Today in My Magic Kitchen we are making a popular treat that we serve at our parties. There are many recipes for bacon-wrapped smokies and they’re all very simple. You can just wrap the smoky with the bacon and leave it at that. I mean it’s bacon for God's sake! It’s perfect as it is, right? The Memphis Mojo Rub™ can be used in so many ways, it’s not just for smoking meats, and it really adds so much to this recipe. You can have a touch of maple syrup for your favorite barbecue sauce, which will soon be Jeffro’s own sauce when we bring it to a store near you.

We started calling this crowd-pleasing appetizer favorite “Sin In Damnation” because it is an artery clogger and it’s definitely not kosher. They are so cute, bite-sized, and tasty so it’s easy to overindulge. Never do I recommend doing that. With anything this addictive, exercise caution and moderation. That old expression “too much is never enough” does not apply here! In my experience, it never applies. There is such a thing as too much of a good thing. A little bit of sin in damnation is good for the soul, but too much is bad for the butt! 

Today in the Magic Kitchen we’re making wings with our Memphis Mojo Rub™. My hubster, Jeff, was born in Detroit, but grew up in Memphis and he called it home for almost 40 years. His late father, John, bought him his first grill - a Webber Kettle - when he was about 20. His love of cooking over an open flame was born. Over the years, he tried many excellent rubs, and from all of these he was inspired to make his own unique blend. But unlike almost every other dry rub, this organic blend does not contain any sugar. We prefer the subtle sweetness of honey mixed with mustard to help the rub stick to the meat. The result is Papa Jeffro’s Memphis Mojo Rub™, available soon in the Magic Pantry™. It’s good dry or with sauce on anything you put on the grill or in the smoker. The result is some slap yo’ mama good barbeque! But don’t slap this mama! I hit back!

Today in my magic kitchen we are making a delicious breakfast for the Passover holiday week - Matzo Brei.

No need to say God bless you! It may sound like a sneeze for those who don’t know what a matzo brei is, but it is a delicious breakfast. It makes a great use of matzo and is similar to French toast or huevos rancheros. I substitute the bread or tortilla chips with... you guessed it, Matzo.

After a couple of days of eating cardboard, which is how my Momster would describe matzo, you do need to find different ways of cooking with the ingredients that are “kosher for Passover” and matzo is key to the week long holiday. It’s so important to the story of Passover which is why it is one of the four questions that the youngest child must ask at a Seder dinner, why do we eat matzo? We are Jews. We suffer. That is why.

Today in my magic kitchen we are making a delicious salmon spread. This salmon spread is one of my favorite things to serve it as an appetizer at Passover. It’s a perfect substitute for gefilte fish for Seder dinner. In the video that accompanies this recipe, I show how to make cucumber rolls stuffed with the salmon spread. They look like little flowers; perfect for the spring holiday.

You will need to use a long English cucumber to really make it work well. But if you do not have the tools or the patience to serve it that way, you can opt to scoop out the seeds to make little cucumber boats stuffed with the spread. You can use a pastry bag or make your own from a Ziploc to fill the boats.

Today in the magic kitchen we are making a staple found in many Jewish holiday meals - Kugel!

Kugels come in many varieties. If you are of the Hebrew persuasion, you probably have had a couple of different kinds in your day. If you’re not a MOTT (member of the Tribe) you might be asking, “What is a Kugel?” By definition (in Jewish cooking) it’s a dish that can be described as a sweet or savory pudding of noodles or potatoes.

In today’s Jewish kitchens, we use a lot of different vegetables for the savory kugels. During Passover, we can’t eat noodles so we stick with vegetables, which tend to be more savory than sweet, except for the carrot. Carrot-based kugels can be made with cinnamon and maple syrup and are quite tasty as well. Carrots, zucchini, and cauliflower have become popular base ingredients for this Passover mainstay.

Do you remember the series of chicken soup for the soul books? I read a couple of them; they were sweet and cute little vignettes meant to make you feel like you’d had a bowl of chicken soup. Chicken soup is also known in some circles as Jewish penicillin. Every nice Jewish girl, and even every not-so-nice Jewish girl like me, has a recipe for chicken soup that they most likely got from their mother or grandmother. Like everything else she cooked, If there was a written recipe of my Momster’s soup, I have never seen it. And no matter who handed the recipe down in a family tree, even someone else’s family recipe, chicken soup and its Pesach sister, matzo ball soup is a staple of Jewish soul food. The ingredients marry in a way that makes anyone sick with any malady, from a cold to heartbreak, feel better after the first sip of broth.

Today in the magic kitchen enchiladas! The Spanish word 'enchilada' means 'to add chili pepper to' or literally 'to season or decorate with chili'. Translated, “enchilada” means soaked, rubbed, or dipped in chile sauce. I love the variety of what you can roll inside an enchilada and the different sauces you can smother your enchiladas in. You can add any kind of vegetable and/or protein, beans, cheese… whatever you like. There are green and red chili sauces, cheese sauces, and more. The enchilada is quite a versatile staple of the cuisine.

Find the full recipe in my Magic Kitchen blog on our website:
https://mamamichesmagickitchen.com/the-magic-kitchen/yaya-enchiladas

This recipe is not Mexican street food. This is Tex-Mex; the Mexican food most Americans my age grew up eating. Hard corn taco shells, store-bought taco seasoning, ground beef, shredded lettuce, tomatoes, shredded cheddar, Monterey Jack cheese, salsa, sour cream, and guacamole. It is one of my favorite comfort foods.

The ultimate comfort food. It is an entire meal in one tray of yummy goodness. All the food groups are represented and necessary to make one feel fabulously full and satisfied. It’s actually also quite easy to make and assemble. There are shortcuts you can make without skimping on flavor. And there are so many variations in ingredients that you can use. You can substitute traditional lasagna noodles with sliced zucchini, or squash, or any number of traditional noodle substitutions A creamy white vegetable lasagna or a chicken Alfredo lasagna are a couple of different options we can explain another time, in another video, but in this video, the old school lasagna that most of us know and love is the star.

If you have seen my recipe and video for my “Momster’s Classic Marinara Sauce” then you will notice that this recipe is similar, but if you haven’t seen it, fear not because all you need to know to make a delicious and easy meat sauce is right here.

It’s a beautiful thing unto itself and it’s the beginning of so many other recipes to build on. This is not a traditionally Italian approach. It’s traditionally my Jewish Momster’s approach combined with years of making it myself. Having developed the twice stolen spice makes every Italian dish I make even better.