Spicy Kitchen

What a day! I started checking email at 5 am, went back to bed for a bit, officially started working at 7:15 and finally stopped at 6:30. I am likely going to miss a big deadline for tomorrow due to a few different factors, which means another weekend of working. I am SO grateful at this point that I decided to not run the Newport Half. Despite my tiring day, all I wanted to do was to come home, put on some old Damien Rice on iTunes, and get cooking. The cold weather outside got me craving hot and spicy, so I concocted a sweet potato and shrimp stew. Trying to use up some of the food we have in the house I made the stew with the following ingredients:

A good glug of olive oil to coat the bottom of a heavy pan

4 medium sweet potatoes cut into thin discs

can Goya coconut milk

remnants of various bags of frozen veggies – peppers, broccoli, green beans, onions, and water chestnuts

Trader Joe’s broccoli slaw

chopped jalapenos

a few dashes Goya habanero sauce

heaping TBS of Thai Kitchen red curry paste

sprinkle of cayenne pepper

scoop of peanut butter

a few crushed coriander seeds

a few spoonfuls of ground flaxseed

20 medium sized shrimp, peeled and deveined

Sautee sweet potatoes in olive oil until soft. Toss in the frozen veggies and lower the heat  to allow everything to get warm. Pour in can of coconut milk, and add in all of the spices, hot sauce, jalapenos, curry paste and ground flaxseed. Simmer for 15-20 to let the flavors mingle. In the last 3 minutes, add the shrimp to the mix and cook until light pink.

Serve with amaranth!

The smell in our kitchen right now is amazing. It is full of all sorts of spices and coconut. Who needs scented candles when you have great food? 🙂

I know this is just a variation on the shrimp curry that I did awhile back, but this one was a bit more soupy/stew-like and included some new spices and sweet potatoes to mix it up. It was the perfect meal to serve on a very dark October evening.

Any fun plans for the weekend? The weather is not looking good for much here, but I am really looking forward to walking dogs, getting this work project done, and getting some rest!

Random question – what are the most common search engine terms that bring people to your site? Mine have been “love of food” and “wine blog” lately. And I love it!Another was “Irish bread horse”. . . a horse made of bread? 😉 I love reading through the search terms; I really get a kick out of it! I also obsessively check my stats. Please tell me I’m not the only one! They are really starting to climb, yay! I don’t think I have mentioned it, but I FINALLY started telling friends and family about the blog after over 4 months, and the response has been good so far. Now I can’t wait to tell more people. I think the only people I am not going to tell are my co-workers.

Don’t forget that I am collecting guest posts for while I am traveling in November. I just booked another trip for work today, this one to Scottsdale, AZ in January. Its going to be a busy fall/winter!

Have a great night! I am off to make some dessert, something that involves shortbread and dark chocolate. And that will likely be featured on the blog sometime this weekend.

G’nite!