Kim Shook

Long time since I’ve posted here, but y’all’s breakfasts are just astounding! I want some popovers, sausages, perfectly fried eggs…. During our recent Florida trip we stayed with friends who share our love of all things food, so we went out to eat at fantastic places that they have found (in Jacksonville, which isn’t easy) and also stayed in to eat her wonderful food. For breakfast one morning she did this really good casserole: Croissant sandwiches made with ham and cheese and topped with more cheese and an egg custard and baked. Another breakfast: Blueberry breakfast cake, eggs baked in potato nests and sausage links.

Mark – I’ve been gone so long that I neglected to say thank you for posting the meat loaf glaze info. I really appreciate it and actually printed it out to try soon. Well, it’s been more than a month since I’ve posted and I can’t possibly mention every single thing that has made me hungry here on this thread as I caught up today. Such gorgeous, delectable-looking food. I can’t come here and not marvel at the talent and creativity that my fellow eG’ers show. I’ve managed to make very few meals since I last posted. What with travelling (Florida, Northern VA and Pittsburgh), house ‘stuff’ and family visits, I’ve hardly had time to come and read, much less participate. I have missed it, though and am hoping that by sitting down today and getting some things posted, I’ll get back in the groove! Some of the cooking below wasn’t strictly mine (though I did assist), but it was home cooking. Our stay in Florida began in Jacksonville and our friends there are as food-obsessed as we are! So we ate out a lot (they managed to find some really good restaurants in Jax – not easy – including a taquería that I’d give a LOT to have here at home), but she’s a great cook, so we ate in for a couple of meals. For dinner we had requested her meat loaf - one of our favorites: Served with mashed potato casserole: Plated with peas and brioche that we brought all the way from Can Can (a local French restaurant/bakery) in Richmond: Perfect, moist slice of meatloaf: After visiting with our friends on the weekend, we drove down to Sarasota to visit my dad and stepmom. They (oddly) have a (golf course) house and a (beach) condo within 5 miles of one another. They use the condo as a ‘guest room’ (and I have NO problem with that), which is where we stayed. We lunched alone one day on leftover’s from Stephanie’s meatloaf: Cold meatloaf sandwiches w/ BBQ chips. And a fabulous view I did do a couple of meals in between Florida and Pittsburgh - Spaghetti Bolognese w/ Italian sausage and salad: Totally out of season, but I was in the MOOD! And Chicken Parm, sautéed spinach and sweet peppers and pasta: Our Pittsburgh trip was a quick long weekend to meet friends. Oldtimers here will remember Racheld, the gifted southern cook and writer that used to post here. I was lucky enough to get to know her through private emails back and forth and a couple of Christmases ago, Mr. Kim gave me the gift of a visit to meet her in person. We had a fabulous time and got to know her and her family very well. So, for our second get-together, we decided to meet in Pittsburg. Another fabulous time – (we LOVED the city and are planning on going back sometime to explore). We ate out most meals, but the best meal of the trip was the feast that we shared in Rachel and her husband’s hotel room. The centerpiece of the meal was his incomparable ham: I know that he cooks it on the grill and not a smoker, but it has an intensity that screams smoker. The best ham that either of us has ever tasted. It continued with Rachel’s fabulous ‘things in dishes’: A braunschweiger- based pâté, the best ‘pammina cheese’ ever and sliced tomatoes from their garden (properly peeled, of course, Rachel being a properly raised Southern girl). We ended up spending the entire afternoon and evening talking and eating and coming back for more and more and more. Delectable. Sunday night we had a lovely snack when we got home, compliments of Rachel’s s daughter. She’d sent an assortment of cheeses, Irish breakfast bread, fig spread and sour cherry spread for us. Everything was delicious: The cheese selection included Saint Andre Triple Crème Brie, Stilton, 20 month aged English Cheddar, Campo D’Montalban, Gorgonzola and Limburger. We nibbled all of the cheeses with some “caraway salt sticks” that we’d gotten at an Italian market in Pittsburgh’s Strip district: They are like a thick, chewy breadstick with a tongue-shocking blast of salt. Perfect coming-home-exhausted-and-slightly-sorry-to-be-back food! More of MY meals : Spicy chicken and peppers, tomatoes, marinated cucumbers and corn. Ham, cucumbers, corn and a white bread and tomato sandwich! A much-anticipated and extraordinarily disappointing meal! We got a little pork loin roast at the farmer’s market (VERY expensive) and I did it on my Cusinart rotisserie. It looked perfect: And was utterly tasteless and tough. No better than grocery store pork. That’ll learn us to shop for pork anywhere but our favorite butcher shop! I also made Tony Bourdain’s Gratin Dauphinois, which ALWAYS works for me. It was gorgeous: But the potatoes were a bit crunchy, which has never happened to me with this recipe. Sigh. Plated with broccoli, corn and cheese rolls: The only thing that was successful was the swoony, rich, dark pork gravy: I found some cheepo pork neck bones at the store and made pork stock to do my gravy with. Fantastic. As a matter of fact, I made enough to freeze to use the next time we have some good, Belmont Butchery pork to go with it. Just last night, we started with salad (not much has changed for me, huh?): My plate w/ ham, tomatoes on bread, green beans: And Mr. Kim’s with the addition of yellow squash:

Kerry – that Lemony Cream Butter Cake looks and sounds fantastic – I just printed out the recipe! Actually everything you are doing looks amazing. I KNOW how busy your life must be and still you are putting out these incredible things. You are my idol, ma’am! Mette – your cordials and jellies look like jewels in the sun! jmacnaughtan – welcome and I am STUNNED by that cake! Inside and out. Darienne – love the cake balls. I’ve not tried them from scratch yet and want to. I loved the looks of the ones that I made last year, but NOT the taste. Some cookies that I made to take to our Pittsburgh meet-up with friends: From the top: Ginger Chewie w/ Sugar Babies, my oatmeal Raisinette cookies, PB cookies – one dipped in Demerara sugar, one sprinkled with sea salt and Dream cookies (a very rich butter cooky) in the middle. Yesterday I tried out a new cooky recipe from David Lebovitz – Tahini and Almond Cookies: They were recommended by Darienne and they were remarkable. I made one slight change – I used smoked almonds instead of regular and added some roughly chopped along with the ground . Fantastic! I’m freezing them to serve at Mr. Kim’s birthday celebration on the 18th. Thanks so much, Darienne!!

We are meeting friends in Pittsburgh this coming weekend and need some ideas for restaurants. We are staying in Coraopolis. All four of us like all kinds of food, so quality rather than a specific genre is important. We'll be there Friday evening through Sunday lunch probably. Thanks in advance for any help you can give me!

You are so good at the ironic/sarcastic/cool vibe that Mr. Kim and I almost took you seriously here. We KNOW that no one that we love and respect could POSSIBLY watch more than eight seconds of these idiots . Mr. Kim wants to know why you can't find a meaningful and intelligent food show to watch....like "Man vs. Food" :laugh: . Seriously, respecting your smarts and taste as much as I do, I must disagree. If I ever saw Nadia on the street, I would have to be physically restrained from slapping her silly and I find the Baron cringingly embarrassing to watch.

SLS – gorgeous goodies! And those cherries look amazingly rich and juicy! Douglas – delicious looking strawberry pie and what a lovely setting! Kerry – love the figgy scones! RWood – beautiful cupcakes – do you know the size of your decorating tip? Last week when my sister was visiting I made some BBC scones: Very good! And fantastic with my own strawberry jam and some bottled clotted cream from WF’s: We hosted the 4th of July celebration this year and I tried a couple of new dessert recipes. Kelsey Nixon’s Chocolate Peanut Butter and Banana Icebox Cake: Slice: Incredibly easy and really delicious. Just chocolate wafer cookies, peanut butter whipped cream and bananas layered in a springform pan. The cookies turn cake-like with the moisture. Lemon Melting Moments: Recommended on Pinterest by our Randi. So tender and good – really lemony and they really do melt in your mouth!

rotuts – do you know, I’ve never had scrapple! Is it grain-filled, like bangers? Mark – your meatloaf looks EXACTLY like how I always want mine to look. We are visiting friend in Florida soon and I’ve requested meatloaf – hers is the best I’ve ever tasted and she gets that mahogany crust like yours. mm – your turbot w/ zucchini is positively inspiring! dcarch – Mr. Kim would melt at that gorgeous sashimi and I’d do the dishes for the skate! Bruce – char siu is probably my favorite pork preparation and yours looks perfect. Also, we went to Capt. Billy’s in Pope’s Creek last weekend for a crab feast and the cakes were very good, but yours look even better! Ashen – beautiful pulled pork. Mr. Kim is itchin’ to do one soon. What with house remodeling, wasp attacks, family visits, etc., as I suspected, I haven’t been doing a lot of cooking lately. And we are leaving soon our Florida trip, so it may be awhile! And I can’t begin to comment on all of the fantastic food that everyone has been serving, but I’ve been dropping in for a quick peek and I’m envious and ravenous, as always! A couple of meals from when my sister was staying with us last week - salad and James Peterson’s brisket w/ pomegranate juice over noodles: We really loved this – moist and tender with the tang of the pomegranate. Another dinner was just a rotisserie chicken, smashed potatoes and sprouts:

KA – Mr. Kim would love your spicy candy! BTW, I mentioned (and thanked you) on the dinner thread. Curls – your cherry pie is just perfection – the crust, the filling – everything. Pastrygirl – gorgeous macarons! I’m shaking in my sandals – my 15 year old niece shares my cooking/crafting interests and wants to come over and join me in trying to make macarons this summer. She knows I’ve never done it before, but I hate that I might disappoint her. I’ll be reading everything I can about them and praying that ours look 1/4 as good as those! We got blueberries in the CSA box this week, so: Blueberry-Lemon Muffins from a Food Network recipe. Very good.

Some truly delicious looking cooking going on here. dcarch – the crust on your pork belly is stupendous – I could almost taste it! Stash – I had to Google ‘bottarga’. Sounds like the perfect mate to pasta and tomatoes. Does it ‘melt’ into the hot food like anchovies? Bruce – I don’t think it’s possible for me to get tired of beautiful, just barely charred chicken. Gorgeous. Scotty – your pork looks perfect – actually glistening! Mike – never a need to apologize for American cheese on a burger. I love all kinds of cheeses on burgers, but my favorite is still American! Norm - !!!! what a perfect, perfect meal. Just think, in a few weeks you can add an ear of corn and a slice of tomato ! Not sure how much I will be able to participate in the near future – crazy couple of weeks and no end in sight. Between painting projects, a HUGE storm this week with lots of yard damage and getting swarmed and stung by yellow jackets (I’m fine, but I’ve been in a Benadryl coma for most of the past week). And coming up family descending, hosting the 4th of July, new windows and siding starting possibly as early as Monday and a trip to Florida later this month! So who knows what kind of ersatz cooking is going to be going on here! I did end up doing a little cooking last night. Dinner was Toad in the Hole w/ onion gravy, mustard slaw and the first of the season marinated cucumbers: I have nothing to compare it to, but we loved the Toad in the Hole and the gravy was delicious. It was recommended to me by Kouign Aman – thanks, KA!!! I had some great stock that I’d made and since the gravy is nothing but caramelized onions and beef stock, it was really fantastic. I know that making it with American breakfast links isn’t traditional, but I don’t care for English sausages, so that was going to happen anyway .

robirdstx – I wanna have lunch with YOU! Between those beautiful tiny little clams and that crawfish sandwich , I’m sitting here drooling! Anna – you and Kerry find the most amazingly places to lunch. Your area of the world is MUCH more interesting than mine! For Mother’s day, I had promised my mother to take her to Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens and to Feathernester’s (a local restaurant/tea room/antique-home furnishings store) for afternoon tea. We finally did it on Tuesday. Feathernester’s is an adorable place. I could move in! The food was pretty uneven, but fun and not terribly expensive: P1110170 by ozisforme, on Flickr P1110172 by ozisforme, on Flickr From 12 o’clock: cheesecake bites, chocolate eclairs (frozen and not completely thawed), cucumber and herbed cream cheese on cocktail rye, herb biscuits with chicken salad (VERY good), pimento cheese on marble rye and cream puffs (also frozen). P1110171 by ozisforme, on Flickr Spice cakes with lemon curd, strawberries and chocolate chip shortbread – all very good.

rotuts – I’m happy to share the cake recipe: http://www.recipecir...ke_from_GA.html - I’m always amazed at how good it is and Mr. Kim is NOT a baker! Prawn – beautiful, beautiful, perfectly perfect ribs!!!! You gotta win with those! Good luck, my friend. pastameshugana - Texas caviar is onion, bell pepper, green onions, jalapenos, garlic, tomatoes, black beans, black eyed peas, vinaigrette, coriander and cilantro – recipe is here: http://www.recipecir...xas_Caviar.html dcarch – lovely! I am particularly enamoured of the pineapple and the watermelon salad. I think my tastebuds have finally realized that summer is upon us. What kind of salad dressing is that on the watermelon/tomato salad? The pie made me hungry and happy – nice combination. Stash – your ‘mundane’ pasta with anchovies has me salivating. I can only imagine how good that is. Rod – thank you so much for the kind words! I just love feeding people and cooking for a crowd is something that my show-off side enjoys. I’ve had a craving for chicken and waffles for a while and decided to indulge tonight: Also sweet potatoes and mustard slaw. The bacon was interesting: Very curly and perfect for putting on top of sandwiches and such. I saw the technique on TV the other night – you just plop a few pieces at a time in a deep saucepan with oil in it. It was really good and something that I’ll try again – much faster than the regular way of cooking bacon and I used the leftover oil/bacon fat to try my chicken. The waffles were unfortunately, horrible. Mr. Kim is trying really have to go low carb and he bought Krusteaz Carb Simple pancake mix. Weird flavor, bad texture – blech! We ended up eating fried chicken and bacon with honey and hot sauce!

Gorgeous eggs, everyone!!! James – I was suspicious of the method, too – with me, whites have to be FULLY cooked (not hard – just good and bouncy) and the yolks warm and runny. That’s exactly how they turned out. I can really get the same thing from an over medium egg, but I just LOVE the look of a sunny side up egg. It’s really silly, but it pleases me . Father’s Day breakfast: By request: Greek scrambled eggs (feta, Cheddar, peppers, onions and olives), Benton bacon and cinnamon toast. The cinnamon toast is made from Scali rolls that I had never heard of before and have been getting at Walmart, of all places. They are really very good – actually the best hoagie rolls I have found in Richmond.

robirdstx – gorgeous wings. I was just telling a friend that wings must be on special everywhere this month – everyone is making them. Bruce – the gai yang sounds right up my alley! Could you hook me up with some proportions for the marinade (didn’t I just get you to do this for something else that you made? I can’t remember what it was, but I know that I made it and we loved it)? Ashen – beautiful rib meal and that salad is gorgeous! Patrick – tah-dig. I want. Father’s day afternoon we went to my SIL’s for a combined Father’s Day celebration and party for our niece’s HS graduation. Our contributions included Marlene’s Red Pepper Jelly Cheesecake: Texas Caviar and pita chips: Green salad w/ mango and cucumbers and lime vinaigrette: Everything turned out very good and was well received, but I honestly didn’t need to bother bringing anything but the one thing that I forgot to take a picture of, so here’s one from Mother’s Day: It’s sweet piggies - just regular mini piggies with a honey/butter/brown sugar sauce poured over before baking. One of our nieces specially requested them and everyone went nuts over them. People were actually picking up the entire baking dish to carry it into other rooms so they wouldn’t get eaten up by others. I made a double batch, but I think that I could have made 10 times that and they would have still disappeared! Mr. Kim made his fabulous apple cake: Mr. Kim’s Father’s day gift: That’s a robe-sized giftbox, with a regular sized dinner plate, fork, knife, etc. Printed out clip-art of a steak dinner. When I asked him what he wanted for Father’s day, he said a steak dinner. Since we were going to be at my SIL’s for dinner, I thought a coupon would be in order. We’ll make a trip to the butcher shop soon . Last night we had so much left over from Father’s day that I assumed it would just be a refrigerator rummage dinner, but bless Momma’s heart she showed up with her vegetable-beef soup: I made a little garlic bread with more of the scali rolls and it was delicious. I did have a little bit of a snack from leftovers:

Shane – sausage sandwiches with gravy and fries….gravy and fries. I think I’m hypnotized! Elise – lovely meals, but that duck sausage in particular has me hungry. robirdstx – delicious looking kebabs! And that last picture looks positively professional! Dinner a couple of nights ago was the filling from the ravioli that I didn’t like the other night made into manicotti w/ egg roll wrappers and a good, meaty Bolognese: This was MUCH better than the ravioli! I also served roasted carrots and kohlrabi, fried Portobello mushrooms and green beans. The mushrooms and kohlrabi came from our CSA box and Mr. Kim like them both VERY much. The green beans came from the CSA, too. Finally something that I love! I cooked them Southern-style (the only way I care for them): with a good, fatty piece of sidemeat, a little brown sugar and a LOT of pepper – boiled like hell for an hour, then very low until all the liquid is gone. A full Dutch oven of beans ends up like this: People who don't approve of this method always snootily say, "why use fresh green beans if you are going to cook them that way? You might as well use canned <sniff>". NOT true - the fresh beans maintain some integrity through all that cooking - canned ones just won't stand up to such treatment! Collapsed, army fatigue green, soft, porky, unctuous and delicious!

Happy Birthday, Elizabeth!

Andie – beautiful scones! I love those cinnamon chips. They can be hard to find, so I stock up when I find them. Elizabeth – sorry, didn’t see your offer of doing the pictorial until today. If you did take pictures, I’d love to see them! Thank you for thinking of me. judiu – I do the ‘fork’ thing, too and that does help, but I’ve always needed to flip the egg to get the whites as done as I like them. See below for what seems to have solved my problem. Mr. Kim’s breakfast this morning: Country ham, tomato and Cheddar omelet. Thanks to Ashen, I finally found a method for cooking a sunny side up egg the way I like it: The white is COMPLETELY cooked and the yolk is runny and warm. That is the most beautiful and perfect fried egg I’ve ever made! I expressed my frustration a little while back and Ashen responded with the directions in post #3519. The only thing that I did differently was to flip the white before putting the yolk on. Thank you so much, Ashen! I didn’t find to too terribly fiddly, especially considering how perfect the egg turns out!

KA – Dogs and Tots! Doesn’t get much better than that. And those strawberries and cream! Wow . I tried out a Giada recipe last night for dinner: Prosciutto ravioli with ricotta and spinach topped with oregano butter with sautéed Swiss chard on the side. I didn’t have any prosciutto, so I subbed country ham. I’m not sure why, but I didn’t care for the ravioli. I found the oregano butter too strong and rich. I think that I would have preferred a light cream sauce. Mr. Kim really liked it. I have a lot of filling left, so I’m going to turn it into a manicotti filling and top it with a Bolognese sauce.

Xilimmns – I’ve heard other people say that about the Keller fried chicken. I need to try those polenta fries. Elizabeth – I don’t find anything ordinary or pedestrian about any of your meals and I would gladly dive into that meatloaf and mac and cheese plate right this second!! Robirdstx – gorgeous meals and I especially love the crust you got on those wings. Dinner last night was nachos made with flour tortillas:

Dessert tonight was PIE! I made a white peach and blueberry pie: I was very happy with the results - except for the unexceptional store bought crust: I was too busy to mess with making my own and, as always, I regretted that I didn’t take the time.

Chris T – Happy Anniversary! Lovely meal. percyn – thanks for the bacon burger explanation. Doesn’t sound too hard. I was thinking it was one of those ‘woven bacon mat’ things. Soba – I think that your bread looks perfect, actually. Great crumb, nice crust – it looks like it would have a good ‘bite’ without being tough. And your artichoke heart dish should be shown to everyone who says that fresh and frozen are interchangeable. Not for everything and certainly not for that lovely dish! Prawn – your lobster is beautiful – it looks like the result of a liaison between a lobster and a lovely coral! And your steak made me faint. dcarch – who knew that artichoke stems were so beautiful? The crust on that roast pork is gorgeous! What was in it? Harry – love the lasagna! I really prefer a ‘deep dish’ lasagna and wish that I got that kind of browning when I make it! Xilimmns – I’ve wanted to make that fried chicken and polenta ‘fries’ forever. They look delicious. Where you happy with the results? David – I love the idea of serving chimmichurri over cod. Avaserfi – I am in awe. Not only beautiful, but it sounds like an amazingly delicious bite! Mark – I’ve been trying to get Mr. Kim to smoke some ribs ever since he got his smoker. I think if I show him yours and your amazing smoke ring, I might be having ribs soon!! Bruce – that caramelized pork sounds like something that I need to try. When you say ‘caramel sauce’ – is that something that you make or buy? I’m assuming that it’s not the jar of stuff in the ice cream aisle? Or is it??? Dinner tonight was salad and hot wings. Mr. Kim’s with Frank’s and some crazy ass sauce called Spontaneous Combustion: He was still feeling it more than an hour after we ate. Mine were MUCH tamer with Frank’s and honey: And white peach and blueberry pie for dessert:

blue_dophin – nice. Except for the zucchini, I’d love to have what you got. I wish we got radishes every week. The two of us alone easily go through a bunch of radishes a week. David Ross makes a lovely salad with parsnips: http://www.recipecir...nip_Salad_.html - you can see a picture of the salad in post #33 here: http://forums.egulle...62#entry1556962 Still have the kohlrabi from last week, but I think I’m going to try cutting it up with a green salad. Luckily Mr. Kim eats most everything. I am trying different methods with most of the stuff, but the squash tends to just get pan frying with onions! Thursday’s CSA box: Blueberries, spring onions, green beans, Swiss chard, thyme, white squash and Portabellas. I’m using the blueberries in a peach and blueberry pie and I’ve got some really good side meat in the freezer to use with the beans. They will get the long-cooked Southern treatment. Not at all sure about the rest.

percyn – those English muffins sound perfect. Everyone’s eggs look just gorgeous. I think I’ve given up on the perfect (for me) unflipped egg. I just can’t get the balance right unless I flip it. Even the slightest bit of unset white gives me the heaves, so I guess OVER is going to be it for me. Not as pretty as y’all’s, though! I don’t know how much cooking I’m going to be getting done this week. Mr. Kim is off again this week and we are trying to get another room painted. Breakfast this morning: Bacon and cream cheese on an ET bagel. Bakery bought bagels, but thanks to Elizabeth’s fabulous bagel tutorial that she sent me, I think that I’ll be attempting my own this coming week!

Elizabeth – thank you for the explanation – they went from sounding disturbing to sounding intriguing ! percyn – how did you do the ‘base of bacon’? It looks fantastic. Norm – oh, my – that cheesecake!!! This weekend, we got some gorgeous pork chops at our favorite butcher shop, Belmont Butchery: I knew that I wanted pan fried chops, so I had them cut to ¾” thick. We had these last night. I also made braised red cabbage, applesauce and biscuits. The chops turned out so good: I love pan fried pork chops, but never make them with grocery store pork. I haven’t cared much for grocery store pork since it became ‘The Other White Meat’. It’s not too difficult to fix up a thick chop or roast with sauces and brines and braising, but a plain fried pork chop with no embellishments other than salt, pepper and flour needs REALLY good pork. And this was – the fat fried up crisp and tasty, the meat was really porky and tender. We ate every morsel but the bone. I made some red cabbage to go with the pork chops. It’s a recipe from “The New Basics” – my usual. The cabbage is braised with red wine, onions, vinegar, raisins, apples, brown sugar and bacon. Before: After: I also served applesauce and sweet potatoes: And biscuits: I put together rather an odd dinner tonight. We found some low carb rice noodles (Guilin Vermicelli) at our local Asian market this past weekend. I had some chile-seasoned chicken stock in the freezer, so I made Mexican Pho, I think : Mr. Kim’s with sriracha and pickled jalapenos! Main course was garlic shrimp (with lots of crunchy focaccia) and zucchini:

Stash, avaserfi, Anna, Paul, Bruce – well, thanks y’all. I was all keyed up to go out in a while for some really good ribs at a favorite local place that just opened a new location right near us. Now what do I want? SCALLOPS!!! Hassouni - Bún Tôm Heo Nướng sounds and looks really, really good. dcarch – your ribs look fantastic and I love that you mixed up the corn with the crawfish – they are the perfect pairing, so why not some of each in each bite! Twyst – soft shells win. Always. Hands down. Oh, my. I haven’t had one yet this summer. Scotty – if you would make me a bowl of that lobster soup without the sirachi (super taster ), I would get on an airplane tonight. Just amazing. Elizabeth – I like the idea of stroganstuff – starting with the basic idea of stroganoff, but using what you have on hand or can get. I have to confess that the name slime caps took me aback. When I Googled ‘Suellius luteus’ and found that they do indeed have slimy caps, I blanched a bit. I don’t eat mushrooms (they are always cut VERY thick in my stroganoff so I can eat around them), but SLIME??? <shiver> Anna – your pantry meals are much, much more impressive than mine! I really like your method of putting corn in a salmon cake. I got a great recipe from Suzi for fresh salmon cakes and I think I’ll add corn next time I make them. Dinner a couple of nights ago was steak, broccoli and corn. The steaks were crappy Omaha Steaks filets that a lovely, but clueless person gave us for Christmas. They looked great and I cooked them perfectly medium rare, but except for the mushrooms on top and the A-1 that we used, they were basically tasteless. Even the bacon they were wrapped in was crappy. The corn was from the grocery store (and pretty good for May), but the broccoli and mushrooms were from our CSA and were great. At least Mr. Kim and Jessica said the mushrooms were great – I don’t indulge. The other side dish was kohlrabi greens. Even Mr. Kim couldn’t eat them and he LOVES most vegetables. No great loss since they came attached to a kohlrabi in our CSA box. I was doing some research on kohlrabi recipes and found some for the greens. At least I tried. Awhile back someone at here (I think it was FrogPrincesse) did a piece of fish wrapped in prosciutto and roasted. It looked so good that I tucked the idea away to try. Cleaning out the freezer yesterday, I found a nice big slice of prosciutto. We got some cod last night and tried it out. Out of the oven: Along with some grape tomatoes that I roasted with the fish. I did nothing but add a little pepper to the fish before I wrapped it. I tossed the tomatoes with a little olive oil and S&P. The fish was really fantastic. Moist and deeply flavored from the ham. An amazingly easy dish and really impressive – I wouldn’t hesitate to do it for company. Topped with a quick shaved fennel and orange salad (fennel from our CSA box – salad was also really good) and served with peas (CSA), broccoli (CSA) and some really good bread from a local bakery: I also reworked some leftover quinoa from the detestable mustard green dish to make a salad with pimentos and zucchini (CSA): Mr. Kim liked this a lot.

Elizabeth – thank you so much. I’ll try that next time. I know that I can use a thick chocolate bar to make small curls, but I really would like to be able to make large curls. Your cake is positively GORGEOUS, btw! Funny – I was searching for a recipe for Death by Chocolate zucchini cake after you mentioned it and came up with YOUR recipe on a gardening site (is that right?). When you posted the picture, it rang a bell and I looked at the site and sure enough! cookingofjoy – I’m a big fan of pink and white, so your cookies and cupcake were close to my heart! Chris – lemon tart is one of my favorite desserts and yours sounds wonderful! I like that you upped the lemon flavor. flourgirl – your cake is beautiful (I love the shape) and sounds delicious. Any chance of getting the recipe?