Journal

2022 - Week 40 Cooking Results

Brats

Good as always.

Baked Potatoes

I should have found some green onions sausage, but I also had some sliced cured meats that we used instead, along with some cheese and sour cream. A welcome addition.

Mexican Chicken Lasagna With Chorizo Beans

I ran out of tortillas when I was making this, but for the most part I followed the guidance. I didn’t have onion powder, but I used a larger then small onion. I also only had some frozen corn. This baked up nice and made for nice leftovers. Perhaps not the best thing to make during a weeknight, but it worked out.

Piles of cheese, some pickled jalapenos and some generally good looking Mexican Lasagna

Tangy Chili Pork Noodles

Much to my surprise, I was out of pork. Plain pork. Ethan from Cooked gap would be up on Tuesday so I got my order in for 5 more pounds of pork. So I used some mass market pork (looked for other options at the store as they occasionally have alternate breeds, but no luck there). After getting over my general guilt and the knowledge that I really need to organize my meat stores, I moved forward. And this actually still turned out really nice. I cut the chili crunch in half, since I didn’t want to make it to spicy for my wife, but added some to mine after the fact. Easy, quick and delicious.

Caramelized Black Pepper Chicken

I actually went through and prepped everything, almost, first. I finished the chicken as the shallots were cooking. I got a nice saucy sauce and as I am reading this I can’t remember if I actually add the black pepper… In fact I’m pretty sure I didn’t. Even so, I would make this again. As suggested I served with a lot of rice, but the balance of the fish sauce and brown sugar really doesn’t overwhelm, like they think some might…but that may be me. I used the Momofuku rice vinegar.

Summer Trip 2022 - Frank Lloyd Wright - Smith House

I have some thoughts about the house. Visited on the morning of 7/16/2022.

Summer Trip 2022 - Frank Lloyd Wright - Affleck House

I have some thoughts about the house. Visited on the morning of 7/16/2022.

2022 - Week 39 Cooking Results

Chickpea Curry

Simple, quick, and vegetarian.

Chicken Stroganoff

Shannon is no the biggest fan of beef, so this is nice compromise, It still has that flavor from the stroganoff but with a nice roasted chicken added instead. It did take a bit, so it was a good weekend meal, but was worth it.

Grilled Cheese

I sliced some tomatoes, had some sliced prairie breeze on the bottom, and some mortadella on the top, and proceeded to griddle them into a nice sandwich. good things.

Sloppy Joes

Ground beef, good things.

Spam and Egg sandwich

I bought a bit of Spam at Costco for various dishes, but haven’t used any for a bit, so this seemed like a good way to use it. It does really fry up nice, which makes sense, since it’s so, relatively, high in fat. layered on an english muffin over cheese and under a fried egg, Good stuff.

2022 - Week 38 Cooking Results

Jajangmyeon

I did not see the roasted chunjang, but did order some chunjang. I ended up using a pound of pork, because that’s what I had in the freezer. I really enjoyed the flavor of this, and Shannon did too. I’ll have to make this again or figure out what else to use chunjang with. This did use an excessive amount of dishes.

Cheesy Baked Pasta with Tomato, Sausage, and Ricotta

I added more Italian sausage, cause again, they come in frozen pounds, and the whole box of pasta. I added an extra can of tomato sauce and a bit more water to adjust for the extra pasta. I also tossed in some leftover sliced onions near the beginning. This was pretty good, pasta came out just about the right consistency, and everything else tasted pretty good. I did forget to add the salt, so that was a bit of a problem, but sprinkling some on the top made up for it.

Hamburgers

Local Beef, good things.

Hot Dogs

All Pork, all good.

Chicken Stuffed with Cheese wrapped in Prosciutto (CJ from the Cheese Shop’s idea)

Put a hunk of cheese, wrapped it with a boneless chicken thigh. Wrapped that in several pieces of prosciutto and baked them at 350 until the chicken was done. There was a crispy outside, juicy chicken and the cheese was melted and had also gone out the sides to sear on the baking sheet to make it a nice chewy partially dehydrated cheese. I served with a simple salad and we ate to our hearts content.

Trombone Shorty - Hoyt Sherman - 9/17/2022

I have a collection of tickets, but as time goes by, these are rarer to even obtain, let alone be able to save. Shannon was nice enough to gather them together and present them. But going forward I’m going to try to add these as a reminder. I may not always have things to say, but it is more of a memory for myself, I suppose.

When I saw the announcement that they Trombone Shorty was coming, I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I had seen him in several shows I like and had some of his music in my rated collection (more has been added). So I told Shannon we were going, then invited Dave and Jo. Luckily I was the mailing list for the promoter and got a pre-sale code and got us tickets pretty close.

It was an enjoyable show, with music going for the entire time that we were there. Its a delight to see excellent performers just put on a great show.

Hoyt Sherman stage shaded in blue light with usher standing near the stage

Pre-Show snapshot