Eighteenth Post ~ Mediterranean Veggie Pizza

Since 33.3% of my loyal readers are vegetarians (Hi Chris!) I thought I'd post this quick and easy vegetarian meal. Made a little bigger, it could serve well as a dinner.

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Here's what you'll need:

~Pita bread (I chose pocket-less)

~Hummus (my favorite is babaganoush, but I have a hard time finding it. I got 40 Spices)

~Veggies

~Olive oil

~Salt/pepper

~Crumbled feta or other goat variety

~Chive

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Sautee the veggies in a skillet with a little olive oil and salt and pepper. I used pre-sliced baby bella mushrooms and some green peppers. As you're letting them sizzle, spread some hummus onto the pita. Eat a little while you're at it - you know you want to.

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Now, snip one chive into the veggies. Stir it around. Then, scatter the veggies on top of the pita and hummus and sprinkle generously with cheese. Pop it into your toaster oven until the cheese is nice and melty.

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Easy, peasy, one-two-threesey! If I were serving this for a dinner, I'd pair it with a Shiraz or Syrah. It would give a nice balance to the spiciness.

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Yours in the love of good food and wine,

AL

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Seventeenth Post ~ Herbed Pork with Green Beans: Faster than a Lousy Microwave Dinner!

Tonight's dinner was incredibly fast and very tasty. Here's what you'll need:

~Pork tenderloins (I chose Wegmans - they were sliced so thin it was practically like pork sushi... I would have liked them a little thicker)
~ Spices (more on that later)
~ Salt/Pepper to taste

~Green beans

I used a spice combination that I'm quite fond of for using as a herb-crusting on any meat. I combined:

~Oregano
~Rosemary
~Paprika
~Salt
~Pepper
~Thyme

I crushed them all together in a small bowl then sprinkled it and patted it into the meat. This pork was so thin that it was cooked literally in minutes; in fact, I think I overcooked it a bit. I didn't add any oil to the pan as I didn't want this meal to be too heavy.

I sauteed the green beans in a pan with a little oil and a tiny amount of water to create some steam.

I served tonight's dinner with a wonderful Italian wine: Lacryma Christi Mastroberardino. It's from the vineyards of Mount Vesuvius, which, being a geek of all things Roman, made me positively shiver with excitement. It is dry but with a grassy, earthy taste. Its pairs wonderfully with the spices in the pork, giving the whole meal a well-balanced, light feeling.

Ahh - a perfect meal! Quick to prepare, wonderfully savory, and nicely paired with a wine positively steeped in history!

Yours in the love of good food and wine (especially when you don't have to fuss after lecturing for over three hours)

AL

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Sixteenth Post: Breaded Chicken with Tortelleni

Perhaps it was because I heard my parents were going to Olive Garden for dinner. Perhaps it's because I've got an open bottle of Merlot screaming for an appropriate dish. Perhaps it's just because I like it. Whatever the reason, I wanted Italian tonight.

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This is a meal that I've altered a bit from my childhood original. My mother learned it from an elderly Italian woman who brought this recipe with her from the Old Country - the original calls for turkey or pork cutlets. However, I had a chicken breast available to me. So I made it work.

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What you'll need for tonight's dinner:

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~ Meat (preferably turkey or pork cutlets) I used one chicken breast cut into strips while it was still partially frozen.

~ Ready-made pasta sauce (of course, the original recipe calls for a home-made pasta sauce learned from this woman from Italy, and let me tell you, if heaven could be created in a pot, it would taste like this sauce. Due to time, I used a ready-made.)

~ Grated cheese (I used Romano)

~ Pasta (I used tortellini)

~ Butter (or margerine)

~ Seasoned bread crumbs

~ Egg

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:: PAUSE ::

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Tortellini is quite possibly the greatest food in existance. You have your noodles, which are pretty great, and cheese, which is quite incredible, and then some genius decided to put the cheese inside the noodle. I'm fairly certain that on that day, the sun shone a little brighter and the world seemed a little happier. Tortellini is perfect by itself, in butter, with herbs, and with pasta sauce. You gotta have a special spot in your heart for these little noodles of cheesey goodness.

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:: UNPAUSE ::

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Start your water boiling. Get out all your ingredients. This is not a meal you want to scramble for. Melt some butter in a stick-free pan. At the same time, have your sauce heating on the stove or in the microwave. To spice up this jarred sauce, I added some cheese, fresh basil, and a little sugar.

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Now, dip your meat in egg and coat in seasoned breadcrumbs. Coat all the pieces, then set them into the sizzling butter on your pan. They will cook pretty quickly.

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Drain and serve your pasta, place some meat with it, and make sure you have ample sauce to dip it in!

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I served tonight's dinner with a Merlot from Mendoza, Argentina. It is fruit-forward and paired beautifully with the salty pasta sauce and the rich, cheesey pasta.

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It's not quite the same as the turkey or pork cutlets, but it certainly fulfilled my desire for Italian! It also shows how versatile this recipe is - try this meal with spaghetti instead of tortellini for a "twist!"

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Yours in the love of good food and wine,
AL

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Fifteenth Post ~ Fresh, simple fare: Green beans with sauteed chicken and mushrooms

Summer has come to Buffalo. Today's highs were in the upper 80s, and boy, did it feel every bit of 90. When it's this hot out, I crave simple foods. Perhaps it's because I know my body just doesn't have the energy to sluggishly pilfer its way through heavily sauced and flavored foods for the needed nutrients. Perhaps it is because I just can't string together too many ingredients at once when my brain feels steamed. In any case, I crave simplicity.

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Tonight's dinner fit the bill. I quite literally pulled from the refrigerator foods that sounded good to me, and then combined them. In the end, I thought it created a sort of Provincal meal. Here's what I grabbed:

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~ Chilled white wine

~ Chicken tenderloins that should be used up

~ Mushrooms (pre-washed and sliced - as I said: simple)

~ Green beans

~ Onion

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For the seasoning:

~ Chilled white wine (noticing a pattern?)

~ Olive oil

~ Chives

~ Basil

~ Salt/pepper

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Cut the chicken up into fork-managable pieces. Place in stick-free pan with chopped onion. Pour on some olive oil, ample white wine, and season with salt and pepper. Toss in some mushrooms and start it sizzling.

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Now that your brain has tackled that, snip up some chives and basil into the mixture. Stir around a bit. It should cook in next to no time.

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:: PAUSE ::

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I'm all for using the proper cooking methods and tools. But some nights (like tonight) call for laziness.

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:: UNPAUSE ::

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Scootch your cooked chicken, onions, mushrooms and herbs over to one end of your pan. Place some frozen green beans in the other end. Tilt the pan so the hot sauce infiltrates the mini bean-fortress you've built. Stir them around a bit 'til they look done. The end result is that the beans will be cooked al dente and sweetened by the flavors of the wine, herbs, and earthiness of the mushrooms.

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Tilt the whole thing onto a plate and enjoy with a glass of chilled white wine. I served this with a French table wine called Vieux Papes. It paired wonderfully, tasting a little grassy (in a refreshing way) and citrussy, making it a perfect companion to this summer meal.

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Bon apetit!

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Yours in the love of food, wine, and occasional laziness,

AL

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Fourteenth Post: Hamburger and Mac & Cheese ~ All Grown Up!

Here's a classic comfort favorite that's given a new spin with some cheese that you might have on hand (if you're a fan of Wegman's cheese flights, which I am) and some marinade.

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This was also a good dinner for tonight because it was minutes in prep time, which was good, as I have a pitiful puppy on the sofa demanding attention - Ginny was spayed today, and it has taken some wind out of her normally full sails...

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So, here's what you'll need for tonights quick, easy and tasty meal:
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For the hamburger:

~ 1 ground beef patty

~ herb marinade

~ basil (optional)

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For the mac & cheese:

~ pasta (I use the term "mac" loosely: penne worked just as well
~ cheese you have on hand (I used Beemster classic, sage derby and Yancy's XXX sharp and a little parm)

~ butter

~ white wine

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One sick puppy (optional)

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Get your water boiling and put some marinade directly on your hamburger patty in the pan. Don't start it heating just yet. While your water is boiling, sit with optional puppy. Once water starts boiling, toss in pasta. Sit with puppy. Smell scorching pasta and race in to actually stir it once or twice. In between, sit with puppy.

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Once you've got a few minutes to go on your pasta, start the cheese and butter melding. Pour in a bit of white wine. Check on puppy. Stir sauce and drain pasta into collander. Check on puppy. Start the heat under your hamburger and marinade. Check on puppy. At this time, pour your pasta into the pan with the (by now) creamy, cheesey sauce. Let it simmer. Flip burger. Check on puppy. Flip burger again, toss pasta around and put it all on a plate. Top burger with fresh basil, if you like. I am getting to enjoy basil on pretty much everything. Watch, I'll be on Medical Mysteries with some strange basil-induced overdose.

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This meal came together nicely. The burger was nice and juicy (the trick, I've learned, is a very low flame). I think the pasta would have been better with a little bit of cream, as it wasn't quite as "saucy" as I had hoped. It still tasted very good, though.
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Check on puppy.

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Pour self a glass of Norton Cab to hopefully chill out a bit.

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Check on puppy.

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Enjoy meal and wine while sitting next to puppy.

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Yours in the love of good food and wine and the stressful moments in life that they help us through,

AL

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Thirteenth Post: Breathing New Life into Tough Steak

It happens. Sometimes you get a steak that just doesn't turn out the way you'd hoped. And as you're sitting there chewing on this darned piece of meat until your jaws ache because you're sure not going to throw it out, you come to the decision that there's nothing to be done with tough meat. Right?.

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Wrong!

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I prepared some steaks the other night when my mother came over for dinner, and of course, because I was preparing food for someone other than myself, bad luck was on my side. The fire alarm was relentless, the broiler inconsistant, and in the end, the steaks were tough. My mom told me that when she had bad luck with steaks, this was always her fallback plan (I always thought it was just a yummy way to cook steak, little did I know...)

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What you'll need to save your steaks:

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~ Steak that has caused you personal, emotional harm, cut up into smallish pieces (use the aforementioned Crocodile Dundee knife from post #12 to maximize feelings of proper revenge)

~ Leftover juices from cooking said steak

~ Soy sauce

~ A baggie and a bowl

~ Time

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After eating and apologizing to your guest(s), smile to yourself with the secret satisfaction of knowing that later on in the week, you shall reincarnate your steak into a delectable dinner for you and you alone. Place the chopped pieces of steak in a baggie in a bowl (It will leak. Trust me). Pour in the remaining juices (I had broiled it in the herbed marinade from post #8, and had added some fresh rosemary). Add some soy sauce. Soy sauce is one of nature's marvels. Not only is it awesome on sushi, but it also acts as a tenderizer for tough meat. Let your steak marinate in your fridge for a few days.

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When you do decide to eat it, heat it in the baggie in the bowl in the microwave for about 2 minutes or under. Serve it over buttered toast.

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::PAUSE::

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It's a very common practice in our family to eat steak on top of buttered toast. It was not until quite recently that I learned that buttering one's steak is a very English thing to do. Perhaps this was my family's way of, over time, adhering to their cultural culinary habits without actually having to admit to putting butter on their steak ("It's not on the steak! It's on the bread which is under the steak, see, I've not buttered my steak at all...")

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::UNPAUSE::

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So you'll need:

~ Bread

~ Butter

~ A toaster

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Just in case you needed help with that one. Extra snark in this post is courtesy of my English ancestry.

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I served tonight's dinner with some baby bella mushrooms sauteed in white wine and olive oil with some fresh basil and a bit of grated parmesan. I uncorked my last bottle of Norton Cabernet Sauvignon (ultimately, a good decision - the cork was crumbly!), which became fruity in the face of the salty marinade, but full-bodied enough to stand up to the ::ahem:: butter.

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And the steak was delightfully tender!

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Yours in the love of giving food a second chance,

AL

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Twelvth Post: Last-minute luncheon of fruit and chicken salad

Jenny and I have been trying to get together all summer. When we finally determined that Thursday would work, we set our plans for a lunch at my new place. I needed a lunch that I could put together quickly but still have it look festive and yummy.

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Here's what you'll need for this summery plate:

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Fruit salad:

~ Seasonal fruit (I chose blueberries, strawberries, one banana and the salvaged part of a nectarine that I dropped on my way home from the store)

~ About a tablespoon of honey

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Chicken salad:

~ Baked chicken (I chose Tyson's natural chicken breast, pre-cooked and packaged!)

~ Dried cranberries (raisens, dried cherries or chopped apple would work just as well)

~ Celery (about 3 stalks)

~ A good amount of Miracle Whip

~ One leaf lettuce per serving (optional)

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On the side:

~ Strawberry yogurt

~ Mint leaf garnishes (0ptional)

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:::PAUSE:::

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Everything in the kitchen is easier, I'm discovering, if you have the right utensils. And this meal was made into an under-20-minute prep thanks to a whacking great Crocodile Dundee type of knife. I whipped out a cutting board and my knife and went to town. In between preps, I'd rinse the blade and go back to work. One knife, one chopping block. Easy, peasy, one-two-threesy.

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:::UNPAUSE:::

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So get out your chopping block and your awesome knife. You'll need two largish bowls for each salad prep. For the chicken salad:

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Dice about 3 stalks of celery

Throw the cranberries in the bowl with it

Coarsely chop the chicken and toss it in

You can season it with a little onion salt and pepper, if you wish

Add desired amount of Miracle Whip and stir to blend it all together.

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Chill in the fridge until ready to serve on your plate on top of the lettuce. Now rinse your knife and cutting board, and back to work!

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For the fruit salad:

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Toss blueberries into the bowl

Slice strawberries into slivers

Cut up the banana

Add any other fruit (like my poor bruised-on-one-end nectarine)

Drizzle a bit of honey over it - a tiny amount - and toss the salad in the dish

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Serve with yogurt for dipping! The nice thing about this meal is I was able to put the plates together and let them chill in the fridge until we were ready to eat.

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I paired this lunch with organic lemonade - and paired it later on with a fabulous slice of strawberry-apple pie from Jenny!

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And that, my friends, is a quick luncheon fit for a month's worth of catching up!

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Yours in the love of food and girl talk,

AL.

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Eleventh Post: Meat, Cheese, Bread, Fruit ~ Enjoying the Simple Things

Cooking involves combining tastes for maximum enjoyment. But sometimes it's just nice to savor each of those tastes independently.
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As long as I can remember, my favorite lunch was what my mom named a "Goodie Lunch." In grade school, nothing made me smile more than snapping open a tupperware container to find neatly rolled slices of ham or turkey, a piece of cheese, crackers and some fruit or vegetables. (Yeah, I seriously had the world's greatest mama.) Today, I enjoy grown-up "goodie lunches," and have fond memories of my lunchbox days!
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This type of selection can be prepared as a larger plate, and might serve as a rustic offering at the next party you host or attend! There's something timeless about its appearance - and in fact, there's very little about this selection of food that has changed in a good number of centuries!
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Today, I got a hearty slice of ham off the bone (which I can use for dinner later on this week, too!) a cheese flight (this week's: Beemster classic, sage derby and Yancy's XXX sharp) which came with a bunch of grapes, and a bulk roll. Paired with a tall glass of lemonade, it's the perfect lunch to nibble on as I work on grading papers!
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Yours in the love of savoring the timelessly simple things one at a time,
AL
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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Tenth Post: Salmon that Rests on its Laurels with Garlic Snap Peas

To me, salmon is the king of fish. Sure, your snapper is fresh and light, your tilapia is melt-in-your-mouth delicate, but salmon, well, it's the fish that eats like a sirloin steak.
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I went back and forth for a while with the patient fellow at the Wegman's fish counter over the best deal for the smallest salmon fillet available. Well, the best deal meant a lot of de-boning, and I just wasn't in the market for that this evening. The farm-raised was priced by the cut, so I ended up with a piece of fresh-caught salmon priced per pound. I got probably the tiniest fillet in the display, so the damage was just over $2.50. Not bad for a fish that spent its life gliding through glacial waters off of the shores of Alaska. And I might add that I may be ruined for salmon forever...
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Anyway. I also purchased some fresh rosemary to see if there was that enormous of a difference between fresh and dried. Let's conclude that I shall be purchasing a rosemary plant to befriend my basil one in the near future.
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Here's what you'll need to make tonight's meal:
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~ 1 salmon fillet (Take my advice; go for the best price. It'll always taste better if you know you haven't spent your week's grocery money on one meal)
~ lemon juice
~ salt and pepper to taste
~ olive oil (again, I heart EVOO)
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For the side:
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~ Sugar snap peas (take a couple right out of the bag and eat them raw - they're like the candy of the vegetable world)
~ 2 small garlic cloves
~ salt and pepper to taste
~ olive oil
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About two hours before you're ready to eat, open the package of salmon and tuck two sprigs of rosemary on either side of it, or sprinkle the whole thing with dried rosemary. Now squeeze some lemon juice on it, and add a dash of salt and pepper. Close the package back up, and go learn about the muscles in the face, or whatever else you have to study for the next two hours.
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Before you start cooking, mince your garlic cloves. Mincing, I've discovered, is a little nicer than pressing, and leaves some of the punch of the garlic for your actual mouthful, rather than in the pan.
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Get out one medium and one small pan. Put about 1.5 tablespoons of EVOO in each. Start the larger one heating. When the oil is just starting to release vapours, carefully place the salmon and rosemary (hopefully looking cozily like one unit) into the pan. It'll sizzle happily. When you see it turning opaque about one quarter the way up, turn it carefully (I used two forks). The rosemary may have to be re-tucked along the sides.
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Around this time, turn on the burner under your smaller pan. Place your snap peas in the pan and salt and pepper them to taste. Sautee them for about 3 minutes or so. Add the garlic, toss, and immediately remove from heat.
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Around this time, you'll want to turn your salmon again. This particular cut was tricky because the middle was quite plump, and I didn't want to overcook the outsides while undercooking the middle. I actually turned off the heat before the middle was fully cooked, and the heat of the pan and the fish finished off the middle while I got the snap peas onto my plate and the wine poured. I then transferred the salmon to the plate, keeping the rosemary to add a bit of it here or there to a bite.
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I paired tonight's dinner with a Cabernet Sauvignon from Medoza, Argentina from Bodega Norton vineyards. It was, in my opinion, a perfect pair. The fruitiness and tannic balance of this Argentine Cab served to keep the salmon from ever tasting "fishy" - rather, it gave the whole meal a sense of completeness in softening any harshness in the natural taste of salmon, enhancing the rosemary essence, and providing a strong counterpart to the garlic in the snap peas.
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All in all, a delightful meal. Interestingly enough, the whole meal (sans EVOO, salt/pepper and other seasonings, which can be considered cupboard-staples) ran about $4.00. Add one glass of this wine, which I got in a sale cart at a small, off-the-beaten-path plaza wine shop (you can find some serious gems in the non-franchised stores!), and you're up to $5.00. Try doing that at an upscale seafood restaurant! Plus, I got my salmon cooked just the way I like it!
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Yours in the love of food and wine and their harmonious balance,
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AL
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P.S. And for those of you who aren't ancient Greece and Rome geeks - the title of this post is in reference to the laurel crown given in the past to Greek victors either athletic or poetic. I thought the rosemary on either side of the salmon resembled it, and it seemed fitting for the King of Fish.
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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.

Ninth Post: "Golden" Crispy Chicken

So tonight I had a craving for comfort food. Which seems like an oxymoron, because I rarely have met a food that hasn't provided me with some sense of comfort. But I digress.

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Tonight's dinner was also serving the much-needed purpose of The Great Fridge Clean-Out. You know what I mean - those last lonely food items that you would normally toss because they're just so scant, but would feel really guilty about doing so: those last three tenderloins that you have to eat soon... a lonely egg... some cheese that's not really enough to do anything with... one sad little chive... some broccoli that you know you'll enjoy once you've cooked it, but sitting there in its plastic bag it's just really not screaming at you.

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So I decided to make something zesty and crispy and comforting out of it all.

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~~~PAUSE~~~

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I've tried sauteeing chicken with coating in the past, but it's never really crisped nicely for me. Tonight I learned the secret: Really hot oil. I also learned the surprisingly shocking and off-putting sensation of teensy little oil burns. So proceed with caution.

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~~~UNPAUSE~~~

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What you'll need for tonight's dinner of convenience and danger (Like a James Bond love affair...):

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~Olive oil (I use an off-brand EVOO)

~Chicken tenderloins

~Hard cheese that can be grated (I used some leftover parm and some San Joaquin Gold)

~1 Egg

~Herbs (I used my newfound favorites: fresh basil and chives)

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Add whatever side you wish to serve or is needing to be eaten. I chose freshly steamed broccoli crowns with butter.

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So. Get everything out and ready. As I said, my parm was getting low, so I grated some San Joaquin Gold into it. It came in one of my cheese flights and is really nice and tastey. I thought it would add some zip. Into the grated cheese I snipped up the chive and two large basil leaves whom I suspect are sapping all the sun and water from the rest of the plant. I broke the egg into my prep bowl and scrambled it. Into the egg mix I plopped the chicken tenderloins and moved them around a bit to coat them.

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Next, start a good amount of olive oil heating in your non-stick pan. Roll the chicken tenderloins around in the cheese herb mixture. Set them gently into the oil. Jump back and nurse your teensy little oil burns and grab a longer fork.

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Meanwhile, you've had your broccoli steaming in the microwave. Take it out to drain it and melt some butter into it.

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Turn your the chicken tenderloins with caution. Note the beautiful golden color they turn!

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Right about now, you'll start to notice how good everything smells. That's the cue for your fire alarm to go off. Turn the chicken once more and go fan the alarm.

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When the chicken is golden on each side and your broccoli is lush and green and you can hear the guys downstairs laughing over your screeching fire alarm, dinner is ready to be served.

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I paired tonight's meal with a Chambourcin by Vetter Vineyards. I haven't had any experience with Chambourcin before, so was surprised to find how tart it was. I rather liked it with the saltiness of the cheese in the chicken. It had that sort of lemon-in-your-water-makes-you-pucker-a-bit refreshing, summery quality to it.

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A fine meal for a lazy Sunday.

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Yours in the love of good food and wine,
AL

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The blogger is not an experienced chef. She takes no responsibility for the quality of the meals prepared while following her advice. Use your own judgment regarding cooking times and proper food handling.