Beans'n'Rice and Corn Maque Choux

We figured it was time to try another recipe from our latest Jay Solomon book - fast becoming one of my favorite cookbooks now. This is the same book that I made the gratin from a while ago. He uses a West Indian recipe and recommends replacing some of the water for the rice with 1/2 cup of coconut milk to enhance flavors. Both the beans and rice were heavy on thyme (I like it way more than I realized!) and cumin (yum! nothing like fresh-ground cumin to enhance the aroma!). We threw in 1/2 cup of wine from one of the many bottles we brought back from BSM into the beans - good idea! I'm now curious about what kind of flavors wine adds to the food. Using a wine vinegar often imparts tartness accompanied by this aftersweet, but wine seems more complex.

Once the rice was cooked (the coconut milk was a killer idea), we mixed the beans and rice and let them simmer for ~ 10 minutes for the flavors to blend - and they did, quite happily!

Corn Maque Choux - Ok, I'm still trying to figure out how to pronounce this, but I'll eat it any day:
1 can corn (couldn't find fresh corn at MM that day)
1/2 bell pepper - chopped
1/2 sweet vidalia onion - chopped
1 tomato - chopped
1 tsp butter
4-5 garlic cloves - minced

Saute onions and garlic in butter till brown
Drain the water from the corn and keep aside
Throw in bell pepper, corn and tomatoes - let this cook for ~ 15 minutes
Add some of the drained water and let it simmer for 5 minutes
Add salt, pepper and a (big) dash of hot sauce
(I might try this with minced jalapenos next time around)

Eat Gratin, be happy!

So behind on my postings. *sigh*

So, I finally got to try out a recipe from the latest Jay Solomon book that I bought a couple of weeks ago (Taste of the Tropics) - I love, absolutely love this book! I started off wanting to make this squash and scallions gratin, but I had no squash! Or scallions! But I did have a ton of fresh asparagus :) And shallots :)

Asparagus and Shallots Gratin
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1 bundle asparagus - chopped into 1' pieces
1 T olive oil
5 cloves garlic, minced (yes, I went overboard, like always!)
4-6 shallots - chopped fine
1 cup coconut milk
1/2 cup milk
1/2 t dried thyme
1 t ground black pepper
1/4 t allspice
1/2 t sea salt

Heat oven to 350F.

Lightly saute the asparagus and shallots in olive oil, add spices and coconut milk and let it simmer for 5-7 minutes. Add the milk and simmer for another 3-4 minutes.
Oooppppsss! Apparently, I needed breadcrumbs to get the crunchy consistency for the gratin. Hmm, let's use tortilla chips instead. So, I broke up a bunch of chips, tossed them into the veggie mixture, and poured it all into a casserole and let bake for 10-12 minutes.

Add a dash of hot sauce and some flatbread = *happy*

Origin (of original recipe :) ) : West Indies