Dinner - The Polyphonic Food Blog

[Pat]

Tonight was baked chicken breasts; leftover wild rice and broccoli; green leaf lettuce with grape tomatoes and white wine vinaigrette; and, garlic naan. When our oven was malfunctioning (one of the times...) and the convection setting worked fine but not the conventional, I discovered that chicken done on convection comes out beautifully moist on the inside with a crispy brown skin, and in a shorter time. I remembered that tonight. Wow, that chicken was good.

[Tweaked]

Singapore Noodles...pretty damn good. 

Recipe from Serious Eats.  I made it without the char siu pork, because I have no idea where I would buy some in the district (Full Key maybe?).  I would watch the sodium levels with this dish, between the fish sauce and the soy sauce and the recipe calling to season with salt at the end.  But overall I thought the recipe worked out very well. 

[ktmoomau]

So today was an odd day.  We flew home from Miami, and picked up the pieces from our garage having a pipe burst in the ceiling and flood the place.  So in good news, Hubby was home for me to cook a corned beef, in bad news, our whole ceiling and insulation got ripped out.  I meant to pick up rye bread and etc at the store, but forgot.  So I made baked Japanese yams, sliced thinly with miso, broth, butter and soy.  And then I steamed broccoli.  It was an odd selection of sides, but that is what Hubby wanted, since I didn't have normal potatoes. 

[dcandohio]

Grilled flank steak, marinated in red wine, soy sauce, Thai chili garlic sauce, maple syrup, pomegranate balsamic vinegar. Twice baked potatoes, Caesar salad,  store-bought brownies. 

[Pat]

12 hours ago, ktmoomau said:

So today was an odd day.  We flew home from Miami, and picked up the pieces from our garage having a pipe burst in the ceiling and flood the place.  So in good news, Hubby was home for me to cook a corned beef, in bad news, our whole ceiling and insulation got ripped out.  I meant to pick up rye bread and etc at the store, but forgot.  So I made baked Japanese yams, sliced thinly with miso, broth, butter and soy.  And then I steamed broccoli.  It was an odd selection of sides, but that is what Hubby wanted, since I didn't have normal potatoes. 

Ick. The joys of home ownership. The preparation for those yams sounds great, though!

[Pat]

Last night I made pulled turkey with homemade bbq sauce, served on whole wheat hamburger buns, with pickles, and a red cabbage and carrot slaw. I also baked some chicken legs, which I'd marinated in buttermilk. My husband had one of those too. I just stuck to sandwich and slaw. It was kind of like a midsummer grilling meal, but done inside in late winter. Summer's coming. Sixteen days till Opening Day!

[Tweaked]

Working on the home made pizza.  This time with Jim Lahey's no knead pizza dough, using King Arthur Bread Flour.  Baked at 550 degrees for about 13 minutes on sheet pans. 

Pizza:  Pesto, caramelized onions, thinly sliced tomatoes, goat cheese.

[Pat]

Baked chicken legs, steamed asparagus, and rice pilaf last night. I used homemade chicken stock to cook the pilaf. That's always a good choice when I have it available.

[Sundae in the Park]

On 3/11/2019 at 7:29 AM, Tweaked said:

Singapore Noodles...pretty damn good. 

Oooooh, good reminder (and pic!), as we love Singapore noodles and have often thought we could try it at home. 

Not much cooking yesterday, as we went out to celebrate a birthday, but I did put up a few pans of roasted vegetables (zucchini and asparagus), made a skillet of sauteed zucchini with the extras that didn't fit on the sheet pans, and cut up carrot sticks and cantaloupe to have healthy stuff readily available in the fridge. 

Over the weekend we made a bazillion meatballs in sauce to eat with spaghetti, and have subsequently been eating meatball subs on bakery bread with gusto and glee. I also made what is probably the last batch of chicken/corn/egg soup for the season, as it is finally looking like the sun is here to stay.  I've been eating down the kalua pork we've had for too long in the freezer for lunches, microwaved over rice, mashed with a hard-boiled egg, with some of my zucchini. It's actually a pretty good combination. 

[Pat]

More pulled turkey sandwiches and slaw last night, plus buttered parsley potatoes.

[Pat]

Last night was an eggplant and rigatoni dish from the NYT, served with roasted lamb shoulder. The recipe wasn't really that great. I might do something like it again using my own instincts rather than following that recipe. I thought the lamb was good along with it. We also had a salad of iceberg lettuce, grape tomatoes, hard-boiled egg, and ranch.

[Pat]

Pulled pork nachos last night, topped with refried beans and sliced jalapenos. I had slow cooked the pork a couple days before with a sour ale, onion, dried spices, and bay leaf. Plus more salad from the night before.

[Katya4me]

Hubby made a vegetarian lentil shepherd pie from The Kitchn and it was delicious. 

[TrelayneNYC]

Some pix from last weekend:

Minestrone alla piemontese

This version takes about an hour to prep and cooks for 5-6 hours. It doesn't contain any tomato and the recipe hails from a trattoria in northwestern Italy (Trattoria Razmataz located at Via Vincenzo Bellini 24, Alessandria, Italy 15121, tel.: +39 0131 223249).

There was also this:

Shortbread cookies with Meyer lemon curd.

The curd was a tad overbaked. That's ok, my co-workers didn't mind.

[TrelayneNYC]

On 3/11/2019 at 7:29 AM, Tweaked said:

Singapore Noodles...pretty damn good. 

Recipe from Serious Eats.  I made it without the char siu pork, because I have no idea where I would buy some in the district (Full Key maybe?).  I would watch the sodium levels with this dish, between the fish sauce and the soy sauce and the recipe calling to season with salt at the end.  But overall I thought the recipe worked out very well. 

Looks wonderful.

I bet it was awesome too.

[TrelayneNYC]

We had meatballs for dinner tonight.

I've posted my recipe elsewhere in this thread but here it is again for convenience.  

170 g fresh breadcrumbs
60 ml whole milk
400 g ground pork
200 g ground beef
32 g chopped mortadella
1 egg
30 g grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
a pinch of grated nutmeg
3 tablespoons finely chopped parsley
2 tablespoons finely chopped mint
salt
black pepper

800 ml crushed tomatoes
1 garlic clove
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 bay leaf

This is my basic recipe for meatballs with the addition of 32 g (1/4 cup) chopped mortadella. The original recipe is from My Kitchen in Rome (which I highly recommend if you love Italian cooking). I've made about 4/5 of the recipes in Rachel's book so you know it's a keeper. Her recipe reverses the proportions of beef to pork but I love the sweetness of ground pork, so there you go. Quantities are also a bit different above and reflect my personal preference. We like our meatballs with not as much breadcrumbs and more herbs, but you might feel differently.

Add the milk to the breadcrumbs. Soak for 10-15 minutes, then squeeze out liquid. Combine breadcrumb mixture, pork, beef, mortadella, egg, cheese, nutmeg, parsley and mint in a large bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Since the cheese will be salty, go easy on the seasoning.

It'll end up looking like this. Form meatballs with a teaspoon.

Line a cookie sheet with foil, then again with parchment paper. Arrange meatballs on top of parchment paper. You'll end up anywhere between 15-20 meatballs.

I like my meatballs golf-ball sized. In the beginning, I'd fry them in olive oil but those ended up greasy. Baking renders them lighter plus you don't need to roll them in flour or cover them in breadcrumbs. Preheat oven at 350 F. Bake at 350 F for 15 minutes.

The sauce is really simple.

Warm 3 tablespoons olive oil in a Dutch oven or large pot. Add some garlic cloves that you've crushed with the back of a spoon. Fry the garlic in the oil over low heat or until the garlic gives off a fragrance that makes your mouth water. This will take some time (at least 15 minutes) and you'll know it's the right moment when the garlic begins to brown.

Next, add the tomatoes, a bay leaf and a pinch of salt. I sometimes like to add some water to the can, slosh it a bit, then add that to the pot.

Raise the heat, bring the mixture to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 10 minutes.

Then add the meatballs to the pot, cover and braise for 30 minutes. Don't forget to stir every so often.

I like to serve these as is, or with grated cheese.

[DaveO]

Oh man!   So now I need to add mortadella...just when I thought I had it down pat.   

Spoil sport!!!!

😂

[Pat]

11 hours ago, DaveO said:

Oh man!   So now I need to add mortadella...just when I thought I had it down pat.   

Spoil sport!!!!

😂

I hadn't thought of mortadella in meatballs before I tried the Giada DeLaurentiis recipe recently for mortadella meatball sliders. They were great. That called for a 2:1 ratio of ground pork to mortadella (no beef). Definitely try adding it.

Last night I braised chicken thighs in a one-skillet meal: chicken, sliced mushrooms, shallot, potato chunks, grape tomatoes, and whole green beans. I kind of made this up as I went along. The liquid was a combination of the last of some homemade chicken stock and the last bit of some boxed broth. The green beans went in to steam with the lid on near the end of the cooking time. I'd gotten the beans from one of the vendors outside at Eastern Market on Saturday. They were really nice quality. I washed them and kept them intact for the dish.  We also had some homemade garlic pita chips and Cava roasted garlic hummus.

 

[dcandohio]

The weather here is horrible today so, being housebound, I am going to make meatballs.

[ktmoomau]

Over the weekend, I made a greens and grain bowl with mixed wild/brown rice, lettuce, lotus root, bell pepper and onion sauteed with lemongrass and ginger, chicken spinach meatballs from costco, and a miso vinaigrette.  

I also made ruebens- I didn't have pickle relish for the Russian dressing, so I used some banana pepper juice, capers and caper juice instead, tasted good to me.

[Pat]

Last night was cheeseburgers with sauteed mushrooms (no bun); leftover steamed broccoli; and spring mix topped with chilled steamed asparagus and grated hard-boiled egg, dressed with white wine - lemon vinaigrette.

[Sundae in the Park]

Over the weekend, we made gochujang rice cakes with kale and ground turkey and "paratha burritos," which are curried ground beef, chopped tomatoes and cucumbers, and garlic yogurt sauce wrapped in parathas (bought frozen from Ranch 99). We'll probably make the paratha burritos again later this week since we still have all the ingredients. We also roasted up a tri-tip and a bunch of zucchinis and made a loaf of soda bread.  

Monday night I stir-fried some peppers, zucchini, and mushrooms with fajita-ish spices, made a pot of rice, and a big bowl of guacamole. Together with the leftover tri-tip and chopped tomatoes we've been having some rather excellent Mexican-style bowls for dinner/lunch.  Yesterday we made a batch of cheesy tuna mac, roasted up a couple pans of asparagus, made a meaty tomato sauce to eat with spaghetti, and prepped a fruit salad of cantaloupe, honey mango, and blackberries.

[Pat]

I made the blueberry-pistachio tabbouleh recipe from Joy the Baker again yesterday. That is a great variation on tabbouleh. It's still savory because blueberries aren't very sweet, but it's a nice twist. We also had black bean and tomatillo soup (creme fraiche, avocado, cilantro), and multigrain sourdough bread and butter.

[Pat]

Salad of iceberg lettuce, red cabbage, and cucumber with lemon - white wine vinaigrette
Tuna noodle casserole

[DonRocks]

17 hours ago, Pat said:

Salad of iceberg lettuce, red cabbage, and cucumber with lemon - white wine vinaigrette
Tuna noodle casserole

Without going to the store, what was the alternative? This sounds like a good fridge cleanout.

[Pat]

10 hours ago, DonRocks said:

Without going to the store, what was the alternative? This sounds like a good fridge cleanout.

I had some chicken breasts in the refrigerator, but my husband took leftover chicken for lunch, so I ruled that out. I also had some vegetables I could have roasted. It was to some degree a "clean things out" meal, but not completely. I used up some bread that was going to go stale making the breadcrumbs for the top of the casserole too.

Speaking of that multigrain sourdough bread...last night was grilled cheese, with bacon and banana peppers, plus leftover blueberry-pistachio tabbouleh and Cape Cod potato chips.

[Pat]

Spring mix with cucumber and lemon - white wine vinaigrette
Toasted sourdough bread and butter
Baked ziti

[Sundae in the Park]

The other night we had Costco tamales (at least we steamed them instead of using the wet-paper-tower-in-the-microwave trick) and cheese quesadillas with guacamole. 

Last night we made sausages with peppers and eggplant - we (barely) crammed 5 sliced peppers and a whole cubed eggplant into a pan with the sausages and all the veg melted down into a jammy, delicious mess.  I also had a random (really random - I've never made it before) craving for potato soup, so I tried out a lightened amalgamation of several recipes. I fried up some bacon, then sauteed an onion and some garlic in the rendered fat, and removed the alliums when they were done. Meanwhile, I boiled up half a head of cauliflower in some vegetable stock, then pureed it with the alliums. In the onion-bacon fat, I sprinkled some whole-wheat flour to make a roux, then added more veg stock, some milk, and a bunch of chopped potatoes.  Simmered the concoction until the potatoes were soft, and then added in the puree, chopped bacon, some shredded cheddar, about a cup of plain yogurt, and salt and pepper.  It's pretty good and ridiculously thick and creamy.

Today so far we've made a blackberry cobbler and a batch of "green sauce" (pureed greens) for the kids to use as pasta sauce.  Tonight we'll roast up a tri-tip and roast some carrots and zucchini.

[Pat]

Breaded chicken cutlets
Roasted carrots and asparagus
Steamed green beans

 

[naxos]

Milk Street aloha ribs, braised kale and plain rice 

[ktmoomau]

Thursday night was broccoli, sausage, kale braised and served over pasta. 

Friday night I made chicken, cabbage, bell pepper and corn enchiladas with rice and beans.

[Pat]

Baked turkey egg rolls (duck sauce; hot Chinese mustard; soy sauce)
Soup: Brown millet - rice ramen, diluted chicken broth, soy sauce, white miso, ginger, sauteed shallot and mushrooms, TJ's frozen stir fry vegetables, basil and cilantro

Almost forgot. I seared a small boneless sirloin steak they had on sale cheap at Whole Foods. I marinated it with a little Worcestershire for a bit beforehand, cooked to medium rare, then rested and sliced it, and served over top of the soup.
 

Try as I might (4 different grocery stores), I could not find fresh bean sprouts for the egg rolls. There were alfalfa sprouts, broccoli sprouts, and something called yoga salad, but none of the thicker white mung bean sprouts that used to be widely available. I bought some alfalfa sprouts, figuring I could add them if necessary, so I did. But I also bought the bean sprouts in the only form I could find them, frozen, in TJ's stir fry vegetables. I bought two packages to pick through, but there really weren't that many even though they were the second ingredient listed. Since I'd opened two bags of frozen vegetables, I heated them all up in the microwave and added to the soup near the end. It was a decent veggie-heavy soup.

[ktmoomau]

Last night I used the wild boar I sous vided that a friend gave me, then cut it into chunks and made it into a soup with celery, carrot, onion, navy beans, rosemary and thyme, a little stock.  The beans I think were old, I have been having some issues with HT beans not hydrating after even very long soaks, so I had to in a desperate it's already too late to be eating dinner attempt to get the soup done, throw it from the cast iron into the instant pot.  This worked, I should have done it sooner (I didn't because with soup, I like to adjust the flavors as it is cooking, etc.  But lessons learned.

[Sundae in the Park]

Baked shells two ways - stuffed with ground turkey, spinach, and a little bit of cheese (ricotta, mozz, and parm mixed together), and stuffed with a whole lotta cheese (same mix)
Green beans sauteed with garlic
Roasted zucchini and carrots
Many honey mangoes

The next couple days we'll be eating leftovers of the above, with an option for tri-tip / guacamole sandwiches on bakery rolls.

[Pat]

We had the last of the breaded chicken cutlets last night, plus leftover baked ziti and a mix of leftover vegetables (carrots, asparagus, and green beans) with a lemon yogurt sauce.

[Pat]

Leftover ramen and vegetable soup topped with cilantro and basil (steak all gone...)
Sourdough toast and butter
Red leaf lettuce, Easter radishes, cucumber, and avocado; Bolthouse Farms Cilantro  - Avocado yogurt dressing

[Tweaked]

Sesame Noodles with Shaking Tofu

[Pat]

Chilaquile casserole and cole slaw. I used a pre-made mix for the slaw but made my own dressing.

[Pat]

Sliced tomatoes and cucumbers, crumbled bacon, sliced ricotta salata, and cilantro - avocado dressing
Kale, sausage, potato, and white bean soup
TJ’s rosemary Italian crackers
Leftover baked turkey egg rolls; duck sauce; hot mustard

[TrelayneNYC]

Spaghetti alla puttanesca
 

[TrelayneNYC]

Some more information on Rummo pasta in case you're interested. It has replaced DeCecco as our go-to brand.

[Pat]

Tonight was orange teriyaki pork tenderloin, spicy roasted broccoli, bulgur with mushrooms, and sourdough baguette and butter.

I used to make the bulgur and mushrooms a lot but hadn't thought about it in ages until a couple days ago. It's an old Martha Stewart recipe, not terribly complicated, and I've abbreviated it further. It's just bulgur softened in heated beef stock for 45 minutes to an hour and then mixed with sliced button mushrooms and diced shallot that have been sauteed in butter and oil, plus fresh thyme, salt, and pepper. (If all the stock isn't absorbed, drain the bulgur in a fine strainer). It comes out with a nice flavor and texture. I'm not a big Martha fan and this is probably the only recipe of hers I've ever had in my rotation.

[reedm]

Sous vide tri-tip finished on the grill, charred asparagus with bernaise, and mashed potatoes. 

Of note, the bernaise sauce was just right, but it broke while I kept it warm. First time for me, I think. Thoughts?

Sous vide tri-tip was amazing.

 

 

[TrelayneNYC]

Pollo alla cacciatora
Pere al forno con marsala e cannella

This version of chicken cacciatore doesn't contain tomatoes and is adapted from a recipe originally from Taverna Volpetti (Via Alessandro Volta, 8, 00153 Rome, Italy; tel.: +39 06 574 4306)

[Smita Nordwall]

10 hours ago, TrelayneNYC said:

Pollo alla cacciatora
Pere al forno con marsala e cannella

This version of chicken cacciatore doesn't contain tomatoes and is adapted from a recipe originally from Taverna Volpetti (Via Alessandro Volta, 8, 00153 Rome, Italy; tel.: +39 06 574 4306)

Can you share the recipe for the chicken, please? 

 

[DaveO]

9 minutes ago, Smita Nordwall said:

Can you share the recipe for the chicken, please? 

 

After looking at the photos I quickly reviewed various recipes for chicken cacciatore without tomatoes.  My my...its a favorite dish of mine-but ALWAYS make it with tomatoes.  Always--say a couple of decades.   While there are recipes on the web w/out tomatoes (and some look quite similar) I too would like yours, Trelayne.  It looks great, as do the pears.

[Sundae in the Park]

15 hours ago, reedm said:

Sous vide tri-tip was amazing.

I am intrigued - do you mind sharing details? How big was your tri-tip? Trimmed or untrimmed? 

[Deborah Lee]

Cara Cara Orange + Agostino Recca Anchovy Fillets in Olive Oil with dashes of Japanese Shichimi Togarashi

[Pat]

Last night I made Roasted Ripe Plantain with African Pepper Compote, which was excellent, and an arroz con pollo recipe from the Post.

I will definitely make the plantains again. This looked beautiful on the serving platter, very bright and colorful. It was more than we could eat in one sitting, so I tried to make sure the other components covered the avocado layer before I put it away so it won't brown too much in the fridge. We'll finish it tonight. The pepper compote made a lot. Even after what went over the platter, there's 12 oz.+ left.  This called for 5 scotch bonnet peppers of mixed colors. Instead I used 1 serrano, 1 fresno, and 1 habenero. This was a perfect amount of heat. It was plenty hot but an enjoyable kind, not burn your face off hot. If anybody wants to try with 5 scotch bonnets, I'd be interested in the results :-)

I had planned previously to make the chicken and saw that there were some negative comments about how it turned out. When I circled back around to it, I dug around for my copy of the cookbook they adapted the recipe from to compare. One of the biggest changes they made was to substitute long grain for short grain rice. One complaint was that there was too much liquid for the amount of rice, and I figured that might have been due to changing the type of rice. So, I kept the amount of liquid the same and upped the rice by 1/4 cup. It came out a little wet, rather than fluffy, but the balance of liquid to rice was undoubtedly better with extra rice. It looked good and tasted fine.

Another significant change they made was to do the rice completely on the stovetop, vs. add some final ingredients and finish cooking the rice in the oven.  That also affected the total cooking time. Undoubtedly, the adaptation was faster to make. Basically, they changed the recipe so much that they might have even been able to get away without mentioning it was adapted...(Come to think of it, they may have written "inspired by" instead of "adapted.")

[ktmoomau]

Well that sounds delicious!  Last week I made double cut pork chops served with bok choy, lotus root and eggplant baked with miso butter.  The next evening was kitchen fridge salad with leftover chicken, lettuce, roasted red peppers, homemade croutons, carrots, celery, blue cheese and vinaigrette.