So...whats for dinner?
Comments
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The menu for Pop Up Taco Night:
Starters
Warm Queso Blanco with fresh green chilis 7
Eggplant Fries With warm queso blanco and lamb jus 8
Tortilla Soup With avocado, pico, and cheese 6
Table Snack
Fresh Made Chips and Assorted House-Made Salsas of Tomatillo and Fire Roasted Tomato included with dinner
Choose Three Tacos:
Buffalo Chicken, Maytag bleu cheese, celery slaw
Braised Lamb Shank, goat cheese, mint chimichurri
Fried Shrimp, smoked jalape� tartar, shaved cabbage
Korean Carnitas, fresh avocado, cilantro, pickled ginger
Beef Barbacoa, queso fresco, shaved cabbage and cilantro
Grilled Ahi Tuna, ginger-lime baby greens, queso fresco0 -
Wow! What an interesting "pop up taco" menu. Who would have guessed?? i'll be so interested to hear what you had. Yum!
And I'm also keeping my fingers crossed for Sharon and you, Eric.
I am sitting in a sun-filled third floor suite overlooking the gorgeous view while I wait for DH to conclude his board meeting so we can get started home.
Earlier, when I came back from my treadmill effort, I noticed a one-legged stink bug crawling on the window pane, which triggered the memory of seeing exactly the same kind of bug several years ago in the same spot (they do like sunny windows in the winter). So I have been bug sitting and taking some pix of it, trying to get the right light that will show the beautiful design on its back. Not much luck. Just looks like a prehistoric creature in the pasture beyond the window!
Last night's dinner was varied....many passed appetizers, things like tuna on toast, olive tapenade on artichoke hearts, shrimp with an interesting dip, endive filled with something (I didn't try), etc., you get the idea. And for the first time (new Medical Director and wife whomwere hosting it), we had chicken for a sit down dinner. It has almost always been a buffet with choices of beef and fish. But this was fine, once I got past my expectation to have a lovely salmon.
The meal started with a parsnip soup with a scallop in the center, then a lovely salad that I wish I'd taken a picture of since it was a little work of art on the plate...some lettuce with candied walnuts and some interesting components on the left side of the plate that I cannot at all recall...but were tasty! The entree was chicken breast and leg (or maybe capon since it was smallish) that had been marinated and was cooked perfectly, served over grits, accompanied by a "bundle" of veggies held together by a round of zucchini....things like brocollini, beets, yellow squash, etc. Then dessert was a tray of interesting speciality cookies and confections, which was perfect since we'd eaten a lot throughout the evening. So it was different, and very nice.
DH just called to see if I wanted to come down to the hospital and help make a dent in the lunch buffet there....so I will since I have yet to eat today...just some delicious coffee, which I plan to buy from the Barrington Roasters on our way home. Goota scoot! No time to proof this...so forgive my many typos
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specialk, good to hear you're getting some relief with respect to your back! Yourturkey Swedish meatballs sound fantastic.
Bedo, you are hilarious! How was the pirate party? I bet your grandchildren love hanging out with their grandma. I love Calamari. The hangy things are the tentacles, my fave!
Minus, love vodka cream over shell fish. Did you use tomatoes in your sauce?
Carole, I agree. Never cook with Grey Goose (my fave) or Belvedere. Get the cheap stuff for cooking.
Question, does anyone know what those brown spots are on the whites of boiled eggs?
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Forgot to add, I made tomato bisque ( per my father's request) for dinner. Would love to see him eat some protein, but I doubt it.
Carole, those tacos look delish, especially the braised lamb shank ones.
Lacey, are you at a bed and breakfast? Love the wine, cheese, hor d'oeuvres and all the accoutrements.
Seems like you had a great little vacay
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Carole, mine is an Instant Pot 6 qt. Duo. I ordered an extra gasket from their website. Go for it!
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hsant - you might look into BeneProtein powder made by Nestles. MD Anderson recommends it for people who can't get enough protein. I used mixed in Instant Breakfast during chemo when I couldn't eat. It dissolves instantly in hot or cold food w/no taste. My good friend mixed it with applesauce, soup, oatmeal, mashed potatoes, etc. for her husband who lost his stomach to cancer. She ordered it by the case from Nestles. Wish I'd known about it for my own dad, who didn't have enough teeth to chew meat at 95.
Lacey - sounds like your trip has been lovely as usual. Joyce - roast chicken just fits my mood. Carole - what an interesting selection of tacos. Susan - is it too cold for work to continue on the house?
Dinner was a small salad & the other half of my baked potato from earlier in the week. I'm not making any progress trying to loose weight before my trip so I can splurge while I'm gone. Large sigh.
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Anybody else see the new spring Sur La Table catalog? Oh my, I have lots of cooking & baking envies. Thought about the pressure cooker discussion while reading about the new Fagor Lux Multicooker. It appears to be a pressure cooker & a slow cooker, but in addition you can brown, sear, simmer, saute, rice cooker, make homemade yogurt, risotto in 7 minutes in the pressure cooker mode, etc.
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Minus, That multi cooker is fascinating, isn't it? It is tempting, except I have no use for a slow cooker. A rice cooker might be a good addition. But my bottom line is, I really have no right to be adding crap to our house and I own a great pressure cooker already. If I didn't have one, I would be seriously looking at this one.
I am on day 12 of this cycle and the fatigue is great. I made dinner last night. I am making dinner tomorrow night. I have produced 7 lunches, 2 batches of bread, 6 dinners, so, tonight we bought a pizza at Mama Gina's. I made a salad. The pizza was not a real pizza tonight. It was a flatbread with a smear of tomato sauce and some cheese meandered by. Thank goodness for the salad!
House. Oh le _sigh_. I want more progress and I really want it now! But, the closed cell foam insulation is done and has been inspected. The electrician is still working but appears to be almost done. The box has been upgraded and moved. The upstairs rooms have all been put on single circuits. Most of the house is powerless though until he finishes the work. The dry wall is done! Now they are working on the skim coat and that should be done Tuesday. I don't know what the plan is from Tuesday through the rest of the week. We meet with the contractor in the morning [on a Sunday no less!] I guess he will be gone this week doing a course. Ugh. I hope that doesn't mean the project stalls again.
Eric, I am going to firmly believe that Sharon's sore is something other than breast cancer unless proven otherwise. I just can't let my brain go there. I have mets so that all of you never have them after all. This is my small mitzvah. :-)
Lacey, this Stockbridge connection is a bit like the Looking Glass isn't it? Always so interesting to hear about your food experiences there. Maybe the stock market collapse has taken a chunk out of the entertaining budget and that is why there was no salmon and/or buffet.
Joyce, you chose the week to travel home wisely. Great break on the temperatures. So nice that you were able to cook such a great meal for your family.
*susan*
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Joyce, and your best will be quite good enough. Trust me.
Eric, hope this distressing skin condition is nothing. Always, the anxiety though dammit.
My pressure cooker does all of those things as well. It has allowed me to get rid of the rice cooker and yogurt maker. The thing makes the most perfect brown rice and risotto. I'm hanging onto the slow cooker for now, only because of it's shape (oval). I use it for mulled cider or wine when entertaining so I'm hesitant to get rid of it just yet.
It has been a weird weekend. DBIL and DSIL are here but almost as soon as they arrived DBIL came down with what we think is food poisoning from a previous meal (he hadn't eaten any of my food). He's had a rough couple of days. There was a memorial service today for our friend so DSIL and I went and DH stayed home with his sick brother. Tonight he felt well enough to go with us to another friends' house for dinner.
I haven't cooked too much. Friday night's dinner was brined pork chops with fennel and onions, shredded Brussels sprouts with shallot and bacon and potatoes roasted with garlic and rosemary. DH made French toast for breakfast and that's the extent of it. We've relied on the kindness of others lol.
Carole, what did you choose for your tacos? Great choices!
Everyone's food sounds great. I'm quite tired so apologize for not responding more.
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Wow Susan....that's a lot for someone that is saying they are fatigued. I hope you're not writing promissory notes on your energy.
Sharon has had these sores before, but I don't remember them from earlier than 5 or so years ago. Before I never gave them much though. Now, there is the much hated "is it back" worry. So far my mind is not doing much thinking along those lines.
Dinner tonight.....Sharon had Jenny Craig (she's lost 8 pounds in a month) and I did 6 ounces of USDA prime New York Strip steak for DD and I. I was going to make a salad to go with meat and green beans, but DD only wanted the beans, so I skipped the salad.
I spent most of the day with a friend helping to find and remove parts from junkyard donor trucks. We both needed stuff for our old, but still running trucks, which we found.....so I wasn't too "upset" when DD didn't want a salad.
Auntie, I'm glad DBIL is feeling better...food poisoning....been there, done that, as probably most have....is no fun at all.
I haven't seen the Sur La Table catalog so I went on-line and found they have a store that I drive by on the way home from work. The classes look interesting, but my reaction to most of the on-line catalog was, "I have that already" or "I can do the same thing by using a couple of less specialized items I already have". Mom's, my grandmother's and my own kitchen stuff, combined, seems to have left me pretty well set.
Your best is all you can do Joyce and you get to decide if what you did was your best. Allowing someone else to decide if you did your best.... just don't do that! :-) Roasted chicken, butternut squash and mashed potatoes....sounds like a perfect meal to me!
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Joyce, I am also happy that you are "up north" during a very favorable period of weather. And your family will, no doubt, be very happy with your meal!
So this afternoon, I did join DH at the hospital after his board meeting and had a nice lunch of a mixed greens salad, baked haddock, and a casserole of artichokes and mushrooms, and not sure what else, but it was delicious. There were also baby potatoes which looked cute, but I skipped.
From there we headed home, stopping at a local grocery store in search of Barrington Roasters Vienna coffee, which I tried and loved this morning. No luck, but did find salmon on sale, and picked up a large bunch of radishes to roast since a friend sent me an email recently about trying that.
So, for dinner we had teriyaki marinated baked salmon, orzo, and roasted radishes with their wilted greens....OMG! They were delightful and very unique to us, tossed with a T. of butter, 2 T of honey, and a bit of white balsamic, salt and pepper..roasted at 450 degrees for 20 minutes in cast iron skillet, then removed from oven and rejoined with their cleaned greens, which were then wilted. As I have already exclaimed....soooo good! I will now bore you with my pic of them, which looks exactly like the pic in the online recipe...but they really are mine!
Hsant, our trips to Stockbridge are connected to DH's board meetings for a small psychiatric hospital. His fellow board members are from many interesting fields, (actors, ambassadors, noted psychiatrists, college profs) and one (who sadly is retiring from the board, so we are not sure if our elaborate housing will continue), a business multi millionaire (conservative estimate) who has an estate near the hospital (as well as one in Manhattan), where he allows members and spouses to stay during meeting weekends. He is a serious collector of European and Eastern Art, and staying there is like living in a five star old world hotel with modern amenities, loaded with antiques and stunning art...original paintings, sculptures, etc. It is magnificent in its setting, physical structure and content!! We have been fortunate to "pretend" that we belong there for even two nights a few times a year.
This very generous man is also renovating and expanding the estate next door to his, which he recently purchased and where he will house his foundation offices. He sponsors aspiring art students (broadly defined)as they pursue their educations...many from Eastern European countries, from where he emigrated. He came to NYC as a poor student, drove a cab to survive, graduated from college, and started a successful software company, which he sold a number of years ago, and is now a wealthy philanthropist. He has many interests and many charities. The sadness in his life is that his lovely wife died from BC about fifteen years ago, and they had no children, so he takes care of the world's children. We are fortunate to know him and be hosted by him.
Susan, I think that the changes in the dinner format and menu had more to do with the new hostess' preference...a changing of the guard. The hospital is in fine shape (sadly, I suppose...so much mental illness abounds) and the dinner was really creative, visually appealing, and healthful, which was good for all of us!
Nance, so sorry that your DBIL had food poisoning. Yuk!! Just hearing that reminds me of my episode with same this past October the night before our beach lobster fest.
Soooo nasty!Back to reality here....:)
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Carole, a few years ago there was a Harvard Lampoon parody of Martha Stewart Living magazine called Is Martha Stuart Living? It was utterly hilarious--it contained a calendar with entries for building henhouses, firing your own pottery, forging your own cutlery, disciplining household employees and farmhands, making your own toilet paper, etc. The funniest article was “How to Make Water.” It called for stuff like a nuclear reactor and deuterium, which she sourced from a “delightful elderly German gentleman named Dieter” who was inexplicably reluctant to be more specific about his whereabouts during WWII. The afterword described a nightmare she had in which she found herself in the parking lot of a drive-in in Nutley, NJ (her home town) with big hair (“teased and stiff with spray”), a short rabbit fur jacket and jeans with zippers at the ankles, realizing to her horror that she liked it.
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Lacey how beautiful!
Chi, too funny!
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Our meeting this morning with the contractor was interesting. He is both embarrassed and sorry that he is running so far behind schedule. As a "gift" he will pay to have all the floors re-sanded and re-finished with polyurethane. New end date is March 15th, and I am still not sure he can make it. We are all getting worried that the kids will not have enough time to truly move in, i.e. put things away and be organized, before the baby arrives.
We are smoking out the neighborhood right now. Ribs are on the smoker. Mop sauce is made. I will make the requested warm potato salad. The question is, what green thing would be good and also be eaten by the girl-child.
Lacey, you are competing with those fancy Stockbridge meals aren't you? Beautiful!
*susan*
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susan - for someone who is fatigued you have an incredible amount of energy! I am not really surprised though - you always amaze me! Wow on the gift of floors being sanded and refinished - yay! When is the baby's due date - how close would that be cutting it? I made your same mets deal for the remaining women in my family (all in-laws), I will be the one with breast cancer because I didn't want them to go through this.
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chisandy that is hysterical I can just picture it, especially the rabbit coat and teased hair.
Lacey I want those radishes! I will have to try. Now for some reason I want to make Kim Chee. One of the few things I'm good at.
Hsant No grandchildren yet. The kids I went to the Pirate Party with are my friend's grandsons, ages 4 and 6 and the party was way too loud! I don't know about those egg spots, sorry.
Job driving me crazy at times. I see 2 x as many people in 4 days as people in comparable positions see in 5. We are in different locations but can see each others schedules..
Thinking about a position, temp, in Cambridge for 3 months, Put out application today but still in the very tentative stages. I would be able to be closer to DD and DSIL and I've always loved Cambridge. I would have a paid apartment and the kitties could come. But it would shake up my health care, although that would be paid for.
For lunch tomorrow made tuna sandwiches, clementines, hard boiled eggs and tomato soup, all to bring and put in my fridge for two days.
Susan, I am so tempted to email you my new lesson. So many triplets, changed tempos. I wish that my teacher would tell me who wrote it so that I could listen to it on youtube. The last one was Bach and I finally did it! (I s$#k) and always will, but it gives me pleasure and it is so fun to learn hard new things that are a big stretch with my first thought being. I can never do this it is way beyond me.
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Bedo - I am always in awe that you are comfortable re-inventing your life. I wish I had the nerve to pick up & go like you did to Alaska. And now possibly something else fun!
Went to a world premier play this afternoon and afterwards to eat at a local Asian restaurant. Sunday through Thursday they have 'happy hour' appetizers & sushi. Just a few options: huge bowl of Miso Soup - $2.00; large salad - $2.00; 2 vegetable fried spring rolls - $2.00; 2 seafood fried rolls - $4.00; 6 crab puffs - $4.00; chicken yakatori kebab - $4.00; 4 large shrimp tempura w/4 onion rings - $6.00; California roll cut into 8 pieces - $4.00. Always nice and hot & very good. But I'm way too full since the temptation to order too much at these prices is formidable.
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Yay for your embarrassed and responsible contractor, Susan! Getting floors done before moving in is so valuable! When is your DGB due? Of course we all want things to be settled before a first child is born...but then, life is never quite settled is it?! You are a resourceful crew, so I'm sure it will work out!
On our walk this afternoon, we stopped at the local grocery store to pick up something for dinner. Lamb loin chops were on sale, and they had four left. We scooped them up, finished our walk, marinated them in rosemary, garlic, and balsamic, and DH grilled them. They were perfect...maybe because we so rarely have red meat, and these were nice cuts. Our sides were equally satisfying: a salad of red and green leaf lettuce, red onion, tomatoes, yellow pepper, kalamata olives, and a dressing of evoo, dijon, touch of garlic and sugar and white balsamic; mashed butternut squash with a touch of maple syrup; and steamed brussels sprouts, which I love...despite the fact that roasted are so often preferred in the food blogs.
Bedo, I bet you would enjoy the stint in Cambridge. Good luck! And yes, try roasting radishes. You will love the sweet little things
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Sharon's dinner was the Jenny Craig stuff that is working for her weight loss. I baked a ham, fixed some green beans and a turned some fruit into something resembling a salad.
Just like yesterday, today was also a busy day. We did all sorts of chores except for laundry. The laundry was done Thursday and Friday. The chores aren't finished, but we're done with them... :-)
Chi, Sharon, being the nuclear engineer, especially liked Dieter's part.
Susan, refinishing the wood floors is a great gift. Wood floors are beautiful, especially right after they are refinished.
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Susan - I agree, the free floor refinishing will be a treat. But sure hope he can keep the March 15th date.
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I kept thinking about that duck leg confit, and realized that's not what I was craving: ever since my trip to Italy I've been jonesing for cacio e pepe (Rome's native pasta dish). I came to the conclusion that every time I keep “eating around" my cravings with substitutes that just don't satisfy them, I end up eventually giving in to the cravings anyway. So I weighed out an ounce of dry spaghetti, cooked it up, and tossed it with olive oil, an ounce of Pecorino Romano (grated with a Microplane) and all the black pepper I could grind until the grinder was empty. Yum! I savored it, literally, one strand at a time. Now I can go another couple of months without cheating with pasta--it'd have driven me crazy till I gave in and ordered (and probably finished) a restaurant-sized portion.
Unfortunately, I overdid the grating part: the forearm tenderness I'd so carefully stroked away with MLD returned with a vengeance. My forearm skin feels like I'm ripping my blood vessels open or tearing every muscle beneath it--it's exquisitely painful to stretch the skin only slightly. I can feel little knots below the surface (which have pinpoint pain when I press), and the soreness runs all the way up the inside of my forearm from just below the wrist up to the biceps--with the most painful part just to the left of the crook of my R elbow. My bracelet, despite hanging loosely from my wrist, is making little divots in my skin, shaped like every link and charm. Hate to think I'm gonna have to wear compression every time I grate cheese, tamp espresso or even open a jar or bottle. Yet the doc and therapist say they can't see or measure it. It's like a toothache that disappears when you walk into the dentist's office, or that weird noise your car makes that stops when the mechanic turns on the engine. The thought of having to drop everything and kill yet another half-hour doing MLD is discouraging--I have a life to live and schedules I need to meet.
My L forearm muscles are sore, too--wonder if this is really fibromyalgia instead??? Or is it cording--with the actual “cords” concealed by fatty tissue? I do sometimes find little bruises a day or two later after the tightness resolves--exactly where the knots have been.
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Chisandy, that is exactly what I have. When I went to PT, freaking out about little knots under the skin in my arm, I was told it is due to cording. When the knots/ cords are resolved, I find bruises where they were. I can see my cords and the knots are right on them.
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Sandy - I hear you about the swelling. I find the hardest part about intermittent LE (or imminent LE, as the case may be) is thinking about the darn sleeve when doing something supposedly normal like grating cheese. I raked up a few leaves last week - really only 10 or 12 pulls with the rake to get them out of a corner - and boom, swelling again. It really pisses me off that I can no longer knead bread or stir thick batter by hand. What scares me the most is that we're at risk for acceleration the rest of our lives.
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So today I joined a gym and found out that I get a free consultation with a personal trainer. I will ask her about arm strengthening excercises. I have been getting spasms in the affected arm when putting on socks or boots or scratching the back of my leg. Goes into a spasm and sends me through the roof. I never had LE or side effects from the surgeries to speak of. I do not like losing my strength, I have always considered myself strong (from lifting all those patients). Walked 3 mi on the treadmill. We really need to change some eating habits around here too....way too much cooking!
today, because it is warm outside, will do skinless chicken breast on the grill. vege sides. will learn to eliminate sides like pasta and potatoes.
Susan (maybe too late?) but I vote coleslaw...but maybe the girl child wouldn't like that.
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ChiSandy, so sorry for your LE flareup, and accompanying symptoms. It seems so awful for that lurking condition to rear its head every time you perform a particular daily life activity...when you might not expect it....grating cheese!!?? Geesh! Does it resolve quickly, or do you have to see a therapist to help promote the drainage and calm thinfs down. Also sorry that it flared for you, Minus. I hope it resolves for you both soon. Hugs to all dealing with this....
Carrie, I found over the last couple of years that cutting waaaay back on pasta and potatoes really has helped in terms of a healthier diet....mainly because we replace those things with more veggies.
I do hope that the trainer can help you with arm pain relief....tho that might be best addressed with an ortho consult and a good PT. Good luck! It was helpful for me to review with my orthopod which exercises will support my arm strength and which will further stress my rotator cuff tear. Sometimes trainers can give you exercises that assume you own a healthy body of a thirty year old...then you stress a vulnerable joint. I have learned to be careful....0 -
Minus, Protein powder has been recommended for my dad. The issue is that he doesn't eat enough food to really benefit from it. He supplements meals (using the word meal loosely) with Ensures, four/day.
Lacey, those radishes look delightful! Picture perfect. I thought they were red skin potatoes.
I gathered that you were at a very fancy, but large B&B or a fancy boutique hotel. Sounds amazing! The artwork must be incredible. The gentleman provides the luxiourious hotel and artwork sounds like a very interesting man. I'm sorry about his wife.
Well, my dad has obtained a little bit of his (already meager) appetite back, and he requested chicken Marsala and mashed potatoes. Hopefully, he will eat more than a few bites
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hsant - put the protein powder in things like mash potatoes. He'll never know. My BFF's husband was only eating small containers of things - like applesauce or baby rice cereal. Much more expensive, but he didn't feel overwhelmed and give up. Great if he'll drink the Ensure. My dad would not.
Lacey - what is happening with your "rotator cuff"? I know you didn't select surgery for now.
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The LE sounds really awful. I hope I don't develop it because I haven't been careful. I wondered whether I should be fitted for a sleeve before I took those long plane flights to and from AUS in 2014 but I didn't do it. Sorry to hear you're both having problems, Sandy and Minus.
I used the re-claimed pressure cooker twice today. First I cooked 5 chicken thighs and made stock in the cooking process. Then I cooked the remaining 1 cup of dry black beans.
Dinner will be leftover oven barbecued chicken thighs from yesterday, a salad with sliced pear and maybe some variety of potato, either small white or sweet. I'm leaning toward the sweet.
It's in the 70's today and I have doors and windows open. Forecast is for rain tomorrow just in time to make the golf courses sloppy again. Playing golf is becoming a memory. Woe is me.
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Pressure cookers scare the c$#p out of me.
Lacey I am familiar with that area and your description of it did more for me than meditating could ever do-not that I meditate-but I was taken to another very peaceful place far away. Thank you.
Chi kiks and minus I hope that there are researchers working somewhere who will come up with something better and kick the c%^p out of lymphedema
Minus, I've also spent 1 1/2 years in Barrow, Ak -Northernmost settlement on the continent with an ocean front apt on the Arctic Ocean -have to fly in- on divided stints to make sure everyone, Inupiat Eskimos, has their mammos and women's health issues taken care of. Ironic. Polar bears, northern lights, - 40 weather and complete dark then complete light. I love travel, but have to work!
And Minus you impress me by your life in Texas and the fun you have I can only imagine, it sounds like such a different life from life in New England, I like to picture it.
Susan good luck on the house! Sounds like you have it under control.
I am not hungry. No dinner tonight. Maybe mussels in butter sauce later.
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OK - I'm jealously picturing Bedo's mussels. The closest I can come is brussels (sprouts of course). I had a big salad for late lunch so not really hungry. Maybe I'll steam up the rest of the zucchini. Or maybe just popcorn a little later.
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