Dinner! 2003

[tommy]

an omelette with leftover duck confit and a drizzle of truffle oil (the cheap kind).

[Alex]

Sautéed chicken livers deglazed with fig balsamic vinegar.

Butternut squash with spinach and corn

2001 Yangarra Park Cab Sauv

Ginger tea, zinc lozenges, vitamin c, garlic, echinacea

[Jinmyo]

Assorted salumi and olives.

Ziti with a wild mushroom cream sauce and rosemary.

Aqua cotta (traditional Italian peasant tomato soup with bread dumplings) topped with some braised crispy pork belly.

Salad of cecci with artichoke bottoms and parsley.

Pecorino and prosciutto with a drizzle of balsamico trad (gold label).

[FoodMan]

Roasted chicken with sage leaves under the skin. Roasted on top of sweet potatoes and Cippoline onions tossed with olive oil S&P and brown sugar. Made a sauce out of the drippings and juices with some Red wine. the sauce was excellent and mildly sweet.

Elie

[torakris]

didn't cook Friday thru Sunday

Monday night:

pork gyoza

nira gyoza

Japanese rice

[Malawry]

Vegetarian sausage subs with a tangle of winy julienned onion, mushroom, red bell pepper

Big butterleaf salad with nubbins of goat cheese and soaked dried cherries

[Placebo]

Seared duck breast in a wine and pomegranate reduction served with a balsamic/evoo-dressed mixed green salad with fgresh herbed chevre and port-marinated figs. Drinking a $10 Rhone.

Edited November 4, 2003 by Placebo (log)

[Malawry]

Pan-fried catfish rubbed with homemade cajun seasoning, per my school final

Grits cooked in roasted veg stock, spiked with Tabasco and smoothed with a little cream cheese

Tomato beurre blanc

Dessert: sauteed pink lady apples drizzled with dark caramel sauce

[hjshorter]

I went to the asian market near us and got a big bunch of holy basil and a pound of great shrimp, so dinner tonight:

Kasma Loha-unchit's Kao Pad Gai Kaprow, with shrimp instead of gai

Steamed asparagus with a soy-sesame sauce

Jasmine rice

[hillvalley]

Roasted organic purple potatoes and garlic with a baguette to sop up the evoo and garlic with......

[torakris]

Tuesday dinner:

takikomi-gohan (rice cooked with salmon, daikon, and ginko nut)

kaiso (seaweed) salad with tofu and a shiso dressing

miso soup with satsumaimo (Japanese sweet potato) and onion

[Jason Perlow]

Sichuan Shredded Beef with Green Beans in Pepper Sauce, adapted from various recipes in Fuchsia Dunlop's "Land of Plenty"

[Chad]

Seriously thick (3") pork chops stuffed with andouille sausage and cornbread. Served with ciabatta, green beans & carrots and the rest of the andouille cornbread. Pork chops were browned in butter/olive oil on the stovetop & finished in the oven.

Lesson learned -- don't wet the cornbread too much. I was afraid that the stuffing would dry out in the oven, so I used about 2T of chicken stock to wet it down before stuffing. Way too much. I didn't take into account how much the chops themselves would drip into the stuffing. It tasted great, but the texture was off. Next time no wetting (or a teaspoon at most).

Chad

[Priscilla]

Cool, Chad. Izzat Fiestaware I see?

Last evening, leftover lobster kicking around. Leftover lobster, yawnyawnyawn.

Lessee, Reservoir Dogs to watch, ongoing rewatchment of the catalogue in advance of seeing Kill Bill. Solitary but sizeable Mr. Stripey tomato from the remaining garden vine. Several slices of Niman Ranch uncured bacon. Portuguese sweet bread made by me the other day. Nice Romaine.

Lobster Clubs!

And Reservoir Dogs.

[fimbul]

Last night's dinner was a lot of fun:

-- Roasted duck legs with tangerine-duck juice served with caramelized star fruit

-- julienned red and yellow peppers glazed in a bit of lemongrass-scented duck broth and served sprinkled with slivers of raw scallion.

-- Spinach salad with red endive and a soy-lime dressing.

[Basilgirl]

So I picked up pupusas at the store the other day. I had never seen pupusas in a regular old grocery store, so naturally I bought them. They were a "product of El Salvador." The Boyfriend had never had them so I figured I'd lay them on him. Last night, took 4 pupusas, layered with some roast pork I had in the fridge and a little Salvadoran fresh cheese I picked up at said grocery store, topped each with another pupusa. Had made the coleslaw awhile earlier ("curtido" - my favorite coleslaw for any meal - well, maybe not NC BBQ). Anyway, griddled the pupusas to heat up/melt cheese. Turned my back for one minute, turned around and - as The Boyfriend exclaimed, it was a "sea of cheese."

I think I'll let the professionals handle the pupusa situation from now on.

[torakris]

Only two more days until payday!

Finishing my week of cleaning out the freezer and cupboard

Weds. dinner:

grilled hoshi-saba (semi-dried mackeral)

soramame (like fava beans) and carrot shira-ae (tofu and sesame dressing)

dried shiitake and konnyaku simmered in a soy-ginger sauce

chirimen-sansho furikake (baby sardines and Japanese pepper)

Japanese rice with 5 grains blend added

[laurel]

Sunday, dinner for 2:

Stuffed Squash:

and leftover black cod from last week.

Tuesday, dinner for myself after a trip to Viet Wah:

Pea Vines:

Okra in Black Bean Sauce:

Broiled Smelt:

[Malawry]

Last night:

Seared ginger-glazed pak choy

Stir-fried shrimp and assorted veg over rice

Gyoza

I tried brining the shrimp. Worked well, but then I didn't back off on the soy sauce to offset the brine so the finished dish was a little oversalted. Better luck next time.

[torakris]

Only one more meal until we have money again!

Thursday dinner:

chicken thighs baked with 20 garlic cloves, lots of lemon slices, gaeta olives, wine and chicken stock

served over couscous with sauteed cabbage and red onion

potato salad made with purple potatoes and regular ones with EVOO, white wine vinegar and basil from the garden

[Malawry]

Tonight:

Butternut squash-filled raviolis with brown butter and fried sage

Wilted spinach salad, red bell pepper and purple onion, balsamic vinaigrette

Rose Levy Beranbaum's Cake Bible pound cake with sauteed apples, vanilla ice cream, and dark caramel sauce. Thanks, Heather, for loaning me the book, if the rest of the cakes are half as good as the pound cake I think it's a worthwhile resource to have around.

[Rachel Perlow]

I've been having a spaghetti craving recently, so yesterday Jason and I made meatballs. Yum. They were made with turkey, which was fine, especially seasoned with lots of fresh parsley, grated provelone and parmesean cheese, a little fresh basil and oregano, half a head of minced garlic, stale breadsticks whirled in the food processer (subsequently moistened with a little milk), and some dried thyme, oregano (has a different flavor from fresh, don't ya know), salt & black pepper, and one egg. Oh, and a little bacon grease to make up for the fact that I was using turkey and not pork or beef. Used a disher to make uniform balls, then rolled in my hands and baked in a hot oven for about 40 minutes, then simmered in a canned tomato based sauce for about a half hour.

The provelone and thyme was a very nice addition to the meatballs, they added a unique flavor that worked with the turkey. We tasted a meatball after baking, before simmering (baking the balls was inspired by Jerry's Pizza in CT), and it was very good, but I prefer the tender texture that simmering them yields (Jerry's doesn't simmer the balls in sauce after baking). The baking was way easier and neater than frying the meatballs prior to simmering. They only had one flat side (as compared to when I shallow fry them and they sometimes get cube or pyramid shaped ), and I deglazed the browned bits from the sheet pan with a little of the tomato sauce. I suppose I could have also used wine, but I had already poured a cup of red wine into the sauce, the tomato sauce worked well enough -- didn't want to lose any of that browned flavor, yum.

There's plenty of meatballs left. I think we'll make some grilled meatball sandwiches in our Toast-N-Serve Magic Bags for lunch.

[Priscilla]

Last evening, having some ragu Bolognese kicking around gave me the idea to make a run on something I'd seen Mario Batali make on Mario Eats Italy, sartu, a pielike affair with layers of this & that inside a rice case. One of those stuffed/wrapped/encased dishes whose cutting open symbolizes the revealing of God's mysteries.

Here's the Food Network recipe link. (Looks like it's due to be re-shown November 14 at 4:30 a.m.)

I used tortellini (dry, Barilla; not bad at all) rather than penne for the pasta/besciamella/peas layer. My favorite layer was the fried eggs. The Consort's and the 12-year-old's favorite layer was the sausage.

The whole shebang blessedly released from its baking vessel -- of course the fear with such preparations is that after all that layering and baking and so forth a broken mass of divergent ingredients will result when turning-out time comes. But all was well.

Very nice Romaine salad with balsamic vinaigrette, even though I usually eschew balsamic vinegar in favor of the regular-type stuff. But it suited the flavor profile of the menu, with straight lively olive oil flavor in there, too. Emulsified LAMF, too, as per my ongoing application of Jackal's instructions from his eGCI class on non-stock-based sauces.

[Basilgirl]

Weds. night: oven-fried chicken chunks (Cook's Illustrated - not bad, not great) on mixed greens with blue cheese and bacon , Trader Joe's Vidalia onion dressing

Last night: Stouffer's 5-cheese pizza - not into the kitchen thing - could have been the long rainy commute home or the few beers to take the edge off

Tonight: Lidia's new-style chicken parmigiana and pasta aglio/olio

[torakris]

Hopefully this was our last of the cooking from fridge melas

Friday night:

too lazy to be creative

dry curry, I think this might be a Japanese invention, though I have no idea -- ground pork, green peas, onions, carrots simmered in a tomato-curry powder--worchestire sauce, they are simmered until there is no sauce left thus the "dry" in the title

served over Japanese rice

coleslaw with cabbage and carrots and a mayo-vinegar dressing

dessert:

pecan bars