Dinner - The Polyphonic Food Blog

[ktmoomau]

Monday night was pork chops with salt, pepper and some Penzey's Mural of Flavor spice.  With roasted Brussels sprouts with lemon and some stock and Parmesan cheese.  It was good, but I think between the sprouts and lemon it was maybe too much bitter, the cheese was needed, some bacon would have really made it better.

Last night was tamale pie, which was quite good, although next time I think the cheese will go inside the cornbread mix instead of just on top and pepperjack all the way, instead of cheddar.

[Pat]

Red leaf lettuce, radishes, cucumber, gigande beans, vinaigrette
Roasted pork tenderloin
Mashed potato casserole

[Simul Parikh]

Trying to make occasional vegan meals and last night tried a vegan mac and "cheese". The "cheese" was made with a base of onions, garlics, tomato paste, cashews, miso paste, and potatoes. It wasn't cheese, but the texture was good and it didn't taste too bad at all. And, some roasted Brussels sprouts on the side. Any other vegan ideas for rich foods like mac and cheese, etc? I did a vegan chorizo and that was pretty good, too.

("How do you know someone is a vegan?" "Don't worry about it, they'll f**kin' tell you!")

Oh - and to the Indians - did your parents use athana masala/methi no masala on Mac and Cheese? I've used it for as long as I've eaten mac and cheese, and didn't know the name, other than the label on my jar of it - 'macaroni masala'... haha. 

[Simul Parikh]

[Smita Nordwall]

38 minutes ago, Simul Parikh said:

Oh - and to the Indians - did your parents use athana masala/methi no masala on Mac and Cheese? I've used it for as long as I've eaten mac and cheese, and didn't know the name, other than the label on my jar of it - 'macaroni masala'... haha. 

Not all Indians... Gujjus! And yes. 

So are you looking for vegan dishes that takes extra effort, specifically? Otherwise just make what dadi/ba made, just don't use ghee, yogurt or buttermilk... voila, vegan!

 

[Pat]

Pain au levain and butter/evoo
Sausage lentil soup

The soup is from Barefoot in Paris. I remembered that it was really good. What I forgot is how long prepping all the vegetables takes and how much it makes. Cutting the recipe in half seems like a good idea, from both vantage points, if only that would occur to me before I get the soup pot going .

[ktmoomau]

Last night was leftover tamale pie and a side salad of just greens and radish with a little ranch dressing.  I forget how good ranch dressing is sometimes, although this wasn't as thick and gloopy as some store bought kinds (was leftover from Hubby's take out), I think it was likely just thinned down a bit, which I liked.

[Pat]

Leftover sausage lentil soup
another Jacques Pepin cheese soufflan
Roasted broccoli, butternut squash, and brussels sprouts

[Pat]

Wheatberry salad with wilted radicchio and raisins; balsamic - red wine vinaigrette
Baked salmon

I was going to serve these separately and put the salmon over some cooked spinach but opted last-minute to top the salad with pieces of the salmon. I think it might have been better as two separate dishes, but it wasn't bad this way.

[DaveO]

Mexican flavored squash ground beef styled casserole: cumin Chile powder and smoked paprika as core spices.   Should have done this earlier in the winter when it was really cold.  

[ktmoomau]

Leftover instant pot rice pilaf with chickpeas, and homemade brownies.

[Pat]

Salad of romaine, radishes, cucumber, green bell pepper, and tomato; champagne - caper vinaigrette
Quinoa chili
Grilled cheese sandwiches

[Pat]

Leftover wheat berry salad
Breaded turkey tenderloins over sautéed garlicky kale and spinach
Leftover roasted broccoli and squash

[Pat]

Leftover romaine salad
Sausages, peppers, and onions, with tomato-mushroom sauce

[reedm]

To celebrate the arrival of Spring, I made beef carbonnade, accompanied by pomme puree and a baguette. I tweaked a couple of recipes, and used a pressure cooker for part of the preparation, and it was absolutely delicious.

[Pat]

A night of leftovers:

wheatberry salad
sausage lentil soup
turkey tenderloin
roasted squash and brussels sprouts

[ktmoomau]

It was use up things in the fridge night, so I sauteed onion and garlic with the last of the kale in the fridge, added in a zucchini that needed to be used, tossed in some chickpeas with lots of olive oil, salt and pepper and tossed in some  veggie penne pasta I boiled and butter.  We ate with a chebe bread that I had a mix of in the cabinet for a while and decided it was time for it to leave the cabinet.

[Pat]

Roasted chicken, potatoes, carrots, and onions
Leftover braised kale and spinach

[ktmoomau]

Leftover carnitas with avocado, radish and onion and hot sauce.

[DaveO]

On 3/21/2018 at 8:33 PM, reedm said:

To celebrate the arrival of Spring, I made beef carbonnade, accompanied by pomme puree and a baguette. I tweaked a couple of recipes, and used a pressure cooker for part of the preparation, and it was absolutely delicious.

Beef stew w/beer and mashed potatoes.  I enjoy that combo. 

Ah, but its beef carbonnade and pomme puree, in fact a recipe and descriptor with which I'm familiar.  Being somewhat blue collarish I tend to describe it with the former rather than the latter name, regardless of the special twists.   Regardless a wonderful winter dish.  Bye bye (hopefully) cold weather.

A wonderful picture.  Thanks

[DaveO]

1 hour ago, ktmoomau said:

Leftover carnitas with avocado, radish and onion and hot sauce.

7 hours ago, Pat said:

......
Leftover braised kale and spinach

On 3/22/2018 at 12:38 PM, Pat said:

A night of leftovers:

......

On 3/21/2018 at 1:05 PM, Pat said:

Leftover romaine salad
.......

On 3/19/2018 at 1:50 AM, ktmoomau said:

Leftover instant pot rice pilaf with chickpeas, and homemade brownies.

I've been cooking more and it mostly seems I've been eating leftovers.   Luckily more often than not its been as good or better the second night. 

[Pat]

Romaine salad (radish, cucumber) with bottled Girard's Caesar dressing
Leftover quinoa chili
Klobasnek (sausage kolaches)

The klobasnek came out well, considering I had never made them before and was a bit short on sausage. I used somewhat smaller pieces than called for and it didn't really seem to matter.

Since we have been trying to eat bread less often, I haven't been baking bread at all. It had been quite a while.  The house smelled great. REALLY great. And, damn, does kneading dough for 10 minutes not just release stress but it also builds muscles. That was a workout.

[Pat]

Leftover romaine salad and sausage kolaches, plus chicken noodle casserole with peas. I made the casserole the same way I'd make tuna noodle casserole, only using leftover shredded chicken, and it came out great.

[DanielK]

Dinner party last night:

Smoked salmon pinwheels
Kentucky Kiss cocktails (basically a Knob Creek bourbon old fashioned with strawberry instead of orange)

Brie en croute with apricot
Glen Manor Hodder Hill 2014

Cornish Game Hens with pomegranate reduction, roasted over eggplant and leek
Maple honey carrots
Twice baked potatoes
Glen Manor Hodder Hill 2012 (OMG this is amazing)

Baked apple dumplings
Cranberry ice cream

[DonRocks]

19 hours ago, DanielK said:

Dinner party last night:

Smoked salmon pinwheels

What's a pinwheel? A spiral-shaped something on a flour-based base?

That's one heck of a meal you had - if there's a better winery in Virginia than Glen Manor (I don't know about RdV), I'd like to know about it - their Hodder Hill is great, and their Sauvignon Blanc is about as good as any American SB I've tried.

[Pat]

Sausage kolaches
Turkey meatloaf with (pork) bacon
Baked sweet potato with maple syrup

[DanielK]

1 hour ago, DonRocks said:

What's a pinwheel? A spiral-shaped something on a flour-based base?

That's one heck of a meal you had - if there's a better winery in Virginia than Glen Manor (I don't know about RdV), I'd like to know about it - their Hodder Hill is great, and their Sauvignon Blanc is about as good as any American SB I've tried.

I arrange the smoked salmon slices on wax paper, slightly overlapping. Spread a thin layer of cream cheese, sprinkle with capers and scallions, and roll up. Slice and serve on a Carr's black pepper table water cracker. Kinda evocative of bagel and lox...

RdV is better than Glen Manor, and there are a couple of others, but they play at a higher price point. I probably agree that for wines in the $20s and $30s, there isn't a better VA winery. But while I'm happy to support the local business, and Jeff and Kelly are fabulous hosts, you can certainly buy better CA/OR wines at that price point. 

[ktmoomau]

Last night was the last of the pork carnitas- made into a bowl.  I made the HT Traders brown and wild rice blend with quinoa, chicken bouillon, frozen spinach, with dried onion and garlic flakes in the instant pot.  On the stovetop I sauteed onion and green pepper slices with corn and cajun seasoning.  Then we topped the rice with the veggies, carnitas, radish, a little crumbled cheese and hot sauce.

I never mind leftovers, especially when I get home late, or Hubby works late.  I often do try to reinvent them a bit though, Hubby doesn't love leftovers, but he often doesn't mind a new creation with leftover ingredients.

[Pat]

Romaine and cucumber with Caesar dressing
Pan-roasted NY strip steak
Steamed asparagus
Orzo

This was a nice meal, except the steak (from Trader Joe's) had quite a bit of gristle.  The combination of items was good, though.

[Pat]

Italian barley soup
Red lentil croquettes with sour cream and tomato salsa
Leftover sausage kolcaches

[Simul Parikh]

Kimchi spam fried rice - ala Kenji

Chicken tonkatsu + tonkatsu sauce

Wow! This is the type of dish I make that truly strengthens the relationship ... there isn't a task today that she'll say no to! 

The kimchi I had did not have much juice (got it from Streets Market). So, I did my best to drain it before stir frying it. Added 1.5 tsp of gochuchang, 2 more garlic cloves, and 2 extra bird chilis. Was amazing.

[porcupine]

Goat curry (used a recipe from 660 Indian Curries for braised lamb shanks); masoor dal (red lentils) with tomato and lime; carrot and peas in a sauce thickened with besan (toasted chickpea flour); saffron butter rice. 

Pães de queijo to start.

Set the timer on the rice cooker to 1850. Went to dish everything out, looked at the cooker, realized it was still set to EST. 

OOPS.

So dinner was a little delayed.

[Pat]

Salad of romaine, yellow bell pepper, radishes, cucumber; bottled Caesar dressing
Leftover chicken noodle casserole
Steamed asparagus

I have excess turkey bologna because the man at the deli counter gave me twice the amount I asked for, so I also made roll-ups with bologna, cream cheese, and chopped olives. I sliced them into little pinwheels and put them on top of the salad too. Weird, but bologna can't really be used for a whole lot else besides sandwiches.  I may try freezing what's left. 

[ktmoomau]

Last night was Greek pasta salad (tomatoes, cucumber, onion, radish, feta, Greek dressing) with chicken rubbed with lemon pepper seasoning.  I have been trying to use up this seasoning because I found it in the cupboard, and don't like waste, but I am not sure I am a huge fan of it, so I should just toss it, it's silly to make myself use something I don't really like.

[DaveO]

1 hour ago, ktmoomau said:

Last night was Greek pasta salad (tomatoes, cucumber, onion, radish, feta, Greek dressing) with chicken rubbed with lemon pepper seasoning.  I have been trying to use up this seasoning because I found it in the cupboard, and don't like waste, but I am not sure I am a huge fan of it, so I should just toss it, it's silly to make myself use something I don't really like.

I’m not a fan of that spice either and I haven’t used it in a while b/c of that; so i’m a bit hazy on it. 

I’ll give it another shot and if completely unhappy also toss it.  Thanks

[ktmoomau]

11 minutes ago, DaveO said:

I’m not a fan of that spice either and I haven’t used it in a while b/c of that; so i’m a bit hazy on it. 

My husband bought it, and I can see why, Lemon Pepper sounds good.  But honestly, if I want lemon flavor on chicken, I likely would just use fresh lemon zest or lemon juice and fresh cracked pepper, I think this spice just gets overwhelming quickly.  

[DaveO]

30 minutes ago, ktmoomau said:

My husband bought it, and I can see why, Lemon Pepper sounds good.  But honestly, if I want lemon flavor on chicken, I likely would just use fresh lemon zest or lemon juice and fresh cracked pepper, I think this spice just gets overwhelming quickly.  

Great comment.  Overwhelming seems to be what I recall.  I’ll still give it at least one more try—for science. 

[DaveO]

7 hours ago, ktmoomau said:

My husband bought it, and I can see why, Lemon Pepper sounds good.  But honestly, if I want lemon flavor on chicken, I likely would just use fresh lemon zest or lemon juice and fresh cracked pepper, I think this spice just gets overwhelming quickly.  

If you don’t use much it’s not overwhelming (per this evening’s test with an admittedly light rub on chicken) but it’s not great either.  Zest or lemon juice with fresh cracked pepper is the better alternative by a landslide!!

[Pat]

20 hours ago, ktmoomau said:

Last night was Greek pasta salad (tomatoes, cucumber, onion, radish, feta, Greek dressing) with chicken rubbed with lemon pepper seasoning.  I have been trying to use up this seasoning because I found it in the cupboard, and don't like waste, but I am not sure I am a huge fan of it, so I should just toss it, it's silly to make myself use something I don't really like.

I am the same way about waste and trying to make myself use something that a sensible person would just finally throw out. Somewhere in the cabinets I have lemon pepper that I bought for a recipe calling for it and which I never use. So, yeah...

Last night was a mushroom pepperoni pizza topped with fistfuls of baby arugula salad. I used store made dough, which I've been doing lately for a fairly quick meal once in a while. As soon as I got home, I pulled the dough out of the refrigerator and stretched it out some on a half sheet pan coated with a little cornmeal. The oven heated while I cleaned and sautéed mushrooms with some garlic and mixed together some tomato paste and sauce with dried herbs to make a pizza sauce.  By the time the oven had gotten to temperature (it takes quite a while with my oven), the dough had rested long enough that I could stretch it out over the whole pan, to the corners.  I spread the sauce over the dough and topped it with the pepperoni, mushrooms, and cheeses (I bought pre-shredded for this purpose). While the pizza baked, I  made some vinaigrette for the arugula. The salad went on top when it came out of the oven.

[Pat]

Last night was pasta with a braised chicken and mushroom ragu, from a recipe I found online. I was partway through making it when it occurred to me that the cookbook given as a source was one I had once thought of buying but had changed my mind after making a recipe from it that didn't work out so great. As I was cooking this, the sauce just didn't seem to be coming together the way I thought it should. In the end, though, it was pretty good. 

The recipe called for a large tube pasta. It looked like the one in the photo might have been pipe rigate, and I was able to find some at Whole Foods. Otherwise, I was planning to use rigatoni, and that appears to be what was called for in the original cookbook recipe. I really liked the shape of the pipe rigate, though.

[Tweaked]

Poha

[Simul Parikh]

Great pictures of POHA!

Made paneer tikka masala and hariyali chicken.

A note on paneer from scratch - whenever I make this, it's crumbly which is good for certain dishes, but it isn't the cubes/blocks. My mom told me how to make the block - make the paneer, dry it out, and then put it into the food processor for about a minute. It may not look like it changed, but now when you shape it, it's no longer crumbly - it comes together and you can make whatever shape you want. Bake it for 12-15 minutes. VOILA! Can't believe I didn't know that. Thanks mom for leaving out a crucial step! 

[Pat]

The center of yesterday's meal was a slow-cooked olive-encrusted lamb shoulder (recipe from Turkish Delights). The recipe says to pull the meat with forks and serve with flatbread and it shows a variety of possible other accompaniments in the photo.  I used purchased whole wheat flatbread and put out the lamb on a platter with strips of roasted Anaheim peppers, roasted prosciutto-wrapped asparagus, halved cherry tomatoes, and yogurt. On the side, for condiments I had some of the olive-anchovy paste that had been scraped off before the shredding of the meat and a spicy feta-habanero dip I had bought from an olive vendor outside at Eastern Market when I went to get some flowers for the table.

This was served with a salad of green beans. roasted asparagus, artichoke hearts, hard-boiled eggs, chopped tomatoes, feta, parsley, and lemon vinaigrette.

.

[ktmoomau]

Tonight was a red curry rice bowl, with pork, green pepper, shallot, green onion, spinach, carrot and broccoli, made with a cheat of red curry paste, PB, cumin and coriander with fish sauce and coconut milk and rice instead of noodles as was on the pinterest recipe.  I thought it turned out very well, and I continue on my quest to use up little jars in my cupboard.  

[porcupine]

Last night was my first attempt at feijoada, served with rice, collards, farofa, and orange segments. Not bad, but I need to assemble a larger variety of smoked/cured/dried meats before trying again.

[Simul Parikh]

Oyakadon! Was sooo good. Whipped up some dashi, sauteed onions in the dashi+soy sauce+rice vinegar+sugar. Then cut up some thin sliced chicken, cooked it through. Separated two eggs, poured the whites into the mixture, cooked til soft, then added the yolks. Put it on hot rice. It was perfect comfort food... And had enough leftover for the lady for breakfast after her night shift. 

[MarkS]

Instant pot Pork Chili Verde.  Note to self that pork cubes will become pork mush when steamed to long.  Tasty but need to follow directions.  Not sure it is really cooking if I can't interact and watch it along the way.

[ktmoomau]

1 minute ago, MarkS said:

Instant pot Pork Chili Verde.  Note to self that pork cubes will become pork mush when steamed to long.  Tasty but need to follow directions.  Not sure it is really cooking if I can't interact and watch it along the way.

I very much rely on the beeps so I can hear when it is up to pressure and starts pressure cooking- then when it switches over to de-pressurizing.  But I just had an instant pot fail the other day with brussels sprouts that ended up being mush- I should have known better.  I did know better, but I learned my lesson the hard way.  I do worry a little about setting it for when I am not home.

[Simul Parikh]

Mine isn't sealing consistently, and sometimes I spend a lot of time trying to cook something, and realize it wasn't sealed. GRRRR... not sure what to do with it. Though it was the washer, but that's not it.

 

[Smita Nordwall]

1 minute ago, Simul Parikh said:

Mine isn't sealing consistently, and sometimes I spend a lot of time trying to cook something, and realize it wasn't sealed. GRRRR... not sure what to do with it. Though it was the washer, but that's not it.

 

Put the sealing ring in the freezer for a bit.