Journal

2022 - Week 14 Cooking Results

Curried Rice

Curried Rice. With bananas? With raisins. So I thought about the savory flavors and sweet. I figured, they’re the type of people that know what they are doing, You get that sweetness from the banana and the scent of the curry and that sweet and tart of the raisons. The raisins where too much for Shannon, which is entirely fair. Shannon liked the banana and curry, but she has never been a fan of raisins, so this was a line she couldn’t cross. I thought it might work, but not so much. And for that I am sorry. However, I enjoyed it, while the the concept of it…was.. not quite what I would have thought.

Tuscan White Bean Soup

I added more celery and carrots and skipped the kale. After using the parmesan rinds and letting them resting the sink, at some point one of the cats, probably Iðunn, stole a rind and ended up dropping it on the stairs to the basement. The soup was pretty good, and I think i’ve made it before, and we both had it as leftovers.

Chickpea Shakshuka

I added more smoked paprika then was called for, cause they’re always a bit lite on the spices. I was only able to get 7 eggs in the pan, which is still quite a number of eggs. It was pretty good, though I may have wanted to have the eggs a little underdone, I cooked them os directed.

Spicy Soy Shrimp Noodles

This came together right quick. The had a nice flavor, shrimp (One of Shannon’s favorite proteins), and used a couple of packs of noodles. A good weeknight dish.

Vegetarian Pizza Turnovers

We’ve had several vegetarian turnovers from this producer, they’re all pretty good, these were also that way..

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 13 Cooking Results

Carbonara

I messed this up a bit. I was a bit impatient on adding the pasta water, and just added too much. Even so, it had a nice flavor and a richness to it.

Cheesy Tingly Wavy Noodle Bake with spicy pork

Unlike some of the other dishes I’ve been making with the schezuan peppercorn, this had a nice balance to be not to numbing. Which is nice, especially for keeping my wife happy. It was pretty easy to put together and led to a nice weeknight dish.

Burgers, sauce based on (short rib burgers for two)

I found ground buffalo in the freezer, so I ended up using that. I added some savory Momofuku salt to the bison, and made patties. I apparently have run out of my standard burger buns, so I used some bread and then made the sauce. This was chosen cause I recently bought white miso and need to use it. I also recently got Momofuku rice vinegar and wanted to use it, I thought the sauce was nice and still paired well with the buffalo.

Baked mac and cheese

To have lots of leftovers, I doubled the recipe. And because of the carbonara I made earlier int he week, used the rest of the pancetta that I bought on purpose for this. I also added extra paprika (smoked), as well. Unfortunately the panko bread crumbs they had at the store were seasoned with “Italian” seasoning which was mostly basil, which has a purpose, but I prefer a lighter hand on basil. So with a mixture of the the plain (maybe half a cup) and the Italian seasoning, we had a nice dinner, with lots of leftovers for lunch.

2022 - Week 12 Cooking Results

Ramen noodles and chicken with a fried egg

Easy to do, fun to eat.

green onion sausage pasta

I pull a package of ground meat and it was Italian sausage, next one was the same, next one to…so Italian sausage it was! I had though I had a green onion sausage when I was looking for pork a week or so ago, but here we are. Good as always.

Brats

I ran out of the Sweet to Eat bakery brat buns I had been using (just ordered a bunch more and put them in the freezer), so I used some “normal” brat buns. Man they’re not great. Good sausage though (“breakfast” from Crooked Gap).

One pot chicken and rice (using the Noma Smoked Mushroom Garum)

Um. Yes. With the amount of paprika, the garum, there was a smoky, super savory and just enjoyable. fantastic.

Grilled Cheese with Chili Crunch

I bought (looks around) American cheese. Slices even. I took the recipe guidance and got the Japanese version of Kewpie mayo (even though it didn’t say that, I assumed they meant that). Making adjustments as I do, I added sliced ham to the middle (Crooked gap). For Shannon’s I left out the chili crunch, but for me I used the extra spicy version on mine. Quite good. Quite Quite good.

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.