Dinner - The Polyphonic Food Blog

[dwt]

Ordered from ProFish for the first time. Order arrived early this morning -- nice, though I feel guilty about the styrofoam container. The Silver Spring Whole Foods, where we buy most of our seafood, hasn't had clams for months and I've been craving them. The promised count from ProFish was 2 dozen. I think we received at least three extra. They were clean and fresh -- all of them opened when cooked. So tonight was linguine with (white) clam sauce and steamed frozen green peas, enjoyed on the patio with my favorite person in the whole world on our 36th anniversary.❤️

[Pat]

Sounds like a wonderful anniversary meal! Congratulations.

Our dinner last night was a big salad with rotisserie chicken breast, cucumber, radishes, bacon, strawberries, pickled raisins, walnuts, celery, shredded cheddar, and romaine. The dressing was buttermilk ranch and I added some blue cheese to mine. My husband also had the last of the spaghetti and meatballs.

[naxos]

Last night made Tandoori ish baked chicken, cucumber avocado and tomato Raita and peach chutney from a disappointing bunch of peaches from WF and plain rice and naan  from WF.

We are missing our favorite foods but have not gone out nor ordered takeout since late February.

[DonRocks]

2 hours ago, naxos said:

We are missing our favorite foods but have not gone out nor fine takeout since late February.

Wow, no good takeout? I couldn't have made it.

(You all don't want to know how much I've spent on carryout in the past four months. I'm not sure *I* want to know.)

[Pat]

Leftover doro wat (with rotisserie chicken wings mixed in); all-teff injera (from Zenebech via the freezer); leftover rice pilaf, green beans, and corn; kik alicha (spiced stewed yellow split peas); and, leftover salad with buttermilk ranch.

[naxos]

23 hours ago, DonRocks said:

Wow, no good takeout? I couldn't have made it.

(You all don't want to know how much I've spent on carryout in the past four months. I'm not sure *I* want to know.)

It’s been a tough slog for someone who, back in the day, packed up the kids and the car to drive from Perouges ( grabbed a galette first) to Crissier to snag a last minute lunch opening at Giradet.

I miss dining out and travel  but love to cook but have never mastered Asian cuisine which is what I miss most now. And being of a certain age, I’m restricting my contacts to grocery delivery.

Mastering sourdough though!

 

[Katya4me]

Last night was garlic butter roasted butternut squash with a side of chopped bacon sauteed with sliced mushrooms.

Tonight was naan pizza on the grill.  I opened the bacon package last night, so fried up some more as a pizza topping.  I'm one of those terrible people, so I put the bacon on the pizza w/ pineapple chunks, topped with mozzarella and then popped on the grill for about 14 min. 

[dwt]

Leftover barbecued chicken, leftover mushroom rice pilaf, and steamed fresh English peas, some of which were sprouting -- the raw sprouts were pleasantly sweet.

[Pat]

I saved what was left of the sauce from the doro wat and reheated the two leg quarters left from rotisserie chicken in it for dinner, along with a couple hard-boiled eggs. We also had more of the kik alicha/split peas, and I made a variation of gomen with spinach, cottage cheese, and niter kibbe/spiced butter. We were going to have the last of the injera but someone _(me) forgot to unwrap the bread from the plastic wrap inside the foil packet before putting the packet in the oven. It has been that kind of day.

[dwt]

From our ProFish order that arrived earlier this week, I made crab cakes using a pound of their MD lump crab meat. The crab was good but not the freshest, lacking the sweetness of crab just out of the water. In fairness, it it did sit in the fridge for 3 days before I used it. The recipe I semi followed uses no bread: dry mustard, old bay, worcestershire, fresh parsely, mayo, and egg. Combined the crab meat with all those ingredients then put it in a colander to drain off excess liquid starting early this morning. The resulting cakes were really good. The two of us shared 3 cakes and put away 3 more in the freezer for later. Veggie side was steamed fresh asparagus -- nice thin stalks.

I plan on ordering crab meat and other items again from ProFish.

[Pat]

Kind of crazy, but I roasted a chicken last night, on a bed of sliced potatoes. We also had fava beans stir-fried in some of the spiced Ethiopian butter I had left. (Shelled, boiled, peeled, and then stir-fried.) The salad was butter lettuce, kalamata olives, tomato, feta, and poached figs, with mustard - red wine vinaigrette.

[Katya4me]

Dinner last night was Szechuan pork with soba noodles.  My tenderloin was 2 lbs and I didn't have any better plans for the other lb, so I doubled the recipe.  It was easier than I expected, I'm not sure I'd have called it Szechuan, but we both enjoyed it and will have plenty of leftovers for lunches. 

[dwt]

Salmon, marinated briefly in soy sauce, low and slow on the charcoal grill. Nailed it -- moist and not too smokey (believe me, I'm  not bragging. my success rate is not that great). Buttered ziti garnished with flat-leaf parsely. Steamed fresh haricot vert.

[saf]

It's Sunday, so it is my husband's day to grill. Porterhouse. Corn. Potatoes. Mushrooms marinated in balsamic. Squash (for him). Salad. Bread.

Dessert is blueberry/peach buckle with buttermilk ice cream.

[dcandohio]

Sunday I had the last package of the “Sunday gravy” that I made and froze at the beginning of the pandemic, served with penne. Trying to transition from full freezer quarantine mode to empty your freezer hurricane mode. Ah. Summer in Florida. 

[Pat]

Salad of poached figs and cottage cheese over baby arugula
Sweet pepper, zucchini and cheddar clafoutis
Leftover roasted sliced potatoes

The savory clafoutis was excellent, a Melissa Clark recipe but by way of the Washington Post. Highly recommended.

[Pat]

Chopped tomato basil salad
Sous vide pork chops
Corn on the cob
Broccoli

[Pat]

Turkey won ton soup
Leftover pork
Leftover yellow split peas
Leftover broccoli

Probably not an optimal day for a hot soup, but this is the second time I'd gotten ground turkey to make dumplings, and my won ton wrappers were nearing the use or freeze date. The last time I'd bought turkey, it had to be used or frozen, so I just cooked it up, thinking I'd make dumplings from it later. Usually you make those with raw meat, but I was on that path. Ended up never making them. So yesterday, 99.9 degrees or not, I made the dumplings.

The turkey was seasoned with soy sauce, toasted sesame oil, and gochujang. It also had chopped shiitakes and scallions in it.

I boiled them in a batch of chicken broth I'd made from a recent roasted chicken carcass. I added some chopped scallion, yellow onion, and some carrot that had been cooked in the base when I made the broth. (Carrot is always the only ingredient that survives broth making, for some reason. I almost always preserve the pieces for something else.) I had a little extra turkey mixture, so threw that loose into the broth to cook as well.

The soup was really good. I credit the broth for a lot of that. It had that distinctive homemade chicken broth flavor, whatever it is. Chicken!

[dwt]

I wish my menus were as varied as Pat's. Once again, I made carbonara for dinner last night. At least I vary the type of pork . This time it was prosciutto, which was good, but not nearly as savory as the version I made with speck. On the side was steamed fresh asparagus.

I'm not sure what tonight will entail. I'd planned on ordering takeout but the weather is not looking good so far. It got so dark here about 1/2 hour ago that the street lights turned on. Might need to root around in the freezer to come up with an alternative.

[naxos]

A great grilled flat iron steak from WF (and it’s on sale)cilantro chimichuri, this morning’s sourdough bread and a Greek salad. Doesn’t completely go together but those were the fresh ingredients I had.

Dessert was exceptionally good  blueberries and peaches  from Twin Springs Farm.

 

[saf]

Salad, roasted spice-rubbed chicken thighs, and bread. 

Dessert was exceptionally good blueberries and peaches, baked on top of a buttermilk cake, and served with buttermilk ice cream.

[Katya4me]

We really liked the super creamy chickpea stew that we got as a side with our takeout kabobs recently.  I found a recipe that seemed to appeal to both of us.   However, we had it last night over rice and it didn't thrill either of us.  Despite soaking all day, the beans still were a bit too crunchy after I unsealed the Instant Pot.  I gave it another 10 min and the chickpeas were soft enough then, but nowhere near creamy.   And my husband felt that everything else in the stew (carrots, potatoes, onions) had lost it's texture in the process.  I've got 2 other recipes to try, but pretty bummed with this result. 

[dwt]

Last night was the last of our ProFish order:  black sea bass fillets, simply prepared with salt/pepper and sauteed in olive oil, served with lemon wedges, steamed fresh broccoli, and basmati rice. I hadn't eaten black sea bass in a long while. Crisfield used to have it on their menu way back in the 80s when we would go there for dinner most Friday nights after swimming laps at the Y -- it was dropped from the menu eventually. They usually have whole ones at WF but they never look good. The eyes are always cloudy and the other whole fish, such as red snapper and bronzini, appear fresher. Some day I'll have to ask the fish monger what gives. 

[naxos]

Summer dinner.. Slow roasted some cherry tomatoes and added them to the leftover cilantro chimichurri sauce.

Quickly marinated swordfish from WF with some of the chimichurri and grilled them.

Used the tomato chimichurri as a sauce for the fish 

Served with great corn from Twin Springs Farm and a salad of tomatoes avocado peppers and local lettuce.

For dessert blueberry and peach crisp.

The sword fish was very good- although nothing holds a candle to swordfish bought at the fishing pier in Montauk

[MarkS]

Grilled swordfish with Basil chimichurri sauce. 

Green bean grilled on grill pan outside burner.

Rioja

[Katya4me]

I saw this recipe for steaks in cherry sauce and it looked really good.  However, I had no steaks on hand, but I did have 4 boneless pork chops.  I thought the substitution turned out very well and while I was not patient enough to let the sauce reduce as much as it should have, I'd definitely make this again.   

[MarkS]

Swordfish is generally our go to at our local fish store, Annapolis Seafood Market.  14.99-16.99/Lb, fresh from the Atlantic. Generally they get a few fish in and cut lots of steaks from the loins.  Very easy fish to grill.

I have bought a few whole Yellow tail snapper as well. Have the fish monger gut, scale , take head and fins off.  Stuff with some herbs and fruit and this also is easy in a fish basket on the grill.

Though I am in Annapolis I tend to avoid whole crabs.  Just can't see buying a dozen jumbos at 100+ dozen and then having to do all that work.  

[MarkS]

Eggplant and onions-Cube eggplant toss with EVOO, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, onion.. Cook in aluminum tray on grill for 1+hours.

Tri Tip from Trader Joes

Probably a Cabernet Sauvignon 

[dwt]

For some reason I've been craving swordfish🤫. Last night was the leftover crab cakes I made from our ProFish order. They survived their two-week stay in the freezer in good shape. Steamed fresh asparagus on the side. Hollandaise would have been nice but I"m lazy and dressed mine with a little Briannas champagne vinaigrette, which Pat turned me onto a while ago.

[dcandohio]

Roasted chicken, sliced, on top of sliced roasted potatoes and oven roasted asparagus. Drizzled with a cheddar cheese sauce. That little meal used up quite a few odds and ends in the refrigerator. 

[Pat]

On 8/1/2020 at 3:55 PM, dwt said:

Briannas champagne vinaigrette

Ha! I don't even remember mentioning that here. It is good.

It's been a while since I've posted in this thread.

Some recent highlights: chilled corn soup; bacon mushroom cheeseburgers (from Red Apron ground beef); baked ziti; tofu and green beans with chile crisp; baked spinach and zucchini; pork fennel sausages, onions, and peppers; brie pesto pepper grilled cheese; kale and sweet potato hash; chicken teriyaki with fried rice, green beans, and cashews; chicken vegetable barley soup; and, tuna noodle casserole with peas, topped with crushed potato chips.

The baked ziti underwent some changes in its various leftover stages, with the addition of peas, pesto, and roasted cherry tomatoes. It had Red Apron fennel sausage in the sauce. The remainder of the sausages were a separate meal. The corn soup was excellent but kept needing to be thinned for each serving. The spinach zucchini casserole used up leftover rice from something or other and reminded me that zucchini actually does have a flavor.

Tonight will be baked chicken thighs, arborio rice with walnuts and broccoli (adapted from a Jacques Pepin recipe), and corn on the cob.

[naxos]

Tonight salmorejo cordobes for appetizer and sheet pan chicken thighs cooked with broccoli, yellow pepper, onion and russet potato.

 

[dwt]

Baby back ribs, with a simple dry rub, low and slow on the Weber kettle. Well, not slow enough. Temperature control was a problem. I had it right at the beginning but at some point when I thought it was getting too low, I opened the vent further and it got up over 300. The ribs were still good -- there's nothing left of the two racks, divided amongst us three. We also had steamed kale with carrots, and macaroni salad from Snider's (one of my vices).

[saf]

It's Sunday again. So, the boy grilled. And we had hanger steak, corn on the cob, focaccia from RavenHook Bakery, twice baked potatoes out of our freezer, grilled mushrooms, and salad. Oh, and shishito peppers. Those plants are going nuts!

[Pat]

Last night was hotdogs on brioche buns, macaroni and cheese, and a skillet medley of garlicky roasted cauliflower and cherry tomatoes with cannellini beans and pesto.

The hotdogs were A & H kosher beef hotdogs I'd found at Trader Joe's, boiled, and they were fantastic. It seems they just began carrying them in June. I am now a fan (and I don't eat many hotdogs). The buns had been carefully wrapped and put in the freezer a month ago after a Whole Foods order brought two packs of them instead of one. 

The mac and cheese is the classic recipe that used to be on the back of the Mueller's box, with a cornstarch roux instead of flour. This used to be my go to, but I hadn't made the actual recipe in quite a while. It's a perennial favorite, never disappoints.

The vegetables were a riff on a recipe I saw in the Post recently but almost completely different . Okay, "loosely inspired by." I sauteed several cloves of garlic, dumped in drained boxed cannellini beans, cooked for a short time and then stirred in the last of some pesto I'd made last week plus cauliflower florets and cherry tomatoes I had roasted with evoo and dried Italian herbs. I splashed in a little chicken broth from a box in the fridge, let everything simmer together for a couple minutes until most of the liquid cooked off, and...that's it. It was quite good. The actual recipe is probably good too.

[saf]

Last night - eggplant parm, more focaccia, salads.

Tonight - salads, TAQUITOS, and guacamole.

[Pat]

Dinner for my husband's birthday:
Caesar(ish) Salad with brioche croutons
St. Louis-style spare ribs
Creamed spinach
Roasted Yukon Gold potatoes
Corn on the cob
Cookies and cream cupcake
Cookies and cream ice cream

The ribs, salad dressing, and cupcake were all from an NRG delivery. The ribs came fully cooked. I reheated them, coating them with the last of some homemade bbq sauce in the fridge near the end. They were incredibly tender. Red Apron pork has been consistently, impressively good.

The roasted potatoes came out perfectly. I did them the way I usually do--boiling until just getting tender and then adding back to the empty pot with butter and oil and shaking them around to rough them up--but instead of putting them in a roasting pan to brown, I laid the quartered potatoes in a hot cast iron pan and put that in the oven (where the ribs were already heating).

This was a lot of food, more than it seemed like when I started out. The spinach, which was a fairly small batch, was the only thing we finished. There was another cupcake (and more ice  cream), but that will wait until tomorrow.

[Pat]

Leftover Caesar salad
Mushroom soup
NY Strip steak
Chinese eggplant with spicy garlic sauce over leftover rice and broccoli

The steak was from Red Apron via NRG and was fantastic. We split one, as we often do. It was 12 oz., about 1" thick. Cooked 5 minutes per side in a screaming hot cast iron skillet, mounted with a little butter, and rested for 10 minutes before serving. The butter was probably gilding the lily but, wow, this was good.

There was a soup from the remaining button and shiitake mushrooms lingering in the refrigerator, some red miso, celery, garlic, onion, and the remainder of a box of chicken broth. I splashed in some sherry vinegar right before serving.

A produce delivery that had promised a couple pieces of eggplant yielded three 6-inchish very slender pale lavender ones. I looked them up and discovered they were Chinese eggplants. I dug around and I found this Steamy Kitchen recipe (haven't looked at that blog in years!) that's more a description than anything (i.e., no amounts for anything except oil), but it worked great. The only thing I didn't have was a fresh red chile. I went instead with half a minced jalapeno rounded out with some Korean chili flakes.

[naxos]

Last night made an old favorite - NYT tandoori salmon - a great dinner party recipe

(if we ever have dinner parties again )

Rice and salad along with the salmon.

 

[MarkS]

Baked eggplant with onions-Yum

Grilled T-Bone Steaks-Yum

2017 Venge Silencieux-Superb  

I've met Kurt Venge a few times and am a huge fan of his wines.  Silenciuex never disappoints and this made a Thursday night pretty special.

[Pat]

Leftover mushroom soup
Rosemary Garlic focaccia and seasoned evoo for dipping
Romaine salad, cucumber, tomato, Caesar dressing
Meatballs in tomato sauce
Steamed broccoli

The meatballs were also from the NRG order. The last time we ordered them we got more meatballs than this time but less sauce. 🤷‍♀️, I guess. The focaccia was the other bread I picked up from Souk yesterday morning. It, along with the cheddar-jalapeno bread we had with lunch, was quite good. I seasoned the oil for dipping with rosemary and garlic plus smoked salt and cracked pepper.

[Pat]

Cheddar jalapeno bread
Leftover chicken
Leftover ribs
Leftover macaroni and cheese
Leftover chili beans
Leftover roasted potatoes

[Pat]

We've been doing our best to finish off leftovers, though I made buttermilk biscuits tonight. But I made them to go with leftover pimento cheese from our Little Pearl takeout order from yesterday, so that's only half of a new thing. The rest of the meal was the last of the baked chicken thighs, reheated corn on the cob, and another go-round of the arborio rice. Its final form was fried with eggplant in garlic ginger sauce and broccoli and extra soy sauce. We also had a salad of romaine, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, and sherry vinaigrette.

[dcandohio]

My best friends finally decided to break their self imposed quarantine to come to my house for dinner tonight. 
I served a salad of Romaine, tomatoes, avocado, and bacon, bound with a little mayonnaise, salt, pepper and white wine vinegar. So easy when summer tomatoes are just perfect. 
I topped mahi-mahi with a mixture of chopped Kalamata olives, tomato, capers, garlic, onion, salt and pepper, olive oil, lemon juice. I wrapped it all in parchment paper and baked it on a sheet pan. 
While the fish was cooking, I sautéed parboiled tiny new potatoes, cut in half, in olive oil with some rosemary.I had succumbed to the temptation of the dessert case of the wild Fork foods near me. The little beignets  filled with chocolate were divinely delicious. 
it felt almost normal to have friends over for dinner  

 

[MarkS]

Salad with local tomato-Plain

Eggplant from Serious Eats.  I added too much ginger and garlic.  Actually garlic was roasted with eggplant as well as in dressing.  Awesome    www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2020/01/fish-fragrant-eggplants-sichuan-braised-eggplant-with-garlic-ginger-and-chilies.html

Pork loin cooked with BBQ Sauce in foil.  Fool proof and always moist..  Very Good

Kunde Meritage from Sonoma 2017.  Complemented the meal well.

 

 

[Pat]

Biscuits with pimento cheese
Arugula and Parmesan ravioli with lemon, butter, Parmesan, and baby arugula
Leftover meatballs and marinara sauce
Zucchini and onions in tomato sauce

I probably could have cooked the zucchini with some of the marinara instead of making a separate tomato sauce for that, but I hadn't realized there was as much marinara left as there was. The zucchini is something I used to make all the time in the summer when I was a teenage vegetarian.

The highlight of the meal was the ravioli. The raw baby arugula on top, combined with lots of lemon juice, Parmesan and some cracked black pepper was delicious. It matched up with the pasta (from Trader Joe's) really well.

[MarkS]

Plank Salmon on the grill with honey and cajun spices.  Nothing beats a piece of farmed, fatty , Atlantic salmon.  Chicken of the sea.

Green beans, baby carrots and corn cooked on a grill pan on the outside burner.

[Pat]

Shaking tofu
Steamed broccoli
Brown rice

Accompaniments:
Mini curry toasts
Quick-pickled cucumber slices
Honey roasted peanuts

The tofu was from an Andrea Nguyen recipe included in a pandemic interview with her. The recipe came out really well. I used shallot, baby arugula, and parsley for the salad component because they're what I had. And I finally had a chance to use the liquid aminos I bought a while ago for something or other and never used. The bottle wasn't even expired!

We had a couple pieces left from a curry-spiced French toast thing I made yesterday, so I cubed the leftover toasts and reheated fairly quickly in some more melted butter. They were one of the add-ons I had at the table and looked almost exactly like the pieces of tofu. Not the same flavor profile but complementary enough.

 

[MarkS]

Last night

Sausages from Whole foods.  Pork Andouille and Turkey Italien.

Kale salad with sundried tomato bits.

Roasted Cauliflower

Too much Rose 

[Pat]

Romaine, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, radishes, feta; vinaigrette
Hot dogs on brioche buns
Corn on the cob
Leftover mac and cheese