We All Make Mistakes - Alamo Soup

Today the Conquistadors learned a vital lesson - we are absolutely not invincible. We knew that from the start, but this was our first massive failure. For the record, it was Luke who was saying that we shouldn't follow the directions on the package of Udon Noodles, and just wing it. There will be no recipe given here, as we do not want anyone ever to repeat our mistake. I will tell you this of the forbidden food: we were attempting to make Udon noodle soup. That is all the information I can disclose in good conscience.

In lieu of a recipe, please accept this sage advice: do not burn chicken, do not overdo noodles to the point of sogginess, take it easy when it comes to soy sauce, and don't add onions where they are not welcome.

We decided to call our Conquista-flop the "Alamo Soup," as it should always be remembered whenever we are planning on doing something without any directions. The dog wouldn't touch it, the garbage disposal complained when we tried to pour it down, and when we threw it outside, everything within its splash radius withered and died. This stuff was toxic. I will have to end this short, as I feel the need to go and hug some trees to get back on Mother Nature's good side.

Always remember...

The Spicy Bacon Buffalo Ranch Chicken Super Sandwich Extravaganza

The ground shakes...
Children scream...
Buildings tremble...
And in a brilliant and dazzling display of light, Matty descends from the heavens, with a frying pan in one hand and a spatula in the other. Oh, joyous day!

Yes, I am indeed back, and actually have been for a while... but now that Lukas, Karsten and I have the house to ourselves (as the others are on a road trip down to Davidson college), we were actually forced to make something delicious. Well, by golly, we succeeded!

What we're looking at is a sandwich, of the chicken variety. We put on chicken, cheese, bacon, and some delightful sauces, and it turned out just heavenly. The whole thing is pretty basic and we were able to make it all from scratch, but the actual frying of the chicken did prove to be a bit of a challenge. We went in with low expectations since we were working with Karsten, the non-Conquistador brother. He was eager to help, and he actually did most of the brainstorming required to get the vision for our bodacious burger.


What you need:
- chicken (amount depends on how many burgers you're making)
- egg (enough to coat however much chicken you are using)
- flour: we actually used potato flour, as we didn't seem to have any regular flour. You might want to plan better than we did.
- breadcrumbs: ours were Italian.
- oil (enough to fry that chicken)
- cheese: we used provolone, and it was good.
- ranch dressing / tiger sauce
- Kaiser rolls: you could use a different kind of sandwich bun, but you'd only be cheating yourself.
- a dash of irony (see below)

You're going to start by cracking open your egg(s) in a bowlish-type thing, and then - this is where the dash of irony comes in - flopping the chicken around in the egg. Once your chicken is all eggy, roll it around in the flour and then the bread crumbs. Next, it's time to fry your chicken in a large skillet with oil. Move it around and flip it periodically, and if you are going to add salt and pepper or other ssssssspices (which we recommend you do,) now is the time to do it. Put some paper towels down somewhere to place the chicken on when it is done frying; you will want to absorb some of that grease. Cook your bacon in another skillet - we had Karsten on bacon duty and myself on frying duty. Again, you'll probably want to grind on some pepper while it's sizzling. You can microwave your bacon... if you have a weak soul.

Then we come to the actual construction of the sandwich. First (and optionally) put any spices you want on the chicken - cajun, chili powder, tiger sauce, pepper blend, whatever. Put enough chicken on the bottom bun to cover it, then put your cheese on top of that. On top of the cheese goes the bacon, and on top of that goes your sauces; ranch is a must, and tiger sauce goes quite well with it too.


Once it's all made, you may want to put it in the toaster oven to melt the cheese and give it a little crispification. Eat.


The general consensus was that this was a triumph; a huge success. It is hard to overstate our satisfaction; this was some quality food. Yes, it did take some time and effort to prepare, and it's not very exotic, but everyone present said they would definitely eat it again. (In fact, we had made a lot of chicken, and at least Karsten and I made second burgers.) We apologize for the long wait between entries, but this one was a definite keeper. And thus, I have made my triumphant return! Look forward to more strange and mysterious adventures in the world of delicious from the Culinary Conquistadors!

This Salad Don't Run.

America.

A lush utopia where freedom is freer*, bison roam the plains**, and a global melting pot exists to better the lives of immigrants from around the entire world***. American is SO awesome that it takes the name of two whole continents to represent one country! The other countries to the north and south seem to understand.
*Yes it is possible. **In significantly diminished numbers. *** This probably isn't true

It is only in the U.S. of A. that a salad like the one you are about to be introduced to could truly be realized. Is it because of the abounding ingenuity in this country? Is it because the Culinary Conquistadors (also borrowing* a name from South America) have unparalleled experience in the world of food preparation? No, believe it or not, neither is the case... it is because America has one more thing that other countries yearn for.
*No we won't pay you for it

Hot dogs.
Yes!! Believe it! We have created the Spicy Hotdog Salad!
How marvelous! Stupendous! What glory could a hotdog salad possibly contain??

Well, I'll tell you.

The story starts, of course, with my discovery of the Angus Beef Hotdog.

Yes, it's capitalized. The most fascinating of the hotdog species, the angus beef dog is the king of weiners. You may think that all hot dogs are the same. If this is the case, please eat a Bar S hot dog and then an angus beef Ballpark frank and come back with a written apology. There are some foods in this world that truly are indistinguishable when it comes to quality. An organic onion and a regular onion, for example, may taste quite similar. Hot dogs, given their somewhat... unsavory nature, tend to vary quite significantly in this respect. We decided to use the best for our creation, and we suggest you do the same.

Torry, the 18 year old of the Treu sons, stood in for Matty in his continued absence and was the champion griller of these beauties; I handled the salad-portion. If you wish to create this healthy* dish yourself, you need only compile the following ingredients**.
*It does not actually follow that simply because something is a salad, it will make you healthy. ** This should make a meal for ~3 people.

- 1 pack of angus beef hotdogs (we used Ballpark)
- pine nuts (optional)
- shredded cheddar cheese
- shredded pepper jack cheese
- genoa salami (you knew it had to make an appearance)
- diced red onion
- American Mix salad (or could compile your own greens)
- 5 Lettuce Mix (see above comment)
- Yellow heirloom (?) tomato
- Tobasco green pepper sauce (can substitute vinaigrette if you dislike mildly spicy dishes)

The first step is to shred your cheese / dice some red onion and tomato if it hasn't been done previously. Also take some salami slices and cut them into 1" x 1/2" strips. The amount you add is up to you - we used 4 slices of salami and maybe 1/4 of the tomato and onion. Take your lettuce / salad mixes, place them in a large salad bowl. The American Mix consists of iceberg lettuce, shredded carrots, and slices of radish, the 5 Lettuce Mix is fairly self-explanatory. The order of adding ingredients from this point on is mostly arbitrary: add your tomato, onion, both cheeses, salami, and pine nuts. At this point you may want to give your salad a preliminary tossing to mix it up.

Take your hot dogs, we used 6 for the salad (and may have eaten the others) and grill them. Once they are finished, slice them into 1/2" or so segments and toss them in the salad. Finally, take a bottle of green pepper sauce (you may know this at the green sauce from Chipotle) and splash it alllllll over your salad. seriously we used like 1/4 of a bottle. It is a mild sauce so it never gets overwhelmingly spicy regardless of volume. Finally, do another thorough salad tossing, now with all ingredients.

Eat.

The wonderful think about America is it is full of lazy people! Or is that the not-so wonderful thing? I forget. Either way, this salad requires minimal cooking and skill to create, so really anyone can make it. We hope you do. It was unanimously agreed that it was delicious, and was definitely something new. So next time you are out of hot dog buns, consider a salad version. You'll likely trick yourself into believing that you are eating healthily and will surely enjoy it.

My Hands Were Thai-d.

"So you've made this before?"

"Kinda, Whitney and I made something like this."

"But you have a recipe."

"Well yeah, but mostly I used it for rough list of what to buy. I'm making a lot of it up..."

"Oh... well you know I want to put this on the blog, I mean it's pretty exotic. I've never even had Thai food. How much of that sauce did you put in?"

"Um... whatever is gone from the bottle?"

"O..k... and the soy sauce?"

"I'd say like, 8 long drips?"

"I don't think a 'drip' is a standard measurement."

"Probably not..."

"Err... Erin, look, the point of this blog is somewhat just to log our escapades, but also the idea is that a person would be able to remake a recipe themselves based on what we write... Have you measured anything?"

"No. I put about a fifth of the bottle of cayenne pepper sauce in though. That is sorta a measurement?"

"I can't cook with you anymore."

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Matty, we miss you.

The Conquistadors, or Conquistador + guests, have been at it again folks! This time the undertaking was something truly exotic - Thai food.

Now I, dear readers, have never experienced Thai food. I realized how astoundingly hard to believe this must be given the culinary expertise exhibited on this blog regularly, but alas, Thai has not previously been part of my repertoire. All I know about Thai food is that it is supposedly peanut-y and spicy.

If that is truly all it takes for a Thai dish to be wildly successful, then hold your hats and try not to fall out of your seats - this one's an award winner.

That is, if you can actually make it.

As you may have effectively gleaned from the introduction to this wonderful post, we had some... issues with the bookkeeping. My lovely guest Erin was the chef de cuisine for this meal and apparently they teach cooking a little bit different in the far-off, secluded land of Indiana.

It was her opinion that food is to be made in the moment - a rough idea of ingredients and process and an adventurous spirit is all that it takes to make a memorable dish. This is a commendable idea to be certain; the Culinary Conquistadors exist not because of our years of training in the crafting of food, but because of our desire to submit to good old-fashioned trial and error. This approach to cooking, unfortunately, has two side effects. The first is that you, the reader of this laudable blog, have very little information to go off should you wish to re-create this dish, and secondly it seems that the less you follow directions, the spicier food becomes.

This second point may merit further research.

Anyhow, as things stand I will do my best to relay to you at least what ingredients were used and will post a link to the recipe on which this creation was roughly based... I wish you the best of luck should you attempt to follow our path.

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Our Ingredients
- Creamy Peanut Butter
- Red Bell Pepper
- Green Bell Pepper
- Soy Sauce
- Spicy Thai Chili Sauce
- Garlic (cloves)
- Paprika
- Chili Powder
- "China Bowl Five Spice Powder"
- Classic Olive Oil
- Sweet & Hot Mustard
- Large can of Tyson chicken
- Small can of Tyson chicken
- Brown Sugar
- Spring Roll Skins
- Red Onion
- Cayenne Pepper Sauce
- Lots o' TLC

I won't attempt to place any measurements on any of these ingredients as, to be honest, they'd be wrong. The assembly itself wasn't too difficult. Before starting, pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Next, mix everything (that isn't the spring roll skins) in a medium mixing bowl. Start with the peanut butter, add peppers, garlic (pressed), sauces, and spices, then chicken last. Be tasting the mixture as you progress, deciding on level of spiciness. Be aware, my fingers (24 hours and at least two-showers of scrubbing later) still smell like garlic.

Peanut butter seems to absorb spiciness from things such as chili powder, pepper sauce, or thai chili sauce, but baking seems to lessen the mitigating effect of the peanut butter. For this reason you may want to continually augment the mixture with more spicy additions, but be aware that the final product will probably end up slightly spicier than the pre-cooked mixture. I don't claim to understand the physics. I blame oils.

Once your mixture is "up to snuff", lay out your spring roll skins (or any sort of asian wraps ought to work). The Vietnamese wraps we used were made of rice starch primarily, and were extremely brittle... You honestly couldn't tell they weren't ultra-thin plastic circles. For this reason they will break when you try to bend them. The solution, we found, is to take the wraps and wet them beforehand... we rotated the wraps in a large salad bowl of water to give them pliability.

Take a wet wrap, place it on a plate. Take some of the filling-mixture you just created and place a line of it off-center atop the flat wrap: maybe an inch-wide line of mixture, about three inches long would be good. Take the edges of the wrap and fold it burrito-style. Here is an explanation I found on how to do this. Lay the filled rolls on a butter-coated baking sheet (will help prevent sticking). We made enough to comfortably fill one sheet with some space between the rolls (as a point of reference). Place the sheet in the oven, and begin cooking. I am unsure exactly how long we left ours in for, but check them periodically every 5 minutes or so after the first 10 minutes to check temperature and whether they seem to be baked.

Once you remove them from the oven the rolls should be ready for consumption - don't worry if they aren't pretty... they aren't really supposed to be. We chose to pour some of the extra Spicy Thai Chili sauce to garnish the rolls / for dipping; I would recommend trying this as I thought it worked out well IF you want it extra spicy. Otherwise you may want to skip it.

The final result was good, tasted much like I believe it was supposed to, just bowel-shakingly spicy given our zeal for heat. To be quite honest there is a high likelihood of your digestive system being in a bit of disarray after this one. Here is the link to the real recipe. You'll note that it is clearly not at all what we produced, but should give you an idea of some of the measurements.

Erin, unfortunately, had to head back to Indiana today, but she did succeed in leaving us a "recipe" and a lesson: "winging-it" can lead to a positive outcome!

With the return of Matty on Monday our culinary team will once more be complete. Best of luck on this recipe and try not to burn off ALL of your tastebuds... more concoctions (and hopefully more witty writing) will abound in the near future!

Holy Crap. That Was Too Much Food.

Hi all, this is Pat Deering, bringing you a special guest entry here on Culinary Conquistadors. With Matty off in places unknown, Luke asked me to do a special appearance and I jumped at the offer.

Anyways, tonight, after a frantic trip to a closed Heinen's and a confusing Giant Eagle, we prepared a pesto and farfalle dish, a Layonnaise potato variation, and a classic marinated bottom round steak (hey, they were buy one get one free). I also recommend picking up a Heineken draught keg like we did. They rock.

First off, is the pesto sauce for the farfalle. Cook your farfalle, put it in a bowl, and then put it in the fridge so it cools. This is critical, as the extra virgin olive oil and basil you'll be heaping on it might lose its flavor in heat. Then, take a handful of basil leaves, 5-7 crushed garlic cloves, extra virgin olive oil, some pine nuts, and a handful of parmesan cheese, and blend them till its smooth. (It will look like snot, don't worry). For better flavor, toast the pine nuts in a pan on medium heat real quick first. Set aside.

As this is going on, you'll want to be boiling your potatoes. Any variety except Idaho bakers should work. In another pan, sautee some onion in butter with a little Lowry's salt, and set aside.

While the potatoes are boiling, marinade your steaks (buy top round, and don't be poor college students like us). We used a Montreal seasoning, some oil, water, and red wine vinegar to prepare ours. Set in a fridge till you're ready to grill.

When the potatoes are ready (fork tender) mash them (skins still on) together with some more butter, a tiny bit of milk, and the onions from before, and then set aside. Have someone throw your steaks on the grill, and then get that farfalle out of the fridge. Toss it with the pesto, some red and yellow peppers, and some black olives (we wanted to add mushrooms too, but the only ones we could find were in the bottom drawer of Lukas's fridge and smelled a bit like DEATH. So we opted out). Any veggies will work honestly, but the black, yellow, and red colors gave a nice contrast to the white pasta and green pesto.

Don't forget about the steaks! I recommend RARE, which is what we had, but if you insist on murdering your meat, you can always go medium rare.

At this point in time, everything should be just about ready. Plate it up, and serve. We of course, made the mistake of make an 8 person box of farfalle, huge 24oz steaks, and enough potatoes to make an Irish man cry. We don't recommend doing that, as now all of us are falling into dangerous food comas.

For now though, Margarita time!

The Mediterranean Flatbread

Unlike it's non-creative name, the Mediterranean Flatbread is a dish to which we all owe some degree of thanks - this is the very creation which led to the creation of the Culinary Conquistadors. To celebrate our inauguration (we just liked it and felt like making it again) we again composed this ode to Southern Italy.

The flatbread's components may seem a bit exotic for lunch, but to be honest, they aren't hard to find.

- Mediterranean-style flatbread (we used Orlando)
- Roasted tomatoes marinated in olive oil (we used Divina brand, the marinade is seasoned)
- Sweet basil (we used dried flakes, though I'm sure fresh would be great)
- Genoa Salami (it returns!)
- Fresh Mozarella
- Ground Pepper
- Sea Salt (Or something you can grind)

First, preheat the oven to 400 degrees (we didn't, but should have). Next, take your flatbread, lay it out. Take the tomatoes and position some atop the bread. We put maybe 7 or so on ours? Do it to taste... just realize that most of the flavor will come from these tomatoes. Pour some of the olive oil from the tomatoes on the top and spread it around to thinly cover the top of the flatbread. Take out your hunk of mozarella and slice off a few pieces. I put about 6 slices on, small ones about an inch long to fill in some of the area between the tomatoes.

Take out your salami, if you have in deli sliced, take 2-3 slices and cut them into strips of about an inch and a half. Lay them on (as much as you feel like eating) atop the rest of the flatbread... if you need an idea how, look at the picture as an example. Finally, give a few shakes of basil, a couple grinds of salt, and a few grinds of pepper. Place on cookie sheet, place in preheated oven. Check after 7-10 minutes... You want to heat it enough to melt the mozarella and release some of the flavor of the salami. You can leave it in longer, but it will creat a crispier, pizza-esque result. Once it's out of the oven, it's ready to be enjoyed.

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Thoughts:

Matty - Bottom Line: I'd eat it again, but with more salami and less cheese. Pretty darn good.

Luke - This is my second time eating it, and it is good. It's only real drawback is the amount of effort that must be expended to make it for lunch... otherwise definitely worth a try.

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And with the addition of this recipe I have one further, unfortunate announcement to make: Matty will be returning to Maine for the next week to help the rest of the family pack up and head back here at the end of the summer... The good thing, however, is that Matty's absence is a good excuse for something else...


SPECIAL GUEST STARS.

What we've been up to: The Conquistadillas

They've done it again!! The Culinary Conquistadors come through with a fantastic, never-before-seen recipe! ~Acclaimed Author

A Triumph! What class! I cannot recommend this creation highly enough! ~Overpaid Analyst

They should be in EVERY major city! ~Random guy #3 from The Boondock Saints

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Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we've created another masterpiece; and yes, we are expecting you to overlook the fact that it was made in a Quesadilla-Maker. It may look like an ordinary quesadilla...

But there's a secret ingredient.

And the secret ingredient... is love.

So basically, we had a lot of tortillas... We actually still have about 2/3 of them left over, so we just might make these again. Anyways, we possess lots of tortillas, a pound of ground beef, and many packets of taco seasoning. I also just happen to have a convenient quesadilla-maker, so, I realize that this recipe is of little use to most people out there (though quesadillas can be made in a skillet easily enough - melt some butter* in a skillet on medium heat, flop in a tortilla, add your fillings, then place another on top... flip when a side gets brown). I'm just letting you know what we've been up to; it's not quite as exotic as the usual, but by no means are we slacking!

*or other buttery substance

La Stuff:

-Tortillas (we used burrito-sized)
- Beef (1/2 a pound makes about 3-4 quesadillas)
Note: Chicken is probably optimal, though chunkier. We were chicken-less.
- Cheese (shredded, lots. What's a quesadilla with no queso?)
Optional:
- Tomatoes, diced (we used multiple kinds, green yellow and red, like what Luke used in his sandwich)
- Sour cream
- Jalapeno sauce (that green sauce from Chipotlé)
- Cayenne pepper sauce
- Salsa

La Process:

- Put your ground beef in a pan and brown it, until it is... brown.
- Put first tortilla on the quesadilla-maker. Put on cheese, beef (or chicken), and whatever else you will be adding. We used everything in the "Optional" column, but don't be afraid to add more.
- Put on the top tortilla and close the lid. Note that you shouldn't put on too much stuff or it will leak; cheese will probably ooze out the sides no matter what, so have a paper towel to clean it between quesadillas.
- Use your spidey-senses to detect when it is done; or just lift up the cover and you will be able to tell. Repeat according to hunger.

All in All:
They were delish. We made a total of three, each better than the last as we gained experience. We also found a packet of microwave Mexican rice, which actually made it a meal. The Conquistadillas are highly recommended, and feel free to experiment if you have the ability. We realize that very few people have quesadilla-makers, but we thought we would let you all know what we've been doing.