OK, all that darn rain 
some of us have received through April had better produce beautiful flowers, 
the start of our herbs and veggies, 
, kids 
playing outside in (please?) some SUNSHINE! 
Grilling will start up for those of you lucky enough to be able to do so. So what’s cooking?
There’s going to be some absolutely bloody lovely cooking tonight. Only it’ll be a Michlein 2* chef doing it (restaurant is about a hour away).
Tomorrow, it’s back to my main man, Nigel Slater, and a recipe from his Kitchen Diaries 3. A lamb loin is browned in olive oil in a roasting tin. A couple of thick slices of ciabatta then go underneath the meat, along with some rosemary sprigs over and under the meat. A big handful of black olives go in and it gets 15 minutes at 200. The meat then rests and is sliced and mixed with a bog standard supermarket bag of salad leaves, and the olives and everything goes back on top of the bread.
I suspect we’ll need cheese and some more of the bread for “afters”.
That looks great!
lamb-soaked bread?? i’m in.
Salad of All the Things is back…! Lots of cucumber and olives, sunflower seeds, nooch (aka nutritional yeast) and the damned grinder top popped off my seasoning salt so there’s a whole lot of that on the right side. 
Also wanted chickpeas, gave them some TLC with a lot of garlic (paste) cooked in some olive oil and tomato paste with a good pinch of salt and some white pepper, juice of half a lemon at the end and scallions on top. Turned out tasty!
Chicken cordon bleu from frozen (meh) and a slaw made from sugar snap peas, cucumber, carrots, and creamy herb dressing (using some of the lingering ramps currently reeking up my fridge).
Went to chinatown yesterday for a few things, got hungry and had some shrimp dumplings and beef rice rolls with a couple of ladies having tea and a snack of cheung fun too.
Was very excited to find a vietnamese grocery store; bought this coffee maker there to approximate a South Indian filter coffee device (I’ve been using an italian stovetop espresso maker, but it’s aluminum and I wanted steel). Tried it today, love the resulting coffee!
I love finding things that look like other things… like the vietnamese version of my mini idli maker!
Repurposed the last of the Xacuti gravy from last week into egg curry with boiled eggs this evening before an event; weird selection of snacks there.
I want that galette plate! What a treasure hunt.
While rooting through the meat drawer in the freezer I found a small vac bag of tenderloin small cuts aka scraps from a whole tenderloin I cleaned and portioned a couple years ago. No date on the bag and it was compromised with a little air in the bag. Smell okay with just a hint of freezer. Made steak tacos with it, pulling together a few things to add in. Grilled green onions, shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, cilantro and green and red salsa along with some queso blanco. Meat cooked med well for my wife, med rare for me
I feel like we’re re-living the story of The Loaves and Fishes. How many times can spaghetti be repurposed? Last night was our third consecutive spaghetti dinner; made it a baked dish, hoping for some variety. At least two portions still remain!
We have mom and dad here so I am taking full advantage of mom’s cooking expertise. We stopped by our local Market Basket (where I never shop…not my favorite food shopping experience) to grab rotisserie chickens for them and B and a few other odds and ends.
I charged mom with miyuk guk (Korean seaweed soup). We had brown bean-y rice; 2 different kimchee - cucumber that mom made and store-bought radish top; sliced-up rotisserie chicken; 2 types of dumplings - pork and veggie in soy/vinegar/gochugaru dipping sauce; sautéed yu choy in lots of garlic. Homey and delicious.
PS Cards are spring onion’s - he’s become adept at Go Fish.
Old-skool tacos tonight in La Tortilla Factory fluffy flour tortillas. This was my most successful saucy meat yet - half an onion blitzed with several cloves of garlic and sauteed in oo, followed by very lean ground beef whisked in with about a cup of water. Then chili powder, lots of Hungarian paprika, cumin, ground New Mexico chili, Badia Adobo seasoning, and cornstarch slurry until nice and thick. Served up with…everything, including quick-pickled jalapeños and homemade salsa. And leftover sugar snap slaw.
Interesting (food and otherwise) day. “Dinner” was a slow progression of snacks from late afternoon through evening, starting at an art fair preview with one friend, and on to happy hour and sort-of dinner with another.
Ate something new: fava leaves (you know, I had been wondering what other leaves would taste good given pea leaves’ deliciousness) with green garbanzo beans that I thought were out of season (they’re a winter favorite in north India).
Other noshes: a warm mixed-pea salad with peas, snow peas, snap peas, and pea tendrils (meh), porchetta over dressed radicchio with avocado (everything was delicious except the out-of-place avocado), olive oil and orange cake (moist and orange-y, really lovely), fried baby artichokes (semi-inedible), Comte fritters (bad cousin of fried mozzarella… greasy and salty), and finally chicken under a brick with polenta (best bite of the day).
Oof. That’s a lot of food, even spread over several people!
A couple of slices of leftover pizza was dinner. Rainy day, wife cancelled her fiber arts meeting due to the number of accidents on the road and headed home. I got home late from a new gig I’m working. Not working tomorrow so may get ambitious in the kitchen. My wife just called out fish and salad, her standard response to what do you want for dinner tomorrow
Available on Amazon (France too) - here’s what my baby idli maker looks like (identical, but several layers - you can use just one layer, though):
Thanks, they are really selling everything!
Upcoming - a Vietnam-esque prawn salad.
Spring onions, lime juice, nam pla, sugar, bean shoots, cucumber, birdseye chilli, spinach, coriander leaves, mint. Topped with king prawns.
If it looks a little too saintly sparse, I’ll quickly cook and cool some noodles to stir through
My mouth is watering over that taco!
Tonight is a sunny spring meal! Ramps two ways: greens sauteed in bacon grease and the bulb lightly pickled. Softshell crab pan fried over grits. Lastly a beautiful tomato sliced with a touch of pepper.
Hope everyone has a great weekend!
