This week in the kitchen

Monday/26-Feb-18: Our meal, rather later than intended, was Calamari Soup (SlowItal, p42; cookbooker). I used up some quite old squid from the freezer, but it was delicious. Not sure why a crockpot is necessary though. And some rice pudding for dessert, with a sprinkle of cinnamon.

Yogurt on overnight.

Tuesday/27-Feb-18: Shopping today because tomorrow is cooking day.

Oops, there was no salmon that I needed to make one last meal from SlowItal. I hadn't come prepared with a backup meal, so I jiggled the meal plan on the run and we'll skip a fish dinner this week.

Our dinner was Pasta with Tuna and Capers in White Wine Sauce (web). We thought this was quite good for canned tuna. Mine was water-packed rather than oil-packed, since I generally don't like the oil kind. I didn't add extra salt at any point. Then a salad. Then more rice pudding, with a slog of crème de cacao this time.

Wednesday/28-Feb-18: Ha, my sore side turns out to be two cracked ribs rather than a pulled muscle.

Leftover Calamari Soup for dinner. Still good it was.

Cookbook: I'd meant to do tajine meals for next month's cookbook, but tomorrow we're participating in a Greek-themed meal, so I think it will be O&C instead. This was on my short list, so here go.

Thursday/1-Mar-18: A Greek-themed meal at Cath's this evening. I brought meze-like things. The easiest was a can of dolmades. Eggplant Salad Country-Style (O&C, p33; cookbooker) was yummy and embarrassingly easy to make.  I chose Radish Salad with Pickled Onions and Feta Cheese (O&C, p201; cookbooker) because it seemed such an odd combination. The Pickled Red Onions (O&C, p75; cookbooker) were surprisingly yummy with the radishes and feta.  I need to compare this recipe with the one I've extracted from another recipe and made a few times. Cath's delicious main was Stuffed Chicken with Spinach (web). Rosemary brought two desserts, a delicious fruit salad and yogurt with honey, walnuts, and cinnamon. Sorry I forgot to take a camera.

Yogurt on overnight.

Friday/2-Mar-18: Our meal was Broccoli Cornmeal Cakes (BH&G; web). (The web version shows honey, which isn't in the magazine clipping and wasn't at all necessary.) I used pyramid cheese for the goat cheese. One recipe made 18 pancakes; we'll have 2 meals of pancakes. Good stuff. Used most of 500g of broccoli. Save some florets for the pizza to come.

Saturday/3-Mar-18: Our meal was a half dose of Tagliatelles au Bleu et aux Noix (VPG, web). This was pretty good. I used fettuccine since the tagliatelle I expected to find in the freezer weren't there. We thought there were slightly too many walnuts, but can't complain too much about that. Then a salad using up the radishes from Thursday. Then a bit of reblochon.

Sunday/4-Mar-18: Pizza for dinner, using up odd bits from the fridge. On the bottom there was leftover pyramid cheese mixed with a bit of sambal. Then some pizza sauce from the freezer. Then grilled zucchini, broccoli, and cauliflower. Sprinkled with black olives, sliced red onions, and capers. Topped with grated mozzarella grated grano padano, and slices of St Maure goat cheese. Yummy it was.

Yogurt on overnight.

Progress on goals
This week: #1 BACKLOG: no; #2 VEG/FISH: 5; #3 COOKBOOK: yes for February, yes for March
Cookbooks of the month: SlowItal for February, O&C for March
This month: #4 PASTA: yes for February, no for March; #5 BREAD: no for February, no for March; #6 GUESTS: yes for February, no for March

This week in the kitchen

Monday/19-Feb-18: Leftover meatloaf (yummy) for our meal, with boiled buttered potatoes and steamed broccoli. An old-fashioned and satisfying meal.

Tuesday/20-Feb-18: Our meal was Tagliatelle with Prosciutto and Peas for Two (web). Easy and very good.

Wednesday/21-Feb-18: Shopping today. We had Gruyère Cracker-Crusted Haddock (Ainsley2, p47), a halfish recipe with haddock/eglefin. We both took a bite and said, Hmm, this could do with a bit of lemon. And, yes, a good squeeze of lemon, brought this from ho-hum to quite tasty. Served with Sweet Potato and Coriander Mash (Ainsley2, p116), which was pretty good. Chopped coriander is tossed in with the sweet potatoes at the last minute, just before draining them; then all is mashed with crème fraîche. Then a salad. Then some store-bought desserts, vanille semoule au lait. We ate well.

Thursday/22-Feb-18: Defrosted the meatballs from Asian Spaghetti and Chicken Meatballs (web) and remade the rest of the recipe. These meatballs are delicious and need to be made in bulk. For dessert, part of a prune tart that I bought on sale yesterday.

Friday/23-Feb-18: Fresh pasta today, served with Cauliflower with Prosciutto and Olives (SlowItal, p182; cookbooker). (Fresh home-made pasta is awfully good. Fresh from the grocery is not nearly as good.) A little odd to me to cook cauliflower like this in the crockpot, but it worked quite well. Then a big salad. We were full.

Saturday/24-Feb-18: Went to make a lamb dish for our meal, but found the lamb hadn't defrosted yet. Instead we had the meal for tomorrow's plan, Bahama Mama Shrimp Flambe (EAT-L, unable to find on the web). Served over long-grained brown rice, with some broiled zucchini chunks that had been tossed with a Trinidadian spice mix from the cupboard and a dab of olive oil. Some ice cream bars for dessert.

Sunday/25-Feb-18: Made some Rice Pudding (MC) to help use up our excess of milk.

Our meal was Greek-Style Lamb Parcels en Papillote (Ainsley2, p93; cookbooker). This was yummy; it's a shame that the meat was overcooked. As suggested, served with Mama's Greek Butter-Bean Salad (Ainsley2, p112). Butter beans are apparently lima beans. Yuck. I used muguets from a jar. (Haven't discovered an English name for these; they look like cannellini on steroids.) Anyhow, that was a super salad; it would be good as a main-dish salad, or to take to an event. (I've enjoyed this Ainsley Harriott book so much I've ordered the first one.)

Progress on goals
This week: #1 BACKLOG: no; #2 VEG/FISH: 2 #3 COOKBOOK: yes
Cookbooks of the month: SlowItal
This month: #4 PASTA: yes; #5 BREAD: no; #6 GUESTS: yes

This week in the kitchen

Monday/12-Feb-18: Suppose we're both feeling a bit better, but still low on energy and coughing a bit. Sigh.

Our meal was Spicy Roasted Broccoli Pasta (web). Having a bit of cauliflower to use up, I used half cauli and half broccoli. This was yummy, a nice small change for my usual sort of broccoli pasta. Then we finished all the torte that Cath left for us, so we are quite stuffed.

Tuesday/13-Feb-18: I had to be at BookChatters at 10am this morning, earlier than I've been up in the last few weeks.

Our main course was Easy Shredded Harrisa [sic] Chicken (web). This seemed like a good idea, but didn't work as well as expected. First, I thought I'd try the pressure cooker version, to save time. That didn't work at all. There's was one cup of harissa, but that apparently doesn't count as liquid, so the pot started burning. Luckily I opened it before things got too bad, and I finished the chicken by simmering it slowly. And the store-bought harissa I got was horribly salty. Yuck. Served with brown rice and Tzatziki (loosely based on web). And some zucchini. I cut up two zukes and tossed them with olive oil and a Moroccan spice mix. Spread them on tin foil on the broiler pan, and broiled for just over ten minutes. Quite nice they were. And a mini Häagen-Dazs for dessert.

Yogurt on overnight.

Wednesday/14-Feb-18: Valentine's lunch out today. Nothing happened in the kitchen. Shopped afterwards at Intermarché rather than Leclerc. They had nothing of the stuff on sale that I wanted, but I did find the "deseeded" tomatoes that Ed seems to be ok with. Bought six of them. And when Ed went to get eggs, he found 8-packs of large eggs. Usually we get 6 or 10 or sometimes 12; first time we've seen 8.

Thursday/15-Feb-18: We discovered this morning that of the last batch of yogurt I made, only three of the seven pots set up properly; the others are quite liquid. Not sure what happened. Testing the yogurt maker now, to see if the temperature is the same for all of the pots. If so, what else could be wrong?

Our meal was Bangladeshi Fish Curry (MJ@Home, p58), which was so-so. Served with Karhai Broccoli (MJ@Home, p148), an old favorite now, and Bangladeshi Red Lentils (MJ@Home, p195). This was good, but something a bit sweet wasn't appealing—maybe the onions cooked long and slow. Not my most successful meal.

Put the stew for tomorrow in the crockpot.

Friday/16-Feb-18: Our meal was a half dose of Peppery Beef Stew (SlowItal, p143), cooked overnight. As suggested, served with Tuscan-Style Beans (SlowItal, p193). Since I have only one crockpot, I cooked these on the stove. Both were good.

Guests this month? Does Cath still count as a guest? Or should it be someone new?

Yogurt on overnight. Don't understand what the problem was with the last batch. It almost seems as if it turned off while it was brewing, but it doesn't seem like there was an electric break since Mini, stove, and phones were all happy. We shall see.

Saturday/17-Feb-18: The overnight yogurt is fine. Still a puzzle what happened to the last batch.

Dinner was Curried Red Lentil Zucchini Soup (web). Yummy stuff. It was supposed to serve four, but the two of us ate it all.

Made up a half dose of Tomato and Red Wine Sauce (SlowItal, p52), doing it all on the stovetop.

Sunday/18-Feb-18: Why is meatloaf from the crockpot better than meatloaf from the oven? Tonight we had a halfish recipe of "Big Meatball" Meatloaf (SlowItal, p154). I used gruyère rather than romano because I had some to use up. The meatloaf was still good. Served with spaetzle and peas-and-carrots. All good.

Progress on goals
This week: #1 BACKLOG: no; #2 VEG/FISH: 3; #3 COOKBOOK: yes
Cookbooks of the month: SlowItal
This month: #4 PASTA: no; #5 BREAD: no; #6 GUESTS: yes

This week in the kitchen

Monday/5-Feb-18: Using up the second half of a butternut squash, our meal was Butternut Squash Soup (SlowItal, p19). Since I've got an old crockpot with lower temperatures and I'm sure this book is meant for the newer, hotter cooking ones, I cooked the soup about 4 hours on High (rather than Low). Then zapped with my immersion blender and served with croutons from the freezer. Pretty good stuff.

Served with a salad made from two of the mini-romaines I bought last week, topped with the remaining Cauli Thai Salad from last week. That worked really well, we thought, a nice spicy salad.

Yogurt on overnight.

Tuesday/6-Feb-18: Leftover broccoli gratin for dinner. Made some Easy Berry Cobbler (HandyBook) with frozen blueberries for dessert. Topped with crème anglaise I bought for something last week and then didn't use.

Wednesday/7-Feb-18: We dragged ourselves off shopping today. Leclerc had half cabbages for sale today. I bought one to give them some encouragement.

For our meal, we had Baked Honey Sriracha Lime Salmon (web), which was easy and yummy. Served with basmati rice and Spicy Stir-Fried Cabbage (web). Mini ice cream bars for dessert. We ate well.

Thursday/8-Feb-18: We had our meal late today. It was a half recipe of Garlicky Shrimp Pasta (web). Good stuff it was—lots of garlic to help fend off whatever bug has us both down. Then a bit salad. Then the rest of the Blueberry Cobbler with crème anglaise.

Yogurt on overnight, with a new starter since the last batches have had an odd cottage cheese-y-ness on the top.

Friday/9-Feb-18: Today we had Smoky Pork Tenderloin with Roasted Sweet Potatoes (web). The meat was yummy (the two of us ate what was supposed to serve four), but the sauce for the sweet potatoes was too sweet even though I reduced the sugar substantially. Served with Roasted Zucchini (web), which was good, but the Italian spice didn't really go with the pork. Of course the spices can be changed. I'll try to keep this in mind when a zucchini side dish is needed. For dessert we had 2-1/2 chocolate truffles each.

Saturday/10-Feb-18: Our meal was Rice with Black Pepper Sauce (Savory, p253), very tasty, easy, and fast. Served with a salad. Then used some of the smashed bananas from the freezer to make Best Banana Bread (HandyBook).

Sunday/11-Feb-18: Cath came for a meal today. I'd already planned the meal, so she just joined in, bringing a yummy dessert.

We started with Roasted Eggplant with Peppers and Cucumber (ClassicItal, p55), a tried-and-true salad. For our main, there was Spiced Beef Stew (SlowItal, p146) served over polenta. This was good, not spicy-hot, but spicy with cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg. It's really the kind of thing you'd do with venison, but it's good with beef also. And cheaper. Forgot to take a picture.

Cath's dessert was Italian Sultana and Ricotta Torte (web)

Progress on goals
This week: #1 BACKLOG: no; #2 VEG/FISH: 5; #3 COOKBOOK: yes
Cookbooks of the month: SlowItal
This month: #4 PASTA: no; #5 BREAD: no; #6 GUESTS: yes
SaveSave
SaveSave