HungryChris

Osso bucco, HC style, with plenty of garlic, rosemary and sage. I used to do this in a combination of fry pan and a covered pot in the oven all afternoon. This one went from the fry pan to the IPot for an hour and stayed on keep warm for two hours. Much less energy and way les stress. Local silver queen corn and tomatoes joined in the fun. This was a winner! Unfortunately, these are farm stand tomatoes, as mine are pretty much done for the season. Oh, and the first reveal of the new tablecloth we picked up in Italy. HC

I brined some more pork tongues for 2 weeks and cooked them in the Ipot and froze them just before we left for vacation. I remembered them today, for some reason, while I was at Aldi, so I added rye bread and Swiss cheese to my list. I took them out of the freezer and miked them long enough to separate a few to thaw on the counter while I worked in the garden and made a corned pork tongue Reuben sandwich for lunch. They are so very good and so very cheap, I just think they will suddenly become the rage any day now and skyrocket in price. HC

They kind of look like mine, which I have been told are Chinese Tsu Li pears. Mine have a good and sweet flavor, never really ripen, but stay grainy and crisp and seem to need to be cooked. I will have to try making those preserves. HC

Pork tenderloins keep going on sale and I keep buying them and looking for different things to do with them. Last night, I cut half of one into sea scallop sized pieces and pounded them out into half inch thick cutlets, marinated them in a mixture of oyster sauce, dry sherry, gochujang, garlic (home grown), brown sugar and chopped green onions. Then I stir fried them in a wok with Shanghai baby bok choy, zucchini, sliced cauliflower stems, sugar snaps and sweet onions and served them with cilantro and lime jasmine rice. It was pretty good. Deb went in for seconds, always a good sign. HC

On our recent trip to Italy, we developed a fondness for aperol spritz's and I decided to add them to our home bar set-up. UPS just delivered the Prosecco, but Pop's Wine can no longer deliver "spirits" outside of the state of NY, so I'll have to pick that up locally. HC

It has been a while since I had ramen, just about a month and a half, in fact. I was running short of kimchi, so I paid a visit to the local (Panda Market) in Norwich, CT. This is a tiny place, but they do a good job. Not my favorite kimchi ( which is made by Kimchi Pride in New Jersey) but I have to drive to Cranston, RI for that, so I settled for the stuff Panda Market has, which is not bad. The wood ears there are just a little too woody for me, so I get mine from Amazonsmile (which kicks a little bit in to Egullet for me). Here is my haul from Panda Market (Not a kimchi handle to be seen), but their Shanghai baby bok choy is always a winner. Here are the wood ears from Amazonsmile And here is lunch. HC

I had a raw portion of boneless chuck steak about an inch thick and as big as your average pot holder left from a chuck steak dinner the other night and decided to turn it into shredded beef for tacos last night. I put about a TBS each of chili, cumin, half as much kosher salt and garlic powder in a large bowl and thrashed the steak around in there, until it was well coated. I added a few bay leaves, a half a cup of beer and wrapped the thing up tightly in a foil pouch. This was put in the IPot on manual for 90 minutes, with a natural release that took some 45 minutes. It shredded beautifully, was perfectly seasoned and went into the tacos with pico de gallo and shredded Mexican cheese blend from Aldi. HC

I noticed that Aldi had mushrooms on sale this week and that means it's time to make more marinated mushrooms. Normally, four pounds will fill a 2 quart jar, but these fell a little short of the top, so I added a thinly sliced onion. HC

I actually had my hand on a can of spam at the market today, but my first reaction was to look around to make sure nobody saw me....I knew I wasn't ready. HC

Truth be told, it is different every time I make it, but this time, it was about 5 dill pickle chips, diced, 3 slices of a small sweet onion, diced, about 4 TBS of kimchi, diced, to which I added enough mayo for a good consistency. I have found that this mixture improves with a little time in the fridge, even overnight. HC

Breakfast was simple, but good (in spite of those scrapple haters out there). The last three slices of scrapple in the freezer, some peppers and onions with a bit of fresh picked garlic and a copious amount of fresh salsa. HC

I spotted these perfectly sized fresh cod fillets yesterday while picking up some basil plants at a market near home. Fish and chips with a spicy kimchi tartar sauce went on the menu. HC

Park's pork scrapple, fresh salsa, blistered shishito peppers and a porcini and melted brie bruschetta. I made a mental note to myself, that on some future snowy or rainy day, when I have no errands to run, this bruschetta combination and a cold beer or two, for lunch, would make me feel like a lucky man, indeed. I am so glad that at a recent lunch in Rome, I had a little refresher course on how much I enjoy the flavor of porcinis. HC

Inspired by some fresh porcini mushrooms on pasta in Rome, I went online and ordered a pound of dried porcinis from nuts.com. When I picked up the held mail from the post office, there they were. My first effort with them was a simple one. I rehydrated them in a tiny amount of boiling water, turned off the heat and let them sit for about an hour. I lifted them out with a slotted spoon and concentrated the hydration liquid by simmering until only a few tablespoons remained. I tossed in a few pats of butter along with the drained porcinis, a splash or two of brandy and a pinch of S & P and simmered for a few minutes and turned off the heat. Here is my breakfast this morning. Some over easy eggs, blistered shishito peppers from the garden and a toasted snowflake roll smeared with porcini & brandy butter. It's a start, and a good one! I intend to make a much bigger batch to keep on hand in the fridge for use as a base in pasta sauce and perhaps as a bruschetta in combination with truffle salsa or melted brie. HC

Cross over into the light and give Park's pork scrapple a try. A nicely crisp slice or two of scrapple and a fresh, hot salsa, or pleasant hot sauce is just a thing of great beauty. The ones I buy go right into the freezer with a purchase date, and I thaw them out on a FIFO basis, slice them up and freeze the slices, so I can have them or not without feeling compelled to use them up in a short time. HC

After 3 weeks of being showered by neglect, the garden needed a little work. I cleaned up half of it and tilled it up, planted 2 rows of seed tape Black Seeded Simpson lettuce and a row of Rapini (Broccoli Rabe), which claims to be a fall crop that can be harvested in winter. As usual the cooler nights have inspired the pepper plants, which all needed to be supported by longer poles, which I did. Because I wanted to make my own Bomba Calabrese, I planted a bunch of red cherry peppers, along with the usual shishitos and Cubanelles. While in Italy we had some killer pasta with a creamy pear sauce and I have been reading about several types. I like the idea of a pear and gorgonzola sauce and intend to try making a few types, so I was pleased to see that the deer had started eating the lower leaves on the pear tree, but had not yet gotten to the pears. I had some firewood delivered while we were gone and intended to process it when we got back. I left a flag on a pole next to the garage where I wanted it dumped. For some reason whoever delivered it chose to ignore my instructions and dropped it on the driveway completely blocking the cars inside! Welcome home Cheeesch!!! That became my absolute first priority. HC

Two eggs over easy, scrapple, blistered shishito peppers, from the garden and a fresh batch of salsa. HC

Just getting back into my own kitchen, after being away for weeks, was a joy. Korean BBQ wings, some of the last tomatoes from the garden and the best local silver queen corn we have had this season. HC

I have never bought dried porcini from nuts.com before, but they do so well with everything else, it seemed a good place to start. I look foreword to checking it out, but am always open to a new and great supplier, and will check them out too! Thanks. HC

After a 4 and 1/2 hour train ride from Rapallo to Rome, we were ready for lunch and found a little place on a tiny side street that showed promise. Deb had spaghetti carbonara and I had Tagliatelle ai funghi porcini. I have a weakness for bruschetta al pomodoro, and will usually try it if I see it on the menu. This was an excellent one made so by the combination of ripe tomatoes, fine olive oil, a truly great toasted crusted bread and sea salt. Deb's dish was made the way it should be (without cream) and tasted great. Here is the view of this little restaurant from our outdoor seating. A little background on my mushroom dish: I spent days looking for some good looking porcinis, which I normally get by making it to market day, as early as possible, in Greve (Saturdays in the main square). The good porcinis disappear very quickly. Because the Chianti Wine Festival was in the square, this past Saturday, the market was a much smaller event and the porcini guy was conspicuous by his absence. It was not until our last day in Rapallo, that I spotted these in the nearby town of Santa Margheriti. And right next door this beautiful fig tart Because we had already cleaned out the apartment fridge and emptied the trash, there would be no cooking or eating in the apartment we would be leaving early the next morning, I took these photos and walked away, heartbroken. But back to the porcini dish above. This was far and away the best porcini dish I had had this entire trip, with large wonderful slices of the unmistakably fresh funghi. I was so taken by the flavor, that as soon as I got back to our hotel in Rome, I went online and ordered a pound of dried porcini from Nuts.com to be sure it would be there shortly after we returned home. HC

I can't remember if I have ever bought spam, yet I have , for some reason, a recollection of what it tastes like. Looking at that picture makes me want to make kimchi fried rice with a bit of spam. HC

Our last night in Rapallo, Italy. We took a ferry out to Portofino and then to Santa Margherita Liguria. We would be leaving early in the morning on a train to Rome. We had used up everything in the apartment fridge, so no more cooking. After packing up and showering off the days hiking, we headed down to Trattoria da Mario. Deb had spaghetti with clams and I wanted a refresher on the walnut sauce, so I got vegetable and herb stuffed ravioli with walnut sauce. We ate outside, under the awning. We finished off the meal with a few glasses of limoncino. HC

It is a prepared local pesto called Pesto Mediterraneo. The ingredients are listed as tomatoes, olive oil, semi skim milk hard cheese, ground almonds, milk, salt, garlic, basil and capers. The pesto is pretty red and the pasta is pretty yellow. The combination almost makes it look orange. Deb had the last of it for breakfast this morning, which is always a good sign. HC

Fresh pasta with local pesto to which I added a bit of garlic and fresh zucchini, served out on the balcony of our rented Air B&B here in Rapallo, Italy. It has taken me a few attempts, a few harsh words and so on to get to the point I can put together a decent meal on the induction cook top, but tonight was pretty good. HC

I think if you could nail someone from across the room with say, soy sauce or ketchup with it, but that doesn't seem likely, based on the picture. HC