Dinner 2025

[Neely]

Dinner was a faux moussaka meaning there was lamb, eggplant and a touch of cinnamon in the stew but without the refinements to make it a real moussaka. 
 

[Honkman]

Rice Noodle and Vegetables Bowl with Pork - slightly warm rice noodles are topped with diced pork cutlets (marinated in a mixture of soy sauce, honey and toasted sesame oil and quickly pan-fried), carrots and celeriac (quickly marinated with rice vinegar, salt and sugar), shredded iceberg lettuce, scallions and mint. Finished with a vinaigrette made from fish sauce, lime juice and zest, chili crunch and ginger

[C. sapidus]

Hot buttered lobster roll with coleslaw and New England clam chowdah (not pictured)

 

[Ddanno]

9 minutes ago, C. sapidus said:

Hot buttered lobster roll with coleslaw and New England clam chowdah (not pictured)

 

 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2-bbYH_akHg&pp=ygUQY2hvd2RhaCBzaW1wc29ucw%3D%3D

[Dante]

Kumpir (toppings of avocado, shredded carrot, quick pickled purple cabbage, and green olives), side of steamed edamame with nutritional yeast, butter, and paprika.

[weinoo]

Since I'm not fortunate enough (nor do I have enough room) to cook with a countertop indoor smoker, I have to resort to old school means.

 

 

Such as my Japanese gin donabe.  This week I experimented with two types of salmon; wild Alaskan king and wild Alaskan sockeye (both fresh).  I happen to like the sockeye moreso than the king; it's just more to my taste.  But these both came out nice and lightly smoked. Served with rice and some sautéed vegetables.

[MaryIsobel]

2 hours ago, weinoo said:

Since I'm not fortunate enough (nor do I have enough room) to cook with a countertop indoor smoker, I have to resort to old school means.

 

 

Such as my Japanese gin donabe.  This week I experimented with two types of salmon; wild Alaskan king and wild Alaskan sockeye (both fresh).  I happen to like the sockeye moreso than the king; it's just more to my taste.  But these both came out nice and lightly smoked. Served with rice and some sautéed vegetables.

Fresh sockeye has spoiled me for any other type of salmon.

[KennethT]

3 hours ago, weinoo said:

Since I'm not fortunate enough (nor do I have enough room) to cook with a countertop indoor smoker, I have to resort to old school means.

 

 

Such as my Japanese gin donabe.  This week I experimented with two types of salmon; wild Alaskan king and wild Alaskan sockeye (both fresh).  I happen to like the sockeye moreso than the king; it's just more to my taste.  But these both came out nice and lightly smoked. Served with rice and some sautéed vegetables.

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of either of those salmon - at least when I used to get them from Wild Alaska...  I found them too lean.  I LOVE the akaroa king salmon from New Zealand - it's almost buttery and so tender.  I actually get it regularly for sashimi at the Wegmans near me.  Best salmon sashimi ever.

 

What do you use to make the smoke in your donabe?  Have you ever seen coconut husk charcoal available near us?

[gulfporter]

Fettucine with charred grape tomatoes, bacon, shallot and arugula.  Topped with parm on the plates. 

 

 

[weinoo]

2 hours ago, KennethT said:

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of either of those salmon - at least when I used to get them from Wild Alaska...  I found them too lean.  I LOVE the akaroa king salmon from New Zealand - it's almost buttery and so tender.  I actually get it regularly for sashimi at the Wegmans near me.  Best salmon sashimi ever.

 

What do you use to make the smoke in your donabe?  Have you ever seen coconut husk charcoal available near us?

 

At home for cooking, I never buy any farmed fish - though I may partake of some - when at a sushi bar, for instance (or if I shop at Russ & Daughters for varieties of smoked salmon).  As I mentioned, both salmon varieties I cooked were delivered fresh, as opposed to how we get them from Wild Alaska or Great Alaska Seafood.

 

For this smoke, I used Japanese (Sakura) cherry blossom wood chips.

[Norm Matthews]

The Korean grocery store has beef and pork already cut up and ready to  take home and marinate but they also have beef short ribs not only cut up but in a marinade ready to take home and grill.  We had not tired them before today and they were good.  The little BBQ was going to be too small and converting the smoker is a chore. the clean-up is too. I got a cheap charcoal grill at Walmart yesterday and set it up for today. In a couple of weeks, Charlie is having a couple over for some of my smoked meat and wants to include some Korean food, so I knew that I'd need a separate grill then, because I can't use my smoker for smoking and grilling at the same time.

[BeeZee]

Did a bunch of grilled veg (I had salmon fillet brushed with hoisin, DH had a strip steak). Corn salad for tomorrow’s dinner, leftovers of the grilled eggplant/zucchini/red bell pepper/red onion warm salad that I make a lot over the summer.

[Neely]

Husband made a beef stew which we had with broccolini and mashed potato. He makes the stew with loads of onions cooked even longer than the beef till they have melted down to form the ‘gravy’. 
 

 

I made an old fashioned apple pie. 
 

 

 

[Honkman]

Vegetarian Wellington Filet with Red Cabbage Salad - the puff pastry was filled with a duxelles/farce made from cremini mushrooms, onions, garlic, walnuts, hazelnuts, parmesan, mustard and thyme and topped with portobello mushroom caps. Served with a simple salad of red cabbage, parsley, olive oil and verjus

[Smithy]

I had dinner guests last night and spent most of the day playing in the kitchen. I don't have pictures of the entire spread (appetizers, slow-cooked pork ribs, green salad, and wine are all out of the photo collection) but I do have photos of the Two Grand Experiments. Yes, I experiment to some degree with company, especially these particular friends.

 

I've been wanting to cook a Washington Post recipe for Roasted Tomato Pie with Cheddar-Parmesan Crust. I had some lovely-looked heirloom tomatoes to commit to the recipe. My gift articles from the Post don't usually seem to work here, but here's the link anyway: click. For good measure, here's a PDF of the document. Roasted Tomato Pie With Cheddar-Parmesan Crust Recipe - The Washington Post.PDF

 

This was a lot of work, but delicious. Next time (and I do think there'll be a next time) I'll either use a smaller pie plate or double the filling. (Edited to add: now as I empty the dishwasher, I see I used a larger pie plate than the recipe specifies. My bad.)

 

 

I'll also be sure not to reach into the food processor bowl with my bare hands to check the dough consistency. I'm not used to using a food processor for pie dough, and my thoughtless action slowed me down. 

 

The other experiment involved making a peach pie using pie filling I'd made and frozen a couple of years ago, when the peaches were particularly good. I suspect I got the idea here someplace. Now I have to find my notes on what, exactly, I put in there: peach chunks, sugar, no doubt some lemon, and either flour or cornstarch. After I made the crust using my mother's standard recipe, not the cheese recipe from the pie above, I put the barely-thawed pie filling into the shell, rolled out the top dough and put it atop everything. I remembered to cut vents but forgot to use liquid to seal the bottom and top crusts. I also didn't think to put an egg wash on the top layer, though maybe it didn't matter. I think it's been at least a decade since I've made this style of pie!

 

 

You can see in the photo that some of the juices leaked out through the unsealed edges, but nobody complained. There was plenty of good flavor in that pie!

 

Edited 2 hours ago by Smithy
Corrected comment about the pie plate. The Post specified 9" and I accidentally used a 10". My fault, not theirs. (log)