Journal

2010 - Week 7 Cooking Results

Chopped Egg And Avocado Sandwich (showed up in my NPR food RSS feed)

This was quite fantastic. Basically you replace most of the mayo with avocado. Such a simple change up, yet so good.

Sicilian Corkscrews with White Beans (heard them talking about this on a repeat of her show a week or so ago)

Simple. Delicious.

Asian Beef and Noodle Soup (RC Cook's Country February/March 2010)

After giving one of my co-workers a little crap for having ramen for lunch, I picked this meal, which used the noodles (not the nasty packet) from ramen. It was pretty good and quick to make.

Chicken Pomodoro (RC Cook's Country February/March 2010)

This worked pretty well, after realizing that I needed to put it on something, I used some of the farro that I had left from the last time that I made it. It turned out pretty well.

Avocado Soup With Tortilla Crisps And Fresh Cheese (NPR RSS feed)

I was not as big of a fan of this...and the directions were a bit lacking. But the ratio of avocado to chicken stock, wasn't right, at least the way I made it, because while it had the color and a bit of heat from the jalapeno, most of the taste was from the chicken stock.

Savory Farro Tart (Proctor was kind enough to buy me some farro from Costco (2 lbs for ~$9), instead of what I had bought before (1/2 lb for ~$9)

So this turned out well...Lets see...cheese, cheese, butter, eggs, garlic and some spices...Made for a relatively quick preparation.

2010 - Week 7 Cooking

2010 - Week 6 Cooking Results

So because I haven't been getting to Hy-Vee until later, I've been often running into the church crowd, which, isn't really a problem I suppose, but I don't like the crowds. Plus Shannon and I are going to try to go to a movie on Sunday, so it would be better to be done earlier.

I think my final goal will to be try to be done Friday night, so when the farmer's market opens back up, I'll be able to shop based on the recipes decided for the week.

Chili

I did make a few mistakes here, I should've added the jalapeno and hatch peppers earlier, so they had time to permeate the chili, but even so it turned out well. Since I like chili so much, I'm surprised I don't make it more...

Smashed Tenderloin Sandwiches

So I used half a pork tenderloin last week and though it'd make a good sandwich...so that's what I did, I made it into sandwiches. I liked how this turned out. Very quick to make.

Long Boy Cheese Burgers (p17 Cook's Country February/March 2010)

This was actually quite good, and relatively simple to make. On to the other side of this. I used the mandolin that I got for Christmas to make fries. Now I imagine that if I were to actually fry them in oil, they would've turned out better, but baked, not so much. Oh well I plan on making a potato gratin soon, so then we'll see this in purposeful action.

Stacked Chicken Enchiladas (RC Cook's Country February/March 2010)

This was another audible call. I apparently don't have a square pan, so I kept the recipe the same, and just made enchiladas. Though it didn't turn out as well since I was out of foil to cook them first before I opened them up for the cooking. I think it turned out well though.

2010 - Week 6 Cooking

  • Chili
  • Smashed Tenderloin Sandwiches
  • Long Boy Cheese Burgers (p17 Cook's Country February/March 2010)
  • Stacked Chicken Enchiladas (RC Cook's Country February/March 2010)

2010 - Week 5 Cooking Results

Deviled Chicken (p14 Cook's Country February/March 2010)

These turned out well, the breading didn't want to stay on very well, but even so, it made for a good eating.

Pork Medallions with Chili-Maple Sauce

I really liked these. a little sweet, but good. It did give me an idea for sandwiches this next week.

Migas (Scrambled Eggs with Corn Tortillas) (Mother's Best: Comfort Food That Takes You Home Again from from Weeknight Kitchen with Lynne Rossetto Kasper

meh...it was ok...

Vodka And Tomato Pasta Sauce, (npr.org)

I was feeling a bit lazy, and didn't want to follow this recipe all the way though (and dirty up the blender and etc), so we made this rustic, and it was great. I didn't blend the sauce to make it smooth and I didn't cook it as long, but even so it turned out great.

Skillet Glazed Pork Chops (p20 Cook's Country February/March 2010)

After visiting the Boelman's at the hospital, we had been talking about tacos, and so we called an audible, dropped by Dahls, picked up some avocados, and a few other things for tacos and bam, had pork tacos. I flavored the pork with salt, pepper and chipotle pepper powder.

Country Captain Chicken (p13 Cook's Country February/March 2010)

I cannot explain how frustrated I was with myself when making this recipe, one stupid mistake. Turn the heat down, let simmer for a while...do I turn it down? No, do I think about it several times? No. I was able to rescue most of this, but even so, I'm a bit upset with myself. Other then the smell of burned food in my nose, which permeated the house, it tasted pretty good.

2010 - Week 4 Cooking Results

Is it possible to make to many meatball based dishes in one week? Yes, yes it is. By the time that I made the Moroccan Beef Meatball Tagine on friday, I was getting a bit tired of making meat balls. Shannon helped make the meatballs for the Spaghetti, since I was running behind and needed to start making the sauce.

This week I also used many pots pans and dishes, so I kept falling further and further behind as the week went on. On Friday, which I took off, I ended up doing 4 loads of dishes before I was caught up.

Lentil Soup with Spicy Italian Sausage (p43 Bon Appétit January 2010)

This was very simple to make, with the spicy Graziano sausage it made for a good and filling meal.

Pork Meatball Banh Mi (p60 Bon Appétit January 2010)

The first meatball dish of the week. I uh...kept eating the meatballs as I was making the rest of the dinner. They were very good. But the dinner was too.

Spiced Chicken Breasts with Poblano and Bell Pepper Rajas (p45 Bon Appétit January 2010)

Whenever I have done something with poblano peppers it always reminds me of a smell that I haven't smelled for a while. Maybe it just trigger to me, but when Sean roasts them at the Farmer's Market or I've cooked them myself, It brings up that thought in my mind. Who knows, maybe it's just me.

Anyways I ended up slicing up the chicken and we had a few fajitas.

Spaghetti and Meatballs All'Amatriciana (p60 Bon Appétit January 2010)

I made this for movie night (we watched The Wild Bunch)Shannon helped me make the meat balls, and after having the first batch of meat balls kind of fall apart as I tried to turn them (the pot I was cooking is is fairly tall and narrow), I ended up putting the rest of them in the oven, while I cooked everything else. This actually turned out fairly well.

Other then being pressed for time, this turned out pretty well. I used a bottle of wine that we had gotten on our honeymoon at a demonstration we went to, since I was almost out of white wines and the only ones left were of the sweeter variety. So pasta, plus bread, white corn, and a simple spinach salad with a rice vinegar based dressing made for quite the feast.

Because of the way I made this, I thought that perhaps the meat combination would make a good hamburger. Bacon + onion, red pepper, etc all processed and mixed into ground chuck. I will probably be making this sometime later.

Moroccan Beef Meatball Tagine (p63 Bon Appétit January 2010)

This was good and tasty, but by this point in the week, I think we were both a little meatballed out. But it still turned out

Chicago Style Deep Dish Pizza (p15 Cook's Illustrated January/February 2010)

So I have kind of avoided making bread based things...There are two great bakeries within a fairly short distance from my house, so it's just never something that I have been dreadfully interested in trying. Plus there is sort of a mysticism to it, I suppose. There is so much mediocre bread out there, that you would think creating something halfway decent would be super hard...I think with my experience here, I think I can move forward a bit and expand bread making to the list of things I do from time to time.

So because I was worried about time, I starting making the dough for the pizza around 1:PM Saturday, it was probably a good thing, since we generally keep the house around 67°F, and because of the, lets say relatively poor insulation, it isn't that way from area to area. So I let the dough get extra time to rise (it didn't hurt that I spent the time playing Super Mario Bros Wii). All the parts were relatively simple and when it came down to it, this was relatively easy to do, just time consuming.

I adjusted the recipe, since it really was only a cheese pizza when I started. I layered the pizza with: dough, Pepperoni, mozzarella, pepperoni, mozzarella, pepperoni, sharp cheddar, sauce, and parmesan. It turned out quite well, and everyone seemed to enjoy it (we had invited Josh and Lindsay over). Of the two 9" pizzas we had about 1/2 of one left. I was quite happy with the way it turned out.

Chicago Style Deep Dish Pizza (p15 Cook's Illustrated January/February 2010)

2010 - Week 3 Cooking Results

I made some pancakes yesterday, since we were almost out of well everything in the house. I used the last of the milk, the rest of the cream from the Cacio e Pepe to make pancakes. Saturday afternoon I made some chocolate muffins (I thought they were a bit too dry, but people liked them) and some hummus for game night.

My younger brother Joseph (Ladies, he is single), came up and brought some chocolate bread (good and fantastic with peanut butter), and before Game Night started last night, we tried to go out to Baby Boomers, which according to their website, should've been open, but was not (I seriously hate that). So we ended up going to the relatively newly opened Open Sesame Lebanese Cafe (where Baby Boomers used to be), and I'm glad we did. The food was very good, so much so I'm interested in going again...soon.

Game night went well. Many games were played. Much fun was had.

Jalapeno Burgers

Took some jalapeno, cheddar cheese and onions, put them in some ground chuck and made a couple of patties. Oh so bad for you, but oh so good.

Goat Chops

I was a bit upset when I finally unwrapped these. I bought these at the last winter's farmers market and they were no where near a consistent shape or size. It was quite frustrating to come around to open it up and see a total hack job. On the other hand, the actual taste of it was pretty good. Just simply salted, cooked in a little olive oil. It had a nice taste...certainly different from say your standard fare, but good.

Cacio e Pepe (p24 Cook's Illustrated January/February 2010)

So few ingredients, I don't see how I messed this up. I ended up with big globs of melted Romano...it was depressing to say the least. Even so, it stated good.

Thai Chicken with Basil (p13 Cook's Illustrated January/February 2010)

Spicy! With extra building spiciness. A bit to much by the end for Shannon. She went up for extra milk to cool the fire. But it was simple and good.

Cajun Red Beans and Rice (p19 Cook's Illustrated January/February 2010)

How is it that the simple food from those lacking always turn out to be so good. This turned out fantastic. I'd love to make it again...