long as it's fully cooked." He ends with saying, "...let them cook for 5 minutes - that concoction in the middle gets nuclear hot and will remove the top of your mouth if you aren't careful. Served with a salad and a beer, you have a good right-down-the-middle meal. Yummy good."

I guess you are wanting to know who will be the next proud owner of this tasty cookbook, Music in the Kitchen by Glenda Pierce Facemire. I numbered all the comments and used a random integer generator to determine the winner. The lucky winner is: Natalie! She's the one going to Diego and Boston. Check out her cute blog The Sweets Life.

Congrats Natalie! Shoot me an e-mail so I can send this brand new cookbook to you.

I got a quick recipe to share too! After Jim and I returned from our honeymoon we had my brother and his girlfriend Tiffany over for a weeknight dinner. I was feeling particularly inspired by seafood...well, mainly because I asked Jim what he wanted to eat and he said simply "seafood." So I went to work looking for recipes that inspired me and met his criteria.

For the starter course, I made a salad of mixed greens dressed in a simple salad dressing, topped with two seared scallops and drizzled with this really yummy Cilantro-Lime Mayo. For the special sauce, you will need cilantro (duh), mayo (duh), dijon mustard (secret ingredient!), garlic, lime and tabasco.

Throw it all in the food processor and blend until you get everything minced and combined really well.

Voila, Cilantro-Lime Mayo. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

I wanted the ingredients to sit and get to know each other really well, so I put it in a zip top bag (labeled of course) and into the fridge for a couple of hours.

Here is the beautiful salad. The salad dressing was made up of grapeseed oil, lemon juice and salt and pepper. Really simple stuff, lightly tossed with the baby greens. Next I seared the scallops, read here for more info on searing scallops. Then I snipped the end of my zip top bag and squeezed a dollop of the Cilantro-Lime Mayo on top of the scallops. This was surprisingly GREAT for something so simple! The Cilantro-Lime Mayo was so good in fact that I could have thinned it with olive oil and used it as a salad dressing.

The entree I served was this flavorful pan seared Tuna with Ginger Shiitake Cream Sauce. If you do the prepping before hand, the dish comes together really quickly.  It's a great recipe to have in your arsenal and even better to impress friends (or your brother and his girlfriend) with all your culinary talent.

We ended our dinner by opening this bottle of Limoncello that we brought back from Italy. Kept in the freezer, it's ready to pour and sip following any meal. It's the perfect after dinner drink in my opinion, I absolutely fell in love with this in Italy.

Cole (bottom left) made friends this night too. Deuce (top right) came with Tiffany and thoroughly enjoyed lounging in Cole's bed. I thought it was so cute the way they shared the bed.

{Cilantro-Lime Mayo}