I bought ground beef and BISO chicken thighs at Hannaford yesterday. I didn’t need either. Someone please stop me from buying stuff on sale! My downstairs freezers are full to the brim!
So something had to be used today. Decided to go with a Cottage Pie since I had some leftover sour creamy mashed potatoes in the freezer from Thanksgiving as a topping
Patterned after the recipe at the link below, I used some leftover pork gravy from last weekend’s roast with some beef stock, added frozen corn with the peas, omitted the celery, and used a very light sprinkle of grated Parm-Reg instead of cheddar.
I made Mexican-ish stuffed zucchini and tomatoes, which we brought over a friends’ house for dinner. Turned out well and a good use of the seasoned brown rice that didn’t make it to the table last meal.
Cilantro-poached sole over a garlic rice pilaf (both recipes from COTMs Mexican Everyday and More Mexican Everyday by Rick Bayless). Also, a salad with a cider vinegar vinaigrette to help cut the richness of the sauce on the fish. The fish recipe is delightful; rice was fine.
Finally making good on one of my goals: cooking a dish from my NYT recipe box that I haven’t made before. It’s mostly chicken or pasta dishes, like in cattle class on the plane , but the roasted salmon with miso cream sauce appealed.
Went to the local fishmonger, who does a 50% off frozen fish every first Sunday of the month & scored Arctic char, steelhead trout & halibut filets.
Thawed the char for tonight’s meal, and had stir-fried broc on the side. I probably made too much sauce (the recipe calls for almost 3 lbs of salmon, and this was a 1.25 lbs total, but it was a nice change of pace.
Maine mussels with white wine/butter/garlic/shallot/crushed red pepper/parsley. Toasted baguette with olive oil and garlic rubbed over it. Salad (not pictured).
dinner last night at my sister’s. i marinated lamb lollipops in garlic/lemon juice/mashed anchovy, rosemary & thyme all day, my sister made fresh pasta, and i made cacio e pepe. the cacio e pepe wasn’t the best, i used the full ingredients on about half the pasta, so a little too oily. the chops were CHEF’S KISS TJ’s delicious baby cauli on the side with pecorino romano.
Chicken Cordon Bleu (filled with prosciutto and gruyere) topped with a parmesan cream sauce with sautéed mushrooms. Some of you might be wondering why the cream sauce is unexpectedly orange. The recipe I followed for the cream sauce called for a cube of chicken bouillon, and all I had around was “Consomate”, a tomato and chicken version. It still worked.
A simple shrimp-and-grits, using locally-caught crustaceans from the freezer, and DH’s home-smoked Kurobuta pork belly. Scallions and lemon juice for the finish.
Mushroom stroganoff. I love this. But I made it wrong. I should’ve seared the mushrooms in a dry pan so they give up their liquid, and then added the butter and onions. Sometimes I remember to do this, but not this time.
and tonight’s repast: i made a teeny (barely 2 lb.) pork shoulder roast, studded with garlic and rubbed with fennel pollen (out of actual fennel!) and red chili flakes, low and slow - 250 degrees for about 3 hours. Rancho Gordo’s alubia blancas in the Instant Pot with just salt & bay leaves for flavoring, a whole mess of broccoli rabe that melted down to nothing, and a roasted delicata squash. The whole reason for making the pork was to have a pork & broccoli rabe sandwich tomorrow with provolone for bfast. i can’t wait.
Simplified cassoulet (without duck confit) - dried cannellini beans, pork shoulder, sausage, tomatoes, tomato paste, garlic, white wine, chicken broth (flavored with salt pork, celery, thyme and bay leaf) and topped with fresh bread crumbs and parsley
A friend of a friend gave our friend several dozen locally harvested middle-neck clams. - which means we got a couple of dozen. We had the first dozen on the half shell on Saturday and decided to cook the rest for Sunday. Mr Bean was responsible for picking the method. He found a recipe for Clams in Spicy Clam Broth with Garlic Mayo from Bon Appetite that caught his fancy. He recently made a HUGE batch of garlic sauce/Toum and this recipe seemed like a good way to combine it with the clams.
The base of the clam broth included garlic, shallots, tomato paste, cherry tomatoes, white wine, hot peppers and more butter than I usually use in a recipe. The clams where lightly steamed in the broth. Delicious. Served with the toum and garlic bread (also made with the toum).
The parathas were stuffed with an interesting mixture: sautéed, spiced Malai (cream) that’s collected from the top of milk everyday (and usually cultured and then turned into ghee). The texture is like crumbled paneer, but it’s a lot richer.
My favorite frozen pizza, speaking of race to the bottom, is the Celeste personals. Sadly I really can’t find them anywhere anymore. They were so bad, they were good. And I’m not sure they taste a thing like pizza - they are their own category of food.
My downstairs freezers are full to the brim!
, but the roasted salmon with miso cream sauce appealed.
