Kim Shook

This. Exactly. I ate up all the stuff that Food Network used to have with REAL chefs and don't need to see reruns. And Julia comes on while I'm at work - we don't have DVR or Tevo (sp?) or any of that newfangled stuff, so that's off. Pooh.

Wow, those look GOOD! Pork cracklins are a favorite carb free snack of mine (the hell with the cholesterol, I'm gonna die of something!) But I do loves me some chicken skin! Yep, me too. I would rather pull all the skin off fried chicken and fill up on that than eat a whole piece without it. Well, I finally got up the nerve and tasted one. I'm not sure still. Very greasy, as you would expect. Pretty good flavor. I might try microwaving for a few seconds and see if that is better. They are still pretty scary, though. Dinner last night was bratwurst w/ caramelized onions, green beans and potatoes, creamed corn and sweet potatoes: The brats were those already cooked ones – really white. Mr. Kim likes the kind that you have to cook, but I actually prefer the flavor and texture of these.

Hee! I love the name 'in-grown onion skin'. It describes it perfectly. I've noticed, too, that these onions seem a little softer. I do what you do.

deadstroke – gorgeous pork belly! djyee – the lemon balm was a nice addition to the chicken. I was afraid it would disappear with the smoke, so I kept it very simple – just olive oil, pepper and the herb. It was delicate, but THERE. robirdstx – that is just a beautiful pizza! Soba – your chicken looks delicious. I cannot truss a chicken to save my life – I end up with 20 feet of string wrapped all around a chicken that is as splayed out as before I tied it. So yours looks pretty good to me. We got our CSA box on Friday and then went out of town until Monday night. So I was trying to use as much as it as possible as quickly as possible. Tonight I did a salad with the Bibb, arugula and radishes (all CSA) topped with some Benton’s proscuitto and poached eggs (CSA): I also did roasted asparagus and Marlene’s glazed carrots (both CSA). The carrots…well, they turned out a little odd: I’ve made the recipe before and they were amazing – so it was the carrots, not the recipe. But these carrots never got tender. They went from raw and hard to candied and tough and never went through a soft phase. It’s something between candy and carrot jerky. Tasted really good, though. Carrots, asparagus and croissant: Dessert will be as many (CSA) strawberries as we can eat before they go furry. When we were in NC this weekend, I got a souvenir: Scary. I found it at a little country gas station/store. Yes, it says “Fried out chicken fat with attached skin”. I haven’t gotten up the courage to open it yet.

merstar – that cake sounds great! What tweaks did you do and how did it taste? My daughter’s best friend ordered mini cupcakes for a gathering he was having for his website: I came up with Margarita mini cupcakes. They were yellow cake flavored with coconut extract and the frosting was a fluffy white icing flavored with key lime extract. I tinted the frosting slightly green and topped it with green sprinkles and some coarse sugar to mimic the salt on a margarita. Some junky cupcakes that I made for Memorial Day: Just a strawberry cake mix with white frosting and decorations. The little neighbor girl loved them !

DeEttas – both of those tortes are just gorgeous! David – your little Bundts are beautiful. Was that pan metal or silicone? jaredrakes - “So many things are still red.” I remember making a cake for my daughter that required red, dark green, dark blue and BLACK frosting. I kept finding smears of color for weeks! Your cake is adorable. Do NOT make excuses for it! Some weekend baking: Orange-Cranberry muffins. I found a fat-free mix in the pantry. I have no idea where they came from since I never buy anything like that (maybe when Jessica moved back in?), but rather than waste it, I messed with it a little bit – an extra egg, dried orange peel flakes and an orange juice and 10X glaze and they weren’t bad at all. Crumb: I also made some oatmeal cookies to take to the office: This is my go-to recipe, perfected over the last 35 years or so that makes a good, chewy, BIG cooky.

menuinprogress – what a beautiful sear on that scallop! Nick – gorgeous duck! deensiebat – that’s some good looking mulch! And, really, isn’t EVERYTHING better with a poached egg on top? Darienne – I’ve made that rice and it’s delicious! Soba – nice to see your post! Beautiful, as always! Mr. Kim was smoking a couple of pork butts to take to NC this weekend so I fixed up a chicken with the lemon balm from the CSA box and had him put it on the smoker too: I rubbed it with olive oil, put some of the leaves under the skin and stuffed the cavity with more leaves: This was one gorgeous, juicy bird – we are smoked chicken converts: We had it with some (Not So) Spicy Sweet Potato and Ginger Soup that a friend sent me the recipe for: This was very popular with Mr. Kim and Jess. Too much cumin for my tastes and besides, I only really like sweet potatoes when they taste like dessert .

djyee – That pasta dish looks wonderful. We love lamb and orzo is my go-to starch, so I know we’d really enjoy that. Thanks for linking to the recipe! Dinner last night was Sweet and Sour Glazed Pork Chops. We went to our butcher and got these lovelies: These things were HUGE – 1” thick, 4” wide and 7” long! And how about that fat cap? The chops were wonderful – juicy, PORKY and the balsamic, honey, butter and rosemary glaze is perfect with pork: I also did the ubiquitous salad and some plain old cheddar au gratin potatoes: Plated:

Darienne – I’ll look for the cut and try that. I really like the idea of pulled beef. I had to laugh when you said that you didn’t know how to pick meat, because that is always my problem, too. I know rib eyes for steaks and chuck for pot roast, but then I get lost. My first impulse is if it’s flat, it’s a steak and if it’s a big ball, it’s a roast . robirdstx – thanks for the link. I printed it out and will try that soon. Your Cannelloni is gorgeous. I make a similar one with chicken and ham and we love it with the spinach! deensiebat – your couscous is lovely. Dinner tonight was MORE Greek salad: yawn And grilled cheeseburgers w/ a fried egg: Nom.

robirdstx – both the garlic toast and the ravioli look wonderful. I am mesmerized by your bread, though. I clicked to enlarge and it looks almost like there is cheese there, too. Could you give me a mini-tutorial on that bread? dcarch – you may only be 6 posts in to your eG career, but you obviously have some serious experience. Gorgeous food and pictures. I am enjoying all of your contributions. The fresh stuff is mostly from the Community Supported Agriculture baskets we have signed up for. MiFi – I would love to try the duck rillets. We had pork rillets in NOLA for the first time and we fell in love. And I think that shrimp, soppressta and mozzarella is an inspired combination (love the fancy picture, too!). Darienne – pulled BEEF? Hmmmm. How’d you do that? What cut of beef? Inquiring minds and all that. deadstroke – Gorgeous first post. We saw beef cheeks in the butcher shop the other day and I wondered what I could do with them. Now I know!

Bruce – thank you! That chicken looks beautiful and the marinade has all my favorite stuff in it! dcarch – I can’t figure out what I’m looking at. Do those ribs have handles? They look fantastic. And are those fries under the impossibly thin and gorgeous red onion strings? Dinner last night was a ‘Greek-ish’ salad. I used the CSA Bibb, mustard greens and spring onions: Dressed w/ a lemon dressing and some of the CSA feta:

Oh, lord, I think I’m guilty of all of this stuff and probably more. And as a basic good girl and cradle Episcopalian things left undone has always bothered me more than things done (I am better at not being bad than I am at being good). Mr. Kim is an anti-waste fiend, so I toss all overripe bananas in the freezer – at last count, I think we have 17. Nothing gets thrown away straight from the table, but when he’s not around I dig around the back of the fridge and find horrors. Erin’s “Oh, God, the lettuce, the lettuce” cracked me right up. I, too, have lettuce shame. Thank God Romaine lasts as long as it does. And with herbs, there seems no way to win. If I buy it at extortionist prices, I use one leaf and the rest dissolves slowly into goo. If I get all energetic and buy plants, I either forget to water them and kill them, or my recipe needs huge amounts and there isn’t enough on the plant.

Some nice produce there. As for the lemon balm, I've never done much with it myself, but these are some suggestions off the top of my head--You could add a little to a salad for a tangy lemon flavor, or stuff some sprigs into the cavity of a chicken before you roast it. You could also steep some lemon balm with fresh mint leaves for a tea. I've served cold herb tea in the summer (usually a mint tea with some sugar added to it), & people liked it. Thanks for the good ideas!

We joined our CSA for the first time this year. They deliver to our door and let us opt out of specific foods we don’t eat. They also gave us the option of every week or every other week, so the problems that other posters have mentioned seem to be taken care of. We aren’t very good about getting out early to the (very) few good farmer’s markets the area and I’m kind of looking forward to meeting the challenge of a mystery basket. We got our first CSA basket Friday: It contained sweet potatoes, asparagus, Bibb lettuce, blackberry jam, spring onions, lemon balm, strawberries, mustard greens, feta and free range eggs. So far we’ve used the asparagus in a salad that Jessica made for dinner tonight, the eggs are almost gone with breakfast today and yesterday and the strawberries were just eaten as is – not even any added sugar. The sweet potatoes (is that odd, getting sweet potatoes in a CSA basket in MAY?) are going into a soup with some ginger and peanut butter! The mustard greens are babies and I’m planning a salad with the Bibb, the greens, spring onions and feta for dinner tomorrow night. The only thing that is stumping me is the lemon balm. I don’t know what to do with it. It’s a pretty big bunch, too. Any ideas?

emmalish – Jess finally got the recipe together for the corn casserole: Click! robirdstx – lovely tortilla soup! That is one of our favorites. We have it at my MIL’s Christmas celebration every year. My BIL lives in Phoenix and brought the recipe back years ago and now it wouldn’t be Christmas without it! Friday night pre-dinner nibbles: Goat cheese, fig preserves and crackers. Dinner was garlic shrimp: Some odd little cuts of steak that I found at the store called “Western Grillers”: They were very chewy, but pretty flavorful: I also made a salad – no picture! I made a big batch of my mother’s vegetable soup for lunches and to stock the freezer: Dinner was a joint effort between Jessica and me. Jessica made an incredible corn, asparagus and feta salad w/ roasted red peppers and red onion: I don’t even LIKE asparagus and red pepper and I loved it. At Jessica’s request, I did her favorite hoisin braised short ribs: These things turn out BLACK, but they aren’t burnt – they are just so incredibly rich and moist and flavorful. I grilled some polenta rounds on my panini maker: Plated: Close up: We had dinner with friends last night and it was a wonderful evening. Good food, good drinks and good company. The whole flow of the evening really made me think. They are a couple that have been together for about twenty five years and are a wonderful host team. One of the guys is a fabulous, instinctive cook. The other guy doesn’t cook at all. While John is putting the finishing touches on dinner, Jack serves the drinks and entertains. The group flowed back and forth between the living room political discussion and the kitchen prep (guess where I spent most of my time). John comes out to have a drink or two while things take care of themselves in the kitchen. It is just such an easy, effortless looking flow – welcoming and gracious and low stress. I wonder if Mr. Kim and I entertain like that and HOPE that we do. But it is something to try to pay attention to. John also served a COMPLETELY demolished Bundt cake that came out of the pan in about 40 pieces. We all laughed and then proceeded to eat every delicious crumb. I know for a fact (because it has happened) that I would never have the grace to do THAT. That cake would have ended up in the back yard for the birds and I would have been at Wal-mart at 3am buying a cake mix.

cathyeats – those scones are gorgeous. I’ll be trying your recipe. They look nice and moist, too. dcarch – Welcome! What lovely and imaginative food! I really love the bacon horns – did you do those on foil forms? We got our first CSA basket Friday afternoon. This is our first experience with a CSA and we’re looking forward to seeing what we get throughout the spring, summer and fall. Breakfast included free range eggs and strawberries from our basket: Also buttermilk pancakes with blueberries and link sausage. Wonderful meal. Look at those yolks: This morning’s breakfast: More of those gorgeous free range eggs, poached VERY badly .

Mysstwalker & judiu – glad you found the recipe! It really is good and unusual! emmalish – I’ve asked Jess for the recipe and will post it as soon as she sends it to me. robirdstx – those fish tacos look wonderful!

Bruce – your meals always make me feel hungry, envious and ignorant in equal parts! I know that we have some really good Indian restaurants in Richmond and Mr. Kim and Jessica love it – I haven’t ANY exposure to Indian food and need to correct that. Darienne – I really like your way of doing the big meal at lunchtime. If we were home during the day, that is EXACTLY how we’d eat. As for pulled pork recipes, I have two. I don’t know how you are set up for outdoor cooking, so I’ll give you both. One is an easy oven cooked recipe click.. If you are set up for smoking, here is Mr. Kim’s rub recipe click and for his sauce click. Prawn – that catfish sounds amazing. I can’t think of another cuisine that would use caramel on anything but sweet dishes. I know (because I ‘wiki-ed’ it ) that catfish are found all over the world, but it still seems funny to think of English folks eating them. My English dad would die before eating catfish (but he thinks eel is lovely – eel just looks like a stretched out catfish to me!). And that tart is gorgeous! The night before Mother’s Day Jessica made dinner to free me up for all the prep for the next day: Butter beans, her fantastic corn casserole and very much kicked up Sloppy Joes. It was delicious and much better than my thrown together meal would have been! My Mother’s Day celebration was a brunch, not a dinner, but we ate it all day, so this seems the best place to post it! Pre-brunch nibbles: Crackers and celery with Rachel’s ‘paminna cheese’: and her ‘Redneck Gazpacho’: A weird and wonderful mixture of fresh tomatoes, mayo, bacon and Saltines! It tastes like BLT in a bowl. Not everyone will remember Rachel since it’s been awhile since she’s participated here. If you don’t, you should search out her old posts (she posted as racheld). What richness of beautiful writing we have here at eGullet – Rachel is one of the best. Brunch also included: Quiche Lorraine: Made with this decidedly oddly shaped Neuske’s bacon: It’s no Blessed Virgin in a potato chip, but it enlivened our morning . I also did a spinach and tomato quiche with Monterey Jack and goat cheeses: Sausage rolls: My stepmom’s chicken casserole: Salad w/ creamy chive dressing: Fruit salad: Dessert was a Key Lime Poppy Seed Cake: It was a white poppy seed cake filled with lime curd and frosted with a key lime extract flavored 7 minute frosting. Very, very good! I forgot to get a picture of a slice, but it was beautiful inside and the leftovers got scarfed up really fast at work. Since my co-hostess turned up sick and I didn’t have any of her food, I had to make a last minute second dessert and I just made one of those frosting cakes since they come together so easily: German chocolate cake with pecan, coconut and caramel frosting drizzled with chocolate and caramel. I also made a pitcher of White Sangria that I forgot to take a picture of. On a trip to visit friends in Florida, we fell in love with Columbia restaurant’s White Sangria and our host, Gary came up with a wonderful version. It was delicious and POTENT!

Tonight was leftovers, but pretty dern good ones: Some of Mr. Kim’s smoked pulled pork from the freezer w/ slaw and my baked beans from last weekend. Great combination.

Dinner last night was another simple, comforting meal: Tunafish salad sandwiches w/ alphabet soup. Can you tell that my life is a little stressful lately ?

Dinner a couple of nights ago was comfort food: Cheese and yellow pepper omelets and roasted asparagus. I had some toasted leftover Yorkshire puds with mine. I was making sausage rolls for Mother’s Day brunch and had some leftover puff pastry. I stuffed a couple of sheets with my pear preserves and made some nice little pastries:

I never thought about it before, but someone on another website mentioned that she brines large amounts of stuff and THEN puts it in the freezer and doesn't have to brine before she cooks it. Just thaws and cooks. Does this really work? I never thought of it, but if it did, I'd use brined things a LOT more often. I like the effect of brining, but just don't plain enough in advance to do it.

Kim, I keep a butane torch handy just for these occasions when things need some help in color and flavor in certain spots. Good idea, percyn! I have a tiny little culinary one, but I've been eyeing the larger one at Lowe's for performing all kinds of kitchen mayhem!

Prawn – thank you! I love the look of those short ribs – I need to do them soon, I keep seeing them everywhere and they are ‘speaking’ to me. And your potato dauphinoise is possibly the most beautiful variation I’ve ever seen! David – your sole dish is lovely and the description sounds absolutely delicious! Thanks for the point by point, too! I love reading that kind of thing. Tonight I finally used the Cusinart rotisserie that Mr. Kim gave me for Christmas: Chicken all done: Out of the rotisserie: I was a little disappointed in the skin. I thought it would be crisper. The meat was completely done, but the skin was a little pallid in most places. Carved: Plated with broccoli and hollandaise, Marlene’s Crispy Smashed Potatoes and Marlene’s yorkies: With gravy:

kayb – your French toast looks so perfect. I’m jealous, mine never gets that evenly toasty! Blether – your fish looks delicious with those little crispy blisters! And Komatsuna sounds like a green I would like a lot! Breakfast this morning was very simple: Scrambled eggs, cantaloupe, sausage and croissant