Dinner! 2003

[Schielke]

Do you find Aidell's sausage dry? Scott always complains whever I buy lowfat sausage, so I haven't tried it yet.

Your cornbread looks delicious! What recipe do you use?

Aidells is great sausage - not at all dry - a tad expensive though about $7.00 for 4 sausages...Here is their web site...

http://www.aidells.com/

The cornbread was a mix from Trader Joes - and its one of the best cornbread mixes we've eaten and it was very inexpensive - like $1.69 for the box...

Check out costco for a good price on Aidell's sausage. I forget how much I paid, but it was for a large pack with about 10 sausages in it. I dont recall it being expensive either.

Ben

[GordonCooks]

Sunday turned into Italian -

Pan roasted Cauliflower with pancetta, red pepper flakes, and oregano.

Salad of Arugula, baby spinach, maytag blue, cumin toasted walnuts, and crisp (unripe) green pears. Just dressed with EVOO and reduced balsamic

Stuffed pork tenderloin with spinach, garlic, sun-dried tomato, pine nuts, and crimini mushrooms.

Left over Sugo Pomodoro and Ziti

Dessert

Crepes with Sweet Marscapone, bananas, and chestnut honey.

Polished of a couple bottles of 96 Barolo and some Moscato

[torakris]

Monday night:

All from David Thompson's Thai Food

Tom yam gung (hot and sour prawn soup) this was quite good, but i thought the shrimp looked very lonely all by themselves so I added some eryngii mushrooms

Grilled Eggplant salad with steamed eggs this was very, very good! one hint after grinding the roasted chilli powder DO NOT take a big whiff to see what it smells like! My nose is still burning

Fried rice with crab, OK don't really need a recipe for this but it was great!

Dessert:

Ice cream leftover from the day before

[Miss J]

A casual egg & veg meal:

Cubes of butternut squash, strips of red pepper, minced garlic and freshly ground coriander sauteed until nicely caramelised, then combined with rocket and beaten eggs and stirred until it formed a softly set eggy- veggie mass. Served with croutons fried in EVOO and a spoonful of sambel olek.

I am SO getting into eggy dinners.

[Rhea_S]

Roasted asparagus, artichokes and grape tomatoes tossed with some potato gnocchi and flavoured with garlic and lemon zest. A tangerine for dessert.

[Priscilla]

Sounds good, Miss J. Eggy dinners are where it's at, I think. Last week sometime had a late-night pick-up meal of salad with goat-cheese croutons topped with poached eggs. Hardly anything better.

Noting the asparagus cooking going on here.

Last evening, couple of guests, couple of CAB self-styled London broil(s), rubbed with sage and rosemary, garlic and salt and cracked pepper that the Consort had reduced to a nice paste with the old mortar & pestle. Plus a little olive oil. Grilled over mesquite, nice dark crustiness all around with a red middle when (thinly) sliced.

ASPARAGUS risotto, made the fahncy way with pre-blanched, shocked, etc. asparagus stirried in ever so carefully at the end, rather than the homely bung-it-in-after-the-onions cook it to a fare-thee-well way I also like. Carnaroli continues its hegemony among Italian rices on my pantry shelf.

After, Romaine salad with walnuts, goat cheese, walnut oil, etc.

Banana-Gorgonzola gratin, as per Toby as per Margaret Pilgrim. Sorta shockingly good, really.

[Liza]

Another bitter cold market day so a big pot of potato, leek and onion soup. Ciabatta with prosciutto and mozzarella from DiPalo's. Por moi, individual linzer tart; por M., chocolate truffles - from the new Ceci-Cela on Chambers Street.

[torakris]

Tuesday dinner:

sprouted mung bean soup with sesame seeds and a splash of sesame oil

panko breaded and deep fried fish with lemon wedges

wild mushroom salad with lime-nampla-cilantro-mint (from Thai Food)

chijimi (Korean savory pancake) with garlic chives and pork served with a kochujang-soy-sesame dipping sauce

crab kimchi --tiny whole crabs about the size of a large thumb, kimchi-d, this was purchased

[JAZ]

After the mention on the Prune restaurant thread of the roasted bone marrow with a parsley and caper salad (and the mention in Ivan's latest episode), I decided to try my hand at recreating it, even though I've never actually had it.

We spread thje marrow on toasted slices of sweet batard with grated aged gouda sprinkled on one side.

Served it with roasted new Yukon Gold potatoes tossed with some roasted garlic grapeseed oil and salt.

No idea if I was close to the original version of the dish, but this was awfully good.

[Miss J]

Worked at home until the wee hours last night, so ended up eating porridge with maple syrup, linseeds and a drizzle of double cream for dinner, and an apple for dessert.

I felt like a student again.

[torakris]

Weds night, still working from Thai Food:

laab --served with red leaf lettuce and cucumbers for scooping

rice noodles with chicken and Chinese broccoli

leftover crab kimchi

1/4 of a head of tuna (given to us by my FIL), sprinkled with salt and pepper and broiled

[FoodMan]

Tuna Salad Sandiwches, Albacore White Tuna/celery/olives/lemon juice/garlic/evoo/s&P in homemade Ciabtta bread with sliced boiled eggs and sliced tomatoes and lettuce. Adapted from the latest F&W magazine.

FM

[SobaAddict70]

I haven't been cooking much lately -- been consumed by work, but hopefully that will change soon.

Saturday: Pici with chicken livers, garlic, sweet peppers, and EVOO. [herbed fried bread crumbs]; sauteed escarole, with EVOO, caramelized onions, red pepper flakes, fennel seed and raisins; Lurisia fizzy mineral water.

Midnight snack: raisin biscotti, almond spice tea.

--------

Last night (after waking up after a sleep marathon from a 27 hour day): Pastrami hero (roasted red peppers, romaine lettuce, pastrami, salami, Virginia ham, sliced red onion, cranberry honey mustard, sliced plum tomatoes, all on a nice baguette), a couple of half-sour pickles, LOTS of Poland Spring. Then went off to bed -- I didn't wake up until this morning.

*sigh*

This had better be over by Friday.

Soba

[Marlene]

Last night for the first time, I made a Prime Rib roast using my new all-clad roasting pan and the convection oven method. First of all, the pan rocks. Conducted the heat beautifully, and there were lots of nice crispy bits on the bottom of the pan. It made a terrific au jus. I have fallen in love with convection roasting and will never roast any other way. I am a serious roaster. I roast something a minimum of twice a week. Until last night, I have never been able to duplicate that nice outside crusts that restaurants do. Last night's beef was brown and crispy on the outside, and beautifully rare-med-rare on the inside. It was, quite simply, awesome.

For dessert, I made Toby's Buttermilk Chocolate Fudge Cake with Ganache. Thanks to several hints and tips from Suzanne F and Sandra Levine, the ganache turned out beautifully. It was the first time I'd attemped a ganache as a frosting rather than a glaze.

My guests were most impressed.

[Simon Majumdar]

Slightly incongruous mix

Started with Gambas Pil Pil

Followed by Toad in the Hole

Not a normal combination I grant you, but it hit the spot

S

[Rhea_S]

Panko-crusted pork chop with chipotle-glazed apples

Simple salad of baby greens

Fresh pineapple with salt for dessert

[awbrig]

Fresh pineapple with salt for dessert

??

[Wimpy]

QUOTE 

Fresh pineapple with salt for dessert 

??

This makes perfect sense Awbrig. Salt brings out the sweetness of the pineapple even more. It's done in the Philippines all the time (pineapple country). You should try it sometime. Anybody care to explain the science?

[SobaAddict70]

Can't explain the science, but we do this with mangoes and papayas all the time as well.

Soba

[Suzanne F]

Makes sense: as salting watermelon, or combining watermelon and feta (if you haven't tried that, DO!!!).

Glad it worked out, Marlene. Now I know I MUST get convection when I replace my stove. That crust on a roast is the best part! Let us know when you do a chicken :drool:

[Rhea_S]

Makes sense: as salting watermelon, or combining watermelon and feta (if you haven't tried that, DO!!!).

I didn't like watermelon when I was younger and only became a fan after trying watermelon and feta. If no feta is at hand, salt does just fine. I salt almost everything.

[torakris]

Thursday night dinner:

the last day of my Thai Food marathon

pomelo salad --this was actually so bad it wasn't even touched, the dried shrimp was overpowering.

kamja namul --stirfried potatoes with a soy-kochujang sauce sprinkled with shiso (Ok this was Thain but i just got a new book Essentials of Asian Cuisine and had to try it out. Wonderful the kids really loved it)

cucumber salad with a sesame dressing (Ok this wasn't Thaineither but since the pomelo salad was so bad I needed something to make up for it, and this was quick)

the hilight of the evening (everybody turn your books to page 358)

salmon and roe salad-- this was incredible (and the picture does it no justice) --a piece of salmon is marinated then left to dry, later it is seared to rare (I used a griddle pan) then flaked and tossed with nampla, lime, sugar, chilies, shallots, mint, coriander, peanuts, and salmon roe.

This was the kind of dish that you eat in a restaurant and then go home and just can't get it out of your mind, so you end up at the restaurant agin the next night thinking you would never be able to create it at home, well the good news is that you can and it is relatively simple.

This may very well be my dish of the year!

Anyway to dessert:

Mia, Julia and I made some cookies very highly adapted from their new children's cookbook.

We cut shapes (flowery) out of frozen puff pastry, then with a rolling pin slightly falttened them while at the same time coating the bottoms with a mixture of crushed hazelnuts and sugar. These were then baked and then after cooling the plain side was spread with nutella and and another cookie was palced on top.

These wer really good!

[FoodMan]

-Chicken Tikka

-Cilantro and Tomato Raita

-Brown Rice

FM

[Varmint]

Roast chicken with fresh thyme, Maple View Dairy butter, and lotsa garlic

Jim Dixon's roasted beets

Sea bean risotto

If you have never had sea beans before, they're quite amazing. I almost consider them to be the vegetable version of caviar -- a great bite of sea salt flavor. They were perfect in the risotto.

[torakris]

Friday night, my husband had a dinner meeting so I made a quick dinner for the kids and I:

iridofu --"scrambled" tofu with green beans, carrots and dried shiitake seasoned with soy-sugar-dashi

liver and garlic chive saute

Japanese rice

dessert:

bought icecream