It's MAY 2021...What's cooking?

I'm planning to bake this in my oven, my questions are, should I sear it before baking it, should I cover while baking it, and for how long? Then I'm going to make some lemon shallots caper sauce to pour over it ( after I slice it before serving it  ). Thank you

Imelda HL wrote:I'm planning to bake this in my oven, my questions are, should I sear it before baking it, should I cover while baking it, and for how long? Then I'm going to make some lemon shallots caper sauce to pour over it ( after I slice it before serving it  ). Thank you

Imelda, when I make pork loin I season it and sear it in a cast iron skillet with just a little oil.  I get it brown on all sides.

Then I put the skillet & pork in a 350° oven, probably for 30 minutes.  NO COVER Check for a temperature of 135° and it's OK if it's a little pink on the inside when you cut it after letting it rest about 10 minutes after it comes out of the oven.  It should be VERY good with your sauce!

Imelda HL wrote:Anybody knows how Debbie (Bugster) is doing? I think I did not see her posting for a while

Imelda, if you click on "Memberlist" at the top of the page you can see Bugster's last log in....she was here this evening.

I have a feeling she's still feeling poorly. I hope she knows we're all still praying for a good recovery and that she starts feeling better soon.

I took some shrimp out of the freezer bag ~ it's so nice to be able to take just the number of shrimps I want to cook as they were frozen before being bagged. This bag seems even larger than the ones I got a few months ago.

I got them cleaned ~ gotta take off the shells & de-vein. I don't leave the tails on ~ seems a waste of that last bit of meat and without any shell we can eat the whole thing. Since they were frozen and thawed I find it better to wrap them in a couple layers of paper towels to pull off the moisture before I drag them through some buttermilk and then a light dredge of corn flour. I haven't been able to find plain corn flour at the stores here but I did pick up some Louisiana fish coating that is mostly corn flour. It's a really nice light coating when you're going to fry in about 1" of hot oil.

I decided to make some zucchini oven fries to go with the fried shrimps. I cut the yellow & green zucchini into small planks, rolled them around in the same buttermilk/sambal oelek chili paste I'll use for the shrimps, and then a toss in some crushed panko & parmesan with a bit of Italian seasoning. I've got the zucchini laid out on a rack over a sheet pan ready to go into a 450° convection oven, in hopes they'll get nice and crispy.

Went for an impromptu visit to son's place. So, he said, "Mom, I still have some fish from last year in the freezer, so we'll have a fishfry tomorrow for lunch. Outside only, cause we're under a COVID lockdown. It's Mothers' Day, so it would be really nice if we could have some of MOM'S potato salad to go with the fish"! Daughter-in-law was horrified, because he's making me "WORK" Danny, of course knows me. I love making it. It's all about spending time together, right?

Yes, Lore, Moms don't mind making favorites for their kids ~ makes no difference if it's your birthday or Mother's Day or Christmas......

besides, it's not that hard to make and it'll give you something to do to occupy your time!

Supper was really, REALLY good. I even got a compliment for the 'zucchini fries'! Woo Hoo!

The zucchini fries out of the oven:





Getting the shrimps ready to fry ~ moistened in about 1 Tbsp. of buttermilk with some garlic chili paste and then dredged in a corn flour 'breading' that cooks up to a really light, crispy coating.






Everything ready for the table:





The shrimps were HUGE! For comparison, here is a cut shrimp next to a teaspoon:





Supper of fried shrimps with a couple condiments, zucchini oven fries & fresh, cut-off-the-cob corn:






I had cleaned 8 shrimps each ~ I have to put a note on the bag of frozen shrimps that 6 per person is more than enough! I couldn't eat more than 6.....I think Dane got down 7 and the rest got tossed.

But he wants the zucchini like that again.

Actually, I'm thinking of making a couple trays of 'zucchini chips', which I've made before. It's just thin sliced zucchini, patted dry after slicing, a bit of olive oil and placed on parchment lined sheet pans. Baked at 275° for 1-1/2 hour or so until brown & crispy. Really tasty. (good done with red beets, too....)

Imelda, your pork loin roast looks fabulous! You always take the 'extra' time to make your dishes look so inviting. Such a labor of love that I'm sure Dirk and his mother appreciate.

*********

Jimmy, I hope you and Ms. T start feeling better. It's no fun when you have an upset tum!

A friend of mine (a neighbor from Ohio) posted a picture of a gift box that was delivered to her for Mother's Day ~ or Friend's Day ~ or 'Thinking of You Day.....

anyway, I thought it was the coolest idea.  Check this out ~ it's just a small company in a little suburb of Toledo Ohio:

https://socialrindco.com/


click on 'info & pricing' to see pics of their product

I can see this sort of business taking off in many areas.

Happy Mother's Day !


Lyn called last week and invited us to join them at one of the local country clubs for a late lunch / early supper today. Any holiday is NOT my favorite day to go out to a restaurant but she's had a tough way to go lately with her broken foot and I didn't want to disappoint her. I thought of just asking them over here but she wouldn't want me to 'go to the trouble' of cooking for all of us.

So, we'll be going out and no cooking here tonight.

I did get a delivery of flowers from DD#1. It's nice to have flowers in the house instead of just out in the courtyard.

I wanted a way to use some of my spicy sprouted sprouts so I came up with a 'Blast-from-the-Past' sandwich:

Ham, sprouts & cream cheese roll-ups.  I use to make these for the girls with grated or julienned vegetables all the time.  They loved them.



After you roll them up you wrap in plastic so the flour tortilla gets softer from the moisture in the cheese & vegetables.

They'll be good for a couple days in the refrigerator.





After an hour in the refrigerator they were soft and ready for my lunch.

From Lore:

"Fish fry at fishing son’s house. Danny and Lisa at their table. This was the last of last fall’s Lake Erie fish. Perch and walleye. Forgot to take a picture when the dish was full! My children like to spray vinegar in n the fish, I don’t. The spray bottle has vinegar. They call it the VDS vinegar delivery system. I made tartar sauce. It should have been an outside get together, it was too cold. Danny and Lisa will be celebrating 31 years marriage on Tuesday. Where did the time go?"

That looks delicious, Lore!

Just one thing......you didn't mention Deviled Eggs !!!


Best part of ANY holiday meal !

We had a lovely time meeting Lyn & Bill and another Toledo friend, Barb for an early supper.  The restaurant really wasn't crowded at all.  

I have my ideas on why it wasn't full.....

We three ladies all ordered the twin lobster tail 'special'.  It was shocking to me they sent opaque lobster tails out of the kitchen.  When I asked for a small plate to send mine back to be cooked more (minus the shells so they might have a better chance of hitting a good temperature) and Barb wanted to do the same so I said, "Just add them to mine ~ so we don't have to wait for two tries".

When returned to us Barb's were cooked through but one of mine must have been put under the broiler UNDER the other one.  It was only about half way white....but I wasn't going to try for a third go around.

We ordered desserts and our waitress brought out 2 of the 4 we ordered (Dane & I were sharing a peach cobbler).  After 10 minutes she returned with the final 2 desserts and said someone had taken HER dessert order to another table so they had to re-make ours.....

((sigh))

It wasn't the poor waitress' fault.  I felt so bad for her.  She was young, and new to the business, I think.  I prompted her to get Dane's filet temperature (medium rare) and then brought up how I'd like my salad (that was included with our meals).  She didn't seem that familiar with the 'Special Mother's Day' menu.  But once she took our orders she got everything correct, right down to my salad not getting any cheese.

Since the pandemic began and when we started going out for meals again I've tried to be very generous ~ overly generous ~ with the wait staff.  They take a lot of flack here with a bunch of grumpy old people who can be very demanding.  When we handed her the payment in the little 'book' I told her we were 'all set' ~ but when she returned with the credit card slips for Bill & Barb to sign she looked at me and asked, "You need change back......right?"  I had paid the check in cash with a sizable tip and just said, "No, thank you so much".

She got the biggest smile and mouthed THANK YOU, THANK YOU!

I'm sure she thought the kitchen screw ups were going to mean a measly tip but that's not how I think it should be.  She's working her butt off and I could see she was trying.  She deserved as generous a tip as possible.  

I remember one other time Lyn & I went to lunch and had the nicest waitress.  She didn't miss a beat.  When we paid I again did a very generous tip....she tried to return it to me and said, It's too much!.  I just said, The government sends out stimulus money so I'm just stimulating YOUR economy!  Before we left she confided she didn't know how she was going to get home that evening because she needed gas and a gallon of milk for her kids and, thanks to Lyn & me, she would be just fine.....and thanked us again.

It just makes me feel good to be able to do a small part of making their day better.

bethk wrote:That looks delicious, Lore!

Just one thing......you didn't mention Deviled Eggs !!!


Best part of ANY holiday meal !

Oh, I made devilled eggs also.

Lore really got me going yesterday.....

First thing I did this morning was pull a couple burger patties out of the freezer and then got busy with hard cooking half a dozen eggs.

Supper tonight will be grilled burgers (cheeseburger for HIM), macaroni salad, doctored up Bush's baked beans and DEVILED EGGS!

It just seemed the right menu for today.