Dinner! 2010

[Aloha Steve]

Steve - Aloha! I did make a couple of substitutions when I made the cornbread. I already had bacon fat on hand so just coated the pan real well, about 3 Tbs., without having to cook more bacon. And I used shortening (Crisco) for the vegetable oil. I used the minimum amount of sugar. Be sure to get your skillet really hot in the oven before you add the batter. My cornbread was done, using the toothpick stuck in the middle method, after 25 minutes.

Ooops, bacon...I did not see that and I found Keri C's own post LOL

Got the Crisco and will use the minimum sugar amount. Will make sure to get the skillet hot and have a toothpick on hand.

Thanks again.

[mgaretz]

Tonight's dinner was Tandoori Chicken with salad and basamati rice. I didn't use any food coloring in the chicken so it's not the traditional red color.

[Blether]

Tonight's dinner was Tandoori Chicken with salad and basamati rice. I didn't use any food coloring in the chicken so it's not the traditional red color.

It looks to be nicely cooked, though. I use paprika for color (2-3T for a 2.5lb chicken) - it gives a nice brick red; real cochineal is no problem but some of the yellows fail the 'natural' or safety test too badly, for me.

[mgaretz]

Tonight's dinner was Tandoori Chicken with salad and basamati rice. I didn't use any food coloring in the chicken so it's not the traditional red color.

It looks to be nicely cooked, though. I use paprika for color (2-3T for a 2.5lb chicken) - it gives a nice brick red; real cochineal is no problem but some of the yellows fail the 'natural' or safety test too badly, for me.

Thanks Blether. I added some paprika hoping for some red - used about 1 tsp for two skinless breasts and two skinless thighs. Guess it wasn't enough, but I have decided I don't care if it's red - it tasted good. And while there was some char, the chicken was moist and tender - something you rarely get in a restaurant. Cooked it all on the grill - 6 minutes per side on indirect medium heat, then another 3 per side on full high direct heat for the char.

[Kim Shook]

Bruce – I love the looks of the shrimp in the tomato cream sauce (and, of course the forbidden – to me – rice).

Shelby – ok, I’ll ‘fess up. Those pierogies are frozen. Mrs. Somebody's. I just cook them like frozen potstickers (yeah, I use them, too ) – plunk in a pan with a little water and oil, cover and cook until soft and then uncover, turn up the heat to evaporate the water and brown (sometimes I add a little butter at that point). But I did caramelize my onions for-EVER!

robirdstx – we did manage to get out of the neighborhood to go to work on Monday. I’ve lived here on and off since 1978 and I’ve never seen this much snow here. Since I am a snow freak, I am actually jealous of Washington DC !

Last Sunday, we went out for a little while to do some shopping, but didn’t stay out long. I spent the day making soup:

My mother’s vegetable soup

and beef vegetable. Most of the beef went next door to thank the neighbor who dug us out of what the plow dumped in front of our driveway (before we even got up!)

We didn’t go anywhere for game watching, so I made us a treat:

two little lobsters. I tried out two versions of lobster rolls – cold w/ mayo and celery and hot with just butter. We preferred the cold, but I’m thinking that if we’d been able to get REALLY good lobsters, we’d have liked the hot better.

Our ‘feast’:

Lobster rolls, various chips and dips and trashy old meatballs w/ BBQ sauce and apricot preserves.

Last night’s dinner was some of the vegetable soup with some Parmesan shavings:

And a lovely little bread, egg and cheese concoction called Grilled Swiss Toast (or “Šveitsi võileivad”) that Pille posted some time ago:

This is basically just bread, hard boiled eggs and cheese baked in the oven until the cheese melts. Delicious and perfect with the soup.

[Shelby]

OMG Kim, I've never seen that grilled toast before. I've got drool all over my chin now! The veggie soup looks sooooo good, too.

[Kim Shook]

OMG Kim, I've never seen that grilled toast before. I've got drool all over my chin now! The veggie soup looks sooooo good, too.

Here's Pille's recipe on her blog and here's the recipe on my website.

[robirdstx]

Chicken and Noodle Soup. Boneless chicken breast and thigh meat poached in chicken broth and shredded, red potato, carrot, celery, onion, garlic, chicken stock, kosher salt and black pepper, and homemade egg noodles.

[mgaretz]

Last night's dinner was grilled salmon with an orange-honey mustard-port wine glaze. Served with steamed Yu Choy and salad (not pictured).

[C. sapidus]

Thanks, Kim, and sorry about the rice. Looks like you manage just fine without it, though. Suddenly, I have a hankering for lobster rolls . . .

mgaretz, orange honey mustard port wine glaze sounds delicious.

In my continuing quest to avoid the grocery store and snow-crazed food hoarders, I cleaned out the pantry for a kinda-sorta-subcontinental meal. I had stocked up on frozen shrimp when they were on sale, and finished the last of the shrimp tonight. Pity, I love shrimp.

Pakistani shrimp curry: The sauce was fragrant with onions, garlic, ginger, cumin, and ground coriander; rich with tomato and coconut milk; and spicy with black pepper and cayenne. Just before serving we folded in chopped chiles and cilantro for a fresh, green jolt of fragrance and chile heat.

Green peas pulao: Cumin, green cardamom, stick cinnamon, cloves, a bay leaf, and chopped onion fried in ghee. Peas briefly sauteed, and then everything steamed with soaked basmati rice.

Naan: Store-bought, baked, and rubbed with ghee. Boys made monstrous Indian tacos, and awarded 8s and 9s for the meal.

[Doodad]

I made a kind of deconstructed beef stroganoff. Thin sliced top sirloin roast quickly grilled, mushroom ravioli on the beef and all topped with an onion/paprika sour cream sauce. It was very good and cut back on the cream and pasta which were my wife's concern.

[mgaretz]

mgaretz, orange honey mustard port wine glaze sounds delicious.

Thanks Bruce - I almost always do this with salmon these days, though I'll usually use whatever red wine is open and a little extra sugar in place of the port. This time no red wine was open so I used the port (which is almost always open). The recipe was designed with Zinfandel originally.

[David Ross]

Last night dinner was Broiled Salmon with Teriyaki Glaze and Spicy Chinese Pickled Cucumbers.

The teriyaki sauce is very, very easy-

1 1/2 cups soy sauce, (I use low sodium soy sauce)

1/3 cup sake

6 tbsp. sugar or honey

2 cloves finely minced garlic

large knob fresh ginger, minced

Boil the ingredients and then turn the heat down and simmer the teriyaki sauce for about 30 minutes. I like to strain out the ginger and garlic so the sauce is smooth.

It's not a sticky, thick teriyaki like the bottled sauces, but it tastes much cleaner and fresh.

[C. sapidus]

David, how did you make the spicy pickled cucumbers?

Just the boys and I tonight, so we enjoyed a simple, bacon-laden dinner. Spaghetti alla carbonara (Bittman’s recipe); green beans with bacon, onion, and parsley; and bread.

[David Ross]

Start the pickled cucumbers a day before you want to use them. I use the long, English cucumbers, mainly because I like their texture and the look of the outer skin, but there really isn't any reason to not use a basic cucumber.

Cut a cucumber in quarters and then in about 2" lengths. Leave it with the skin on. I started with a Chinese recipe that called for seeding the cucumber but for the finished dish, I found it too much trouble to seed the cucumber, (and in this dish I prefer the appearance of chunks of raw cucumber with the skin and seeds).

You put the chunks of cucumber in a bowl and cover with about a teaspoon or so of Kosher salt and let it sit for a half hour. The cucumber will leech some water and take in a little salt. Drain and pat the cucumber dry and put in a large bowl.

Heat about two tablespoons of toasted sesame oil in a hot wok or frying pan and toast about a teaspoon of Szechuan peppercorns and 2 or 3 dried red chiles in the hot oil. Let the oil cool to warm and pour it over the cucumbers. Add about 2 tablespoons of minced fresh ginger, 2 cloves of minced garlic and 1/2 a finely diced fresh jalapeno pepper.

The recipe called for a pickling brine of 1 1/2 tablespoons of rice vinegar and 1 1/2 tablespoons of sugar. 1 boosted the rice vinegar to 2 tablespoons and added 2 tablespoons of low salt soy sauce and whisked that together with the sugar and tossed it with the cucumber ingredients, covered the whole lot and refrigerated it for a day before serving it with the teriyaki salmon.

I figure these fresh pickles will also go well with some grilled black pepper chicken I'm planning on for dinner later this coming week. There sweet, sour, cool and very spicy. I think next time I'll add some julienned strips of sweet red and green bell pepper.

[Blether]

Great-looking teriyaki, David.

Kim, I love your beef & vegetable soup.

I tried making winter seafood terrines with uni and ankimo (monkfish liver):

(uni porn):

This is the first time I've cooked ankimo, 'the foie gras of the sea'. I used a standard mousseline for the terrines, and used the egg yolks in a lemony mayonnaise.

I planned to make separate uni and ankimo mixtures, and fold the (small volume) uni into the ankimo for a 'ripple ice cream' effect. I was surprised when the ankimo blended down to a vivid coral pink rather than the beige I'd expected. In the end there's not much colour contrast, and I made one pure uni terrine (bottom right here) and the rest (two shown here) ankimo with a barely-visible swirl of uni. Bottom left, this one thought it would be able to release from the terrine if the oil-brushing was coated with parsley. It was wrong.

Conclusion: ankimo's a powerful flavour to serve this way. Seasoning ? Portion sizes ? Accents in an ordinary fish terrine ? A work in progress. On the uni side, well, you can't beat good uni, nor at that price should you able to.

Dessert:

Seasonal Mikkabi mikan (mandarin oranges from central Japan) and unseasonal bananas, with ginger-honey syrup and black pepper.

Edited February 14, 2010 by Blether (log)

[Kim Shook]

robirdstx – lovely soup! You make me want to get out the stock pot and start some chicken soup myself. Mr. Kim would faint away, though, since I made it recently and I NEVER cook the same thing twice in 6 months !

Mark – I agree with Bruce – that salmon sounds fantastic!

Bruce – Wow. My make do meals NEVER come out so lovely! And carbonara…I need to remember to make that soon. I love it and haven’t made it in years.

Dinner tonight was salad:

just iceberg w/ bleu cheese. I actually think that bleu cheese dressing is really good on cold, crisp iceberg.

Sorta Fajitas :lol: :

I asked for advice on another board about using flat iron steak and two people suggested fajitas. Someone else suggested a sour orange marinade, so I put the two ideas together. I mixed up a fajita rub and added some Penzey’s dried orange peel. I sliced the meat and rubbed the pieces with the mixture and let it sit for a couple of hours. About an hour before cooking, I added sliced onions (I didn’t have any peppers but would have added them if I had had some) and some orange champagne vinegar. It turned out very well.

I served the “fajitas” with baked potatoes:

I also made Michael Ruhlman’s Buttermilk Cluster Rolls:

They were delicious.

[Pilori]

King Crab legs were on sale today at Whole Foods! Took advantage....

And the girlfriend made some French bread!

Edited February 14, 2010 by Pilori (log)

[Blether]

It's still winter today, and there are, err, plenty more fish in the sea. Bruce, I too think your carbonara is beautiful, and you've given me the perfect lead-in for somthing I've been threatening to do for a long time, 'unibonara' - replacing the cheese with uni, and the pancetta/bacon with smoked fish:

The other flavours are tsubure (soft) umeboshi (the milder honey-cured variety) - that would be lemon juice and salt if unavailable; a teaspoon of grated parmesan per person; white wine; salt, pepper and of course garlic.

Japan is not good for smoked fish. I picked up these smoked and (mercilessly) dried hokke from Yoshiike supermarket at Okachimachi. They're so tough I soaked them first in the wine for half an hour, and they're sweet - I might have gained by knowing at the shop that the characters for sweet, 甘 ama and grass, 草 kusa combined read 'kanzou' and mean licorice, but the only alternative available anyway was fatty smoked salmon belly. I went with it and it worked, though surely better options exist.

The garnish is of course a piece of uni, with kizami nori - julienned nori. The nori wilts too fast and I don't think I'd do that again - better Italian or ordinary parsley, or in Japan some mizuna or similar.

The flavour, though, is utterly fantastic - you can take that to the bank.

Edited February 14, 2010 by Blether (log)

[percyn]

Good meals all!

First, delayed Super Bowl eats -

Nachos

Chili Cheese Dog (w/guacamole)

Wings

Meals from this week -

Korean Tacos (Bul go gi w/kimchi like pickled vegetables)

Steak, mashed sweet potatoes, hericot verts, mushrooms

[percyn]

I tried making winter seafood terrines with uni and ankimo (monkfish liver):

Very nice Blether.

Does that say 680 yen for all that Uni? How much did it weigh? In the US 80g of Uni runs between $20-$30 based on the quality and is typically only available via distributors or your sushi chef if you know hem well.

A few months ago I made a lobster and uni custard and it was delicious. Took almost a whole tray of A grade Uni though (besides a few pieces I could not resist eating as I was making the custard).

[robirdstx]

Valentine's Day Dinner was Chicken Parmesan For Two served over homemade spaghetti with a side salad.

[mgaretz]

My fiancée and daughter wanted my Drunken Noodles (Pad Kee Mao) for Valentine's Day dinner.

[twoshoes]

Valentine's Day Dinner was Chicken Parmesan For Two served over homemade spaghetti with a side salad.

that just looks great.

[Blether]

Does that say 680 yen for all that Uni? How much did it weigh? In the US 80g of Uni runs between $20-$30 based on the quality and is typically only available via distributors or your sushi chef if you know hem well.

Yes, 680yen. The tray for the pasta was the same size but reduced to 480yen - they were reduced through being a bit raggedy-looking (I picked the best one that was left). 680yen has been pretty much the standard supermarket price here for this size tray for years now, certainly at my local ones. More than ten years ?

I weighed the uni off the tray so I could formulate the mousseline right - there were 70 grams, all told - a scant two-and-a-half ounces.

The funny thing is (I know you'll be laughing merrily) both these trays were marked アメリカ産 amerika-san, 'produced in America'. The next most common source is Chile. At your prices... ouch ! How far are you from the sea, Percy ? They're not that hard to pry from the rocks, break open or wash out under a tap or in the sea.

Edited February 15, 2010 by Blether (log)