Dinner! 2012

[rarerollingobject]

RRO – when you do your BBQ tour, let me know. I’ll join you for the NC section! That is actually something that I’d love to do, too. I was raised on central NC BBQ, but I have absolutely no prejudices about BBQ – I love it all: beef, pork, chicken, sauce/no sauce/tomato-based sauce, NC, TX, SC!

...

Not to go off-topic, but I think it would be great if a few eGulleters could get together and do a BBQ crawl. I signed up for a KCBS (Kansas City BBQ Society) judging class next week, just for fun and would love to sample BBQ from various regions.

Happy to rent a luxury coach for the roadtrip.

Y'all come on to Memphis and Little Rock and points in between. I will SHOW you barbecue.

How awesome would that be..percyn, keep me posted if this pans out into an actual thing. What's 15-20 hours flight time for BBQ??

I spent the afternoon in one of Sydney's Vietnamese enclaves, Cabramatta. I found these fantastic rice crackers; I've only seen these in Vietnam. Banh trang me tom, rice crackers with dried shrimp and sesame seeds.

I wasn't sure how to cook them so the lady in the shop told me to microwave them for 60 seconds on high..dubious, I did and it worked perfectly.

Also bought some nem nuong from one of the butchers; ground pork pre-marinated in lemongrass, garlic, black pepper, sugar and fish sauce. Made them into patties, grilled them and gobbled them up with some carrot quick pickle, mint, basil and nuoc cham (fish sauce and water seasoned with sugar, chilli, garlic, rice vinegar, and lime juice). You break off bits of the rice cracker to use as a scoop. Delightful.

Edited April 9, 2012 by rarerollingobject (log)

[rod rock]

@SobaAddict70 This looks good , now i got idea for tonight

[Franci]

robirdstx Beautiful pizza. Do you use a pizza stone?

Made my first dish with homemade preserved lemons last night. Moroccan in inspiration but modern in execution (although mostly cooked in the tagine).

Very nice looking! I have two jars of preserved lemon from last june, need to use before making a new batch.

Love your scallops Soba, that's what I'm going make tonight.

RRO, I'm sure I'd love those rice crackers. And I could dip almost anything in nuoc cham, it one of my favourite sauces.

Yesterday, for Easter, we had a bigger meal at lunch as customary for Italians.

I made Ottolenghi Artichokes, mozzarella with candied lemon, which we really enjoyed

Then I roasted two lamb shoulders, one simple with garlic, rosmary and anchovies, the other stuffed, a recipe from Stephan Reynaud. The first won other the stuff by far. I served with more artichokes from Ottolenghi. This, not bad but I'm not sure I'll make it again.

At night we had leftover lamb with turnips. I made a very good lamb glaze from a lamb stock I made the day before.

[C. sapidus]

Franci – looks good as always

Rare RO – Vietnamese tacos!

Pork picadillo tacos – leftover pulled pork with raisins, slivered almonds, and fried onions, tossed with a fried sauce of chipotles, tomatoes, roasted garlic, black pepper, cinnamon, and cloves. Served on corn tortillas.

Guacamole – our usual, made in the mortar with Serrano chiles, garlic, and lime juice.

[kayb]

RRO – when you do your BBQ tour, let me know. I’ll join you for the NC section! That is actually something that I’d love to do, too. I was raised on central NC BBQ, but I have absolutely no prejudices about BBQ – I love it all: beef, pork, chicken, sauce/no sauce/tomato-based sauce, NC, TX, SC!

...

Not to go off-topic, but I think it would be great if a few eGulleters could get together and do a BBQ crawl. I signed up for a KCBS (Kansas City BBQ Society) judging class next week, just for fun and would love to sample BBQ from various regions.

Happy to rent a luxury coach for the roadtrip.

Y'all come on to Memphis and Little Rock and points in between. I will SHOW you barbecue.

How awesome would that be..percyn, keep me posted if this pans out into an actual thing. What's 15-20 hours flight time for BBQ??

Seriously. You can fly into Memphis, which is a Delta hub. I can meet you. We will hit Cozy Corner for the barbecued Cornish game hen; Central because it's a favorite of the masses, and pretty damn good; then Interstate, because, well, it's Interstate and it's iconic. Then we'll head down to Jones in Marianna (latest James Beard American Classic award winner); over to DeValls Bluff for Craigs (Allegedly the best in the state, but I'll contest that), Little Rock for Sims (Carolina-ish mustardy sauce), down to Hot Springs for McClards (I'm not all that about it, but it's Bill Clinton's favorite), back up to Jonesboro for Couch's (GOOD stuff), over to Blytheville for Dixie Pig, and back down to West Memphis for Roadside before you head back to the airport. It would be a barbecue pilgrimage. Three days, much pork. Give me details on time and I'll happily lead the group.

And this is probably in the wrong topic at this point, so if it moves, I'll go with it. I'd like to see this happen.

[nikkib]

Just delicious looking food everyone!

[Rico]

Pork picadillo tacos – leftover pulled pork with raisins, slivered almonds, and fried onions, tossed with a fried sauce of chipotles, tomatoes, roasted garlic, black pepper, cinnamon, and cloves. Served on corn tortillas.

Guacamole – our usual, made in the mortar with Serrano chiles, garlic, and lime juice.

Geez, Bruce - those look amazing! That's a fantastic photo.

[Paul Bacino]

Just delicious looking food everyone!

Yeah..not easy to look at these great meals in the AM

Thanks

Paul

[SobaAddict70]

Thanks folks.

Indian last night, because I had some green beans that I needed to use up, along with some wonderful spring kale from USGM...

Green beans and kale bihari masala, basmati brown rice

I don't cook Indian as often as I'd like to. That'll be changing soon...

S.

[Franci]

Tonight I made some experiments.

I was going to fry my usual fish (anchovies and red mullets) so I decided to puff some pasta and some rice (chinese go ba). I also had some leftover spaghetti, which became a frittata di spaghetti. And a crudite platter.

[FrogPrincesse]

Dinner tonight: grilled Delmonico steak with goat butter and fresh thyme; grilled asparagus with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and shaved Parmigiano Reggiano Stravecchio; arugula salad; country levain bread.

[Kim Shook]

Robirdstx – thanks for the sausage info – I’ve saved a link in my favorites to order sometime. It sounds like something that both of us would love. Your pizzas are super and when I saw your gratin, it made me wish that I’d insisted on making it for Easter.

Stash – Your beautiful spring dishes are one of the things that I always look forward to this time of year.

Paul – I’ve added mashed potatoes to fish cakes, but not crabcakes. Good idea! I’ll be trying that this summer.

Elizabeth – that romanesco rising from your plate is really rather unworldly looking.

Kate – your delicious looking nem nuong sent me scurrying for a recipe. I really want to taste those patties!

Easter dinner this year was at 3pm and was, as I said in another thread, a potluck this year. As I suspected, a potluck saves a bit of money, but doesn’t save much in the way of work and aggravation! If you are the host, you still have to clean and prep and set up a bar, etc., etc. And people are STILL late. Luckily, the family that was an HOUR late wasn’t bringing anything really vital – just some vegetables . Seriously, though, it was a very good meal and we all had a great time. The menu included (didn’t get pictures of everything):

CI’s Apple Cider Baked Ham:

The flavor and tenderness and moistness of this ham was wonderful – I will definitely be using this recipe again. The ham itself was a problem. Carving was a giant PITA – I’ve never seen a ham with more stuff (it looked like silverskin) running through it. After carving around those sections, we ended up with very few decent sized pieces and lots of almost bite sized pieces. From online pictures, I’m pretty sure that we had a shank end ham, but from the description of the meat itself, I’m just not sure.

Smoked lamb w/ minted goat cheese:

Mr. Kim smoked and I did the goat cheese. The lamb was perfect – tender and juicy and NOT overcooked. Everyone raved about it and said that it was some of the best lamb they had ever tasted (just like year before last!). I eat so slowly that I ended up with stone cold lamb on my plate and even then it was amazingly tender. The minted goat cheese was an idea that I stole from Ocean Blvd. restaurant in the OBX. It was a perfect accompaniment to the lamb – tangy and minty. I’m not a big fan of bottled mint sauce and don’t like mint jelly at all, so this was a great improvement.

My mother’s potato salad :

MIL’s scalloped carrots:

A friend brought green beans and sweet potatoes. Another friend brought the deviled eggs. My SIL brought a gorgeous fruit tray (I’m still working on that). Jessica made what is probably my very favorite salad:

It’s that Asian salad with Napa cabbage and toasted Ramen noodles.

I did Michael Ruhlman’s Buttermilk Rolls:

Always a success for me. They are HUGE, though. These were 3 oz. (an ounce smaller than the directions call for), and they were STILL enormous! I baked them just slightly short of done on Saturday and covered them with foil. Then on Sunday, I baked them until they reached the correct temperature. They were perfect. I had an extra couple of pans (I doubled the recipe and ended up with 30 rolls) and heated one up on Monday night and they were still great. I love this recipe so much. Best compliment ever? My MIL who is a champion baker (literally – she’s won contest and state fair 1st place ribbons for her yeast rolls), asked me for the recipe!

My MIL’s GF Lemon angel food cake:

Surprisingly good – I’d never have guessed GF.

I did Rainbow cookies:

Very, very cute, but I want to make them so that they look like the ones in the internet post about them. I love that each section of the coil is distinct and I love the crisp edges on the colors.

I did my usual carrot cake bars:

So good – even people who don’t usually like dessert like these.

I also did some GF Brownies for my niece:

My niece liked them and was happy to take them all home with her – I thought they were gacky – not much chocolate flavor and wet!

An adorable Red Velvet cake that my friend made:

My dad and stepmom were here for a couple of days after Easter. The first night they were here I served Jessica’s Asian salad:

And tagliatelle w/ Bolognese sauce along with some cheese topped chicken that was braised in the sauce:

I do not find pasta to be very photogenic. At least not the way I take pictures.

[rotuts]

Kim: your lamb looks delicious and perfect. and followed by carrot cake?

what could top that!

[Panaderia Canadiense]

Kim, I'm still swooning over your lamb... (pause to wipe drool from keyboard....)

And I love Romanesco, it's my favourite alien vegetable ever.

[eldereno]

Kim, the carrot cake bars are not listed in the recipes on your web page. They look delicious and my husband loves carrot cake. Can you share?

[Kim Shook]

Thanks rotuts and PC - I'll pass your lamb love on to Mr. Kim!

eldereno - I laughed when I read your comment because I had the damndest time finding the recipe myself. I always call them Carrot Cake Bars, but the name of the recipe is actually Frosted Carrot Bars .

[heidih]

I spent the afternoon in one of Sydney's Vietnamese enclaves, Cabramatta. I found these fantastic rice crackers; I've only seen these in Vietnam. Banh trang me tom, rice crackers with dried shrimp and sesame seeds.

RRO - are they not magical and tasty?! I used the black sesame ones to scoop of ceviche here. I have also had them served with traditional Vietnamese chicken salad - Goi Ga.

[patrickamory]

Really enjoying FrogPrincesse's delmonico steak and Kim's lamb... not to mention Kim's mother's potato salad.

I'm a bit behind here, but we had Persian food three nights ago.

The jujeh still on their sword-like skewers:

Another tahdig (of course!), but prepared by a slightly different method:

Side dish was simple - leeks with butter and chervil:

The kebabs on the plate with the lovely fluffy rice:

(My involvement in the cooking was strictly limited to the leeks.)

[mm84321]

Found a beautiful Dory yesterday. A 4 pounder, from Montauk. Decided to debone it and roast it whole for some friends of my parents.

Chilled asparagus soup

Dory, garbanzo beans, spring garlic

Veal cooked for 25 hours, mashed potatoes

[dcarch]

I have not posted in the past many days.

I am amazed by the incredible display of gastronomic wizardries by everyone.

Been very busy with work, getting the garden ready for spring and income tax obligations. So please pardon my enjoying your work but not commenting.

I did take time to prepare an Easter meal.

Sous vide leg of lamb on hosta shoots from my garden.

Asparagus with oyster mushrooms.

Real wild rice with tapioca.

Strawberries with cream filling.

dcarch

[heidih]

Real wild rice with tapioca.

That sounds like a nice different contrast. How did you treat the tapioca pearls - boiled in a seasoned broth and folded into the rice or??

[dcarch]

Real wild rice with tapioca.

That sounds like a nice different contrast. How did you treat the tapioca pearls - boiled in a seasoned broth and folded into the rice or??

In deed, I wanted to add some complexity to a simple wild rice dish by giving it a contrasting texture. The tapioca was simmered in clam juicy then folded into the wild rice. The clam taste makes it appropriate to serve the dish in a sea shell.

dcarch

[mm84321]

dcarch Are those chive flowers on the asparagus dish? Are they from your garden. Mine haven't produced any yet.

[rarerollingobject]

Well, I feel silly following the amazing meals of Patrick, Kim, mm84321 and dcarch with THIS..but hey, someone has to.

Here's the diametric opposite of those meals' precision and beauty; a big plate of squid grilled Japanese-style, which is to say, skin on and served with lemon and Kewpie mayo. And more than one cold beer.

[dcarch]

dcarch Are those chive flowers on the asparagus dish? Are they from your garden. Mine haven't produced any yet.

Those are from my lawn. No they are not chives. I had found out that they are edible a few years back, but have since forgotten the name. The flowers open during the day and close during the night. May be someone can tell the name.

rarerollingobject, those of us who have tried to cook squid can instantly tell that your squid is a dish of beauty. Totally amazing in the exact timing in cooking. There is a very narrow window between overcooking and raw squid. Beautifully photographed too.

dcarch