"Rooster's Beak"

So I arrived home Monday evening with far too much energy to burn and an overwhelming urge for fresh Pico de Gallo (translated from Spanish to mean “Rooster’s beak”), in addition to my Hispanic culinary cravings I was also armed with the knowledge that my wife and I had previously decided to defrost some chicken breast this morning after our 5am “wakeup call” run.

As you read along it may not occur to you that in our house it is almost impossible for me to wrestle control of the kitchen from the “dinner Nazi”. Granted she delivers some of the most extraordinary morsels that a man could desire, but with that being said, I have been chased out of the kitchen by a spoon wielding maniac on more occasions than I care to remember.

OK it’s not actually that bad, but the “lady doth rein supreme in the land of cookery”, and that I mean with the greatest of sincerity.

Anyway, back to those Mexicans and their culinary creations.

When Ash and I lived in the posh West End we would “do Mexican” maybe twice a month, and don’t get me wrong we enjoyed it, but at some point we decided that we could probably create our own dishes with half the calories that you would find in the average Mexican eatery. (Was that an entire bar of Land O’ Lakes butter in my fajitas?)

This was certainly an evolution, and as such is still a work in progress to make food that taste great but with significantly less fat and using fresher ingredients.

So here is what I came up with, and yes I actually figured it out all by my lonesome.


Mojo marinated grilled chicken breast with a sweet & spicy black bean sauce that was comprised of black beans, caramelized onions, fresh garlic, jalapeno peppers (from our raised garden), and freshly diced tomatoes from Ash’s good friend’s garden near Charlottesville. The sweetness of the sauce was achieved with brown sugar and honey.

I paired the Pico De Gallo (all fresh local veggies) with whole wheat tortillas pan fried in olive oil.

A cold Legend’s Pale Ale and dinner was good to go.