Delayed, forgot about going out to eat with my parents for Joseph's graduation.
This took a while, had lots of pieces (requested to be on a bed of rice and a side of beans), but ended up being right up my alley. However, with the addition of the olives and capers, it removed it from Shannon's alley. I suppose it was a good thing that I like it, because I'll end up being the one eating all the leftovers.
So I used the Shropshire Blue and Vermillion River Blue in combination with some Prairie Breeze. This turned out really well, it wasn't a completely smooth sauce, but it had a strong, but not to strong, blue cheese flavor, which was quite good. It didn't last that long. Good stuffs.
So instead of using bison, I ended up using a combination of beef and Graziano sausage. I mixed in some of the remaining Rouge River Blue in and covering it with some thick cut bacon. This was a mistake. The thinner bacon would've probably got crispier. But even so, it still worked out well and tasted good. And you have, leftover meatloaf for...meat loaf sandwiches.
I also picked up my Cedar Ridge Single Malt Whiskey order. It was nice to trek by myself and come back, just to have a little alone time. Though for 30 minutes or so of the drive I spent it on a conference call. I also picked up two extra bottles for friends.
Busy weekend, running behind, but here we are. Farmer's market is just under a week away. Looking forward to the short trip to Cedar Ridge to pick up my single malt whiskey I have on reserve.
So like the other pizza from them, I'm not so good with the pizza stone, and because I'm unwilling to sacrifice stones to practice, I combine them and have a pan pizza to some extent. On that note the amount of garlic oil was a bit to much for what the pizza turned out to be. But I do think that this crust could handle the normal thickened sauce that I make for their non-whole-wheat crust. I guess we'll have to find out.
Delayed, made Sloppy Sammys instead. Joseph came over, ate dinner, made cookies, then didn't leave any cookies behind... Just saying.
I didn't use near as much zucchini as the recipe called for, (1 / 3) but even so it turned out pretty good and was quick enough for a busy night.
So I had to cut the recipe because I didn't have a big enough pan to address all the pieces of chicken. The combination of both the ginger in the rice and the adobo chicken made for a great meal. It wasn't quick, but it was very good.
Another busy week is over. Things should start calming down now, I hope. but now I move on to other things. My inbox (how I manage what I'm supposed to be doing) crossed over 700 items, but is now under in the mid 100s.
Sometimes being salaried works out in my favor, sometimes it doesn't, the last few weeks, it really hasn't. Mainly I want it to be over so I can start doing my normal routine again. Walk, breakfast / food magazine reading, and then prep for work. Shouldn't be too much longer.
We're going to keep simple for the most part this week, just to not stress out things. We're under 2 weeks until DTFM!
So this was simple to make, came together quickly and because I served it with rice, I actually started the rice early and still had to wait for the rice to finish. Good taste, and good for rewarming the next day for lunch.
So I am thinking the reason why this wanted to use 3/4th a pound instead of a whole pound. Even after adjusting the amounts a bit up, I still ended up with a not so creamy version of it. I did use some very nice cheese (Sharfer Maxx), so the taste was there, but I expect this could've been better. However, my point remains. unless there is a reason, a magazine editor should remember what options are generally available to their average reader. So I do have a reason to be reasonably annoyed when they call to use 3/4ths of a 1 pound box of pasta.
This goes to the point that you can add a runny egg yolk to almost anything, and it makes it better. Simple dish, that defiantly lost something when I couldn't add runny eggs to it when I took it to work for lunch over the following day or two. But even so, good the first time around, not so bad even without the eggs.
I really need to replace the non-stick pan. Even oiled, it is starting become problematic. I guess I should add this to the list of cookie sheets, half sheet pans, 9x13 baking dishes... What am I waiting for.
Anyways, practicing on searing the Mahi Mahi, got a nice sear on one of the two sides and they were just about the right size for the bread that we normally buy. Basically we treated the end product like it was a pounded out chicken and put mayo, honey dijon, baby spinach (hurry up farmer's market, I miss you) and for me, a few pickles. Turned out pretty well. Shannon asked if this was a good fish for fish and chips, and it's really not, but I guess I'll have to try that sometime, though not with these.
Didn't skim the recipe well enough, ended up making the dough on saturday, and considering that it wanted the dough to be refrigerated for at least 18 hours, it made it hard to make it on Saturday. So we headed out to eat instead.
nom nom nom...
Busy week. By the time I remembered to reserve eggs from Blue Gate, it was to late, and I didn't think I'd have time to run down there anyways. Less then 48 hours before we swap over to the new name and It'll be hopefully less crazy. I have most of the things done, that I need done. Only a crap ton of things to do on day one. I guess we'll see how it all works out.
I'm old and my hands know it, and are suffering because of my age.
On a more positive front, I'm making a starting attempt at growing my own herbs. I bought a couple of pots to grow some herbs on the deck. The basil that I planted last year, didn't have enough water to make it through the year and go to seed (my own fault, well and the weather too). The chives my mom planted are still growing well and are already coming up. This means before to much longer, we'll have chive blossoms. I'm not willing to make to much of a starting investment, because I don't want to fail and have spend lot of money doing so. So we'll see how it turns out. (We also got a hedge trimmer, finally.)
Even though I've started working normalish hours again, I'm not sure how the week is going to play out, so I'll plan for a lack of time, and go from there.
Last night we made smoothies with my newish stick blender. The frozen fruit we had was mixtures (except blueberries, but Shannon's not a huge blueberry fan), and tended to be a bit on the tart side. So the notes we had, were probably need some juice to make it smoother and need more sweeter fruits.
So there wasn't any arugula at the store when I went shopping, and it's clearly to early for my favorite arugula to be around, especially with the coldness lately. So I just used baby spinach. It was good, but I still want to do this with the arugula.
Super simple, I changed things around a bit though. I seared the chicken first, so that it was almost cooked all the way through, then had that rest while I cooked the vegetables. I by itself the soup it self was pretty plain, but when you add that squeeze of lemon juice and that sprinkling of baby dill, it takes it from being blah to yum. To be fair, I do love the taste and smell of dill. My wife didn't add that much but still liked the soup.
Crap. I knew I should've checked seafood watch, before I bought that Mahi Mahi. Bad Sam. Anyway, I've never been thrilled at the selection / price balance of the fish selection. Yes, I live in the middle of a land locked state, and the idea of buying fish, where I know it has to travel quite a bit just to get here, let alone the number of days and treatment of the fish. So when I saw a package of IQF Mahi Mahi at CostCo I was excited. I'm supposed to eat more fish, here's fish (not from China, no offense to the people of China, but your business practices are to shady to apply to food that will go into my body). But it turns out it's from Ecuador. To late now, can't take it back, must be more mindful in the future.
Anyways, Quick sear on the Mahi Mahi that was covered in a nice spice mixture (cumin and smoked serrano) and then some normal taco toppings. It came together very quickly, which was nice, cause it was a wicked long day that day. Also very tasty, and all things considered, pretty good for us.
Two things, prepped at the same time, topped with a 3rd thing, prepped while the others are cooking. Good use of time, and came together well. I didn't have the red jalapeno peppers, but I used green instead. It was spicy, but not to much, and simple to make.
Ok so I intended to chop up some peppadews and put them in the burger, but end I went another way. I participated in a cheese destiny event. I walked into the Cheese Shop with the purpose of picking up a cheese for the burgers, and Brett just happened to be answering the question of another employee at the Cheese Shop as to what his favorite cheese for pork was (Shropshire Blue). So it was a cheese destiny event (Brett's quote). In the chiller case was their fabulously delicious pepper jam. And bam, there was dinner. Pepper jam, Shropshire Blue, and ground pork from Crooked Gap. Fan-freaking-tastic.
It is an excellent combination, you must make it. I may make it again.
One to two more weeks of craziness, I hope. Going with quick things again.
I love lamb. I meant to do this for dinner last sunday, but I didn't take out the lamb early enough, it was still very frozen by the time I could've used it, so we had the ham and mashed potatoes again.
I was exhausted Went to work early (like I've been doing), left even later then I have been working (after 7), and just didn't feel like going through the effort. So I simplified. 3 eggs, a dash of soy sauce, some ground pepper, then it was more of a build your own sandwich thing. I did use La Mie petite baguettes and for mine I added some of the pickled peppers bought for the red beans and rice. It worked out and was tasty I should make the real thing sometime, but for now, this worked. I cut off the ends then cut the remaining parts of the baguettes into thirds. Good quick meal.
nom nom nom. I used Zachte Boerenkaas from Holland's Family Farms. This was at the suggestion of Brett from The Cheese Shop of Des Moines. This added a nice creamy texture and a flavor that is stronger then mozzarella, but not overpowering. Great suggestion and a great pizza.
Did I make it look like a sundae on purpose? Perhaps, but it worked. It was nice, the rice soaked up the liquid in the bowl and combined together to be a nice balanced flavor. I added a bit more heat with some hot sauce. I'd make this again, and I'd be curious to make it with out using canned beans.
I've been a more beer and whiskey mood lately, so the idea of opening up a bottle of wine to use a couple of tablespoons, just didn't really appeal to me. So I skipped that part. That being said, tit turned out very good. I used some very nice Gruyere, and then got a loaf of bread from La Mie (had to make a run in the middle of the day to get that and a couple of petite baguettes). I wish I could remember what the bread was called, but it was very good as toast and grilled, almost wished I made a sandwich out of it before it turned. Anyways, very simple, and very good, you can mod the recipe down to fit your own needs, I will have to try it again sometime and go after the wine when I'm more curious.
There is something just magically about butter, cream and potatoes. You can mash potatoes, but without the butter and cream, it just doesn't taste like it should or have that texture it should. I'm curious if you could do this with some non-cow based substances, but right now I have no reason to try. The ham was ok. I thought about splurging on a Eden Farms ham, or something like that, but just couldn't bring myself to drop $50+ on a whole ham.
