Norm Matthews

I thought I'd make Steak au Poivre for dinner. So in keeping with the French name, I made French bread, used French brandy, opened a can of French cut green beans and finally brought home some French fries from McDonalds.😅

Charlie showed me a recipe for Parm. baked lobster tails and asked if I could make it some time. I made it today. I don't know much about seafood. About the only time I eat it is when I am in Seattle or California and it is never as good here in Kansas as it is with a view of the ocean in the background.

Our back door neighbors left a box on our porch with a Christmas card. The box contained three pasta packages with snowflake, snow men and sleds shapes and directions of what to do with them. I was a little hesitant about doing pasta kits but I have tried two now and they were pretty good. One was chili. I hoped it wasn't going to be a version of Cincinnati chili. It wasn't. That was a couple days ago. Today I got some frozen tamales and steamed them then topped them with some of the left over chili. The other one I tried was a chicken noodle soup. I used up most or the left over turkey with it. While I was eating some, I was thinking about the time when I was growing up on Strawberry Hill. It was a working class neighborhood. Most people worked in the nearby stock yards or in railroad maintenance yards. We lived in a second story apartment and my bedroom window over looked a tavern across the street. Every night a guy with a tamale push cart would go around the neighborhood and stop at the taverns in the neighborhood. (there were three in a block and a half on our street) Dad would get some for us from time to time. I can still hear him calling loudly HOT..MALES HOT ..MALES .

Thanks for the suggetion. I will look into it. I had a full sized one a while back. I used it until it fell apart.

Leftovers from yesterdays kabobs got turned into provolone and steak sandwiches.

Charlie is suggesting we get a big one. So far, as far ass I am concerned this one is workihg out just fine. It's a Quisinart.

I used the new mimi grill again. This time with kabobs. I seasoned them with Cajun seasoning and we had them with rice, Kimchi and Yumyum sauce.

We had been planning to have beef bulgogi today since Tuesday. Bulgogi tastes best when cooked over charcoal. In the past I would convert my smoker because it was the only place I can use charcoal. It takes time to set it up and change it back. Bulgogi is messy while cooking and clean-up isn't fun. A few months ago, I ordered a small 18-inch portable charcoal grill for doing bulgogi. Today is the first time I have used it. I put a grill mat over it to help make clean-up easier. We were waiting to get hungry before I started to grill . Instead it started to get dark and turn cold, so I grilled it then. I took this picture and in a few minutes I took another but by then it was too dark.

I tried to bend them but when I did, the spacing between them wasn't even on both sides so I bent them back. Since I don't really have anything to lose, I could try again. When I ordered them, I looked for ones like i remembered but didn't see any. PS wouldn't you know? When I looked again just now, I did see some but they didn't have handles so I'd need to use tongs to take them out. Considering how much oil it takes to submerge them, I will just stick to frying them flat.

I was thinking back to the first time I had a taco. I was a teenager in Kansas City and an elderly couple was selling them out of their apartment. You knocked on the door, came in and sat down while they made them for you. When mom learned how to make them at home, there was a wire form that held the corn tortillas in hot oil while they were cooking. I wondered if they still made those taco shell forms. They do but they aren't shaped like the old ones. They are more open than regular shells. I got one and today when I asked Charlie if he had any ideas for supper and he said "Tacos", I used it and their shape makes them harder to eat. I'm going to use up the rest the corn tortillas as flat tostada shells. And when I have fried up the last of the corn tortillas, I'll go back to getting the store bought taco shells. Anybody want a 'taco' shell holder?

Charlie asked for Martini Chicken and I tried a bread roll recipe. The Parker House rolls will go in my Thanksgiving folder for probable future use . The big roll was lleft-over dough after I had filled the tray. The pasta and sauce are not part of the original Martini recipe.

Charlie asked for Country Fried Steak today. He always wants it with mashed potatoes, peas, rolls and peppered white gravy. I forgot to get some rolls but had some I made a few days ago. I thought my sister wasn't going to do the Thanksgiving rolls this year and was trying some different recipes and had some of those in the freezer. They are made with mashed potatoes. She is making the rolls this year, I found out yesterday. The mashed potatoes and gravy came from envelops. Just add water. At first I felt guilty about taking shortcuts but they save so much time and taste good. Good enough for a quick Friday meal.

A couple of days ago we had grilled steak and today it was Korean Fried Chicken Wings.

Would you recommend one or the other, or are both?

I found a 2014 recipe on my computer from a really nice lady and very good cook from NOLA for New Orleans style shrimp. More than half way through the recipe, it wasn't working so I looked up the original from Chef Jared Besh and discovered a cup of oyster liquor missing so I had to make some changes in the recipe but it still turned out well. One thing that helped the taste was using wild caught Gulf shrimp. I had never noticed that kind before and it was much better tasting than what is usually available here in Kansas. It brought back memories of what shrimp used to taste like a long time ago. If they continue to carry them, I will have to get one of those shrimp tools for shelling and deveining. It was no small chore to do them all by hand.