Tonight's Dinner

[Mikey]

Tonight’s dinner was veal schnitzel with sauerkraut and spaetzel with pork gravy. Bought two veal scallopini portions and coated them with corn starch, egg wash (bit of milk) and bread crumbs. Got to let them dry for a while on a rack.

Spaetzel is just egg, half shell of water and flour + salt and pepper. Needs the consistency of bead dough. It gets lopped off, small dollops at a time, into a pot of boiling water. Got to keep the knife wet to get good cuts.

Veal is cooked on steel pan with butter. Takes only a couple of minutes each side.

Sauerkraut and gravy are just heat ups.

Damn this sounds like a work of art. Takes me back 40 years or so to when I was working in a German restaurant. Sometimes bartender, sometimes waiter, sometimes cook, sometimes all three. Often depended on the condition of the alcoholic former Hitler Youth owner.

[Mikey]

Grilled salmon, kale Caesar salad, olive and rosemary sourdough bread. Nice thing about this dinner is that in the time it takes to heat up the grill (16 minutes) the salad is completely constructed. Five minutes on the grill and toast the bread and you’re good to go.

[smackaholic]

Grilled coho salmon and a wedge salad.

Salmon is wild caught and bought fresh at Costco a couple of months ago. I had too much so I froze a couple of pieces and thawed them out this afternoon. They freeze really well if you wrap the pieces tightly in saran wrap and then in a Ziplock.

I was inspired to get the salmon on tonight by a recipe in today's NYT for baked salmon with a brown sugar/Dijon mustard glaze. In the discussion there was a lot of disagreement about what proportions of Dijon and sugar to use, and cooking temperature and time in the oven. There were a few people who suggested that you need to cook it with the skin down, and not spray the foil with oil so the skin will stick. Then you can slide the delicious flesh right off and not worry about the skin.

I'm thinking WTF, I like the flavor of good salmon, especially with a nice crispy skin. And who needs a sweet glaze to cover the flavor up. I have a heavy cast iron skillet plate that I use on the gas grill. Lightly season the salmon fillets (tonight I used Bad Byron's Butt Rub). Heat the grill plate up really hot and cook the skin side down for about 2 1/2 minutes (depending on thickness), then flip it and cook the other side for 1 1/2 to 3 minutes. Let it sit for a few minutes. That's it. Serve with a couple of slices of freshly picked Meyer lemon. My wife likes a little tartar sauce. I like to add a little Sriracha.

I don't know if "wedge salad" is a thing in the rest of the US but it's gotten pretty popular in restaurants around here in the past few years. Usually it's a 1/4 wedge of an iceberg lettuce head, topped with blue cheese dressing, bacon bits, some halved cherry tomatoes and some blue cheese crumbles. My variation uses half of a head of baby romaine, bacon bits, avocado, chunks of a farmers market heirloom tomato called "pineapple" and blue cheese crumbles from Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese Co., about the best you can get. Every once in a while they carry the cheese at our local Costco for a ridiculously low price so I usually stock up on a few chunks. And, believe it or not, the best blue cheese dressing I've ever gotten at a grocery store is Bob's Big Boy Roquefort Dressing.

The bread is from Prager Brothers (a local bakery). It's a multi-grain sourdough, sliced and toasted.

This took 30 minutes from the first step (turning on the grill) to putting it on the table. Served with a 2020 Esprit de Tablas Blanc, from Tablas Creek Winery in Paso Robles.

https://tablascreek.com/wines/2020_espr ... blas_blanc

I’m with you on Salmon skin. Love “Salmon potato chips”. And it’s one of the best fats you can eat.


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[smackaholic]

Tonight’s dinner (actually last night):

Mikey’s can’t miss garlic baked chicken thighs
Baked Japanese sweet potatoes
Sautéed broccolini (also known as baby broccoli), topped with a little grated Parmesan

This is one of our "go-to" meals because it's pretty simple and inexpensive. Also the chicken is delicious and almost impossible to fuck up. I often use brown rice instead of the sweet potato. The veggie could be regular broccoli, steamed cabbage or a kale Caesar salad.






Step-by-step

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

For the chicken I usually use thighs with the bone and skin still on. You can use breasts too without changing anything. Put them skin side up in a glass baking dish (dark color preferably). Sprinkle in the following order.

1. Some kind of salty seasoning mix. Here I’m using Kinder’s Santa Maria mix. I’ve even used Lawry’s in the past. Doesn’t make a whole lot of difference.
2. Dried minced garlic.
3. (Optional) black garlic and truffle Parmesan mix.
4. Kraft grated Parmesan. It has to be Kraft in the green bottle because it makes a nice crust. The real Parmesan would just melt.
5. A sprinkle of smoked paprika.







When it’s ready, put it on a rack in the top half of the oven, along with the:

Japanese sweet potatoes. If you haven’t had these before they have a dark skin but almost white inside. A lot dryer than the orange yams. You spray them with some EVOO and the skin gets a little bit carmelized. Very delicious with some melted butter, S&P.



Bake the chicken and sweet potatoes together for 60 minutes at 400 degrees. If you use larger potatoes you may need to give them up to 80 or 90 minutes. The ones here are pretty small.



Broccolini, steamed for 5 minutes in a skillet, and then sauteed for a few minutes with some garlic slices.




Here's the chicken when it came out of the oven.

Chicken thighs are my favorite part of the bird. Have a package I need to pull out of the freezer soon for some chicken cacciatore.


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[Mikey]

Chicken thighs are my favorite part of the bird. Have a package I need to pull out of the freezer soon for some chicken cacciatore.

Fukkin' Dagos. Can't eat anything without drowning it in a bunch of gravy first.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

Tried something new this weekend. We often make lime/cilantro rice, trying to be similar to that which is served at Chipotle. And ours has always been sticky and not that fucking great, to be honest. So I read up on how to do it and found something that actually works.

First, you buy Basmati rice. Its a long grain white rice. We often use Jasmine for this dish. It is the wrong choice.

Next, you boil the rice like pasta. At least four times as much water as rice, and do not cover the pot. You dump the rice in after the water boils, and you include a bay leaf. After about 10.5 minutes, you put the rice in a colander and remove the bay leaf. You pour boiling water on the rice to rinse it (we used a boiling pot).

Then, you transfer the hot, drained rice into a mixing bowl and add some citrus juice (we used 2 limes and one lemon for 2 cups of dry rice), a small amount of olive oil (less than a tablespoon), some salt and pepper (to taste) and about half a clump of chopped cilantro (a clump being the amount that is sold in stores here). Toss that around a bit (Mrs. 88 would not allow me to add butter, but it was screaming for it). T'was fucking good.

We had it with Jamaican jerk chicken and roasted parmesan acorn squash. Crushed with some vino.

[Mikey]

That rice sounds good. I’ve tried to duplicate the rice we get at Mexican places around here, which always has some tomato or something else that adds some red color. I’ve used boxed “Mexican” and “Spanish” rice mixes from the grocery store, and tried to put something together on my own, but without much success. It’s usually edible but too wet, or something.

Maybe I should look for a recipe.

Nah that’s too logical and easy. Like I used to say, I’m an engineer. Engineers don’t follow instructions - we write them.

[Mikey]

I made a stew the other day that I found in NYT Cooking (a great resource for recipes). It had onions, leeks, lentils, potatoes, canned tomatoes, smoked paprika, saffron, thyme. Maybe some other stuff. Option for “carnivores” to add chorizo or ham.

I had some farmers market tomatoes on the counter that were approaching their drop dead date so I peeled them and substituted for the canned tomatoes. Also added carrots, black kale and some chanterelle mushrooms that I had in the fridge. I didn’t have any chorizo or ham, so I took a frozen package of ground turkey and browned it up with the dregs of a bag of bacon bits from Costco, and threw that in as well. Also used chicken bone broth instead of water. This actually came out really good. And I have enough left in the freezer for six more meals.

It simmered for another 30 minutes or so after this picture and it thickened up pretty nicely.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

That looks tasty, Mikey. Do you have Kenji Lopez-Alt's cookbook called The Food Lab? It is written for engineers. Explains why all the weird things that produce great results work from a science perspective.

[Mikey]

Added to my list.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

Added to my list.

Kenji has a lot of youtube videos, where he puts on a GoPro and just makes shit in his house (usually while having a beer or three). His techniques and approaches to cooking are very entertaining. The dog almost always shows up for a sample at the end, which is nice.

His primary website is seriouseats.com, which also has a lot of great ideas on how to get it done in the kitchen.

[smackaholic]

Chicken thighs are my favorite part of the bird. Have a package I need to pull out of the freezer soon for some chicken cacciatore.

Fukkin' Dagos. Can't eat anything without drowning it in a bunch of gravy first.

You gotta problem wit dat?


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[Mikey]

Grilled ono (also known as wahoo or king mackerel), with Italian flat beans, also grilled. Ono means “delicious” in Hawaiian, and it is.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

Looks good. Where do you get that bread? We have shitty bakeries here.

[Rootbeer]

Kenji Lopez-Alt's cookbook called The Food Lab

Absolutely RACK that book. If you do not have it, get it, or at least put it on your Christmas wish list. Phenomenal cookbook, doesn't just tell you what and how, but explains why. Cannot recommend this cookbook enough.

Bought it in spiral bound. Thanks for the recommendation.

[HighPlainsGrifter]

Made two pots of chili today, a red with bison meat and a green with pork. Both recipes were experimental and I'm happy with the results. I need to make a few alterations to the red but the green might be perfect.

[Mikey]

Looks good. Where do you get that bread? We have shitty bakeries here.

It’s a local bakery in Carlsbad called Prager Brothers. Started by a couple brothers a few years ago. One of them has a music degree and one a degree in plant biology. They started out with a small storefront and bakery in an industrial park, selling their stuff at farmers markets, where I started buying their bread. They used to sell mostly various forms of sourdough, Italian style flatbreads and baguettes, but have expanded into a lot of other stuff, all of which is fantastic. They now have several outlets but still operate out of the same industrial park and farmers markets. Their booth usually has the longest line at the farmers market I go to on Saturday mornings. I go through an average of one or two loaves of their multi grain sourdough and a baguette every week. A pretty cool local success story, actually. Even though they’ve grown they haven’t basically changed the way they operate.

https://www.pragerbrothers.com/about

[88BuckeyeGrad]

That is very cool. My wife's family owned a restaurant and a bakery in Ohio. They started the bakery because the restaurant could not find good bread and rolls to serve with the restaurant fare. They ended up selling the restaurant long before they sold the bakery. It is still in operation (not quite as good as when my wife's parents ran it, but still better than the industrial crap found in supermarkets around here).

We have not found a good bakery here. There are some in-store grocery store bakeries around. But they are meh, in my opinion. You are fortunate to have a great bakery.

[Mikey]

Lamb chops and chanterelle mushrooms just on the Weber.





Almost ready to come off.





On the plate with kale Caesar salad and some pasta. The pasta is rotini made from chickpeas. First time I’ve tried it. It’s OK but a little mushier than the “real” thing. Not sure if I’ll use this again.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

I'm going to have to start taking some pics of dinner. We made Shrimp Fra Diavolo tonight, and it was killer. Served with Caprese salad and crusty bread. We've got a boring salad with grilled chicken lined up for tomorrow, and salmon with quinoa on Tuesday (having blood drawn for our annual physical on Wednesday morning, so tonight was the last rich meal until then). We'll probably nail something beefy on the grill on Wednesday night. Thursday is an unknown right now. Maybe some green chili (huge fan, HPG - I'll have to share my recipe sometime). We are traveling beginning on Friday.

[Mikey]

You absolutely should. Some the meals you describe sound pretty awesome. It seems like you plan things well in advance. Maybe a week at a time? I wish I could be that organized. I can only plan one or two nights ahead and it’s often something from the freezer made in advance. Sometimes Mrs Mikey (or Mr Mikey) just isn’t hungry enough for dinner so we end up just grazing on leftovers or something from the fridge. Maybe some scrambled eggs. That throws off any long term plans. I can’t delay cooking any planned fish for more than a day or two.

The chops last night were in celebration of the daughter coming over. Seems like she takes pictures of just about everything she eats and posts it somewhere. Says it’s a Millennial thing? She was all over it last night with her smart phone. We also had a dessert improvised yesterday, with chocolate and pistachio flavored kefir and some shortbread cookies from Prager Brothers bakery. Actually tasted very good. Sort of like a deconstructed cheesecake with a cookie crust.

[HighPlainsGrifter]

Made green chili again last night. I'm still experimenting with this recipe. I added too many tomatoes and not enough green chilis this time. When I get it right I'll share the recipe.

Made a bread pudding without recipe last night and it was fantastic. I need to refine it a little and put a recipe in the family cook book.

[Mikey]

Do you use tomatillos?

[HighPlainsGrifter]

You'll roll your eyes at this but my grocery store doesn't sell tomatillos. When I say I live in a food hellscape I'm not
kidding.

I used canned diced red tomatoes.

[Mikey]

Not surprised at all actually. We’re basically in Mexico Norte here and that kind of stuff is easily found. There are actually supermarkets that cater to the Latino community.

Ever tried this stuff? Grown in New Mexico where chile verde is sort of a way of life.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

My green chile recipe started from a Nate Rateliff T-shirt which had the design shown below:



If you try to follow the recipe, you discover that there are a few unexplained things. I also tried a recipe from Kenji Lopez-Alt and eventually merged aspects of both into the following:

GREEN CHILE
Makes 6-8 hearty servings

Ingredients:
5 Poblano peppers (we cannot get Hatch chiles here - they would be a better choice - you can use Anaheim's too)
3 Serrano peppers
2 Jalapeno peppers
4 Roma tomatoes
8 Tomatillos (husks removed, rinsed and dried)
6 Garlic cloves (peeled)
1 Yellow (or sweet) onion (diced)
4 Strips of thick-cut bacon
2 pounds 1” cubed pork shoulder, heavily salted and peppered in a bowl
1 14-ounce can of Rotel original diced tomatoes and chiles
4 Cups chicken stock
1 Tablespoon of ground oregano
1 Tablespoon of ground cumin
1 Heavy dash of ground cayenne pepper

Preparation

Roast all of the fresh veggies except the onion. The peppers should be charred and blistered. If you place them in a bag or sealed container, it will be easier to remove the skins, which you should do wearing plastic gloves. After all are roasted, chop them up into 1/2” chunks. We remove most of the pepper seeds. Set the veggies aside in a bowl for later.

In a large Dutch oven, cook the bacon until very crispy. You are trying to get the bacon fat out, but not burn it too much. Remove the bacon and then turn up the heat on the bacon grease until it is almost smoking. Add half of the cubed pork and do not move it around. Let it sear for about three minutes. Then stir it and brown that portion of pork. Once it is brown on all sides, add the remaining pork and cook until all pork is browned on all sides. You will want to turn down the heat to medium toward the end. Once the pork is browned, remove it from the Dutch oven and put it in a bowl. Chop the bacon into smaller (half inch) pieces and add it to the bowl containing the pork.

In the Dutch oven, add the diced onions and saute in the pork/bacon juices until softened. Add the roasted and chopped veggies to the Dutch oven and cook down a bit. You do not want to remove all of the liquid, but you do want to cook the veggies down a bit (maybe 5-10 minutes). Add the oregano, cumin and cayenne pepper and stir until fragrant (about a minute), and then add the canned tomatoes and chicken stock and scrape anything that might be stuck to the bottom of the Dutch oven into the mix. Add the pork/bacon back into the pot and bring everything to a slow boil (takes a while), then turn down the heat and simmer for about 2-3 hours, stirring occasionally.

We think this dish is best if served over sticky Jasmine rice the next day. We like sour cream as a garnish. Some recipes call for chopped Cilantro and warm tortillas. Cold beer is essential.

[Mikey]

Nice. I’m going to try that soon.

Every year our locally owned supermarket has a couple of days during or after the Hatch harvest where you can buy a box (like a large fruit box) of chiles and they roast them in large barrel roaster in the parking lot. The fragrance in the parking lot can get pretty strong. I’ve never gone for the whole box but I’ve bought some pretty big piles and cooked them on the Weber.

[Mikey]

Last night:

Microwave chicken breast with wild rice medley and broccolini.
You may say WTF, microwave chicken breast? But this is really good. And easy. Take two large bone-in chicken breasts and place in a Corningware (or other microwave safe vessel) sprinkle with a little Lawry’s seasoning salt, cover it, and microwave for 18 minutes (a little more or less depending on the large breastedness of the chicken). Remove from the microwave and let it sit covered for six minutes. Tender juicy white meat!!

Before:






After:





The plate (the juice gets poured onto the rice):

[Mikey]

Tonight:

Mrs Mikey could only eat about a third of her chicken breast so there was a fair amount of white meat left over, which led to tonight’s experiment.

Miso (yellow) soup with dashi, last night's leftover microwave chicken breast, tofu, fresh shiitakes, wakame, authentic Japanese udon noodles, chopped green onions, fried onion flakes. Seasoned with some shichimi togarashi.



This was tasty AF.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

• Wagu ribeye seared on black iron with butter and fresh Thyme

• Mrs. 88's take on Ruth's Chris creamed spinach

• 88's take on Haricots Verts Amandine

• Ridge Zin

[Mikey]

Good stuff. Do you pan broil the steak? Whenever I try to cook a ribeye on the grill it seems to turn into a bonfire.

And the juice from Ridge. Nice. I think I'll have to go pop a bottle of some nice red tonight.

[88BuckeyeGrad]

Good stuff. Do you pan broil the steak? Whenever I try to cook a ribeye on the grill it seems to turn into a bonfire.

And the juice from Ridge. Nice. I think I'll have to go pop a bottle of some nice red tonight.

Those steaks would have been an inferno if I grilled them. So I heated up a cast iron skillet on the grill, added some salt and laid the steaks on it. On the first flip, I added some butter and fresh Thyme on the cooked side. When it was time to flip again, the Thyme and butter went onto the grill with the steaks on top and more butter and Thyme was added on the second cooked side. I then flipped them as needed while I took instant read temps in the center of the steaks. Once the center was about 128F I removed the pan from the grill and then removed the steaks from the pan to rest. They were good.

[Mikey]

This is an old standby of ours but I haven’t fixed it for maybe a year. Not exactly a low calorie meal, but perfect for a cold winter night. Should get down to the low 40s tonight.

Oven braised (thick cut) pork chop with mashed potatoes, canned green beans, pan gravy, and applesauce (not shown) on the side. Definitely comfort food.

[HighPlainsGrifter]

That looks really good, Mikey. I ate a pile of 5 scrambled eggs and six slices of bacon.

[Mikey]

Last night’s dinner:

Tuna and white bean salad made with Italian bluefin tuna packed in EVOO, “Marcella” beans fro Rancho Gordo heirloom beans, some capers, a little red onion, and piled on a bed of arugula from the local farmers market. Cherry tomatoes also from the farmers market.



Risotto with asparagus and fresh morel mushrooms, made with imported vialone nano rice and freshly grated Parmesan, mushrooms and asparagus from the farmers market.

This was one of the better meals that I’ve come up with in quite a while. The rich creaminess of the risotto was perfectly offset by the cool acidity (red wine vinegar and tomatoes) and brightness of the salad.

The tuna and white bean salad is pretty traditionally Italian. I’ve been making it off and on for years and the degree of satisfaction compared to the effort to put it together never ceases to amaze me. This is one dish that you’ll never use water packed tuna for.

[Mikey]

Tonight’s fish tostada, made with grilled corvina (Mexican sea bass).

[Mikey]

Halibut and asparagus, both grilled on a cast iron plate in the gas Webber. Crusty multi grain sourdough, warmed in the oven. Meyer lemon slices from our tree.

Simple but healthy and very tasty.

[Roux]

Nice job on the fish