Portugal

Roasted Chicken Thighs with Orange Slices

This is a dish we love to make for its gorgeous look and amazing flavors.  We use olive oil, Porcini mushrooms or cremini mushrooms, Giant Beans from Greece for their incredibly dense creamy flavors, red, yellow and orange bell peppers, Cara Cara oranges for their unique flavor, Spanish chorizo with its smoky paprika flavor, and we sometimes use Cajun Andouille sausage for it’s immense smokiness and depth of Cajun flavors.   

Clay Baked Chicken or Duck

For years we have returned again and again to this simple savory feast… it’s like an old trusted friend.  We just tossed this chubby duck inside the clay pot along with tons of veggies, stuck it a cold oven, set it to 475 degrees and got back to the family fun.  An hour later, time to feast.  It’s that simple.  

Clams and Monkfish with Spanish Chorizo and Saffron Fennel Broth

I grew up in a time and a place where the possibility of experiencing exotic or umami infused cuisine was just about zero.  The little town in Illinois I come from had 500 residents, a couple of coffee shops, one family restaurant specializing in deep fried food, and was more than an hour from the closest big city.   But when I still a little kid, I began to realize with a kind of bewilderment, that other people didn’t seem to be amazed by food quite the way that I was.