So...whats for dinner?

Hi everyone 

Cherry yes I would like\ the recipe for salmon gravalax, it looks so appetising. 

Eric that is one lot of oranges for one tree! I too was imagining an orchard!

Your salads sound so good Kayak... I can't bring myself to eat salads in winter though. I admit I am very seasonal in my cooking, and winter is all about hot soups, roasts and grilled veggies.... Maybe in the spring I'll get down to it.

Today we have chicken breast with spinach in the oven. So here goes.

Boil and drain spinach. Fry mushrooms and garlic lightly and then reduce in white wine. Add mushrooms and garlic to the spinach and add a spoonful of grated hard cheese such as kefalotiri, grano padano or parmeggiano reggiano. 

Slice open your chicken breast or pocket it and fill with the mixture above. Pop into the oven until ready. Sorry I cant tell you how long for. It's still in the oven!

Hi 

The ricotta stuffed shells sounds good Special K....might get down to doing them in the couple of weeks left at home. Today was meant to be a lazy day from cooking point of view. I spent the morning getting some exercise walking around in the gentle sun. Spent an hour walking today. Then I got home and prepared mushrooms for a mushroom soup - nothing special mushrooms and garlic boiled away with a mushroom stock cube and blended and then a dollop of cream added at the end. That's the healthier (and quicker) version. In the past I stirfried the garlic and mushrooms before boiling, and added funghi porcini as well. These days I cut out the stirfry to decrease the calorific count.

Anyway cut a long story short, the DH was going to be meeting the MIL and her sister, and I asked him to bring them over for tea. Only neither of them would eat my mushroom soup I'm sure, so I rustled up another dish which is currently in the oven. 

Baked rice - here it goes:

Make a bolognese sauce - stirfy minced meat around 200g, add sliced fresh mushroom, frozen peas, some salt. When cooked add a tin of tomato sauce, and water and bubble away. Simmer for around 20 minutes. In a highish oven dish, add a glass of whole grain rice, the bolognese sauce, 2 glasses of water and 2 beaten eggs mixed with a spoonful of grated kefalotiri cheese. Bake in the oven until it crisps at the top.

I am enjoying my cooking days and also the company on this page!

Hi everyone! Long time no "see." Happy New Year! I see we have some new faces. Nice to meet you all. I am trying to behave these days since I have gained so much weight so I have taken to watching food porn on you tube...LOL I found these very strange guys in Serbia that cook in the woods, all from scratch and honestly, I am mesmerized by what they can do. Sometimes it is in their brick oven other times on the side of a stream in a picturesque setting. They cook absolutely EVERYTHING. Check it out if you want. You too will be drooling after a while. Beats cooking it myself as this is far less caloric.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoINOifaV3E

Special - I often play the game to see how long I can wait before going to the store. But then you all know that I eat very eclectic & different meals.

April - sooooo glad to see you back.

Yesterday I almost finished the Black Eyed Pea casserole (pork tomatoes, chili, etc). Today I made the Hawaiian roll Sliders "casserole". Perfect meal for a cold day. I made 1/2 of the dozen with ham & cheddar and the other 1/2 with turkey & Havarti. Impossible to eat just one!!!

Played Chickenfoot this afternoon. One of our neighbors died last March but her husband has been playing with us, which he never did before. He says it's comforting to hear "girls" talking and laughing in the house. Today he told us his dinner specialty.... RESERVATIONS.

Wanted to make duck breast Thurs. night but it hadn't defrosted enough; so I nuked a chicken chili verde tamale, and hit the supermarket. From the kosher section at the Evanston Jewel I had a Moroccan eggplant-red pepper relish (like ratatouille cooked down with harissa) and (for dessert) some noodle kugel. From Whole Foods' hot bar, pineapple pulled pork (no sauce).

Tonight I braved the duck breast, having found a foolproof recipe: pat a 6-oz. duck breast dry with paper towels, score the skin in a crosshatch pattern, salt & pepper. Let it sit 15 min. at room temp. Into a cold cast iron skillet, pour 1-2 tsps. heat-tolerant fat (I used grapeseed oil). Place the duck breast skin side down and use it to spread the oil. Turn on the stove, to medium-high. Season the meat side. Once it starts to sizzle, give it 3-5 min. and then flip. Give it 3 min on the meat side and 30 sec. ea. on each edge. Remove to carving board, tent with foil and let it rest before slicing across the grain. I used the Christian Poitier prefab red wine-shallot sauce to nap it. Roasted Brussels sprouts with olive oil, salt & herbes de Provence; baked a sweet potato with salt, pepper and cinnamon.

Here it is:

Last night's dinner at "California Pizza Kitchen" over by Arizona State University. I was over there to sell my mom's 1994 Buick (driven only 65,900 miles) to one of DD's roommates.

The girl's dad in in Pennsylvania and he was a bit worried about a $600 car...but after she sent him picture of the car, the interior, tires, and service receipts, I'm not sure if she, or her dad, was more excited. She is the same age as DD (20) and she said this is the first time she had done anything "so adult like".

I also took the opportunity to teach her, and DD, the things to check before buying a used car..I guess I will never miss a chance to teach a young lady to be more independent. :-)

Cherry: Here you go. I make 1/2 & 1/2 with two different meat & two cheeses on each end, and usually don't do more than 8 slices of each meat & cheese. Make sure you bake until the cheese melts.

HAWAIIAN BREAD SLIDERS

1/4 cup mayonnaise

12 slices deli thin ham

12 slices deli thin turkey

12 slices thin deli Swiss cheese or cheese of your choice

1/2 tablespoon sesame or poppy seeds

3/4 tablespoon Dijon mustard (I used a full 1 Tblsp)

1/4 cup melted butter

1/2 tablespoon onion powder (used only 1 tsp)

1/4 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

Cut rolls in half horizontally. Spread mayo over bottom half. Layer ham, turkey and cheese over this. Replace top half. Bunch rolls closely together in a baking dish. Mix remaining ingredients except sesame seeds and pour evenly over rolls or you can use a pastry brush to spread over tops, letting some run down sides. Sprinkle on seeds. Cover with foil and let sit for at least 10 minutes or you can refrigerate overnight. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Uncover and bake for additional 3 minutes or until tops are slightly brown and crisp. Serve warm.

i love the Hawaiian rolls. In the casserole or just to eat.

I had my port removed, went pretty well. But i left the Tagaderm on a bit too long and now have a lovely red square surrounding the wound. LOL. I should have removed it last night. O well. It feels better since I took it off and replaced it with gauze and paper tape.

We went out to eat yesterday, as I didnt want to cook. Funny how even a real small operation takes a lot out of you. We went to a small restaurant nearby and I had fried chicken tenderloins. And fries. Yes, not exactly a light supper, but yummy!

Tomorrow Im doing the steaks with green beans and mashed potatoes from my Home Chef box. It was suppised to be brussels sprouts, but the sprouts will last longer, so green beans from the chicken meal it is. LOL. Ill eat the sprouts with the chicken.

Much love to all

Glad you're feeling better, Cherry. Those photos are gorgeous. -1C is actually pretty normal for Chicago in January. We suddenly got a bit warmer these past few days but it'll drop again this week after Mon. & Tuesday's snowfalls. (Not back into the deep freeze, though). Felt wonderful to go shopping today in shoes & socks instead of UGGs.

I can still smell the aroma of the rendering duck fat from Friday night, and I realize that aromas are just as delicious (almost but not quite satisfying) as tastes & textures. Yes, the skin got perfectly crispy! Had too many leftovers (odds & ends of a chicken tamale, carnitas, Moroccan red pepper relish, noodle kugel) that would have gone bad had I not eaten them, so they (along with a small tuna salad sandwich and a ripe tomato-basil salad) were my dinner. Then Bob brought home leftover sushi, sashimi & edamame!

Been binge-watching last year's season of "Worst Cooks in America," and I realize that except for a professional or two who'd never needed to cook, most of the contestants are rather spectacularly stupid. But the one thing they have in common is that all of them are incredibly inexperienced (and limited) eaters. How does one not know what a Brussels sprout is? Or has never seen an eggplant except as an emoji--and therefore has an aversion to even trying it because of the internet connotation? Or won't eat anything green? I have learned over the years that if you don't like to eat a variety of things, you're not going to be much of a cook, because you won't know what things are supposed to taste like.

Making shaved steak, cheese and pepper grinders to go with a salad tonight

Beautiful coffee service, Cherry! Years ago, I used to subscribe to Gevalia (whole bean) before I realized it was probably roasted long before shipping. And the packages piled up over the months. Nowadays, I won't use any beans older than a couple of months post-roast for brewed coffee (and even that is pushing it), nor older than a couple of weeks for espresso. My housekeeper gets my discards--she uses them to anchor floral arrangements at church or for her party-planning business. I'm bummed out, though, that my local roaster will no longer sell me 1/2-lb. packages of beans (I prefer not to buy more than I'll use before it goes stale). They used to split 1-lb. bags all the time, but now that they've followed industry-standard and reduced package size to 12-oz., they will no longer split bags. Oh, well: either I will have to share with other espresso-aficionado friends (of which I have none--I'm the only one who's seriously into 'spro), overcaffeinate (and drink enough decaf daily to cause heartburn), or my housekeeper will have to ramp up her floral arrangement game.

Lovely china, cherry. Coffee will certainly taste good served in such pretty cups!

I see the Hawaiian rolls at the supermarket and at Sam's Club, but have never bought them.

Last night was a take-out pizza with thin crust. I had thoughts of making a pizza but got lazy.

I am making no consistent progress with losing weight. This morning's weigh in on my evil scale was not good. A new week begins...

Eric, I learned to drive an old automatic shift car and then had to switch to a manual shift. I preferred the manual for years. I love my keyless Prius. It's so convenient just to push a button.

Happy Monday to all.

Coffee made from stale beans won't hurt you, but it'll smell & taste like cardboard. (It might or might not lose any of its beneficial properties, due to degradation of caffeine and theobromine). Freshly-roasted (w/in a month, maybe two, for brewed coffee and 3-14 days for espresso) beans are best because roasting releases aromatic oils & esters within the bean, along with CO2. CO2 is odorless and flavorless, but contributes nothing to the bean's flavor or aroma. That's why, if you look at those little sealed bags, you will see a perforated circular dimple" about a third of the way down the bag. That is a one-way valve to allow CO2 to escape without allowing air in (but every time you open the bag, you expose the beans to air and oxygen gets in anyway). Oxygen is the enemy of freshness. Over time, the volatile oils will evaporate and eventually oxidize. (Roasting is controlled oxidation). Grinding accelerates that process, which is why you should never buy ground coffee and should grind just before you brew. (K-Cups and Nespresso capsules are vacuum-sealed as soon as they're filled with freshly-ground coffee from freshly-roasted beans, but when the machine punctures them, the coffee is brewed immediately before the flavors can degrade very much.

When you open a can of ground coffee you will hear a "whoosh" and smell a coffee aroma--that's the CO2 escaping, taking some of those volatile oils & flavor compounds with them. That's why subsequent pots never taste as good as the first. (Maxwell House's "good to the last drop" slogan is only true if it refers to the first cup made from the first pot, provided the pot doesn't sit on the warming plate very long). Same thing if you buy a sealed bag of less-recently-roasted beans from the grocery store (and sadly, most Starbucks shops). It'll smell great, but not for very long. It's shameful, but the "best by" dates on sealed Starbucks or other brand bags are usually 6-12 months down the pike. (Even artisanal roasters, if the bag carries a "best before" rather than a "roasted on" date, have a "best by" date of 3-6 months; some Starbucks bags in low-volume shops may already be 6 months old, with the pull date being a year post-packing). At Whole Foods, the Allegro bins almost always have a "filled on," not "roasted on" date. Counting backwards, it takes the beans about a week to ship from factory to WF, the beans must "rest" (to let the CO2 "out-gas") for 3-4 days before being packed into large sacks and can sit in the warehouse or loading dock for as long as a week before being shipped. And those bins in the store are rarely filled on the same day you're buying your beans.

Decaf beans have already lost quite a bit of their oils during the decaffeination process, and out-gassed all their CO2 as well. The flavor oils & compounds are only partially extractable from the solvent (whether chemical, seltzer or water) in which they're soaked to remove most of their caffeine, before being re-introduced to the beans. You will rarely find a decaf roasted any lighter than dark-ish "Vienna" or "full city" roast, because so much of their flavor has been sacrificed by the decaffeination process that they need to be roasted dark enough for more carbon to make them taste "stronger."

Here's a dirty little secret: people think that the darker the roasted beans, the stronger the coffee and the more caffeine. They brag that they're drinking a "manlier" cup. WRONG! The darker a bean is roasted, the more caffeine is burned away. Roasting develops the flavor and releases the caffeine & oils of the beans--but only up to a point. ("City" or "full city" roast is about as dark as it gets while retaining both maximal flavor & aroma and normal caffeine). Any darker, and you're tasting much more carbon than you are bean, and you're getting less caffeine. The coffee will look and taste stronger, but in terms of both acidity and caffeine it'll be weaker. French or Italian roasts, the darkest, taste the strongest but have the least caffeine. The further south you go in Italy, the darker they like their espresso. But the best and most potent espresso is roasted no darker than full city, ideally medium ("Firenze") roast. (And the further south you go in Italy, the more likely you are to get "espresso" brewed in a Moka pot or even flip-drip--that's also why they like to add liqueurs such as sambuca to make a "corretto." You will probably be served a bottle of anisette along with your demitasse, especially in Sicily).

And that's another reason why decaf beans are roasted much darker--the decaffeination process doesn't remove all caffeine from the bean, so dark-roasting burns away most of the remainder.

As to "Starbucks" being denigrated as "Charbucks" or "Starburnt," that used to be true back in the days when not even the bulk beans used to brew their coffees were all that fresh. After Howard Schultz bought back the company, he introduced lighter "Pike Place" and "blonde" roasts for sale (and for awhile even sold them in bulk, bagged to order, for takeaway). But why does Starbucks coffee, regardless of variety, always taste the same? Customers have come to expect a characteristic "Starbucks" dark-roast taste--so all their coffees brewed in-store for drinking are brewed to a strength that'll taste like that. The lighter beans are brewed much stronger, and have more caffeine, than coffee brewed from the darker beans! To get the true taste of the bean, ignore the advice to use 2 scoops (that's 4 Tbs!) per 6-oz cup--use one scoop per 8-oz. cup when you brew at home.

A woman in my Zumba class brought a bag of lemons this morning. And so I am making lemon chicken for dinner tonight!

MJ

Tapper, you gave me the idea with the lemon chicken.

The main dish for dinner tonight was chicken in a slightly thickened lemon sauce. I was away from the house most of the day today, so I cut the "about a pound" of boneless skinless chicken breasts to half thickness so they would cook more quickly.

Add olive oil to cover the bottom of a skillet and cook the chicken breasts until done. Remove the chicken breasts from the skillet when done.

Combine 1 cup of chicken broth, about 1/3 cup of lemon juice, a teaspoon of red wine vinegar and dissolve a couple of teaspoons of cornstarch in the liquid. Then add a clove of minced garlic, a 1/2 teaspoon of dried oregano, some capers (I used a couple of tablespoons) and a small amount of salt and pepper. Put this into the skillet used to cook the chicken and bring to a light boil to thicken the sauce.

When the sauce has thickened, put the chicken back into the sauce and serve while hot.

When I first I started experimenting with this recipe, I used a 1/4 cup of lemon juice. We like 'tart' dishes, so I increased the lemon juice to 1/2 cup, but that was to much for our tastes, so I settled on the 1/3 cup of lemon juice.