We’re having a miserable summer here on the coast so far. Almost all of May, June, & now July have been like the above weather. There’s been one HOT day 88f and maybe a week of sunny days spread out across the last 10 weeks in dribs & drabs
This weather report brought to you by tonight’s dinner:
Roast Chicken, Mashed taters, & something green.
Seriously close to the same near me north of Boston. 99% humididity here. I’ve had a massive headache all day because of this weather.
And like you, have only wanted to make comfort food. Made a big-ass pot of meat sauce yesterday to feed my freezer, and used some of it to make baked ziti for dinner last night (with enough for a couple of work lunches). No green. No crusty roll. No wine. No picture.
Chopped steak N’ eggs for dinner.
The chopped steak was actually a burger I had in the freezer, seasoned with S&P + some Montreal steak seasoning, a couple of fried eggs, some cocktail tomatoes drizzled with EVOO and some frozen fries in lieu of bread. A dollop of HP sauce to add some zing!
Offered by the New York Times as a sheet-pan dinner, I like to make it in a couple of cast iron skillets. I use yogurt instead of mayo with good results. Here with cukes and toms from the summer garden.
Keepin’ it real with my horrendous lack of plating skills.
The sun came out again today. The Pacific Ocean was the most stunning cobalt blue. Dinner was pita stuffed with crumbled falafels, romaine, tomatoes, cucumber, red onion and sweet cherry peppers with creamy garlic dressing. There was wine. Dessert will be jumbo Rainiers.
Freezer purge today. It was 90° outside and the time spent in front of the open door was refreshing, to say the least. Dungeness crab quiche (my favorite Sunset Magazine cookbook recipe) made with frozen crab from this past winter and a frozen pie crust that was probably stashed in there about the same time. Had that with scratch made Caesar salad and dressing with dried out, toasted baguette croutons. Thundershowers came in just as I was about to fire up the oven and cooled things down enough to make the kitchen bearable. Yum, no pictutes, sorry.
BF made dijon chicken and sauteed spinach, and my potato salad (minced shallots, fresh thyme, olive oil, salt & pepper - only he peeled them where i would left the skins on) - delicious, all of it, but especially his spinach - nice and garlicky.
103 this weekend in mt Shasta. Freind is coming up to celebrate my pre birthday
Grilling outside. wearing shorts . On the deck with a great view a bucket full of ice with beers . Of course there will be wine and some vodka shots . Cheers
After a long day, BF and I went to grab a drink at a Houlihan’s which is less than a mile from our house but we never go to. Actually had not been since I was a kid. That will definitely change. They made a great Bombay Sapphire Martini (BF had a Chocolate one) and we got an order of their “Famous Shrooms” appetizer which were hilariously gigantic and really good.
Pic taken after we had eaten two. The size is not given any justice here.
We then had takeout Indian food from a place a bit farther than our usual spot. BF brought it after visiting his family who live near it. The food there is actually light-years ahead of our go-to place, owing to the Indian population in the area. An excellent Chicken Biryani and Tikka Masala, both lethally spicy!
Stir-fry with sliced sirloin petite filets (they were tiny-- there’s actually three here), broccoli, onion, and dried red chilis in a spicy Szechuan sauce. I bought the steak today planning to cook it in cast iron and serve with fries. But then I remembered I had Szechuan sauce that I ordered on the side from the Chinese restaurant the other night and plain basmati rice that went untouched last night from Spice House. So I gave it an Asian spin and figured this would be a chance to use up some ingredients in the fridge. Perfection, though the chilis I added brought the spice levels off the charts.
To those of you experiencing cooler weather I will gladly trade our heat wave for your lower temperatures. It’s been in the high 20s Celsius for a couple of weeks now in Ottawa and I’m done with it.
Last night’s dinner was linguine with roasted red peppers. I will have to work on reducing the portion size of the pasta I eat…
