What'cha Cookin' Tonight II

[onejayhawk]

I found a huge Avocado--it's over a pound--so some guac is coming in a day or three. It reminded me of this.

Green Hummus

1 can chickpeas
olive oil, as needed
1 tsp sesame oil
lemon zest to taste
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp smoky paprika or powdered chipotle
2 Tbsp minced cilantro or parsley
1 small jalapeno
1 medium avocado
Juice of one lemon
small bunch basil
Salt to taste

Sear the jalapeno over a burner til the skin blisters
Place in a bag and set aside
Pour peas and liquid into a saucepan. Add water to cover and bring to a boil. Simmer until desired doneness.
Immediately drain and rinse with cold water.
Put peas, sesame oil, garlic, cilantro, lemon zest, and paprika in a food processor, reserving a few peas.
Process until pasty but smooth, adding oil only if necessary.
Remove jalapeno from the bag. Skin, seed, and mince.
Remove the meat of the avocado and mash with lemon juice.
Roll basil and cut in small ribbons (chiffonade).
Add avocado, basil, and jalapeno to mashed peas.
Mix til blended. Hand mash reserved peas and add for texture.
Garnish with cilantro leaves and a sprinkle of paprika.

I intended to enter it in a California Avocado recipe contest but did not get the sample ready in time.

It's peach season.

Peach Salsa

1/2 bunch cilantro
2-3 green onions
2-3 jalapenos
salt
3 cloves garlic, minced
two pounds dead ripe peaches
1 avocado
lime juice

Clean and mince the first three ingredients and sprinkle with salt.
Skin, pit, and mash peaches and avocado.
Mix with lime juice and garlic.
Mix in the green ingredients.
Chill.

 

[onejayhawk]

Watermelon Punch

3-4 cups seedless watermelon, cubed or balled
1 package red colored gelatin
1 liter ginger ale or lemon-lime soda

Purée melon, gelatin, and 1 cup soda in a blender
Strain through a sieve onto ice
Add remaining soda, stir briefly and serve

Use the pulp for ice cubes

Grape-sicles

Remove seedless grapes from stems and rinse well
Place on a cookie sheet
While still wet, sprinkle with instant lemonade (eg CountryTime)
Freeze
Remove from the sheet with a spatula and store frozen in a bag or container

Any color of grape will work. The instant lemonade is not necessary, but it makes the grapes popsicle-ish. Omit lemonade and use the grapes as ice cubes in wine or fruit drinks

 

[Sommerswerd]

On vacation with family in Martha's Vineyard. Taking advantage of the availability of relatively lower priced seafood

First day here. Lobster feast. Boiling the lobsters with a good amount of butter in the water does wonders for the flavour, and elimminates the need for dipping-butter. I paired with summer corn, also boiled with butter, and steamed broccoli. Came out great.

 

[Samson]

On vacation with family in Martha's Vineyard. Taking advantage of the availability of relatively lower priced seafood

First day here. Lobster feast. Boiling the lobsters with a good amount of butter in the water does wonders for the flavour, and elimminates the need for dipping-butter. I paired with summer corn, also boiled with butter, and steamed broccoli. Came out great.View attachment 602951

That is a massive pile of lobsters, I am envious.

The other day I had some milk that was going off, so I tried making yogurt for the first time. I never realized it was so easy. Milk on the turn + teaspoon live yogurt + 48 hours somewhere warm = load of yogurt.

 

[Gorbles]

That was me with sundried tomatoes. Slice, salt, spread on a baking tray, shove in the over on an extremely low heat for about 2 hours (the recipe said 250 F / 120 C, but I went as low as 100 - 110 C because they were crisping too fast. We have a pretty new oven, and apparently low heats can be a bit inconsistent anyway).

Seasoned halfway through with a bunch of oregano, thyme and basil. Came out fantastic. Used them on a variety of pizzas (homemade apart from the dough) and in some pesto pasta.

 

[Zkribbler]

Spaghetti & chocolate ice cream flavored burp. I could have lived without that.

 

[Zardnaar]

I still remember exactly why:

KFCs chicken is too greasy for my tastes. The spice mixture is boring. The quality of the chicken is absolutely disgusting. I only went to KFC three or four times in my entire life and on two occasions I was served something that looked like a fried fetus (this happens not-so-rarely. Is it quality control that screwed up? or are the people paid so little that they don't care? who knows). Popeyes chicken is bad quality, but still better, relatively speaking. Popeyes also had okay sauces, nothing special, and a pretty nice bun. I think it's the bun and the meat quality which makes the biggest difference for me. I also prefer Popeyes' breading.

KFC are cool insofar as they make their mistreatment of lifestock public. I thought that was a big balls move. I'm absolutely positive that other fast food chains have similiarly disgusting living conditions for their chicken.

KFC is better here but inconsistent. If you go in while it's quiet and request fresh chicken and chips with extra seasoning.

Also they do burgers and chicken wraps which are legit nice.

Americans seem to like our McDonalds and Dominos. Better quality ingredients.

McDinda has a coue of nie options like an Angus beef burger and I like the 1/4 pounder.

Indian McDonald's looks nice.

 

[Quintillus]

It's been awhile since we posted anything we cooked! This week, I've made spinach lasagna roll-ups (you roll up the ricotta/spinach/mozzarella/egg filling inside of each lasanga noodle, with tomato sauce on top, and bake the whole thing in the oven), and an Austrian mohnstrudel - poppyseed strudel. The former is a family favorite since we discovered the recipe in the early 2010's; the latter is from a mix but the first item of its sort that I've made, and turned out well.

Next is likely bucatini all'Amatriciana. I have some spare guanciale from the local Italian market (they finally sell the authentic Italian style, and not just the southern style smoked pork jowl), as well as some spare pecorino romano from the same store, and what better dish to use it for? Well, maybe rigatoni alla zozzona or cacio e pepe for the pecorino, but I've already made those recently.

After that, I'm planning to make paneer jalfrezi (Gopher link) for the first time. There's an Indian market near me as well as the Italian, and I love a good jalfrezi. 2020 was the year of cream for me; 2021 was the year of chicken; I hope 2022 may be the year of Indian cuisine (I may wind up trying onejayhawk's recipe for butter chicken on the previous page). Though Italian is always going to be a contestant for my next recipe. I'm already planning for a pasta alla valdostana, from the least-populous region of Italy next to the French and Swiss borders. I may have got a friend addicted to this recipe and purchased a small ham and some Fontina for it tonight.

The paneer jalfrezi is the only recipe of the linked recipes I haven't made; I'd recommend all the others from experience. Though I reduce the ricotta and mozzarella to 2 cups in the lasagna; it's more convenient from a purchasing standpoint, and I still struggle to fit all the filling in.

 

[Samson]

This week I have been mostly eating pheasant drumsticks. They were £1/Kg at the posh butchers, so I bought a load. I have done them a number of ways, fried, roast and in a stew. They are delicious, but kind of hard work with the tendons.

 

[Quintillus]

That reminds me, I want to try Cornish game hen. They're somewhat common locally, despite being nowhere near Cornwall. I reckon it would be a good addition to my repertoire, and probably tasty as well. Thought about picking one up tonight, but the store I was at only had them in packs of two.

 

[Azem.Ocram]

I was so exhausted after cooking tameles yesterday, I forgot to tell anyone

 

[warpus]

I cooked some Hoisin roasted peanut shanghai noodles sort of stirfry with pork, bok choy, and other veggies earlier today. It really hit the spot and I've already had a 2nd portion for a late dinner

 

[Quintillus]

Went on a recipe discovery kick last night and found about a dozen more than I want to try, mostly Italian or British but with some French, American, German, and Slovenian in there for good measure. Bought the ingredients to make a homemade pesto tonight; rather than basil I'll be starting out with a rocket pesto (arugula for the North Americans on the boards, which includes me but it sounds more fun to say rocket pesto).

But tonight I'll be making penna alla vodka with a cardamom crumb cake for dessert. The former is way better with a homemade vodka sauce than storebought and is pretty easy, and the latter is a treat that I make infrequently, but always enjoy when I do. Seemed like a good combo to make for a celebratory occasion.

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I might be interested in a link for that dish, warpus. I was just thinking the other day that I should make Singapore mei fun again, but I really ought to branch out my east Asian cuisine as well, and already have some Hoisin sauce on hand.

 

[MaryKB]

Chicken parm sliders.

 

[Sommerswerd]

That reminds me, I want to try Cornish game hen. They're somewhat common locally, despite being nowhere near Cornwall. I reckon it would be a good addition to my repertoire, and probably tasty as well. Thought about picking one up tonight, but the store I was at only had them in packs of two.

So good. Little mini chickens. Like personal size pizzas... personal size chickens

I made some sautéed kale to go with the rest of dinner tonight... pot roast, with quartered red potatoes and sliced carrots. I didn't make any of the latter stuff... it was premade by a local grocer, but the kale I cooked myself.

I diced yellow onion and added some baby bella mushrooms, the tiny ones whole, the larger ones I separated the caps from the stems, and began to caramelize that all in olive oil. Once the onion was coated I added a chunk of bacon, let it fry up and start to melt its fat, then I added the kale, let that reduce a little then added a little water to steam the kale. Salt and crushed red pepper for seasoning. It came out really good. I didn't think to take a picture as I was just trying to get my kids fed. , but the kale had a nice forest green colour, not the olive drab of overcooked green vegs. Next time I will try to remember to take a pic, as I think this is going to be my new jam.

 

[Quintillus]

That sounds pretty good. Chopping the kale first? I need to diversify my side dish/veggie side of cooking, how it often goes is I make a good main dish but then if there's a side, it's either bread and butter or a salad.

I did wind up making the rocket/arugula pesto. I wouldn't put it above basil, but wow, it's actually pretty easy to make pesto at home. I went 50/50 on the traditional/modern method of preparation, using a mortar and pestle to crush some pine nuts and a couple cloves of garlic, and then using an immersion blender to mix the rocket, olive oil, and parmesan with the pine nuts and garlic. The sauce was ready before the pasta. One of the great things was by making it at home, you can control how oily you want it to be; a fair amount of store-bought pesto in jars is too oily for my preference, and I don't buy it often enough to reliably remember which brands those are.

Buckwheat pancakes for breakfast this morning. Served with maple syrup and freshly cut strawberries on top. Very good, and I'll have breakfast tomorrow as well.

 

[Samson]

So good. Little mini chickens. Like personal size pizzas... personal size chickens

I made some sautéed kale to go with the rest of dinner tonight... pot roast, with quartered red potatoes and sliced carrots. I didn't make any of the latter stuff... it was premade by a local grocer, but the kale I cooked myself.

I diced yellow onion and added some baby bella mushrooms, the tiny ones whole, the larger ones I separated the caps from the stems, and began to caramelize that all in olive oil. Once the onion was coated I added a chunk of bacon, let it fry up and start to melt its fat, then I added the kale, let that reduce a little then added a little water to steam the kale. Salt and crushed red pepper for seasoning. It came out really good. I didn't think to take a picture as I was just trying to get my kids fed. , but the kale had a nice forest green colour, not the olive drab of overcooked green vegs. Next time I will try to remember to take a pic, as I think this is going to be my new jam.

I have this radical theory. It applies to kale cooked like you did it, old red cabbage boiled with dried fruit, sugar and vinegar, and old white cabbage made into coleslaw with mayo, nuts and dried fruit. These are recipes designed for the middle of winter when all you have is the old tough barasica because you are poor and you need calories. So the recipes add loads of human effort and calories to old tough barasica and managed to make it really nice. In this day and age when you can get fresh young cabbage year round, and it is frequently the cheapest option, you can always swap the old tough brassica for young cabbage and the product will be nicer, or you can put in less effort and calories and it be just as nice.

 

[warpus]

Damn y'all have been cooking up a storm. I can taste those parm sliders just by looking at them.

I made some Mee Goreng lookalike w/ ground beef, sweet peppers, asian greens, and spiced peanuts. What made this dish are the made from scratch shanghai noodles, although it wasn't me who made them. The package they arrived in made it look as though they were made by a person and not a machine though. Maybe it's my imagination, but they came out really good. The sauce was key too (garlic, ginger, ponzu lime sauce, sweet soy sauce), but the texture of the noodles is just soo good.

 

[Ferocitus]

Kugelis, for Lithuanian Independence Day.

 

[Sarin]

Given the current events, the decoration is a bit tasteless.