shitty pic of a very good dinner, at my sister’s last night. Wild sea bass i sauteed in evoo flavored with a mashed garlic clove, burst tomatoes, kalamata olives, thyme, fino sherry, and lemon juice. Also corn on the cob because, summer.
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Putting the Q to werk this summer!
Pork and vegetable brochettes, I had one with meat and one without, saving the other for whenever. Really good house brand tzatziki from Farm Boy on the side, lots of mint and dill, but not enough lemon for my liking, romaine salad with the usual accoutrements, lemon/Dijon vinaigrette.
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My fishmonger had tautog in nice 8 oz. fillets, so I got a couple. Roasted at 425F for 10 minutes over the remaining mushrooms from earlier this weekend and some sage and served with some pearl couscous. I love the meaty texture of this fish!
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Broccoli, pancetta, and caramelized onion quiche with Monterey and Pepper Jack cheeses, using 4 eggs, 2/3 cup heavy cream, and 1/2 cup 1% milk, minced fresh thyme and parsley. Slightly undercooked because the jiggle test gave a false-positive. 
I’ll go back to my knife test.
A tomato and cuke salad with Ken’s Italian dressing with some Penzeys Italian herbs and a pinch of sugar.
There was wine.
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I didn’t forget.
But imo it’s just your standard meatball mix.
1 egg per lb. of ground beef
Minced garlic (that stuff in the jar is so convenient)
Dried basil
Dried oregano
Red pepper flakes
Onion powder
Grated parm which I forgot
Parsley - Fresh if I have it but very rarely, so dried
S & P of course
Italian breadcrumbs and a little water to moisten.
There was Scotch last night.
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Band practice today for the annual arts fest with a substitute drummer. When I showed up at my bassist’s place where I’d moved practice to not stress our monkey boy out unnecessarily, nobody was there yet. Sax player got lost en route, and my keyboarder thought it started an hour later & told the drummer the same 
Nice to get out of the house for a brief distraction, although our kitty seemed a bit more upbeat today.
As for WFD: after last night’s crampiness I thought I’d go easy on our tummies (hopefully!), and made an orzotto-ish dish: toasted about 1/3 cup of orzo in butter, added s&p, then slowly added BTB chicken. A tiny splash of wine from an ancient white wine bottle that was in the fridge from before our trip, i.e. not fit for dranking anymore, but fine for that lil hit of acidity, a squeeze of tomato paste, and a splash of TJ’s creamy tomato soup. Fresh chopped parsley to finish. A little saltier than expected — shoulda taken the saltiness of BTB into account when I seasoned the orzo. Still finished our small bowls. Savory!
I also cut up a couple of Persian cukes and added salt & white wine vinegar, but didn’t have much in case they were the culprit for my cramps yesterday.
Easy Sunday night dinner.
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Thanks)! I’ll have to play around with it when I make my own (eventually!).
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I had plenty of leftover ingredients from last week’s panuozzo, so here we are again (with pleasure).
Served with homemade basil marinara for dipping, and salad greens in vinaigrette.
Lettuces, tomatoes, and basil from the garden.
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Alaskan cod, seasoned with pepper, garlic, paprika, and pan fried, cilantro. Fresh corn, mini bells, onion, pepper, cilantro also pan fried. Mixed greens salad, red onion, tomatoes, avocado, pepper, jalapeno ranch dressing.
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Wow, i must have missed the first version of this, and had never heard of a panuozzo. looks really delicious!
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We enjoyed another outstanding dinner at James on Main, in Hackettstown, NJ, including excellent yellow coconut curry with coral tooth mushroom, toasted pumpkin seeds, roasted Japanese eggplant, and sticky black rice; duck confit spring roll with pickled golden enoki mushroom & seaweed salad, smoked lions’s mane mushroom teriyaki hot sauce; black tiger prawns with green papaya & mango salad, micro cilantro, peanut scallion vinaigrette; Moulard duck- yuzu mandarin glazed breast, black sesame cake, red watercress & confit salad; excellent tilefish with herbed potato puree, broccolini, tomato basil butter sauce; rare seared tuna and avocado with ripe cherry bomb tomatoes, honey gem lettuce, organic cucumber, cilantro & lime; excellent hand cut fries with black garlic aioli. we took home an excellent semolina olive oil cake for dessert. It all went great with a couple of excellent cabernets.
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We made our Bolivian dinner tonight. BF made Huminta - which is usually rather like a corn bread/pudding in tamal form, wrapped in corn husks and steamed. But since the corn in Bolivia has humongous kernels and therefore really big husks compared to our corn, he did the easier casserole version. Fresh raw corn is scraped from the cobs, and blended until it forms a loose paste, with cheese, aji amarillo (a mild yellow chili), sugar, butter or lard, and, notably, anise.
I made Sajta de Pollo (“Sajta” = stew) - a chicken dish claimed by Peru, Bolivia, and Argentina. I saw many different recipes, so finally used elements of most, including the blended peanut sauce (like a watery peanut butter) that is more common in Peru. The dish also called for aji amarillo, as well as cumin, onions, celery, tomatoes, chicken stock, and serrano chilies. The really exotic ingredient it uses is tunta - an Andean potato product similar to chuño - both of which dehydrated by freeze-drying and sun-drying. They’re very dense with a little funk, with tunta being white and chuño being almost black. We both grew up eating both, although chuño more often. My local Mexi-mart happens to sell tunta (they carry a lot of South American products in general).
Both turned out great. Two little problems with the huminta - BF put in more sugar than he probably should have as it’s not normally a super sweet dish, so this turned out more like a dessert. Also, the sugar made the edges burn, but we pulled it just in time before it actually tasted burnt. For all that, it was truly delicious, very moist and tender inside, and i really loved the hint of anise.
As for the stew, I shouldn’t have added the potatoes and the tunta until we plated as they sucked up all the juices. Super flavorful, though, and like most typical Andean meals, sided by rice. Carbalicious! I’d make it again and plate the taters at the end.
BF added our Tiwanaku (an ancient ruins site near Lake Titicaca) totem as a centerpiece.
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I hadn’t heard of it either until @Mr_Happy posted one recently. I’m sure glad he did! It’s a great addition to our pizza rotation.
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What a fun meal!!
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I decided that it was time for the summer’s first lobster fest over this past long holiday weekend, so we made the drive up to Cape Ann Lobstermen in Gloucester, MA. One day I made lobster rolls on New England style hot dog rolls I first grilled in butter. Added a strip of bacon for a surf and turf vibe. Also, when using jarred mayo I definitely want Duke’s.
The next day, I made us lobster fra diavolo on the very mild side to let the seafood flavor shine through. We like this dish with toasted panko and basil “confetti.”
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So summery!
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Sooooo…my frequent MOAR BACON! mentions were influential, I see. 
That lobstah roll looks amazing! I haven’t had lobster in many years - I think it’s just too rich for my system now - but I’d like to try a lobster bisque with maybe a claw in it. Hmmm…might have to ask around where I can buy it for home eating.
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Wegman’s and Hannaford both show lobster tail available (on Instacart, anyway). It’s not the claw, but it would give you a manageable amount and some shell to help infuse a bisque base!
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Hmmm…you’ve given me an addition to my shopping list for either nearby Hannaford OR when I next hit up Wegmans (on the 19th). Thanks!
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Could be! One slice of bacon, thick cut, does the job on that lobster roll. It’s a tasty extra without overwhelming the lobster flavor.
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