Valentine's Day at Home

Brian and I aren't big on going out to dinner on V Day.  It was an experience from ten years ago that ruined it....reservations at a well-known Italian restaurant in the city.  Only to have to wait over an hour after our reservation at a crowded bar that was packed tight like sardines.  From then on most of our Valentine's Day dinners have been at home.  I say "most" because one of our best was a hockey game and subs at D'Angelos.  I'm being serious, it was fun and I can't remember what year it was.

So scenes from this year's dinner.  First, let me tell you that the kids had chicken nuggets and mac n cheese in front of the TV.  Anything to keep them happy so we could enjoy our meal and each other's company.

First, bruschetta on pizza crust.  Fresh, garlicky and delightful.  

Then, the main course.  NY strip steak with red wine sauce,  snow crab legs, baked potato and asparagus with parmesan.

And an hour or two later while watching TV, homemade molten chocolate cake with a little vanilla ice cream.

With dinner like that, why go out??  Happy Valentine's Day!

Lemon and Garlic Week!

This week's theme is lemon and garlic.  Apparently.  This was purely accidental, but it's definitely two well-loved ingredients in this house.  Brian wrote the menu and it's chock full of delicious recipes...but clearly he was craving lemon and garlic when he wrote it!

Monday night:  grilled chicken with lemon and garlic, rice and frozen peas.  Chicken recipe courtesy of Better Homes and Gardens.

This was a whole chicken that he cut up and grilled.  On a weeknight.  :)  The intensity of the marinade was incredibly flavorful.  I couldn't wait for the leftovers the next day!  And yes...frozen peas.  My mother will be happy to hear that she was right...frozen does taste way better than canned.  Not to my child self, but as an adult frozen are the way to go.

Tuesday:  rib eye steaks with grilled garlic.  Accompanied by baked potatoes and grilled Caesar Salad.  Steak recipe courtesy of Better Homes and Gardens.

First of all, there's no such thing as too much garlic.  That's the way it is in our house, anyway!  Roasted (or in this case grilled) garlic, smushed on a piece of bread is delightful.  The same garlic smushed on steak is to DIE FOR.  And the steak was cooked perfectly, medium to medium-well.  Just how I like it best.  :)

The first time I ever had a "grilled" Caesar salad I wasn't sure I'd like it.  But the smokiness of the grill, combined with the saltiness of the shaved parmesan and the tang of the caesar dressing....it's something special, I tell ya!

 The last meal in the theme of the week:  Lemon Tilapia packets with corn and zucchini.  Recipe courtesy of Hubby's Mom, who emailed it to him.  Served over quinoa, which we almost forgot to make.

Couple of things:

-Fish store didn't have tilapia, so we substituted cod.  By the by, I loved having a small local fish store in our old neighborhood, and now we have one near here, too!
-Recipe called for corn on the cob cut into rings with the kernels intact.  There really wasn't any fresh corn in the stores, so Brian substituted the chinese-style canned mini corn ears that you see in stir-frys.  I don't think it translated well.  If we were to make this again, it would be when corn on the cob is available.
-Fish can overcook quickly.  It was still edible, but it could've been better.  This was a tough dinner because of the distractions.
-I have to say....quinoa isn't something I pictured myself eating.  But the more I have of it, the more I like it!

So there you have it:  Lemon and Garlic week is over.  Pretty soon it'll be time for fall suppers and crockpot stuff!

A Woman of my Word

I said last week that we'd make meatballs, and I keep my word.  Last night:  meatballs.  :)  I originally wanted to make these on Sunday but we as a family (read:  Crafty Mama)  tend(s) to overcram Sundays.  So last night after dinner, it was meatball city!

No recipes...just flying by the seat of our pants.  A package of ground pork, a package of ground beef.  And I got really daring and didn't measure ingredients.  Sometimes it's best that way.  Some bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, two eggs, oregano, rosemary, garlic powder, salt and pepper.  Brian rolled them and fried them in vegetable oil while I worked on feeding kids and doing dishes.  (We make a good team that way.)    He used his induction cooker to better control the temperature, which seems like it was a good idea.  Next time Brian wants to make them like his mom made them growing up:  added to sauce and simmering in a crockpot for several hours.  I've had Mom G's meatballs, they are pretty good!

All in all, I'd say the process only took about an hour, give or take.  I wish I had taken a photo of the meatball assembly line, but alas, I did not so you will have to imagine it.    Now there are several bags of (hopefully) good-quality meatballs in my freezer, and one bag to go with cheese tortellini and leftover marinara tonight.  Looking forward to it!

Easy Empanadas

When i first started working in housing, I had a tenant named Mrs. Alvarez.  I remember her fondly, not just because she was a lovely person but also because she was the first tenant I ever got to practice speaking Spanish with on a regular basis.  My Spanish back then was pretty awful, but we seemed to understand each other on some level and I got better with time.  It was with them I graduated from stammering "I'm sorry, I don't understand" to confidently marching out "You have too much soap in the machine, that's why it's leaking."

Mrs. Alvarez and her husband were originally from Colombia, and enjoyed showing me pictures of their life there.  She also made the BEST empanadas.  She would bring them down to the office at 9:30 in the morning, and they would smell so good I would eat one right then and there.  (I've always had the ability to eat pretty much anything at any hour)  Eating these kinds of things has led me to a love of Hispanic foods.

When I saw a recipe for empanadas, I immediately remembered these little beef "pies" that she would bring down.  Plus I am always game for something that is not your typical hamburger use.  (i.e. meatloaf, meatballs or cheeseburgers)  The recipe was spiced beef and cheese, baked in piecrust.  They tasted pretty good, but obviously weren't the same.  Mrs. Alvarez also used diced potatoes, and her empanadas were spicier and also fried.  Still, they were pretty delicious, and now I have ideas on how to improve.  I served them with home-fried potatoes and green beans.  Next time I will use black beans.  All in all, it was a nice visit to a memory.

My First Pot Roast

I can't believe I'd never made a pot roast before....we had it a lot when i lived at home with my folks.  Mom had a recipe where you added meat, veggies and the cooking liquid to a plastic bag and put it in the microwave.   Unconventional,  I know, but it was delicious.  She always served it with buttered noodles, peas and carrots.   Mmmmmmm childhood.  :)

This was a McCormick recipe, and a simple one at that.  Veggies, meat,  water and spice packet, then "set n forget" on low for eight hours!  I love dinners that kind of take care of themselves like magic.  The meat was fork-tender, and there's plenty of leftovers.  Add my mom's roasted beets plus biscuits on the side and you've got a pretty good way to end a weekend. 

Fond Memories of "The Bean"

I was stuck at home this morning, at the mercy of the oil company to do our annual maintenance on the heating system.  I ended up having an early lunch.  We'd had roasted chicken on Sunday, so with the leftovers I decided to make some tarragon chicken salad.  It's quite easy..just some cut up chicken, add a little mayo, some salt, pepper and dried tarragon.  Sometimes I like to add chopped walnuts or pecans, but I didn't today.

Isn't it funny how food (the smell, especially) can whisk you back to somewhere else?  I worked at a coffee shop nicknamed "The Bean" in college, where I used to make this very sandwich for customers, topped with avocado slices.  That, and I learned the ins and outs of being a barista and really learned to appreciate coffee in its many forms.  .  My interview consisted of making sure I was a living, breathing person, and at the end I was given a key to the shop and told  to show up for the bagel delivery at 7am the next morning.  That was it.  I guess I have a really trustworthy face!

The owner, Delia (not her real name) was an absolute bear.  She was pretty short-tempered but she liked me, paying me 50 cents more per hour (plus tips) than anybody else.  And allowing my then-boyfriend Brian to call me from his naval deployment in the Mediterranean.  These were the days before cell phones were widely available and cheap as they are now...if he didn't get me at the house, he didn't get me on the phone at all.  Delia thought it was pretty romantic, so she told me to tell him to call the shop if he got five minutes.  (I'll always remember her for that.)

The coffee shop was a cute little place, on one of the main drags in Newport, RI.  It was fairly expensive, being Newport and all, but people came in all the time and we had lots of regulars.  Some of her specialties included fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies as big as your head, spinach and feta croissants, and she made a mean chicken and tortellini soup.  Her husband, Greg (also not his real name) was some sort of executive for some foreign car company and he spent most weeks in New Jersey, working.  On weekends he would come home and work in the shop as well.  They used to get into the most terrific spats, with yelling and drama and usually somebody throwing something in the kitchen.  She fired employees for trivial things, and often called them the next day to apologize and beg them to come back.    My friends usually came by for chai lattes and veggie wraps, and if it was slow I'd sit with them for a spell.  It sounds crazy, but I loved working there.  I loved the fast pace, the steady flow of people coming and going.  Working there fueled a desire to someday own my own coffee shop.

  After graduation, I would stop in from time to time, whenever I found myself in Newport.  (which wasn't that often.)  The last time I was there was in 2004, when my college roommate got married.  Delia wasn't there that day, but the place hadn't changed one iota.  Two years later, I was in Newport for a conference.  Pregnant with my first child, I stopped by to visit my old boss and her shop and to my chagrin, it wasn't there anymore. Delia had apparently sold the building, and the new owner had turned it into a tapas restaurant.  Now, I adore tapas, but the place will always be "The Bean" in my mind.

As for my old dream of owning a coffee shop?  It'll probably always remain a dream.  Having that kind of place is like being married to a business.  You put your all into it, and while I am an ambitious person, I don't know if I have the desire anymore.  But I still love the coffee.

Thinking of you today, Delia, as I relish my tarragon chicken salad sandwich.  Best Wishes!

Soup's On!

I enjoy making soup.  I don't do it often, though, because of the time committment.  Boiling a whole chicken until the meat falls off the bones, then adding vegetables and a starch (my preference:  rice or noodles) makes your whole house smell fantastic!  But the time it takes to boil away the meat, the chopping of the vegetables...it's substantial.  However, I do find the chopping, stirring and tasting to be somewhat meditative.

So when I saw a recipe in Cooking Light for Escarole, Bean and Sausage Soup with Parmesan Cheese, I thought, hey, I can do that!  One of my favorite soups growing up was my friend Heather's mom's Escarole and Meatball Soup, so I knew that I would like this.

Shopping for it was a real who's who in the produce aisle:  the recipe calls for fennel, garlic, onion, white beans and escarole.  Happily, my local market had it all and I was soon on my way home.  It comes together rather quickly too, and doesn't make so much that you have way more than you could ever possibly eat.  I think I went a little heavy on the fennel, but the end result is delicious.  Which brings me to another thought:  I need to do this more often.  Making homemade soup is good for the mind, and good for the soul.

How to make a Philadelphian Happy!

It's not hard....it just takes some wins against New York.   Philly has humiliated New York on three fronts in the past week so there's been some jubilation in this transplanted Philadelphian's house this week.  But nothing beat what came in the mail today


A Flyers Limited Edition Tin....

......Filled with a variety of Tastycakes!

Brian said that he would share them with me if I could name two of the four players on the lid.  I totally bombed the challenge.  Luckily, I'm not a woman scorned, because he goes to bed earlier than I do and I seriously considered a third photo of me raiding the tin.

Love you, honey!  :)

My Husband, the Butcher

Our family hosts Christmas dinner, which is traditionally a roast beef.  I can still remember how the kitchen used to smell in my grandparent's house, with a roast beef in the oven!  Mmmmmmm....

This year, Brian thought about what we wanted to do, roast-wise.  (this really is more his area of expertise.)  He decided that we should buy a really big roast, figure out how many people we were having and then cut it up into the Christmas roast and some steaks.  Ten NY strip steaks later, we had our Christmas Roast!  And it is a beautiful sight:

We had some of the steak for dinner tonight and it was out-of-this-world!  Can't wait for Saturday!

Anniversary Dinner

For our tenth wedding anniversary, Brian and I took a trip to New York City to have dinner, catch a show and stay in a fancy hotel.  It was fantastic!  I've already summed up the rest of the trip on my other blog so now it's time for all who've been waiting to hear about it, the food!

We stayed at "The London" on W 54th.  Very impressive, simple and beautiful hotel.  It is also the home of not one but two of Gordon Ramsay's Restaurants.  Yes....Gordon Ramsay, as in "Hell's Kitchen."  I don't watch the show but I have heard plenty about it and have several friends that do.  I have heard enough about the show to know that he yells a lot and one friend of mine asked me (after proclaiming her intense jealousy) if I had any urges to call anyone a "stupid donkey" while I was there.  Well...no.  No, I did not!  :)

There are two restaurants on-site.  One is fancier (albeit more expensive) and the other one is smaller and more intimate. We chose the smaller one, which is called Maze.  After perusing the menu we opted for the "Tasting Menu" which consisted of five courses including dessert.

First Course:  Sweet Corn Soup with Shrimp and Nectarine.  These are flavors I would never think of putting together, but they paired very well!  The sweetness was perfect and not over-the-top.  I actually found myself wanting another bowl.

Second Course:  Watermelon Salad with Tomato and Feta.  Again, three things I'd never put together but this was soooo refreshing.  I'd make this for a summer party for sure. 

Third Course:  Roasted Sea Scallop with English Peas and Tomatoes.  Clearly the biggest roast scallop I have ever seen!!  It was cooked perfectly with no rubber-like texture.  There was just enough butter to moisten it, and the peas and baby tomatoes were a lovely accompaniment.

Fourth Course:  Split Menu.  Brian chose the steak and I opted for the salmon.  The steak came with pommes anna, and "spiced eggplant."  It was more like an eggplant puree, which Brian politely declined.  My salmon came with butternut squash and gnocchi.  The salmon was perfect!  I guess I'm not a gnocchi fan though, I've tried it a couple of times and I'm just not into it. 

Final Course:   The Dessert.  Brian chose a chocolate pudding-like concoction infused with cardamom, with almond ice cream on the side.  Mmmmm.......just like the center of a molten chocolate cake!  And the almond ice cream was obviously fresh, and definitely something I'd like to taste again.  My dessert was a custard cream with fresh berries and strawberry sorbet.  Again, very fresh sorbet, I'm usually not a fan of strawberry liquids or desserts but this was incredible. 

So, in conclusion I'd say that dinner was excellent.  Not the best meal of my life (which was a discussion had at dinner, we challenged each other to name the best dinner we'd ever had in the past ten years!) but certainly delicious.  The tasting menu made me feel like a celebrity judge! 

Christmas Eats

Christmas is a magical time.....and that's true for food too.  :)

Christmas Eve was a little low key, with a simple pasta supper.  But we had our tradtional late Christmas Breakfast...a dutch baby!  A dutch baby is essentially an oven pancake, topped with jam, powdered sugar, maply syrup or whatever you like.  I had received a gift of different butters from a friend of mine, so we went with Peach Butter.  Delicious.  :)

Then there were appetizers.....spicy shrimp cocktail and cheese and crackers.  Always good choices. 

Then dinner....oh dinner.  I didn't do too much of the dinner prep this year, Brian really outshone himself in the kitchen!  I prepared the buttered stuffed apples, and he did the rest.  Oh.....and our company helped too.....my cousin and my dad peeled potatoes, my mom put stuff together and so did my aunt.  My mom made a homemade vegetable soup as a starter.  I really like starting Christmas dinner with soup, it just makes it that much more special.  The roast beef came out perfect, with a slightly pink center.  All of the sides were fantastic.  And they all cleaned up after dinner so Preggo Ginny didn't have to do anything except continue to sip her coffee and chat with Auntie Kim!

Then there were lots of unwrapping gifts, followed by dessert.  Chocolate was the main theme, with Kim's brownies and homemade chocolate truffles, my aunt's trifle and a white chocolate and cranberry cheesecake that Mom brought.  By the end of the night if you were hungry it was your own fault.

I'm happy to say that I survived Christmas with gestational diabetes.  I did not feel at all deprived of treats, and my blood sugar numbers, though slightly high, weren't bad at all.  However, now my day of debauchery is over and it's time to start behaving again. 

Now for food-themed Christmas gifts:  I got a new 11 inch frying pan to replace the one that's losing it's nonstick coating.  Brian received Alton Brown's "Good Eats:  Reminiscing the First Six Seasons" book.  It turns out that the jacket cover opens up to a huge movie poster of Alton.....and he wants to frame it and hang it in our kitchen!  We shall see.....Brian also surprised me with a Better Homes and Gardens cookbook called "9x13: The Pan that Can!"  Every single recipe in the book is made in a 9x13 pan, from breakfast to roasts to casseroles and cakes.  That's a pretty neat concept.  I've always liked casseroles but don't have a lot of recipes for them.  So I know what we'll be putting on the menu over the next couple of weeks.  Plus, it wouldn't hurt to have some casseroles for when the baby arrives!

It was a very Merry Christmas in our house, not to mention delicious.  Hope yours was Merry and Delicious, too!

Food Memory

How do you know when you've eaten something realllllllly good?? Not just run-of-the-mill delicious? When you are still raving about it two years (or longer) later!

I was talking to someone today about vacationing in southern Maine. She was considering York, and our family had gone to Wells a couple of years ago. We were talking about Ogunquit and the Marginal Way. And I said, "Oh if you go there....I know the best breakfast place. It's called "The Egg and I." I had the most fantastic eggs benedict there....only instead of canadian bacon, it had a pile of shredded Maine lobster. I'd go back just for that!"

Yep......that's how you know you've had something incredible, when you remember just how it tasted like it was yesterday!

Coffee Shop Treats

Today I'm 12 weeks pregnant, and I've made a pivotal turn. The morning sickness has subsided, and I appear to be all about the food!

I had a three hour diabetes test today, and I had to fast from midnight on. Basically, the lab takes your blood when you arrive, and you drink this nasty, thick, sugary orange beverage. Then they take your blood every hour for the next three. You are not allowed to leave the doctor's office during this time, so be sure to bring a book or other entertainment. By the time I left it was lunchtime and I was ravenous! Before heading to work, I treated myself to a Panera lunch. I hadn't been there in a while and it certainly didn't disappoint.

I got the "Pick-Two" special, with summer corn chowder and a smoked turkey sandwich on cheese focciacia. Wow! I've wanted some corn chowder for a while now and this one was delicious. The corn was roasted and there were peppers in the chowder, so it had a Southwestern flavor. But you could still taste the buttery goodness that is essential in corn chowder. And focciacia rocks just by itself; add some smoked turkey, greens and chipotle mayo and it's out of here! I had that happy, warm feeling that you get when you've eaten something really pleasing. I haven't felt that way in a very long time, it made my afternoon before heading to work.

I have always had an aspiration for owning a coffee shop. I worked for a small specialty coffee shop duirng my college days at Salve, and I loved making coffee drinks and fancy sandwiches, baking cinnamon buns and huge chocolate chip cookies and cutting slices of scrumptious baked goods for customers. I also enjoyed the atmosphere with our regulars and tourist customers, experiencing their pleasure over our specials and new bakery items. Yeah, I'm probably viewing it through nostalgia-tinted lenses, but these are the parts that I remember. Maybe someday when Brian and I retire we can make that dream come true. Sitting in Panera today and being so pleased made me revisit those fond days.