A Hearty Breakfast

So we received upwards of 16 inches of snow here yesterday. I've never seen anything quite like this. As you can see above, I had a great time yesterday. However,the fun was all over this morning. Below is what our cars looked like morning when I went out to begin clearing the snow off of and from around the cars so that we can actually get out sometime this week should we find the need. My car is on the right and was driven briefly on Saturday morning before most of the snow came. Julia's on the left has not been driven since Friday. The one nice part about working outside today is that we talked with almost all of our neighbors for the first time.


We recently received 5 lbs of DeRamus Family Hickory Smoked Country Cured Pork Sausage from Julia's uncle James. We've used it a couple of times so far, which I will try to blog about at some point, but not for breakfast yet. The preparation couldn't be easier. Simply poke some holes in the sausage with a fork and then cover it in a frying pan with an inch or so of water and let it cook on medium heat for a while. When it's done, slice it up as you wish and brown it a little bit. That's it.
I went with scrambled eggs and toast with mine while Julia enjoyed a poached egg, toast, and grapefruit.


I don't know how much I will be able to blog this week before Christmas so I may have to leave this up and taunt Justin for a little while longer with breakfast foods.

Seasons Greetings Loyal Reader

If you've held on long enough to actually see this, congratulations and thank you. Everywhere I've gone over the past few months, people keep asking, "When are you going to blog again?" Well, in reality it's just been my Mom and Julia's uncle James that have asked.

During the downtime, I've kept the chicken and rice counter accurate so you don't have to worry about that. I just really haven't been cooking much and not a whole lot that is interesting or new. I guess I sort of ran out of things in my repertoire and once I started keeping track of my chicken and rice intake, I wanted to prove that I do occasionally eat other things.

Anyway, be on the lookout for some new things here in the coming weeks. I can't promise it will be great but at least Justin will no longer be immediately taunted with the vision of ham, egg, and cheese toast.

Ham, Egg, & Cheese Toast

Since I only had a small amount of Smithfield ham remaining, I decided to eat it all for breakfast. I first started with the ham and then added the cheese. This went into the oven while I fried the egg, which topped off the sandwich and made for a super delicious breakfast. Thank you.

Smithfield Ham and Chicken Bake

Sometime during my teenage years, the male members of The Newtster's family decided we didn't really enjoy turkey at holiday meals. It was always too dry and not particularly enjoyable. This should not be construed as a criticism of my mother's culinary abilities, rather an expression of preferences.

In the absence of turkey, ham became our holiday meat of choice. As I've mentioned before, Smithfield ham is the best of all the hams out there. Virginia law used to state that "Genuine Smithfield hams [are those] cut from the carcasses of peanut-fed hogs, raised in the peanut-belt of the Commonwealth of Virginia or the State of North Carolina, and which are cured, treated, smoked, and processed in the town of Smithfield, in the Commonwealth of Virginia." Therefore, anything deviating from these specifications could best be described as 'Country Ham'. Apparently the statute was repealed sometime in 2008. Regardless, Smithfield ham and Country ham are essentially interchangeable terms for the same great treat.

The Smithfield Ham and Chicken Bake quickly became a family favorite and a fixture at most holiday meals. It is rather rich so it probably wouldn't work in heavy rotation for meals. The recipe is very simple once you have located the proper ham.
- 4-6 boneless chicken breasts
- 1 can of Cream of Mushroom Soup
- 8 oz. of light sour cream
- Thinly sliced Smithfield ham (approx. 1/3 lbs)

Preheat the oven to 275°. Line completely the bottom of a baking dish with the Smithfield ham. Place the chicken breasts on top of the ham. In a small bowl mix the soup and sour cream and spoon it generously on top of the chicken. Put this in the oven for two and a half to three hours.

When the chicken comes out, the ham has basically molded to the bottom of the chicken is super tasty. Mandy should like this one because of the super long baking time. Of course that says nothing of the other ingredients, which Mandy should not like.....

And since I am The Newtster, what better accompaniment could there be for this delicacy than rice? None is of course the correct answer. As you can see, The Newstress sauted some asparagus for herself, which she said was a nice addition.

With the chicken burrito from Qdoba I had for supper on Monday, that brings the Chicken and Rice counter to 22.

Cuban Sandwich

As anyone who knows me will tell you, I love pork. So it should surprise no one that I love Cuban sandwiches. It's hard for me to find foods that I like prepared exactly as they were intended, and the Cuban sandwich is no exception. However, the Cuban sandwich comes much closer than many in that the only change/omission I make is leaving off the pickles. In fact pickles make my top 5 most common ways to ruin a sandwich list. That list goes:
1. Mayonnaise
2. Pickles
3. Onion
4. Tomato
5. Any combination of 1-4 (Note: I completely avoided cole slaw and sauerkraut as those are too obvious)
Now, lettuce is also a good way to ruin a sandwich, but a sandwich with lettuce on it is usually not irreparable, though shredded lettuce does mean a bit more work in clearing the sandwich. When it is cleared though, there is usually not much hint that lettuce was ever on the sandwich, unlike onions. Everything else is on the list because it leaves behind some sort of liquid which ruins the sandwich. This list should not be construed as "complete". It only covers the most common mistakes I have encountered in sandwiches.

For a sandwich so nearly perfectly suited for The Newtster, it is sad that I can probably count the number of times I have had a Cuban sandwich on two hands. The Mid-Atlantic region, where I have spent nearly all of my life, just isn't the hotbed of Cuban sandwiches and I was too young to get into them when we lived in South Florida for a few years. The first time I can recall encountering this wonderful creation was at a Cuban restaurant in Virginia Beach. One of my good friends in high school was of Cuban descent, her parents having come to the United States like so many others to escape the Castro regime. I went to dinner with them one night to try a new place simply called 'Havana'. As luck would have it, before we even ordered, her parents discovered that they were from the same place in Cuba as the waiter and knew his parents back in Cuba. It made the evening much more special for them. What made the evening the most special for me though was the ridiculously delicious sandwich my friend suggested for me. That was probably 1997 or 1998.

Over the next decade, I haven't had much of a chance to have Cuban sandwiches. I have had a couple here and there, but those times are few and far between. Then, in the middle of 2008, my Mom told me about an article in Garden & Gun magazine called 'Death By Cuban Sandwich'. It's a great article from a great magazine and it created a strong desire for me to have a Cuban sandwich, a desire which has gone unfulfilled until now. After watching numerous CSI: Miami re-runs this past weekend and learning that the Wake Forest basketball team will be losing....errrr..... playing in Miami to start the NCAA tournament at the end of this week, I determined that the time was right to attempt to make this simple sandwich for myself.

The start to any good Cuban sandwich is Cuban bread. Perfect. I can't get any here in DC. Cuban bread is apparently similar in nature to French bread, except it is made with lard for added moisture. Knowing that I could not get any Cuban bread, I settled on two nice loaves of French bread from Harris Teeter.

The next ingredient is yellow mustard. That's easy. After the mustard comes ham. My choice of ham happened to be the variety of Virginia baked ham that was on sale in the grocery store. I probably should have gone with some sort of glazed ham for sweetness but the baked ham was just fine.
Next comes the roasted pork. Based upon some research, one way to prepare Cuban roasted pork is by marinating the meat in a mojo sauce. After seeking out some recipes, I discovered that Goya makes a Mojo Criollo sauce. I bought a small pork shoulder (just under 2.5 lbs), poked numerous holes in it with a fork, and marinated it for a few hours in the Goya mojo. Let me tell you, the sauce smells fantastic. If I had the foresight to marinate this thing overnight, it would have been better but it still gave the pork a nice flavor, at least on the outside. I roasted it in a 350° oven for 30 minutes per pound and it came out nice and tender. Unfortunately a lot of the meat was darker and fatty but it did yield a good amount of tender meat for the sandwiches.

After the roasted pork comes the Swiss cheese. Again, I went with what was on sale, which was Finlandia. Traditional Cuban sandwiches, as I mentioned earlier, are topped with pickles. I did actually buy some hamburger dill chips for Julia's sandwich since I knew she wouldn't mind them. After some more mustard on the top piece of bread, the sandwich was complete.

The last step in preparing a Cuban sandwich is toasting it in a sandwich press. While we don't own one of these, we do own a George Forman Lean Mean Fat Reducing Grilling Machine. Close enough. I brushed some butter on both the top and bottom pieces of bread and put it in the Forman, pressing down on the top to collapse the bread and toast it faster. After five minutes or so, the bread was toasted and the cheese was all melted.

The result came out pretty nicely. To accompany the sandwich, I finally bought a mandolin slicer and prepared some fresh baked potato chips in the oven. We were both pleased with the results.

I'm Still Eating

I have received some concerned messages from my loyal readers. Please rest assured that despite my lack of blogging thus far in 2009, I am in fact still eating. I will try to get some more stuff up here soon, but in the meantime I will try to bring you up to speed.

After spending the early part of January in Roanoke with my family, Julia and I went to Winston for the UNC game, which was a great time. While in Roanoke, I cooked a few times but nothing special, just spaghetti once or twice and some jambalaya. Since the jambalaya had both chicken and rice, that was another one for the counter. And since Mandy inquired, the counter has also gone up as the direct result of eating Mexican (chicken quesadillas with rice and chicken tacos with rice) and Chinese food once. I also cooked some jambalaya back here at home for yet another notch on the counter, bringing the total to 12.

We hunkered down at home during the inauguration so I did cook during that time, but again nothing special and nothing that you haven't seen on this blog before. We have also seen 4 movies at 4 different theaters over the last week or so. We saw Gran Torino, Doubt, The Wrestler, and Slumdog Millionaire. I thought they were all good and am disappointed that Gran Torino was shut out from the Oscars. Oh well. Julia and I also quietly celebrated our 10 year dating anniversary last week, which is pretty crazy to think about.

In just over a month from today, 4 blogs will collide in New York City. Stayed tuned as it should be fun.....

A Look Back At 2008

This picture was taken somewhere in Louisiana in April and I think it provides a good backdrop for what this post is all about, namely a look back at some of The Newtster's favorites from 2008. These generally fall into two categories: sights and foods. I am undertaking some effort to remain somewhat anonymous here so I had to make sure that my pictures do not blow my cover. Please also keep in mind that these were taken with a point and shoot camera so while the photo quality may not be spectacular, these captured the moment pretty well.Let's first start with all the places I have been this year, in chronological order by date of first visit. While I did not physically see each of these signs, you can tell below which ones I did personally visit.


In keeping with the chronology, I will attempt to keep my favorites in order by the date they were taken.

02/08/08 - Lincoln Memorial - Washington, D.C
Taken at dusk before catching a flight to Boston to celebrate the end of a friend's chemotherapy treatments. There was a great sliver of moon just above the building that I tried to capture.











03/30/08 - Sunset Over The Gulf of Mexico - Marco Island, FL
There were quite a few pictures from this trip that I had to choose from, but this was the most unique. The beach if huge and there is a little marshy area which you see in the foreground.









04/18/08 - Ray's Drive In - Lufkin, TX
Since this is ostensibly a food blog, here is the best burger of the year. This was taken during the road trip with Joe to Texas and Louisiana. The burger was spectacular, as was my vanilla milkshake, which unfortunately is not pictured here except for the top of the straw at the very bottom of the picture.







04/19/08 - New Zion Missionary Baptist Church Barbeque - Huntsville, TX
This fantastic plate of food included 3 different meats. The brisket was the best, followed by the sausage and then the ribs. They didn't have any chicken on the day we were there. All in all, a great stop.








04/20/08 - Oil Derrick - Outskirts of College Station, TX
After hoping to see one since entering Texas two days before, we finally saw one. Great photo-op.










04/21/08 - Bourbon Street - New Orleans, LA
This was the first trip to New Orleans for both Julia and Joe. A great time was had by all. Joe and I volunteered with Habitat For Humanity for two days and we managed to get in a Mavs vs. Hornets playoff game for good measure.









04/25/08 - Bristol Motor Speedway - Bristol, TN
It took a few steps for me to actually get up on the window because I'm not so limber. This was also taken from some sort of construction site.










05/14/08 - Sunrise at Pine Tree Overlook - Milepost 95 on the Blue Ridge Parkway
After road closures thwarted an attempt to get to this overlook in March, I managed to make it for a sunrise in May. You can just barely see the sun peeking over the mountain. The tree to the right was crazy looking. I only saw one other car while here. It was super serene.







05/25/08 - Pierce's Pitt Bar-B-Que - Williamsburg, VA
The world's greatest barbeque and barbeque sauce.











06/23/08 - Rainbow as seen from the window of our condo - Alexandria, VA
This followed a severe storm. There was actually a double rainbow but it did not show very well in the picture.














09/05/08 - Blockbuster Video - Alexandria, VA
Discovery that Planter's Cheez Balls are finally back, but only at Blockbuster.












11/02/08 - Sarah and Jonathan's House - Richmond, VA
Baxter, Sarah and Jonathan's miniature dachshund, demonstrates his unique ability to sit like a "tall boy". He will reportedly sit like this for very long periods of time. He is also showing off his new Wake football jersey in this picture, which clearly needed to be altered in order to fit his T-Rex legs.












11/20/08 - Tinker Mountain - Roanoke, VA
This is a view of Tinker Mountain, which if you have been by Roanoke on I-81 before you have no doubt noticed. When I was young and went to visit my grandparents in Roanoke, my Granddad always took me to the Roanoke Regional Airport to watch planes land. I loved it. If the planes were landing on one of the runways, they flew right over the upper right corner of the mountain. I spent countless hours watching this mountain and think about it every time I see it.

That's it for this year. Thanks for stopping by and making it a hugely successful debut this year. See you in 2009.