Journal

Desk Reorganization

So when I was excited to switch to the new laptop and and turn in my, showing it’s age, However when I bought a monitor for it, for the desktop system, the 4k 24” monitor, just wasn’t’ big enough. there’s no way I could justify to myself, let alone Shannon, the PRO XDR, but with the induction of the Studio Display, I was able to see the logic of it, but the problem is that made the Desk really crowded.

The crowded desktop before.

So I thought about it for a bit, and thought I might have a plan, but when I started placing things, that made less sense, and adjusted a bit further. Originally I thought I could get the laptops and the wires boxes in the middle, but the monitors took up a bit to much space, so the wires are in the middle, and teh laptops behind the middle of the monitors.

double desk, wires everywhere with the progress showing of the reorganizaing but still a lot of work needed

Mid-progress

the organization was making progress, and I got the movement of the drawers and printer stand to the top of Shannon’s art supply cabinet. This was about the point where we started watching Top Gun, so my progress slowed a bit, but I was able to get everything eventually done, enough. The Lenovo USB-C wires to connect the monitors are…well…not very flexible. And the display port, mine, cable is just to long, sot the work area could use a bit more work. The ethernet cablles are also a bit long as well. Overall I think it’ll do for now, though I did add some stuff to my cart to think about, to perhaps finish ($80 of cords)

It feels a bit less crowded, and less distracting. I guess we’ll see how the work side is on Monday, though I did test and make sure everything came back up and works as expected.

2022 - Week 11 Cooking Results

Baked Ziti with Sausage

I added red pepper flakes, and a bit more Parmesan than called for. Easy to do, but came together well.

Baked Ziti with Sausage in a white baking dish, melted cheese in the center

Baked Ziti with sausage

Jambalaya

With the recent events that mad me think of New Orleans, and this looked pretty good, and I also bought a few packages of andouille sausage from Crooked Gap. The instructions were pretty clear, but as I was using basmati rice, I let it simmer for a bit more time then called for, since I didn’t want to have a an experience like a bit before where the rice ended up being crunchy. So with that adjustment it came out pretty good. Should it have tomatoes? or Be more spicy? all of these things are worth a debate, but this was sure a good base recipe.

Ground Beef Stroganoff

I am not quite sure I was in the mood for it, but I was, so I made it. It was pretty good.

Bangers, mash and onion gravy

I appear to be out of bangers, much to my dismay. I did end up using apple bratwurst. I am sad I messed up the onion gravy, more specifically, I messed up the onions. I either let them go for too long, or had them a bit to hot and the gravy didn’t recover the flavor. I was disappointed in myself, the rest was fine though.

Brats

Good as always.

2022 - Week 9 Cooking Results

Chicken and Corn Chowder with Sweet Potatoes

This is one of those things where Cooks Country/Illustrated, implies a thing, but doesn’t actually say it. Would I prefer to have just corn meal and some other ingredients, rather thin jiffy corn mix? (which I threw away part of cause what am I going to use the rest of a tiny box for). Yes short cut, but seriously, give another option. Also with their clear limitation that you can only have 3 steps, it creates sub steps in a “paragraph” that is not great to read when you are doing actual steps.

That all being said, it made a really good stew and I like the method (other then my general complaint about the corn mix), more then I was expecting, but it made for really good leftovers, if I’m honest.

Tomato Rice Bake with Smoked Sausage

Relatively easy to put together, though I did end up putting the sausage in a circle in the pan, which made it took a bit longer. The only issue, overall, was the rice was unevenly cooked. While mine ranged from done to underdone, Shannon’s ranged from done to a bit crispy. I can see the flavor in it, and when I put it away I added a bit more chicken stock, hoping that it’ll soak in so when I reheat the leftovers, they’ll get done enough. I can see how this should go, and it seems like a good plan, but maybe a bit more time being covered like and hour and fifteen minutes. Or perhaps, partially cook the rice before hand.

I used a package of Spicy Smoked Sausage from Red Table Meat. My second time.. It is quite delicious.

Baked Potato with Green Onion Sausage

I noticed I had a lot of green onion sausage, which I would normally use for pizza, which I haven’t been making lately. Because of this I though it would be good for a baked potato, and i it was!. Clearly an easy dinner. Shredded Prairie Breeze, Sour Cream, green onion sausage.

Pasta

Just my normal random pasta, good as always.

2022 - Week 8 Cooking Results

Chicken Pasta e Fagiole with Smoked Paprika

Came together quickly. I subbed out the pancetta, because I couldn’t find it, for bacon, but mostly followed it for the rest of it. Except the ground chicken, the only had the super lean nobody really wants to eat ground chicken. I think it could have use a bit more smoked paprika. Still pretty good though.

Chicken and Corn Chowder with Sweet Potatoes

I was tired after a long day, and made that same eggs and sausage dish from last week. I’ll try this next week.

Dan Dan Mian

So, I went and bought some Sichuan peppercorns, just sort of experimenting with those flavor profiles. I guess this pushed it a little too much far for Shannon. Which I understand. It made water taste odd, and left my mouth a bit numb. It was certainly tasty. I would be curious on how it would be from a restaurant. Anyways Ill be looking for more use of the peppercorns, but a seriously toned down instance.

Shepherd’s Pie

I’ve made this several times, i vary a bit this way and that. I added Parmesan to the potatoes along with the egg a bit more Worcestershire sauce and other adjustments. Still good.

Taco Salad

Good as always.

2022 - Week 5 Cooking Results

Simple Fried Rice

I added more carrots, added celery, more ham. I added some Sichuan pepper on top of it. Perhaps a bit more oil. Still a bit basic, so I added some soy sauce and some sabal oelek.

Chicken Orzo

This was simple and good enough for both of us to eat it as leftovers, well me after I finished eating the Tingly Lamb.

Mongolian Beef Pasta

It was. Meh? I used some leftover pasta (as in half of a box that was left). Not that flavorful.

Tingly Lamb Ssäm with Quick-Pickled Celery (Today)

There is something that feel good about making something that takes a while and tastes quite good. I started a bit later then I should have. I did have some problems cutting the meat off the bones, but eventually got there. After searing the meat, cooking the veggies, and deglazing it with boomtown lager, the braise started and eventually the house starting smelling wonderful. While that was going on I prepared, the relish and took out some sourdough flatbread. Then while the meat warmed up, and I waited, the released smells brought joy. Time passed. Pulled out the meat, shredded it, back in at a higher temp. As the liquid evaporated, it was almost time to eat. Then it was.

Hamburgers

Ended up being pork, got a nice sear on them and served them.

2022 - Week 3 Cooking Results

Curry Chicken Salad

Yeah I didn’t do all that stuff. I just added madras curry powder to the mayo and chicken.

Soy & Cider-Braised Chicken with Glazed Sweet Potatoes

I used skinless thighs and with that made some adjustments, accordingly. I tossed the chicken with the spicy seasoned salt, then used vegetable oil to replace the rendered chicken fat (not a great replacement, but what can you do). And cooked the onion, jalapeño and garlic. I used a Normandy Cider (rest for me), to deglaze the pan and then followed the recipe after that. Only I braised for a bit longer, because the chicken was raw, when I put it in for braising, as opposed to partially cooked.

I was surprised that my normal grocery store had white sweet potatoes, but I was not that surprised that they weren’t in the system, so I got them at a bargain, I’m guessing. Never bought white sweet potatoes before.

As a note, I overbought chicken stock a bit ago, and finally have made it through them all, with this dish (well half of the last box).

I made jasmine rice but instead of pepper added the spicy seasoning.

I really enjoyed this.

Baked Mac and cheese

This is a return to a favorite. This is a nice base that you can flex a little bit on, without having the sauce break or etc.

Bacon, Egg, & Cheese Breakfast Potatoes

I forgot to add the chili crunch at the end, but these were still quite good.

Pork Burgers

These ended up being lamb, since I found ground lamb first. Good as always.

2022 - Week 1 Cooking Results

Shredded Lamb Noodle Soup Recipe

So, this required a pressure cooker. And so I went from going to make this on Monday, to starting to make it Monday night. So after Shannon went to bed, I started by salting the lamb shanks and then made some appropriate sized bags.

As a note, I need better scissors for cutting the plastic related to making bags.

I added the shanks to multiple bags, added some olive oil and then vacuum sealed them and put them in the water bath for 16 hours at around 150F.

After that was complete, I made the broth. I had to make a bit of a audible since they didn’t have anise pods, I had to guess as to how much ground anise I had to use. I added everything back to the pot and simmered for a couple hours or so.

I then made the topping. Iðunn is not a huge fan of my blade coffee/spice grinder that I used. This is where things started to become so very delicious. I started to combined the pulled lamb with the other ingredients and wow…just wow. That was very tasty, and a bit numbing.

Bringing everything tighter, with noodles, and the stock and the lamb it was quite a meal and worth the effort.

That being said, I used the lamb on ramen twice this week.

Sloppy Sammys

I used some ground chicken. I went to the grocery store on a Monday, as opposed to my usual Sunday, and it was quite a bit more crowded then I expected. Though I do suppose that is to be expected. There were a number of people that really didn’t notice their surroundings and so I did have to patiently wait for a number of things, including the ground chicken. Other then that it was a normal dish. Mustard, diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, onions, spices herbs.

Spam, Egg and Cheese Sandwich or just Egg and Cheese bagel

So my younger chef brother dropped by and dropped off some sourdough bagels and a loaf of bread. I stuck the bread in the freezer.

Those bagels…

I honestly thing that him finding the flavor just speaks to our genetic connection cause it’s just a small and taste of heaven. There have been a handful of bagels around here and some of them are pretty good…but this…

I bought some spam from CostCo, and what to start using some of them. The idea was, originally to use them in dishes in places where they were used, but none have crossed my path recently.

Spam gave a nice fatty cooked flavor to it and the rest of it was pretty good over all. A good quick meal.

Crunchy Cheesy Bean Bake

I added about twice the mozzarella, and half of a large yellow onion. Other then that I followed the recipe pretty closely, except the fresh thyme sprigs. This didn’t take to long to do, though more then thirty minutes, it was quite tasty and filling.

Sausage Sandwiches with Marinara and Mozzarella

A few steps to step up the flavor of a jar of marinara, I got and extra ball of mozzarella and used that instead of the deli mozzarella. and only made 4 instead of 6. I used buns from a place in Ankeny that I order from my coop from time to time. It came out pretty tasty. Not to much labor, and a nice simple process to follow.

2021 - Week 52 Cooking Results

Mac and Cheese with Crispy Scallion Breadcrumbs

It was ok. This is the first one of the Momofuku set where I was like…I mean I guess it’s ok. There was something about the sauce consistency that were a bit less then desirable. I do have a bunch of ramen noodles to work through, so that’s nice.

Sheet-Pan Gochujang Chicken and Roasted Vegetables

I used the last of the squash I had, and some potatoes. I think I could’ve gotten away with making more sauce using more gochujang and going from there. It was a bit under flavored in my mind. Overall, not to bad, but I suppose I could make it more to my taste.

Pork Chops with Creamy Apple-Mustard Sauce

I was released from work early. Which is an extra odd concept now, that I literally work in a section of my basement. Anyways, I got the sous vide started to get the chops ready to just finish off in the pan. Shannon brought home a side and I put the together sauce. It was a pretty good dinner.

Frijoles Charros (sort of based on this)

I am curious how this came about. Hot Dogs? The rest makes sense to me, to some extent. I did salt and soak the beens then cook them separately. I combined the other ingratiates, more or less as they are called for, though the recipe ingredient list order was wrong. It was pretty good over all. I kind of want to know the origins, to perhaps understand the inclusion of the ingredients. It seems like it may be more of a family variant from time to time, so perhaps to bulk up on a cheap meat source, hot dogs. I used Hebrew National and went from there. I would perhaps make it again, but will probably need more recipe inputs.

Shredded Lamb Noodle Soup Recipe

Delayed. I got a bit confused when my brother was coming in. So I’ll do it early next week.

12 Beers and Christmas

For the first time since the the beginning of the pandemic we spent a significant amount of time outside of our house and inside someone else’s house. We, of course, thank the Matta’s for hosting us and taking the extra steps to make us feel safe (testing and all those things). We also met up with other friends and called our good friend in Japan. The topics varied widely, talking about the lives during the pandemic housing, and the difference between Japan, California, and Iowa. It was fun to catch up, actually see and hug people.

2021 - Week 50 Cooking Results

To see this on a random day in December, is a bit shocking:

Screen caputure of National Weather Service alert for the derecho on 12/15-16/2021

NWS Alert from 12/15/2021

As the last derecho caught pretty much everyone by surprise, we watched this one pass through. In Des Moines it wasn’t near as bad, since only a 8000 or so people lost power, as opposed to last time where 132,000 or so people lost power. Certainly it is an unpleasant experience to have the fears from last year combined with watching suspected/real tornadoes near areas you know, hearing the wind and hoping to keep power. Unlike last time where I was wearing headphones the entire time…well until I lost power.

Buttermilk Pancakes

Good Pancakes. I really like the pattern on one of the pancakes.

close up image of a pancake

pancake

Gammy Brown's Deviled Ham

Ready for watching a movie and tweeting, we had snacks, crackers and cheese ready to go, unfortunately, the second Derecho of my life (and in 2 years), happened and this became more of a button down the hatches and watch weather for hours and hope for the best. Most of the people I know made it out fine. That being said, it was pretty good. A nice thing to snack on while avoiding the worst of it.

Chicken and Sweet Potato Curry

Chicken from the freezer, sweet potato from the counter. It was a pretty nice meal.

Brats

Good as always.

Leftover Turkey Pot Pie

Delayed. It was still a bit frozen and I didn’t really want to over cook.