Dinner! 2009

[AVFOOL]

Since I started the topic about pork belly, I thought I may as well include a picture to show how it turned out.

Photo edited slightly to get rid of someone's hand about to grab the plate.

The pork (if I modestly say) was some of the nicest I've ever eaten. It's the first time I've cooked belly of pork before, so it's nice to discover how easy it is to feed a group of people.

Disappointed with the crackling. While it tasted good, it lacked the crunch crackling is supposed to have. I put the crackling back in the oven for a further 15 minutes but nothing seemed to be happening and people were arriving so I had to serve it.

Accompaniments were shredded spring greens, with diced apple and garlic, polenta mash and caramalised shallots with a creamy mustard sauce.

Pleased with the results but will have to work on getting that crackling right.

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Cook pork skin with fat on stove at low - medium to render all the fat and than let sit for a while until crispy.

[Knaw]

Mishmishiya (Tagine of Lamb with Apricots) from Claudia Roden's The New Book of Middle Eastern Food.

[KeystoneNate]

These pictures are all fantastic and look quite tasty! Thanks to everyone for sharing. I have a couple from last night - one of my wife's coworkers brought us a smoked trout back from a trip he had taken. So I needed a way to use it. Over the weekend we had a spinach and goat cheese salad with smoked trout and the remainder went into last night's dinner. I smoked a pork shoulder over the weekend, so I threw some of that in the hash as well.

Smoked Trout and Pulled Pork Hash with Fried Egg

Smoked Trout Brandade

[Peter Green]

Friends were over from abroad last night, so we called up our common acquaintances and got everyone back together for an evening.

The starter was a Thai salad of fresh greens and grilled tenderloin. Unfortunately, this was inhaled before I could get off a picture. The salad portion consisted of endives, romaine lettuce, dill, coriander, mint, and anything else that wasn't moving fast enough in the crisper.

The dressing was standard Thai. Palm sugar, lime juice, nampla, chlis. I deseeded the chilis to ensure that my guests didn't howl (too much).

Then we ran a palate cleanser, a G&T sorbet. A bit of honey in there to sweeten the basic ingredients, and the zest of three limes and their juice.

The main course was an attempt to clear out some of the freezer and pantry. I had the ink pasta sitting there for some time, so this seemed like the moment to use it up. A bit of parmesan shredded on top.

The salmon was one of the ones I hauled back from Vancouver in December, served on a bed of dill for the smell. I topped it with a bit of lemon, and poured a light drizzle of 4 year old balsamic through that.

The broccoli was there for the colour, and to clear the differing fats of the fish, the cheese, and the fuqaa (Arabian desert truffles).

The truffles we cooked lightly in butter. It's one of those flavours you don't want to mess around with too much.

[Kim Shook]

percyn – thank you, I’ll look for those noodles at our local Indian food store.

Dinner on Monday:

This was something called Bloody Mary Beef that someone at my office raved about. The beef was odd. The recipe was basically take stew meat, add some pearl onions, onion soup mix, flour, celery, bloody Mary mix, red wine – dump into a slow cooker and cook. That sounded like a good start to me, so I applied what I know: I browned the meat with some of the flour and Penzey’s French 4 spice, deglazed with some of the wine and reduced that. I added pepper and more onions than called for. When I tasted it after it was done, it didn’t taste very good – very flat and almost sour. This was Sunday and it was too late to eat dinner anyway (the recipe calls for lean meat and I should have known better, so it took a LONG time to get tender). The next night when I heated it up, it tasted MUCH better, but too salty due to the onion soup mix. I need to find out what that really ‘brings’ and sub something else. I also need to use some meat with some fat (like a pot roast) so that the meat ends up tender AND moist. It was very dry. Anyway, I think it’s worth playing around with. I served it on egg noodles with bread and salad w/ bleu cheese and Benton’s bacon.

[judiu]

percyn – thank you, I’ll look for those noodles at our local Indian food store.

Dinner on Monday:

This was something called Bloody Mary Beef that someone at my office raved about.  The beef was odd.  The recipe was basically take stew meat, add some pearl onions,  onion soup mix, flour, celery, bloody Mary mix, red wine – dump into a slow cooker and cook.  That sounded like a good start to me, so I applied what I know: I browned the meat with some of the flour and Penzey’s French 4 spice, deglazed with some of the wine and reduced that.  I added pepper and more onions than called for.  When I tasted it after it was done, it didn’t taste very good – very flat and almost sour.  This was Sunday and it was too late to eat dinner anyway (the recipe calls for lean meat and I should have known better, so it took a LONG time to get tender).  The next night when I heated it up, it tasted MUCH better, but too salty due to the onion soup mix.  I need to find out what that really ‘brings’ and sub something else.  I also need to use some meat with some fat (like a pot roast) so that the meat ends up tender AND moist.  It was very dry.  Anyway, I think it’s worth playing around with.  I served it on egg noodles with bread and salad w/ bleu cheese and Benton’s bacon.

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Kim, I think a carmalized onion confit with a touch of added salt would work, and maybe add some unsalted (or undersalted) beef stock and a pinch of sugar, instead of the soup mix .Also a good belt of Worcestershire sauce and maybe some celery seed or celery salt And yes to the fattier roast! HTH!

[Ce'nedra]

keystonenate: Your egg is PERFECT. Love the artistic leaf on top.

Peter: You know what, I've never had ink pasta before (not quite sure if this strange or not). Does it taste any different from the norm? Also, does it stain your teeth? haha

Kim: Perhaps the flavours didn't turn out right this time but still, you always present some of the loveliest looking comfort food. Something I would love to snuggle up to in bed (of course I'm talking about the food).

Dinner for me was spring rolls served with vermicelli, lettuce, cucumbers, bean sprouts, herbs and pickled carrots. Nuoc cham was drizzled on top.

Really delicious but most of the spring rolls burst open when I was trying to fry them unfortunately (carefully hidden in this picture...of course). I shall blame the brand of the spring roll wrapper.

[Peter Green]

Peter: You know what, I've never had ink pasta before (not quite sure if this strange or not). Does it taste any different from the norm? Also, does it stain your teeth? haha

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It can leave a goth tinge around the teeth, but what's interesting is the hue it imparts to my wooden spoons.

Still, it's not as bad as the black rice stains.

[Domestic Goddess]

Ce'nedra - it's easy to make black ink pasta. Just add several drops of squid ink to your fresh pasta, knead until the color is distributed evenly and then cook the same way as you would with regular pasta. My mother would make arroz negra (squid ink rice) and bihon negra (squid ink rice noodles). The latter is a favorite of my brother where the savory black sauce is complemented with the addition of squid rings all throughout the noodles. We've always got fresh squid ink (from the squid heads themselves) and never tried the bottled ones. The squid ink adds a distinctive flavor to the pasta/dish/meal.

[percyn]

Nate - Nice egg on trout hash

Yesterday I made a version of Bul Go Gi - topped it with some sriracha after the picture was taken.

[Octaveman]

Lemon Pepper Shrimp

[Prawncrackers]

I should be packing because we're moving house in a couple of days (yay bigger kitchen) but procrastinating is my forte! I've been running down the freezer, here are some dinners from the past couple of weeks.

Venison liver with marsala sauce, champ mash & venison heart salad. The liver was so-so, not as nice as calves, but the the heart was tasty.

Pizza pie, with Tallegio & Goats Cheese, Olives, Anchovy & Rocket.

Herb Crusted Rack of Lamb, Red Wine Sauce, Purple Broccoli & Jerusalem Artichokes (hiding!):

[adey73]

Prawn if you had a trace of human dignity you'd invite us all round for supper

Looks great as ever, you flash brummy b'stard!

[Prawncrackers]

Cheers Adey you Northern tosser!

[Kim Shook]

judiu – thanks for the ideas. I put all of your advice with your recipe on my webpage, so that I can use it when I do this recipe next time.

Ce'nedra – thank you so much! I appreciate hearing that. My favorite food to cook is approachable food. I have been accused of cooking intimidating food, so it’s really nice to hear that it looks comforting to someone who is knowledgeable about food! Now, I would really like to approach those spring rolls! They look wonderful.

Prawn – good luck on the move (I know we’d all love to see pictures of the new kitchen!) and I am in awe of your middle of packing meals. My family would be lucky to get delivery if I were in the middle of that!

Tonight we made two dishes that my dad and stepmom make and recommended to me. . The first was an orange-walnut salad with a paprika sweet & sour dressing. Really good salad – Daddy does it composed rather than tossed and it’s a beautiful salad – Bibb, Romaine and spinach with mandarin oranges, dried cranberries, toasted walnuts and feta cheese:

The main course was what they call “Paprika Chicken”. It’s a Cooking Light recipe that they’ve adapted. Basically braised chicken thighs with potatoes, carrots, onions and green beans. Not really a stew, but it makes a nice, thick and really flavorful sauce. I served it with a good, crusty baguette:

[dockhl]

Kim~

that salad looks right up my SO's alley (hmmmmmmmmmmm.............sounds a little risque ! )

"paprika sweet & sour dressing"

Can you tell me about this? I love anything paprikash, so you have hit my sweet spot tonight

[C. sapidus]

We marinated thick T-bone steaks with soy sauce, black pepper, and mashed garlic; grilled the steaks, and then rested them in a warm oven. Most of the family simply devoured the steaks plain. Elder son is playing two sports at the moment, so he polished off two steaks (one per sport, presumably).

The children ate a salad of sliced cucumbers, Romaine lettuce, and halved grape tomatoes, topped with ranch dressing. After the youngsters had take their share we mixed in sliced lemongrass and shallots, torn mint leaves, and a dressing of pureed cilantro stems, chiles, garlic, lemon juice, palm sugar, white pepper, and fish sauce.

For starch, I cooked coconut rice and Mrs. C whipped up a tasty fingerling potato salad. My plate: steak salad and coconut rice.

[Kim Shook]

Kim~

that salad looks right up my SO's alley (hmmmmmmmmmmm.............sounds a little risque !  )

"paprika sweet & sour dressing"

Can you tell me about this? I love anything paprikash, so you have hit my sweet spot tonight 

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Here's the recipe for the salad and the dressing. Hope you like it.

[NadyaDuke]

This is my first post to this thread - so this may be cheating as we took a picture BEFORE cooking:

This is the material for Garlic Crusted Steaks with Broccolini. My husband signed up for Weber's weekly recipe, and sends them to me when he likes the look of them. This turned out well, and the wine ('02 Archery Summit Red Hills Estate Pinot Noir) was fabulous.

[dockhl]

Kim~

that salad looks right up my SO's alley (hmmmmmmmmmmm.............sounds a little risque !  )

"paprika sweet & sour dressing"

Can you tell me about this? I love anything paprikash, so you have hit my sweet spot tonight 

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Here's the recipe for the salad and the dressing. Hope you like it.

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Thanks, Kim. Looks perfect !

[suzilightning]

friday night was soup night around here. for johnnybird it was clam chowder with garlic bread for dunking.

for me it was barley vegetable soup with a yummy(but bad photographed) grilled cheese made with grated cheddar and gruyere.

last night was gumbo as linked here in the Gumbo cookoff

Edited March 15, 2009 by suzilightning (log)

[judiu]

judiu – thanks for the ideas.  I put all of your advice with your recipe on my webpage, so that I can use it when I do this recipe next time.

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Wow! Thanks for the props, Kim!

[Ce'nedra]

Ce'nedra - it's easy to make black ink pasta. Just add several drops of squid ink to your fresh pasta, knead until the color is distributed evenly and then cook the same way as you would with regular pasta. My mother would make arroz negra (squid ink rice) and bihon negra (squid ink rice noodles). The latter is a favorite of my brother where the savory black sauce is complemented with the addition of squid rings all throughout the noodles. We've always got fresh squid ink (from the squid heads themselves) and never tried the bottled ones. The squid ink adds a distinctive flavor to the pasta/dish/meal.

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Ahh thanks for the tip! What's it best served with -meat wise?

This is actually from a few days ago. I love the subtle, clean taste of this noodle soup (hu tieu). Anyone know what these eggs are actually called?

They're obviously not yet developed enough to be laid. The texture is fabulous! We often have this noodle soup with quail eggs but those are sooo expensive and these are a really good alternative.

The meat you're seeing is char siu.

[johnnyd]

St Patrick's Day means New England Boiled Dinner at our house in Maine USA.

Flat-cut Brisket - simmered 3 hours,

Parsnip, Rutabaga, Carrot, Potato, Cabbage - added final 1/2 hour

Garnish (okay, smothered) with Sauce Albert - White sauce, horseradish, mustard, cream

[Jamon.Iberico]

Ce'nedra - it's easy to make black ink pasta. Just add several drops of squid ink to your fresh pasta, knead until the color is distributed evenly and then cook the same way as you would with regular pasta. My mother would make arroz negra (squid ink rice) and bihon negra (squid ink rice noodles). The latter is a favorite of my brother where the savory black sauce is complemented with the addition of squid rings all throughout the noodles. We've always got fresh squid ink (from the squid heads themselves) and never tried the bottled ones. The squid ink adds a distinctive flavor to the pasta/dish/meal.

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Ahh thanks for the tip! What's it best served with -meat wise?

This is actually from a few days ago. I love the subtle, clean taste of this noodle soup (hu tieu). Anyone know what these eggs are actually called?

They're obviously not yet developed enough to be laid. The texture is fabulous! We often have this noodle soup with quail eggs but those are sooo expensive and these are a really good alternative.

The meat you're seeing is char siu.

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That is gorgeously vibrant! Well done!