Under Pressure

My pressure cooker is definitely the most underused appliance in my kitchen.  So when I was browsing cookbooks recently at the library, a cookbook specializing in pressure cooker recipes caught my eye.  We chose three recipes for the menu this week:

Pot Roast with Potatoes

By and far the best recipe of the three, but definitely took the most time to prepare.  It was a good choice for a  Sunday night dinner, and had lots of great flavor.



Enchilada-Glazed Chicken Tacos

This made a tasty, saucy shredded chicken, which we served with flour tortillas, rice and beans and for the grown-ups, sliced avocado.  (Though the kids can try this whenever they like!)
However tasty it was, though, my taco completely fell apart.  Leftovers were taco "bowls" with all the fixings.


Pork Chops with Buttery Apples served over Shaved Brussels Sprouts

This was definitely the worst recipe of the three.  Overdone pork, apples turned to mushy sauce, and watery shaved Brussels sprouts.  Brian and I each ate a bit and it did little more than "fill the belly."  All leftovers were promptly discarded and we tried to forget the sadness of this recipe.


So....thoughts on pressure cookers.

1.  The "browning" feature?  It doesn't really brown, at least not as well as on the stovetop.

2.  I didn't find any of these recipes to be a huge timesaver.  The pot roast recipe took about three hours.  Which, I guess, is a timesaver compared to how long it takes to make a pot roast and potatoes in the oven.

That being said, I'd still try some different recipes with the pressure cooker.  It is great for "set it and forget it" until it's time to depressurize.  Think we'll stick to weekends, though.

"Bowl of Red"

The title is homage to the Good Eats episode of the same name.

I had originally planned on making this on a Sunday morning and having it that night for dinner.  A 14-hour power outage changed those plans, so I threw it together on a Monday night.  I hate cooking stuff that takes a while on a weeknight.  But do you know what?  Dinner on Tuesday was just a quick warm-up, and there's plenty of nice things to be said about that.

Also, I don't utilize a chili recipe.  I just throw it together, based on what I have and what sounds good!  This one started with sauteed minced pepper and onion, and then added ground beef, beef chuck, a spice blend that I make up on the fly, tomato paste, a can of crushed tomatoes and a can of drained kidney beans.  This was one of the best chilis that I ever made, allowing it to simmer for 90 minutes really breaks down the meat into soft, wonderful bits of beef chuck.  And the skillet cornbread that Brian made (with my own grown anaheim peppers!) hit the spot.

Chicken Tortellini Soup

My first from-scratch soup made without a recipe!  Ta-Da!

First, I boiled a whole chicken.  Yep....just threw it in a pot with some onion, carrots and celery and filled it up past the chicken.  Oh, and I added plenty of salt, a small handful.  I'm usually guilty of not seasoning enough.  I boiled that chicken for about 45 minutes, then took it out and carved it.  And by carved, I mean pulled the meat off barbarically.  :)  I threw it back in the pot with some sauteed peppers and onions and cooked tortellini.  Lastly, I tossed in fresh baby spinach leaves.  Voila!  Lunch, with a ton of leftovers.  The only thing that I thought that it could use was some mushrooms.

Can't wait to make some homemade soup again.  This weather certainly calls for it.

Playing Catch-Up

Well.

Life has a way of running away with you sometimes, especially around the holidays.  So normally I would have written a post about each of these things individually.  Instead, here's a group post.  These are all things that we've eaten in the last couple of weeks that I thought were noteworthy...

 Spinach frittata.  Something that I had never had before, and it was awesome.  I'm not sure what the difference is between this and crustless quiche, if there is a difference at all.  Leftovers were delicious for a couple of mornings after we had this for dinner.  

 This is called "Cowboy Caviar."  I made it from a recipe online for the resident holiday party last week.  The recipe calls for corn, black beans, black-eyed peas, cilantro, green onion, tomato and avocado.  They didn't have black-eyed peas at the grocery store so I subbed pinto beans.  This was great with tostitos scoops.

We were going to have friends over for a football game one Sunday but they had to cancel last minute.  So we ate the food anyway (of course!)  Mushroom swiss burgers were incredible, and this warm potato salad was simply divine.  It's a stretch calling it a "salad" instead of roast potatoes but you know what?  The name doesn't matter, it was so good.

Weekend Warriors

What a weekend in our kitchen.

First, let's talk about this pizza for Saturday lunch.  I had no idea that ricotta, arugula and caramelized onion would make such fantastic pizza toppings.  Unfortunately, you can't reheat pizza with arugula on top, because it wilts.  So we had to eat it all, tough break.

I made stuff for our freezer.  Three freezer bags of ratatouille, and this time I salted the eggplant slices first a la Alton Brown.  It definitely got some of the moisture out, making the finished product less "mushy."  It'll go great with a starch and a little grated Parmesan later.

Then it was time for a magic trick....turning a $4.23 whole chicken into two meals and then boiling the carcass for chicken stock.  (Thank you, rapidly approaching "sell-by" dates!)  And honestly, it didn't take very long.  I just sauteed some aromatics (in this case a whole sliced onion, a couple of carrots and some celery ribs) and added the carcass, covered with water and let it boil for an hour.  I'll strain the fat off the top tonight and put it in the freezer for some delightful chicken soup at a later date.

Now, I've got some overripe bananas to turn into muffins, and yesterday we went apple picking.   Thinking about what to make!  

One and Only

I've never been a fan of ground turkey.

There, I said it.  It's just not as tasty as ground beef.  Sure, it's better for your health but turkey meatloaf is icky, and don't even get me started on turkey meatballs.  Turkey meatballs with tomato sauce are just plain said.

However, with that being said, I was pleasantly surprised last week with I found this recipe on Pinterest for Thai Turkey Burgers with Broccoli Slaw.  With the right veggies and herbs, these were fantastic.  Garlic, ginger, cilantro....all good stuff.  It made 6 or 7 patties and I had the rest of them as the week went on, over a little rice or quinoa with a smear of hoisin  sauce on top.  I'd certainly make them again.  The slaw, well, it was so-so.  I appreciated the flavors but after the first serving it got a bit mushy in the fridge so I threw it out.

So there you go, Ground turkey, for turning me into a believer.

Weekend Eats

This past weekend brought to you by the letter "S."  "S" is for salad, salmon and stew.

Lunch on Saturday was a game of "What can we use up?"  A quick scan of ingredients put together a salad of spinach and arugula, sliced avocado and the leftover frozen scallops wrapped in bacon from Valentine's Day last month.  (Of course we cooked them first.  Frozen sounds barbaric.)  A spicy mayonnaise dressing tied it together nicely and it was a lot more filling than I would've surmised.  I wasn't really hungry til dinner!

And DINNER!     Another trip to the Disney cookbook from our trip last year, to salmon wrapped in phyllo dough. It also had a lovely spinach, cream cheese and sundried tomato filling with the salmon.  It was in a oft-used word, awesome.  I can't wait to have the last one for lunch today.

And finally, stew.  There's a new collection of cookbooks at the library from Good Housekeeping, each volume is "400 calories or less."  I brought home the Comfort Foods one and we made the chicken pot pie and "light" beef and broccoli a few weeks ago.  This time I brought home "Italian" and "Chicken Dishes."  Going through the Italian book on Friday night I decided to try the lentil stew with butternut squash.  Lentils aren't something we typically eat, but once I saw the protein and fiber counts I decided to give it a try.  (20 grams each, by the way.)  Fiber is a tough thing for hubby and I to get, but we're working on it.  It was a crockpot recipe, and it took about eight hours.  I didn't have the 2 lbs butternut squash that the recipe called for so I subbed in some carrots.  The result had good flavor and we'll eat it all this week at lunchtime.

So really, it was a good weekend in the kitchen, and all brought to you by the letter "S."  "S" is certainly a good letter for the kitchen.  :)

Sunday Comfort Food: Chicken and Dumplings

Sundays are good for a warm, comforting meal, especially in the winter.  This week we had chicken and dumplings.

Let me just tell you, the house smelled AMAZING while it cooked.  And why wouldn't it, with onions, celery, chicken thighs, carrots, broth and bread-y goodness that is the dumpling?  Snow was falling, food was simmering, it was an iconic Winter Sunday.

And best of all--three servings for leftovers, and it's another food that tastes even better the next day.  Happiness.

First Meals of 2015

The holidays have passed, and now we're happy to get back to a routine.  And also, cook some healthier, less rich food.  Not that we don't love the rich stuff, because we do.

Brian got a new 30-minute meal cookbook for Christmas put out by America's Test Kitchen.  So far we've had three recipes from it and have plans for more.  Like most things ATK puts out, everything has been good so far.

First dinner:  Salmon with lime and spice, with rice and broccoli.  Nothing too fancy...

Saturday night: white chicken chili.  This was definitely more than 30 minutes, more like 45.  It probably has more to do with the fact that dried hominy was used instead of the canned hominy that the recipe listed...but oh well. Hominy was a new ingredient to us, and took a little getting used to.   Leftovers yesterday weren't quite as chewy, and the flavor was really good.  It's weird eating chili with no tomatoes or beans, I definitely prefer the other way better.

I roasted a chicken on Sunday, and we had baked potatoes and roast carrots and parsnips.  The whole dinner in the oven, yeah!  Roast parsnips are so delicious and sweet.

last night:  meatless Monday!  Tortellini with asparagus and peas, in a tarragon cream sauce.  Yeah, I said healthier and less rich.  Total lie tonight, but no meat, so it's a trade?

Tonight's dinner is scallop risotto with tomatoes.  I'm dying to see if the "thirty minute recipe" is the real deal or full of lies.  We shall see.

Something Different

Three "Different" dinners had in this house in the past week.  Because the "same old, same old" gets well....old!

 Fried Chicken isn't new.....but this was a cornmeal fried chicken instead of breaded.  Still was good, but I like breading better.  The batter got Hubby thinking about corn dogs.

 Flank steak with a chipotle aioli.  Delicious!  Flank steak is my new favorite cut of beef.  On the side is saffron rice and peas.

Tonight:  what I refer to as "Chinese Spaghetti."  It's kind of like a pork lo mein, but unfortunately we put too much rice noodle in it.  Still had great flavor though.

A Cheesy Day

Today's recipes are courtesy of my trolling around on Pinterest.  Cheesy Potato Soup and Spinach, Chicken and Pasta Casserole.

First up:  the soup.  The first instruction is to cook a pound of diced bacon.  OH YEAH!!!  The chopping was almost theraputic today, onions, celery and garlic and then, potato all having a turn on the cutting board.  Brian got a new peeler set for Christmas, and I didn't realize until today just how DULL our old one is!    It took forever to cook the potatoes because I didn't cut them up small enough, making our lunch a very quick one at that because we had movie plans.  It was delicious though, and there's enough for leftovers AND the freezer.  Hooray!

The casserole was good, but a bit of a pain to make.  The only reason it was a pain was our lack of planning, though.  Brian browned red onion in the oven while I defrosted chicken and frozen spinach.  And I'm making a decision:  no more frozen spinach in casseroles.  Or maybe at all:  why would you put yourself through squeezing all the moisture out of it with paper towels if you don't have to?  Peeling chopped spinach out of a paper towel is tedious, next time I'll just wilt some fresh spinach in a skillet and add it later.  The cheesy part of this casserole that I liked best was adding 8 oz of chive and onion cream cheese to the pasta, chicken and spinach.  It melted beautifully and combined with a can of diced Italian-style tomatoes to make a thick "sauce."  And the mozzarella cheese melted on the top was pretty fantastic, too.

Evolution of Taste

I've always said that I like most food, that there is a very short list of things that I won't eat.  A few of those things that have made the list:  chickpeas, olives, lima beans, mint, lamb, conch fish, venison, beer and cilantro.

As I grow older, things change.  For example, I may not like chickpeas whole, but if it's garlic or red pepper hummus, I dip chips and veggies like there's no tomorrow.  It turns out that I don't care for dried cilantro, but fresh is delicious in a homemade salsa.  And I even appreciate a cold beer on occasion.

I can stand the occasional black olive in a salad or on a pizza.  Not much else though, I adore Greek salads on Wednesday nights at knit night at the local Panera but I always pick out the olives.  (Because I never, ever remember that I can order the salad without them!)  Last month however, Brian made a chicken dish from "50 Shades of Chicken that featured garlic and kalamata olives.  I thought I'd hate it, but I didn't.  Turns out I like the FLAVOR of olives, but not whole and the having to pit them.  And if they're canned.....blech.  As a side note, the "50 Shades of Chicken" is a parody cookbook of the E.L. James "50 Shades of Grey" book series.  I don't believe that it was well-received, as Brian found it on the bargain bookshelf at Barnes and Noble when it first came out.  Which is a travesty....every recipe in there is a hit so far!

Even Brian has to admit that his tastes have changed.  The man that insists that he hates Mexican food suggested making enchiladas this past weekend.  Enchiladas!  I love Mexican food, so this sounded great to me!  A friend of ours used to make them but they were vegetarian, using refried beans as the protein source.  No wonder Brian didn't like them....but I thought they were OK.  Anyway....his enchiladas came out fantastically on Sunday night!  He took a recipe from ATK's "Simple Dishes" cookbook that called for ground turkey and subbed ground beef and mushrooms.  Not only were they delectable, they made scads of leftovers for this week.  It also turns out that, like lasagna, the leftovers taste even better!

Leftover Pizza Day

What's better than Make Your Own Pizza for a birthday celebration on Sunday, complete with red velvet and chocolate mini cupcakes?

Going home for lunch on Monday, just for the sheer reason of using a toaster oven to warm up the pizza instead of getting it all rubber-y in the microwave.  Seriously delicious.  Bacon, peppers, onion, mushroom and garlic is a good combo.

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!

Shredded Beef Tacos

A new Pinterest recipe!   Chillier nights mean autumn is coming, and that always gets me thinking about the crockpot.  Some people like to use theirs in the summer but it's just not my thing. I've seen a lot of recipes for cooking meat in the crockpot for tacos but never tried one.   The set-and-forget was really great this weekend, too.  I'm pretty sure that this cooking at home was the only reason we didn't get dinner out on Saturday after going shopping at the mall.   This one did not disappoint!

Plus....lots of leftovers for a busy Monday at work!  Win, Win!

Food from This Weekend

My friend Maureen was here this weekend, and we ate out a lot.  A lot, A LOT!  Usually Brian or I cook, but this weekend was a flurry of activity and we didn't get around to getting groceries.  And everything we had was full of AWESOME!

Three places worth mentioning:

Friday night we went to Ronnie's in Auburn, MA.  I'd been before and this place is worth raving about.  It is the BEST fried seafood around.  It doesn't taste greasy but honestly, like they change the oil in the fryer in between customers.  Clean, delicious and exactly how it should taste.  Brian and I had fried clams, she had clam fritters, and Kid 1 and Kid 2 had a burger and fish strips, respectively. Sean normally likes fish sticks at home, but he proclaimed these "too fishy."  Ah well.  After we finished our meals we went to the back of Ronnie's where they have the ice cream.  The ice cream is certainly worth raving about!  I had just enough room for a twisted soft serve cone, and I decided to share with Sean.   That boy....if you get him his own kiddie cone he'll refuse to eat it.  Offer to share your small cone and the child will devour it as if it's the last cone on Earth!  The funny part of the evening was when Will asked us if he had ice cream on his face.  Um.....not your whole face per se, buddy.  But pretty close!

Saturday evening we found this place in Oxford called "Oxford Casual Dining."  What a find!!  It had lots of Italian specialties, plus a decent kids menu.  An added bonus is that no one seemed to care around us when the kids weren't perfect angels.  I got my ultimate favorite, chicken marsala.  They did not disappoint!  And there's leftovers for lunch tomorrow so that's great.  :)  And dessert....authentic key lime pie.  Not the kind that makes your mouth pucker as soon as you taste it, just smooth and citrus-y.  We will definitely go back to this place.

On Sunday, we went to Uncle Jay's Twisted Fork for breakfast, in Cherry Valley.  This place was rated a "Hidden Gem" by the Phantom Gourmet.  And they totally deserve it!!!  Will's already asking if we can go again next weekend.  What a treat.  This place is certainly NOT a "greasy spoon."  Everything is made to order, and to die for.

My lobster Benedict.  I had it in Maine several years ago and have always wanted to have it again.   English muffin, lobster meat, poached eggs and fresh hollandaise.   Call it a "once in every six years" treat.

Will was super-impressed with his "Wicked Awesome Waffle."  It was a waffle, sliced banana, chocolate sauce and fresh whipped cream.  He ate as much as he could, stopping twice and coming back for more.

Tex-Mex Tonight

We found ourselves with a plethora of fresh cilantro after a party on Friday....so tex-mex on Sunday!  Had a great recipe for pork tacos with fresh mango salsa out of an America's Test Kitchen cookbook.   It used ground pork instead of tenderloin, and canned Chipotle in adobo sauce.   Rounded out with rice and beans, fresh guacamole ( that I "wing" instead of using a recipe now) and you've gor a great meal.  And plenty of leftovers, whixh is always my favorite.

Back in Business

Hooray, we've moved!  Still getting settled and will be for a while but let me tell you, it is SO NICE to be cooking again.  Starting out slow, but after weeks of quickie dinners and lots of takeout, it is good to eat decent food.  Not that going out to eat isn't "decent," but it is nice to be cooking again.

The new house has a very nice kitchen, and cooking in the summer is a lot sweeter when you're "slaving at a hot stove" in central air conditioning!!!   Our first home-cooked meal?  Steak on the grill, with potato packets and canned green beans.  Gotta start somewhere.  :)

In the mornings Hubby is doing the kids' dropoff so I actually have time for REAL breakfast.  So here's today's meal: 

dropped egg on toast with leftover potatoes, and Cabot vanilla bean greek yogurt with some blueberries.  Delish!  I'd never had this brand of greek yogurt before and it's great  Lots of vanilla flavor.  Having "breakfast for dinner" tonight and I'm going to make smoothies for the kids with this yogurt and some frozen tropical fruit.

It feels SO GOOD to be back in business!

Two Pastas

Last week, neither of us wanted to cook.  But we've been eating out a lot lately and basically Brian forced himself to cook.  Was I so glad....skillet lasagna is incredible!  And it's one of those meals that gets better with the leftovers.  So, so very good!

Later on, we had linguine with shrimp and scallops, with blistered grape tomatoes.  Another fantastic pasta, featuring two of my favorite things!

This is probably the last post from the kitchen at this house, packing up has already commenced.  And there's talk of stopping at BJ's today to get a huge bag of paper plates to cut down on how few dishes we need to do in the next couple of weeks.  See you soon from our new kitchen!!

More March Meals

The last few weeks have been insane.  Getting a house ready to sell is way more work than I ever thought.

It's going well, though.   I've packed up a lot of things for storage, and we've painted, cleaned, fixed, installed, and lots of other action words and items.  Pretty soon though, I'll be packing up the cookbooks.  That's ok though, there's still the Internet.  :)

I haven't had time to write individual meal posts, so how about a summary.

One night last week we had Pork Lettuce Wraps, courtesy of this month's "Cooking Light."  Usually I make these with chicken, so this was a nice change.  The ground pork is mixed with garlic and ginger and sauteed, and the vegetables (peppers, cucumber, etc...I didn't have any carrot so I put some onion in there instead) were supposed to be raw.  I don't really like raw veggies on a wrap, so I opted to sautee lightly.  It called for a serrano pepper, but only half of a serrano pepper.  Right, anyway....I chopped up a whole one because they're small and I am just NOT going to put half a serrano pepper away in the crisper to rot slowly.  I ignored my desire to put sriracha sauce in the mix and I'm glad I did because OH BABY!  Those were spicier than expected.  Delicious though.  Brian wasn't crazy about them because of the intense flavors.  (Fresh garlic, ginger paste, serrano)  I served the leftovers over rice the next day and was thrilled with them.

We were replacing the carpet in the family room over to Pergo laminate flooring on St. Patrick's Day weekend.  I had anticipated that this would take both Saturday and Sunday, so there really wasn't a point to making a corned beef and cabbage dinner.  Which is really too bad, because I love corned beef and cabbage!  So I planned an Irish Beef Stew instead.  And thanks to the awesome skills of hubby, my brother and my dad, the floor was done in a day!  I am SO THANKFUL that we have family members that not only have the skills to do this kind of work, that they don't mind helping!  The stew was really good, with some Irish soda bread on the side.  (not made by either of us, but bought at Price Chopper.)

Lastly, and I feel this really deserves its own blog entry....steak over arugula with a parmesan butter.  This recipe was out of Epicurious (goodness what a great cookbook!) and it only called for 12 oz of ribeye steak.  I was skeptical, I really was.  But sliced up, and served with a balsamic brown sugar and shallot glaze and the aforementioned pamesan butter?  This was good enough to be restaurant food.  And I wasn't at all unhappy with the amount of steak.  So, so very good.  And a very easy recipe to boot, the only difficult part was making sure you didn't overcook the steak.

That's it for now, folks!