Norm Matthews

Yes it is a cherry preserve. There was a story in the KC Star about how the owners of Bonne Maman helped Jews during WWII.

I picked out three chicken wing recipes that I thought looked good. Charlie narrowed it down to two. We had one about a week ago. It was a Korean style. Today it was one with a cherry glaze. We had mac and cheese with it

Valentines...valentines. That seems to ring a bell. I'll have to look it up if I can't recall what it is pretty soon. We had galbi for dinner. I double checked the sugar cannister to make sure it wasn't filled with salt this time.

Today is the second day in a row that I made these. We couldn't eat them yesterday because somehow I filled the sugar canister with salt. Charlie ordered sushi for delivery. Fortunately I had an extra package of chicken wings to properly make this Korean style chicken wings.

They were good and they just needed thawing with the steam in the pot. I will wait until they are on sale because they are expensive. During Christmas through New Years and a little beyond, they were $10/lb. Now they are nearly twice that.

@liuzhou One way I enjoy brisket is braised in beer and I always put some in Chili. I will have to remember to try it with mussels. We had crab boil tonight. I am pretty sure this will be the last time I get crab legs when they are not on sale.

Charlie had a pretty simple request for dinner tonight: steak, asparagus and mac n cheese. The mac and cheese box said to use 3T. of butter and 2T. of milk. That is less than usual. The only difference was the one we had today was gluten free so it didn't use wheat flour in the pasta, and the serving was ten calories less. We could not tell any difference.

For dinner tonight, I made Anne Burrell's recipes for Marinara sauce and Meatballs.

@Kim Shook Thank you for that, Kim.

I guess me getting the humor dates me too.

I don't know. Maybe just once more.

A while back, while shopping at the Asian market, I picked up what I thought were Cornish hens. They were frozen and the label was hard to read. I made out "New York Dressed" which I took to mean some kind of seasoning. I cooked them today. When I took them out of the wrapping, they still had heads and feet. They had their insides too!. The breast meat was dark. They were SQUAB, not Cornish hens. I made corn, parsnips and rice to go with them. I made an orange sauce for them. It's the first time I've had squab.

Once she (Martha) had a cookie contest and the grand winner was for chocolate cookies. Two of the ingredients were Dutch Cocoa powder and baking soda. Turned out the recipe does not work with those two ingredients. You need to use either baking powder or cocoa powder like Hershey. Dutch cocoa powder does not have the acid needed to work with baking soda. The first time I used Hershey cocoa and they came out fine. Next time I uses Dutch cocoa and they were totally flat. They even spread. It took me six months to figure out what was wrong.

I use a fries recipe very similar except it makes thin fries and the boil time is shorter. Cut potatoes into 1/4-inch strips, soak in water a couple minutes, transfer to pot with water to cover.. about 4 cups. Add 2 Tbsp salt and 2 Tbsp. white vinegar and turn heat on high. When boiling, time for five minutes, then transfer to cold water to stop cooking. Spread on dish towel and dry. Fry @ 375 for just one minute. Drain and freeze. When ready to cook fry from frozen@ 375 for three minutes, transfer to paper towels, salt and serve.

This recipe looked good and it was but I didn't notice that it was a Martha Stewart recipe until I got back from shopping. I have noticed sometimes on her recipes, the list of ingredients don't always jibe with the directions. This one said bone-in pork chops when they must have meant boneless because the directions said to pound them thin and then after cooked and before serving, to slice them up. I did neither and they came out OK. Charlie said it was good.

DARTO Carbon Steel Pans info@dartointernational.com via gmail.mcsv.net DARTO /// Presale - Our n.27 pan, thicker than usual I got an email with this announcement and thought I'd pass it on. If I needed one, I'd prefer one with a bigger diameter. I have one Darto which is the largest diameter and one from Made in (France) that is larger and I like it OK.

Charlie likes Philly Cheesesteak sandwiches so I hoped he would like this Cheesesteak casserole. He said it was really good.

We had a quick and simple dinner tonight. We split an ear of corn and split half a potato. He was still making some mac and cheese when I took the picture.

I have that book. I'll give it a try. Thanks.

The ingredients in the dip follows. The onion is cooked in the butter until soft then the other ingredients except the shredded cheese are added and put in a baking dish, the shredded cheese is added on top and baked @ 350 for about 20 minutes. I added about one or two ounces of the cheese spread pictured below before I transferred it to a baking dish. I also used blackeyed peas cooked from dried instead of canned. I prefer the taste of fresh cooked peas to those of canned. PS I also mashed some of the peas while still in the skillet. 1 tablespoon butter 1 small onion, diced 1/2-1 tablespoon finely chopped pickled jalapenos 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin 4 ounces cream cheese, softened 1/3 cup sour cream 1 (10-ounce) can Rotel diced tomatoes and green chilies, drained 1 (15-ounce) can seasoned black-eyed peas, drained salt and pepper 1/2 cup shredded Mexican cheese or cheddar

Since Charlie is getting tired of blackeyed peas, I made a chip dip with them and he liked that. He ate almost half of that. I cooked navy beans with the ham hocks and collard greens instead. Even though we have this same meal every New Years Day and only then, we are both getting tired of it. I think next year I will make Hoppin' John instead. Charlie likes rice and beans so maybe he will like it too. One year Cassie wanted to have a Mexican New Years dinner and we didn't have the other meal at all and the next day I slipped on some ice and broke every bone in my ankle so I am loathe to skip all those ingredients again.

That will be collards, ham hocks, corn bread, and black eyed peas. I am going to do navy beans for Charlie and have black eyed peas in a dip with corn chips. All supposed to be symbols of good luck, progress and prosperity. I have read that during the Civil War, the Northern soldiers burned all the crops but left the black eyed peas alone. They thought it must be a crop for the animals, not people.

In order to make up a little for Charlies less than enthusiastic expectation for tomorrows traditional Southern New Years Day dinner, I made our NYE dinner with things he really likes. I also made a black eyed pea chip dip instead of just plain ones for tomorrow too. He might like them better with rice but I don't. There was a cartoon in todays Kansas City Star that said "Top Ten Moments of 2020" It showed tonight's clock with ten seconds left until midnight.

I asked Charlie if he wanted rib roast, ham or turkey for Christmas dinner. He said he wanted Thanksgiving dinner again. Turkey. Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas.

Charlie wanted a repeat of Thanksgiving dinner for tomorrow and since I used a lot of the same ingredients in game hens, we had those tonight.