Glazed salmon fillets with Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup

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When I first created my Not Ketchup fruit ketchups, I really only thought about using them on meat. Burgers, steak, chicken, sausages, lamb chops, pork chops, ribs. Meaty meat.

But after spending a lot of time at Santa Monica Seafood - the best retail seafood market, wholesale seafood distributor and seafood cafe in southern California, and an enthusiastic supporter of Not Ketchup from the very beginning - I realized that Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup, with its perfectly balanced combination of sweet, salty, tangy, and slightly spicy, would pair well with rich, buttery salmon fillets.

This recipe puts the salmon under the broiler, but you can do it on the grill as well. Just make sure you don't put the fish too close to the heat source - you want the Not Ketchup to caramelize and bubble without burning.

Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup Glazed Salmon

By Erika Kerekes
Published 01/06/2015

Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup fruit ketchup sauce makes a sweet, tangy, slightly spicy glaze for oven-roasted salmon fillets. A delicious and easy gourmet dinner.

Ingredients

• 4 4-ounce salmon fillets
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 cup Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup

Instructions

1. Preheat the broiler until very hot, with the oven rack about 4 inches below the heat.
2. Line a sheet pan with foil and spray with nonstick cooking spray. Place the salmon fillets on the baking sheet and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
3. Using a basting brush or the back of a spoon, spread each fillet generously on all sides with ⅓ of the Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup. Broil the salmon 2-3 minutes, until the Not Ketchup coating starts to brown and sizzle.
4. Remove the baking pan from the oven. Slather the salmon with another layer of Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup. Return the baking sheet to the oven for another 3-4 minutes, watching carefully to make sure the salmon doesn’t burn. The salmon is done when the outside is browned and bubbling and the inside is cooked through.
5. Drizzle the remaining Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup over the top of the salmon fillets and serve immediately.

Yield: 4 servings
Prep Time: 00 hrs. 05 mins.

Cook time: 00 hrs. 10 mins.
Total time: 15 mins.
Tags: seafood, fish, salmon, dinner, Not Ketchup, chipotle

Pulled pork baked taquitos

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If it were January, I'd be making some New Year's resolutions.

Work less. Pay more attention to the kids. Stop multitasking. Breathe. Exercise. Cook dinner. Blog more!

But it's June. I can't work less or important things won't get done. My kids are busy themselves, thank goodness, too busy to realize just how distracted I've been. Multitasking feels essential. I'm breathing and occasionally exercising. Cooking dinner? A few times a week, better than nothing.

But hey, at least I'm here writing this post.

On Memorial Day, for the first time in months, we had friends over for dinner. I made pulled pork and (of course) served it with a Not Ketchup bar. Guess what? All four flavors taste great when mixed with slow-cooked shredded pork shoulder. My favorite for pulled pork is Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup, with Spiced Fig Not Ketchup a close second. Blueberry Not Ketchup always has its fans. And Smoky Date Not Ketchup is a good all-around choice too, especially for kids who might not like the spices in the other flavors.

The next day I mixed the leftover pulled pork with shredded Mexican blend cheese and rolled it up in flour tortillas, then baked them until crispy. It was one of those forehead-smacking moments: Why haven't I ever thought to do this before? They were tasty and so much fun to eat - especially when we dipped them into guacamole and more Not Ketchup.

Of course, you can put just about anything inside a tortilla and roll it up. Beans, cooked vegetables, leftover rice, chopped rotisserie chicken. Just mix it with some shredded cheese before rolling and baking. And serve a delicious dip on the side.

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Pulled pork baked taquitos

by Erika Kerekes June-2-2014

Mix pulled pork with shredded cheese, roll it up in flour tortillas, and bake in the oven until crispy. Serve with a fun dip on the side, like guacamole, salsa, or Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup sauce.

Ingredients

• 3 cups pulled pork, cooled
• 2 cups shredded Mexican blend cheese
• 8 flour tortillas
• Guacamole and Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup, for dipping

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil, then spray the foil lightly with cooking spray.In a medium-sized mixing bowl, blend the pulled pork with the shredded cheese with a large spoon.Lay one tortilla on a cutting board and spoon about 1/4 cup of the filling lengthwise on the bottom third of the tortilla. Roll the tortilla up tightly around the filling. Lay the taquito on the baking sheet, seam side down. Repeat with the remaining tortillas and filling.Bake the taquitos until golden brown and crisp, 10-15 minutes. Serve immediately with guacamole and Cherry Chipotle Not Ketchup on the side.

Details

Prep time: 10 mins Cook time: 15 mins Total time: 25 mins Yield: 8 taquitos

Antioxidant chocolate bark: My favorite homemade holiday gift

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Every December the members of Food Bloggers Los Angeles get together at my house for our annual Cookie and Cookbook Swap. I love hosting this gathering because everyone's in a great mood (SUGAR! BUTTER! CHOCOLATE!) and it's a festive way to start off the holiday season.

There's only one problem: I don't make a lot of cookies.

This year, short on time and motivation, I defaulted to my favorite chocolate bark. I call this Antioxidant Chocolate Bark because it's full of things that are good for you: very dark chocolate, dried cherries, dried blueberries, and nuts. It's gluten-free, dairy-free (if you choose dairy-free chocolate), delicious, and extremely easy to make. In fact, I put together the super-size batch for our cookie swap last Friday in the 20 minutes between when my alarm clock went off and when we had to leave for the school bus stop.

Feel free to use whatever combination of nuts, seeds, and dried fruit you have in your pantry. Sometimes I even crush amaretti (crisp Italian almond cookies) and add the crumbs in for an extra crunch. Do use salted nuts; the salt brings out the flavor of the bittersweet chocolate perfectly.

Scroll down for links to all the amazing cookies made by FBLA members at our 2013 Cookie and Cookbook Swap!

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Antioxidant Chocolate Bark

by Erika Kerekes December-8-2013

One of the easiest and healthiest homemade treats you can make for holiday gifts. Very dark bittersweet chocolate with dried cherries, blueberries, and apricots, plus pistachios and almonds.

Ingredients

• 1 pound very dark chocolate (72% cocoa solids), chopped
• 1/2 cup dried apricots
• 3/4 cup dried tart cherries
• 3/4 cup dried blueberries
• 1/2 cup shelled pistachios, roasted and salted
• 1/2 cup sliced almonds, roasted and salted

Instructions

Line a half-sheet baking pan with parchment paper.Break the chocolate into pieces and put into a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on high 45 seconds, then let stand 1 minute. Stir and microwave again for 30 seconds. Repeat until the chocolate is nearly melted, with just a few little chunks remaining. Remove the bowl from the microwave and stir continuously until the residual heat in the bowl melts the rest of the chocolate. (Alternatively, melt the chocolate in a double boiler on the stove.)While the chocolate is melting, chop the apricots and cherries into smaller pieces, roughly 1/4 inch. You can also chop the pistachios if you like (I usually don't).When the chocolate is melted and smooth, dump in all the dried fruit and nuts. Stir until everything is coated. Pour the chocolate mixture onto the prepared baking sheet and spread into a thin, even layer with a spatula or the back of a spoon.Leave the chocolate bark at room temperature to set. The temperature in the room will determine how long the chocolate bark will take to harden - the cooler the room, the quicker the bark will be done. Don't refrigerate it, though, or the chocolate will lose its glossy shine.To serve, break into pieces, working quickly so the heat of your hands doesn't melt the chocolate (always a problem for me).

Details

Prep time: 10 mins Cook time: 5 mins Total time: 15 mins Yield: 20+ servings

FBLA 2013 Cookie Exchange Recipes

• Chai Tea Cookies -- Cathy Arkle of She Paused 4 Thought (She also got tired of rolling the dough and refashioned the rest into Baby Hedgehog cookies.)
• Butter Pecan Fudge -- Dorothy Reinhold (me!) from Shockingly Delicious.
• Antioxidant Chocolate Bark -- Erika Kerekes (our hostess) of In Erika's Kitchen.
• Sweet Potato Marshmallow Bars with White Chocolate Chips -- Jennifer Richmond of Kitchy Cooking.
• Chocolate Chip and Apricot Walnut Rugelach and Vegan Chocolate Mini Cupcakes ("Naughty & Nice Cookies") -- Dana of Foodie Goes Healthy
• Vintage Sponge Drops with Double Fudge Filling -- Leslie Macchiarella of Bake This Cake.
• Sicilian Christmas cookies -- Judy Lyness of Two Broads Abroad.
• Cranberry Orange Walnut Sugar Cookies -- Patricia Rose of Fresh Food in a Flash.
• Brown Butter Praline Chocolate Chip Cookies -- Valentina Wein of Cooking On The Weekends.
• Mini Chocolate Nut Sandwich Cookies -- Kelly Page of Tasting Page.
• Rosemary Raisin Cocktail Shortbread -- Sharon Graves of Cheesy Pennies.
• Saketini Christmas Balls, Chocolate Macarons with Japanese Wine Cream Centers, and Matcha Green Tea Cookies with Chocolate Centers & Espresso Cookies with Caramel Fillings -- Kim Watkinson of Ninja Baking.
• Blueberry Coconut Mini Cupcakes, Rainbow Chocolate Bark, and Vegan Gingersnaps -- Judy Weintraub of Bumbleberry Breeze.
• Chocolate-Dipped Apricots with Pistachios -- Adair Seldon of Lentil Breakdown.
• Spumoni Shortbread -- Nancy Rose Eisman of Adventures with Nancy Rose.
• Crispy Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies and Cardamom Gingersnap Cookies -- Alison Ashton of Nourish Network .
• Gluten-Free Pumpkin Oat Bars -- Alanna Waldron of Eats Real Food.
• Red Velvet Gooey Butter Cookies -- Tanaya Ghosh of Tanaya's Table. (Tanaya's Table, the blog, will launch in 2014.)
• Black and White Cookies -- Tina Kil. (Her blog isn’t up yet, but watch for her contributions in the future!)

Non-Cookie Items

• Chiang Mai Chicken in Endive Spears -- Cathy Arkle of She Paused 4 Thought.
• Seasonal salad -- Nancy Rose Eisman of Adventures with Nancy Rose.
• Barrel-Aged Sazerac -- Jennifer Richmond of Kitchy Cooking.

Fresh cherry cobbler

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Every June the kids and I head up to Leona Valley to pick cherries. It takes a bit more than an hour to get to Leona Valley, a tiny town in a long, thin valley cozied up against the mountains that separate the Los Angeles basin from the high desert of the Antelope Valley.

For five or six weekends each spring the town is crawling with urban tourists like me who come to pick cherries. There are a dozen pick-your-own orchards, one huge and borderline industrial, the rest small and dusty. We like the dusty ones.

This year we went to Rolling Thunder Cherry Ranch because I've been following them on Facebook and I like to reward forward-thinking businesses that embrace online marketing. They could not have been sweeter, and that goes for both the people and the cherries. Ten pounds of Bing cherries later, we drove home, dusty, happy, stomachs filled with cherries that didn't quite make it into our buckets.

I got up early this morning and made cherry cobbler. Sweet syrupy red cherries with a fluffy biscuit topping - in my book there's no better breakfast.

Note on preparation: Pitting cherries is a pain in the neck. There's no way around it. Sometimes I use my OXO Good Grips Cherry Pitter. Other times I rip the fruit apart with my fingers and endure the stains on my skin. There are larger cherry pitters with handles that look cool, but they do miss pits and I'm never in the mood for broken teeth. I'd rather do it by hand and make sure the pits are gone.

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Fresh cherry cobbler

by Erika Kerekes June-11-2013

Sweet, syrupy red cherries with a fluffy biscuit topping - there's no better way to enjoy the season's best fresh cherries.

Ingredients

• 6 cups fresh cherries, pitted
• 1 Tablespoon cornstarch
• 2/3 cup granulated sugar, divided
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 5 Tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
• 2/3 cup buttermilk
• 2 Tablespoons coarse raw sugar

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.In a large bowl, toss the cherries with the cornstarch and 1/3 cup granulated sugar. Let sit 15 minutes. Spray an 8-inch square baking dish with nonstick cooking spray and pour in the cherry mixture. Slip the baking dish into the oven and bake about 20 minutes, until the cherries are hot and the juices bubble around the edges.Meantime, while the cherries are in the oven, whisk together the remaining 1/3 cup granulated sugar, flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Quickly stir together the melted butter and buttermilk in a bowl or measuring cup, then pour over the dry ingredients. Mix with a fork until the dough just comes together. Using one hand, knead quickly by flipping the dough over on itself three or four times in the bowl, then turn the dough out onto the counter. Pat the dough into an 8-inch square.Pull the cherries out of the oven. Using a large spatula or your hands, lay the biscuit dough on top of the cherries. Sprinkle with the coarse raw sugar and return the pan to the oven. Bake another 30-35 minutes, or until the biscuit topping is golden brown, the fruit is bubbling furiously, and the house smells wonderful.Let cool at least 20 minutes before serving to let the juices firm up a bit. Serve warm or at room temperature with ice cream or whipped cream.

Details

Prep time: 30 mins Cook time: 55 mins Total time: 1 hour 25 mins Yield: 6-8 servings