Dinner! 2008

[Dr. J]

Matthew Grant where did you get that Wagyu Ribeye from, that is one of the finest steaks i've ever seen?!  Mind you Suzilighting's cote de veau (?) is not bad either, it's like choosing between Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn!!

This weekend, i've been reprising some old favourites.  Friday was Tea smoked duck with a new sesame soy dressing (similar to a tempura dipping sauce - with bonito, mirin, soy, sesame etc).  This was really delicious, the dressing lifting one of my all time favourite dishes to a new level:

Saturday, was fresh crab linguine:

Sunday, i had to reprise the reprisal!  Friday's duck was so good i had to take another breast out of the freezer straight away to cure and cook it again.  This time with more dressing and the addition of fresh mild red chillies:

Salty, sweet and very savoury:

Ever cooked something that was so good you just had to cook it again straight away? 

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Very, very nice prawn..... Since you went twice with the dish and were that impressed, can we get some more details or proportions on the dressing?

[Prawncrackers]

Sure thing Dr J, i remember posting the recipe for the duck itself last year on another forum here. The new dressing goes like this; bring to a simmer 4tbl light soy, 2tbl mirin, 4tbl water, three finger pinch of bonito flakes, 1/2tsp sugar and 1/2 star anise. Take it off the heat and let it steep for 10-15 minutes. Strain off the bonito flakes, to the liquor add 2 or 3 finely sliced scallion whites (use the greens to garnish), a heaped tbl of toasted sesame seeds and a dash of toasted sesame oil. Warm through to take the rawness out of the onions. That's it, make sure it's cooled a little before spooning it over the sliced duck breasts. There should be plenty for 2 large breasts. Please give this one a go, i promise you won't be disapponted! Maybe you'd make this dish twice too?!

[Lisa2k]

Oh god, this thread is so hard to look through, as I want to eat every single one of your meals. Some serious talent and love go into these dishes. OK, I better stop before I drool all over my keyboard.

Having said that, do some of these recipes end up in the Recipegullet? I need to make/eat them!

Finally, based on the 5-spice sauce chicken drumsticks photo I saw above, I threw together a marinade of whatever I had on hand, including oyster sauce, soy, ginger, toasted sesame oil, 5 spice , light brown turbinado sugar, sambal, loads of garlic, shallots etc, and immersed (with a lot of inside-out rubbing) a 6 lb roasting chicken into it. I can't wait to get home and roast it whole, serving it along with some garlic stir-fried baby bok choy and anything else interesting I come up with, depending (again) on what I have on hand. I'll post some photos if it works out well.

Edited April 21, 2008 by Lisa2k (log)

[percyn]

Percyn, you may want to take a look at this recipe for chilli crab, with an accompanying video of a the chef making it in his restaurant.

I've been meaning to post a link to that site for a while. It accompanies a terrific TV show we have down here that follows the host around Australia talking to people of various cultures preparing their own regional cuisines. I should warn you, you can watch a lot of time disappear on that site.

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Thanks DrTim, this site has one of the easier recipes for Chili crab and I spent an hour browsing the other recipes.

[Bella S.F.]

We made MiFi's Seven Hour Roasted Lamb yesterday. If you want to see what it looked like, check out his picture on P.736, post 22076. I wanted to take a picture but we just sort-a put it on the plate and started eating. It was really wonderful.

We had put it in the oven right after breakfast at about 10:00. By 11:00 I was starving. the smell was amazing. Spent the day hungry. I did add lots of garlic cloves, whole shallots, as well as baby artichokes that I had trimmed and cut in half. They were really yummy. The onions, garlic, and shallots sort of all melted together, which of course contributed to the great flavor. Maybe next time I need to put in much larger pieces of onion also so that they will be retain their "onion-ness".

Just a marvelous meal. Thank you so much, MiFi!

[Priscilla]

Ahi cutlets, an ongoing exploration: Last evening panko'd, served on top of Swiss chard braised in cream w/double-smoked bacon and a little shallot. Crispy romaine salade w/Balsamic and olive oil. LBB little baguettes.

[Stefferdoos]

Tonight it was bibimbap. Or, at least my version of it.

I used sirloin marinated in Korean BBQ marinade, lettuce, zuchinni, rice, egg, bean sprouts, carrots , scallions and cukes that I pickled in some rice vinegar, soy and Siracha (I should have done the same with the sprouts I think).

Plus a liberal amount of this:

And all stirred up to one yummy mess.

Honestly, I love that paste so much sometimes I just steam some rice and mix it in along with some lettuce.

Edited April 22, 2008 by Stefferdoos (log)

[SobaAddict70]

Ramp risotto

Not recommended if you're watching your weight.

[Lisa2k]

Spicy Red Roast chicken with coconut-saffron basmati rice, spiked with diced red rocoto chiles. Stir fried garlic baby bok choy and roasted peppers, with a light soy-sesame oil drizzle. Messy plating, but pleasing to the palate.

Also, I made a batch of Korean BBQ Pork buns to snack on today. They're like Char Sui Bau (chinese pork buns), but glazed and baked instead of steamed, just like the ones you find in the Korean bakeries.

I REALLY need a better camera. I currently use a Vivitar digicam. Can anyone recommend a good digital camera that isn't too OTT expensive?

Edited April 24, 2008 by Lisa2k (log)

[Ted Fairhead]

Having Kim (Shook) of blogging fame, visit us meant that I had to come up with a fairly good dinner!

So I made a meat pie with some Angus sirloin we had in the freezer

She gave it a thumbs up.

[tupac17616]

A couple of recent dinners, a couple of bad photos

Asparagi alla milanese, roasted cauliflower with grapes

Pan-roasted chicken leg with mashed sweet potatoes, mushroom duxelles, and asparagus

[Stefferdoos]

Having Kim (Shook) of blogging fame, visit us meant that I had to come up with a fairly good dinner!

So I made a meat pie with some Angus sirloin we had in the freezer

She gave it a thumbs up.

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Did you use some of that bacon she brought you in it as well?

[petite tête de chou]

Having Kim (Shook) of blogging fame, visit us meant that I had to come up with a fairly good dinner!

So I made a meat pie with some Angus sirloin we had in the freezer

She gave it a thumbs up.

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Are you sure it was beef in that pie and not four and twenty blackbirds? Love the pie funnel.

[Sabrosita]

Ramp risotto

Not recommended if you're watching your weight. 

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Holy heck! I just finished breakfast and this is already making my mouth water.

[Domestic Goddess]

This was my dinner last night.

It was cold and chilly and perfect for... Pork Sinigang (Pork Tamarind Sour Soup)

I added kangkong (water spinach), tomatoes, onion and peeled taro root to the soup. It was hot, sour and very tasty. Perfect to chase the chill in the air away.

[monavano]

Frittata with asparagus, ham and smoked gruyere.

Spinach salad with warm bacon dressing.

Baked rosemary potatoes.

[Shelby]

Frittata with asparagus, ham and smoked gruyere.

Spinach salad with warm bacon dressing.

Baked rosemary potatoes.

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Such a perfect spring meal!!!

I just picked our second batch of asparagus.

I'm bummed. I have a lot of dinner pics to share, but I can't get ImageGullet to work for me. I can't figure out what the heck is wrong

[rooftop1000]

I took a 4 pound rib roast that I bought around Easter out of the freezer, and forgot to invite anyone over for dinner

So I cut it in half, generously salted it, and dropped onto a very hot grill with a probe set for 128

Small russet potatoes par-nuked along side and waited...and waited

A couple of 2 pound steaks take a while to cook.

Around 120 degrees I went to flip the potatoes and discovered I was out of propane

Isn't carryover wonderfull? Steam some broccoli and eat....

We had 1 steak the dog had 1 bone, tomorrow Fahitas!!

tracey

Edited April 25, 2008 by rooftop1000 (log)

[menuinprogress]

It was cold and chilly and perfect for... Pork Sinigang (Pork Tamarind Sour Soup)

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Beautiful! What cut of pork did you use?

[Prawncrackers]

I'm bummed.  I have a lot of dinner pics to share, but I can't get ImageGullet to work for me.  I can't figure out what the heck is wrong 

Maybe you had the same problem as me. I could not for the life of me load my usual 600-700kb images, just kept getting a blank screen - not even the usual error message. Tried Firefox & Opera, finally i tried a samller (~250kb) image and that worked.

[Shelby]

I'm bummed.  I have a lot of dinner pics to share, but I can't get ImageGullet to work for me.  I can't figure out what the heck is wrong 

Maybe you had the same problem as me. I could not for the life of me load my usual 600-700kb images, just kept getting a blank screen - not even the usual error message. Tried Firefox & Opera, finally i tried a samller (~250kb) image and that worked.

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Yeah, that's what it does to me! It acts like it's downloading and then goes to a blank page. I'll try doing smaller ones. Thanks for the tip.

[Domestic Goddess]

It was cold and chilly and perfect for... Pork Sinigang (Pork Tamarind Sour Soup)

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Beautiful! What cut of pork did you use?

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I think it was from the backside. And it was pretty cheap too, about $7 for almost 2 kilos worth of meat.

[Prawncrackers]

A couple of fish dinners this week. First up was seared Fillet of Sea Bream, Roasted Tomato & Fried Polenta. The fish with the tomato was nice, the polenta with tomato was good too. But the fish with the polenta just didn't work for us!

Tonight was Roasted Monkfish, crushed Jersey Royals, Baby Leaf Salad, Saffron Scallop Sauce. This one was a winner all round

[David Ross]

Roasted Monkfish, crushed Jersey Royals, Baby Leaf Salad, Saffron Scallop Sauce.  This one was a winner all round 

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This dish is a stunner! Very nice indeed. Can you share the Saffron Scallop Sauce with us?

[David Ross]

Last night was an experiment-"Fried Calamari with Green Goddess Sauce."

I experimented a bit with the breading on the Calamari. I used a mix of Corn Flake crumbs and cornstarch. While the breading turned out o.k., the calamari weren't as crunchcy as they are when I use my regular seasoned flour mixture. Next time I'm going to experiment with a panko mixture for the breading.

My Mother used to buy Green Goddess Salad Dressing, I think Wishbone brand, when I was a kid in the 60's-70's. For some reason, a few years ago as I approached 50, I turned back to many of the foods of my youth. I searched and searched for Green Goddess and couldn't find a single bottle in any major market. I've found it in specialty markets, but it doesn't taste anything like what I remebered.

A few years back I found a recipe online and I've been using it ever since. This time I added some extra "green" to the Green Goddess by adding some cilantro. I added a bit more tarragon vinegar than I prefer, but the extra tang in the dressing helped cut through the richness of the fried calamari and those butter-dipped breadsticks you see in the background. Enjoy.