January 2018, Whats for Dinner??

UNCLE JIMMY wrote:For supper, I made Greek style Hot Dog &  Hamburger Chili
I had that on hot dogs on toasted bread.

I fired up the grill this afternoon ( we had a hot spell .... 20 degrees )
and burned Tina's trotters and ham hocks for a batch of pigs feet.
They cooked all day. The house smells it too! LOL

Funny that you mentioned firing up the grill now that winter is over, Jimmy. I talked to DD#2 (in Ohio) and she said it was 36° so they were cooking steaks on the grill!

I'm jealous....I think I mentioned our grill 'died'.

So, today 'WE' cleaned the oven, as good as we could (it was REALLY bad with burned on grease). Thank heavens Mr. Amazing is not adverse to assisting or it would have just had a 'lick & a promise' and I would have closed the door. The only reason I decided to do a clean up is that every time I use it on a high temperature the house fills with smoke. The firemen said if they come one more time on a 'false alarm' from the neighbors they're going to charge us.....

That, and I want to make a chicken breast and dressing oven meal tonight......

We had paneed chicken the other night, my absolute favorite way of having chicken breasts, which were on sale so Brian picked up a bunch. He was nice enough to slice the breasts in half, hammer the areas that needed hammering to even out each piece, and then breaded and sautéed them. All I had to do was make some tarragon cream sauce, which he loves. In fact, anytime I'm craving that chicken dish I just have to mention the sauce and he's more than willing to handle making the chicken.

I also tried making a pilaf using 1/2 cup of orzo pasta and 1/2 cup of jasmine rice. First, I cooked a couple of thinly sliced garlic cloves in butter for about a minute. Then I added in the pasta and rice, and browned those for about 5 minutes, stirring often so nothing burned. Once they looked sufficiently brown, I added some dried thyme and warmed that up. Then I added in 1-1/2 cups of homemade chicken stock I'd made recently. Brought that to a boil, reduced to a simmer, put the top on and reduced the heat to simmer. Cooked the rice for 20 minutes, then moved it off the heat and waited 5 minutes. Then I added a little bit of salt, freshly grated black pepper, chopped fresh thyme leaves and minced parsley to the rice, about 1/4 cup of each I guess. I put the top back on and served the pilaf after letting it sit for about 5 minutes to let the herb flavor settle in.

Boy, did it turn out good. I'd made the chicken stock a couple of days before and had yet to freeze what I hadn't already used. It was really a nice stock, too, as I roasted the chicken carcass I had from that 11.5 pound chicken I'd bought before Christmas, along with an onion I peeled and cut into wedges and a couple sticks of celery. Roasting the carcass and the veggies not only gave a nice flavor to the stock but it was a lot darker than my regular chicken stock. Laughed, as I had the perfect amount of stock left to use in my pilaf AND my tarragon cream sauce -- things NEVER seem to work out so perfectly for me even though I always have boxed chicken stock in the pantry along with Better Than Bouillon Reduced Sodium Chicken Base in the fridge to supplement or stand in for homemade stock.

Definitely will make that again, as I'm always looking for a nice side dish that doesn't need gravy or sauce like plain rice or pasta would. We've been having a hard time finding orzo in the local grocery but Brian recently said he ran across a bag of it in a box of "extras" we had in the laundry room that wouldn't fit in the cabinets -- this was our old "pantry" before I made the pantry in the tiny room housing our gas water heater. I didn't want to use it all up at once so figured I'd try using some of it in a pilaf. I'm going to have to try to order it online so I can have a few pounds on hand.

I didn't know your grill died, Beth. That's too bad; hope it didn't happen at an inopportune time as is usually the case (mid-meal). From what I've read, that is, if you're in the market for a used one, Craigs List usually often has grills for sale, both charcoal and gas.

I know you use yours often to make dinner so I guess you're going with gas again.

We're trying to eat solely out of the freezer, as it's jam packed. Of course, we cheated when I saw those boneless chicken breasts on sale for $1.19/lb. but we're back on track.

Tonight we're having stuffed bell peppers that were frozen individually in foil the last time I made them -- I always make a lot of them so I can freeze some. And I'm making macaroni and cheese to go alongside the peppers. I always think that's the perfect side dish with stuffed peppers.

Dessert is the last of a chocolate ice cream pie that Al, our contractor (a/k/a my cabana boy), made and brought over a couple days ago. Unbeknownst to me, he'd promised Brian the day before that he was going to bring him one. No quicker way to make a friend of Brian than bringing him dessert. It was really good too, though Al warned me the graham cracker crumb layers would get kind of soft after the first night so leftovers wouldn't be as good as "firsties." Who cares? It's still delicious and I'm sorry tonight will be the end of it.

Yes, Michelle, the grill died mid-meal.....I had just put our salmon and cod on the grill using the grill mats when I noticed it wasn't really hot. It had heated up to 'high' when I checked on it and by the time I put the fish on the grill it just wasn't staying hot. I thought it was just out of gas so Dane switched tanks and then couldn't get it to light.

I ended up cooking the salmon and cod in the CI skillet so it wasn't a big deal as far as supper was concerned, but when he checked it out the next day he discovered everything was burned through and that's why it wouldn't work.

So, now it sits under cover, waiting for a new friend to come and take his place.....((sigh))

Tonight I did an oven meal: Roast chicken breast over some apple dressing, baked butternut squash and Penzey seasoned peas.

The same thing happened to our little Weber. Customer service thought it was the gas regulator. IDK. Our unit was 12 years old so we just bought a new one.

I'm really, really determined to use up everything out of my freezer before purchasing anything new. It was really hard, went to Costco today and resisted the lamb chops! I had a small steak in my feeezer, so that's what I had with some broccoli and cauliflower, just plain steamed, a little butter and salt. YUMM!

We had a turkey on Sunday. We finished up the white meat today and are sick of turkey. The dark meat goes to the dogs.
Been listening to the news. Out here where they had that big fire around Ventura and Montecito, we are now having rain. The mudslides and debris flows have killed 13 people since last night. Some homes that were spared from the fire were washed away by the mud and debris. Horrible!

Terrible, terrible news to watch.

I went out to Turtle Jack's the other day to have what is my favourite dish there. Salmon with spicy mango pineapple salsa. I'd had it a couple of times before, and this time was very disappointed. I remembered the salsa as being really flavourful and spicy. And, I thought that it was put on the fish before it was baked. It was served as a side, and at first I couldn't find any mango. Upon really examining it, I realized that the mango was there, but not ripe, so tasteless.

I asked if the dish was spicy, at first the server said "not very" and I said that I like very spicy, I think she forgot to mention it to the kitchen. Fish was good, veggies were grilled perfectly, but I won't be ordering it there any more. Mangoes here in the grocery stores are now really tasteless.

I have made salmon for myself with a spicy salsa topping which is much better. Served it to company two weeks ago and they loved it.

My topping was a ripe mango, chopped, about 1/2 cup sweet corn, about half a cup of red bell pepper, chopped, some fresh parsley, half a jalapeno pepper chopped fine, a couple of tablespoons of oil (I like grapeseed or avocado) s/p, and put this on top of my salmon in the oven.

Lore, do you cook the fish before you add the salsa ~ kind of like a glaze? Or do you let it braise in the salsa?

Both ways sound good but I'm just wondering how you do yours.

[quote="bethk"]Lore, do you cook the fish before you add the salsa ~ kind of like a glaze?  Or do you let it braise in the salsa?  

Both ways sound good but I'm just wondering how you do yours.[/quot

Fish was not cooked ahead. Salsa just on top, it becomes hot, but salmon doesn't take very long. about 20 min. at 400F.

I am sick and tired of being sick and tired......how a cold can hang on so long in someone who really hasn't been sick in about 3 years is beyond me. You'd think my immune system would just knock it out. What's really weird is waking up from a dead sleep and sneezing for 3 or 4 minutes straight. I don't understand how I can need to sneeze, especially since I wear a CPAP and have positive air flow blowing air INTO my nasal passages. You'd think that alone should help stop the 'itch' of a sneezing fit, wouldn't you? I do think, even though I take an allergy pill every night, that the high pollen we have right now from the stupid palms has a lot to do with my misery. Dane has been parking the car in the driveway so he can play darts in the garage and when he brings it in it's just covered with yellow pollen.

And this morning HE thanked me profusely for sharing my cold with him. Lucky guy ~ I don't usually share much of anything with him but maybe he'll keep the germs to himself.

Tonight was a 'comfort food' meal. We use to have it when I was growing up. Creamed ham on noodles and green beans. It's nothing more than a white sauce with chopped ham, spooned over egg noodles. I think it's one of those 'you-had-to-grow-up-with-it' meals. It always makes me feel better, just like cream of tomato soup w/bread & butter sandwich does.

It usually takes one or two weeks for the worst to pass. With me, I always get a cough that takes at least a month to get rid of.

Dinner tonight was called Cuban Beef Picadillo. It was a one skillet dish with rice on the side.

Jimmy, he gets cuter by the day!

UNCLE JIMMY wrote:Hi!  Baby Liam Here..... Just Checking in.
Got a few more teeth now, and Pop Pops made me some toast to chew on.
The taste is great, but my Mommy says, I'm getting a Buddha Belly! Gotta watch those carbs! Haaaaa!

Babies are supposed to have a Buddah belly! He is adorable! Love those curly locks.

My computer is giving me fits.....it lost my shortcut Food Pics file. I've got to wait for Lyn to be available to come over and help me figure out where it went......

Crap......

Katie has had an upset stomach for a couple of days. I need to find something bland to cook for dinner. Any Ideas?

Bugster2 wrote:Katie has had an upset stomach for a couple of days. I need to find something bland to cook for dinner. Any Ideas?

Got any Cream of Wheat or grits? That's about as bland as it gets.