Jamaican Jerk Sandwiches with Caribbean Accoutrements

I have been wanting to make a Jamaican jerk-spiced tempeh sandwich ever since I had a transcendent one at Deschutes Brewery in Bend. Sadly, this exquisite menu item did not make the jump over the mountains to the brewery's Portland location, so I had to try to replicate it at home.

I started off by making a marinade at home. I marinaded some chicken and my tempeh in it for a good 24 hours, using these ingredients:

• Ground allspice
• Ground thyme
• Ground black pepper
• Ground sage
• Ground nutmeg
• Ground cinnamon
• Ginger
• Garlic
  
• Brown sugar
  
• Molasses
• Rum
  
• Vinegar
• Pineapple juice
• Juice of 1 lime
• Jalapenos (but they weren't hot enough)
  
• Green onions
  

To go along with the sandwiches, I got a little wild and tried to replicate Caribbean flavors. Or at least what a white girl from the Pacific Northwest thinks Caribbean flavors are. I bought a plantain and sliced it up, then sauteed til it was golden brown, like so:

I also made a mango-bean-avocado salad to go along with everything. It had kidney beans, chopped fresh mango, halved cherry tomatoes, cilantro, chopped avocado and a bit of pineapple juice to keep the avocado from going brown.

See the pretty colors?

To top the sandwiches, I quickly pan-grilled a few rings of pineapple. I also sauteed some red peppers and onion in this pan to top my sandwich.

I put the whole wheat bun with some cheddar cheese in the toaster for a few, then topped with a pineapple ring.

Here is Cookie Monster's sandwich, made with chicken tenders instead of the tempeh. After I had cooked my tempeh through, I added his chicken and dumped in the rest of the marinade, which reduced into a lovely jerk sauce to cover everything.

Here is my tempeh with the peppers peeking out from underneath.

And my whole plate. I doused the sandwich with a bit more of the reduced marinade/sauce before putting its top on.

All in all, this was a really good recipe, but I did not use enough spice. I actually went into the kitchen and got the jar of pickled jalapenos out, adding a few to my sandwich. The extra spice really added a lot, and I plopped a few more into the leftovers.

This was also a pretty good likeness of my beloved Deschutes sandwich. I did not use focaccia bread, obviously, because I try to make my food indulgences in restaurants and eat healthier at home. But the flavors were very similar, and this was a really good and different dinner.

Go me!

Zucchini & Potato Cakes (& a salad too)

I got a lovely zucchini from my garden! Finally! It was a pretty decent-sized zuke, too, because it was ready to pick, but we left it on the vine while we were gone for four days. So it was rarin' to go when we got back!

I was looking for a different way to prepare zucchini since it's so versatile, and found this recipe, courtesy of the Pioneer Woman.Thanks, Ree!

I started off by grating about half my zucchini (it was big, people) and three baby purple potatoes into a bowl. Then I made cookie monster squeeze out all the liquid so the cakes would not be watery. I know this looks like coleslaw, but trust me, it's not.

Meanwhile, I started one of my favoritist summer salads: warm tomato salad. I concocted this recipe last summer when my mom had enough cherry tomatoes to make tomato sauce that could satiate Italy. Seeing as how shipping costs for tomato sauce to the entire country of Italy were a tad astronomical, I opted instead to use the bounty of tomatoes in a new way. Thus, this salad was born. I always start off by sauteeing the vegetables we have on-hand at the time. This time, it was zucchini (surprise!) and some delicious sugar snap peas, also from our garden. Since I also had some tempeh that needed to be used up (really. Have you ever smelled rotten tempeh? Blech!) and to add some protein, I cut that into chunks and sauteed it up too. Then I added the tomatoes, halved if they were big, and let it cook away.

Meanwhile, back at Zucchini Potato Central, the lovely crimson Lady Purple Potato and Lord Zucchini were introduced to good ol' predictable Ms. Salt and Ms. Pepper, the sturdy and versatile Mr. Egg and his son, Mr. Egg II, Fru Danish hard yellow cheese and the unpredictable addition of Rabbi Matzo Meal, since I forgot Signore Breadcrumb Italiano's invitation in the mail. It was a quite the rockin' (and diverse!) party!

...And back to the salad! It's like a TV show focusing on two different plot lines. How will they intersect? [Cue suspenseful music]
After all the veggies were sufficiently cooked through, I added a clove of chopped garlic, wilted in some spinach and basil (guess from where?!) and added a handful of bleu cheese.

Here, our cast have joined into a flavorful ensemble and are cooking away a small amount of olive oil. Sorry, P-Dub, just can't use the amounts of butter you do in your kitchen. My thighs cling to it like they may never see butter again.

Everyone outta the pool!

Oh yeah! I made garlic toast too! I spread some sundried tomato and basil Alouette cheese onto some bread and topped with a little parmesan, then toasted 'til it looked like this.

Wow, my whole mouth just filled with saliva.

And here we have our dinner!

The zucchini cakes were frickin' awesome! They were starchy from the potato but still very light, with just the right amount of cheesiness (from the cheese I think was Danish fontina, but can't remember) and they had a very mild zucchini flavor. Cookie Monster even liked them, and he hates squash! Ding ding ding! We have a winner!