A Summer BBQ: Grilled Chicken with Mango Salsa

Summertime means BBQs and this tasty chicken, soon to be topped with Mango Salsa

I remember a time when summer vacation for me meant (in a good year) a trip to Italy. Now, living most of the year in Italy, summer is the time when I head back to the US to escape the heat, humidity, and crowds of tourists that summer brings to Italy. It’s also the time when I get to visit my family, including my 4 grandchildren, in New Mexico.

Summertime fun in New Mexico means catching up with friends, backyard brunches, cocktails on the patio, family BBQs, and pool parties. And when my granddaughter Isabelle makes a special request for “that chicken with the mango on top”, well, it’s my grandmotherly duty to get busy in the kitchen.

I found a version of this chicken dish many years ago in, of all places, a Weight Watchers magazine. I’ve tinkered quite a bit with it since then and it has become one of my family’s favorites. The original recipe was called Cuban Chicken with Black Bean Mango Salsa, we just call it Grilled Mango Chicken. And my version has no beans or cilantro (mostly because some in my family don’t like them - crazy, no?),

Marinade ingredients, simple but flavorful

I’ve adjusted the marinade proportions a bit. I also use skinless, boneless chicken thighs instead of the breasts that the original recipe called for. Thighs are much easier to grill, faster, and remain so moist. The star of the dish is the salsa. Sweet, ripe mango and avocado with red onion and spices. My changes means that it no longer qualifies as a diet recipe!

Here is the recipe I use to make a family sized batch (feeds 10-12 people):

Marinate 15 skinless, boneless chicken thighs (about 4 - 4.5 pounds) for 6-8 hours in: 1 cup orange juice, 1/3 cup fresh squeezed lime juice, 1 and 1/2 tablespoons olive oil, 1 tablespoon finely minced garlic, 2 teaspoons cumin powder, 1 and 1/2 teaspoons salt, and 1 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper. Be sure to open up the chicken thighs so more surface area is exposed to the marinade. Laying them flat in a couple of gallon size zip-lock baggies works great. Refrigerate until ready to grill. Grill for 15-20 minutes (I use a gas grill, but a stovetop grill pan works too).

Prepare the mango avocado salsa an hour or two before serving. Cube 2 large mangoes and 1 large avocado. Add 1/2 cup orange juice, 3 tablespoons fresh lime juice, 2 tablespoons finely diced red onion, 1 teaspoon olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon cumin, 1/4 teaspoon salt. Refrigerate until ready to serve. Serve in a big bowl and let everyone scoop some onto their grilled chicken.

Corn salad Ina Garten style

The grilled chicken pairs well with a green salad or, even better, a fresh corn salad.

I like Ina Garten’s corn salad recipe which simply dresses fresh corn, cooked until just tender, with some chopped red onion, olive oil, cider vinegar, salt, pepper, and a bit of fresh basil.

A bowl of juicy watermelon makes a perfect dessert. Tastes like summer !

A Summer Luncheon: Poached Salmon with Wasabi Sauce

June is a fickle month - sometimes barely reaching spring time temperatures and other times bringing hot summer weather a bit too early. But when the calendar flips to July, then summer begins in earnest. In Italy, that means hot and humid weather. In New Mexico, where I am spending the summer visiting family, the weather is hot but dry with occasional stormy, cloudy days. No matter where I find myself in summer, the hot weather means I do my bread baking early in the morning and look for cool, refreshing things to cook for meals. It also means the herbs in my “garden” (really just a collection of pots on my patio) are ready to incorporate into many dishes. It’s always more fun if the meal is shared with friends, so summer time entertaining is always on my July calendar.

One dish I often cook when in the US, but rarely make when I’m in Italy, is salmon. I’ve grilled it, baked it, pan fried it, breaded and deep fried it. Once I baked 5 whole, fresh caught Alaskan salmon to feed 50 people at a co-workers wedding (the salmon were caught in Alaska by her brother and shipped on ice to New Mexico). That was fun! But rarely is a whole salmon on the menu - usually I’m cooking individual salmon pieces, medium thickness and about 6 ounces each. In the US that often means a bag of frozen salmon from Costco is in my freezer.

One thing I had never tried (before this week) was poaching salmon. Poached salmon - it just sounds elegant, doesn’t it? Best of all, it can be poached early in the day, chilled, and served cold. That makes it perfect for a summer-time luncheon. Cold salmon calls for a brightly flavored sauce, so to go with my poached salmon experiment I made a wasabi mayonnaise. For my luncheon I added a salad (brought by my guest) and some sourdough bread. To finish the lunch, some sweets from a local bakery added a perfect finish. What a nice way to welcome summer! My adventure in poaching salmon turned out nicely and I think it is destined to become one of my favorite summer time meals.

The poached salmon makes a beautiful presentation when garnished with lemon slices and fresh chives.

Recipes

Poached Salmon

Salmon pieces are cooked in a flavorful poaching liquid of wine, lemon juice, chives

Poaching liquid: Combine 1/2 cup white wine (I used some leftover Prosecco that was almost flat), 1 cup water, 2 lemon slices, a small bunch of chives (rough chopped), 1/4 teaspoon salt, and a pinch of black pepper in a deep pan. Bring to a slow boil.

Slip salmon pieces (thicker pieces, not very thin filets, about 6 oz each) into the poaching liquid, reduce heat, simmer about 10 minutes or until just cooked through. If the poaching liquid is not quite deep enough to completely cover the salmon, then turn them over mid-way through cooking, gently so as not to break them). Remove salmon from liquid, peel off the skin, and chill.

Ingredients for the wasabi mayonnaise. I used bunching onions fresh from the garden, but scallions will work nicely too.

Wasabi Mayonnaise

1/2 cup Best Foods mayonnaise

2 1/2 Tablespoons wasabi paste (this amount gives mild heat, use more or less to taste)

1 Tablespoon finely chopped bunching onions or scallions

1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Combine all ingredients and refrigerate for at least 3 hours before serving to allow the flavor to develop.

To serve : plate the chilled salmon on top of lettuce leaves, garnish with lemon slices and whole chives, and serve with wasabi mayonnaise on the side.

A Farewell Luncheon (and a Recipe for Farro Salad)

Moving to Italy is something that I daydream about all the time. I haven’t yet managed it, but that is not the case for my friends Jim and Rod. After many trips to Italy, and two recent trips to Lucca, they have decided to make the big move. On their latest trip, they rented an apartment just steps outside of Lucca’s walls in a quiet neighborhood (giving me a bad case of apartment envy, not to mention envy of their two gorgeous balconies). Then they came home to New Mexico, sold their house, gave up years of collected belongings, and packed their essentials. How exciting is that?

Recently, I had Rod and Jim over for a going-away lunch. It is quite hot in New Mexico at this time of year, so I fixed an Italian-inspired lunch that involved little actual cooking. On the menu was a cold farro salad with shrimp (more about farro in a minute), sliced tomatoes with burrata (topped with basil, salt, and olive oil), and a simple bruschetta of bread topped with olive oil and salt. The wine was a Gavi, my favorite light Italian white, perfect for a hot summer day. Dessert came from Whole Foods and wasn’t the least bit Italian – Key lime tartlets.

Whole grain farro

Are you familiar with farro? It’s an ancient form of wheat; some say it is the grain from which all modern wheats are descended.  Farro is an important part of the Lucchese culinary tradition, found mostly in soups that also feature beans or vegetables. 

Farro is high in fiber, has good protein and vitamin content, and is lower in gluten than modern wheat. Farro can be found in three forms: whole grain, semi-pearled (polished to remove some of the tougher outer husk) and pearled (all the husk polished away). The form influences both nutritional value (highest in the whole grain) and cooking time (quicker with pearled forms). I tend to use the semi-pearled variety when I can find it, but also like the whole grain, which maintains a chewier texture even after the longer cooking time.

The farro salad that I make uses a base of 1 ½ cups uncooked farro, covered in water (about 3 ½ cups but the exact amount isn’t critical – just cover the farro at least 1 inch deep and drain off any extra water at the end of cooking), and ½ tsp salt. Bring to a boil, turn heat down to simmer, and cook until tender.  Cooking time varies depending on type of farro used and altitude. I live at about 5,000 feet; my whole grain farro took about an hour. Pearled farro can cook in as little as 20 to 30 minutes. If using whole grain, the cooking time is shorter if it is soaked overnight before cooking. When done, drain off any extra water and cool the farro before preparing the salad.

To make the salad, add the following to the cooked and cooled farro and toss:

½ of an English cucumber, seeded and cut into small cubes

1/3 c. finely diced red onion

4-5 oz. of crumbled feta cheese

¾ tsp coarsely ground black pepper

½ - 1 tsp sea salt (I use Penzey’s French Gray Sea Salt)

5 tbl. fresh lemon juice

5 tbl. good olive oil

Mix together and chill for an hour or two before serving.

The farro salad goes well with steamed shrimp, 1 to 1.5 pounds marinated several hours in 4 tbl olive oil, 4 tbl fresh lemon juice, 1 tbl chopped fresh mint leaves, and ½ tsp coarsely ground pepper. Sprinkle with sea salt before serving.

After a wonderful lunch, I'm sending Jim and Rod off on their Italian adventure with big hugs and a “Ci vediamo a Lucca in Settembre” (see you in Lucca in September).  

They've even promised to cook for me in their new kitchen.

-post by JMB

A Late Summer Grower's Market

The Sunday grower's market in Corrales, NM

Is there a better place to be on an August morning than outdoors at a grower’s market? This is especially true when the sky is blue, the temperature mild, and you are itching to fire up the grill and roast some veggies.

Whether I am at home in New Mexico or somewhere in Europe, I know that the August market will be bursting with the colors, flavors, and scents of the late summer harvest. This is the peak time for melons, peaches, tomatoes, corn, peppers, squash – all of which provide great inspiration for adventures in the kitchen.

Green chile roasting - the scent of late summer in New Mexico

In New Mexico, August is also the time of the chile harvest  – and if you’ve never smelled roasting green chile, tumbling in a basket over an open flame, then you have really missed out! For me, that pungent scent signals two things – that I am definitely home in New Mexico and that fall is just around the corner.

I’m enjoying my last two weeks of summer at home before I head back to Italy for most of September and October. So, for the next two weeks, I’m all about the local markets in New Mexico, including the one I visited last Sunday in the small village of Corrales, not far from my home in Albuquerque.

I did my market shopping to the delightful  sound of live music, in this case a marimba and a steel drum. The chile was roasting, the vendors were cutting slices of peaches and melon for tasting (yum!), and the growers were exclaiming about crops just picked that morning (including some fresh-as-could be purple okra, which I couldn't resist), as well as what the harvest would bring in the upcoming weeks. Shoppers wandered around with colorful market baskets, filling them with even more colorful produce. The atmosphere was festive as the locals enjoyed a mild morning with just the first hint of fall in the air.

variegated purple beans

tiny carrots are so flavorful

multicolored peppers

It’s hard to believe that in a couple of weeks I’ll be wandering the market in Lucca, filling my basket with the fabulous fruits and vegetables of the end-of summer harvest in Italy. Stay tuned – I’ll be posting in real time from Italy in a few weeks and I bet there will be some markets, some festivals, and some adventures in the coming posts.                                                   -post by JB