gulfporter

FWIW: My 91 y/o FIL is no longer mobile enough to go out to eat, so I now have to cook/bake at his house when we visit. After I burnt a few things in the upper oven, I switched to the lower oven and had other disastrous results, all on tried-and-true recipes. Bought an oven thermometer and discovered the upper wall oven runs 25 degrees hotter than its digital readout, while the lower wall oven runs 20 degrees cooler than its digital readout. The ovens are top of the line, but almost 20 years old.

We had a low-end Danby wine chiller in Mexico (about $300 as I recall). Electricity is very expensive in MX and this chiller was too expensive to run. It was also a bit noisy in our open floor plan. We are back in the US now and I'd consider one for my current kitchen, but I've googled those under $400 range and have to yet to find any that are Energy Star rated (low usage). They do indeed look very nice....many are blue-lighted. In MX, we'd simply plug it in when we entertained since it was a novelty there.

For dinner last night, I grilled about a pound of fresh asparagus tossed with olive oil, crushed garlic and salt and pepper. While they were grilling, I fired up the grill's side burner and lightly fried two eggs in duck fat....sunny side up, basted with the duck fat, no browning. I threw in some diced prosciutto at the very end. Placed the runny eggs and prosciutto over the grilled asparagus and served to an appreciative husband who poured us a very nice pinot grigio. Some fresh sourdough bread from the Farmer's Market to sop up the plate. I like payoffs like this....a 5 minute effort with a very tasty result and very little clean-up.

This is a new show on BBC-America. Here's the setup: A real-life restaurant critic for The Times (of London) flies over the pond to revew restaurants in the US and Canada. His claim is that positive restaurant reviews in The Times can generate up to a million dollars for the restaurant. He visits 5 restaurants in a particular city and gives one of them a positive review (on Huff Post). The critic (Giles Coren) is likable and the show is quite entertaining; he can be a bit snarky about poor food or service, but not in an angry or vulgar way. Interesting to see him experience certain foods (softshell crabs) for the first time.

A very enjoyable and civilized cooking competition show. So far (I've seen 3 episodes), none of the personal drama and histrionics that are seen on most of the competitive cooking shows that are US-based. It's on PBS, so check your local listings.

Is it just us, or does everyone hate much of the hyperbole that accompanies Valentine's Day? You know, the "special" dinner restaurant menu (read: overpriced); the competition at the office for who-gets-the-biggest arrangement of roses; the pressure to buy a heart-shaped gift, never to be seen again after 2/15; the embarrassment at being at the corner drugstore's greeting card 'picked over' display on the way home from work that evening. Not to mention that if you lived in DC-Metro where we did for 30+ years, if you didn't make your VD reservation at an 'in' restaurant, you were SOL. Oh, the shame! At least 2 decades ago (been married for 4 decades), after never having a great meal for VD at a restaurant, we decided that VD is best celebrated at home, cooking a wonderful meal together. And lots of chocolate to follow. For us a much better choice than going out and feeling a bit 'on display' at restaurants where maitre d's hand out a small sad rose as if to compensate for the 30% hike in normal pricing. What do you do for VD??

An advance Heads Up to everyone.... March 14 (3.14) is Pi Day. Two years ago at my former home in Arizona, we hosted a Pi Day Party and invited friends to bring Pi's, savory or sweet. It was a fun foodie event. I was a bit worried that the 'sweet' Pi's would far outnumber the savory Pi's, but it all worked out. The savory Pi's that showed up included: Beef and Guinness Tamale Quiches Mini Pizza Pi's Caramelized Onion and Apple Tart Greek Chicken/Feta/Spinach

It's the best 'restaurant' show on TV... not all that shouting that other shows about restaurants seem to think is entertaining.

White Spinach Lasagna Bechamel sauce 6 cups milk 1 cup butter 1 cup unbleached flour salt and pepper 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg Spinach Filling 1/4 cup olive oil 4 garlic cloves,crushed 2 cups chopped onions 2 boxes frozen spinach wrung DRY 2 tsp. dried oregano 1 tsp. dried basil Ricotta Filling 1 lb ricotta cheese 2 eggs, beaten 1 1/2 cups parmesan cheese, freshly grated ½ small jar green pesto sauce 2 cups Italian blend cheese, grated 1 box no boil lasagna noodles Directions Make bechamel: Melt butter, whisk in flour and cook for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Gradually whisk in the milk, heat over medium until thickened (10 minutes). Remove from heat and add nutmeg and s&p to taste. Make the Spinach filling: Sauté the onions in the until soft and translucent, add garlic cook another minute. Stir in the spinach and spices and s&p to taste. Make Ricotta filling: Mix the ricotta, eggs, pesto sauce and the parmesan cheese together. Assembly: Oil a large deep lasagna pan. I made 4 complete layers, starting with the sauce, then the no-boil noodles, then spinach, then ricotta, then grated cheese. Lather rinse repeat x 4. Cover the casserole tightly with foil and bake at 350°F for 45 minutes. Uncover the casserole and bake for another 10 to 15 minutes until cheese is browned. Remove the casserole from the oven and let it rest for 15 to 20 minutes before serving.

I did not soak the no-boil noodles and they came out perfectly in the recipe. I will post the recipe under "recipes."

Here's my review of no-boil lasagna noodles. I used Barilla since that was the only brand available where I shopped. I made a spinach lasagna with a bechamel sauce; after removing from oven I let it sit for 20 minutes before cutting and the squares came out beautifully neat and 'clean'...they held together without any slippin' or slidin' on the plates. I used a deep pan and I made four layers of noodles, sauce, cheese and spinach. The no-boil noodles were a real time saver and they had a mouth feel closer to fresh pasta than the standard dry lasagna sheets which always struck me as a bit too thick.

Q: Are you planning to provide lunches for a school, where the staff will heat and serve? Or you planning to make meals for kids to tote to school themselves? If it's the latter, you'll need to develop menus that don't require a lot of reheating or last minute cooking. The grilled cheese sandwich on your sample menu is practically compulsory in school cafeterias, but I don't see how you can achieve a gooey toasty grilled cheese sandwich that's brought from home in a brown bag.

I like a touch of sweetness with foie gras....a dot of fig jam is nice.

I've never eaten them or used them and looking for tips, suggestions and warnings. We will be care-giving my 91 year old FIL for the coming week. It's challenging, yet rewarding (his regular caregiver takes the week off, so she won't burn out). Instead of our normal routine of one meal out per day, we're cooking 3 squares a day (at 91 he has a very healthy appetite). We're having 8 people over towards the end of our stay, to celebrate his 91st birthday. We are thinking of making a casserole and Martha Stewart's Spinach Lasagna with a bechamal sauce will please him and our vegetarian niece. The recipe calls for no-boil lasagna noodles, so this isn't a substitution. Because his BD will be busy and crowded, I wouldn't mind giving up the boiling of lasagna noodles, but am wondering if the time-saving will still produce a decent white lasagna.

I am lazy. I buy Dorot brand crushed frozen garlic at Trader Joe's. It is sold in little ice cube trays; grown on a kibbutz in Israel and thaws so quickly. I make fresh salad dressing every few days and it is the perfect texture and taste. My freezer always has several packs of this stuff.

Marinating beef is more common. While not a true brine, I personally use marinade recipes with lots of soy sauce, which is quite salty.

I use it to fry eggs. It complements the egg better than bacon fat. Not just good for breakfast eggs, but especially nice to have a duck fat fried egg atop fresh asparagus. When I can get quail eggs, I also fry in duck fat and serve over slices of baguettes with a bit of serrano ham.

Yo no se (I don't know). I googled some recipes and based on the taste profile as I recall it, Rick Bayless' recipe seems to be the closest. FYI, there's a typo/omission in his recipe; the 2nd item leaves out the important words, Ancho Chilies. Here's the link: http://www.rickbayless.com/recipe/grilled-fish-with-ancho-tamarind-sauce-and-eggplant/

Una margarita tamarindo, por favor! Very popular all over Mexico and very enjoyable. Tamarind is also commonly used as a base for a sauce that is served with fish, shrimp and chicken. I do not recall tamarind served in a hot beverage when we lived in Mexico (though the temperature there rarely called for a hot beverage).

This is one of those silly recipes that people always seem to like; when I serve it (It's my MIL's recipe), it's fun to have people guess the ingredients. 3 egg whites1 c sugar1 tsp vanilla14 Ritz crackers3/4 c walnuts1 c cream, whipped to stiff Beat egg whites with sugar and vanilla till stiff and glossy. Spray pie pan with PAM. Make crust by crushing Ritz crackers; lay them in pie pan. Cover with walnut pieces. Top with meringue, leaving a slight 'well' in the center. Bake 325 for 30 min. Cool, then top with whipped cream and serve.

Thx for the advice; we will have it at 7PM as the more we thought about having it in the afternoon, the more we feared it would be viewed as a kiddie party. And, as a non-parent but an aunt who entertained umpteen nieces and nephews, including them in 'adult' party situations is a good way for them to enhance their social skills and good manners. Of course this is assuming the adults are setting a good example

I moved earlier this year. Our new neighborhood is a mixed-bag of singles, young families, retirees. We have been invited to 3 parties since our arrival. Two were mid-afternoon weekend BBQ's, one was a 7PM wiener roast. All invitations were done via notes left on car and doorstep; this seems to be the MO here. We don't even know people's last names or phone numbers. This Valentine's Day is a Saturday and we'd like to host a Just Desserts Party. We've hosted these before in our old home and started at 7PM; there were no kiddies, all neighbors were retired or semi-retired and we knew most of them ate dinner around 6PM. But with kids in our new neighborhood, aged 5 to 14, plus mostly younger singles and couples, I'm not sure of the best start time. We never had kids, so we aren't sure of their eating times, bedtimes, etc. We don't want to exclude the kids. Opinions welcome re: would it be better to have a mid-afternoon dessert party or best to keep it an after dinner party? We like the after dinner party, personally, but Is it better to have kids all sugared-up earlier in the day vs. close to bedtime? When we've hosted after-dinner Valentine's dessert parties before, we always had a case of champagne and not certain that would be an appropriate mid-afternoon offering, though it is a holiday and people are welcome to BYOB (other parties in the neighborhood were BYOB). Don't want to walk around and 'poll' neighbors on what would work for them ... fearing a different answer from each home, plus many have odd work schedules and we rarely even see them.

Our NYE dinner is grilled rack of lamb served with a cherry chipotle sauce. The lamb is already slathered in marinade in the fridge as I type. Side of grilled radicchio with a reduced balsamic dressing. We're in FL this year in our new home and taking advantage of the warm evenings for outside cooking. Our NYD meal will be pork belly tacos with fresh cabbage slaw and salsa verde. Side of Texas caviar. No desserts nor heavy starches as we face the reality of the post-holiday bathroom scale.

I married young and knew little about cooking. My in-laws gave me a few cookbooks, good ones, by James Beard, Julia Child and Craig Claiborne. I looked at them, but all we could afford at the time were cheap hamburger (sold in those 5 pound rolls) and pancake mix. Like I said, we were young (19 and 20) and food was not a big deal to us. As we aged and as our careers/business flourished, we started paying more attention to food (we could finally afford to go to restaurants where you didn't order at the counter). Sometime in the 80's, my in-laws gave me subscriptions to both Gourmet and Bon Appetit (my FIL at age 91 still renews my BA). It was these magazines that brought out my interest in cooking. Maybe it was the slick presentations (as I recall the cookbooks were mostly line drawings of food). I made a point to make one recipe a week from one of the current magazine issues. I did this up until we retired in 2003. I still enjoy BA and probably make a recipe from their current issue once or twice a month.