Easy does it.

Menu for 3/16:

• Tuna on sourdough with homemade hummus sandwiches

The Sandwiches:

Tuna in olive oil, minced celery, minced yellow onion, lemon juice, "good" mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, salt & pepper, hummus (ingredients to follow),  sourdough bread.

The Hummus:

Canned chickpeas, tahini or sesame sauce, minced garlic, lemon juice, Tabasco sauce, salt.


This recipe is from my Ina book. When we (my darling and I, not the royal 'we') first looked through this book we never considered looking at the lunch section. I think that we figured that since this whole project is about making him dinner then we should look at only dinner recipes. HA! We're adults! We could have ice cream for dinner if we want! Therefore we are living on the edge this week with this LUNCH recipe. Daring, I know. If I had an ice cream maker I think that I would make ice cream for dinner one of these nights and he would be over the moon. Alas though, I do not own an ice cream maker. *sigh*

Back to the recipe! This was one of the ones that we both agreed sounded om nom and since I am no stranger to making hummus from scratch, it doesn't seem like it will be all that difficult. I have to say that as of late the ease factor of a given recipe is a large part of whether I pick it or not. On weeks such as 10,8,7, and 4, I was nearly falling asleep while eating. So that fact coupled with the fact that I have been waking up at about ten of five in the morning to go to the gym at least twice a week makes the ease factor a huge deciding point. That and this one is rather healthy compared to some of the others that I have prepared for him *cough cough* steak *cough cough*. 

I am planning on trying to stick to the letter of these recipes. I will tell you that I did omit the cornichons from the tuna because pickles give me heartburn like none other. It's weird, I love cucumbers (in my world they are called crunchy water) and I love dill and I love vinegar, but put them together and my body revolts and tries to burn itself from the inside out. Sad in a way. I have already asked him if he wanted them and he said no as well, so it is a mutual thing.Tahini has proved to be a difficult find so I have compensated and bought yogurt as a substitute. From my earlier hummus making experience I know that it is fine to use. I will still go out and look for it but I am not holding out much hope. I have to get Tabasco sauce too, preferably the smoked kind.

For easy shopping I took pictures of the recipe with my camera phone so I could see the ingredients. I might do that from now on and publish them at the end of my 'finished product' posts. I don't know though, what do you guys think?

43-10

Ingredients.

Egg noodles boiling.

Stirring

Adding butter.

Adding heavy cream.

The Cheese!

Finished in the pan.

Butter and garlic.

Add shrimp

Scampi sauce.

Fettuccine on the plate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finished Meal.

I honestly can not believe that I am ten meals into this thing and still going strong. I am rather proud of myself when I think about it. huh. Anyway, here is my from scratch fettuccine alfredo and shrimp scampi. This one actually posed more of a challenge than I thought it was going to. After reading the really short recipes in the 70's-riffic cookbook that I bought I thought that these where going to be a snap. I think that they would have been if I took them a little more seriously than I did. Normally when I cook from a recipe I will read through it at least 4 or 5 times before i attempt to cook it. With these I think I look over the ingredient lists and then skimmed the directions and figured that I could do this no problem. Eh, I was half right. The fettuccine was fairly straight forward and not that difficult to do, though I really should have prepped first. I didn't have anything measured out at all. Poor planning I know. It was the scampi sauce that gave me most of the issue. The book said that it would turn syrupy; it did no such thing. It went from liquid to congealed in a matter of 45 seconds. It didn't taste bad though. After we finished eating the meal I figured that I just had added too much lemon juice. 

The darling boy gave me a seven for this try, but it must be said that that was only after I gave him the sad puppy dog eyes and told him that I would only rank it a 5. So I guess you can say I guilt-ed an extra point out of him. It is still a seven though, so there. HA! I am pretty sure that he liked it though. He compared it to one of those Lipton™ pasta sides, we figured out about halfway thought it was most comparable to the broccoli in cream sauce one, which is rather amusing considering that there was no broccoli in this whole meal. There are worse things that I could have my cooking compared to so I am not that sad about it. 

I guess in the end of this one I know that I should have done more preparation and gave the book a little more attention. So the lower mark is all me and not the food's fault, but hey they can't all be 10's, right?

 Next week: Back to my darling Ina? Perhaps... 

Back to the books!

Menu for 8/9:

• Shrimp Scampi
• Fettuccine Alfredo

Shrimp Scampi:

Shrimp, butter, lemon juice, parsley, salt & pepper, garlic, maybe white wine.

So this week it is back to the books; cookbooks that is. I received two cookbooks for Christmas and have since purchased 3 more so it is about time to put them to use. Both of this week's recipes come from a book that I bought about a week ago from "Used Book Superstore!", and yes that is the real name of the store. Well, I may have added the exclamation point. If you are unfamiliar with this place let me briefly enlighten you. Imagine the book section of your local thrift store, on steroids. That about sums it up; it has the same musty smell and weird selection just tons more of both. The book that the recipes are from is a gem; it is called "Cooking for 1 or 2" and was published in 1978. It is amazingly 70's-riffic and I am convinced that it was for the girls who just got married and had no idea what a kitchen was. It has a recipe for a baked potato. Awesome. My recipe for a baked potato; clean potato, wrap in tinfoil, put in 350° oven for 20 minutes, done. Well, after perusing the book a couple of times I've decided that I am going to try one of the "challenging" recipes with this Shrimp Scampi.

Fettuccine Alfredo:

Egg noodles, heavy cream, shredded Parmesan and Romano cheeses, butter, salt & pepper, a pinch of nutmeg.

This recipe is from the same book as the previous recipe. Again it is from the more "challenging" part of the book. The menu this week was a joint decision and I am going to state ahead of time that I think these recipes will not be too hard to complete and that I think I will finish at a rather normal time. I also think that they are going to taste delicious together, albeit really rich.

The camera that I normally use has been going through hissy fits as of late demanding that there is no memory card when there clearly is one. Hence I have been using the camera on my phone, so I apologize for the poor quality. I am hoping to replace the temperamental one soon but you, my dear readers, may have to put up with lesser quality photographs for a little while.

44-9

Ingredients

Sausage all sliced up.

Crusts

Sauced!

Sauced and cheesed!

Topping-ed

Cooked.

Mine sliced.

ACTION SHOT: His being cut.

Stringy cheese shot!

His first portion.

Gelato

 

 

 

 

 

 

Heavenly spoon gelato.

So here it is; home made pizza. This was an easy one, I think the most difficult part of this was slicing the sausage (actually salami). The worst part of the was the casing that I just removed and it made that job a heck of a lot easier. This was also very quick. I got home at around 7pm yesterday and by 8:30 we were eating. I did do a little dilly-dallying too. 

This meal received an 8 and 1/2 star rating though I did promise him that I would inform those who read this that an entire star is strictly for the gelato. I will tell you more about the gelato later (it was so good!). The pizza's were good enough that I would/will definitely do this again (I still have one crust left), but I did learn about what I would put on them and what not too. For instance the salami on my darling's pizza; I don't know if I would go with they type again, I think that I would get the pre-sliced kind so it would be easier for me to cook and easier for him to chew. Also that type of salami made his very salty. Mine was not that salty at all and I am pretty sure that that is because of the amount of green I had on mine. He and I discussed what we were going to do with the next crust and sauce and we thought that mixing the pizza and pesto sauces together might be a good way to even them out. It would be interesting to look at, that is for sure. He did really like it though. You might be able to figure that out with the final plate picture; he was holding it and didn't put it down so that I could actually that a "final picture". He wanted to eat it that much. 

He told me that the gelato was cheating. I don't see how, I mean it isn't like I haven't purchased a dessert item to accompany a meal before. His birthday cupcake. Even though I didn't purposely purchase the gelato for this meal I did decided to couple it with the pizza so that should count for something. It was sooooo good! Oh my, there were surprise chocolates in the gelato. I mean chocolates too; tiny little square chocolate that were filled with caramel. Insane good, we have some left and are planning to eat it as a reward after he helps me do my taxes. 

Next week: Something from the cookbooks I think.

Pizza-Pizza

Menu for 3/2:

• Pizza (two types)
• Sea-salt caramel gelato

Pizza #1:

Pizza crust, pizza sauce, mozzarella and provolone cheese, fancy sausage, garlic.

I am going to fully admit right now that I am partially cheating. There is no real recipe this week. I have bought Pillsbury Pizza Dough™, and Trader Joe's Pizza Sauce™ and plan to make a mess of them. Furthermore I did not cure the sausage myself nor did I curd the cheese. Sue me.  I don't even know if the expression "curd the cheese" is the correct term either, or if it is even a real term at all. Well it is now. Anyway, as you may have noticed, this pizza has meat on it to it is his pizza. We had fun on Saturday and went to BJ's Wholesale Club while incredibly hungry. I don't recommend this unless you are willing to pay $50 for only cheese, pizza crust, and Ruffles™. On the brighter side I can now make enough pizza crust to feed at least the Back Bay, if not all of Boston. Only pizza crust though. I could make Boston pizza bread sticks? Oooo! Cheesy bread sticks!! Hmm, I don't know if I want to share now that I thought of it.

Pizza #2:

 Pizza crust, pesto, shrimp, broccoli, spinach, mozzarella and provolone cheese.

This one is clearly mine and it is going to be delicious. I am stoked for it and I don't even surf/skateboard so the fact that I am using the term "stoked" should emphasize the level of how much I am anticipating this nom-fest. I might add a little bit of garlic to it just to boost it into the stratosphere of nom. It is going to be good. That is what I am trying to convey, alright.

Sea-salt Caramel Gelato:

Yeah, this was an impulse buy, 100% impulse buy. You try walking past a little tub of delicious with that title. I dare you to resist it!*

*This dare does not apply to those whose don't like any of the following: gelato, caramel, sea-salt.

45-8

Mirepoix, butter and herbs.

Potatoes added

Starting to look like soup!

Chicken with herbs.

Cutting up the tortillas.

Toasting up the tortillas.

Looking even more soup like with rice.

The boy helped stir, that is his hand.

Roasted corn and shrimp.

Cooked chicken.

Shredded chicken is that only way to go when you are dealing with the soup, chicken combo.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Final meal.

I would just like to state that this was a total free-form soup, I had the general idea but when it can to execution I just kind of winged it. 
and it payed off. My friends you are looking at my second meal that ranks a 10 on the boy's Nom scale. I think that this 10 is more earned too. I mean filet mignon with hand cut fries is an easy 10, but this? This is earned. 

I apologize for not having the obligatory ingredients photo. The whole point of "winging it" is to just figure it out as you go along, so if I knew what would end up in there then I an defeated before I even start. Right? Right.Well I can tell you that there is cumin, chili powder, red chili flakes, seasoned salt, and one packet of onion soup mix in this bad boy. There is also shrimp, roasted corn, rice, flour, butter, hot water, 2 russet potatoes, mirepoix, and 'Herbes de Provence', which are a mixture of dried herbs I bought from a specialty store on Newbury Street last week. The amounts are a mystery, I just mixed them in until they tasted good. The cumin, chili powder and red chili flakes definitely added some heat, but it was a slow burn type of heat that really complimented the sweetness of the roasted corn. The toasted tortillas were really great too, they added a great crunchy texture with out over powering the flavor. We had a ton left over too, and that is after he had two bowls and I had a bowl and a half.

Homemade soup is such an easy thing to make and is so satisfying to eat. This one was rather thick but it wasn't quite a chowder so we nicknamed it stoup (the baby of stew and soup). He told me that I could make this again for him anytime, and I just might. I don't thin any batch of stoup will be like the other. Too much stuff to play with :) Next week... Something different but I don't know what yet!

Ahhh! How is it Wednesday?

I am sorry everyone. The Monday holiday completely threw off my schedule and I didn't notice until about 8pm last night that I had not made my usual Tuesday post. Bad me! Well to try and redeem myself I am posting now.

I am planning on making soup tonight. There is no set recipe because I am flying by the seat of my pants on this one. I bought mirepoix and some chicken breasts and that is about as far as I have gone with it. I think I may try a white chili but I honestly have no clue. Fascinating reading, I know. Things that I know will be in the chili: Mirepoix, potatoes, roasted corn, peas, and chicken for the boy. I do have some rosemary and thyme; I am thinking to roast the chicken breasts with the herbs and chop them up and add them to his at the end. Ooh! I just forgot that I have also bought tortillas and I am planning to cut them up and toast them and add them at the end AND I have rice. So there.

You know that cooking show where the trained chef is a creeper in the supermarket and follows a woman home to make a gourmet meal with stuff she already has in her pantry? (it exists I swear) That would be helpful if it happened to me today. Cross you fingers and wait for pictures tomorrow!