Kim Shook

Blether – I never get tired of shepherd’s pie, especially one as gorgeous as that. But next time, I’d like to see a picture of the inside, please! lochaven – your Swedish meatballs look delicious. We haven’t had them in so long – I need to do them soon. Dinner tonight: Cheese soufflés, Shriner Brunswick stew – fixed up (I added hot sauce, Worcestershire, a little bacon salt and a LOT of pepper), but still not as good as mine . I always add some of Mr. Kim’s pulled pork and that makes all the difference in the world!

I have literally over a dozen jams, jellies, preserves, etc. And the truth is that I usually prefer just butter on my toast - especially if it is an egg meal.

dcarch – love, love, LOVE the look of that dirty rice! Shelby – oh, my, dear! Your Fat Tuesday meal? Every single thing looks delicious and beautiful! I’m still full and I would have some of everything! That bread is truly impressive. Franci – how I envy you being able to buy plaice. I love it so much! Bruce – your pasta looks fabulous and I, too, am intrigued by the idea of slow cooked onions on pasta! robirdstx – mmmmm, tonkatsu! Haven’t had that in awhile. Dinner tonight: Smothered cube steak, smashed potatoes and green beans. Just good, plain comfort food.

judiu – sorry, I didn’t notice your question until just now. Here is the recipe for Doddie’s salad. I had a wonderful lunch on Wednesday and I’d love to duplicate it. Mr. Kim and I met downtown and went to church on Wednesday and had lunch from one of the street carts. Mr. Kim’s was no great shakes, but mine was great! I had I had a shrimp wrap with lettuce, tomatoes, feta and spinach. The shrimp were plump and sweet and spiced perfectly: My side was Israeli couscous with orange segments, corn, black beans, cilantro and cumin vinaigrette: Really good. Mr. Kim had a lime and cilantro marinated beef sandwich with feta and tzatziki and red pepper hummus: The beef was kind of bland – couldn’t taste the lime and cilantro and the tzatziki was not as good as mine !

I don't know where the garlic comes from around here, but I've found the quality to be anything from bad to just ok. This has been a constant for all of my cooking life (30 years) with grocery store garlic (the only place I'd ever bought it). Year before last, when we joined a CSA, was a revelation. The garlic was so fresh and juicy that I was tempted to eat a raw clove. We've joined a CSA again for this year and I'm hoping that we'll get that incredible garlic again.

Keith – aaahhh, if only I could – unfortunately they are 6 hours north of me. But I googled pork buns in my town and found a restaurant that serves them. Soon! Christine – thank you, ma’am! When I make those, I always make extra for the freezer – we love having them for a pick up dinner or breakfast. We have enough for one more meal! Dinner tonight was fried shrimp w/ rémoulade, Marlene’s panko onion rings, slaw: Those onion rings are positively addictive.

I am thoroughly enjoying this, Chris - so glad to see you blogging. I am in awe at your chocolates. One of my 'retirement' projects is supposed to be learning how to temper chocolate, but I can't imagine getting something that perfect! I'm glad to see someone else who likes their smooth-top range. I love mine and can't imagine trading it for anything else. I always feel like I have to justify my love, though!

Anna – ‘heroin wings’ – I want some for dinner! And would you give a little primer in Parmesan onions? Pretty please? Those look wonderful. I must be on your wavelength, because that shrimp salad with the hearts of palm looked fantastic to me, too! Shelby – how does sesame honey chicken work? It looks great. Kay – I’d call those meals MUCH more than decent! I’m swooning over the shrimp and grits, especially. Dcarch – what kind of sauce was under your lamb chops? It looks almost creamy. David – your cod wrapped in bacon is beautiful – so clean and fresh looking! Mrs. S – your entire anniversary meal looks and sounds delicious, but I believe that I would have shamed myself with the gougeres and parm crisps! I can almost taste them. amkr – Welcome! Your pork belly bun is a thing of beauty! I want to find somewhere hear that makes those! robirdstx – your soup looks so good. We are making a sausage and escarole soup with cannellini beans on Friday for our CSA soup swap on Saturday, but the next time that I make it, I think I’ll switch out the beans for lentils! Stash – that blood orange and endive salad looks like early Spring! So pretty and fresh sounding. Finally starting to feel human again after being sick since Sunday. Dinner last night came out of the freezer (I did cook them originally, though): Sausage rolls and mini quiche Lorraine. Plus a salad

Thanks so much for posting this, David! I'm printing this out and will place with the pastrami short ribs recipe so that I'll remember to do it next time!

Ok, I am an animal . I don't do any of these elegant things that everyone else is mentioning. When I get really desperate, I gnaw on dark baking chocolate (and I am NOT a dark chocolate girl), roast marshmallows over a candle or put extra Splenda on my Cap'n Crunch Peanut Butter cereal. <slinks away in shame>

My favorite hash is roast beef hash, but one of the best I’ve ever made, flavor-wise is with Michael Ruhlman’s pastrami short ribs. Just onions, potatoes and the ribs chopped and fried in a pan: The flavor is great, but the texture is off. It just isn’t ‘hashy’ enough. The pieces are too large and separate. To me, hash isn’t hash unless it clings together. Like Chris A, to my tastes it needs to be an amalgamation of meat and potatoes. If you can pull out each individual ingredient and lay them down in a line, it’s just chopped things that were cooked together. I really liked the looks of David’s hash in post #32. I think that I need to use his Better Homes and Gardens recipe. Unfortunately, I don’t have the 1976 edition - I’ve got a 1951 and a 1982 (the year we got married!). David, you gave great directions in that post, but could you give me a hint about proportions – meat to potato to evaporated milk? And here’s a question that occurred to me: if you make fish hash and form it into patties and cook it crisp on either side, what’s the difference between that hash and fish cakes? Because I sometimes use mashed potatoes, but other times I use pretty chunky ‘smashed’ potatoes to make fish cakes.

Thanks, Scotty! Everything was put together ahead of time and those souffles are cooked from frozen. I love them so much!

Had a former co-worker over for lunch yesterday. We had a marvelous time – good food, good talk and lots of laughing! We started off with Salsa Canapes: Little filo cups filled with fresh salsa, mayo, cojito and chorizo. Lunch was Michael Ruhlman’s Cheddar cheese soufflés: Perfect, delicious and impressive, as always! Doddie’s Crab and Ham salad: Made with lobster and shrimp this time. Apple-Walnut Tossed Salad with a fresh cranberry vinaigrette: Dessert was leftover from Valentine’s day - Chocolate Mousse Cheesecake: And Sesame-Ginger Rice Krispie Treats:

I really hope that you get an answer to this. Peanut caramel !

I did already know this and it's sort of what I tried to do, but no apologies needed. Because I only 'sort of' did it that way. I tried to make a ganache with the white chocolate, figuring that that would work better with the chocolate ganache, but it was too liquid. I'll take your advice next time and just melt the white chocolate. Thank you! Stuart - thanks for posting the link to the recipe. I haven't had a chance to post it to my recipe site yet, so I appreciate it. It really is a great recipe!

Thank you, ma'am! The salad was really, really good and the dessert was seriously easy to make. I stretched it out over 3 days, so not so time consuming. Good on Mr. Shelby for coming through with the ribs! That's love! So, tell me how a Wooley Bear caterpillar qualifies to win a dog show?

tikidoc – thanks for the macaron pointers – all the information is being saved for when I take the plunge! Valentine desserts - Dessert #1: Momofuku Milk Bar’s (via deensiebat) Sesame-Ginger Rice Krispie Treats. A really grown up treat. Thank you so much for posting about these, deensiebat! You posted about them back in December and I said then that they would be a perfect Valentines gift for Mr. Kim and I was right – he loved them. I made them yesterday and thought that there was not enough ginger in them. But when we tasted them tonight it came through beautifully. These were more a gift for Mr. Kim since he loves all things gingery! The real Valentines dessert was this - Dessert #2: Chocolate Mousse Cheesecake from the blog Mangio Da Sola. It was incredible. It has an Oreo cooky crust, a cheesecake layer (from a Dorie Greenspan recipe), a chocolate mousse layer (from a Tyler Florence recipe) and is topped with ganache. It was so easy and turned out perfectly. I tried to be cute and put white chocolate hearts on the ganache and crapped up the look of it , but it was just delicious.

dcarch – the venison looks perfect and delicious, but what really wowed me was the wild rice. I’m sure I’ve never had the real thing, just farmed and can’t imagine how much better that is – especially with duck liver. I’m swooning. I hope that everyone is having a lovely day. Mine was great – I got to play all day in the kitchen and feed my husband of almost 30 years (next month). He’s my forever sweetheart – he puts up with a lot, supports me always and eats everything I put in front of him. Last night he even agreed to try liver sometime ! Valentines Dinner: Shrimp rémoulade: This was the recipe from Galatoire’s and it was fantastic. Love Potion Salad: This recipe came from a Diane Mott Davidson book. The salad was greens, grape tomatoes, crumbled bleu cheese and pine nuts. The dressing was garlic, shallot, mayo, Dijon, basil, balsamic vinegar, Parmesan and olive oil. We really loved this salad and it’s a good thing, because I have a full pint jar left of the dressing. My sad, sad Pomme Souffle w/ béarnaise: Not one single one of my Pommes soufflé-d . So we had potato chips with béarnaise. Pretty fancy, but not what I wanted. I know that they are notoriously difficult and that even seasoned chefs don’t expect any more than an 80% - 90% success rate. So I figured maybe I’d get 30%. Not zero percent. The directions that I found were, I think basically correct, but I think that I actually cut them too thin. Apparently Jacques Pepin slices them just slightly more than 1/8-inch. Rack of lamb: Needed to get it a little more crispy in the pan before putting it in the oven, but otherwise it was perfect. Plate: Lamb w/ mint pesto, cranberry, orange & almond long grain & wild rice, lobster medallions w/ lemon butter sauce. Dessert #1: Momofuku Milk Bar’s (via deensiebat) Sesame-Ginger Rice Krispie Treats. A really grown up treat. You really need to make these a day ahead of time, because when I made them yesterday you could hardly taste the ginger and today it comes through beautifully. These were more a gift for Mr. Kim since he loves all things gingery! The real Valentines dessert was this - Dessert #2: Chocolate Mousse Cheesecake from the blog Mangio Da Sola. It was incredible. It has an Oreo cooky crust, a cheesecake layer (from a Dorie Greenspan recipe), a chocolate mousse layer (from a Tyler Florence recipe) and is topped with ganache. It was so easy and turned out perfectly. I tried to be cute and put white chocolate hearts on the ganache and crapped up the look of it, but it was just delicious. So, other than the potatoes, it was a very successful meal! I had a lot of fun over the last few days. It was exactly the kind of thing I was looking forward to when I quit work.

Happy Valentines Day, Everyone! Shelby - got a can of Reddi Whip? Well it turns out I had the energy, after all! Valentines Breakfast for Mr. Kim: Hard boiled eggs and Benton’s bacon. Thank you, Shelby - they really were cute - and a big perplexity for Mr. Kim. They look a little obscene before you cut them in half: It’s a little like being mooned by an extremely pale person (such as myself).

Can you get gingersnaps? They work great for crusts. Really - any type of crisp cooky will work - even filled ones.

I don't have this exact thing, but before Christmas, I bought this. It's 3 slow cookers in one and each cooker has it's own temperature gauge. You can actually cook in them, but I just used mine to keep mashed potatoes, gravy and stuffing hot. I really liked it - it works great, only one cord and it looked a little neater than a bunch of slow cookers sitting on the table. I got mine at Walmart and it was only $35.

Adorable! If I have any energy left after dinner tonight, I'm going to make those for Mr. Kim's breakfast!

Thanks so much, I think that's exactly what it is. Well, the recipe I used it in was a salad dressing and though it may be different, it tastes great.

I bought a bag of what I thought was basil at our Asian grocery store. It smelled fairly basil-y and looked like it. The young lady putting out produce seemed to indicate that it was basil. She was right about the mint, but I'm not sure about the basil. I've chopped it all up unfortunately, so I can't show you. When I started chopping it, it smelled a bit like licorice and tasted slighly like that, too. Each bunch had a purplish bulb on it with lavender blossoms. So - what is it?

Keith_W – that is a gorgeous meal! What lucky guests. I love, love, love the heart shaped vegetables! Prawn – we cataloged all three freezers today and I found a lamb roast of some sort and some duck fat. Slow roasted lamb and duck fat roasted potatoes are in my future. That just looks amazing! And that cheesecake!!!! Be still, my heart. That is EXACTLY how cheesecake should look! Can you hook a girl up with a recipe for that? You don’t even have to translate it from the British ! Dinner tonight was a new recipe – one that Mr. Kim and I both worked on and contributed to. Our CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) group is having a Soup Swap and we wanted to bring something interesting. We hunted through all of my recipes and nothing really ‘got’ us. Mr. Kim started talking about a sausage and kale soup and I suggested adding cannellini beans and subbing escarole for kale (not a big kale fan). Mr. Kim looked around on the internet and came up with some recipes. We borrowed a lot from Giada, but made it our own with Italian sausage, potatoes and marjoram. We were really pleased with the results and with how quickly and easily this was made: Escarole and Bean Soup w/ Italian Sausage