I was eating at Chipotle restaurant a few months ago and got the corn as one of my fillings for my burrito.  It was so spicy, and I felt like they were going to stick around with me for the rest of the day.  I called them spicy corn rippers and remember having tears in my eyes (doesn’t take much) from laughing so hard.  I decided to make a recipe with that name (just for fun, you can call it something else).  “What’s for dinner tonight honey?”  “Oh, nothing really, just a spicy corn ripper salad that I whipped up dear”.

Spicy Corn Ripper Salad

Serves 4

1 lb. chicken breast, chopped

1/4 c. bbq sauce

1 cup corn

1/2 cup black beans

1 jalepeno, diced

1 lime

1 tomato, chopped

1 avocado, chopped

salt and pepper

1/4 c. cilantro, chopped

salad greens

cook the chicken in a skillet, and mix in the bbq sauce, set aside.  Mix the remaining ingredients and divide on plates, top with the chicken.  I like to add fried tortilla strips for crunch.

I am going to start shooting some cooking videos for the new version of my diet chef. I figured out that some of members lacked some basic skills, so I am going to have a video cooking school where I will teach the basics. Let me know if you have any cooking dilemma’s that you would like me to address. They are going to be real short and simple videos, nothing fancy, I am just going to be using my flip video camera. I was doing a test video today, and found that I might have a slight problem when shooting them in my kitchen, the video is only 10 seconds, see if you can find what my potential problem might be. (you might have to turn the volume up to hear it).

When I came up with the idea for mydietchef.com it was basically to help people with easy and healthy dinner recipes.  I figured people who had been ordered by a doctor to eat healthy, people with diabetes, mothers who wanted their families to eat healthy, etc.  needed an easy to use one-stop source to help get dinner on the table.  Well, I then realized that a lot of these people needed to lose weight first, so I teamed up with Tamra, a registered dietitian, to come up with  a weight loss program.  We decided to stay away from any exotic, cooky, new, ways to lose weight, and focused on good ol’ fashioned calorie controlled plans with a wide variety of food options, and even fat (good fats), and carbohydrates (whole grains).  We do the calorie counting for you, you just pick the food you like to eat.  I read this interesting story today about calories.  New York has passed a law where chains have to post the calories of an item next to the price.  When I was living there, I was absolutely shocked at how many calories were in things such as low-fat muffins and salads.  The story states that one restaurant’s average seller turned in to it’s top seller once customers saw how low it was in calories, which proves to me if we are empowered with this information, we will make good choices, and force the restaurants to give us better choices.  Now, calories of course are just a part of the puzzle, but good to see our society getting back to the basics.  Maybe I’m just Old School?

Jeff the Chef and Celeste the Massage Therapist just got back from voting!  We were looking for Joe the Plumber, but didn’t see him.  There seems to be a real buzz about this election.  Certainly in my voting life I have not sensed such enthusiasm.  We are in a battleground state so we have seen the candidates visit our state quite a bit.  There have been waits of 2 hours and more to cast your vote, but we used the wonderful world wide web to find where the shortest lines were (downtown library).  I already told you who I voted for for president, but I didn’t vote the party line, as we have a great Republican Mayor who is running for Governor.  Don’t forget to exercise your right to make a difference!

We headed up to the Blue Ridge Mountains to see the Autumn leaves, and get away for the day.  It was a beautiful day, and the drive up was peaceful.  Our first stop was Asheville, where we found a restaurant called Mellow Mushroom that had closed in Charlotte.  I remembered their pizza was to die for, and they had local microbrews and a large outdoor patio, so it was a no-brainer.

Walking around with full and happy bellies, we stumbled upon a Sarah Palin rally.  There were long lines to get in to hear her speak.

And there were a lot of protesters that wanted their voices heard as well.

It was fun to be a part of it for awhile, there were people everywhere, and you could feel the energy.  It would have been nice to see one of them fancy outfits that Sarah Palin has been buying, but we went up there to escape the crowds, so we headed out on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  There was a detour and we spent an hour or two getting lost and trying to find our way back to the pretty leaves.  We finally got back on the Parkway before the sun set.

It was a great day, and reminds me that we all need to block out time to do these type of trips to get away from it all.  I know your wanting a recipe, so my next post I will give you one.  Until then, I’m still in chill mode from that great day trip.

I was working out yesterday, and when I finished the basketball court was open, so I decided to take a few shots. Before I knew it I was in a pick-up game, and the only white guy on the floor. Let me preface by saying I had just worked out for 45 minutes (decided to go for it), I am short, and I have a trick knee. I had a blast even though I was bleeding, sprained a finger, had blisters, and threw up a couple of air balls. This video is too cool, it will make your heart feel good! I am headed off to the North Carolina Mountains to see the Autumn leaves, hope to have some good pictures to share!

We want a cat video!  We want a cat video!  O.K. easy does it, I know you get restless when I haven’t posted a cat video in awhile.  I love this one.  Anyone who has a cat can now see in video what their night looks like.

What the f#@!?  Grab your kids!  I said grab your kids and run!  There is an alien chef that has landed!  Wait- he’s smiling, he’s a friendly chef!  It’s o.k. he’s a friendly chef!

I took this picture of myself in New York last month for them to base the character off of.  This way you can see how far off they were in the beginning, and can judge if the final character has a likeness to me.

Once I got the beta version of mydietchef.com up, I immediately had a laundry list of things to add, change, make better, etc.  I will be launching the 2.0 version next month, and it is going to be really cool!  I am also going to be redoing this blog once I get that figured out.  One feature I am going to be adding is a recipe contest, where each week I will be giving away a prize for the best healthy recipe, so get your favorite healthy recipes ready to send to me (I’ll let you know when we get close).  One of the new design features that I hadn’t planned was a chef character.  But I warmed up to the idea, who wouldn’t want their very own  character?  I decided he should at least resemble me.  I thought it would be funny to show you the process in getting to the final character.  This is one of the first versions they came up with, not even close, his head is almost as big as his body, his eyeballs made me nervous, and what’s up with that mini apron/shorts combination, wait, if I made my own pimped out version with baggy shorts, cool logo on the apron, slots for my tools…..never mind.

Sure enough Blue did come from a loving home, and we had her for all of 24 hours. Funny how you can miss an animal that you barely got to know. Celeste is really going to miss her, she thought she was a cat girl, and it turns out she has a real affinity for dogs.

We all learned something from her, I learned I would love a dog if I could ever figure out how to control my schedule. I think Celeste learned that she would welcome a dog in her animal family, her mom learned she could walk to the end of the street and back, butternut learned that she isn’t a princess, and Weezie learned, well, I’m not sure what Weezie learned? It was fun for a day, Celeste now has proof that she is a dog whisperer in training.

Turns out Blue’s real name is Kaiya and her owner was indeed looking for her, so everyone won in the end. Thanks Kaiya- good to know ya.
YOUR MY GIRL BLUE!!!!!!

I must have been feeling nostalgic, or just testing the outer limits to what was on my ipod as I was working out today.  It started with Brooks and Dunn’s “Boot Skootin’ Boogie”, moved on to “Born in the U.S.A.”, and even the classic Bon Jovi song “Wanted Dead or Alive”.  Is it wrong that I was daydreaming during that song that I was an outlaw on a horse somehwhere near Pirtleville with my rhinestone chef toolbelt and chef knives drawn?  Thought so.

I just got a hilarious email from my friend Crystal.  I think she’s cooking on a research vessel in the Gulf of Mexico.  She was talking about rural Louisiana, and mentioned Pickled Pig Lips.  I thought she was joking, but she wasn’t.  Can you get any more disgusting?  How about an order of Bull’s ball’s (wait, people eat that too!). Well, I feel a bit guilty that I haven’t given you a recipe in awhile, so click here for a pickled pork recipe, now you just have to find fresh pig lips.

Celeste was driving home last night and found a dog running in traffic, so being the animal loving gal she is, guess who she took home?

We call her blue because when I printed the lost dog flyers she made, I accidentaly printed them blue.  Does anyone remember the old guy named Blue from the movie Old School??  She seems to be older (the gray hair gave it away), and must come from a loving home because she is trained.  Celeste is a regular dog whisperer, she has her sitting, rolling over, coming, and laying down on command, these spoiled cats that live here couldn’t be bothered with such demands (I still love ‘em though) .  Needless to say the cats are not happy about this new intruder.  One of the cats (butternut), has been a house cat her whole life, and has not been around a dog, I think it’s good for her.  Celeste bought blue a collar and ball that she likes to play with.

She is putting up the flyers this afternoon, so if you live in the Dilworth neighborhood of Charlotte and recognize blue, let me know, we’re taking care of her for now, but hurry up because I see a turf war about to happen real soon!

Yes, milkshakes make you fat, but I was reading an interesting article that scientist are using Chocolate milkshakes to help understand how the brain influences obesity.  I worked at a coffee shop in Seattle many years ago where we made an Espresso milkshake, you take Haagen Dazs vanilla ice cream, a couple shots of espresso, and a little milk, and blend.  Pure heaven!  Sorry, I got off topic, here’s the article if your interested.

I can think of better ways to earn $400.  I love a burger more than anyone from time to time, but just imagine what his gut feels like- gross!  Here’s the story.

I find it amusing that someone got to my website by searching for “chef tool belt” and found it even more amusing that there is such a thing, and even more amusing that I want one, and even more amusing that my post yesterday is on page 2 of google for “chef tool belt” (o.k. I’ll stop).  It would have made my life easier last winter though when I would run out to the grill and back to the kitchen countless times, and then I started thinking what a cool idea to have a slot for knives with a sharpening stone, and something to hold bar towels, thermometers, how about a cell phone, o.k. this is getting out of hand, plus I would look like such a dork (unless I made my own pimped out one).  Hold on a minute….never mind.

I was checking the statistics yesterday for this blog.  I haven’t done it in ages (there are a lot of you following along).  It gives you some funny stats like what words people searched to find you (carcass, chef tool belt, mexican chef employment ad, barefoot), and what country my visitors are from.  People are following along from places I wouldn’t have figured such as Macedonia, Saudi Arabia, Finland (I’m big in Finland), Kuwait, Russia, Jordan, Panama…..   Thanks for following along, isn’t the internet great!

I made a bunch of Health Bread last night. It’s good to give as a present, or if you don’t have many friends, I guess you could make a health bread necklace or earrings and watch your circle of friends grow very quickly.  Just search for health bread if you want the recipe (your welcome).

Mccain’s favorite chef is in Annapolis Md. I spent a week there on a yacht several years ago, though I don’t think I ate at the restaurant. It really is a cool town (for a few days). John Mccain’s son is in the Naval Academy, so I guess he visits once and awhile. Nobody at the restaurant has actually had a conversation with him, and the chef doesn’t even know when he’s cooking for him. Something sounds fishy to me, I’m sticking with my support for Obama. You can read the story here.