Tag: chicken

What’s for supper? Vol. 280: Comfort, comfort food, o my people

Comfort! Comfort! Baked ziti with sausage, and chili verde with corn bread, and juicy, vaguely Asian beef for your ramen, o my people. And some adorable lemon tarts you can probably make even if you’re terrible with desserts. O my people.

Also, I hope you guys like pictures, because I took a lot of pictures this week.

SATURDAY
Hot dogs, chips? 

Maybe? 

SUNDAY
Baked ziti with sausage, breadsticks, mini lemon meringue tarts

We had such a nice day on Sunday. Damien made dinner, Elijah, who is taking a cooking class in school, decided we needed homemade breadsticks, and I got a yen for lemon meringue tarts. Other than the cozy kitchen activities, we just went to Mass and played with the animals and dyed hair and hung out. 

First the ziti. We used to have baked ziti allllll the time, and we really got burnt out on it. But that would not have happened if we had been using this recipe. A Deadspin recipe.

The picture, sadly, doesn’t capture even a fraction of its massive, creamy, meltingly cheesy, chaotic, flavorful glory. It has three kinds of cheese, fresh herbs, sausage, hunks of tomato, everything good. It’s like lasagna showed up at your house and got hysterical, but in the most entertaining way.

Here’s Elijah kneading his second batch of breadstick dough.

He made a batch of breadsticks just for snacks, and they got gobbled up right away, so he went right back and made another double batch for dinner. I’ll see if I can get his recipe.

And now for dessert. So, these lemon tarts are . . . not sophisticated. They have two flavors: LEMON!! and SUGAR!! If you like those two things, you will like this dessert, which is bright and cute and not hard to make, although it’s a bit labor intensive. 

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Last time I made this recipe, I just made pie. This time, I thought it would be fun to have individual little tarts. 

I ended up using a full box of animal crackers (I told you it wasn’t sophisticated) which made enough crust for 24 cupcake-sized tarts. I didn’t have faith that they would hold together, so I used cupcake papers. This turned out to be unnecessary, as the crust and the lemon layer are both quite sturdy, and it just gave me an extra step to do when I had to peel them all off after baking. Anyway, I whirred the animal crackers, butter, and brown sugar in the food processor until it felt like damp sand, then deposited a heap into each cupcake tin. Then I pressed each one with a cup, to make, well, a cup shape. 

You do not need to bake these shells before filling. Then you just mix together condensed milk, egg yolks, lemon juice, and lemon zest, and pour it into the shells, and bake. 

Shiny!

Then the meringue is just egg whites and powdered sugar. Note that this is the third kind of sugar in this recipe already, gevalt. This is where your teeth are really going to start to bother you. So you just whip it into stiff peaks, glop it on top of the baked lemon, and then bake it a little more. 

But wait! You need these to be a little more lemony and a little more sugary! So you are going to make some candied lemon peels, which are surprisingly easy and quick to whip up.

Basically, you scoop out the pulp, cut the lemon peel thinly, boil it in plain water three times to cut the bitterness, then boil it in sugar water, drain it and let it dry a bit, then toss it with sugar and ginger. 

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In real life, they look less like french fries. 

I couldn’t quite, quite figure out how to place the lemon peel garnishes.  Hmm?

Do you like my hat?

The meringue had plenty of little ledges and curls, so it wasn’t hard to make a half-dozen lemon peels stay on each tart, but they looked a little inelegant. 

Maybe next time I will insert the peels in between the meringue and the curd. That would probably work!

Okay, they kind of look like french fries. 

I think next time I do this, I will use ginger snaps for the crust, and probably leave more pith on the lemon peel, and maybe cut them a little thicker, because I tasted more sugar than lemon. But overall, everyone liked it, and in retrospect, this was the dessert that launched a migraine that hasn’t let up all week, so you know it’s good.

Really, what is wrong with me.

MONDAY
Chili verde, corn bread, rice, pineapple

Speaking of food that hurts, here is another dish I’ve been craving, but I felt some trepidation about coming home with the right peppers, after my experience last time and also that other time. I always tell myself, Now look, you’re a functioning adult. You can read and everything. All you have to do is look carefully at the tags, maybe consult that plastic binder they have, and you’ll be able to tell which kind of pepper is which. You’ll be able to tell!

And I try; I really do. I’m highly motivated. And yet somehow I always end up coming home with, like, a Columbian dolor extremo pepper or a — guys, I’m really tired and I can’t seem to come up with a fake funny pepper name, but you get the idea. I’m a pepper idiot. Soy pimienta idiota. 

Anyway, this time, I got lucky, because the spiciness was perfect. Whatever these are, they were good.

In this recipe you roast the peppers along with the tomatillos,

then pull off the skins, and I also removed about 80% of the seeds and membrane. Then you puree it all in the food processor along with lots of onions, garlic, and cilantro. Mmmm.

Brown up some seasoned pork chunks in oil in batches,

then throw the puree into the pot with the pork and let it simmer. I did this part in the crock pot and let it go all day, and oh boy, it was so tender and savory and wonderful by dinner time.

Serve it over rice to sop up the wonderful juices, squeeze a little lime over the top and put a little sour cream to cool it down, and it was amazing.

Spicy enough to wake up my whole face, but it didn’t cause any pain. Good stuff.

This is fork-tender, so you can easily shred it if you want, but I felt like leaving it in chunks. You can also add some broth before you start it simmering, to, well, make it more brothy; but I liked having it fairly thick. Just so you know, there are options. 

I made a tray of corn bread that I didn’t overbake for once in my life. I have switched to a more finely milled corn meal, so maybe that helps. This picture is from Picasso’s cornbread period:

You don’t need a cornbread recipe, right? It’s just regular cornbread. 

TUESDAY
Roast drumsticks, baked potatoes, steamed veggies

Dinner had been challenging for certain people for the last couple of days, so I decided to go with a kid-pleaser: Just regular normal drumsticks seasoned with salt and pepper, baked potatoes with butter and sour cream, and mixed vegetables that went straight from a bag in the freezer, to a bowl on the table, to the garbage, no mess, no fuss. 

I have to admit, it was a tasty meal. Nothing wrong with drumsticks and baked potatoes. I also made some frozen butternut squash, which I ate out of a sense of duty to eat something that was not brown, but it was not great. 

What was great was this POTATO BUTT.

I believe this is what the kids call an “absolute unit.” To see this and other absolute units, follow @PotatoesButts on Twitter. This will not profit you in any way. 

WEDNESDAY
Vermonter sandwiches, Bugles

A much-longed-for sandwich. Toasted ciabatta rolls, honey mustard, thick slices of roast chicken, slices of sharp cheddar, bacon, and slices of green apple. 

Someday I’ll take a good picture of this very fine, tart, hearty sandwich, but not today. 

THURSDAY
Beef and tofu ramen 

Usually, “fancy ramen” includes some boneless pork ribs sauteed in soy sauce and sliced up. I was pretty tired of this, so I got a big hunk of beef chuck roast, intending to marinate it. Then somehow it came to be 4 PM on Thursday, and the beef was still sitting there and hadn’t even bothered to magically marinate itself, the lazy thing.  So I rubbed some brown sugar on top, sprinkled it heavily with garlic powder and dried ginger and lightly with salt

and put it in a 400 oven for about half an hour, then sliced it up. 

Not bad! It had achieved a vaguely Asian taste, and it was juicy, and that was what I was going for. 

We also had soft boiled eggs, pea shoots, scallions, spinach, firm tofu, and various sauces. I put a blob of sambal oelek on the edge of my bowl and added a dab to every third spoonful or so. 

I also had meant to do more with the tofu, but I just ran out of time, so I just cut it into cubes, warmed it in the microwave, and threw it in my bowl. It was fine. I like tofu. But I wouldn’t mind trying some more exciting things with it, if anyone has some low-skill ideas for me.

Gosh, I love this meal. I love all my meals. I love food. 

FRIDAY

Today we are doing some kind of outdoor winter fundraising thing, and I’m experiencing a bad attitude about it. I plan to buy some Aldi pizza on the way home, and also something for dinner tomorrow, because it sure looks like we’re gonna be snowed it. Maybe I’ll make some pie. 

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Cheater's lemon meringue pie

I like a pie shell made from several cups of animal cracker crumbs whirred into a sandy texture, mixed with a stick of melted butter and 1/4 cup of brown sugar and a dash of salt. Mix well and press into the pan.

Ingredients

  • 1 pie shell

For the lemon layer:

  • 14 oz sweetened condensed milk
  • 3 egg yolks
  • 1/2 cup lemon juice
  • 1 lemon, zested

For the meringue:

  • 3 egg whites
  • 1/2 cup confectioner's sugar

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350

  2. Mix together the condensed milk, egg yolks, lemon juice, and lemon zest until well combined. Pour the mixture into the pie shell.

  3. Bake 10-15 minutes until the mixture has a little skin.

  4. While it's baking, use an electric mixer with a whisk attachment to beat the egg whites until it has soft peaks. Then gradually add the sugar until it has stiff peaks.

  5. When the lemon layer comes out of the oven, spread the meringue over the top and make a little peaks all over it with a fork or spatula.

  6. Return the pie to the oven and bake for another ten minutes or so until the meringue is slightly browned.

 

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candied lemon peels

use as garnishes, or just eat as candy

Ingredients

  • 3 lemons
  • 2 cups sugar, plus extra for sprinkling
  • dash ginger (optional)

Instructions

  1. Cut the lemons in half or quarters. Scoop out all the pulp.

  2. Cut the rind into strips as thinly as you can. It's fine to leave the pith attached.

  3. Put the strips in a small pot, cover with cold water, bring to a boil, then drain. Do this three times. This is to reduce the bitterness of the pith.

  4. After the third boil, drain off the water, remove the strips and set them aside.

  5. Combine two cups of sugar with two cups of water and heat, stirring, until the sugar is dissolved. Return the citrus strips to the pot. Simmer, stirring often, until the pith is translucent.

  6. At this point you have a few options:

    (a) You can keep the citrus peels in the sugar water and store it that way. They are less decorative this way, but they will keep in the refrigerator; or

    (b) You can drain the sugar water off and spread the citrus peels out on a tray to dry. Toss them with more sugar, or colored sugar, and powdered ginger if you like. They will be dry enough to use as garnishes in about half an hour, but they will feel more candied if you let them dry overnight. They will keep for several weeks if you store them in an airtight container.

5 from 1 vote
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Spicy Chili Verde

You can decrease the heat by seeding the peppers, using fewer habañeros, or substituting some milder pepper. It does get less spicy as it cooks, so don't be alarmed if you make the salsa and it's overwhelming!

Ingredients

  • 5 lbs pork shoulder
  • salt and pepper
  • oil for cooking
  • 2 cups chicken broth or beer (optional)

For the salsa verde:

  • 4 Anaheim peppers
  • 2 habañero peppers
  • 4 jalapeño peppers
  • 4 medium onions, quartered
  • 12 tomatillos
  • 1 head garlic, cloves peeled or unpeeled
  • 1 bunch cilantro

For serving:

  • lime wedges
  • sour cream
  • additional cilantro for topping

Instructions

  1. Preheat the broiler.

  2. Pull the husks and stems off the tomatillos and rinse them. Cut the ends off all the peppers. Grease a large pan and put the tomatillos, peppers, and onions on it. Broil five minutes, turn, and broil five minutes more, until they are slightly charred.

  3. When they are cool enough to handle, you can at this point remove the seeds from the peppers to decrease the spiciness, if you want. If you roasted the garlic in its peel, just squeeze the insides out and discard the peels.

  4. Put the tomatillos, peppers, garlic and onions in a food processor or blender with the garlic and cilantro. Purée.

  5. In a heavy pot, heat some oil. Salt and pepper the pork chunks and brown them in the oil. You will need to do it in batches so the pork has enough room and browns, rather than simmering.

  6. When all the meat is browned, return it all to the pot and add the puréed ingredients.

  7. Simmer at a low heat for at least three hours until the meat is tender. If you want thinner chili verde, stir in the chicken broth or beer. If you don't want the pork in large chunks, press the meat with the back of a spoon to make it collapse into shreds.

  8. Spoon the chili verde into bowls, squeeze some lime juice over the top, and top with sour cream and fresh cilantro.

 

 

What’s for supper? Vol. 275: It’s “tah-ZHEEN”

Happy Friday! Or whatever! Tell me it’s any day at all, and I’ll believe you. Tell me it’s the 34th Throosday in Blorgvent and I’ll believe you. It’s been the kind of week where I’m literally dreaming about sleeping. I seem to have two weeks of What’s For Suppers to catch up on, so I’ll just hit the highlights of last week: 

Two Fridays ago was ramen with shrimp, broccoli, and soft boiled eggs. I’m sharing a pic because I so infrequently manage to actually soft boil eggs. I always go hard. 

The shrimp was tasty. I think Damien sauteed it in sesame oil and garlic and then squeezed lemon over it, or something along those lines. 

Another fine meal was toward the end of Chanukah, when we had
Potato latkes and homemade applesauce, smoked chicken thighs and homemade barbecue sauce

Latkes are easy to make,

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but when you’re making a lot of them, it’s a problem to know how to manage all those potato shreds ahead of time. Normally, peeled potatoes discolor very quickly, and I usually solve this by keeping them in water until I’m ready to use them; but if you’re going to fry several batches of them, it’s a hassle to get all the water off first so the hot oil doesn’t spatter. This year, I tried something new: I shredded the potatoes in the food processor, and then I just rinsed the shreds thoroughly in very cold water, left them in the colander, and covered them with plastic wrap. Guess what happened? THEY STAYED WHITE. 

Amazing. 

Now, the absolute truth is that, when I added the eggs and flour and salt and pepper, the potatoes ended up giving up so much water, they were pretty wet anyway, and I still ended up having to squeeze the mixture pretty vigorously before putting the latkes in the oil. But I still got a little thrill because at least they weren’t brownish purple. 

The latkes turned out well, crisp on the outside and tender and mealy inside. It’s dark as heck and after all these years, I haven’t figure out how to rig up some good indoor lighting to take good food pictures during winter, so here you go:

We had them with sour cream and homemade applesauce, which I made in the Instant Pot. I peeled and cored a few dozen apples and put them in the IP with about a cup of water and cooked them on high for maybe eight minutes, twelve minutes, I don’t know. Then I drained off what turned out to be too much water and added some butter, vanilla, and cinnamon, and gave it a little stir, and that was it. Hot damn, homemade apple sauce is just the best thing in the world. 

I was astonished at what a lovely rose color I got even without the peels. 

I don’t think I added sugar, because these are still local, in-season apples and the flavor shouldn’t be tampered with much.  I used Cortland, Macintosh, and Granny Smith, which are all on the tart end of the scale. 

Damien made his wonderful sugar smoked chicken thighs out on the grill, and he used the same spices to made a homemade barbecue sauce which turned out a little spicier than expected, so he served it for dipping, rather than brushing it on. 

Man, it smelled good in the house, with the smoked chicken, the warm apple sauce, and whatnot. A strange meal, but hearty and tasty. I never know what to make with latkes! The only thing I can think of is chicken soup, which we have at other times, and brisket, which I remember from my childhood with loathing. 

Then I squeaked in a bit batch of rugelach on the very last day of Chanukah. I do love rugelach, and I give you my blessing to make them for Christmas, because they are delicious and not hard to make and they’re adorable. (And you can take advantage of my brilliant ooze rescue method.)

I ended up with four varieties this year: Cinnamon honey walnut, ginger walnut, cherry, and blueberry. Lovely, lovely. They ended up a little fluffier and less flaky than normal this year, for reasons unknown, but I did not mind.  

Last Wednesday was Benny’s birthday and she requested Damien’s delectable basil chicken cutlets with homemade red sauce and provolone. He uses this Deadspin recipe and it has never been anything but excellent. Juicy chicken in a fluffy breading with a basil leaf tucked under a slice of provolone, served with a scoop of hot red sauce over it, so the cheese melts and melds the whole thing together. 

He made so much, we had it the second day, layered into a casserole dish and heated up like a giant chicken lasagna. So good. 

Over the weekend was her birthday party, which we managed to have almost entirely outdoors, because NH is all ate up with Covid again. We had a pallet bonfire, and the kids whooped it up on the trampoline in the dark with glow sticks, and then we came in for presents, went outside to set off fireworks, and came in for cake. Some party photos on Facebook here and here. 

We decided to make bonfire cupcakes, which are very easy to make, but are pretty impressive. Chocolate frosting, broken hazelnut Pirouline wafers for the logs, shredded coconut with green food coloring for the grass. We put a bunch of Jolly Ranchers in a bag and smashed it with a hammer, then spread the chunks in a parchment paper-lined pan in a low oven for a few minutes until the candy melted. Then we let it harden into a sheet, then cracked it into little “flames.” Stick a few in between the logs, sprinkle on some gold sugar for embers, and you have little cupcake campfires. 

 

Top each one with a mini marshmallow on a toothpick, and it’s just cute.

I did toast each one with a butane lighter because my life was ruined anyway.

And that was last week! This week, let’s see. 

MONDAY
Carbonara 

A sweet Facebook friend sent me three pounds of most excellent smoked bacon from Tennessee, with a warning not to attempt to eat it straight like breakfast bacon, because it’s powerful stuff.  My dears, I’ve never had such bacon. Such an intense, earthy, smoky flavor. It was really exciting! I really get the best mail and have the nicest readers. I didn’t get very good pictures because I was in a bit of a hurry to start gobbling it up.

If you’re not familiar with carbonara, it may be the most cheering, flavorful dish you can make with the fewest number of ingredients. Just pasta, bacon, eggs, pepper, and parm. Well, I guess that’s five, and maybe not so surprising that it tastes so good, but it really is wonderful, and you should make it soon. 

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TUESDAY
Vaguely Mediterranean chicken on pita with yogurt sauce; Greek vegetable salad

Not exactly shawarma, but I did throw together several of the ingredients for the marinade

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and put some chicken thighs in it for several hours. Then I broiled it, turning once

and served it with pita pockets and yogurt sauce, and a little salad. Pretty tasty with very little effort. 

I served it with grape tomatoes, baby cucumbers, black olives, red onion, fresh parsley and dill, kosher salt, and olive oil.

We also had some kalamata olives, which I ended up serving on the side, thinking they had pits in them, but they did not, oops. And some hunks of feta cheese. 

It was a really good meal, and I liked it a lot. Fresh squeezed lemon juice in the marinade on a Tuesday! Freshly pressed garlic in the yogurt sauce! Two kinds of fresh herbs! I’m making a fuss because NOBODY ELSE DID, which for some reason still bothers me even at this late date after all these years. Oh well. 

WEDNESDAY
My birthday!

The kids had chicken nuggets and Damien and I ran away to Luca’s, where we haven’t been for many a year. I went ahead and ordered the garlicky escargot, because I’ve never had escargot, and if not when your husband has offered to take you to a Rather Expensive Restaurant, then when? 

They were . . . fine. I don’t know why you would have escargot if you could have seafood, though. They were just kind of chewy and muddy, kind of like if someone was trying to somehow reconstitute mussels or oysters from scratch but had only heard them described. So now I know! 

Then, after surreptitiously looking up how to pronounce “tagine,” I ordered the Moroccan lamb tagine, and that was a good idea.

The lamb was braised tenderly in a lovely, slightly spicy broth, and it had carrots, fingerling potatoes, apricots, and pistachios, and I forget what else, served with a yogurt sauce. Very  pretty, warming, and interesting to eat. I also had a couple of delicious cocktails made with pear vodka, ginger liqueur, and nutmeg on the rim, and the whole meal was extremely pleasant and autumnal. 

Then we saw West Side Story, which Damien and I both loved. The older kids and Damien got me excellent, thoughtful gifts, and the younger kids made me wonderful cards. (The middle kids acted like I was some sort of vaguely familiar insect who was late picking them up, but what are you gonna do.) 

THURSDAY
Korean beef bowl on rice; sugar snap peas

Always tasty, even when you run out of brown sugar and have to use honey, and don’t have red pepper flakes and have to use chili powder. I did put red pepper flakes on the list right away, though. We felt that loss more keenly than the brown sugar part. Although it was a bit dry, because we didn’t have the sugar melting into a sauce. Being hungry helped. Write that down. 

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FRIDAY
Omelettes and hash browns

But I have to buy more eggs! The kids have been doing distance school all week, and apparently that means Egg Time. 

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Potato latkes

Serve with sour cream and/or apple sauce for Hanukkah or ANY TIME. Makes about 25+ latkes

Ingredients

  • 4 lbs potatoes, peeled
  • 6 eggs beaten
  • 6 Tbsp flour (substitute matzoh meal for Passover)
  • salt and pepper
  • oil for frying

Instructions

  1. Grate the potatoes. Let them sit in a colander for a while, if you can, and squeeze out as much liquid as possible. 

  2. Mix together the eggs, salt and pepper, and flour. Stir into the potato mixture and mix well. 

  3. Turn the oven on to 350 and put a paper-lined pan in the oven to receive the latkes and keep them warm while you're frying. 

  4. Put 1/4 to 1/2 and inch of oil in your frying pan and heat it up until a drop of batter will bubble.  

  5. Take a handful of the potato mixture, flatten it slightly, and lay it in the pan, leaving room between latkes. Repeat with the rest of the mixture, making several batches to leave room in between latkes. Fry until golden brown on both sides, turning once. Eat right away or keep warm in oven, but not too long. 

  6. Serve with sour cream and/or applesauce or apple slices. 

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Smoked chicken thighs with sugar rub

Ingredients

  • 1.5 cups brown sugar
  • .5 cups white sugar
  • 2 Tbsp chili powder
  • 2 Tbsp garlic powder
  • 2 tsp chili pepper flakes
  • salt and pepper
  • 20 chicken thighs

Instructions

  1. Mix dry ingredients together. Rub all over chicken and let marinate until the sugar melts a bit. 

  2. Light the fire, and let it burn down to coals. Shove the coals over to one side and lay the chicken on the grill. Lower the lid and let the chicken smoke for an hour or two until they are fully cooked. 

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Rugelach

These are tender little pastries for Chanukah or any time. Use whatever kind of filling you like: Jams, preserves, cinnamon sugar, nutella, etc. These are time consuming, but don't take much skill, and they freeze well, so they make pretty little gifts.

Servings 80 rugelach

Ingredients

dough

  • half pound butter
  • 8 oz cream cheese
  • 2 cups flour
  • 1 cup or more sugar, for rolling

filling

  • 1/4-1/2 cup preserves or other filling
  • 1/4-1/2 cup finely chopped nuts (optional)

Instructions

  1. In a food processor, combine the cream cheese and butter until smooth. Slowly add in the flour and keep mixing until smooth. You can do this by hand, but it will take a while! The dough should be fairly stiff and not sticky when it's done.

  2. Divide the dough into 8 balls. Cover with plastic wrap and chill for at least 30 minutes.

  3. Preheat the oven to 400.

  4. Prepare a pan by lining it with parchment paper, then spraying a baking rack and putting the rack on the parchment paper. Line a second pan with parchment paper, to which you will remove the rugelach when they come out of the oven.

  5. Use the sugar to cover your work space, and use a rolling pin to roll a ball of dough into a round shape the size of a large plate. It should be thin enough to flap a bit when you give it a shake. If your rolling pin sticks, sprinkle more sugar on. You can turn the dough over to make sure both sides get sugared. It doesn't have to be perfectly round, as it will be cut into pieces.

  6. Spread the jam or other filling over the dough, leaving an open space in the middle. If you're adding nuts, sprinkle them over the filling.

  7. Using a pizza cutter, cut the dough into 16-20 triangles.

  8. Roll each triangle up from the outside in. Place each rolled rugelach on the sprayed baking rack on the pan, with the skinny point down. They puff up a bit, so leave the space of one rugelach in between.

  9. Repeat for each ball of dough.

  10. Bake for ten minutes. If the dough isn't golden brown, give it another two minutes. These go from perfect to burnt very quickly, so be alert.

  11. When they bake, the filling will ooze out and pool and burn on the parchment paper, but the rugelach will not burn.

  12. When the rugelach come out of the oven, immediately use a butter knife to transfer them to another pan or rack to cool.

  13. Once they are cool, they can be wrapped in plastic and kept in the freezer for weeks without harm.

 

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Spaghetti carbonara

An easy, delicious meal.

Ingredients

  • 3 lbs bacon
  • 3 lbs spaghetti
  • 1 to 1-1/2 sticks butter
  • 6 eggs, beaten
  • lots of pepper
  • 6-8 oz grated parmesan cheese

Instructions

  1. Fry the bacon until it is crisp. Drain and break it into pieces.

  2. Boil the spaghetti in salted water until al dente. If you like, add some bacon grease to the boiling water.

  3. Drain the spaghetti and return it to the pot. Add the butter, pieces of bacon, parmesan cheese, and pepper and mix it up until the butter is melted.

  4. Add the raw beaten egg and mix it quickly until the spaghetti is coated. Serve immediately.

 

5 from 2 votes
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Chicken shawarma

Ingredients

  • 8 lbs boned, skinned chicken thighs
  • 4-5 red onions
  • 1.5 cups lemon juice
  • 2 cups olive oil
  • 4 tsp kosher salt
  • 2 Tbs, 2 tsp pepper
  • 2 Tbs, 2 tsp cumin
  • 1 Tbsp red pepper flakes OR Aleppo pepper
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1 entire head garlic, crushed OR bashed into pieces

Instructions

  1. Mix marinade ingredients together, then add chicken. Put in ziplock bag and let marinate several hours or overnight.

  2. Preheat the oven to 425.

  3. Grease a shallow pan. Take the chicken out of the marinade and spread it in a single layer on the pan, and top with the onions (sliced or quartered). If you kept the garlic in larger pieces, fish those out of the marinade and strew them over the chicken. Cook for 45 minutes or more. 

  4. Chop up the chicken a bit, if you like, and finish cooking it so it crisps up a bit more.

  5. Serve chicken and onions with pita bread triangles, cucumbers, tomatoes, assorted olives, feta cheese, fresh parsley, pomegranates or grapes, fried eggplant, and yogurt sauce.

 

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Yogurt sauce

Ingredients

  • 32 oz full fat Greek yogurt
  • 5 cloves garlic, crushed
  • 1/4 cup lemon juice
  • 3 Tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp pepper
  • fresh parsley or dill, chopped (optional)

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients together. Use for spreading on grilled meats, dipping pita or vegetables, etc. 

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Korean Beef Bowl

A very quick and satisfying meal with lots of flavor and only a few ingredients. Serve over rice, with sesame seeds and chopped scallions on the top if you like. You can use garlic powder and powdered ginger, but fresh is better. The proportions are flexible, and you can easily add more of any sauce ingredient at the end of cooking to adjust to your taste.

Ingredients

  • 1 cup brown sugar (or less if you're not crazy about sweetness)
  • 1 cup soy sauce
  • 1 Tbsp red pepper flakes
  • 3-4 inches fresh ginger, minced
  • 6-8 cloves garlic, minced
  • 3-4 lb2 ground beef
  • scallions, chopped, for garnish
  • sesame seeds for garnish

Instructions

  1. In a large skillet, cook ground beef, breaking it into bits, until the meat is nearly browned. Drain most of the fat and add the fresh ginger and garlic. Continue cooking until the meat is all cooked.

  2. Add the soy sauce, brown sugar, and red pepper flakes the ground beef and stir to combine. Cook a little longer until everything is hot and saucy.

  3. Serve over rice and garnish with scallions and sesame seeds. 

 

What’s for supper? Vol. 272: Floppo de gallo

In haste! In haste! Oh, what a hurry I am in. Here is what we ate this week:

SATURDAY
Duck buns!

We were in Boston, as I said. We were running very late and were starving, and really needed just anything to gobble down before the show, and we thought we had found a restaurant, but it turned out to be a nail spa, and I was just about to suggest stopping into a CVS to get some Combos and turkey jerky, when we found ourselves in the outskirts of Chinatown. The Dumpling Cafe was the first restaurant that was open, and there were lots of Asian families eating there, which seemed promising. The menu was long and overwhelming and the clock was ticking, so I chose duck buns at random. An excellent choice.

This is heart’s desire food: Piping hot, sweet and glossy outside, pillowy soft and tender inside, with a rich, savory heart of duck meat, and a tangy, gingery sauce for dipping. Amazing. Moe ordered some kind of seafood thingy and gave me all the bits with visible tentacles. Damien had some kind of pork and crab dumplings that came in a lovely little wooden steamer basket

and were incredibly juicy inside. Clara had some kind of vegetable thing, and Lena had some other kind of dumplings. So nice. So nice. Next time we’re in Boston, we’re definitely going back.

SUNDAY
Pasta with Marcella Hazan’s sauce, garlic bread, salad, fruit, Italian ices

Sunday I had signed us up to make a dinner in honor of St. Clare for the Dead Theologian’s Society youth group, and I guess it takes 24 years of practice, but we did manage to go to Mass, run errands, shop, deliver the food, cook, and get a hot dinner on the table for a crowd of youth by 5:15. By which I mean I made a little fuss about how this was my project and I was in charge, and then Damien did most of the work.

I did rinse off some fruit, and it turned out pretty:

Of course there was way way too much food, but we wrapped it up and someone showed us where to leave it to donate it to the homeless shelter, so that worked out well. 

Here is where I once again pester you to try Marcella Hazan’s miraculous three-ingredient red sauce that tastes so savory, you’ll think someone is playing a trick on you. 

Jump to Recipe

The other thing to know is to salt your water heavily when you’re cooking pasta, and then scoop out a big bunch of the water before you drain your cooked pasta and keep it handy. Then, after you drain it, you can add some of the hot pasta water back in to keep it from sticking together. Tricks!

We opted for garlic bread made with garlic powder, since this was for the youth group and we didn’t want to terrify anyone with real garlic. (Here’s my confession: I prefer it with garlic powder myself. Or garlic salt. It just tastes good.)

MONDAY
Chicken caesar salad, pomegranates

Grilled chicken on romaine lettuce, freshly-shredded parmesan, caesar dressing from a bottle, cucumbers, and plenty of garlicky, buttery homemade croutons curated from our extensive collection of leftover hot dog buns. 

Plenty of pomegranates left over from the Italian dinner. One of my children told me that, when you crack open a bit of pomegranate and unexpectedly find another little row of juicy seeds, he feels like a monkey who’s broken open a rotten log and found a little trove of termites; but in a good way. We’re all poets around here. 

TUESDAY
Gochujang pork ribs, sesame Brussels sprouts, rice

Haven’t broken out the old gochujang for a while. Used up the old tub and ordered a new one. I made a little sauce with gochujang, honey, sugar, soy sauce, and garlic and let the ribs marinate for several hours. 

Jump to Recipe

One of these days, I’ll make full-on gochujang bulgoki, with the thinly sliced pork and carrots and onions wrapped up in little bundles with rice and seaweed. Boy is that tasty. But pork ribs marinated in the sauce and then broiled to a little char is also pretty good for a Tuesday.

I made the Brussels sprouts by trimming and halving them, drizzling them with sesame oil and sprinkling them with brown sugar, kosher salt, and sesame seeds, and broiling them in a shallow pan. (I broiled the Brussels sprouts most of the way first, then moved them down to a low rack and broiled the pork on the top rack.) They were pretty good. These were small and tender sprouts, and I liked having the sweet vegetables to go along with the spicy meat. 

WEDNESDAY
Bagel, sausage, egg, cheese sandwiches

On Wednesday, I succumbed to a sudden, fierce urge to clean out the refrigerator, which was . . . gloppy. You couldn’t pay me enough to show “before” pictures, but here is the “after.”

The entire middle shelf of the refrigerator is cheese. Cheese sticks, cheese balls, cheese slices, cheese blocks, cheese hunks, shredded cheese, and misc. I made only a very small dent in the cheese with the bagel sandwiches. There were also five open jars of pickles that I absolutely refused to put back. 

You can also see that we’re slowly replacing original parts with Rubbermaid. Actually Rubbermaid is too rich for our blood; it’s pure Sterilite in there, baby.  One of these days, I’m going to take a hot nail and make a hole in the side of the freezer door and string a bungee cord from side to side, and then we’ll have freezer door storage again, too. 

We do have a second fridge, but it never helps, somehow. I don’t want to talk about it. 

THURSDAY
Vermonter sandwiches, chips

A very fine sandwich. A thick slice of grilled chicken, a thick slice of sharp cheddar, a thick slice of tart green apple, some bacon, some honey mustard, and toasted sourdough. Everybody likes meals that start out with this kind of table:

The only trick was, we couldn’t find my amazing apple peeler-corer-slicer machine anywhere. It’s not a very big kitchen, and I crawled all the heck over it, over and over again, and I have no idea where it went. Oh well. It’ll turn up. We survived. 

 

FRIDAY
Tuna noodle

Promised but not delivered last week. Last week, we had fish tacos with pico de gallo, which ended up as a rather pretty plate. Here’s a photo that didn’t make it into last week’s post:

Sour cream, shredded cabbage, fish, cilantro, lime, avocado, hot sauce, pico de gallo.

And my pico de gallo recipe:

Jump to Recipe

which I didn’t follow because I had thrown out the jalapeños in a snit of some kind or other, and then didn’t feel like chopping tomatoes, so I tried to make it in the food processor, which either I don’t know how to do, or else you can’t do that. So it turned out a little . . . floppy. Floppo de gallo. But it was still better that store-bought salsa, I thought, so there you go.

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Marcella Hazan's tomato sauce

We made a quadruple recipe of this for twelve people. 

Keyword Marcella Hazan, pasta, spaghetti, tomatoes

Ingredients

  • 28 oz can crushed tomatoes or whole tomatoes, broken up
  • 1 onion peeled and cut in half
  • salt to taste
  • 5 Tbsp butter

Instructions

  1. Put all ingredients in a heavy pot.

  2. Simmer at least 90 minutes. 

  3. Take out the onions.

  4. I'm freaking serious, that's it!

 

5 from 1 vote
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Gochujang bulgoki (spicy Korean pork)


Ingredients

  • 1.5 pound boneless pork, sliced thin
  • 4 carrots in matchsticks or shreds
  • 1 onion sliced thin

sauce:

  • 5 generous Tbsp gochujang (fermented pepper paste)
  • 2 Tbsp honey
  • 2 tsp sugar
  • 2 Tbsp soy sauce
  • 5 cloves minced garlic

Serve with white rice and nori (seaweed sheets) or lettuce leaves to wrap

Instructions

  1. Combine pork, onions, and carrots.

    Mix together all sauce ingredients and stir into pork and vegetables. 

    Cover and let marinate for several hours or overnight.

    Heat a pan with a little oil and sauté the pork mixture until pork is cooked through.

    Serve with rice and lettuce or nori. Eat by taking pieces of lettuce or nori, putting a scoop of meat and rice in, and making little bundles to eat. 

 

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Pico De Gallo

quick and easy fresh dip or topping for tacos, etc.

Ingredients

  • 2 large tomatoes, diced
  • 1 jalapeño pepper, seeded and diced OR 1/2 serrano pepper
  • 1/2 onion, diced
  • 1/2 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
  • 1/8 cup lime juice
  • dash kosher salt

Instructions

  1. Mix ingredients together and serve with your favorite Mexican food

What’s for supper? Vol. 267: The ramens of the day

Cozy foods this week! Brussels sprouts! Some fish sauce comparison! Amusing tricks with lemon! The rediscovery of fennel! And more. Come see what we ate. 

Despite my excitement, I didn’t get around to using my new foley mill last week, for applesauce or anything else. We do go to an apple orchard; we did not pick apples from our own tree yet. I did buy a second single-use appliance, though: One of those cast iron apple slicer and peelers that clamps onto the counter and does everything with a crank. Pretty ingenious. 

The kids like to put apple slices on their ham and cheese sandwiches, so this will probably get regular use, beyond just the production of tasty, tasty apple peels

We are really slipping as a family, though. In the past, we would have been knee deep in denuded onions, potatoes, and baseballs,  with little peels of doll heads all over the floor. Now we’re just, “tee hee, I can peel all the apples I want.” We’re slipping.

SATURDAY
Hot dogs and chips

An extremely drivey day that started out with a Saturday morning alarm and two loads of cars through the drive-thru flu shot clinic, and kept going like that. Benny had a pal over, Damien cooked hot dogs on the grill, and we had a campfire and roasted marshmallows. I did buy a skeleton. We haven’t settled on a ludicrous display for the year, but we now have two fully posable skeletons. 

SUNDAY
Salad with chicken, feta, walnuts, cranberries

Sunday was the day we chose to go apple picking. We’ve gotten pretty good at planning day trips. Damien cooked the chicken after Mass, and we had the kids make their Monday lunches and do their evening chores in the afternoon, so when we got home late and full of apples and smelling faintly of goat poo, all we had to do was eat the prepped food and slither into bed. Truly, the greatest organizational hack of all, though, is to not have a baby or a toddler. Nothing beats it. Also, let people go apple picking in their pajamas if they want. 

I myself wore a sweater and leggings, which are pajamas. As I mentioned, we are slipping. (If you care to see our apple picking photos, they are here.)

The dinner we prepped was salad with roast chicken, toasted walnuts (toast on a pan in the oven for a few minutes or, even easier, in the microwave for a few minutes), feta cheese, and dried cranberries. I had mine with wine vinegar. 

Decent and filling. I feel like there was some kind of bread component, but maybe I’m confused.

MONDAY
Meatloaf, mashed potatoes, roast honey balsamic Brussels sprouts with walnuts

My big secret with meatloaf is only to make it a few times a year, so it doesn’t become an emotional burden. The other thing I struggle with, with meatloaf, is the desire to get cute with it. I want to make adorable little meat muffins, and I know nobody wants that, even though I feel like deep down they would enjoy it. 

Or I start pulling out my silicone pans

or I start felling sculptural, and we end up with meat horrors

Or, not pictured, giant meat boobies. It’s just . . . you give me big hunks of raw material, and I want to create. Anyway, this time I just made three big loaves, that’s it. That’s what kind of month it’s been. Here. Here’s yer meat. 

It’s a serviceable recipe, though, as long as you don’t underseason it.

Jump to Recipe

I use red wine and Worcestershire sauce inside and ketchup outside, and it has a pretty good savor. It would make good leftover sandwiches, but that doesn’t fit into my current calorie arrangement, so the leftovers are just hulking in the fridge, awaiting their doom. And who isn’t. 

We also had ten pounds of mashed potatoes, which I meant to make as garlic parmesan mashed potatoes

Jump to Recipe

but I just plain forgot, so they were just plain with milk and butter and salt

and I also forgot how dang long it takes potatoes to cook, so we had supper pretty late.

I also had four pounds of Brussels sprouts, first of the season. They turned out swell, with very little effort. I stemmed and halved them, spread them in a pan, and drizzled them with olive oil and honey, and some balsamic vinegar, pepper and kosher salt, and then – aha! – tossed in a few handfuls of chopped walnuts, and roasted it under the broiler. 

I don’t know why I have two photos of this, but here you are. 

To think that I spent most of my life not knowing about roasted vegetables. You throw a few nuts in there, and it’s almost a meal in itself. Thank you, Aldi, for cheap nuts. 

TUESDAY
Banh mi, pineapple

I have, in the past few years, tried banh mi from various places, and mine is the best. It just is. I recommend mine. I’ve also tried making my same recipe with various meats, and it always tastes the same as very cheap pork, because the sauce is just that powerful. 

Jump to Recipe

I use a lightly toasted baguette with plenty of plain mayo. I put out sriracha mayo for anyone who wants it, but for me, there are enough other spicy elements. Pork, sweet pickled carrots, plain cucumbers, plenty of cilantro, a few jalapeños, and that’s it. It’s just the best sandwich going. 

Here’s the recipe for pickled carrots, which I may fiddle with. It’s a bit sweet.

Jump to Recipe

I served pineapple on the side because I got confused. It was supposed to be for Wednesday, but I had already started cutting it up, so it was too late. 

I also used a different kind of fish sauce in the sauce this time, and it was just as savory and salty and weird, but the smell wasn’t eye-watering. I mean, my eyes were a little concerned, but they weren’t absolutely streaming. Fish sauce is made by mixing anchovies with salt and then I guess letting it sit in giant fermentation vats for several months, and then collecting the runoff, or something? I haven’t looked into this deeply. Anyway, I’m drinking more. 

Now you know everything I know. The less stinky sauce was considerably cheaper, too. 

WEDNESDAY
Pork ramen

I cleverly timed this so we would have leftover vaguely Asian sandwich fixings from Tuesday to top the ramen on Wednesday. Oh, I’ve got a few tricks up my sl– ope, nope, sorry, that’s a carrot. Damn shredded carrots got everywhere. I’m not joking, it was terrible. 

So we just had a big pot of ramen, and I cooked up some boneless pork ribs in sesame oil and sloshed on a little soy sauce toward the end

and sliced them up. I considered messing around with some garlic and brown sugar, but then I remembered how lazy I am.

Also set out soft boiled eggs, cucumbers and carrots from the previous day, some nori, pea shoots, crunchy noodles, sesame seeds, and all the various sauces I could find that seemed like they came from the right hemisphere. 

I do like this meal, and it’s so easy and cheap. I think the most expensive part was the nori.

Top view. Dive in!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THURSDAY
Ina Garten’s roast chicken with carrots and fennel

Damien was in charge of Thursday’s meal, and he went for this spectacular roast chicken and vegetable dish. The chickens are stuffed with garlic, lemon, and thyme, and wow, can you taste it. It’s so juicy and absolutely packed with flavor, not to mention hilarious to look at. 

Hello, lemons! The chickens get roasted on a bed of vegetables, and I think Damien made a separate platter of just vegetables so there would be plenty. I always forget about fennel in between having this dish, and it’s so good. It’s like all the best parts of onion and cabbage, but it takes up other flavors very nicely. People describe fennel as having a licorice-like taste, and I guess it does, but I don’t like licorice (or anise), and I like fennel a lot. It’s just sort of fancy and peasant-y at the same time, sort of elegant and cozy, juicy and crunchy. I don’t know. Don’t even get me started about the carrots. 

This is a very fine meal, very cheering on a gloomy, rainy day. We served it with plenty of baguettes and soft butter to sop up the lovely lemony juices. 

Look at that beautiful fennel, so elegant, so cozy.

FRIDAY
Grilled cheese

Finally Friday. Kind of a draggy week. Just a lot of covid tests and . . . I don’t have to tell you, the same nonsense everyone is dealing with. Everything is medium terrible and I feel medium guilty for not managing it better. Whatever. We live to grill another day. My stupid hip is still endlessly healing up from ??mysterious non injury maybe arthritis?? so I’m on day 2 of a yoga program. It’s this one, which is on Amazon Prime, if you’re interested. It’s not too woo woo, and she’s pretty good at explaining what you’re actually supposed to be doing with your parts. Then at the end she’s like “and now we will pray to honor the body” and I’m like “sorry toots, gotta shower and get to adoration” and I boop it off. 

 

5 from 1 vote
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Meatloaf (actually two giant meatloaves)

Ingredients

  • 5 lbs ground beef
  • 2 lbs ground turkey
  • 8 eggs
  • 4 cups breadcrumbs
  • 3/4 cup milk OR red wine
  • 1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce

plenty of salt, pepper, garlic powder or fresh garlic, onion powder, fresh parsley, etc.

  • ketchup for the top
  • 2 onions diced and fried (optional)

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 450

  2. Mix all meat, eggs, milk, breadcrumbs, and seasonings together with your hands until well blended.

  3. Form meat into two oblong loaves on pan with drainage

  4. Squirt ketchup all over the outside of the loaves and spread to cover with spatula. Don't pretend you're too good for this. It's delicious. 

  5. Bake for an hour or so, until meat is cooked all the way through. Slice and serve. 

 

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Garlic parmesan mashed potatoes

Ingredients

  • 5-6 lbs potatoes
  • 8-10 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
  • 8 Tbsp butter
  • 1-1/2 cups milk
  • 8 oz grated parmesan
  • salt and pepper

Instructions

  1. Peel the potatoes and put them in a pot. Cover the with water. Add a bit of salt and the smashed garlic cloves.

  2. Cover and bring to a boil, then simmer with lid loosely on until the potatoes are tender, about 25 minutes.

  3. Drain the water out of the pot. Add the butter and milk and mash well.

  4. Add the parmesan and salt and pepper to taste and stir until combined.

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Pork banh mi

Ingredients

  • 5-6 lbs Pork loin
  • 1/2 cup fish sauce
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 1 minced onion
  • 1/2 head garlic, minced or crushed
  • 2 tsp pepper

Veggies and dressing

  • carrots
  • cucumbers
  • vinegar
  • sugar
  • cilantro
  • mayonnaise
  • Sriracha sauce

Instructions

  1. Slice the raw pork as thinly as you can. 

  2. Mix together the fish sauce ingredients and add the meat slices. Seal in a ziplock bag to marinate, as it is horrendously stinky. Marinate several hours or overnight. 

  3. Grill the meat over coals or on a pan under a hot broiler. 

  4. Toast a sliced baguette or other crusty bread. 

 

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quick-pickled carrots and/or cucumbers for banh mi, bibimbap, ramen, tacos, etc.

An easy way to add tons of bright flavor and crunch to a meal. We pickle carrots and cucumbers most often, but you can also use radishes, red onions, daikon, or any firm vegetable. 

Ingredients

  • 6-7 medium carrots, peeled
  • 1 lb mini cucumbers (or 1 lg cucumber)

For the brine (make double if pickling both carrots and cukes)

  • 1 cup water
  • 1/2 cup rice vinegar (other vinegars will also work; you'll just get a slightly different flavor)
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 Tbsp kosher salt

Instructions

  1. Mix brine ingredients together until salt and sugar are dissolved. 

  2. Slice or julienne the vegetables. The thinner they are, the more flavor they pick up, but the more quickly they will go soft, so decide how soon you are going to eat them and cut accordingly!

    Add them to the brine so they are submerged.

  3. Cover and let sit for a few hours or overnight or longer. Refrigerate if you're going to leave them overnight or longer.

What’s for supper? Vol. 265: U jelly bro?

It’s fall! This means grapes! It means squash! It means . . . Korean food, why not! Come along and see; we have some lovely recipes this week. 

SATURDAY
Hamburgers, chips, veg and dip, watermelon

There was a little resurgence of summer weather, so Benny’s pal came over and helped her pick some grapes, and we had a little cookout. I spent a few hours working on my never-ending project, this ultra deluxe raccoon-proof garbage enclosure, with Real Hinged Door that Opens and Closes. 

Eventually it will have a corrugated tin roof, and a locking latch, and it will be wrapped in welded wire fencing, and I really do believe I’ll finish it someday. Someday.  Maybe I can be buried in it. 

SUNDAY
Ragù on fettuccine, garlic bread

Damien made his scrumptous Deadspin ragù, which uses ground pork and veal, shredded carrots and celery, and is just heavenly. You could feast on the aroma alone.

We spent a good part of Sunday and Monday evenings making grape jelly. Sunday we picked grapes, pulled off the stems, and cleaned them,

[this is supposed to be two sets of photos embedded from Instagram, but I can’t tell if they’re showing up properly or not]

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Simcha Fisher (@simchafisher)

 

and Monday we did the actual jelly-making.

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Simcha Fisher (@simchafisher)

We ended up with about twelve pounds of grapes, and I got to startle a few family members who weren’t aware we were making jelly.

I firmly told myself that the main goal was to have a nice time with Benny, and not necessarily to come out with some grade A jelly, and that was a good thing, because we achieved the former, but not the latter. We ended up with 4 jars of decent jelly,

and another ten jars of something more like syrup — in some cases, because I didn’t realize that, if you decrease the sugar, you need to buy special low-sugar pectin, and in some cases because I used the right amount of sugar but ran out of liquid pectin and used powdered, misread the directions, and just screwed it up generally. This is after I mouthed off about how my mother never used to read the directions and that’s why her jelly was always turned so weird. 

Oh, I just used the recipe on the pectin boxes. I used Ball RealFruit liquid pectin, which was simple and easy, and Sure Jell powdered pectin, which was a little more involved.

I did learn that Concord grapes are very high in histamines, and if you get impatient with the potato masher and decide to mash them by hand, your hands will light up like Christmas trees. I learned that grape flavored Laffy Taffy is the exact flavor of Concord Grape jelly foam, which is kind of startling. And that’s all I learned. Maybe next year, we’ll just make juice.  

MONDAY
Italian sandwiches

Ciabatta rolls with spicy salami, prosciutto, mozzarella, tomatoes, red pesto, olive oil and vinegar, and a little fresh pepper.

We’ve been having this sandwich about once a week and I’m nowhere near tired of it yet. I mean not this specific sandwich.

TUESDAY
Honey mustard chicken thighs with fall vegetables

A one-pan meal, nice and easy. Let’s launch the beginning of butternut squash season with a useful tip: To easily peel butternut squash, cut off the ends and pierce it several times with a fork, then microwave it for 3-4 minutes. You should be able to peel it with a vegetable peeler and cut it fairly easily after that. 

So for this dish, you cut up your squash and potato, drizzle it with oil and season it with salt and pepper, lay the chicken on top, and then stir up a simple sauce and brush the chicken with the sauce. Then you just roast it all together. 

Jump to Recipe

The sauce runs down into the pan, and vegetables pick it up, it all melds together, nice skin, everybody’s happy. 

I had some leftover broccoli and carrots in the fridge, so I added those in halfway through the cooking, and that worked nicely. 

This meal is subject to endless varieties of vegetables and seasonings, and you can make it all ahead of time. It all goes in one pan, but it’s easy for picky eaters to fish out the things they like.

Win win win. I don’t know why this picture looks like I took it through a butterscotch wrapper, but there it is.

WEDNESDAY
Regular tacos

Nothing to report. I do remember that I kept calling everyone for supper and they kept wandering off, so I got mad and left, and then two hours later Corrie tearfully claimed no one told her it was supper time, and I felt so bad, but then they told me she was on the couch reading Calvin and Hobbes and wouldn’t answer them, and they actually went over and shook her, but she refused to respond. I heated up a taco for her anyway, but by this point, I was confused about who I was supposed to be mad at, so I just sat on the couch and felt mad in general. Does it usually take this long to get used to getting back to school? I don’t remember, but I feel like I’m-a-gonna die. 

THURSDAY
Instant pot bo ssam with spicy walnut sauce, rice, pineapple

This recipe looks like more work than it really is. If you skip most of the extras, basically you just have to find the fattiest hunk of pork you can, slather it with big handfuls of salt and sugar, wrap it up, ignore it for many hours, unwrap and cook it for many more hours, slather some sauce on at the last minute and cook it a little more, then chunk it on the table to gasps or admiration.

Okay, so you have to make two sauces, but one only has three ingredients, and you can make the other one in the food processor. It contains your entire yearly recommended allowance for salt and sugar. This is one of those foods where people are just silent while eating it, and you think, “Maybe they don’t like it very much” but then they get up and RUN to the platter and get more. IT’S VERY GOOD. Especially the parts where the caramelized fat has basically turned into pork candy. Pork candy that makes you weep. 

It’s supposed to cook at least six hours in a 300-degree oven, and I put it in way too late, so after a few hours, I moved it to the Instant Pot and cooked it on high for 45 minutes on the rack with a cup of water, then put it back in the oven for ten minutes to finish the sauce crust. You guys, it was PERFECT. Here is when it came out of the IP:

And here is after ten minutes under the broiler (and yes, I could have moved the rack down a few notches):

When you broke through the shiny, charred exterior, the inside was beautifully shredded and incredibly moist and full of intense flavor. I’ll be using the IP for this recipe from now on. 

The pork itself is quite sweet and salty, not spicy, and most of the kids really liked it. The sauce that goes along with it is spicy and savory and strange. A little goes a long way, but you won’t want to miss it. 

Bo ssam is supposed to be wraps, and I forgot to buy any lettuce to wrap it in, but nobody minded — we just ate the shredded pork with rice. You definitely want rice or something else mild to give your mouth a rest from all that intense flavor. 

FRIDAY
Mac and cheese

I used up only about 20% of the vast stores of leftover cheese that are cluttering up the fridge. However, I only made three pounds of macaroni, which is close to what people will actually eat, so maybe I won’t have created vast stores of leftover macaroni and cheese to clutter up the fridge. Maybe.

And now the adoration chapel has finally opened up again, and we signed our vaccinated asses up for a weekly hour on Fridays. I’ll pray for youse!

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One pan honey garlic chicken thighs with fall veg

Adapted from Damn Delicious 

Ingredients

  • 18 chicken thighs
  • 2 lbs broccoli in spears
  • 4-5 lbs potatoes in wedges, skin on if you like
  • 1 butternut squash, peeled and cubed

sauce:

  • 1/3+ cup honey
  • 1/3+ cup brown sugar
  • 3 tbsp dijon or yellow mustard
  • 9 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 tsp oregano
  • 2 tsp dried basil
  • salt and pepper
  • 6 tbsp olive oil
  • olive oil for drizzing

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 400. Prepare the sauce. 

  2. In a large, greased sheet pan, spread the potatoes and squash. Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. 

  3. Lay the chicken thighs on top of the potatoes and squash. Brush the sauce over the chicken skins. 

  4. Roast the chicken for thirty minutes or more until they are almost cooked.

  5. Add the broccoli, arranging it on top of the potatoes and in between the chicken. Return the pan to the oven and let it finish cooking another 10 -20 minutes so you don't die. The skins should be golden and the broccoli should be a little charred. 

What’s for supper? Vol. 263: Cardiologist’s delight

Let’s go! No tears! No tears! Where is your mask! Where are your shoes!!! Here’s what we ate this week, which was BACK-TO-SCHOOL WEEK: 

SATURDAY
Prosciutto sandwiches

Damien handled dinner while I took the kids shopping for school supplies on the absolute last possible day I could get away with it. I don’t remember if I actually ate some hemp gummies beforehand, or just planned to, but I’m here now, so I clearly survived somehow. 

My particular sandwich was a length of baguette with prosciutto, provolone, tomato, olive oil and vinegar, fresh pepper, and a schmear of red pesto. Yum yum. I wish I had one right now. 

Sometimes people ask us, “Simcha, Damien, your household seems to run so smoothly, and your children all seem so capable and well-rounded. What’s the secret to your success?” We always smile and gently explain that it’s simple: We invite our children to help us in the kitchen. This not only teaches them skills they’ll lean on for the rest of their lives, it keeps them invested in the immediate well-being of the family, and shows that their actions in the here and now truly are, in a very real way, who we are as a community. Here, for instance, is a tomato one of the children sliced up for dinner in a very real way:

Nice slicing, jerk. I’ll invest you in a very real way.

SUNDAY
Ape law

Clara and I were at the Green River Festival, as I mentioned.

Those are my migraine sunglasses. I know they look stupid but they’re the only frames that don’t squeeze my head. I had a falafel wrap for lunch from Ahli Baba’s Kabob Shop based in Burlington, VT (fresh and tasty, and the pita was top notch) and some kind of pork dumplings and coconut curry for dinner, but I paid cash so my bank statements aren’t reminding me who that vendor was. I also bought some peaches and cream ice pops from Crooked Stick Pops, and they tasted exactly like peaches and cream, so that was nice. 

I am not sure what the people at home had? Possibly grilled burgers and hot dogs. We call this “ape law,” which just means I’m not there and didn’t make any plans or buy any groceries, which just means Damien usually makes burgers and they watch SpongeBob or something. In order to get a really good Ape Law situation going, you have to be not exhausted, and we are all exhausted. 

MONDAY
BLTs

First day of school for college kids and Catholic high school. We had LEFTOVER BACON after supper, can you imagine? I truly just do not know how much food to buy anymore. 

Benny and Corrie made a back-to-school cake together, very cute.

They accidentally added three times too much water, then bulked it up with flour. They then gave this brand of cake mix low ratings because the texture is fine, but it’s kind of bland. And their mother officially has no opinion about that. 

TUESDAY
Vermonter sandwiches, broccoli, bacon-roasted corn on the cob

Orientation day for elementary and middle school charter school kids. This turned out to be a half day, but I somehow missed that detail, so what could have been a mere 3/4 of a day of driving around like an idiot turned into a full day of driving around like an idiot (because they were two different halves of the day and two different towns, but not the same town we live in). This is what people are referring to when they say some parents are just too lazy to homeschool their own children [skin falls off from sheer exhaustion].

Anyway, Vermonter sandwiches are: Roast chicken breast, bacon, sharp cheddar cheese, green apple, and honey mustard on sourdough or ciabatta. 

A good, hearty sandwich, and you can of course make everything ahead of time. If you rinse the apple slices in lemon or lime juice, they won’t go brown.

I also cut up a bunch of raw broccoli, and then forgot I had done so and thought we still needed a side, so I shucked a bunch of corn. I then got a brilliant if not precisely heart-healthy idea: I put the corn on a giant baking pan and poured a bunch of bacon grease and bits over it and rolled it around, and sprinkled it heavily with salt. I covered it loosely with tin foil and roasted it for several minutes until it was making a little noise. Then I uncovered it and let it brown up a bit, and turned it a bit and browned the other side. 

It was pretty fab! Not monstrously, earth-shatteringly wonderful, but it tasted special and crisp and savory, and it sure was easy. Definitely worth doing if you have bacon fat around, especially if you do not feel like heating up a giant pot of water, which I could go the whole rest of my life without feeling like. 

WEDNESDAY
Mexican beef bowls

First day of public high school and first full day of everyone in everything. I wanted to make a hearty and popular meal, but I bobbled it a little bit. I didn’t buy enough meat, and I cooked it too long, and I forgot to get corn chips or avocados, and I accidentally put basil-flavored tomatoes into the beans instead of chili tomatoes, and I burned the rice a bit. Come to think of it, everyone must have been absolutely starving, because I screwed that up pretty bad! Oh well. 

It’s a great marinade, though,

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and a good meal if you don’t screw it up. So we had rice, beef, corn, sweet peppers, cilantro, sour cream, beans and tomatoes, cheddar cheese, and limes. I didn’t get around to sautéing the peppers. I did use Taijin powder liberally, which always helps.

I cut the corn off the leftover corn on the cob and heated it up in a pan. Hey, I actually burned that, too. You know what, it was a very trying day, but everyone got fed. 

THURSDAY
Omelettes, sausages, cinnamon buns

I didn’t burn a single omelette, and even managed to do a fancy trifold on some of them, but the photos didn’t turn out great, so you’ll have to use your imagination. We just had your choice of cheddar cheese and ham, and the cinnamon buns were from a can. Everyone was happy. 

FRIDAY
Stuffed shells

Benny has been longing for this meal for weeks, but it’s been way too hot and steamy to even consider it, but I have to admit, today it’s chilly and foggy and perfectly fine for stuffed shells. I always think, “Just because school starts, that doesn’t mean we have to stop going to the beach and stuff! We can still have summer fun on weekends for a while!” but it seems like the temperature plummets the very moment the school year begins, and bam, it’s fall. Oh well. At least we have stuffed shells. I guess I have to heat up a big pot of water, though. 

My recipe isn’t spectacular, but it’s serviceable, and has nutmeg. Gonna shave up a ton of fresh parmesan, which makes a big difference, too. 

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Stuffed shells

Just a basic recipe. You can add meat to the sauce or spinach to the cheese, or anything that strikes your fancy. Serves about 10.

Ingredients

  • 2 12-oz boxes jumbo shells
  • 2 32-oz tubs ricotta cheese
  • 8 oz grated parmesan cheese
  • 4 cups shredded mozzarella, divided
  • 4 eggs, beaten
  • 1 Tbsp garlic powder
  • 2 Tbsp dried basil
  • 1 Tbsp salt
  • 1 tsp pepper
  • 1/2 tsp nutmeg
  • 4-5 cups pasta sauce

Instructions

  1. Cook the shells in salted water, drain, and rinse in cool water. Mix them up with a little olive oil so they don't stick together. Or if you will be using them soon, let them stay in the pot of cool water.

  2. Preheat the oven to 350. Mix into the ricotta cheese all the seasoning, the beaten eggs, the parmesan, and 3 of the cups of mozzarella, setting aside the rest of the mozzarella.

  3. Spread a little sauce in the bottom of an oven-proof pan or dish. Spoon a few tablespoons of the cheese filling into each shell and lay the stuffed shells close together.

  4. Top with the rest of the pasta sauce, and sprinkled the remaining mozzarella on top of that. Cover loosely with foil and cook for 45 minutes or longer, until it's bubbly. 

 

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Beef marinade for fajita bowls

enough for 6-7 lbs of beef

Ingredients

  • 1 cup lime juice
  • 1/3 cup Worcestershire sauce
  • 1/2 cup olive oil
  • 1 head garlic, crushed
  • 2 Tbsp cumin
  • 2 Tbsp chili powder
  • 1 Tbsp paprika
  • 2 tsp hot pepper flakes
  • 1 Tbsp salt
  • 2 tsp pepper
  • 1 bunch cilantro, chopped

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients together.

  2. Pour over beef, sliced or unsliced, and marinate several hours. If the meat is sliced, pan fry. If not, cook in a 350 oven, uncovered, for about 40 minutes. I cook the meat in all the marinade and then use the excess as gravy.

What’s for supper? Vol. 260: In which I say tomatermorts

It’s been a while! We’re in a bit of a summer fun frenzy and going on a lot of day trips and side quests, so I’m busy and confused. There are only a few food photos on my phone and lots of zoo, planetarium, concert, birthday, swimming, yard project, and campfire photos (along with flat tire, dumb dog, flooded basement, calamitous kitchen, and ER parking lot photos). We also bought a used ice fishing house and Damien’s converting it into an office. More on that later, you bet.

I’ll just do highlights of the last few weeks’ suppers, to bring us up to speed. And you know, I’m pretty impressed at what yummy meals I made. My secret is that now I have more time and more money. And that’s my secret. 

Here’s what we had:

Buffalo chicken wraps

Another meal-turned salad-turned wrap, like the chicken caesar wrap of last edition. I cooked some frozen buffalo chicken tenders and served them on pita with tomatoes, lettuce, crunchy fried onions, and blue cheese dressing. I think there was also shredded pepper jack cheese. 

Not mind-blowing, but tasty, and a good addition to the rotation. 

Taquitos and cowboy caviar

Aldi’s chicken taquitos are really tasty. They include discernible bits of meat and the flavor is nice, and they get crisp in the oven. Plus they are called “Casa Mamita” which makes me laugh, because you have to say all their food names with a German accent. 

I made a big bowl of what’s apparently called “cowboy caviar,” which is one of those completely unnecessary cultural phenomena, like a Polaris Slingshot, or neufchatel cheese, or the state of Arizona. Cowboy caviar itself is delicious, but I’m talking about that name. They should have named it literally anything else. The zoo has an anteater named “Giacomo,” so that proves we have more freedom than we may realize. 

Anyway, I made it with  . . . well, I didn’t write it down, but squinting at this photo, it looks like tomatoes, avocado, green peppers, scallions, corn, black beans, and red onions. Probably cilantro. I think I made the dressing with white vine vinegar and olive oil, but I honestly don’t recall. There are tons of variations of this dish, so if you mooch around on Google, you’ll get the idea.

I skipped the chips and just had extra cowboy caviar. No ragrets.

I also tried not one but two TikTok recipes. I’m too old to be on actual TikTok, but I found websites that describe what may be found there, without any danger of having to see sassy nurses dancing and pointing to things. I went with the tomato feta pasta bake and the suggested cream cheese sausage balls.

The first was a win. It’s a very easy dish to make. You throw all your vegetables in a pan with a few seasonings and olive oil. As you can see, I added onions and basil. 

Then you chunk some feta and stuff on top and just bake it. People tell me the secret is to use the kind of feta that comes in brine, so it melts well.

It’s done when the tomatoes are squashy and the feta is toasty.

While that’s cooking, you make a big pot of pasta and then throw it all together and mix until the feta is a creamy sauce, and throw some lemon zest in there just for nice. 

I wish I had roasted it just a tiny bit longer to make those tomatoes really piping hot and collapsed, but it was very, very good. Tonys of melty flavor, very filling and pleasant. I might add the basil after cooking next time, so more of the flavor comes through. 

The little meatballs, made of sausage, cream cheese, cheddar cheese, and bisquick, were easy enough to make (although it took a LONG time to get the ingredients blended), and they were fine.

but if something is going to taste, and be, that fatty, it really needs to be magnificent, and these were just fine. (To be fair, I didn’t make the suggested dipping sauce, so maybe that would have made a big difference.)  We only ate half, and I froze the rest so I’ll have a quick meal on hand, but I won’t bother making these again. The feta pasta was a hit, though. Very happy to have a new meatless meal, with tons of variations possible.

Chicken shawarma again!

Well met, old friend.

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I marinated the chicken overnight and just threw the onions on top of the meat before I cooked it. This is the way. 

Served with pita, garlicky yogurt sauce,

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feta, tomatoes, cucumbers, and olives. Still the tastiest low-skill meal around.

Mexican beef bowl

Actually, all the bowls were dirty, so we had Mexican beef plate. This is sounding less and less like an actual recipe, and more like one of those foods that can’t quite bring itself to be specific. I wish I could remember what I saw, but it was something like “chewy munch snacks” and it did not inspire confidence. But anyway, this is an actual recipe and quite a delicious one.

Jump to Recipe

The marinade is simple but excitingly tangy and rich. 

I served the marinated meat strips with rice, fried peppers and onions, a mixture of tomatoes and chili peppers and black beans, slightly charred corn, and cilantro, sour cream, and lime wedges. It was so much food I forgot to eat corn chips, which is saying something. 

Looks like I have one more photo: 
Chicken caprese sandwiches

Grilled sliced chicken on baguettes with tomatoes, fresh basil, and fresh mozzarella, with olive oil and balsamic vinegar and freshly-ground salt and pepper. If your stupid refrigerator freezes your cheese, you can defrost it gently by submerging the sealed package in warm water for a while. The vital part of this dish is the fake Pringles in a violent shade of orange. This is the way. 

***

5 from 2 votes
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Chicken shawarma

Ingredients

  • 8 lbs boned, skinned chicken thighs
  • 4-5 red onions
  • 1.5 cups lemon juice
  • 2 cups olive oil
  • 4 tsp kosher salt
  • 2 Tbs, 2 tsp pepper
  • 2 Tbs, 2 tsp cumin
  • 1 Tbsp red pepper flakes OR Aleppo pepper
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1 entire head garlic, crushed OR bashed into pieces

Instructions

  1. Mix marinade ingredients together, then add chicken. Put in ziplock bag and let marinate several hours or overnight.

  2. Preheat the oven to 425.

  3. Grease a shallow pan. Take the chicken out of the marinade and spread it in a single layer on the pan, and top with the onions (sliced or quartered). If you kept the garlic in larger pieces, fish those out of the marinade and strew them over the chicken. Cook for 45 minutes or more. 

  4. Chop up the chicken a bit, if you like, and finish cooking it so it crisps up a bit more.

  5. Serve chicken and onions with pita bread triangles, cucumbers, tomatoes, assorted olives, feta cheese, fresh parsley, pomegranates or grapes, fried eggplant, and yogurt sauce.

 

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Yogurt sauce

Ingredients

  • 32 oz full fat Greek yogurt
  • 5 cloves garlic, crushed
  • 1/4 cup lemon juice
  • 3 Tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp pepper
  • fresh parsley or dill, chopped (optional)

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients together. Use for spreading on grilled meats, dipping pita or vegetables, etc. 

 

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Beef marinade for fajita bowls

enough for 6-7 lbs of beef

Ingredients

  • 1 cup lime juice
  • 1/3 cup Worcestershire sauce
  • 1/2 cup olive oil
  • 1 head garlic, crushed
  • 2 Tbsp cumin
  • 2 Tbsp chili powder
  • 1 Tbsp paprika
  • 2 tsp hot pepper flakes
  • 1 Tbsp salt
  • 2 tsp pepper
  • 1 bunch cilantro, chopped

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients together.

  2. Pour over beef, sliced or unsliced, and marinate several hours. If the meat is sliced, pan fry. If not, cook in a 350 oven, uncovered, for about 40 minutes. I cook the meat in all the marinade and then use the excess as gravy.

What’s for supper? Vol. 259: Totus Foodus

It’s Totus Tuus week! We haven’t been for a few years, so we were delighted to sign up again for this Catholic day camp. Well, I was delighted. The kids were jerky about it in that very specific way that signals to parents that it’s actually a good thing, but they don’t want you to feel like you’ve done something right. 

The only catch is that the church is 35 minutes away, and we have kids in the day and evening programs, so that makes . . . a lot of driving. That means it’s week for easy peasy meals. Here’s what we had:

SATURDAY
Steak sandwiches, fries, watermelon

Well, this was before camp week started, so Damien grilled some steaks and sliced them up, and we had the meat on toasted rolls with mayo, provolone, and roasted red peppers. Mighty tasty. 

I love sandwiches that look like they’ve been tucked into bed with a blanket of cheese, and also I don’t really understand why all my pants are tight. In this essay I will explain

SUNDAY
Vermonter sandwiches

A favorite cold sandwich, great for prepping ahead of time. I usually use ciabatta rolls, but had sourdough bread this time. Cold chicken, bacon, thick slices of cheddar and green apple, and honey mustard. I took a picture of the fixins

But not the sandwich. Here is a Vermonter of ages past:

Shoutout to everyone who’s recently accused me of journalistic sloppiness, when in fact I’m the kind of person who feels the need to disclose that the sandwich pictured above is a previous sandwich and varies slightly from the current one. 

Anyway. Such a pleasant combination of sweet and savory, and all kinds of textures. 

MONDAY
Chicken caesar wraps

I forget who suggested this on Facebook, but thank you, genius! Really trying to use up leftovers, rather than throw them away. We had chicken left over from the Vermonter sandwiches and from whatever chicken dish we had last week, as well as some freshly-grated parmesan cheese from the pasta on Friday, so I just bought a bunch of pita bread, romaine lettuce, bottled dressing, and cherry tomatoes, and it went very nicely together, very pretty. 

I know tomatoes don’t go on caesar salad, but it was a very good addition to this wrap, which just about everyone liked. It turns out almost no one in the family likes the kind of flatbread they sell around here, but they do like pita. You hear that, pita?

It’s funny, I’ve been making all these salads that are modified versions of full, carbier meals, and now lately I’ve been reverting them back into sandwiches. It’s the circle of salad (ingonyama nengw’ enamabala).

TUESDAY
Burgers, veg and dip

Nothing to report. Lots of vegetable action happening around here lately.

This is the proper amount of ketchup and mustard, by the way. I am a professional and I should know.  

WEDNESDAY
Domino’s pizza

I know it’s not exquisite, but I like Domino’s pizza. I like how pillowy soft it is, and I like the salty, somewhat gritty crust. There is far better pizzas in the world, and I like them too, but Domino’s pleases me. 

Also, Damien discovered that, if you order it online, it’s $12 a pizza, but if you call up the local store, it’s $7. We did the math and it turns out we’re not quite willing to pay $20 for the privilege of not talking to anybody. But there was a struggle. 

THURSDAY
Whatever you want from the fancy part of the supermarket.

Listen, Biden just paid us to be lazy, and I’m not made of stone. On the way home home from camp session one, I turned them loose in the supermarket and we came home with an assortment sushi, pizza rolls, chicken tenders, pizza, and misc.

Then Damien and I both dropped off the older kids at session two and got Chinese food while we sat back and waited for a couple of seminarians to secure our children’s spiritual future. 

This particular restaurant mayyyy be a grandparent restaurant. They don’t give you chopsticks, and everything is sweet, sweet, sweet, and we’re pretty sure the music they were playing was a jazzy synth version of “How can I keep from singing?” for some reason; but the food was hot and delicious and nobody yelled at me. That has been my standard for an excellent experience lately: Did anybody yell at me? No? Then A+. I had some kind of prawn and vegetable thing that was very tasty, and it did not yell at me.

Then we killed some time at a sort of rural Walmart store called Runnings, which featured some unsettling taxidermy and the biggest frying pan I’ve ever seen. You’ll have to imagine it, because I do have a photo, but while we were out yesterday, someone, reportedly “maybe the cat” knelt on my computer and now it doesn’t work. It’s under warranty, and Lena’s graciously letting me use her computer for now. I don’t know any of my own passwords and I don’t know how to do anything and am suffering greatly. Anyway the upshot is that if I have to process one more photo on an unfamiliar laptop, I’m going to have a nervous breakdown. 

FRIDAY
Spaghetti? I don’t know.  Maybe I will just put out all the extra snacks and lunch treats I bought while suffering from inappropriate guilt over making them go to fun camp for five days! How about that! How about that!

What’s for supper? Vol. 258: There’s always enough food. What if there’s not enough food?

I have an overwhelming desire to talk about cheese! Who’s with me?

Here’s what we ate this week:

SATURDAY
Pizza

I took myself by the scruff of the neck and bought a mere four balls of pizza dough, with which to make a paltry four pizzas for our diminished little miniature family of eleven. We just can’t eat six pizzas anymore. There’s so much left over, it’s ridiculous. We are ridiculous with food. 

We had one olive pizza, one pepperoni, one cheese, and one with red and yellow peppers, salami and pepperoni, and fresh mozzarella. Made me want more salami, red pepper, and fresh mozzarella in my life. I would eat that on a sandwich, wouldn’t you?

SUNDAY
July 4th cookout!

We didn’t get to have this party last year because of covid. Cancelling it was especially hard, not just because it’s much-anticipated annual family reunion, but because it was supposed to be the party in lieu of a wake for my dad, which we also couldn’t have because of covid. So, this year, we did it! Almost all my siblings were there, many of their children, and also a dear friend from college that I haven’t seen in something like ten years. It was a wonderful, wonderful day.

Plenty of food, great weather, tons of sparklers and kind of a lot of fireworks, and poppers and glow sticks and tiki torches, temporary patriotic tattoos, candy, a reading of the Declaration of Independence, and everything. 

The only thing approaching a disappointment was that my brother’s dog didn’t like our dog. Our dog was too dumb to realize this, though, so he, at least, was spared the disappointment. I did make frozen ham balls for both of them (you put ham and various dog treats in a bowl or bag of water and freeze it, and licking it it keeps them entertained and cool at outdoor events), but that wasn’t enough to forge a friendship over. 

We do a basic American cookout food, no fancy tricks with fish sauce or shallots or bechamel anything. Hamburgers, hot dogs, brats and sausages, veggie burgers and dogs, and smoked chicken thighs. Damien also made some clams in white wine and lemon juice just for fun, and we had pasta salad, and potato salad, veggies and hummus, chips and dip, and watermelon, and more store brand soda than you could shake a stick at (oh yes, there was Dr. Perky and Mountain Lion), and cheap domestic beer, and dark and stormies. For dessert, we had ice cream cups, chocolate and vanilla pudding cups, and red and blue jello cups with whipped cream. U.S.A!. U.S.A! It was a good, good party. Nobody even got burned or drowned.

I think we ended up with about 4o people. Damien got a bird’s eye view with his drone. You can see the kids lining up to get their sparklers lit.

DCIM100MEDIADJI_0245.JPG

I didn’t get a lot of food photos. The potato salad was potatoes, mayo with cider vinegar and sugar, fresh dill, celery, and salt and pepper. The pasta salad was farfalle, fresh basil and parsley, red onions, artichoke hearts, sun dried tomatoes, roasted red peppers, black olives, olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and salt and pepper and oregano, and fresh parmesan. 

MONDAY
Leftover chicken, hot dogs, and brats, and salads

So, maybe we made too much food. Plenty of leftovers.

Oops, I forgot to share the smoked chicken recipe. Here:
Jump to Recipe

TUESDAY
Leftover burgers, chips

Yep, still plenty of leftovers. 

WEDNESDAY
Chicken caprese sandwiches, watermelon

Hoping to avoid an insurrection, we threw out the rest of the leftovers and had chicken sandwiches with provolone, tomato, and basil on ciabatta rolls.

There was some leftover watermelon, but I craftily cut it into chunks, rather than serving slices.  They weren’t fooled, though, and I had to eat most of it myself. 

THURSDAY
Steak and blueberry salad with lemon feta crisps; cherry pie

Something completely different. Steak was on sale, so Damien made a sugar-salt rub, grilled them and sliced them, and I served the meat on salad greens with blueberries. 

I wanted to try making cheese crisps, which I have heard are very easy. Well, they were easy, but I would not call them crisp in any way. Cheese disks, I guess. Cheese blips. 

It was probably the type of cheese I used. I crumbled some feta cheese and mixed in some shredded mozzarella and the zest of a few lemons, put the mixture in little piles on a sheet pan covered with parchment paper, and baked for 6-7 minutes. I tried 375 and 400, but they really just came out chewy, even after they cooled on a rack for a few hours. The flavor was excellent, though, and really perfect to go with the steak and blueberries. Next time I will try just parmesan and see how that goes. 

We had some guests and I was a tiny bit concerned there wasn’t enough food (even thought there is always always always enough food. There is always too much food), so I decided to make some cherry pies. I was planning a lattice crust, which I usually manage without any trouble, but I was rattled due to trying to make a lattice crust while simultaneously getting embroiled in one of the wildest goose chases I’ve been in in years, involving Facebook marketplace and some wooden pallets, heavy rain, an allegedly disgruntled ex-tenant (not mine), a security camera, LOTS of screenshots, at least two people taking photos of each other’s license plates, and the police force in two different towns; and the kids were playing Dungeons and Dragons very loudly the whole time, which is not to say this was their fault, but it definitely did not help. I may possibly write it up at some point, but the short version is I never did get my pallets. We saw a nice turkey family on the way there, though, and some pretty fawns on the way home. I never got any pie. 

And look! I have a video of Benny showing us how to pit cherries with nothing but a bottle and a chopstick (and a cherry). This must be about a year old, because it’s shortly after Benny’s haircut, but before I painted the kitchen yellow. And it’s cherry season.  

Anyway, I ended up making one pie with a sort of twisted spiral crust

and one rather tacky flower one.

Did I mention I never got any pie? Too embroiled. I hope there is some leftover. (Of course there is some leftover. THERE’S [waves arms like deranged orchestra conductor] ALWAYS ENOUGH FOOD AND THERE’S ALWAYS SOME FOOD LEFT OVER.)

FRIDAY
Marcella Hazan’s tomato sauce and pasta, garlic bread

Marcella Hazan to the rescue. 

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It’s still raining. I believe we’re having another dinner guest. What if there’s not enough food? Maybe I should run out and get more food. I would hate to not have enough food. 

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Smoked chicken thighs with sugar rub

Ingredients

  • 1.5 cups brown sugar
  • .5 cups white sugar
  • 2 Tbsp chili powder
  • 2 Tbsp garlic powder
  • 2 tsp chili pepper flakes
  • salt and pepper
  • 20 chicken thighs

Instructions

  1. Mix dry ingredients together. Rub all over chicken and let marinate until the sugar melts a bit. 

  2. Light the fire, and let it burn down to coals. Shove the coals over to one side and lay the chicken on the grill. Lower the lid and let the chicken smoke for an hour or two until they are fully cooked. 

5 from 1 vote
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Basic pie crust

Ingredients

  • 2-1/2 cups flour
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1-1/2 sticks butter, FROZEN
  • 1/4 cup water, with an ice cube

Instructions

  1. Freeze the butter for at least 20 minutes, then shred it on a box grater. Set aside.

  2. Put the water in a cup and throw an ice cube in it. Set aside.

  3. In a bowl, combine the flour and salt. Then add the shredded butter and combine with a butter knife or your fingers until there are no piles of loose, dry flour. Try not to work it too hard. It's fine if there are still visible nuggets of butter.

  4. Sprinkle the dough ball with a little iced water at a time until the dough starts to become pliable but not sticky. Use the water to incorporate any remaining dry flour.

  5. If you're ready to roll out the dough, flour a surface, place the dough in the middle, flour a rolling pin, and roll it out from the center.

  6. If you're going to use it later, wrap it tightly in plastic wrap. You can keep it in the fridge for several days or in the freezer for several months, if you wrap it with enough layers. Let it return to room temperature before attempting to roll it out!

  7. If the crust is too crumbly, you can add extra water, but make sure it's at room temp. Sometimes perfect dough is crumbly just because it's too cold, so give it time to warm up.

  8. You can easily patch cracked dough by rolling out a patch and attaching it to the cracked part with a little water. Pinch it together.

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Cherry pie filling for TWO pies

Keyword cherries, cherry pie, desserts, fruit desserts, pie

Ingredients

  • 7 cups cherries pitted
  • 2-2/2 cups white sugar
  • 2 tsp almond extract
  • 1/2 cup cornstarch
  • 3 Tbsp butter

Instructions

To pit cherries:

  1. Pull the stem off the cherry and place it, stem-side down, in a bottle with a narrow neck, like a beer bottle. Drive the blunt end of a chopstick down through the cherry, forcing the pit out into the bottle.

To make the filling:

  1. Mix together the pitted cherries, sugar, and cornstarch in a bowl and let it sit for ten minutes or so until they get juicy. 

  2. Stir the almond extract into the cherry mixture and heat in a heavy pot over medium heat. Bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer over medium heat, stirring constantly, for several minutes. Stir in the butter.

  3. Let the mixture cool a bit, then pour into pie shells. 

Recipe Notes

This would also be fine over ice cream. 

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Marcella Hazan's tomato sauce

We made a quadruple recipe of this for twelve people. 

Keyword Marcella Hazan, pasta, spaghetti, tomatoes

Ingredients

  • 28 oz can crushed tomatoes or whole tomatoes, broken up
  • 1 onion peeled and cut in half
  • salt to taste
  • 5 Tbsp butter

Instructions

  1. Put all ingredients in a heavy pot.

  2. Simmer at least 90 minutes. 

  3. Take out the onions.

  4. I'm freaking serious, that's it!

What’s for supper? Vol. 255: I’m in the zarn

I was kind of blah about writing this post today, but as I went through my photos, and gosh, we had some pretty good food this week. We had several meals where leftovers were successfully rolled into the next meal, which is always gratifying. Is it weird that I’m enjoying this food all over again by writing about it? That’s okay.  

SATURDAY
Burgers and chips

Nothing to report, but tasty.

Cooked outside, eaten outside, and you can see I haven’t killed my mother’s day flowers yet. 

SUNDAY
Pulled pork sandwiches, coleslaw

I don’t remember what I put in the slow cooker with the pork. I think some ginger ale and misc spices. I was planning to serve it with bottled sauce, so it really just needed to shred, not taste like anything in particular. I had mine with Carolina-style sauce, red onions, and jalapeños, and it hit the spot. The sweet, citrus-y sauce was great with the sharp onion and spicy jalapeño.

Cole slaw was real simple, just cabbage and carrots with a dressing of mayo, cider vinegar, a little sugar, and pepper. I use half a cabbage and just throw the rest away, which feels terrible, but it’s just bowing to the inevitable. Yes, I know I can compost it. I won’t, though.

MONDAY
Chicken caesar salad with fresh duck egg dressing

I mentioned how much I like duck eggs last week. Well, my friend Roberta brought over some more, and I made some VERY POWERFUL caesar salad dressing with them. Duck egg yolks, fresh garlic, kosher salt, fresh lemon juice, a little mustard, and tons of freshly-grated parmesan, anchovies, and vegetable oil. 

I accidentally bought anchovies wrapped up around capers, but it didn’t seem like the time to be cowardly, so I threw them all in there, along with the fish oil. You are supposed to mix together most of the dressing ingredients and then slowly drip the egg yolk in one drop at a time, but life is short. I just put everything in the food processor. 

Jump to Recipe

I swear, if you put a fuse in this thing, you could blow up a city block.

I roasted up the chicken breasts with some basic seasonings and served it with Romaine lettuce, the dressing, some more shredded parmesan, and something called parmesan crisps, which I guess is fried cheese? They’re pretty good, but they put, like, eight in a bag. I know I’m giving my kids food issues when I say “okay, everybody gets four,” but that’s how it worked out. 

Anyway, the salad was delicious.

Big hit. There was way too much dressing, and I ended up throwing away the extra, because I’m brave enough to eat raw duck egg yolk, but not for more than 48 hours. 

TUESDAY
Roast beef, chimichurri, garlic knots, raw veg, etc.

Now this was a lovely meal. I suddenly remembered about chimichurri, which made me think of roast beef, which made me think of garlic knots, and then it just went from there. 

We ended up with those three elements, plus raw broccoli, raw sugar snap peas, some lovely cheddar left over from Opera Nite, and some crackers, and some feta, and some beautiful dry salami, and of course some last-chance duck egg caesar salad dressing. Everyone loved this meal. I have no idea who ended up with what, but there was something for everyone. 

I made the roast beef by giving it a heavy coating of kosher salt, pepper, and onion powder, and sloshing some red wine over it and cooking it uncovered for maybe 40 minutes in a 375 oven. It came out lovely and rare and juicy. 

The garlic knots were from frozen pizza dough. Chop into 12 pieces, roll into snakes, knot and pinch, and top with butter and garlic salt, and bake at 350 for 11 minutes or so. You can also bake these first and then roll them in melted butter, and maybe some parmesan, but I prefer this less-greasy type.

Oh, the other thing is that my food processor broke. The little tab that activates the motor snapped off, and there is no workaround that didn’t sound like an electric shock to me. So I tried making chimichurri in the blender, which only reminded me that I hate all blenders and think they should be illegal. In my madness, I then tried making chimichurri in the standing mixer with the whisk attachment. I knew it was stupid, but I just had to try. (Do not try this.) So finally I just put it in a bowl and chopped away for a very long time like a peasant. Of course it worked fine. Chopping works.

(I did have some regrets about being the kind of person who doesn’t bother to cut the stems off parsley, though. You can get away with that if you use a food processor! Anyway, my friend Tina is very graciously sending me her extra Cuisinart, and I’m SUPER EXCITED. Oh, the things I will process!

Anyway, if you don’t have chimichurri in your circulation, you really should. It goes on all kinds of foods and makes them taste like a summer day.

Jump to Recipe

The recipe is very adaptable to what kind of herbs you have and how spicy you like it. 

WEDNESDAY
Grilled ham and cheese, pasta salad, leftover broccoli

Damien made the sandwiches. He not only puts mayo outside the sandwiches before frying them in butter, he puts mayo on the inside of the bread, for purposes of having more mayo. Did I mention he’s lost 65 pounds this year? He should write a book.

The pasta salad was nice. I used farfalle, and just threw in the rest of the chimichurri, plus some leftover salami and red onions and feta, and some sun dried tomatoes, and some sea salt. 

It really could have used a little brightening up with wine vinegar, but I was too lazy to open a bottle. 

THURSDAY
Chicken drumsticks, risotto, salad

Bit of a crazy day. I was super distracted, and I have no idea what I did, but the Instant Pot kept beeping and burning and not cooperating, and I kept accidentally eating leftover pasta salad even though it was almost supper time.  The risotto ended up quite creamy and delicious, but I had no idea what I would find when I finally opened the lid. (It’s a good recipe, I was just in another zarn.*)

Jump to Recipe

The drumsticks were uninspired, just salt and pepper and olive oil, roasted on a tray with drainage until they were done. Hey, hot food!

This picture makes me laugh. I couldn’t figure out how to position a lone drumstick so it didn’t look like it was pointing at something. 

FRIDAY
Tuna noodle

At the kids’ request. (For those not in the know, this is a casserole of canned tuna mixed with cream of mushroom soup and egg noodles, topped with crushed corn flakes and potato chips, served with a dressing of ketchup and mayonnaise. If you know, you know.)

I forgot this is the feast day, though: Sacred Heart. I feel like it would be contrary to the spirit of the day by serving meat that happened to be all the meat we have leftover in the fridge, but on the other hand, meat. It’s a struggle. What are you all having? 

*This is a family joke I just remembered. There was some song that went, “It’s so hard to love you / when you’re in another’s arms” and some kid misheard it as “in another zarn,” which they took to mean “not here.” So whenever we saw someone spacing out or mentally absent, that became “in another zarn.” But I think I can truthfully say I was mostly in the zarn this week!

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caesar salad dressing

Ingredients

  • 1 cup vegetable oil
  • 6 cloves garlic, minced
  • 12 anchovy fillets, chopped
  • 1 Tbsp kosher salt
  • 1/2 cup fresh lemon juice (about two large lemons' worth)
  • 1 Tbsp mustard
  • 4 raw egg yolks, beaten
  • 3/4 cup finely grated parmesan

Instructions

  1. Just mix it all together, you coward.

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Chimichurri

Dipping sauce, marinade, you name it

Ingredients

  • 2 cups curly parsley
  • 1 cup Italian parsley
  • 1/4 cup dried oregano (or fresh if you have it)
  • 1 Tbsp red pepper flakes
  • 2 Tbsp minced garlic
  • 1 tsp pepper
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/4 cup red wine vinegar
  • 1 cup olive oil

Instructions

  1. Put all ingredients except olive oil in food processor. Whir until it's blended but a little chunky. 

  2. Slowly pour olive oil in while continuing to blend. 

 

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Instant Pot Risotto

Almost as good as stovetop risotto, and ten billion times easier. Makes about eight cups. 

Ingredients

  • 1 medium onion, diced
  • 4 cloves garlic, minced or crushed
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp ground sage
  • 3 Tbsp olive oil
  • 4 cups rice, raw
  • 6 cups chicken stock
  • 2 cups dry white wine
  • 1/2 cup butter
  • pepper
  • 1.5 cups grated parmesan cheese

Instructions

  1. Turn IP on sautee, add oil, and sautee the onion, garlic, salt, and sage until onions are soft.

  2. Add rice and butter and cook for five minutes or more, stirring constantly, until rice is mostly opaque and butter is melted.

  3. Press "cancel," add the broth and wine, and stir.

  4. Close the top, close valve, set to high pressure for 9 minutes.

  5. Release the pressure and carefully stir in the parmesan cheese and pepper. Add salt if necessary.