Eggs Benedict Cuban-Style (with recipe)

What to do with all that leftover pulled pork and delicious ingredients for Cuban Sandwiches when you're getting tired of eating Cuban Sandwiches?  Here's an idea for you!

Jen's favorite breakfast food is Eggs Benedict - so we wanted to try giving her favorite dish a Cuban flair - and it worked marvelously!  

Re-heat your pulled pork and ham and get ready to try this one!  This recipe is for two servings - but you'll be cutting up bread enough for 4 so adjust accordingly!

This is also easier done with two people so one can be poaching eggs while the other is whisking (and whisking and whisking) Hollandaise sauce!

Ingredients:

• Pulled Pork
• Ham Slices
• Cuban Hoagies
• 4 Organic Eggs (for poaching)
• 4 Organic Egg Yolks (for Hollandaise)
• 2 Sticks Organic Butter
• 1 Tablespoon White Wine Vinegar
• 1 Teaspoon White Pepper (use whatever you have on hand, this is just what we used)
• 1/2 Teaspoon Sea Salt
• Juice of 1/2 Lemon
• 1/4 Cup Cold Water
• 1 Tablespoon (or so) Yellow Mustard
• Dill for garnish (we sprinkled dried dill - you could use fresh as well of course!)

Directions:

• Put pulled pork in oven to re-heat on a low setting while you work on your sauce
• Gather all ingredients for your Hollandaise and get them together by the stove - you'll need to do this quickly.
• Melt butter in a small saucepan over medium heat; slowly bring to a boil, skimming froth from surface. (I used a large spoon and just kept skimming until the layer on top was gone) Carefully pour melted butter into a small bowl, holding back the milky sediment in the bottom of the pan. The clarified butter should be the color of light olive oil; let cool to room temperature.
• Wash saucepan thoroughly and dry - returning to stove for next step.
• While the butter is cooling - slice your Cuban Bread as you would for a sandwich, then cut in 1/2 to make 4 smaller pieces.  Place in toaster so they're ready for toasting.
• In saucepan, mix vinegar together with 1/4 cup cold water and pepper. Place over medium-high heat until liquid is reduced by one-third; remove from heat and let cool completely. (I filled a sink with cold water and placed the bottom of the pan in the water until it was cooled to speed things up)
• Add egg yolks to cooled reduction and whisk to combine.
• Place saucepan on stove over very low heat; whisk, making sure the whisk comes in contact with the bottom of the pan. Gradually increase heat whisking, so the sauce emulsifies progressively and becomes smooth and creamy, 8 to 10 minutes; do not let the temperature of the sauce rise above 150 degrees.
• While you're doing this - have someone start poaching eggs, toasting bread and getting your meat out and ready to plate!
• Remove saucepan from heat and whisk in clarified butter in a slow, steady stream; season with salt. Stir in lemon. Use a fine mesh strainer; strain mixture and discard solids. Whisk in mustard; Use sauce immediately.
• On a plate, place warmed ham on your toasted bread, topped with some pulled pork.  Lay two poached eggs on top of the meat and spoon on your Hollandaise sauce.  Garnish with dill and serve warm!

If you're making this by yourself, you'll have to figure out how to time it well, but it will be worth it!  This has some wonderful Cuban Sandwich flavor but it's clearly breakfast!  And just like the sandwiches, it's VERY filling.  We loved it!!!!!  This one is definitely going down as a success.

I modified the Hollandaise recipe I found here for this adventure.  

The Brownifer Cuban Sandwich

We were inspired by our visit to Stick a Pork In It to create our own version of the Cuban Sandwich. We hit the Internet Super Highway and did some research on the history of this tradition.

I won't bore you with the research, you can look all of that up yourself.  But we decided to stay authentic, leave off the salami and give it our own flair with Brownie's smoked, pulled pork.

In researching this sandwich, I found that Cubans are very adamant that you use Cuban Bread for this, so I did some reading on that as well. My adventure perfecting Cuban Hoagies finally came together in batch #3, they were delicious! You should definitely give them a try - not sure this would have turned out the same if we hadn't used them!

Now, pulled pork takes quite a few hours to do and you can't really time it. It's done when it's done. So we decided to make a Cuban Night of it and invited friends over for Mojitos and a Cuban-themed meal.  This also gave us a chance to get more opinions on our creation, which we love.

I'll shut up now, here's what we did:

Ingredients:

Pulled Pork (smoked on your own BBQ grill if possible)
Ham slices (we had the deli slice ours so the thickness was where we wanted it and uniform)
Brick of Swiss Cheese, thinly sliced
Sandwich Slicer Pickles (we even found organic ones with no artificial dye!)
Mustard - lots of mustard!
Cuban Hoagies (substitute any hoagies or bread - you know what you like)

Directions:

• Slice Hoagies sandwich-style
• Put mustard on both bread slices. A lot of mustard - and don't be shy - use that mustard!!!!!
• Lay top and bottom on broiler tray and liberally add a layer of sliced Swiss Cheese to each and put under the broiler on low until the cheese is melted
• Lay down your ham slices on the bottom slice of your sandwich (our bread used two slices)
• Lay down a layer of pickles - thick as you like (we used four to cover the bread)
• Top with pulled pork and put the top on your sandwich, pressing down so that cheese can do its job and hold everything together
• Slice sandwich at the diagonal

We served our Cubans with some traditional sides that I found recipes for here.  They turned out really well!  There were two of us in our dinner party who are not fans of sweet potatoes - and we loved the potatoes!  So even if it's not your thing, give it a try!  And the beans were so flavorful but a word to the wise, (learn from my Mojito-fueled mistake) measure your salt!  I always under-salt things and Brownie is always adding more salt to my recipes so ... in my mind I needed to add more than it called for.  Don't.  They tasted fabulous, but I used way too much salt.

These sandwiches were the talk of our Memorial Day weekend!  All of our guests loved them, but only one could finish the whole thing!  They're large.  We finished the night off with Mojitos, spiced rum and cigars by the fire .... all of us too full to eat anything else.

Try these out and let us know what variations you used and how they turned out!

¡Que aproveche amigos!

Smoked Kokanee Fillets with 'Dirty' Potato Salad

Tonight we were blessed with some Kokanee fillets from a friend who spent the weekend fishing in a tournament.  Lucky us!

It didn't take long for Brownie to fire up the charcoal!  Keep in mind, these are smoked on the BBQ, not grilled. The fish just wouldn't have paired with the 'dirty' potato salad if it hadn't been smoked.

So here it is for approximately 2 servings:

Ingredients:

• 4 cups chopped potatoes (as you wish)
• 2 Tablespoons olive oil
• 2 cloves minced garlic
• Salt
• Pepper
• 3 sprigs fresh Thyme
• 1 pad salted butter 
• 1 cup Tzatziki (our recipe here)
• Chopped green onion
• 4 - 6 Smoked Kokanee Fillets
• 3 tablespoons raw honey
• 2 Tablespoons whole grain mustard
• 1 Tablespoon horseradish mustard

Directions:

• Toss chopped potatoes with olive oil, garlic, thyme, salt and pepper to taste
• Place potatoes in tin foil - before sealing, put pad of butter on top of potatoes
• Place on the grill over medium/high heat or in the oven at 400 until fork tender
• Put honey in a microwave-safe bowl and microwave just enough to warm it
• Mix mustards with honey and whisk with a fork until a sauce forms
• Toss cooked potatoes with Tzatziki until coated
• Put 1/2 of potatoes on each plate
• Place fillets over potato salad
• Sprinkle with chopped green onion
• Drizzle desired amount of honey/mustard sauce over your creation

Enjoy!   The spice rub combines nicely with the honey/mustard mixture to give you that tangy Barbecue taste. A sophisticated spin on BBQ and potato salad!

Now go fishing so you can whip this up!

BBQ Plates

Brownie's first love is Barbeque.  He just couldn't help himself this weekend, he had to use that smoker!  I should have known when he came home with a grocery bag from Market of Choice that I was in for it.  Sending him to MOC is like sending me to a shoe store!  It's a playground and his imagination goes wild!

So yes, we had BBQ ribs, BBQ chicken sausages, BBQ shrimp, grilled veggies and a yummy salad from their deli.  We ate huge plates of food (I couldn't finish - too much meat!) and spoke in southern accents describing the food.  Hey, we said we were foodies, we didn't say we weren't odd! :-)

Vegan BBQ

I have a dear friend who is trying to get back to eating vegan and we were long overdue for a visit.  Since we asked him over, we made sure that all of our snacks and everything we grilled was vegan.

Brownie sure does some amazing things with herbs and spices and vegetables!  We were all so full and everything was delicious.  If you think you can't fill up on vegan food - think again!  Portabello mushrooms are an amazing grilling substitute for meat and they have such a rich, meaty flavor.

Vegan BBQ was a success!  What other challenges can we throw around here!?

BBQ Ribs

If there's anything Brownie loves, its smoking meat on his BBQ!  This process takes hours - it's a labor of love.  Sometimes he will stay up all night, setting alarms and checking charcoal and wood throughout the night just to get the meat perfect for the next day.  

Which means ... neither of us sleep.  But ribs don't take all night.  He started these today and by the time I got home from dance practice - they were nearly done and ready to rest.

When he cut into them ... oh my!  Juicy and tender and just right!  Now we're off to dig into these and get messy!  Goodnight all!

BBQ Brisket

Brownie's latest BBQ masterpiece.  This baby was on the grill all night, torturing our neighbors with meaty, smoky smells.  I'm surprised no one is knocking on our door today.

Brownie's favorite part of BBQing is slicing into his latest endeavor.  Today - he discovered perfection waiting inside!  This Brisket was juicy and just melts in your mouth.  He's super proud of this one!

We put our slices on a bun with some pickled carrots, cucumber and thinly sliced red onion.  They were absolutely incredible!  Leftovers are going to be amazing for the next few days!!

BBQ Success!!!!!