Day 18: Lamb Chops with Crossover Spice Crust, Melted Greens with Ricotta, No-Cook Whole Wheat Couscous

I can definitely see the grocery prices going UP, UP, UP during this project. To save money on this one, I confess I did NOT get the $5 EACH organic lamb chops and instead substituted the $5 for 4 organic pork chops instead.

Lamb Chops (ok, Pork Chops) with Crossover Spice Crust
Melted Greens with Ricotta variation
No-Cook Whole Wheat CouscousI will key my eye open for when the lamb chops are on sale and then try this again with lamb. But I figured I could get a similar crust with pork and I think the substitute worked out well.

This is a VERY easy recipe for lamb (or pork). Make their recommended Crossover Spice Blend (1 part black pepper to 2 parts ground cumin to 4 parts ground coriander). Combine a couple tablespoons of this with 1 tablespoon coarse sea salt. Rub it on both sides of your chops, saving a little bit of the spice blend on the side.

Heavily film a pan with olive oil. Warm the oil on medium-high and then sear the chops for 3 minutes on each side. Continue cooking at medium for an additional 6-9 minutes, turning occasionally, until they are cooked to your liking. Dust the cooked chops with additional spice and a squeeze of lemon.

This made a very nice crust on the pork and the crossover blend is a nice change from your basic American rubs.

On the side I made my favorite Melted Greens with Kale. Again, this is garlic and dried chile quickly cooked in warm oil and then add your ripped, clean greens and 1/3 cup of broth or water. Cook, covered, for 15 minutes or so, and add more water if you need to. Add salt and pepper to taste at the end. The variation here is to finish the cooked greens with a few tablespoons of ricotta. I thought it was fine, but the small container of ricotta cost $5 and now I have to find something else to do with the rest of it before it goes bad. Trevor's critique was that the variation with bacon was much, much better.

The first time I made the melted greens, the chile gave a spectacular little buzz on the lips and I haven't recreated this in the four times since that I have made it. This time I even added another chile and I still couldn't taste anything but ricotta and kale. Maybe the bacon fat carried the heat a little better.

Finally, I made the No-cook whole wheat couscous. The principle here is that couscous is already cooked. So take 2 cups of whole wheat couscous, mix it with a 1/2 teaspoon of salt and drizzle with a 1/2 cup of water. Gently toss to coat and then let it stand a few minutes before adding another 1/2 cup. Repeat the process until 2-3 cups water is absorbed to your liking.

OK, this was easy to make and to fit in with cooking my other items, but it was SOOOOOO boring. Maybe the key is to do this first and then saute some onions and garlic and spices in chicken broth and then add the couscous and heat it up. Room temperature, and without flavorings, it was bland. I poured some of the pork juices on it to flavor it a little. Also, 2 cups is A LOT. I made it will just 1 cup of couscous and it was plenty for our meal and for leftovers the next day.

36 recipes down in How to Eat Supper.

DAY 17: The Quintessential Pesto with Risotto

I decided to take it easy this night and make only ONE dish that required constant vigilance.

The Quintessential Pesto with Risotto

Many people are intimidated by risotto, I know I used to be, because it requires you to stir constantly while you are making the dish. It is fairly easy once you get going, but you need to make sure if you are making any other dishes to make those first! Then give all of your attention to the risotto.

This recipe starts with you making the pesto first. And thankfully, it is your basic pesto. Food process garlic and salt first. Then add your basil, pine nuts and cheeses. Here they recommend Fiore Shado sheep cheese and Parmigiano-reggiano. I couldn't find the sheep cheese even at my fancy grocer, so I just used Parmigiano. Then add your olive oil, making a rough paste. Set this aside.

Now one trick to risotto is make it in the heaviest pan you have so that it won't be as likely to burn. I also keep the heat a little lower than recommended.

Start by heating your oil or butter. Saute the chopped onions for 3 minutes. Then add the garlic and the Arborio rice. Cook for another 3 minutes, stirring frequently. And now the risotto cooking begins. Add some white wine and cook that down. Then you add your chicken broth 1 cup at a time and wait until it cooks down before adding the next cup of broth. If you start with 1 heaping cup of rice, then you will need up to 4 cups of broth.

Do not stop stirring!

Even if it seems fine and you walk away for as little as 30 seconds, you can come back to a stuck and burning pan. There is no trick or fancy cooking here, it is just simple stirring. But it goes fairly quickly and is done in about 20 minutes.

Take the risotto off the heat when it is still a little soupy. It will continue to cook as you let it sit for 3 minutes. Then fold in the pesto and some reserved pine nuts. I added thin sliced basil and shaved Parmigiano on top as a garnish. This was yummy and made a minimal amount of dishes dirty. Always a good thing.

33 recipes down in How to Eat Supper.

Day 16: Pan-Crisped Deviled Eggs, Warm White Bean Salad, Rainbow and nut Macaroons

When you need to catch up on your cooking blog, just have a big party and it will force you to make a whole bunch of food.

Pan-Crisped Deviled Eggs on French Lettuces
Warm White Bean Salad with Fragrant Garlic and Rosemary
Rainbow Macaroons
Coconut Nut Macaroons

I haven't cooked much in the last few days. We have been building a new deck off our new kitchen and that was keeping us pretty busy and so the solution was to have a big potluck to celebrate the new deck. I wanted to make items that could be easily snacked upon.

We tried the Pan-Crisped Deviled Eggs at the Splendid Table party that inspired me to do this project and let me say these babies do not disappoint. This is a very basic deviled egg recipe--hard cooked eggs stuffed with the yolks mixed with mayo, white wine vinegar, milk, garlic, and mustard--but the twist is that you brown the tops of them by throwing them face down in olive and sauteing them. It is a little nerve-wracking at first because you think they are going to fall apart in the pan and ruin all of your hard work. But if you pack the stuffing well into the eggs they do not fall apart at all. Also, I chilled them for a couple hours before browning them and that seemed to help them stay in one piece. Then you serve them with a sauce you make with half of the yolk stuffing mixed with olive oil, mustard, vinegar, and milk. These disappeared from the buffet table almost instantaneously. Everyone was surprised that they were pan-fried. You are supposed to serve them on lettuces mixed with the dressing but I just put the dressing on the side and guests could put a dollop of it directly on the eggs.

The warm white bean salad was not quite as impressive as the eggs, but it was tasty as well. The salad is extremely simple. Crush five cloves of garlic with 1/2 teaspoon of salt and then chop fine. Saute the garlic in 1/4 cup of olive oil over low heat so you don't burn it. This smells fabulous. I just stood over the stove, inhaling deeply at this point. Stir in the rosemary and then add the white beans. You have to cook this gently because you can smash up the beans pretty easily if you aren't careful. Add some mixed greens and just wilt them before taking off the heat.
The finale of this dish is the topping which you make in adavance. Take one piece of whole-grain bread and pulverize it in the food processor. Toast this in a saute pan, no oil, turning constantly until you have nice cooked bread crumbs. Then mix that with grated parmigiano and black pepper. Spread out on top of beans. Yummy.

I made a double batch of macaroons and made the coconut nut variation--just add chopped almonds--and the rainbow variation--just add food coloring. The nut macaroons were delicious as expected. I used almond extract instead of vanilla which added to the chopped almond taste. But I have to say the rainbow macaroons looked pretty disgusting. I am not sure if the authors actually made this variation or they just thought it was a good idea. Nobody ate any of the weird, colored ones and there were a lot of kids at the party too!

On a side note, my friend Karen showed up with a plate of ribs and stole the show. They were tasty and disappeared as fast as the alcohol.

Refreshing drink: Mix one part Pimm's with two parts lime-ade. Serve over ice with a lime and a sprig of rosemary.32 recipes down in How To Eat Supper.

Day 15:Flash Chicken Saute with Cider and Almonds, Green Beans with Preserved Lemon and Black Olives

Not every meal is destined to be a fabulous meal. Do not assume the cooking times given will work for you!

Flash Chicken Saute with Cider and Almonds
Green Beans with Preserved Lemon and Black Olives

This was one of those meals where I was trying to cook too many things at once and the recipe times given in the cookbook were way off.

Flash Chicken saute is an interesting recipe. First you cook down some chicken broth that you will use later in the sauce. At first it was taking forever to boil down, I turned away for a minute, and when I came back it was practically all gone and the pan was burning. Ok, try number two, and this time I hovered over the pan. After cooking down the broth, you set it aside and wipe down your pan. Then you brown your organic, boneless, skinless, insanely expensive, chicken breasts. This recipe said to brown them, then cook them uncovered for 4 minutes each side. Well I did this and this is where things started to go terribly wrong. After the 10 minutes or so cooking time, when you are supposed to take the meat off the oven, my breasts were completely raw in the middle. I had already started the beans and also some melted greens, so I threw some white wine in the pan and covered it to poach the chicken a little quicker. Maybe they used extremely thin breasts for their cooking, but it ended up taking another 5 minutes to get these gigantic pieces of chicken cooked. And then you aren't even done yet. You put the chicken in the oven, covered to keep it warm and then you have to make the sauce.

Now you have to take cider vinegar, a LOT of cider vinegar (1 cup) and boil it down to 1/4 cup! I don't think they allowed any time for this in the recipe, but it took me a good 7 minutes. Then you added the reserved chicken broth, cook for another 2 minutes, add a little butter, swirl to melt and immediately pour over the chicken. Top with chopped, salted almonds. WHEW!

The recipe said there was 15 minutes stove time, but it ended up being more like 25 minutes, NOT counting re-reducing the chicken broth in the beginning.

This was actually fairly simple and straightforward, if you are cooking it by itself. But I was also trying to time the green beans and the kale with the chicken. I even waited a while before starting them, but they still ended up overcooked.

The green beans are a variation on the yummy beans with lemon, garlic, and parmigiano gremolata I made last week. But instead of those flavorings, you use preserved lemon, cilantro, and olives. Now this is exactly the same combo that we loved so much on the pork tenderloin two weeks ago. But it was way too strong for these green beans. I think the preserved lemon needs something fatty to balance it out. It was just too tart here.

The pot of the melted greens burned, but luckily the greens themselves were okay.

The chicken turned out very good. The cider-broth sauce wasn't as strong as I thought it was going to be and the almonds were a nice touch. I need to make this again but maybe I'll serve it with a salad that I make in advance, to avoid imitating a whirling dervish again.

28 recipes down in How To Eat Supper.

Day 14: Cheese-Gilded Linguine with Smoky Tomatoes

At first this recipe seems like a boring tomato/cheese pasta dish. But the trick is tossing the linguine with the cheese before adding the tomato sauce.

Cheese-Gilded Linguine with Smoky Tomatoes

I have been making some of the more complicated items from How to Eat Supper and I wanted to cook something a little simpler for dinner. Like I said above, at first glance this looks like a fairly straight forward pasta recipe.

Cook up some bacon. Drain bacon on paper towels and pour off all but a couple of tablespoons of bacon fat. Saute a chopped onion with salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes until it starts to brown. I added a dried red chile at this point which is not called for but I think added significantly in the dish. Add 5 minced garlic cloves and cook a minute more before adding 2-3 pounds of chopped tomatoes and the bacon, chopped. You can use canned or fresh tomatoes here, I used canned. Their preferred trick with canned tomatoes is to use whole canned tomatoes and then smash them with your wooden spatula as you put them in the pan.

Cook the sauce until nice and bubbly, 8 minutes or so. I kept it on warm while cooking the linguine. The recipe calls for 1 lb of linguine, but we found the sauce to be on the short side with that much pasta. Next time I might just use 3/4 or even just 1/2 of a package. Mix the cooked pasta with one cup of grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese before tossing with the pasta.

This was a nice simple meal. The whole dried chile I added gave a nice, subtle, and smoky spice and mixing the cheese in first guarantees that the cheese flavor is predominate in the dish. I am going to cook leftovers with meatballs tonight. (Grass fed-organic meat of course!)

One funny side note: The pictures are few and far between in this cookbook. Many of the recipes and more complicated techniques have no picture at all. And I have to admit that it is usually a photo that entices me to make something out of a cookbook. But for this recipe they took the time to show how to toss pasta with cheese! They are nice photos of course, but I just thought it was funny.

26 recipes down in How to Eat Supper.

Day 13: Edna Lewis's Sugared Raspberries

Edna Lewis's Sugared Raspberries

Now this is meant to be a preserving thing without any cooking. Just mix 2 cups raspberries with 2 cups sugar. Use a fork to mash up the berries. It basically looks like freezer jam. Now if you throw it in a jar (without normal canning procedures) and refrigerate, and it is supposed to last for many months for you to eat in the winter.

I admit I only made a half recipe because the raspberries are so amazingly perfect right now, we eat all that come into our lives immediately. My mom used to do this with strawberries when I was a kid (for eating right away--not saving) and I thought it was a waste of fresh tasting strawberries. I feel the same way with raspberries. Maybe it will be a little bit of heaven in January but I don't think I'll find out since I don't have any extra raspberries to spare! Maybe my friend Jenn who grows raspberries will want to try this.

I poured a little over some mango sorbet and it wasn't bad.

25 recipes down in How to Eat Supper.

Day 12: Roasted Chicken Breasts with Preserved Lemon, Green Beans w/ Gremolata, and Honey Mustard Vinaigrette

The preserved lemon is key in the chicken recipe. You CANNOT substitute normal lemons, but it is worth the effort to track down the hard to find preserved ones.

Roasted Chicken Breasts with Preserved Lemon
Green Beans with Lemon, Garlic, and Parmigiano Gremolata
Honey Mustard Vinaigrette

I am starting a new plan of attack with these recipes. Many of the recipes, while so simple at first glance, actually contain items that are quite expensive. So I am looking through the book and trying to cluster all of the recipes that, say, used preserved lemon or fresh basil. This sounds simple enough, but so far I have been mostly just picking items that sounded good for dinner that night. Onto the recipes....

I have been intrigued by this roasted chicken recipe that used preserved lemons since I first opened the cookbook. What were preserved lemons, why hadn't I noticed them before? Turns out they cost almost $7 for just two of them, so that might have had a lot to do with why I hadn't used them before! I keep reading that they are used quite a bit in Moroccan cooking. And the clincher is, they are so easy to make very, very cheaply- they're just salt and lemons! But they take 3 weeks to preserve and I wanted to try my recipe now.

This is one of the most successful dishes I have made so far out of this cookbook. You start with 1/2 -3/4 of a preserved lemon, chop that up in the food processor with olive oil, cilantro, garlic, and cumin seeds. Spread this mixture over bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts, sprinkle with lots of pepper, then slow roast for close to an hour at 300 F, basting occaisionally. I didn't even baste until the end because the lemon mixture stayed right on the breasts. The chicken came out so flavorful and juicy, it is hard to describe how juicy. I guess it is the combination of the skin-on, bone-in and the slow roasting that does the trick. And the preserved lemon does not disappoint! It was tangy, it was salty, it was lemony without the pucker face, is all I can say.

The green beans were a really nice match for the chicken because they had lemon and garlic and well. Quick saute the beans in olive oil first and then add a little water and cook, covered for 15 minutes or so. Food process the zest of 1 lemon, a handful of flat-leaf parsley, garlic, salt, and pepper. Add just half the mix to the cooking beans. Mix the other half with a 1/2 cup of grated parmigiano. When you take the beans off, toss with the remaining lemon/cheese mix. Again, this was easy and tasty and went well with the chicken.

Finally, I wanted to try another salad dressing and the Honey Mustard variation on the basic vinaigrette did not disappoint. I hand whisked up all of the ingredients in a little bowl and tossed just before serving. The secret with this one is that just a little bit of mayo made it nice and creamy.

Hands down this was Trevor's favorite meal so far. I was pretty happy with it too.

24 recipes down in the Splendid Table's How To East Supper.

Day 11: Black Pepper-Honey Steak and Moroccan Chermoula Vinaigrette Dressing

Nothing is better on a hot day than a crisp salad topped with steak, cooked rare and sliced thin.

Black Pepper-Honey Steak
Moroccan Chermoula Vinaigrette

We just started ordering grass-fed beef from a little farm over in Walla Walla (Thundering Hooves) and this cookbook only has one steak recipe, surprisingly, so I wanted to try both steak and recipe at the same time.

This starts with sitting the steak (whatever cut is your preference, I used top sirloin) in a basic marinade of red wine, honey, garlic, and pepper. I let it sit for about 20 minutes while I prepared the dressing and the salad. Dry off the steak before you saute it in olive oil and toss the marinade. (You could probably cook down the marinade for a sauce, but I followed the recipe on this one.) I didn't cook this as long as they recommended as I wanted it to be a little on the rare side and these were pretty thin steaks.

I was worried that with such a quick marinade that I wouldn't taste the honey or wine much. But, happily, I was wrong. The honey gives it a delicately sweet, caramelized effect. You add salt and pepper while cooking as well and I wish I had added a lot more pepper. But over all this was a pretty easy and different way to cook a steak. Again, I think grilling this would have given a better texture and next time I make this I will be sure to try that.

I didn't want a big old steak by itself, so I sliced it on top a simple salad made from all of our farm share odds and ends that were mixed with the Moroccan Chermoula Vinaigrette, one of the many variations on a basic vinaigrette in the cookbook.

The chermoula is very similar to the Argentinian chimichurri sauce I frequently make to cook steak and chicken in, so it was interesting to try the same flavors atop a salad. I love the smell of cilantro, garlic, vinegar, and olive oil. It doesn't get much better than this. They recommended letting the dressing sit 20 minutes before using to mellow out the flavors. That happened just in the natural order of me cooking things and it tasted delicious.

Another weird note, this cookbook always says coriander leaves instead of cilantro. (Yes, yes, I know it is technically the same thing) Is that another mid-west thing?

21 recipes down in How To Cook Supper.

Day 10: Chicken Curry with Gentle Spices, Thai Cantaloupe Salad with Chile, Sally's Coconut Macaroons (chocolate variation)

These recipes have the longest names, I feel like I am writing a novel just putting the title up!

Chicken Curry with Gentle Spices
Crossover Spice Blend
Thai Cantaloupe Salad with Chile
Sally's Coconut Macaroons (Chocolate Variation)

OK, despite the long-winded, overly descriptive names, these were all supercalifragilisticexpialidocious delicious. The chicken curry is very easy to make and one of the least expensive recipes in the whole book, I think. The idea is to blend up your own curry paste out of fresh ginger, garlic, onion, tomatoes, chiles, and spices. This is not like the bright red mystery curry paste from the grocery store. They recommend their own Crossover Spice Blend as the base, but once I made it, it justed tasted like a simple garam masala, a spice easily obtainable from any asian or middle eastern market. I ended up adding some of my favorite garam masala my sister brought me from Dubai. Then the curry had a lot more punch.

This curry is a yogurt base and you have to cook with whole fat plain yogurt, no trying to go low fat here or it won't work. First, you cook the curry spice blend in oil with onion and then cook it and cook it and cook it until the oil separates from the curry. Now they tell you not to hurry past this step and that it should take about 10 minutes to "break" the sauce. I had to cook it for nearly 15 minutes before it looked like the oil was pooling out separately. And I never was really sure I got it right, a photo in the cookbook might have been helpful in explaining what you are supposed to look for.

This cookbook is short on photos of the actual process and sometimes you need that if you have never made what they are describing. Next, you add about half the yogurt and again, you have to cook it and cook it and cook it until the yogurt nearly cooks away and becomes very thick. Finally, you add the chopped, boneless (organic-preferred of course) chicken thighs and the remaining yogurt and simmer until the chicken is cooked. Then you spoon out the chicken and keep cooking the sauce until the oil separates once again. Pour the sauce over the chicken, garnish with cilantro, and poof! Perfect, delicious, not too spicy curry. This was a crowd pleaser and I want to try it with pork or white fish. Tofu would probably be good too.

I served simple brown rice on the side (cooked the Splendid Table--boiling like pasta---way) along with zucchini quick sauted in chiles and oil.

The curry was pretty high maintenance, easy to make, but you had to stir it the whole time. So when it came to the Cantaloupe salad, I ignored the recommendation of making it right before you served it. Instead, I made it before I started the curry and chilled it in the fridge until we were ready to eat. I tossed it again to re-coat the fruit and I thought it tasted great. It's very simple: cubed cantaloupe, thin sliced basil, fresh chile or jalapeno, lime juice, sugar, fish sauce (key, don't skip this!), and a pinch of sugar, salt, and pepper. Very colorful and exotic looking and the coolness of the cantaloupe was a nice balance to the curry.

For dessert I made Sally's Coconut Macaroons but one of the variations, adding chocolate chips to the batter. Again, these cooked far faster in my oven, 10-12 minutes faster than what the recipe calls for. These were even better than the plain batch I made last week. The chocolate barely melted and wasn't messy like I thought it would be and we ate nearly all of them. It was so easy to just grab another one. These are super easy to make and would be great to take to a party.

Luckily our friend Karen was there to help us eat all of this good, good food.

19 recipes down in How To Eat Supper.

Day 9: Tamarind-Glazed Pork Chops and Melted Greens

The only way I can describe tamarind is to say that it is like a bitter molasses--sour, smoky molasses. I've always enjoyed tamarind-flavored food in restaurants but it has been a couple years since I have used it at home.

Tamarind-Glazed Pork Chops
Melted Greens

This recipe is really a winner. Easy to make, inexpensive ingredients, and a little exotic at the same time. It just requires a little deeper pantry stocking of dried ancho peppers and tamarind concentrate. It was an effort to find the tamarind concentrate at my local uber-gourmet grocer, but it was only $4 and a little goes a very long way, so we will be enjoying these pork chops again soon.

Using thin pork chops is key and it cooks quickly so make sure you plan ahead whatever else you are making. For this dish you blend up the tamarind, a sweet dried chile, garlic, fish sauce (always my secret ingredient in sauces), sugar, dry white wine and a little water.

Sear the pork in a little oil, add marinade in the last few minutes of cooking to get it nice and bubbly and all over the pork, and that is it! I sauted them but I think they might have been tastier off the grill.

I paired it with the normal Melted Greens recipe, no bacon this time, and again, the chile pepper really made the kale stand out. This was a good combo with the garlic and chile in the pork sauce. I added white wine to the kale as well. I've now got a bottle of Hogue Fume Blanc in the fridge that is specifically for cooking since every other recipe in this cookbook uses wine.

I paired this with Otis Kenyon 2005 Matchless Red Wine from Walla Walla. I could drink a whole bottle of that wine by myself, but Trevor likes wine too, so I have to share.

15 recipes down in How To Eat Supper.

Day 8: Provencal Tuna Salad

It's summertime and the salad makings are easy.

Provencal Tuna Salad

This is your basic tuna salad: canned tuna, tomatoes, Kalamata olives, capers, red onion, and fresh dill tossed with olive oil and lemon juice. I had to cheat a little on this one. I thought I had capers, so I substituted the more tried and true white-trash-preferred pickles and it tasted just fine, thank you very much. I only had a couple bits of fresh dill from the farm share so I also added some dried which, honestly, didn't add much flavor at all.

I was on my own for lunch today so I halved the recipe which is easy on this one.

Very easy to make, I couldn't resist throwing in some broccoli and snap peas. I didn't bother eating it on bread or greens, I just ate it right out of the serving bowl. I think presentation would be nice if you spread out some greens and then piled this in the middle with garnishes of red onion rings and larger sprigs of dill.

But I was so hungry, I ate it and forgot to take a picture!

13 recipes down in How to Eat Supper. I think I have been a little lazy this week. We went out to dinner last night and we are going out tomorrow so I feel a big cooking frenzy coming on this weekend. I may need dinner guests...

Day 7: 21st-Century Mac 'N' Cheese

Why do cookbooks insist on so many recipes that are loaded with fat, cholesterol, and calories?

21st Century Mac 'N' Cheese

I had to go to an artist meeting/potluck last night so I thought this would be a good opportunity to make one of the fattier looking recipes. Something to please a crowd, but something you don't want to eat at home all the time.

I had to double this one but it definitely served more than the suggested serving size.

Basically it's lots and lots of full fat cheese mixed with milk (I used nonfat, I'm sure I wasn't supposed to), egg, onions, paprika, and red pepper flakes and then mixed with cooked elbow macaroni and put in a buttered casserole. The finale was mixing a lot of melted butter with crumbled saltines and sprinkling on top before baking for 25 minutes. It was extremely easy to make, but if you double it, mix the ingredients in your food processor in TWO BATCHES or you will make a big mess all over the counter like I did.

The paprika is really key here, it gave a lovely sweet smell. But again, one garlic clove just wouldn't cut it for me, so I quadrupled the garlic, red pepper flakes, and black pepper. I think it could be really good with chipotle or fresh basil thrown in. The gruyere and cream cheese added a nice taste but I went cheap on the cheddar since the gruyere was $8.40 and you couldn't taste it at all.

Why have only one recipe in your entire cookbook that uses saltines? I used 24 and now I have three of those sleeves left over. Anybody want them? Partially hydrogenated oil, yummy!

Needless to say, this was a big hit at the party and I only brought a tiny bit home which I scrambled up for breakfast with a left-over turkey burger. I forgot to bring the Tang beverage that probably would have been a nice retro touch. I think I'll have to make another variation of the simple salad tonight to combat the effects of mac 'n' cheese!


12 recipes down in The Splendid Tables HOW TO EAT SUPPER.

Day 6: Tomato-Cheddar-Packed Turkey Burgers

Do cookbook authors think more about the names of the recipes than the taste of the recipes?

Tomato-Cheddar-Packed Turkey Burgers

Now don't get me wrong, I actually liked this burger quite a bit. However, the whole bit about stuffing the burgers with the cheese was a bit silly. Sure it was fun to bite into the burger and have cheddar cheese squirt out, but the cheddar cheese added a lot to the flavor since without much spice, turkey is pretty bland. So I would have just preferred to put a big slice of cheddar on top and enjoy the cheese the whole meal.

But maybe sometimes it is all about trying to think of the next NEW EXCITING THING! instead of a just saying, you know a nice grilled onion-tomato-packed turkey burger with cheese on top is pretty darn good.

Also, I have to take this moment to complain about the poor quality of hamburger buns out there. I cannot, for the life of me, find a traditional looking hamburger bun that doesn't have high-fructose corn syrup as the second or third ingredient. I buy the whole wheat and they are still loaded with the stuff. And in the "healthy" section of the grocery store, there are no hamburger buns. Maybe they figure if you are going to eat a burger, you don't care about your health. And if you do ciabatta or some other hard roll, these delicate burgers would squish out all over the place. Maybe next time, I will just prepare them sans rolls and put garlic bread on the side.

11 recipes down in How To Eat Supper

Day 5: Dressing-In-A-Bowl Supper Salad

The evening after the 4th of July seemed like a perfect time for a simple salad after all the grilled meats, potato salads, cupcakes, and copious amounts of wine from the night before.

Dressing-In-A-Bowl Supper Salad

This seemed too easy to be something to make out of a cookbook, but this salad has a very nice, simple premise. You start by marinating chopped red onion and garbanzo beans in your salad bowl with vinegar, grainy mustard, and salt and pepper. Let that sit for a half an hour to mellow the onion while prepping the rest of the salad. Pick out your raw veggies, fresh herbs, meat or soy product if desired, and your preferred salad greens. I know there is a lot of discussion that tearing lettuce is better than chopping lettuce, but I like to chop my lettuce greens fairly small. I think it makes the salad look more sophisticated. Finally, add your olive oil and toss everything and serve immediately. I added some shaved parmesan on top and some left over Kalamata olives on the side and we had a simple meal that made us feel incredible healthy compared to the over-eating of the holiday.

I especially like the versatility of this dish because I have a great opportunity to use all those farm share veggies that have been stacking up in the fridge.

10 recipes down in How to Eat Supper.

Day 4: Pork Tenderloin with Black Olives and Orange, Three-pea Toss, and Working Mother's Barley

Whenever you want to impress dinner guests, pork tenderloin is a sure winner. I cook pork tenderloin frequently and it is nice to have a new recipe for it.

Pork Tenderloin with Black Olives and Orange
Three-Pea Toss
Working Mother's Barley

Since my last dinner pairings didn't go together so well, I decided to try one of the suggested menus listed instead the cover of the cookbook. These turned out very impressive and beautiful on the table together.

I had to double the pork recipe. Even then it was close having only 2 tenderloins for 4 people. There wasn't a single piece left over. The recipe called for stuffing the tenderloin with the garlic and orange zest mixture, then browning it before putting it in the oven. I cut the slits in the pork but only put half of the stuffing in before browning because I was afraid it might all fall out. Then after I browned them, I put the rest of the stuffing in. I was skeptical of all the orange and how it really would go together, but I dutifully followed the recipe. The white wine makes the orange juice sauce extra delicious but you have to watch it very, very carefully and add more liquid (I added wine) during cooking or it can easily burn. There was plenty of sauce for everyone to ladle lots of it all over their pork. The orange and the olives were a sweet and salty delight.

The Three-Pea Toss has few ingredients, but all are important enough that you shouldn't leave out any of them. Next time I would add more mint as most of us at the dinner table could barely taste it in the dish. The almonds were a nice, crunchy addition. I don't own a wok and I am not about to go buy one just for a couple of stir-frys in this cookbook and it worked out just fine in an extra large skillet.

The barley was incredibly easy to make. I cooked it in chicken broth, but then added water as it boiled down so it wouldn't burn. The extra orange/wine sauce from the pork tasted extremely good spooned onto the barley. I will start making barley much more often.

Cost wise, this looks like it is going to end up being an expensive project. The Kalamata olives, for example, were $4.80 and the almonds cost almost $6. I will have to look for another recipe with almonds so they don't go to waste. The barley was the best priced at less than a dollar per pound.

There was absolutely no leftovers from this dinner. Lots and lots of compliments on a relatively simple meal! The meal was rounded out with a Cabernet from Horse Heaven Hills and a puff pastry apple tart.

9 recipes down in How To Eat Supper.

Day 3: Pasta with Chopping-board Pesto, Melted Greens, and Gingerbread

If you take on a cooking project, half the recipes or make sure your husband takes leftovers to work so you don't eat two pieces of gingerbread for breakfast.

Pasta with Chopping-board Pistachio Pesto
Melting Greens with Bacon (variation)
Dark and Moist Gingerbread

Dinner was a garlic fiesta.

I am drawn to this pasta recipe for two major reasons.

First, I like the idea of pesto with pistachios, the flavor is different—saltier, roasted goodness-- and you get more of a crunch than with the traditional pine nuts.

Second, the authors recommend chopping everything together on the board at the same time. This is fun and a little messy because your chopping board gets a little full.

You start by chopping the salt, pepper, and garlic together and the smell is amazing. Then you slowly add ingredients until it is all there, one big sloppy, yummy mish-mash. One point of caution is that you barely cook the sauce so beware of the garlic if you have a breakfast meeting the next day! But we like garlic so I piled it on.

I used less pasta than they recommended (and I used whole wheat pasta because that never hurts) and it still didn’t seem like there was much sauce. But once the flavors were allowed to mingle with the pasta and cheese, it was pretty good.

I paired this with Melting Greens with the bacon variation. Basically, you cook coarsely chopped bacon in a big pot, then add chopped garlic and a dried red chile and then add water or broth and ripped up kale and cook for 10-15 minutes. I added a splash of white wine in the end as well, but that wasn’t in the recipe.

Now, if you are not a kale fan, this recipe will make you one. I already cook something similar like this every week in summer and fall because we get so much kale from our farm share but the added chile was an interesting twist. DO NOT LEAVE OUT THE CHILE! At the end of cooking, you remove the chile, but when we bit into the kale, there was a delightful tangy bit of heat on the tongue that took this recipe to a whole new level. I may never be able to make kale again without throwing in a chile.

The greens were a little strong paired with the pesto pasta. Next time I might just put the pasta with some steamed or roasted veggies on the side. The greens could be good next to a steak or pork chops. We topped off the meal by drinking a bottle of Clos du Val Cabernet Sauvignon. That really made me think about steak.

I knew I wouldn’t be cooking the next evening because we are going to an art opening so I wanted to squeeze in another recipe so I don’t fall behind in the cookbook.

Dark and Moist Gingerbread

This gingerbread is extremely easy to make and comes out fluffy and moist just like they promised. And it is cooked in a square cake pan instead of a bread pan so it is more like cake. I prefer bread shaped, however, because you can slice it thin and put butter and jam on the slices.

An interesting twist calls for black pepper in the spice mix and it made the flavors a little stronger. This is not a wimpy gingerbread flavor. Instead of serving it with whipped cream, I dusted it with powdered sugar and topped it off with sliced mint and strawberries, yum!

Six recipes down in How to Eat Supper!

DAY 2: Plumped Ginger-Caramel Shrimp and Dumbed-Down Rice

Never trust the cooking and prep times that you are given in a cookbook!

Plumped Ginger-Caramel Shrimp and Dumbed-down Rice

The shrimp calls for either peeled OR un-peeled shrimp. Expect to add 15 minutes to the recipe if you have to peel the pesky little critters. And I prefer to peel my own shrimp because it is 50% cheaper. I just can’t bring myself to spend $17/lb for prepared shrimp.

This recipe also had an interesting step of soaking the shrimp (By the size of them, I would call them prawns, but maybe it is a mid-west thing to call them shrimp.)---anyways, the first step is to soak the shrimp in a brine made of water, sea salt, chile powder, and sugar. I was skeptical, but after draining the bathing beauties, they did have a really pleasant smell and chile powder speckle to them. However, the amount of garlic and ginger in the sauce really overpowers the delicacy of the brine I think, but maybe the brine soak has some other shrimp-plumping power.

The recipe declared these were going to be delicious and they were not lying. A caramelized sauce of sugar, ginger, and garlic over lots of fat, juicy shrimp was spectacular. Overall, it was very easy to make with no special skills. My only complaint was there wasn’t enough sauce for the shrimp. I added a couple tablespoons of water during cooking to stretch it.

I did screw up the timing on the dumbed-down rice. The whole concept is to boil rice in A LOT of water, undercook it a bit, drain it, and let it sit for another 5 minutes before fluffing. But at their 10 minute cook time my long-grained white rice was still pretty crunchy. So the shrimp ended up having to sit for 6 minutes more before the rice was done. And dumbed-down rice is just boring white rice. I like a little more character in my rice. I am still, however, looking forward to the leftovers for lunch.

I also wanted to make the Ripe Tomato Stack with Pine Nuts and Mozzarella but upon getting home from my bike ride to the grocery store, I realized I had no currants. As I want to make everything authentically from the cookbook (at least once), the tomato stacks will have to wait. Instead we had a nice sugar snap pea, tomato, basil, and mozzarella salad on the side.

The biggest issue with this project is the constant grocery list making. We belong to a farm share that I have to pick up today and I will have to see if any of the ingredients we get matches any recipes before I head back to the grocery store.

3 recipes down in The Splendid Table’s How to Eat Supper.

Day 1: Sally's Coconut Macaroons

Predictably, I start with dessert.

Sally’s Coconut Macaroons.

I have never been super successful with macaroons but when I saw this recipe has only 5 ingredients, I thought, perfect first recipe to jump into.

The first complaint I have about cookbooks, especially cookie recipes in cookbooks, is that they always say the recipe makes 24 or 36 and then you only get 12 or 15 out of them. That is one of the only bits of cooking advice I remember my mother ever giving me, “You’re lucky if you get half of what the recipe says you’ll get.” Now I realize it is most likely because the cookbooks want to make the per-serving calories look a lot less than it really is.

Sally said I could get 30 cookies. I ended up with 17, not counting the two I ate in raw batter. (Excellent batter by the way) So 19 total-which is better than my normal estimates.

My retro Frigidaire Flair oven is too hot so I set it to 300 F instead of 350 F, but the first batch still burned a little even though I took them out at 20 minutes instead of 25.

The second batch was perfect because I took them out at 15 minutes.

(Now if I had made them teaspoon size like the recipe called for, would they have cooked in 10 minutes?)

The second batch was perfectly golden, a nice crust on the outside and gooey and delicious on the inside. I was sad that I made this recipe first until I realized there were 5 more variations I will get to cook. I might even say there are 6 more variations since the main recipe said use vanilla or almond extract and I used vanilla. Now I can try them again with almond. Not a bad start. I am dreading the panna cotta because I have never really enjoyed panna cotta.

Check off one in How to Eat Supper.

Introduction to Cooking the Whole Cookbook

I have been thinking about this project for a few months now but wanted to start it after I finished the big mosaic project I was working on.

My inspiration comes from the Julie and Julia memoir my friend Julia (no relation to either Julie or Julia) gave me since she knows how much I love to cook. For those who have not yet come across this memoir, Julie and Julia chronicles a year of Julie Powell cooking EVERY SINGLE RECIPE in Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Childs in one calendar year.

I like the idea of cooking every recipe in a cookbook, of really becoming intimate with one person’s tastes and pursuits, but I don’t like the idea of purposely torturing myself with aspic and goat’s head or what have you. I wanted to enjoy what I was about to do; I wanted to inspire others to cook and give critiques on the recipes. Most cookbooks I own offer little inspiration than a couple of interesting recipes mixed in with a lot of filler. I wanted to cook good food from a good, simple cookbook.

And then The Splendid Table’s How to Eat Supper by Lynne Rosetto Kaspar and Sally Swift came out. The Splendid Table is a public radio cooking show that I adore and most of the recipes discussed on the show are doable and tasty to boot. My husband and I were invited to a private party in Seattle sponsored by our local public radio station (KUOW) where we got to eat some of the food from the book, hear Lynne herself speak, and as a little added bonus, we also received a signed copy of the book.

I had finally found my cookbook.

So for no special reason than perhaps it hit 92 degrees F today, I decided to turn on the oven this evening and start my quest to cook everything and all of it’s variations in How to Eat Supper. This cookbook doesn’t have half the recipes as the French cooking book has, so a year would be too long to loiter and dilly-dally.

This book has approximately 182 recipes, but there are so many variations I am not sure I made an exact count. I will not know how many there really are until I declare myself finished. ALSO, I want to have a little buffer in case I screw up a recipe and I want to do a do-over. I don’t want to race through these and learn how to make them badly.

So I am giving myself until Thanksgiving. 5 months. That is just a little over one recipe per day, which isn’t the most stressful schedule but will allow me time to cook some of the recipes a couple of times. And for the finale, I will pick my favorite recipes from the cookbook to recreate on Thanksgiving Day, my favorite holiday.