What's cooking? part 4

tonight was improvisatory fish tacos with various condiments based on stuff i felt like making. i'm trying to be v. mindful of technique so the highlights of the meal were focusing on getting a nice golden brown sear on my fish pieces and making my own mayonnaise to turn into a creamy chipotle-garlic thing.

Stressful weekend ahead, think I am going to wind down on the lord's afternoon by making carnitas. I got some corn tortillas what are begging to be stuffed with pork.

for our first meal back home from the hospital i made a big salad with goat cheese rolled in crushed toasted pine nuts and baked and topped with crab cakes!

my god

Congrats! Xp

i am gonna make spinach- & ricotta-stuffed shells and pull a brownie and drink a lot of wine imho

damn those carnitas were GOOD
hot sauce
corn tortillas
cilantor
onions
carnitas
joy

I just needed a day where I sat around at home cooking a multi-hour epic meal, drinking wine, listening to all my favorite songs.

flying out tomorrow so eating the very last fridge remnants. Glad to discover that pita bread with goats cheese & fig jam is the best thing ever.

I have never made carnitas! I need to try this.

Tonight I made chicken breasts rolled with asparagus, basil, prosciutto and shaved parm. They were so good! I also made cupcakes bc I borrowed someone's cupcake book and I need to return it but I hadn't made anything, they are too sweet and too dry and I feel like I wasted a ton of time for something meh.

http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/07/no-waste-tacos-de-carnitas-with-salsa-verde-recipe.html

cilantor

This sounds like a magical Mexican / Indian beast.

Tonight I made a salad from white beans that I had in the freezer and a can of really good tuna in olive oil from some seafaring enterprise in Seattle. Those items (including the oil) plus lemon, red wine vinegar, garlic, and flat leaf parsley. So good for ten minutes worth of work.

I just needed a day where I sat around at home cooking a multi-hour epic meal, drinking wine, listening to all my favorite songs.

― Dale, dale, dale (Abbbottt), Saturday, April 28, 2012 10:07 PM (Yesterday)

yes

Made something akin to this on a whim last night:

http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/23413/cheese+and+salmon+bake

(without the baking it bit, tbh). Weather's cold and indoorsy now, so I shall eat all of the bechamels with impunity!

started off with some homemade poppers (jalapenos stuffed with cream cheese and wrapped with bacon, grilled until peppers are soft and bacon crispy, dabbed with bbq sauce at the end); moved on to radishes from the garden steamed in a foil packet with some butter and dill; currently smoking an eggplant for baba ganoush and doing some sweet potatoes in a vaguely harbl style, but on the grill; piece de resistance will be ginormous sirloin in a dry rub served with a dab of some potent cilantro-garlic-red pepper-lime concoction, maybe grilled pineapple if we still have room.

cooking over fire is one of my favorite things; we are in the process of fixing our chimney so that we can do this in the winter:

http://www.firepit-and-grilling-guru.com/hearth-cooking.html

I used to make a cheese, salmon and pasta bake sometimes, hadn't thought of using rice. This is a useful idea since mr spacecadet doesn't eat pasta. Thanks!

omg quincie I love poppers

Mr Veg makes them sometimes <3

they are super delicious--spicy, creamy, crispy, smokey, bacon-y, and a tiny bit sweet from the dab of bbq. One of my favorite foods, actually.

And who am I kidding I also like the purchased-frozen-from-Sysco-and-deep-fried bar versions.

steamed radishes!! What are they like?

I got a bunch of ramps in my CSA share and besides singing the chorus of "Raw Ramp" at them dozens of times, what do you do with them?

Grill them and eat over polenta w/ other veg?

quick sautee, do the stems and then add the leaves later because they get kinda slimy if you cook them too long. i mix them in with other veges because they add such a nice accent and you don't need to use many

The steamed radishes were really good! They mellowed out but still had nice texture, and of course the radish+butter+salt thing is all-time classic.

I made a tomato-based stew out of some leftover grilled vegetables, added some green beans and leeks, tossed in some berbere and cumin (why not?) s/p etc and then ate it over some small pan-fried arepas. could use polenta or mashed root veg or w/e for the base. sometimes i stuff the arepas with a little bit of cheese, but this time i didn't because i didn't have the right kind of cheese.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7048/7150688831_9d0070db59.jpg

oh and a can of garbanzos went in there too

Man, you're good at that stuff. I should keep more vegetables around for that kind of thing.

it was REALLY easy! arepas are super easy to make too, and a bag of masa lasts forever. (make sure you buy masarepa, i like venezolana brand better than goya, not just cornmeal)

the basic stew:

can of diced tomatoes (with juice -- if you really don't have any spices on hand get the "with basil" flavor or whatever and you just need to add salt at the end)
can of garbanzos (drained and rinsed)
whatever else you have that won't get sog, like green beans, onions, bell peppers, whatever

add spices of your choice -- i like it kinda spicy but usually with cumin, rosemary, and cayenne, sometimes berbere for added flavor, curry would work obvs

cook for a while, salt, taste, serve over whatever

I usually have mushrooms in there but I ate them all already.

also this reheats well in a workplace environment -- sent the leftovers to work today, in fact
ok done

can of tomatoes + can of banzos + X veg is one of my faves meals; I eat it like once a week. I keep getting chard in my CSA share so that's usually the veg.

I have cans of chickpeas from someone who was cleaning out her cupboards and I haven't done anything with them because...meh. Maybe it's time to start! I'm going to take your advice re arepas, that seems like something I could make happen.

lol @ can of banzos

arepas -- make like it says on the package with those proportions of salt/water, only add (per my experienced arepa-making student's advice)

* a spoonful of sugar (so small an amt it's not worth skipping, trust me)
* a plotz of earth balance/butter if you desire, not too much

it will all melt together when you add the boiling water to the powder and yield a more delicious product, also less likely to stick to the pan with a little grease already incorporated
also let's face it more delicious

also get yellow and not white

Sound advice. Will pick up next time I'm in Bushwick! There's a new grocery store open at the north end of my street, it's all clean and shiny and carries like everything Latin.

If you have lots of chickpeas to spare, roasted with some cayenne pepper on it makes an amazing snack

BTW my fermented beets came out very pretty, crunchy, sour/tangy, and flavorful, but maybe a bit heavy on the clove and cinnamon. i'll use more ginger and orange next time.

any advice for fermenting daikon? i was thinking of using some beet juice to make them a nice light pink color and then wrap them with pickled ginger, cilantro, lime, lettuce in rice paper spring rolls? dipping in sweet chili sauce? sounds pretty nom to me.
+ tofu?

sorry i said nom
i meant "delicious/tasty/other more acceptable word"

Your tomato chickpea veg concoction resembles something I make probably every two weeks - I always think of it as leftover ratatouille. I can throw in anything but the chickpeas are what makes it for some reason!

I've never made arepas but I have at times served it over polenta!

Same thing, basically. Arepas are just fried/grilled polenta blobs only you get to call them arepas.

They were delicious smothered in my chicken adobo tomato saucey and potato soup.

I found the GOYA yellow masarepa at the first West Indian vegetable market I went into, btw! Score.

Nice! Leftovers?

"Leftover" is a relative term; I usually eat the same thing for about 4 days. I figure I'll get tonight's dinner out of the stew, and I am looking greatly forward to that.

made a stir fry with chicken thighs and some frozen corn and green beans but somehow botched things by putting basmati rice in the rice maker. it was ok, but not the right match.

A few weeks ago I put orzo (pasta) in my rice maker ;_; That was a very sad stir fry.

I think I need a new rice maker, or at least a new rice maker pot. I have no idea wtf I did, but the bottom has scrape marks and I think I ate a batch of rice that had material from the rice maker in it :(

Yeah I am getting a new rice maker I think. I want one with a timer and that will make oatmeal in the morning