Pat

Last night I made an old stand-by, chili beans and mac casserole. It's from the 9x13 cookbook*, all recipes made in that size pan. In an effort not to make way too much food, lately I've been ending up not making enough to have leftovers around for my husband's lunch, etc. This makes a bountiful amount of food. We had it with a salad of escarole, tomatoes, and lettuce with ranch dressing. *The book is a fairly small paperback and the binding is barely holding on after all these years. I've always found it good to use for pot lucks, etc. These are the ingredients. Technique is pretty straightforward. Bake at 350 for 1 hour, though I did it at a higher temperature for a somewhat shorter time yesterday. It has to cook long enough for the macaroni to cook in the liquid. 2 tablespoons vegetable oil 2 onions -- chopped 1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef -- or turkey 1 tablespoon chili powder -- or to taste 1 1/2 cups sharp cheddar cheese -- grated 2 28 oz. cans kidney beans -- undrained 1 28 oz. can crushed tomatoes 1 1/2 cups olives -- pitted 3/4 cup elbow macaroni -- uncooked 1/2 cup sharp cheddar cheese -- grated

We have those too sometimes. That's when I realize why restaurants add that curly parsley garnish to plates (or used to; it seems not to be so common any more). I try to find any reasonable green herb to mince and sprinkle over the plate. If I have any, sometimes I'll halve a cherry tomato or two to set alongside the beige food. Last night was actually rather beige, come to think of it . I fried up some mushroom and sauerkraut pierogies I'd bought at Stachowski's a couple months ago and had stashed in the freezer. We had them with caramelized onions and sauteed enoki and sliced button mushrooms. This used a lot of butter all around. I balanced things somewhat with braised rainbow chard and green curly kale to accompany.

Will have to try that ⬆️ salad. I've got some leftover rotisserie chicken in the freezer. It reminds me a bit of the chicken ranch pasta salad with avocado and bacon I made from her site recently, and rotisserie chicken worked great. Speaking of her site, we had salmon with creamed spinach and mashed potatoes last night. I combined 2 recipes from Half-Baked Harvest, as she tends to reissue variations on the same essential recipe over time. I included both the cream cheese and pepper flakes from this one and the thyme, dill, green onions, salsa verde, and sun-dried tomatoes from this, so it was spicy. I used heavy cream, lemon juice and zest as well. The last bit of the cream went into the mashed potatoes as did some excess dill and green onion tops. It looked beautiful plated.

Last night was patty melts, french fries, and salad. I bought ground beef on sale that was 80/20. I usually go somewhat lower fat, so the patties were a bit greasy. I should stick to using that for cooking up ground beef for something where it gets well -drained and use the better stuff for burgers.

So sorry to read this. I always learned from his posts.

A while back I had bought a small boneless leg of lamb at TJ's that I intended for Easter. I was eyeing a recipe from a Greek cookbook* I've had for years and don't think I've ever cooked from. When I went to get started, I realized that the 2 hours I'd set aside were not going to be anywhere near enough time given how slowly the prep would go. Instead, for Easter we had this chicken pasta salad, which was excellent and made a ton of food for leftovers. A couple of days later, I set aside lots of time to make the lamb recipe (Roast Lamb from Rhodes), and...we still ate dinner late 🙃. The recipe struck me as a cross between dolma and kleftiko, as the lamb is first wrapped in lettuce leaves and then in parchment or foil parcels. Thin slices of tomato and onion go on top of the lamb before wrapping. The recipe called for either romaine or red leaf lettuce. I had both and used most of two heads of lettuce. (Each bundle uses 4 or 5 leaves.) Having made dolma and stuffed cabbage in the past, I should have thought to cut the out the thickest part of the stems of the leaves. It was hard to roll the lettuce bundles with those intact. Otherwise this came out well, time issues notwithstanding. After an hour roasting, the foil is cut open and feta is crumbled over the lamb inside for the remaining oven time. We had these with asparagus and garlic naan. There were quite a few leftover, so last night I reheated them in a Staub cocotte. I put a layer of drained and rinsed Great Northern beans on the bottom and nestled in the lamb bundles. I halved several cocktail tomatoes and scattered over the top. Then I poured over some canned tomato juice and white wine over it all and heated until everything was nice and warm and the tomatoes were breaking down. This was a great use of the extras and I think we liked it even more than the original. We served this straight from the pot at the table, accompanied by more garlic naan and a salad. For the salad: The remaining romaine and red lettuces, cucumber, radishes, and tomatoes, with crumbled feta and marcona almonds to top. The dressing was the last of the ranch made for the chicken pasta salad. (I only used about 2/3 of the dressing on the pasta salad.) *The cookbook is Regional Greek Cooking by Dean and Catherine Karayanis.

Last night was fish-centered. I made small pumpernickel canapes topped with cream cheese, smoked salmon, red onion and dill. I forgot capers. We also had a baked halibut fillet with lemon and tarragon and a mix of buttered peas and carrots with dill. The plates were very bright-looking.

I haven't been cooking much either. Last night I had a chicken recipe in mind. I knew my package was less than the amount but was going to scale down the recipe. When I opened the package, I found 3 skinless boneless breasts all of completely different sizes and thicknesses. That wasn't going to work for the recipe, so I sliced the chicken into strips of as close to the same size as I could and dredged in a mixture of seasoned flour and a little cornstarch. Then I cooked them in batches in the air fryer. I simmered asparagus (which was to be part of the sheet pan recipe) until crisp-tender and put that on a sheet pan next to the cooked chicken strips. I seasoned the asparagus with salt and pepper and drizzled with a little evoo and balsamic vinegar. I topped the chicken with some pizza sauce that was in the fridge and then with some fresh basil leaves, shredded mozzarella and a few discs of fresh mozzarella. The pan went under the broiler while I cooked angel hair pasta I had hanging around in a tall jar, a mix of regular and whole wheat. For serving I tossed the pasta with some torn fresh basil, the very last of the sauce, and grated Parmesan. I also put some grated Parmesan over top of the chicken to serve. Good meal but it took a while longer than I had allocated for the original recipe. Saturday night was a salmon fillet I marinated in sesame soy dressing and baked. We had that with white rice and sauteed then braised curly kale.

I had made some spicy baked sweet potato wedges for one of the meals I don't seem to have written about. We had them leftover last night, along with rotisserie chicken and smoked salmon dill crostini. The base of each crostini was a thin layer of whipped cream cheese. There was a sauce for the potatoes, a crema with lime juice, and I drizzled a little of that on top of each crostini before serving. We also had some marinated gigande beans alongside the crostini. This was a simple, mostly no-cook meal.

I originally had different plans for the ground turkey I had in the refrigerator, but I mixed up its use by date with the sausage (ugh, but that pasta with sausage was good!). I discovered* this mid-day yesterday and decided it must be cooked immediately. Didn't even wait until dinner time. Once it was browned and broken into small bits, I added a can of tomato sauce, about another can of water, some minced dehydrated onion, chopped celery, and Cajun seasoning (some Penzey's, which was old, and some other, newer from WF). Carrots didn't occur to me or I could have had the trinity. I also added a can of Ro-Tel and a can of drained, rinsed small red beans. At some point I added some torn fresh basil as well. I simmered this for a while and then put it in the fridge until dinner time. It made a nice stewy soup (I guess Rachael Ray calls that a stoup.) We had this with a NY style thin crust pizza from della barba. They've been running $2 off specials on Tuesdays. I've been ordering the plain cheese and then adding toppings at home before putting it in a warm oven to be ready for dinner. Usually I do just pepperoni, but yesterday I sauteed the last of the enoki mushrooms I had and topped the pizza with them, some pre-shredded mozzarella, and whole fresh basil leaves. (I can't recall what recipe I bought the mozzarella for, but I only needed 3/4 of the bag, and one of the problems with pre-shredded cheese is it goes bad fairly quickly. The last 1/4 of that bag seems to be lasting forever.) Anyway, the turkey was salvaged and dinner saved. *I try to keep a current list of fresh provisions I have on hand, so things don't go bad before I remember them. When I was putting something else into the meat drawer, I looked at the turkey date and went, "Huh? The 10th?" Then I checked my list and, indeed, had transposed the dates for the hot Italian sausage and the ground turkey in my mind. I need to remember to look at the list more frequently😞.

Last night was an omelette filled with the last of the creamed spinach and mushrooms, baked potato, and toast. Tonight is bucatini with hot Italian sausage, mushrooms, and Rao's caramelized onion marinara. We're also having a big salad and a baguette.

Thanks for the review! I pass this place a lot too, and I love causa.

Pre-prepping the main part of dinner worked out well, time-wise. We had cinnamon rosemary pork chops, along with asparagus with lemon butter, leftover roasted potatoes, and sourdough bread. That pork chop recipe is excellent. I've found, after making it a bunch of times, that plain whole milk yogurt works better in the marinade than Greek. It needs that little bit of extra liquid.

I picked up a smallish piece of brisket (just under 2 lbs.) at Safeway recently and decided to cook it in the InstantPot, using this recipe from The Kitchn*. I roasted some multicolored fingerling potatoes to go with it and reheated the leftover creamed spinach, mushrooms, etc., I'd made the other night for some vegetables. Really good meal, but even with the IP, we ate later than I wanted. I prepped tonight's dinner before starting the brisket and that was a planning error 😑. *On a complete side note, I really do not like the current buzzfeed-y kind of website they have. I feel like the site is less useful than it used to be, but I can still occasionally find something there. It's probably all SEO driven and I'm the wrong market. Maybe it's just me?

I cut the remainder of the striata baguette into 4 slabs and made Italian bread pizza. I drizzled the slabs with some oil and lightly toasted them in the oven as it was heating to 400, while I blanched baby spinach and sauteed enoki and sliced King Trumpet mushrooms with some garlic. Two of the slabs were topped with the last of the shredded rotisserie chicken breast, the greens, most of the mushrooms, and some of the garlic. Crumbled queso fresco, a couple spoonfuls of whole milk ricotta, and grated Parmesan went on top, along with a chiffonade of basil. The other two got coated with a bit of TJ's jarred pizza sauce, then sliced pepperoni and the remainder of the mushrooms and garlic. I drizzled a little more sauce over that. They were topped with shredded mozzarella and grated Parmesan, plus basil. I managed to get a nice variety of ingredients on these without overloading the pizzas. Toasting the bread a little in advance helped prevent sogginess too. We had this with an iceberg salad with cucumber, tomatoes, olives, carrots, and cornichons.

I had taken some D'Artagnan Green Circle chicken leg quarters out to thaw a few days ago and then realized I had to use them . So I made them in the air fryer last night, seasoned with some salt and pepper and dredged in a light coating of flour; 35 minutes at 380 and they were just right. I served them with pan vegetables. This started with a mirepoix, and once those (that?) had sauteed, I added chopped garlic and diced jalapeno to the pan. Mushrooms went in next: soaked dried button mushrooms and some fresh Enoki, King Oyster, and Maitake. (The fresh ones were from a Costco gourmet pack. I have plenty left to use--soon, now that the package is open.) Last vegetable in was chopped frozen spinach. I boiled it for a couple minutes and squeezed out excess liquid so I didn't add too much extra water. Once that shrank down in the pan, I splashed in some white wine to cook off. Near the end of the cooking time, I stirred some heavy cream into the mixture and adjusted the seasoning, which was basically salt and pepper. I made a big salad, enough to last for a few days: iceberg and frisee, cucumber, carrots, celery, red onion, olives, cornichons, and queso fresco. We also had cups of soup. My husband had NE clam chowder from WF prepared foods and I had the remnants of our old cod and lentil meals turned into a little fish soup. There was bread and butter as well (striata baguette from Radici).

This is vintage Don Rocks right here ⬆️ 😎

I hardly ever watch Food Network anymore, but I still occasionally look through the recipes on the site. I made this Chicken Parmesan Casserole from there last night. It was quite successful. I used WF rotisserie chicken, though it would be cheaper to use a Costco one. It used to be I'd make recipes like this all the time, but it seems like I don't make anywhere near as many casseroles as I used to. We had this with salad and sourdough bread.

Air fryers are great for chicken. Congratulations on your acquisition🙂 We've been having leftovers interspersed with new meals. A few days ago I made a teriyaki pork tenderloin and served it over a prepared miso mushroom noodle bowl from Foxtrot (without their dressing), along with broccoli and pineapple chunks. Fairly quick meal (due to the, uh, "semi-homemade" part and advance marinating of the pork) and really delicious. I took a few photos but they don't really look as good as this was. Last night I cooked up some sausages I'd bought at Stachowski's in Georgetown earlier in the week. They were Thai chicken, with green chilies, mint, and basil. They had started to thaw a little bit by the time I got them home and, since I was planning on making them soon, I put them in the meat drawer of the fridge instead of the freezer. Took them out yesterday only to notice "Keep frozen" on the package. Oops. Since they're uncooked (but vacuum-sealed), they were basically a slab of sausage instead of separate links. So I cooked them like loose sausage in a scorching cast iron pan while cooking up some white rice and roasting poblanos. I stuffed the peppers along with a mixture of the rice and sausage and topped each with a piece of sharp cheddar. Then I put them back in the oven until the cheese melted. Very good. We had them with a side salad.

I baked cod last night (lemon, s + p, smoked paprika) and served it over leftover lentil salad and coconut rice, with broccoli on the side. Salad and sourdough bread.

Last night we had hamburgers on whole wheat buns and Latin American green lentil salad, a recipe from Michael Natkin's Herbivoracious. Tonight is leftover bbq chicken thighs, coconut rice, and boiled broccoli with nutritional yeast.

Friend is looking for recs for friends visiting. Preferably in DC proper.

Last night was hamburgers plus a big salad and leftover coconut rice with peas and carrots.

I love seared tuna! That sounds great. Last night was pasta again. I had an eggplant I couldn't decide what to do with. I landed on this recipe I'd saved a while ago, in part because I had all the ingredients except fresh basil (which, of course, I forgot to buy yesterday...). The eggplant wasn't exactly evenly diceable after being roasted, but this worked out pretty well. In lieu of fresh basil, I added some Penzey's pasta sprinkle into the puree before assembling everything. I baked it at 375ish instead of broiling rather than searching for a casserole dish that could go under the broiler. We had this with sourdough bread and a salad of gem and iceberg lettuces, avocado, tomato, hard-boiled eggs, and bacon, with a bottled creamy Italian dressing.

The one that's supposed to be opening at Mass and 3rd NE keeps showing progress but is not yet open. Just thought I'd toss that out there.