Writing from Home

April in the Kitchen

Things have been rather strange the last few weeks, so I haven’t posted weekly updates. Instead, here’s a roundup of April and some links to new recipes we’ve tried.

April, 2012	# of meals
Total dinners cooked	23
Dessert served	5
Grill Used	11 meals, 15 dishes
Ate out	2 restaurants and 3 dinners with friends
Have no idea what we ate!
New recipes	4
Meat Breakdown (exclusive of eating out)
Beef	10
Fowl	5
Lamb	1
Pork	8
Fish	4
No meat	3

 

Split Pea Soup from epicurious.com – the trick is to use half as much marjoram, a Turkish bay leaf, a chunk of good smoked ham, home-made stock for half the water, and 2-3 cloves of garlic. Savory and comforting.

Colcannon made with kale – be sure to cook the kale until tender before adding it to the mash.

The surprise of the month was the arrival of a young friend at my door with a giant cabbage from  the San Luis Obispo market – it was HUGE. This inspired pork-stuffed cabbage rolls, a great recipe from Simply Recipes. The cabbage rolls, tasty with paprika, are cooked on a bed of sauerkraut. We have great kraut from Moessner Farms! And the finishing touch is sour cream stirred into the cooked kraut. Delicious.

How big was the cabbage? Each leaf made 2 cabbage rolls!

The downer of the month – last Friday we arrived at the local farmer’s market to find that, alas, it will be no more. The reasons cited are paperwork, cost, and declining revenue. This is the last straw. I’m done with Ridgecrest, done.

This Week in the Kitchen, April 14, 2012 Edition

Finally just about over this flu.

Sunday Dinner with Friends

We invite some friends to share Easter dinner with us.  Hubby grills a leg of lamb rubbed with Herbes de Provence. I roast quartered small red potatoes with onions and carrot chunks. While the lamb rests, hubby grills slices of zucchini. I have made Janice’s tomato chutney. For dessert we have homemade strawberry ice cream, our second batch of the year, atop some sliced berries. It is yummy.

Monday

Last week at Trader Joe’s we explored some of the frozen foods, actually looking for soup ingredients for some friends. I decided to try the veggie burgers. Tonight we’re having the Vegetable Masala burgers, along with more traditional beef burgers. Hubby grills some asparagus, and I throw together a salad. The veggie burgers we serve with Mrs. Ball’s Mango Chutney and crispy romaine lettuce. Altogether creditable.

Tuesday            

Tonight we have some arugula and ricotta ravioli from Trader Joe’s with some of our Umami pasta sauce. The arugula is a nice change-up – a hint of bitter greens adds zing. On the side we have a salad – we’re trying to get back into the salad habit.

Wednesday Dinner with Friends

Tonight I’m making carbonnade again, this time with proper Chimay Belgian beer. We serve it on papardelle, accompanied by green beans with pine nuts. It is delicious. Thank you Daniel Boulud. Linda brings poppy seed cake for dessert. We agree to sign affidavits if necessary that our guests were fed poppy seeds.

Thursday

Tonight hubby makes crab cakes using a new recipe from cook’s Illustrated. The trick to the crunchy finish is ground-up panko used as a crust. This is a keeper recipe.

Friday

Tonight we have matzo ball soup using Ben’s recipe, which I repeat here for your edification. The real taste secrets? Duck fat in the matzo and duck broth for the soup. Comfort food.

Ben Nissan’s Matzoh Ball Recipe

1 cup Matzo Meal

4 large eggs

1/4 cup chicken fat, oil, or melted margarine

1/4 cup water or seltzer (I always use seltzer)

 1 teaspoon salt or to taste (I usually use more-especially if not using chicken fat)

pinch of ground pepper (I use more)

 

Beat eggs. Add water, oil, salt, pepper and mix well.

Add Matzo meal and stir thoroughly to combine.

Refrigerate for 1/2 to one hour.  NOTE: This is important! Otherwise you won't be able to form the matzo balls.

Partially fill a large pot with water and bring to a boil.

Wet your hands with cold water.

Form mixture into ball about 1" in diameter.  Don't worry, they're going to expand.

Drop matzo balls into  boiling water. 

When all the matzo balls are in the pot, reduce heat to low.

Simmer covered for about 30 minutes or until done. I read somewhere that the longer you cook them the lighter they become. 

     Seems counterintuitive to me but what do I know. Anyway, I usually cook for 30 or 40 minutes and then taste one...cook's treat!

Remove from the water with a slotted spoon. They can either go directly into the soup or sit in a large bowl. Just remember to put them into the soup to reheat 15 to 30 minutes before you're ready to eat them.

This makes about 10  1.5"' matzo balls

Saturday

Party tomorrow, so burgers tonight. For hubby and me, we have Trader Joe’s regular veggie burgers. For Adam we make beef burgers. Tomorrow is our annual birthday party, particularly celebrating Dick Wisdom’s 85^th birthday. The menu includes buffalo tri tip, slaw, Thai Kitchen rice (the Spicy Thai Chili flavor), and birthday cake. We will conclude the party with the ritual shooting of the balloons – with BB guns.

This Week in the Kitchen, April 7, 2012 Editioni

We are all improving, but there’s still a whole lot of coughing going on! I have no food pictures this week, so instead I offer you a cat ball picture.

Sunday

Hubby makes an eggplant gratin for lunch. I cook up a big pot of Umami pasta sauce from The Fifth Taste. We have whole wheat fusilli with some of the sauce for our dinner – and there are three portions left for future use! Yay.

Monday

Buffalo tri-tip, baked potato, grilled asparagus, sliced cucumbers, the first radishes of spring, and a salad. Uninspired but tasty, tasty and comforting.

Tuesday

Cranberry beans cooked with half a smoked ham hock, a salad of mixed greens with dried cranberries and walnuts (our standard salad), and bread – a down home dinner.

Wednesday Dinner with Friends

I’m still struggling, but am well enough to entertain. I’m trying to get in all the cool-weather recipes I can before summer arrives, so tonight we have Pork and PoblanoTamale Pie, steamed broccoli, a baked sweet potato, mixed green salad, and lemon bars. The lemon bars are made from a King Arthur mix – I’m not much of a baker.

The pork tamale pie is a favorite.  It comes from the April, 2010, Bon Appetit. I simplify a bit by using ground pork, up the oregano a bit (using Mexican oregano toasted and ground), and make a little extra cornbread. I confess that I even bought a Mario Batali iron skillet just for this recipe – not that it doesn’t come in handy for others, too.

Thursday

Today is cleaning lady day. We flee to Lancaster to shop. For dinner – we have lots of leftovers.

Friday

Salmon, actually sockeye, but tasty, glazed with equal parts of soy sauce and maple syrup, is our main course tonight. Of course today was Farmer’s Market day, so we have a choice of veggies. We continue our spring eating habits with grilled asparagus. And we have bread -- the marvelous half-boule of rustic whole grain bread that Trader Joe's carries.

Saturday

Tonight we have been invited to share in a seder. We enjoy ourselves immensely – after all, when you have to drink four glasses of wine! The matzoh balls are delicious, made with duck fat and floated in tasty chicken broth. We didn’t do any of the cooking, but were able to supply the duck fat and the homemade stock. I’ve asked for Ben’s recipe – definitely making matzoh ball soup soon.

This Week in the Kitchen, March 31, 2012 Edition and March Roundup

Arugula, Radicchio, and Endive Salad

 

The virus rages. But one must eat, eh?

Sunday

I venture out to the grocery for a few items, a mistake. Sneezing and coughing fits ensue. Comfort food is in order – burgers, grilled zucchini, roasted beets.

Monday

Hubby sees that I am struggling, so offers to make the chicken pot pie. I hand him my recipe. Perhaps the fever has robbed my taste buds of function, but the result is exceeding bland. Or maybe it is that the wild mushrooms we used just didn’t have much taste? Hubby complains that the recipe is hard – step after step after step. It took him longer than he thought it ought to. Perhaps whomever wrote the recipe should simplify it. Whose recipe is it? “Mine,” I reply.

Tuesday

Maple/Soy marinated coho salmon, grilled baby bok choy, brown basmati rice, and some sliced Persian cucumbers on the side. If you haven’t grilled baby bok choy, you may want to try. It’s really good.

Remove any damaged outside leaves and trim excess root. Slice the green tops thinly and set aside. Halve the bok choy vertically, spray with olive oil, add salt and pepper. Grill the bok choy in a vegetable basket until tender. Meanwhile, sautee the green tops in a bit of butter or oil, and serve these atop the grilled stalks.

We have a running debate in our house about “tender” grilled vegetables. Hubby likes his with a bit of crunch, and I like mine limp and sweet. He’s pretty good about doing some of each.

Pork Loin with Salsa Verde, Tomato-Potato Gratin

Wednesday

No dinner with friends this week. I am really down with this virus, and now Hubby is coughing as well. I throw a corned beef brisket in the crock pot and it cooks all day. We strain the broth, and cook cabbage and carrots to go along with the meat and a loaf of homemade soda bread, made from the Cook’s Illustrated Baking Illustrated. Of course I discover that I have no cream of tartar in the cupboard, so substitutions must be made. Flurry ensues.

Thursday

I must be getting better – time for a new recipe. Martha Rose Shulman, who writes for the New York Times Health Section, has a feature on vegetarian burgers. Tonight I’m trying the quinoa and greens one. I happen to have some lovely beet greens, a box of red quinoa, and a can of garbanzos, so I’m set to go.

I don’t have much luck getting the burgers to stick together, but the fragmented results do make a tasty sandwich, with a little mayo and a tomato slice. To go along with our “burgers”, we have baby spinach sautéed with shallots.

I’m pondering whether adding some Greek yogurt to the mix might help bind it. The egg I used just wasn’t enough. I’m going to try the burger with Asian flavors next.

Friday

In search of better sausage, I have bought some Johnsonville mild Italian sausages. Hubby will grill these along with some asparagus from today’s Farmer’s Market, and I’m making Fettuccine Alfredo as a side dish. Oh, joyous – cream and parmesan.

The sausage is ... meh.

Saturday

Tonight is a gourmet dinner. While I’m still coughing occasionally, the fever is gone and I’m not contagious. Hubby thinks he’s feeling better as well. But this morning, I hear Adam coughing. I offer him tissues, an antihistamine, and condolences.

Our course tonight is the salad course – arugula, radicchio, and endive with white wine vinaigrette.

Lattice-Topped Apricot Crostata

The dinner is delicious as usual. I've sprinkled images throughout this post. Of the first course, a delicious Broccoli Rabe, Black Olive and Smoked Mozzarella Pizza, I have no pictures -- too busy eating and swilling champagne!

 

 

 

 

March Roundup

March, 2012	# of meals
Total dinners cooked	28
Dessert served	5
Grill Used	13 dinners, 27 dishes
Ate out	3
Have no idea what we ate!	0
New recipes	15
Meat Breakdown (exclusive of eating out)
Red Meat	7
Fowl	5
Lamb	2
Pork	6
Fish	4
No meat	4

This Week in the Kitchen, March 24, 2012 Edition

I haven’t taken any food pictures this week, so I’ll just give you a picture of two of the cookbooks that feature prominently in this week’s menus.

Sunday

Tonight we try a new recipe, Spicy Chicken Thighs, from the April issue of Bon Appetít. I forgo the salsa, but love the marinade. I would do this again. To accompany the chicken (skinless, by the way) we sautéed baby spinach with a bit of butter and some shallots, and toasted some TJ’s whole grain naan.

Monday

Today we have another version of the Test Kitchen’s bean stew, this one made with Mayocoba beans, mild Italian sausage, and cabbage. If you haven’t discovered Mayocoba beans, you may want to look for them in the Mexican food section of your market. They are about the size of great northerns, a beautiful ivory color, and have excellent texture and taste. Along with the stew, we had Southen Cornbread, another Test Kitchen recipe that we debuted in recent weeks. It is yummy.

I did discover that Albertson’s is no longer carrying the same kind of bulk Italian sausage. I tried the replacement, a Villa Roma chub. This sausage compares very poorly to the New York style sausage they used to carry – it’s virtually tasteless – and I won’t buy it again. I talked to the butcher. He advised me to register my complaint with Albertsons, so I sent them an email.

 Tuesday

Tonight we’re using some tilapia to make fish tacos in the style of Cindy Pawlcyn. The fish is sautéed until flaky, then mixed with a bit of mayonnaise and a mustard vinaigrette. The vinaigrette is used to dress the greens that go on the tacos.

Wednesday Dinner with Friends

Tonight we are grilling pork tenderloin, using a Barbecue! Bible recipe – Susur Lee’s Chinese Barbecued Pork. The loin is marinated in a wonderful concoction of soy sauce, maple syrup, dry sherry, ginger, vegetables, and orange zest.  While grilling the pork, one strains the marinade and cooks it until syrupy. This is then used to glaze the pork during the last half of cooking. This is a perennial favorite at our house.

To go with the pork, we have grilled asparagus, and I’m trying a new rice recipe, Green Jasmine Rice, from epicurious. The rice is disappointing – bland and very unappealing in texture. Perhaps it would have been better in the full context of the recipe, with curried tofu. Back to the drawing board.

Thursday

This is when I really succumbed to the virus that is plaguing our house, so a simple dinner is in order – grilled lamb loin chops rubbed with oil, salt, pepper, and herbs de Provence, baked Table Queen squash, grilled zucchini. I also have a couple of nice tomatoes that we’ll grill to accompany.

Friday

The virus has really got hold, so even simpler food --  TJ’s Hofbrau brats, roasted onions and peppers, steamed broccoli. I didn't even make it to the Farmer's Market today.

Saturday

Steve Raichlen's Beer Can Chicken, baked squash, baked potato, carrots in the French style.