So...whats for dinner?
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Here is our leftovers dinner...otherwise named “for darn sures” or, “jump ups”. I’m guessing that some of the long timers on this thread might recall our long discussions about names for leftovers. There may be more names than I remember. So ours tonight were apps from our paella dinner (not the actual ones...made new ones from ingreds that were taking up room in refridge), mushroom soup from Sunday, shrimp puttanesca and orzo, and a fresh salad, with crusty bread. Odd combo, but interesting.
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Lacey12, yes the prep was a bit involved and took about 45 minutes of constant attention (chopping, searing, etc). Both meals tasted good but isn’t a good value for the cost. In this case, the value was primarily in inspiration, as I will make some similar but easier versions.
I also noticed an email that my next box had been delivered. I didn’t realize that the promo offer was actually a recurring thing, so I’ve cancelled future deliveries but now have two more meals to make.
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Lacey - I love 'jump ups'. Your mixed meal looks wonderful. I should tell you I cheated with the Cod. Today's meal was served on Zucchini Noodles. Really quite good & of course healthy. I'll do the leftover piece of fish on 'real' pasta,
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The zucchini noodles sound like a much healthier option than the pasta, Minus. I will have to drag out my spiralizer and try that.
Illimae, I agree that the value of those meals is inspiration, and I was really put off by feeling like I was playing “gourmet house chef” with small amounts of many ingredients requiring lots of prep work. I got the feeling that the objective was to make the “cook” feel like a “chef”....which on a nightly basis is not mine! But I did like the general idea of some of the meals, especially b/c they were vegan and I don’t so often make such meals....just can’t ditch the dairy, and am allergic to cashews which is a staple for many vegans. My DDIL raves about the Purple Carrot meals, I think, because it helps her save time from food shopping, and she loves preparing meals exactly with explicit directions (her surgeon mind) and she doesn’t mind doing clean up! None of those match my preferences. ;
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Lacey, I love breaded and fried eggplant but stopped cooking it years ago because the eggplant absorbs so much oil. I'm looking forward to trying to replicate fried eggplant in the air fryer. I cooked chicken drumsticks for dinner last night and the result was good but still not Popeye's. What a low bar some of us set!!!
I had told dh to buy two chicken legs. He came home with a package of drumsticks. "Do you think chickens walk on drumsticks?" I asked him. They were huge, by drumstick standards. Those must have been weight lifter chickens. I didn't have time to marinate them in buttermilk for two hours but did marinate for 1 hour. They were crispy and well cooked in 20 min. according to the internal thermometer but could have used 2 or 3 more minutes. Next time I will cook smaller drumsticks (and thighs).
I also cooked some sweet potato fries in the air fryer, then kept them warm while the chicken cooked. The fries were ok because the sweet potato wasn't really sweet, just pink potato. Southern farmers always allowed their sweet potatoes to "age" before they were ready to eat. When you buy sweet potatoes in the supermarket, you never know what you're getting.
DH had a bowl of warmed up limas and rice with his meal. I had two drumsticks and a handful of fries. I had a late lunch at a Mexican restaurant with niece Rebecca and ate a bowl of soup and some chips and salsa.
It makes sense that those pre-planned meals with instructions would serve as inspiration.
Our jump-ups all too often jump into the garbage when they're discovered in the refrigerator. I should keep a list...ah, another list. LOL.
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Have been out of town but following along - didn't have anything to post about but did have one fantastic meal - huge shrimp cocktail and a filet, watching the sunset - yay!
Tonight was pasta salad and roast beef sandwiches, and a salted caramel brownie with Moose Tracks ice cream for DH. Will be back in the swing of cooking starting tomorrow!
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Stopped off at Halal Guys in Lincolnwood after errands--too tired to go through the supermarket and then come home & cooked. I remember the lines at their food truck in Manhattan being almost a block long, and everything smelling amazing. This branch had a very limited menu: falafel, beef gyros or chicken shwarma. So I opted for the falafel--which came with salad, olives, turmeric rice, babaghannouj, and tahini. Pretty good (I had about half the platter, Gordy didn't want the remaining two of five falafel) but hungry again. Thinking I should've opted for the chicken shwarma, with maybe a couple falafel on the side. Oh, well, maybe next time. Regretting not having gone to Cellars to watch the Loyola game, but the special was $10 Reubens & fries; I never liked Reuben sandwiches (what a terrible thing to do to perfectly nice corned beef & rye bread) and I'm not in a fries kinda mood. Also didn't want to drink. Besides, I'd like to avoid spreading flu germs around my favorite restaurant in case Gordy's still contagious and I'm a vector even if immune.
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Carole - I really do have yellow sticky notes on the cupboard to remind me what I thought about cooking. But then I have yellow sticky notes everywhere. This was my first week for the reminder meal notes but it really helped getting things out of the freezer.
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I lost my post..I accidentally managed to highlight the entire post and then when I hit the next character, it all went away. sigh.
Chi, here's hoping you remain immune to the flu and everyone else quickly gets over it.
Down, I've been making salads like that except I forgot to get tomatoes today when I walked to the store. I went there to get tomatoes but ended up getting apples, peaches, blackberries, blueberries and strawberries...everything but tomatoes. :-)
It's 1/2 mile to the store and if I walk at a brisk pace it's 15 minutes to walk there and back. . The weather is so nice that I don't feel like getting into the car and driving over there.
Tonight Sharon and I walked 2-1/2 miles at a nice leisurely pace. We walk along a canal bank far from roads so there is no traffic noise...we can talk without shouting.
The big news for me the past couple of days is I now have two electric ranges. The electric range at the neighbor's house quit working. I offered to fix it for them, but they decided they wanted a new stove. They were going to put it out on the curb with a "free needs work" sign and if it was still there in the morning, take it to the city's recycle place. I went and got an appliance dolly and moved it onto my back porch. The location I chose is where a spa used to sit. It's out of the rain and has a suitable electric circuit to power the range. I had to get a plug ($35) to put on the range's power cord cord, spend a few minutes figuring out the stove's problem.and get the replacement part ($28). So, for $63 I now have TWO OVENS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and I can use the oven in the summertime without worrying about heating up the kitchen.
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Two stoves? Eric, you & Sharon can also start keeping kosher (just kidding).
You're not the only one who keeps losing posts. I see others mention their frustration on a lot of BCO threads. And it gets even quirkier when using a mobile device rather than a computer. There is something definitely "off" about the software that powers this site.
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I’ve had that happen too.
So far I have no clue on what to make for dinner. Will have to go freezer diving a bit later.
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Sandy, you have easy access to an amazing array of restaurant food. The falafel tray sounds good. I may try making them some time in the future.
Eric, what a clever fellow you are and so like my dh! He has picked up any number of items left out for the garbage man, brought them home and repaired them. The latest was a gas powered blower that seemed new and was easily repaired. We put items on the curb, too. The funniest situation was the time we put my manual Nordic Track out beside the street with the manual (I always keep manuals). The doorbell rang later and a tiny lady was there, asking whether the treadmill was free. Just about that time, a large, muscular African American man was loading up the treadmill into his pickup truck. The lady was outraged as though the man had stolen what was rightfully hers. Later I learned that the tiny lady was my hair stylist's mother! What a small world.
Last night was leftovers, lima beans and brown rice, chicken drumstick for each of us, and a romaine salad.
Tonight is dinner out at the nicer restaurant at our club where I will "spend" my free birthday dinner. The chef is new, replacing a very good former chef. Tomorrow is Louisiana Derby Day at the race track in New Orleans. We will probably indulge in the corned beef sandwiches that are famous race track fare. We are invited to join a small group for dinner afterwards at nearby Cafe Degas but will decide then whether to accept or head on back across the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway.
Today is a beautiful day and I will venture out into all that pollen to play golf with my Friday women's group.
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In the yard again from 8am to 2pm. It's 80 degrees and just too hot for anymore heavy digging in the sun. I should get all the back beds turned with one more day's work.
Breakfast was one leftover Hatch Chili scone from the freezer. Going out for pizza tonight with some neighbors.
Eric - I love the idea of a stove on the back porch. I rarely turn my oven on in the hottest months so that's a good idea.
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MOmmyof2, Amen! I have no inspiration for dinner tonight either! No budget for taking the family of 7 out for dinner. Did pizza last weekend. Already made a meat/veg, a soup, a salad, a pasta, and omelets this week and my kids will kill me if I serve chicken again. Would do a quiche if it weren't so similar to an omelet. Hey! I'll get some fresh ground beef on the way home from work and we'll have hamburgers and baked beans and roasted seasoned potatoes and I'll be a hero to my son. Yes, that's the winning ticket for tonight
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend full of great food and fellowship.
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Hi, all. Lots of delicious sounding meals lately!
I'd been contending with pretty frequent bouts of wooziness since my final round of chemo which meant not much appetite/not much cooking. Finally turned the corner yesterday, hooray! I made a small boneless leg of lamb rubbed with herbs de Provence, Japanese sweet potatoes and a celery/apple/walnut salad with crumbled blue cheese an dijon vinaigrette for dinner. There is leftover lamb for both another dinner and sandwiches over the weekend.
Tonight we are having baked pasta with mushrooms, sausage and breadcrumbs.
Tomorrow I'm taking my husband to one of his favorite restaurants (Sardinian) for his birthday. Unfortunately, chemo has made red wine, something I used to enjoy almost nightly, taste like acid to me. I'm sure that will eventually resolve, but meanwhile the birthday boy will have to settle for something by the glass.
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Had a couple of thin steaks that were large enough for me to cut into two portions each. Cooked those up and made onion gravy from scratch to put over the top of them. Opened a can of peas and a pasta side dish to go with it
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Well, it’s Friday, I was tired and DH wasn’t hungry, so I made nachos from some leftover corn tortillas (pan fried in sunflower oil), beans, sharp cheddar and sour cream.
For dessert I’m having leftover chocolate delight from a local restaurant. I tried it at lunch with a friend weeks ago and it was one of the best things I’ve ever tasted, so my friend bought a whole pan to share at a belated birthday lunch. I’m going to try to recreate a sugar free version for DH.
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Oh my goodness illimae - what is that restaurant? I need to go there this week!!!
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minus - Can I go with you?
eric- genius idea for oven #2! You are Mr. Fix-it
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Magari, that lamb sounds amazing! Lucky you to have a Sardinian restaurant. (We have all sorts of Italian regional...except that). Not even Eataly has a Sardinian counter (though it does have some Sardinian pastas &. wines for sale).
Went "freezer foraging" for dinner: came up with a filet of wild king salmon big enough for two, so I split it the long way. Brined, then pan-seared. In my "crisper cache" were fresh asparagus, which I rinsed, nuked for 30 sec. and then sauteed with salt, olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Despite having had rice for brunch (the leftover falafel platter), I nuked Seeds of Change brown rice/red quinoa pilaf. Gordy had dinner here after seeing Leslie off to O'Hare for her flight to see family in Houston; right now he's doing his regular Friday night improv show. Bouncing back from flu--missed just one rehearsal and did a writers' meeting via Skype.
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My mom had an electric range and a wall oven in the kitchen and an extra range in the garage. So, she had 3 ovens and 8 stove top "burners". I always envied that arrangement of stoves and ovens. :-)
Illimae, it's a good thing I've already eaten. That looks good!
I lost another post again, but I only had one line typed and I discovered what I'm doing to make it happen. It's a "my problem" issue and not a site issue. My laptop's mouse pad is just "below" the keyboard's space bar. If my thumb taps the lower right corner of the mouse pad twice in a very short amount of time, all of the text I've typed gets highlighted. If I then type another character, all of the highlighted text is replaced by the one new character. It is very easy for my right thumb to tap the mouse pad while I'm typing.......I will look to see if I can change what happens when I "double tap" the mouse pad.
There are a million ways to make something "break", so I'm sure there are other ways to lose a post...this is just one I noticed. If I were to type more slowly, I might be able to stop before I type the next character.
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The restaurant is Mandola’s Deli. It’s not helpful for my weight loss goals but hey, life is short, right? Lol
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Hmmm....wonder if Leslie (Gordy's girlfriend who's from Katy) knows about Mandola's. She's down there now visiting her folks for spring break.
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Illi - oh my, that's a LONG way away. Not only clear across town, but past town & even east of 45. I thought you were on the West side? Unfortunately I won't be driving that far, but I will check the other Mandola restaurants to see if they have something similar. Maybe if I go fishing in Galveston this summer I'll stop on the way.
Sandy - the Mandola family has been around forever so the girl's parents will likely know of them.
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Minus, yes I’m on the west side and it is far but I work near memorial park and the friend I went with works downtown and gets to lots of restaurants all over the city, plus he drives.
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Well, I've been working at a gig in Boston for a bit so breakfast buffet every day... never want to see scrambled eggs, melon brie cheese and bagels again and I take a yogurt and make a cheese sandwich with mustard every day to take to work.
MOmmyof2 I aspire to cook as well as you. (you're practical)
Sorry I have had no time to catch up.
Family problems
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Illi - Your food pics always look yummy. That cake - looks scrumptious!
Bedo - Lucky you, in Boston - hope you have had time to dine on some of the other great food in that city.
Dinner last night was a small pizza made on mini-naan (crafted, baked & served by DH). Organic mozzarella/shrooms/chopped tomato + a bit of chicken breast & canadian bacon, on thin layer of pesto. Dessert was a decadent cheesecake brownie from a local bakery.
Tonight will be zucchini sprials, organic sauteed shrooms & organic chicken/spinach sausage in organic tomato sauce. I use a hefty amount of zucchini spirals in place of pasta - add spices to taste to the rather plain tomato sauce. Also, will have a chopped avocado sprinkled with some balsamic vinaigrette & fresh grated pepper. Lots of yummy vegetables!
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Hi, all and Happy Sunday. The sun is literally out today after several days of rain, which we badly needed.
Used some of the buttermilk I had left from the Irish brown bread I'd made last week to make buttermilk french toast yesterday morning, which was a new recipe for me and came out great. I used leftover sourdough bread instead of the challah it called for, added a bit of orange zest to the batter, and made Nigella Lawson's orange syrup (fresh OJ, marmalade and a bit of sugar) as an alternative to maple syrup.
I made split pea soup in my Instant Pot for lunch, which only took half an hour and now we have leftovers for the week.
Tonight we'll be having more of the leg of lamb I made a couple of nights ago, and my husband chose Yorkshire pudding over gratin dauphinois to go with that. I do not have the fat from the roasting pan to put in the Yorkshire pudding pan, so will likely sub olive oil and maybe a touch of bacon fat. Think I'll do some glazed carrots as well for both vitamins and color.
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Eric, glad you discovered the dynamic working against getting your post posted! I think my issue is that I always post from my Ipad, which may render this site as unstable. When I can remember, I will write my posts in my notes, then copy and paste here. I am chuckling about your recent stove inheritance and fix em up. I can certainly see how using an outdoor range would be helpful during your hot summers. But if you collect any more ranges, I might place you in my category of Talenti container savers! 😉
Celia, nice veggie dinner!
Last night I was really tired after returning from the March For Our Lives in Boston, so we decided to just heat up some leftovers to have along with cheese and crackers and a nice red wine.
Tonight I’ll concoct an eggplant casserole (with no pasta involved) with the eggplant pieces I made last week breaded in chickpea flour. I’ll probably include some large mushrooms and artichoke hearts, a spicy tomato sauce, and some mozzarella cheese.
Tomorrow night we will have a stand up dinner at a local restaurant that makes delicious and interesting pizzas, where our state rep is having a fundraising event. They’ll have many kinds of pizza and salads offered casual buffet style. It seems I will be dining out a lot this week, since I am meeting friends for lunch and dinner on various days/evenings, and we have a neighborhood brunch to attend on Saturday, then a C’s game Saturday night. Sadly, I do better with my food intake being healthy when we eat at home....so this will be a challenging week as I struggle to get those extra lbs off. I probably need to cut down on my volunteer schedule so I can spend more time in the gym to take care of this weight concern.
Tomorrow, I have another follow up eye appt, and it will be interesting to hear what is going on since my eyes are clearly not seeing that well yet, and floaters show up often with my left eye, most recently done. The good news is that I have not fallen again, my bruises are healing, and my facial hematoma is lightening up, so I no longer look like a domestic violence victim. I need to give three powerpoint presentations at an elementary school this week to help reduce student anxiety about the state tests that are coming up, so I’m glad that I won’t look horrid in front of those audiences!
Minus, I hope you get to connect with some of our new threadmembers either in Houston or SF. I fondly remember our dinner here with Susan at erbaluce!
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Magari, I missed your last post while I was typing. Realized that I forgot to mention how delicious your lamb dinner sounded. And your description of tonight’s leftovers’ effort sounds great. Your use of the Instant Pot reminds me that I really must rescue mine which has now lived unopened in its mailer box for almost a year! Yikes! I think if I learn some lower calorie/fat items it can be used for, I might get in the habit of using it. But first I must unearth it
Carole, I will be interested to learn if you try and like using your air fryer for making eggplant.
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