Dinner! 2003

[Basilgirl]

Friday night:

Oven-braised pork chops with red onions and pears, from Lidia's Italian-American Kitchen, which I just checked out of the library today. I have to say, this one recipe, selected at random, impressed me greatly. I may buy the book based on it alone. And I say this even though I ate the dish without the garnish of reduced basalmic vinegar that is intended to provide an extra bite. I would have included the vinegar, but my reduction went too far. In the end, it resembled (and still resembles) volcanic rock. I may have ruined the pot.

SethG: I made this Sat. night. Same thing happened to me with the balsamic. It went from a slow boil to a blackened hunk of burnt concrete in no time. I sprayed it with that new Dawn power cleaner stuff and let it soak and it came right off my stainless steel pot. Otherwise, another delicious Lidia recipe.

[DaleJ]

Sunday evening dinner for six:

Homemade gravlax on pumpernickle

Pumpkin soup with Parmagiano

Reconstituted porcini and fresh mushroom frittata

New Zealand Souvignon Blanc

Stuffed pork loin (spinach, garlic, anchovy, bread crumbs) with roasted Brussels Sprouts

Homewood (Sonoma) Petit Sirah

Ice cream with Scotch and Espresso dust (this from an early Marcella Hazan book)

Grappa and homemade limoncello

[Priscilla]

Last evening, kaki fry, Japanese-style panko'd oysters, fried. Oyster dishes, a Thanksgiving season tradition, sorta, on account of the oyster/turkey dressing connection and all the Pacific oysters in the stores in support of same.

Also mung bean sprouts marinated in mirin, soy, grated fresh ginger, drizzle of sesame oil at service, nice organic green beans from the natural-foods supermarket with Torakris's sesame sauce, quick cucumber pickle, nice Nishiki rice from the cooker.

Copying what our favorite noodle house offers with its kaki fry, had okonomiyaki sauce as well as tonkatsu sauce on the table.

The Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau everybody's going on about over in Wine ... could've been worse, by a long shot, not worthless, and the label is beeyootiful, but here in CA, EVEN at Trader Joe's, I paid $8.99/bottle, a price point that sticks a bit in one's craw, when one is talking BN.

[torakris]

Tuesday night:

Thai style red curry with tofu and kabocha squash

Jasmine rice

avocado and red onion salad

[liamsaunt]

roasted salmon in a honey mustard garlic marinade, green beans with almonds, rice pilaf, sweet and sour carrots, chardonnay.

[laurel]

Saturday, dinner for two:

Spaghetti Squash Puttanesca:

Smoked Tofu:

Monday, dinner for six:

Butternut Squash Soup:

Tea-smoked Tuna and Salmon Eggs:

Roasted Brussels Sprouts:

Coconut Parsnips and Rutabagas:

Fava Beans:

Pumpkin Pie:

[bleachboy]

Home-ground hamburger with Iowa bacon and Kewpie mayonnaise (on a bun).

[project]

Put some of the 'Chicken Casserole' described above in a bowl,

warmed in microwave, ate with toast.

Onions should be cut into smaller pieces; it needs more salt

and lemon juice. Now that it's all cooked, it's darned

convenient. It's too rich to permit eating large quantities.

The vegetable flavor is nicely prominent, but so is the

chicken flavor. Even with reheating, the chicken is not

really overdone. With more salt and lemon juice to fully

'balance' all the flavors, there will be a lot of everything!

Net, so far, it's okay.

Note that in the making, reduced 6.5 quarts of chicken stock

to 3 C which would gel at room temperature. So, reduction was

to nearly a demi-glace. So, that's about all the chicken

stock flavor can expect to get into that much roux, milk, and

cream. This also explains why in this dish the chicken

poaching liquid is just white wine and water and not white

wine and chicken stock! Or, once I did this poaching with

stock and wine, did the reduction, and got something that

would NOT combine with roux! Or, small discovery: With way

too much gelatine, a liquid and a roux will not go together,

and an attempt to put them together will cause the fat to

separate out out right away! Some months ago, I did a thread

on this little discovery.

Should have mentioned, this chicken dish was adapted from:

Jacques Pepin, 'Jacques Pepin's Complete Techniques', ISBN

1-57912-165-9, Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, New York,

2001.

in particular, the recipe for "Chicken Pie", recipe 151 on

pages 384-386. I just took the filling and forgot the pie!

Pepin calls for small peas, and I intended to include them but

forgot!

There is a lot in common with the recipe I posted on the

thread for 'Coquille St. Jacques'.

Ate the same last night while listening to "Nessun Dorma!"

from G. Puccini's 'Turandot'. Extra credit in dinner music

points to any eGulleteer that can guess the probable source

last night!

[SethG]

SethG: I made this Sat. night. Same thing happened to me with the balsamic. It went from a slow boil to a blackened hunk of burnt concrete in no time. I sprayed it with that new Dawn power cleaner stuff and let it soak and it came right off my stainless steel pot. Otherwise, another delicious Lidia recipe.

I actually got my pot cleaned up, too, after soaking it for about 12 hours. The difficulty for me, at least, was that the vinegar bubbled up so much as it reduced. It was hard to tell what was going on beneath the bubbles. I kept removing it from the heat to check, and I know I had liquid down there just a couple minutes before it turned to rock.

Last night (Tuesday) was baked ziti, with ricotta and eggplant, again from Lidia's "Italian-American" book. Such simple comfort food, but so satisfying. I'll definitely be looking to buy the book.

We also had a salad.

[torakris]

Weds dinner:

cooking for my family of 5 plus 2 more kids

a big pot of cabbage soup with potatoes and onions and fortified with a healthy amount of bacon

menchi-katsu - a Japanese creation of a hamburger patty that has been panko'd and deep fried, served with okonomiyaki sauce

heated up corn (canned)-- my MIL gave my 3 cans of corn and I wanted to use them up

cucumber pickles with ginger (a purchased product)

Japanese rice

[dumpling]

Wednesday

Mixed green salad with feta and black olive dressing with pears and glazed walnuts

Veal osso buco with carrots and onions over Risotto alla Milanese, accompanied by young green peas.

Came out really just right- lovely and warming.

Apple crumble

All set for tomorrow?!?

Edited November 27, 2003 by dumpling (log)

[Suzanne F]

- "Product" -- our euphemism for purchased frozen crab cakes

- The best macaroni and cheese I've ever made: sweated shallots before making the roux; added lots of Old Bay, dry mustard, cayenne; 5 cheeses (neufchatel, 2 kinds of cheddar, Parmigiano Reggiano, Pecorino Romano); and a perfect crust of the grated cheeses plus cheese-cracker crumbs

- Plain steamed spinach

- Salad with romaine, radicchio, endive, and boston, plus home-roasted and -martinated peppers, and home-pickled artichoke hearts, dressed with the oil from the veg plus the spiced brine from the artichokes

- Roederer Estate sparkling wine (CA Champagne substitute) to celebrate that HWOE finished and delivered the first draft of one of the two books he's working on.

[torakris]

Well Thanksgiving has come and gone!

Since it isn't celebrated in Japan and my family doesn't care for most of the traditional dishes, I went for a Thanksgiving inspired meal:

sauteed chicken breasts with a cranberry salsa (with cranberries, red onion, orange sections, cilantro and jalapeno) this was incredibly good!

roasted potatoes with a chipolte mayo (homemade)

cornbread with whole corn added

pumpkin pie for dessert

[liamsaunt]

Wednesday: wild mushroom risotto, arugula salad, wine

Thursday: So much food. Two turkeys roasted with stuffing, another stuffing, sausage based, baked outside the bird, buttercup squash puree, mashed sweet potatoes with pecans, green beans with almonds, mashed potatoes (yes, lots of mashed vegetables here), roasted cauliflower, homemade bread, cranberry sauce, pinot noir, two kinds of gravy. For dessert: apple pie, pumpkin cheesecake. I think everyone except for me is already asleep from all of this food!

[fresco]

It's been pissing rain all day, very much like London weather. I had a particularly nice halibut fillet, so made, for the first time, fish and chips. No beer in the house, so I used cider in the batter. Turned out ok (wife says chips better than from local fish and chip shop.)

[mags]

Thanksgiving dinner at Washington Park, Jonathan Waxman's new place, and gawd was it good. Salad with prosciutto and roasted mushrooms of various kinds, then seriously great venison (none of us opted for turkey) partnered with mashed potatoes, mashed sweets, stuffing, and brussels sprouts gratin -- easily the best brussels sprouts preparation I've ever had, and I love my sprouts! And terrific pumpkin pie for dessert.

The only sad part is no leftovers, but since I'm trying to avoid starch as a rule -- and Thanksgiving, in general is a starch-fest -- this was actually part of the plan. But we ate at around five, and you know, a turkey-and-stuffing sandwich with some cranberry sauce on top would taste very delicious right about now.

[dumpling]

Thanksgiving dinner:

I was assisted by dishes from my sister and one of my friends. We had ten people.

Two salads-

mixed green salad

red cabbage, apple, walnut and pear salad

Butternut squash soup served in two sugar pumpkins

Sage and Rosemary Roast Turkey with sausage, apple, chestnut, sage and rosemary cornbread stuffing, some in bird some out. Also a veggie version. Turkey gravy.

Also some organic(no antibiotics) turkey.

Mashed potatoes

Extra squash puree topped with marshmallows

Cauliflower parsnip puree

Green beans and almonds with breadcrumbs

Organic cranberry sauce

Desserts:

Organic pumpkin pie

Pecan pie

Mixed berry pie

Assoted cookies

Bed is for sleeping. ZZZZZ....

Edited November 28, 2003 by dumpling (log)

[torakris]

Friday dinner:

saba no miso-ni (mackeral simmered in a miso sauce) with Japanese leeks

kiriboshi-daikon (dried daikon strips) with a kochujang, soy, sesame, chile, sugar, vinegar dressing

kimchee

kabocha salad, smashed with a little mayo, salt, sugar and a touch of cinnamon

cucumber pickles

Japanese rice

dessert:

the other half of yesterday's pumpkin pie

[zhangstah]

mom's still not over the cooking frenzy that she gets into around every holiday yet . . it's a chinese mother thing . .

tonight's din for 6 people:

- lamb and carrots stewed in light, clear broth

- tangcu paigu (directly translated: sugar-vinegar spareribs .. one of her specialties)

- tripe salad in mala sauce, szechuan style

- slaw of white turnips and carrots in sweet and sour vinaigrette (without oil)

- seafood medley in white sauce

- bitter melon sauteed with garlic and strips of pork

- broad beans stirfry with reconstituted japanese mushrooms of some sort (very meaty and 'mushroomy' . . delish)

all served with steaming bowls of white rice

there's no rhyme or reason to why the menu turned out this way . .she never actually plans for cohesion . . everything always turns out wonderfully though and somehow fits

[Priscilla]

Lessee, last evening, Alaskan King crab meat not eaten on Thurs ... potatoes, onion ... crab hash!

A fave, discovered in the PNW, which we'd not had for years seemingly. Have always had or made it with Dungeness, truly a superior crab, but the Alaskan King wasn't bad. Turned out very well, in fact, especially when topped with the Consort's perfect poached eggs.

Rye toast and VH1's Spice Girls BtM on the side. DeLoach Zinfandel, just so good.

[hjshorter]

Little pizzas with assorted toppings: caramelized onions, goat cheese, nicoise olives, artichoke & red pepper tapenades, sausage and mozzerella.

1998 Lan Rioja pulled from the basement collection.

[torakris]

Saturday dinner:

chicken thigh and hard boiled eggs simmered with a red miso, kochujang, soy, sake, mirin and sugar sauce

leftovers from yesterday

kabocha salad

kimchi

dried daikon strips with kochujang sauce

cucumber pickles

Japanese rice

dessert

orange and fresh cranberry biscotti

[Suzanne F]

mom's still not over the cooking frenzy that she gets into around every holiday yet . . it's a chinese mother thing . .

tonight's din for 6 people:

- lamb and carrots stewed in light, clear broth

- tangcu paigu (directly translated: sugar-vinegar spareribs ..  one of her specialties)

- tripe salad in mala sauce, szechuan style

- slaw of white turnips and carrots in sweet and sour vinaigrette (without oil)

- seafood medley in white sauce

- bitter melon sauteed with garlic and strips of pork

- broad beans stirfry with reconstituted japanese mushrooms of some sort (very meaty and 'mushroomy' . . delish)

all served with steaming bowls of white rice

there's no rhyme or reason to why the menu turned out this way . .she never actually plans for cohesion . . everything always turns out wonderfully though and somehow fits 

Wow, zhangstah: if that's what you get to have for dinner, please, please keep posting. Welcome

Tonight (saturday) we had:

Chicken broth (made yesterday/today) with fine egg noodles

Portobello mushroom caps grilled, then baked with a topping of own stems, pancetta, panko, parmesan, shallots, a little egg, and ricotta.

Roast garlic mashed potatoes.

Salad with mustard/garlic/dill dressing

Harwood (Australian) Shiraz, bought today at a wine store in our neighborhood that we never noticed before.

[Susan in FL]

Just wanted to mention that I love reading this thread... It's great for ideas, plus I've always been curious about what other people have for dinner.

Last night was pistachio-crusted grouper with mango and kiwi salsa, and an assortment of fresh baby vegetables. The food was great, but the Clos du Bois Chardonnay wasn't a very good match.

[torakris]

Sunday dinner:

Thai scallop salad (raw sashimi style scallops were tossed with lime juice, nampla, lemon grass, kaffir lime leaves, chiles, cilantro and mint) From Thai Food

wide rice noodles stirfried with komatsu-na and garlic with oyster sauce

tomatoes with salt and lime juice

dessert:

homemade chocolate cake