Dinner 2015 (Part 2)

[Thanks for the Crepes]

Oh patrickamory,

 

Your "spread" looks so inviting! Looks like tip top quality everything.

 

You have some lucky friends/family who shared this lovely meal with you.

 

Would you mind commenting on "finocchiona"? My eyes skipped the last syllable, and I looking around your photo for fennel slices, and when I found none, went back and read it again. I guess this is some kind of charcuterie that's flavored with fennel.

 

Wow!

[Thanks for the Crepes]

Dinner tonight was just leftover roasted chicken with spinach salad.

 

I cooked the chicken in the oven indoors the night before. I had gotten the grill all ready to go and even had my bag of mesquite wood chunks out on the deck in prep to cook it on the grill outside. Then Mother Nature rained on my parade at what I call the "point of no return," which is the amount of time you need to get a wood or charcoal fire started and cook your food before sundown. Oh well, the mesquite experiment (inspired by Smithy's posts about mesquite-cooked Texas BBQ in the Camping, Princess Style thread) is still on the slate.

 

The spinach salad is simple but delicious. Only one grocery in our area carries more mature curly spinach. Some of the leaves are large enough to need to be torn in half. Curly spinach is sweeter, thicker and more succulent and flavorful to me than the tiny flatleaf baby spinach you find everywhere. I used to grow it, and of course it was better, but what I can commercially get is very respectable.

 

You fry up good bacon, boil some eggs, and use good tomatoes as garnishes. This time of year grape tomatoes have the best flavor around here.

 

Then you toss the spinach with sliced spring onion and a good vinaigrette made with (I like) white vinegar, a little good oil, salt pepper, and some sugar all to balanced taste. It needs minimal dressing whether cold or wilted.

 

You can cook the vinaigrette or not. I didn't, but when I do, I usually throw in the green onion after the mixture boils. This is wilted salad when you heat the dressing.

 

It's a very visually appealing salad either way, and most folks (including my not-very-salad-inclined husband) will eat more than they do with most salads.

[Shelby]

Jo--LOL on the smoke alarms.  May I ask where you got your pork?  If it's online, I might have to copy you and get some.  I for sure can't find it around here.

 

ThanksfortheCrepes--I've got some spinach growing in the garden.  If the bunnies don't eat it (sigh) I'll definitely be trying your salad recipe.

 

Patrick--I'd definitely have loved spending time on your terrace with all of that wonderful food and drink!

 

 

And, because I can't say it enough.  Rachel, please stop by more often.  I miss your posts!!!

 

Messy plate but it tasted good.  Asparagus is really going bonkers in the garden.  Eggs from down the road, boudin, asparagus, hollandaise (that didn't thicken like it should have.  I'm so hit and miss on that stuff).

 

 

A mini pizza.  Husband had meetings and I was feeling hungry.  I usually take the night off cooking when he's not home....I don't know what came over me lol.

 

 

Venison tacos

 

 

My husband went fishing in the river at our house yesterday morning.   I thought about joining him, but I didn't.  It's been raining a lot (not complaining we need it) and it's super muddy.  He brought home a couple nice catfish so I fried 'em up along with some mushrooms.  Garden asparagus, mac and cheese and homemade tarter sauce rounded it out.  

 

 

I hope everyone has a great week!

Edited April 20, 2015 by Shelby (log)

[liamsaunt]

Cusk in green curry sauce

 

[kayb]

Houseful of kids and grandkids over the weekend, so I opted for easy -- penne with bolognese. Not half bad, and a couple of pint cartons of sauce in the freezer to boot.

 

 

One night last week, it was fried rice, which once again led me to thank Mark Bittman for How To Cook Everything, the book which is worth its price for two things alone: how to make fried rice, and his pizza dough.  (Although I go to it a great deal for a lot of other things as well.)

 

The mise:

 

 

For the protein, I used chicken left over from a bird I'd roasted the previous weekend for chicken alfredo.

 

The finished product. I used a bit too much oil.

 

[Paul Bacino]

Bracciole in a Genevese Sauce

 

Which for me  the Sauce is like a Onion Sunday gravy.

 

So  I did this different..I wrapped a sausage in both round and sirloin cuts  and braised these in a carmalized onion sauce with a spot of madeira and beef stock

 

 

 

[Toliver]

Dinner a couple of nights ago:

Not a great experiment.  I got a craving for spaghetti and had all the makings but no ground beef or Italian sausage.  So I used cut up brats from the other night.  German-Italian spaghetti?  I figured that it was pork, like Italian sausage and simmering in the sauce all day should make it soak up those flavors.  Whatever, it tasted quite peculiar combined with the sauce.  

On occasion, my mom would use kielbasa sausage as the meat in her spaghetti sauce and would even use slices of the sausage on her homemade pizzas instead of pepperoni. Back then, we didn't go out to eat very often (not many did then) so her versions of pizza and red sauce became the "norm" for us. As kids, we didn't know any better and enjoyed it all. Go figure! 

[Kim Shook]

Norm – thank you, that sounds really good!

 

Thanks for the crepes – your spinach salad sounds fantastic.  I miss that spinach you are describing.  I almost never find it here in Richmond and find that ‘baby’ spinach insipid.  Tossing a salad with it is futile because all it does is lie flat in the bottom of the bowl.

 

Last night I did Jessica’s favorite meal – salad and short ribs on polenta:

 

Slow cooker polenta:

The only way I cook it anymore.  The short ribs were my Hoisin Braised Ribs, a recipe that I developed when I wanted a good hoisin short rib, but all the recipes I tried were too strongly flavored with the hoisin – the beef flavor was lost.  We like this one a lot:

[JoNorvelleWalker]

Jo--LOL on the smoke alarms.  May I ask where you got your pork?  If it's online, I might have to copy you and get some.  I for sure can't find it around here.

 

I purchased the Berkshire pork from a local market that is not quite local enough for me to get to without assistance.  I was able to make the trip because my son kindly took me on a shopping expedition last weekend.

 

http://www.mccaffreys.com/

 

 

However I recall seeing Berkshire pork for sale online.

[suzilightning]

Heading down the shore tomorrow for a week ...... YEAH!!!!!!

 

Up in Poughkeepsie for the weekend ... no one was interested in food.  As usual.

 

Got back last night and it is leftovers.  Rosemary salt roasted pork loin with roasted veg - Yukon gold potatoes, carrots, shallots, parsnips and garlic with pan gravy.  Same thing for dinner tonight .... if John ever wakes up.

[patrickamory]

So much tasty food depicted in the past few days!

 

Thanks for the Crepes: exactly right, finocchiona is a sort of Tuscan salami made with fennel seeds. One of my favorite pieces of Italian charcuterie. Here is a link:

 

http://www.creminelli.com/finocchiona-italian-salami-1.html

[Okanagancook]

Made the paella last night.  Really good.  I used a very good stock.

 

Pictures of the mis en place; marinating rabbit and chicken; the bubbling rice and the finished product.

 

After baking the paella it needed to go on the stove to get the bottom crispy......love my brother who cleaned the paella pan this morning

 

[Okanagancook]

BBQ's lamb chops, Texas toast, yogurt/cuc/garlic and Ted Reader's BBQ vegetable salad.  I hovered over the chops on the grill with Thermapen in hand and cooked them perfectly....really, just as good as sous vide without all the waiting and I got to drink wine while I was cooking them and enjoying the view of our spectacular surrounds

[huiray]

Pad woon sen (ผัดวุ้นเส้น).  Today's version chez huiray.

 

 

A quick note to those interested – pad woon sen is the sort of dish that doesn't have a single definitive recipe, although there are commonalities and certain basic ingredients (e.g. vermicelli/cellophane or glass noodles; some sort of meat, various vegetables, garlic, fish sauce...usually eggs but that can also be omitted...).  The name of the dish is literally "stir-fried vermicelli/glassnoodles**.  It is often whipped up as a dish (maybe less noodles then) to accompany white rice, but is also eaten by itself (maybe more noodles).  

 

**and synonyms

[mgaretz]

Tonight's dinner will be:  Beef stew made in the slow cooker (this shot is still in the cooker, it's on warm, waiting for my wife to get home).  Chuck, celery, carrots, onion, peas, potatoes, barley and a lot of mushrooms.

 

Edited April 21, 2015 by mgaretz (log)

[mm84321]

Green asparagus, sauce mousseline

 

Baby artichoke risotto

Edited April 21, 2015 by mm84321 (log)

[Okanagancook]

mm84321: beautiful dishes. I have a question for you seeing that our asparagus season is coming up. Thick or thin stalks? Last year I went for the thick stalks. Snapped off the fibrous end and did gentle peel on the stalks.

[Thanks for the Crepes]

Hey mgaretz,

 

I love celery braised with beef stew or pot roast! I have never seen a recipe for either one that included celery, and you're the first other person I have seen to include it.

 

Even celery frowners (and I know there are many) wouldn't recognize this vegetable after it has taken a long hot bath in beef juices.

Edited April 21, 2015 by Thanks for the Crepes (log)

[JoNorvelleWalker]

mm84321: beautiful dishes. I have a question for you seeing that our asparagus season is coming up. Thick or thin stalks? Last year I went for the thick stalks. Snapped off the fibrous end and did gentle peel on the stalks.

 

I vote for thin stalks, unpeeled and barely blanched.

[dcarch]

I vote for thin stalks, unpeeled and barely blanched.

 

 

------- Thick or thin stalks? Last year I went for the thick stalks. Snapped off the fibrous end and did gentle peel on the stalks.

 

 

I swear, no Photoshop.

 

Found these in NYC Grand Central Terminal food market.

 

dcarch

 

Edited April 21, 2015 by dcarch (log)

[JoNorvelleWalker]

I used to manufacture cameras that were used, for among other things, asparagus grading.  Those sure are pretty.

[Thanks for the Crepes]

The thick/thin asparagus question is a good one, and my answer is: it depends.

 

I used to think the thinner the better until I started buying some that came from Peru several years ago. Maybe they were just getting started in the business; I don't know. You're supposed to wait until the second year to take a harvest. It doesn't even make sense that thin asparagus would be fibrous, but this was, not woody, but the most fibrous asparagus I ever ate. Peruvian asparagus has gotten much better in recent years, but I've never seen thick stalks from there.

 

I just love asparagus though, and I wouldn't kick thick or thin stalks off my dinner plate ever. It's a nutrition powerhouse, and so delicious topped with an over easy egg fried with extra butter for drizzling and a spritz of lemon. I can eat this as an entree with some good bread.

 

I'm now thinking about Shelby's garden asparagus which is producing prolifically right now, lucky girl. 

 

dcarch's photo of NYC asparagus is the stuff dreams are made of, wow!

[mgaretz]

Hey mgaretz,

 

I love celery braised with beef stew or pot roast! I have never seen a recipe for either one that included celery, and you're the first other person I have seen to include it.

 

Even celery frowners (and I know there are many) wouldn't recognize this vegetable after it has taken a long hot bath in beef juices.

 

Thanks. I have always made stew with celery, and I think my Mom did too.  Of course, I put celery in my red sauce too!

[JoNorvelleWalker]

 

As posted in the tagine thread.  Served with a baguette.  I confess I left the salt out of the baguette dough.  First time this has happened.  I can only say that historically salt is a recent addition to French bread.  But now I see why salt was invented.

[Anna N]

I had a loaf of fresh bread, some cheese that needed using up and not very much energy left. A grilled cheese sandwich seemed inevitable. Photographs of grilled cheese sandwiches look incredibly appetizing. But the truth of the matter is I am not particularly fond of them. This one was no different. I managed to get down half of it. Yet another case of the triumph of hope over experience!