Dinner 2016 (Part 1)

[Norm Matthews]

I couldn't get out to shop for dinner today because it was too icy. I tried but barely made it around the block to get back home. Cassie called from work asking if  she could get anything from the store on her way home.  I told her what I wanted but the store didn't have everything, so took what she brought and winged it.  It was some chicken breasts and pasta with a vodka sauce, vinegar and cherry peppers added.  We also had some sourdough bread that came out of the oven the other day.  The cat  liked it too. She got a little bit later.

 

Edited January 20, 2016 by Norm Matthews (log)

[kayb]

Second night in a row for a "meh" dinner. I had a recipe I'd found somewhere for vegetarian chili with butternut squash. Wasn't bad, just wasn't good. Meh. Hurts even worse because it was a poor use of Rancho Gordo beans.

Tomorrow night, I'm cooking meat loaf. I KNOW I can nail that one. 

[Vlcatko]

Event heavy weekend so Saturday dinner was just a light snack - crunchy spiced chickpeas (mild chili + smoked paprika) and a glass of cider. First time I roasted the chickpeas just soaked (close to two days in turkey stock) not cooked and I think I prefer it this way.

 

Yesterday I had rump steak with stem broccoli and purple potatoes, forgot to take a picture of it plated but I took a picture of the leftovers which I packed for today's lunch

 

[sartoric]

On 18 January 2016 at 0:34 AM, huiray said:

"Kam Heong" Chicken Wings. Last night's version.

Chicken wings – flats and drumettes, chopped into halves across the bones; tossed w/ and marinated w/ Shaohsing wine, sea salt, jaggery, oyster sauce, sesame oil, corn starch, rice flour. Then: shallow-fried in a hot pan w/ hot oil, full flame, till slightly browned. Reserved.

Into medium-hot pan w/ peanut oil: sliced shallots, chopped garlic, minced pre-soaked dried shrimp (har mai), julienned ginger, trimmed & washed curry leaves (Murraya koenigii), chopped de-seeded hot green chillies; sautéed till fragrant plus a bit more. Added in a slurry of {the soaking water for the shrimp w/ Madras curry powder, bit of jaggery, a few dollops of oyster sauce, some fish sauce, dash of double-fermented soy sauce, dash of dark soy sauce, a good squeeze of fresh lime juice}; cooked everything on high heat.

The reserved fried chicken wing pieces were added back in, tossed and stirred a minute or two (the sauce is also reduced a bit).

Served

NOTE: "Kam Heong" (金香) is a style of flavoring/cooking for dishes like this; other meats or seafood or shellfish are used as desired. Common in Malaysian-Chinese cuisine. I've also posted a few preps of "Kam Heong" Clams on eG before.

 

Simple stir-fried yu choy sum hearts.

 

Eaten w/ white rice, of course.

 

 

Huiray, this looks so good, I'm doing it. 

I've bought the chicken wings, I have fresh curry leaves plus the pantry necessities. 

Thank you !

[huiray]

Loofah Soup.

Hot oil, chopped smashed garlic, sliced pork, sea salt; water plus chicken stock, simmer; pre-soaked/rehydrated and trimmed snow fungus (Tremella fuciformis), simmer; fresh shiitake mushrooms, sliced de-ribbed angled loofah (Luffa acutangula), simmer a few minutes more.

 

Pork Belly "Pad Woon Sen".^¶¶

Medium-hot oil, sliced shallots, chopped smashed garlic, sliced-up/cut-up skinless pork belly, sauté; splash of sauce mixture,** sauté, splash of water, continue sauté; sliced kai-lan stems and inner leaves w/ leafy tops cut off, max heat, toss around; well created in center, bit more oil added, two farm-fresh eggs broken in, scrambled in situ till still slightly unset; pre-softened cellophane noodles cut-in-two across the bundles, stir & toss, rest of the sauce mixture, chopped de-seeded hot green chillies, quartered shallots, stir & toss well; trimmed de-stringed celery heart stems & leaves, trimmed scallions (lots), toss & stir & fold over. Serve.

** Sauce mixture: Fish sauce [Red Boat], double-fermented soy sauce [LKK], oyster sauce [LKK], hon-mirin [Takara], ground white pepper.

 

^¶¶ ETA: See the asterisked note in this post for some additional comments.

Edited January 20, 2016 by huiray (log)

[huiray]

7 hours ago, sartoric said:

 

Huiray, this looks so good, I'm doing it. 

I've bought the chicken wings, I have fresh curry leaves plus the pantry necessities. 

Thank you !

 

Hope you like it.  BTW, just in case it is not apparent, the dish I made as shown is "chopstick food" with eating of the wing pieces done "E/SE Asian/Chinese style" with nibbling on it around the bones in one's mouth or while being held by the chopsticks. :-) (And the rice, as shown, being eaten w/ chopsticks in the usual manner, Chinese-style, with saucy bits etc plopped onto the rice as well)

 

P.s. - One does not need chicken wings, as I commented on in my post. Sliced chicken pieces/chicken breast; shellfish, etc are also done this way. Less commonly w/ pork; I'm not sure if it is done w/ beef.

[Kim Shook]

dcarch – How do you prepare your canned oysters?  They look interesting and I’d  buy them if I thought I could do something good with them.  Never ever tried anything except canned smoked oysters. 

 

Last night was Mike’s split pea soup

 

Served with some gorgeous bread from a local bakery (they make nothing but this bread) and Cheddar:

Perfect frigid night meal.

[dcarch]

47 minutes ago, Kim Shook said:

dcarch – How do you prepare your canned oysters?  They look interesting and I’d  buy them if I thought I could do something good with them.  Never ever tried anything except canned smoked oysters. 

---------------

 

 

Kim,

 

It was surprisingly good and simple. Just use the same recipes for escargot. After all, most of the time escargots come in a can.

 

dcarch

[heidih]

11 hours ago, Vlcatko said:

Event heavy weekend so Saturday dinner was just a light snack - crunchy spiced chickpeas (mild chili + smoked paprika) and a glass of cider. First time I roasted the chickpeas just soaked (close to two days in turkey stock) not cooked and I think I prefer it this way.

 

 

 

 

Those look great so I need details   I had not heard about soaking in stock and imagine any flavorful liquid would work. Did you use salt in the stock or salt them after roasting. Also tossed in oil? At what temp cooked and for how long?  

[Sparren]

Yesterday I made some Ramen for me and my son. I probably have violated what should be included in a Ramen since I didn´t follow any recipe and used glass noodles instead of wheat noodles but it tasted very good.

Edited January 20, 2016 by Sparren (log)

[HungryChris]

Baked stuffed shrimp using broken pieces in the stuffing made with Ritz-like crackers, chopped shallots, green onions, garlic, parmesan cheese, butter and dry sherry. The shrimp to be stuffed are cleaned and prepared. The broken pieces are cleaned and sautéed with butter and the garlic, shallots and green onions, then chopped and added to the dry ingredients and the pan deglazed with copious amounts of sherry which is added to the stuffing. These are U-15s.

 

 

Edited January 21, 2016 by HungryChris
typo (log)

[Franci]

We had braised beef shanks, a little Chinese in flavor due to some  star anise and dried mandarin peel and kabocha squash spätzle with Bruxelles sprouts 

 

[heidih]

Franci - we need to know about the  kabocha squash spätzle!

[Franci]

Sure, Heidih. I roast the kabocha squash in the oven (cut in half with seeds removed and wrapped in foil, face down) and then I pass it though a ricer or mill. For every 300g net of squash, I add 120g of flour and 2 eggs, some salt, nutmeg and cook like spaetzle. I then saute' in butter. After that you can take it where you want: add more vegetables/bake with some cheese, dress with a duck ragout or some smoked ricotta etc.

Edited January 21, 2016 by Franci (log)

[Vlcatko]

10 hours ago, heidih said:

Those look great so I need details   I had not heard about soaking in stock and imagine any flavorful liquid would work. Did you use salt in the stock or salt them after roasting. Also tossed in oil? At what temp cooked and for how long?

Thanks, Heidih! The idea came from reading multiple articles about soaking/preparing traditional beans (and yes, they mention basically any flavorful liquid can be used) and having some leftover stock after finishing my chestnut soup. The stock was a bit salty but not nearly enough to eat just like that - I misjudged the amount of water I used. So I soaked the chickpeas in it as it was, after draining and drying, tossed them in a bit of rice oil, added smoked paprika, mild chili and salt. Into the oven they went (baking paper was used, I think aluminium foil might have been better), 210°C, some time over 30 minutes, can't say exactly - forgot to write the times down After tasting I decided to add a bit more salt - no problem when they are still hot and slightly greasy from the oven...

[Anna N]

 

At the moment, for many reasons, I cannot always prepare the kind of food I usually enjoy.  But somewhere I read something that stuck in my mind – – if you can't get out of it get into it.   This for the time being is my mantra. I stocked up yesterday on some ready-to-eat or very easy to prepare ingredients from a well regarded specialty grocery store. This is a sandwich made with Virginia-style ham accompanied by some purchased pickles. A slice of purchased walnut strudel was dessert.

[liamsaunt]

Last night was use up the fridge sandwich night.  My husband's, with leftover rib roast from Saturday:

 

 

Mine, with chicken marinated in fish sauce, and some of the never ending carrot-daikon pickle

 

 

And the other night when it was freezing, I changed our menu from fish tacos to pasta puttanesca.  Lots of garlic, red pepper flakes, and anchovies, and some haddock thrown in as well since I had it to use up:

 

 

More fridge bin ends will make up tonight's dinner as well.

[liuzhou]

Chicken in a caper, garlic, chilli cream sauce.

 

Stir-fried lettuce with oyster sauce.

 

Steamed Cambodian jasmine rice

 

[Shelby]

Spinach salad, oysters and SV venison steaks

 

 

 

 

[rotuts]

how were those

 

SV venison steaks

 

which cut etc ?

[Shelby]

5 minutes ago, rotuts said:

how were those

 

SV venison steaks

 

which cut etc ?

More info on the newbie SV thread  

[Ann_T]

So many outstanding meals and photos.

 

Kim, great looking loaf of bread.  Nice to have a great bakery that specializes.

 

Hungry Chris,   Would love your stuffed shrimp.   

 

Liamsaunt, That is one beautiful prime rib sandwich and photo.

 

Baked Crusty Rolls for dinner 

 Portuguese Chicken Sandwiches with  Peri Peri mayo.

I had some extra tourtiere filling leftover from Christmas Eve that I froze and I had leftover chicken gravy so I made Tourtiere turnovers with commerical puff pastry. 

 

Roast Chicken - Sunday night- Easiest dinner to prepare on a work night.  Chicken was presalted two days earlier and roasted at 500°F.

 

[kayb]

Some days, you just need to get back to where you came from.

 

Clockwise from 12 o'clock, potato salad, meat loaf, "jail slaw," and purple hulled peas with tomato relish. Cornbread would have been good, but I waited too late to to think of it.

 

[Vlcatko]

Started cleaning out the fridge/pantry/freezer - tonight's what-have-you ramen bowl - instant ramen noodles in turkey broth (perked up by pan juices from the beef), thinly sliced beef, stem broccoli, wilted spinach and red mangold leaves, omelette, soft-boiled egg

[sartoric]

Huirays chicken wings in the Kam Heong (golden fragrant) style.
Served with stir fried sugar snap peas and steamed rice.

 

 

Thanks huiray, it was delicious and I will make it again.