A Quiche Lorraine(ish) meal.
I used pancetta instead of bacon.
I used a combo of half-and-half and heavy cream.
I added sautéed spinach.
I used store-bought pie crust.
Could have used a pinch more salt, but it was good and will give me some work lunches.
Salad was halved Wegmans red sweeties cherry tomatoes, some English cuke, and halved radishes with Ken’s Italian dressing blended with some freshly minced and air-dried parsley, Aleppo pepper and some honey.
There was wine.
Another convert to my Cult of the Stuffed Squid.
Our pesca buddy’s still not a 100%, so we decided to postpone our dinner with him to some other time.
Much to my delight I found one more package of lemongrass sausages the lovely @Bigley9 procured for us from the SEA market in the fall, and our dinner plans were set for Sssssspicy Sssssssunday: egg-fried rice with TPSTOGAG, two of the sausages, bok choy, red pepper, oyster shrooms, and lots n lots of heat in the form of 6 BE peppers & Vietnamese kumquat hot sauce to keep us warm amidst snow squalls and icy temps. The texture wasn’t as perfect as the last fried rice I made, but the flavors made up for it 
Too keep us cool as cucumbers I also made a smacked cuke salad.
I’m so glad I changed from a cilantro hater to a cilantro lover. I absolutely adore that ish now 
This looks so delicious!
I tried stuffing them with sausage once. It wasn’t as good as the combination I used yesterday, where all the individual flavors reinforced one another.
I think the sausage might be a bit overwhelming.
Tonight’s meal had Germanic flair: smoked brined pork loin (courtesy of my FIL), roasted onions, apples, and yellow potatoes, Austrian Sauerkraut (I add 1 c unsweetened applesauce), butter beans simmered with garlic, fresh sage and thyme, and olive oil, and a refreshing fennel slaw with lemon yogurt dressing. I drizzled some reduced cider over the pork.
The flavors didn’t work, either.
My favorite, pork tenderloin with cranberry sauce sauce. Cauli rice cooked in a splash of chicken broth with celery, onion and golden raisins. Cabbages and carrot slaw, creamy curry dressing and peanuts.
Tonight’s dinner was a Chicken, Cabbage & Vegetable Soup. We’ve been having a bit of a cold snap here; when I delivered a big bowl of hot soup to Neighbor #2 she was delighted. She told me she had been (kind of) cold all day and a bowl of piping hot soup was exactly what she needed, tonight.
I’ve been MIA and not sure when i was last here, but hello and Happy New Year!
There’s not been a ton of actual cooking of late because the BF had a hip replacement surgery and didn’t have much of an appetite (yucky hospital food and a couple nights I brought him food from home), plus the dental issues (poor guy, you’d think he was in his 90s! he’s 2 years younger than me! but we’re slowly working on his myriad of issues) - that was earlier this week, and he’s recovering very well after a bit of a shaky start.
I won’t try catching up, and again, not a lot of our dinners were noteworthy, but here is our NYE dinner (pretty sure I haven’t already posted it)…
I made osso bucco with orange peel, anchovy, and oil-cured olives, ala Serious Eats, and a wonderful gremolata. I used veal and beef shanks - super tender and delicious! But the best was the risotto Milanese, with saffron - i worked on it for almost an hour, and it paid off - I achieved the perfect, creamy texture. We had good wine gifted by one of my attys, and a very nice Frenchy champagne by another.
(If I already posted that, please forgive…)
That weekend, I went to a friend’s wonderfully decadent dinner party before the BF’s surgery, for a braised Sichuan goose dinner and all manner of other lovely Sichuany-themed/flavored things, including homemade dried beef with dipping sauces, and a fabulous take on strange flavor chicken but with turkey instead.
(Not-Sichuany dried apricot pie. A deelite!)
Since then, it’s been a lot of take-out, impromptu salads, snacking on Chex-Mix, etc. (i have quite literally gained 7 lbs since Thanksgiving, and am hopping back onto the salad/tofu train starting this week!)
But tonight, i finally “cooked” - aka, melted some Velveeta cheese into cooked tiny macaroni, diced up some ham and chopped up some canned tomatoes. Had Velveeta in the house (a first!) because the BF expressed an interest in having some and of course has since not touched it, so, mac & cheese with ham and tomato. Never made M&C with Velveeta, nor ham, much less with tomato, but all sounded good and it really was. Steamed broccoli for me with an anchovy/olive oil mix, so i’d eat less M&C. It worked. And yeah, I’ve made fancy M&C before, but Velveeta is just something else…
A friend has a connection a with a local clamming operation and was kind enough to give us some freshly dug clams. Since it was too windy to grill them last night I made a riff on Mr Bean’s favorite dish from a local restaurant.
Clams with tomatoes (usually cherry but I had roasted plum tomatoes from the summer), andouille (from the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia with a nice spicy kick to it), garlic, white wine, cannellini beans, anchovy and tomato pastes, and mint (since I didn’t have any fresh basil). It was very good and I think I will always use mint.
Best wishes to the BF for a speedy recovery!!
Lots of good eats! And 
for a quick recovery for da man!
thanks much!
Thanks!
wow, just seeing this - THIS is LIVING!!
Tuxedo Cat Approval!
