Dinner 2023

Senior Sea Kayaker · December 19, 2023

We had a small family dinner for my Mom's 90th birthday yesterday. The menu was designed with items she likes and I was too busy to get more than a few photos.

First: Aged cheddar and chives biscuits with a bay scallop and clam chowder.

Main: Gnocchi with shrimp and last season's sugar snap and snow peas in a roasted tomato and pepper sauce. Green salad on the side.

Dessert: Birthday cheesecake (by request).

Held a little early so we could get her back to her retirement residence early.

Edited December 19, 2023 by Senior Sea Kayaker (log)

rotuts · December 19, 2023

@Senior Sea Kayaker

that shrimp plate looks delicious.

fine looking plump shrimp.

liamsaunt · December 19, 2023

Butternut squash soup thickened with tortilla chips. My niece calls it nacho soup.

**FrogPrincesse** · December 19, 2023

Traditional quiche lorraine (creme fraiche, eggs, bacon, salt & pepper, nutmeg - no cheese).

Honkman · December 20, 2023

Cauliflower “Couscous” with Vegetables - Coarsely grated cauliflower sautéed with leeks, baby spinach, green peppers and cranberries. At the end mixed with sauce made from Greek yoghurt, mustard, garlic, dill and cumin.

liuzhou · December 20, 2023

I guess like most people, I don’t like to eat the same things on consecutive days (or even consecutive weeks), but today I made an exception.

Last night, I had 辣子鸡 (là zi jī ), Chongqing Chicken with Chillies and tonight I had 乐山辣子鸡铁板炒饭 (lè shān là zi jī tiě bǎn chǎo fàn), Leshan Chicken with Chillies Iron Plate Fried Rice. Chongqing is a city in China which used to be classified as part of Sichuan, but no longer. Leshan is a town in Sichuan famous for its 71-metre (233-feet) high Leshan Giant Buddha, the tallest in the world.

So basically two variations on the same Sichuan idea. The fried rice looked very different from last night’s dish, as if someone had picked out most of the chillies from the mound of chillies and added them to the fried rice, but the taste was all there. The chillies are not meant to be eaten anyway!

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liamsaunt · December 20, 2023

Spicy noodles with roasted broccoli and soy sauce egg

mgaretz · December 20, 2023

Recent dinners:

Italian sausage cooked on the grill with stewed tomatoes, snap peas and garlic bread:

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Sirloin, cooked SV then seared with baked potato and snap peas. Made the potato a new way for me - in the Ninja Speedi on Steam Crisp. 35 minutes to a perfect baker - creamy inside with crisp skin. Butter added after the pic was taken.

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OlyveOyl · December 20, 2023

Variations on a theme…veggies and pasta. Maccheroni with sautéed onions, garlic, broad beans and tomatoes. Added a little Njuda to get our taste buds attention and topped with toasted breadcrumbs . Breadcrumbs were ground up Pepperidge Farm dry herb stuffing mix @rotuts.toasted with a little olive oil.

Desert was Financiers with a chocolate ganache center and chocolate flakes.

billyhill · December 20, 2023

Finally made falafel. It was a big hit. Claudia Roden's recipe with fava beans.

C. sapidus · December 21, 2023

Found a dog-friendly BBQ joint in downtown Flagstaff, just off Route 66. Mac and cheese and the BBQ sauces were particularly good. Nice crunchy coleslaw, too. Porter to go with.

weinoo · December 21, 2023

Hot mess of a dinner last night.

Not bad looking here, striped bass roasted on top of par-roasted potatoes, with thyme, lemon, olive oil.

Plated is a whole other story...

With well-cooked broccoli raab.

Ugly delicious.

MaryIsobel · December 21, 2023

4 hours ago, weinoo said:

Hot mess of a dinner last night.

Not bad looking here, striped bass roasted on top of par-roasted potatoes, with thyme, lemon, olive oil.

Plated is a whole other story...

With well-cooked broccoli raab.

Ugly delicious.

That looks delicious - plating is over-rated on the day to day.

Edited December 21, 2023 by MaryIsobel (log)

liuzhou · December 21, 2023

Here’s an oddity but a good one. It was described as American yet is redolent of the spices of Sichuan. Or perhaps they mean the crayfish are American in that they were introduced from America after the European varieties, Astacus fluviatilis were nearly wiped out by a plague in the 19th and 20th centuries then moved eastwards from there. That said there are crayfish native to China, in the Cambaroides family, so who knows?

美国小龙虾饭 [麻辣] (měi guó xiǎo lóng xiā fàn [má là]), American crayfish over rice [spicy].

The crayfish are cooked in a Sichuan ma la sauce with chilli and Sichuan peppercorns and served with 土豆丝 (tǔ dòu sī) potato slivers stir fried and finished with rice wine vinegar. Also some greens and served over rice.

Edited December 22, 2023 by liuzhou (log)

pastameshugana · December 21, 2023

On 12/17/2023 at 10:34 PM, Duvel said:

The whole meal sounds great. And I learned something new (never heard of Feuerzangenbowle until just now).

But what caught my eye is my knife - I've been using a pair of those Globals for coming up on 17 years now.

Ann_T · December 21, 2023

@liuzhou, I'm sure you wish you were able to cook, but damn you have the best take out food ever.

Didn't cook last night. Had a take out pizza from a new place. Disappointing.

We had wings Tuesday night.

Started in the oven and finished on the grill, and homemade potato chips.

KennethT · December 21, 2023

11 minutes ago, Ann_T said:

@liuzhou, I'm sure you wish you were able to cook, but damn you have the best take out food ever.

Didn't cook last night. Had a take out pizza from a new place. Disappointing.

We had wings Tuesday night.

Started in the oven and finished on the grill, and homemade potato chips.

Gorgeous wings. What type of dipping sauce is that?

Duvel · December 21, 2023

4 hours ago, pastameshugana said:

But what caught my eye is my knife - I've been using a pair of those Globals for coming up on 17 years now.

Yeah … it’s a workhorse. I bought in actually in Japan - funny enough also 17 years ago 🤗

I will get a new (additional) one this Christmas. Bought it in May when visiting Japan as a double pack (larger & smaller one), and Santa will present those to little one and me, so we can cook together 🤭

chromedome · December 21, 2023

4 minutes ago, Duvel said:

I will get a new (additional) one this Christmas. Bought it in May when visiting Japan as a double pack (larger & smaller one), and Santa will present those to little one and me, so we can cook together 🤭

I gifted my own son a chef's knife, slicer and paring knife of his own when he was in high school and I was in culinary school. They weren't in that same ballpark for quality (the commercial yellow-handle Henckels used in so many restaurant kitchens) but he was still pretty proud. He was in the cooking class at his school because they'd had the bright idea of splitting the traditional "Home Ec" into two modules called "Food" and "Fashions," which opened the door - psychologically - for more boys to sign up for the cooking portion of it.

He was so enthused, fact, that he wanted to take his shiny new personal knives to school and use them in class. I asked him, "Say, refresh my memory... why was it your school got locked down last week?"

"Geez" he replied, "Because some freakin' idiot brought a knife to- ... oh."

He definitely caught the bug, though. He made us perfectly good individual cheese souffles one morning for breakfast, when I had a (rare) day off and could sleep in. I appreciated the gesture, if not the three hours' kitchen-cleaning afterwards. He's 35 now, and his Facebook posts are still frequently about one or another meal he's concocted.

Captain · December 21, 2023

A pie floater. Pie, mashed minted peas and gravy.

Tropicalsenior · December 21, 2023

49 minutes ago, Captain said:

A pie floater. Pie, mashed minted peas and gravy.

Just had to Google that. It sounds interesting and delicious.

Norm Matthews · December 21, 2023

Every once in a while, mom would put a piece of brisket in a covered skillet on the back of the stove just before we went to church in the morning and by suppertime we had my favorite Sunday dinner. I have never been able to match the delicious flavor of that brisket. I still try from time to time but still fall short. I tried one today in the slow cooker. It was good but not up to what mom made. I had scalloped potatoes with them and carrots and turnips as well. I needed one turnip a while back and the store only had a bag of small ones so these needed cooking and today was as good a time as any to use them.

Edited December 21, 2023 by Norm Matthews (log)

Honkman · December 22, 2023

Korean style fried rice with calrose rice, chicken thighs, sweet potatoes, green cabbage, scallions, garlic, ginger, gochujang, soy sauce, sugar, rice vinegar