This week in the kitchen

Monday/27-Aug-12: Pizza round 2, a loose interpretation of Chicken and Herb White Pizza (CL/oct11), using the store-bought pizza and turkey (still from Thanksgiving!). It was OK. Ed says my homemade pizza crust is tastier, if thicker, more like foccacia really. A bit of Bittersweet Chocolate Pudding for afters.

Tuesday/28-Aug-12: A neighbor brought a bowlful of plums. Made some Plum Amaretto Jam (SmallBatch, p50) and still have a quart or more or mirabelles left. Tomorrow maybe.

Pizza round 3. Ed didn't say "lunchtime" till 15.30, which would have made dinner way too late. So I popped the leftover pizza in the oven and we had that for whatever meal you call it at 16.00. Later we had some fruit.

Wednesday/29-Aug-12: Shopping today, pretty much following the list. Froze up the Vanilla Ice Milk (MC); I'd cut this recipe back by a quarter, but it was still a bit too much for my freezer.

Dinner was a half dose of Zucchini Rice Casserole (web, cookbooker), good but a long time in the cooking (nothing difficult, just time in the oven). Beforehand we had some "toasts" with chive Boursin topped with smoked salmon. Followed by a salad. Then we finished off the Bittersweet Chocolate Pudding.

Thursday/30-Aug-12: Had our main meal at lunch today, a half dose of Cashew Salmon with Apricot Couscous (web), very good. Would be a nice company meal probably. Then a salad. And then chocolate mini Magnums for an easy dessert.

Yogurt on overnight.

Friday/31-Aug-12: After the little bit of rain, the squash plants are blooming like mad. The day turned into a kitchen day somehow.

Roasted another pair of beets from the garden. Made some Marinated Zucchini Sticks (Goldbeck, p67), which turned out to be pretty good, although we really didn't need them in the end. Then made again Chocolate Zucchini Cake (TooMany, p215). Used most of the Chinese cabbage I bought for Mama's Garlic Coleslaw (MC), which is a very nice coleslaw. Then there were Savory Grilled Potatoes (MC), which I did in the toaster oven rather than on the grill. The main was grilled kip filets with Chipotle-Sage Dry Rub (HC); a tasty rub, have a bit in the freezer now. Fridge is full of leftovers too.

Sally came for dinner after visiting Mike in the hospital. He may get out on Sunday after more than a week. Sent her home with some Chocolate Zucchini Cake.

Saturday/1-Sep-12: One of my weekly cleaning tasks is to "deep-clean" three shelves, i.e., all the books off each shelf, dust or vacuum, dust the books and replace them, considering if there are any candidates for recycling. Today I'm back to the beginning! The goal was to go all the way around in a year, but I think it's been a bit quicker, so maybe I need to slow down my pace.

Finished off the Zucchini Rice Casserole and Mama's Garlic Coleslaw for dinner. No dessert since we had Chocolate Zucchini Cake after lunch.

Sunday/2-Sep-12: Sort of ate our main meal at lunch today, two of us split one three-course meal at a vide grenier. In the evening, we had a big salad with some cooked chicken. And some Chocolate Zucchini Cake.

Progress on goals
This week: #1 COOKBOOKS: yes, #2 BREAD: no, #3 SOUP: no, #4 MIDDAY: yes, #5 VEG/FISH: 2
This month: #6 PASTA: yes for Aug, no for Sep

This week in the kitchen

Monday/5-Jul-10: Off to a quiz and dinner in Ambernac tonight. Did a bit of shopping first. Cool weather today, hooray!

Tuesday/6-Jul-10: A bit of Indian this evening. Ground Lamb Cutlets, Parsi Style (IndLight, p107; MC), Potatoes and Peas in a Yoghurt Sauce (TasteIndia, p68), and plain rice. The potatoes were rather soupy; I chopped another potato into the leftovers and will add a bit more water when I cook them.

Somewhere in here, I started making iced tea to drink during the day. My, that's good when it's hot!

Wednesday/7-Jul-10: Made a loaf of Craig Claiborne's banana bread. Good stuff.

Dinner was Zucchini and Chickpea Pancakes (soon to be MC) with a big salad. For the pancakes I buzzed up a sauce with creme fraiche, some mango chutney, and a dab of cayenne. Finished off the store-bought rice puddings (sort of rice kheer), then indulged in some popsicles.

I see I really overbought at the grocery on Monday, in spite of having a "plan." I think I'll need to cook and freeze some things before we go.

Thursday/8-Jul-10: For lunch, it was leftovers, the lamb patties, accompanied by the potatoes and peas over (newly cooked) rice. It's gotten h-o-t, and thunderstorms are forecast for tonight.

Friday/9-Jul-10: Oops, forgot to buy sweet potatoes for today's planned meal and have run out of ginger. Back to the drawing board. Instead I made Roast Chicken Legs with Lemon and Thyme (now MC), collected from EAT-L. It was very good. This was accompanied by Macaroni Salad (Goldbeck, p48; now MC) and sweet corn. Last year I think we had corn-on-the-cob only twice, from the same shipment to the grocery. Since this was the first time we've seen it, and we'll be gone next week, this may be it for the year. It was good.

Saturday/10-Jul-10: Today's task is using up fresh stuff in the fridge by cooking for the freezer. Made an old favorite, Yogurt Carrot Soup, down to adding the yogurt. (This isn't yet in MC, I wonder why?) Shredded zucchini for some bread, after reading that this works great.

Dinner was pasta with a broccoli and goat cheese sauce, along with a big salad. Had the last of our popsicles for dessert. Will buy more juice upon our return

Sunday/11-Jul-10: Off to Prague today.

CookbooksEtc Ingredient Contest 2010

1. 23-May/28-May: strawberries — Balsamic Strawberries with Arugula and Goat Cheese
   
2. 29-May/4-Jun: cheese — Spinach-Stuffed Anchos
   
3. 5-Jun/11-Jun: whole wheat flour — Ned and Crescent's Favorite Multigrain Pancakes
4. 12-Jun/18-Jun: ground pork or pork sausage — Curried Rice Noodles with Ground Meat
5. 19-Jun/25-Jun: blueberries — Tarte Amandine à la Myrtille
6. 26-Jun/2-Jul: salmon — Almond-Crusted Grilled Salmon with Garlic Sauce
7. 3-Jul/9-Jul: potatoes — Potatoes and Peas in a Yoghurt Sauce
8. 10-Jul/16-Jul: elbow macaroni — Macaroni Salad
9. 17-Jul/23-Jul: tomatoes
10. 24-Jul/30-Jul:
11. 31-Jul/6-Aug:
12. 7-Aug/13-Aug:

This week in the kitchen

Monday/15-Feb-10: Sat outside in the afternoon sun to shuck the Moroccan fava beans I impulsively bought on Saturday. I parboiled and peeled them while Cooking Italy's Spinach Soup with Crostini (ClassicItal, p89-90) was cooking for this evening's dinner. Ed read more from Mayle's Bon Appetit while the cooking was going on, and was very skeptical that anyone could taste the difference in salts. I put my open jar of Il de Ré salt on the table and opened the jar of Camargue salt from the pantry. You can indeed taste the difference. Actually, the Camargue salt just tasted salty, while the Il de Ré had a more complex taste. Now I'll have to look for some others to taste.

Tuesday/15-Feb-10: Dinner at the pub quiz tonight. Further, not much action in the kitchen.

Wednesday/17-Feb-10: Made the West Indies Salmon Cakes (now MC) from 28cooks for dinner. Couldn't find canned salmon in the shops here, so I bought 2 cans when we were last in The Netherlands. These have gone back on the list. This was a winner of a recipe. I never like salmon croquettes or patties as a child, but these are really tasty. Froze three for another dinner. They went really well with Carrot and Ginger Quickie Pickle. Served withTurmeric Rice(Q&E, p100) and steamed broccoli. Meant to start some chickpeas soaking for falafel tomorrow night, but discovered I don't have any!

Was pleased to discover in Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian that he doesn't like canola oil. It was not available in The Netherlands, so I've only recently tried it. And don't like the taste. What's this stuff good for? I'd thought to use it as a neutral oil, finishing the first bottle and the backup on the shelf, but I won't buy it again. I'll stick with peanut and corn oils when I need neutral, thank you.

Thursday/18-Feb-10: Went to the market today and it was actually there. Got the usual sort of stuff plus some filets of rascasse/scorpionfish for tonight's dinner. Rascasse is apparently the most important fish in bouillabaise. At the butcher, I got a chuck steak (marcreuse) for the next Cooking Italy assignment.

For dinner we had Baked Fish with Shrimp (MC 2BTried) with the rascasse, which turned out to be quite boney. I used some medium shrimp, cut in half, and some small scallops for the topping. Probably less topping and the smaller shrimp would be better. Also, a dab of white wine in the white sauce topping might be nice. Served with the rest of the haricots verts and some pasta.

Friday/19-Feb-10: Today we had our late Valentine's Da y lunch at Le Roc du Boeuf near Chabanais, a very nice meal and restaurant. After lunch we shopped in St. Junien so we could get some of our favorite trio rice, which seems no longer to be available in the Charente. Also bought some eau de vie to make limoncello and some wine for the Coooking Italy pot roast. Strange that there is no Italian wine available here. There is a bit of German wine (Alsace and Riesling), but nothing Italian.

Neither of us feeling especially hungry near dinnertime, we made a plate with apples, carrots, radishes, tomatoes (for me), tuna rillettes on toasts topped with the carrot-ginger pickle. Good munchies.

Saturday/20-Feb-10: Felt like having falafels recently, so I made them today. Followed Bittman's recipe (H2CEV, p625). They were tasty, but most of them fell apart, so we've got several cups of falafel crumbs to use for something. Not sure what went wrong. Maybe I didn't grind it all finely enough? Disappointing. Accompanied by tahini sauce (Goldbeck, p200) and Fava Bean Hummus (MC) and Cream Cheese and Cucumber Salad (Michoteta) (Roden, p65). This salad is an old favorite which I've neglected for a long time.

Sunday/21-Feb-10: Mad the Beaujolais Buttermilk Coffee Cake again, prior to making the Cooking Italy pot roast. Since my replacement Pyrex dish won't arrive till next month, I made this in a bundt pan, putting the topping on the bottom. But the cake didn't want to turn out of the pan, so we're just cutting our slices directly from the pan. A very tasty cake.

Twas a Cooking Italy dinner tonight. We had Pot Roast of Beef Braised in Amarone (ClassicItal, p393), Mashed Potatoes with Milk and Parmesan, Bolognese Style (ClassicItal, p518), and some steamed broccoli. The mashed pots were a lot of foofaraw for nothing particularly special. Would be better to follow my normal smash potato procedure and add a bit of grated Parmesan while mashing away. And no nutmeg. What a chunk of beef that was! We had dinner. I froze up the same amount (slices and a bit of sauce) for a repeat. Plus more meat and sauce for beef pot pie. Plus almost 8 ounces of beef bits for who knows what.