Margit in charge, Kevin and I assisting
Fresh Garden Lettuce with Soy Milk Mustard Dressing
Roast Lamb with Apple/Prune Sauce, from epicurious, very good
Scandinavian Split Pea Soup
Vegan Soda Bread
Brussels Sprouts, shredded with butter and pecans
Pears Poached in White Wine
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Best Meal Ever
Thanks to last weekend's wonderful Yosemite trip, I've been a little overwhelmed this week and haven't gotten around to posting Tuesday's dinner until now. And once again, I don't have time to flesh it out; V-day dinner starts in half an hour. However, it was really, really good, so I want to at least get the list down before I forget the dishes.
Roasted Salmon
With Asianish Glaze: Two parts mustard, One part soy sauce, a big glug of olive oil, and as much garlic as we had time to chop. Roasted at 500 for maybe 25 minutes? (Thank you Christie! That fish was maybe the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in our kitchen!)
Lentilles au vin (encore, this time with champignons)
I carefully followed a recipe from Local Flavors by Deborah Madison, but the basic idea is this: get a lot of dried porcini mushrooms, maybe a cup and a half. Let them soak in boiling water for at least a half hour. While that is happening, saute some carrots and onions and celery and garlic in olive oil, then add some (four bottles of) wine. Simmer for a long time. Add the mushroom soaking liquid and some (maybe two cups) of soy sauce. Simmer some more, then strain, and mix with some (a gallon of) French lentils, and some chopped brown button mushrooms you've been roasting for the last half hour. This will be way to much food, so maybe next time cut by a quarter.
Carrot Salad (encore, this time with raisins and sesame seeds)
I don't always like raisins in my carrot salad, but I guess the house does. The leftovers didn't last half as long as last time.
Beet and Tomato Ragout with Goat Cheese Souffles
A favorite dinner party recipe from back when I was a grown up. It scaled remarkably well.
Chard and Beet Greens
Apparently emblematic of my cooking. Fortunately, pretty tasty.
Reheated Day Old Acme Bread
We had a lot of rolls this week, so I threw them in a metal bowl with a bit of water in the bottom and put them in a 500 degree oven for ten minutes. This worked ever better than I expected. We should do this every week that we have rolls, because I don't think we ever get through all the bread.
Vegan Chocolate Raspberry Cake
From the Veganomicon; very delicious. Someone asked "What kind of black magic makes this cake vegan?" The answer: Smucker's Strawberry Jam.
Roasted Salmon
With Asianish Glaze: Two parts mustard, One part soy sauce, a big glug of olive oil, and as much garlic as we had time to chop. Roasted at 500 for maybe 25 minutes? (Thank you Christie! That fish was maybe the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in our kitchen!)
Lentilles au vin (encore, this time with champignons)
I carefully followed a recipe from Local Flavors by Deborah Madison, but the basic idea is this: get a lot of dried porcini mushrooms, maybe a cup and a half. Let them soak in boiling water for at least a half hour. While that is happening, saute some carrots and onions and celery and garlic in olive oil, then add some (four bottles of) wine. Simmer for a long time. Add the mushroom soaking liquid and some (maybe two cups) of soy sauce. Simmer some more, then strain, and mix with some (a gallon of) French lentils, and some chopped brown button mushrooms you've been roasting for the last half hour. This will be way to much food, so maybe next time cut by a quarter.
Carrot Salad (encore, this time with raisins and sesame seeds)
I don't always like raisins in my carrot salad, but I guess the house does. The leftovers didn't last half as long as last time.
Beet and Tomato Ragout with Goat Cheese Souffles
A favorite dinner party recipe from back when I was a grown up. It scaled remarkably well.
Chard and Beet Greens
Apparently emblematic of my cooking. Fortunately, pretty tasty.
Reheated Day Old Acme Bread
We had a lot of rolls this week, so I threw them in a metal bowl with a bit of water in the bottom and put them in a 500 degree oven for ten minutes. This worked ever better than I expected. We should do this every week that we have rolls, because I don't think we ever get through all the bread.
Vegan Chocolate Raspberry Cake
From the Veganomicon; very delicious. Someone asked "What kind of black magic makes this cake vegan?" The answer: Smucker's Strawberry Jam.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Indian Setsubun
Tuesday, February 3rd
Rescued Chickpeas
The chickpeas leftovers from Thursday were not getting eaten. I rescued them by substituting them, spinach and all, into a channa masala recipe. This would have worked well if I had been more careful with the spices; I accidentally poured in some cardamom at one point when I thought I was adding cumin. It was a bit much. The channa masala and spinach combo was great, though. Tasty (if you imagined away the extra cardamom) and really beautiful.
Rice With Onions
And cashews on the side. Should have had cranberries, but I forgot to put them out. This was also slightly overspiced, but would have been a great dish if I had been just a little more conservative. Next time: puree lots of garlic, ginger, and chilies in the food processor, fry briefly in a lot of olive oil, add the rice and water with just two or three cinnamon sticks and a tiny bit of turmeric and cumin, and mix in caramelized onions at the end. One gallon of short grain brown rice needs somewhere strictly between twenty two and thirty two cups of water.
Chicken Kebabs
From Julie Sahni's Savoring India, with dried cilantro instead of fresh, and three whole lemons in the marinade. Margit grilled these outside, and they were awesome. One whole box of frozen boneless skinless breasts was just about a perfect quantity.
Brussels Sprouts with Spicy Cornmeal
From the Veganomicon. Not as interesting as I expected it to be, but still very good. Rebecca did this one start to finish. This included trimming an enormous box of itty bitty sprouts.
Carrot Soup
Epicurious recipe. Okay, but not worth making again. Again, the spices were off. This time, they had been carefully measured, and then some fraction got charred and had to be replaced, but it wasn't clear how large a fraction had been lost... Also, important lesson: do not throw huge chunks of ginger into a giant pot soup that is going to be pureed with the immersion blender. This may well work in a tiny pot, but it will not work for the house. No matter how homogeneous you try to make the soup, you will fail, and you will miss some ginger chunks, and you will burn yourself. Chunks of veggies are okay.
Raita
Grated cucumber, dried peppermint, and Zeph's yogurt.
Sweet Coconut Green Tea Black Bean Soup
Small nod to Setsubun. Green tea, coconut milk, agave syrup, black beans, dried fruit. Too sweet for me, but most of it was eaten.
Rescued Chickpeas
The chickpeas leftovers from Thursday were not getting eaten. I rescued them by substituting them, spinach and all, into a channa masala recipe. This would have worked well if I had been more careful with the spices; I accidentally poured in some cardamom at one point when I thought I was adding cumin. It was a bit much. The channa masala and spinach combo was great, though. Tasty (if you imagined away the extra cardamom) and really beautiful.
Rice With Onions
And cashews on the side. Should have had cranberries, but I forgot to put them out. This was also slightly overspiced, but would have been a great dish if I had been just a little more conservative. Next time: puree lots of garlic, ginger, and chilies in the food processor, fry briefly in a lot of olive oil, add the rice and water with just two or three cinnamon sticks and a tiny bit of turmeric and cumin, and mix in caramelized onions at the end. One gallon of short grain brown rice needs somewhere strictly between twenty two and thirty two cups of water.
Chicken Kebabs
From Julie Sahni's Savoring India, with dried cilantro instead of fresh, and three whole lemons in the marinade. Margit grilled these outside, and they were awesome. One whole box of frozen boneless skinless breasts was just about a perfect quantity.
Brussels Sprouts with Spicy Cornmeal
From the Veganomicon. Not as interesting as I expected it to be, but still very good. Rebecca did this one start to finish. This included trimming an enormous box of itty bitty sprouts.
Carrot Soup
Epicurious recipe. Okay, but not worth making again. Again, the spices were off. This time, they had been carefully measured, and then some fraction got charred and had to be replaced, but it wasn't clear how large a fraction had been lost... Also, important lesson: do not throw huge chunks of ginger into a giant pot soup that is going to be pureed with the immersion blender. This may well work in a tiny pot, but it will not work for the house. No matter how homogeneous you try to make the soup, you will fail, and you will miss some ginger chunks, and you will burn yourself. Chunks of veggies are okay.
Raita
Grated cucumber, dried peppermint, and Zeph's yogurt.
Sweet Coconut Green Tea Black Bean Soup
Small nod to Setsubun. Green tea, coconut milk, agave syrup, black beans, dried fruit. Too sweet for me, but most of it was eaten.
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