Our son came over today to play tennis with John and afterwards we picked up banh mi from Lee’s Sandwiches which is a Vietnamese chain here in California. I love banh mi with its delicate crunchy roll and its pickled vegetables and it’s my favorite choice when we get take-out. I ate the whole sandwich so it put constraints on the rest of my eating day.
For dinner I had the soup I made a few days ago and have been eating for lunch. It is a vegetable soup with some chicken added. Every day I take a portion of it and add a little more chicken and chicken stock plus some fresh vegetables. Today’s freshening included celery, broccoli, and cabbage. With the cabbage addition, a little vinegar seemed like a good idea. It gave the soup a nice tang. I had enough for two bowls and enjoyed it immensely.
Split chickpea stew (Chana dal) with cauliflower rice and kale
We go back and forth about which of our dal dishes we like better, Afghani dal or Chana dal. I think our favorite is whatever we are currently eating! It is amazing how much flavor you can build with just a few pantry spices, ginger, garlic, dried split chickpeas, a couple of cans of tomatoes, and water.
We make this dish in our Instant Pot. It cooks under pressure for 15 minutes and then we let it cool down naturally for 10 minutes before releasing the rest of the steam. To serve I put a layer of shredded kale in the bottom of the bowl followed by rice. I used cauliflower rice and John had regular white rice. The Chana dal goes on top. I like a little sriracha as a garnish.
Mmm, so good! And since we made a triple recipe there is plenty left over for dinner on Monday!!
Seared scallops and sheet pan new potatoes and B. sprouts
This is the second of our special occasion for no reason dinners this week. And much like our pasta dinner on Wednesday it was delicious, quick to make, and easy (but, alas, not inexpensive.) Since the scallops take almost no time at all to cook, I started the vegetables in a 425F oven first. I split both the potatoes and the Brussels sprouts in half, tossed them with some EVOO and salt in a plastic ziplock bag, and laid them cut side up on an aluminum foil lined sheet pan. They took about 20 minutes. John was busy searing the scallops for the last 5 minutes.
Our dinner ready to be plated
I opened a bottle of Wente Chardonnay to accompany our dinner. It is lovely to treat yourself like a guest with a special dinner and a glass of wine!
I suggested to John last night that maybe we should have pasta with vegetables twice a week. It is delicious, quick, inexpensive, and easy. Plus it’s vegan! Really how many dinners can check all those boxes!
So I chopped up the mushrooms and got them going in a pan with dried oregano, chile flakes, and two teaspoons of olive oil. Next I chopped the onion while the mushrooms cooked. John minced some garlic. (Thanks, John!) Then he boiled the salted water while I chopped the broccolini stems and threw them in with the mushrooms et al. I added a little pasta water to help the stems along. John gave me a cup of the pasta water to use for sauce and he dumped in the cooked, drained pasta and I added the florets. Stir, stir, over heat, add some pasta water. Voila, we are done. Our kitchen pas de deux took maybe 20 minutes.
Roasted Chilean sea bass, crinkle-cut butternut squash, steamed green beans
On Monday we bought some Chilean sea bass from Costco. It is a departure from our usual frozen pieces. It, being fish, needed to be eaten by at least the next day. John roasted the sea bass for about 20 minutes at 400F. It came out perfectly, succulent and sweet.
I was as usual on vegetable detail. Trader Joe’s had changed its usual butternut squash chunks into butternut squash crinkle fries. I decided to roast them in the oven at the same temperature as the fish. I also gave them a brief visit under the broiler at the end. Personally I like the chunks better and I hope that TJ’s will switch back. There just was not enough butternut squash in each bite.
Finishing up an easy vegetable job, I steamed the green beans for about 10 minutes. Since these were haricot vert the time in the steam bath was a little much and the beans were a little limper than I would have liked. My dinner companions said they were fine, especially with a small pat of butter on top.
All in all it was quite a nice, almost special occasion on a non-occasion day, dinner. It would have been even nicer with a chilled bottle of white burgundy but we are trying to be good this week.
Sort of chicken piccata with broccoli and Vichy carrots
The reason I call this sort of chicken piccata is because we did not start out with a butter sauce. We used our stand-by, McCormack Chicken Gravy, to use as a base. Instead of making the mix with a cup of water John made it with 1/2 cup white wine and 1/2 cup water. In addition he added a good squeeze of lemon, some capers, and a tablespoon or so of sautéed, minced shallots. It was our lower calorie version of piccata. Having made the sauce/gravy John added the chicken which is also our stand-by, Costco rotisserie chicken white meat pack.
The chicken warming gently in the “piccata” sauce
Meanwhile I was busy with the vegetables. The Vichy carrots I made were from a recipe by Pierre Franey who was a celebrity chef before the existence of Food Network. The carrots were slice length-wise with a mandolin and we cooked ours in 1/4 cup water, 1/2 teaspoon brown sugar, 1 tablespoon of lemon juice, 2 teaspoons of olive oil, salt, pepper, and garnished with chopped parsley. I substituted the brown sugar for white sugar and the olive oil for 2 tablespoons of butter. They came out really well and John said they were the star of the dinner.
Vichy carrots
Unfortunately my hands were not the stars of the kitchen as I managed to cut both of them on the mandolin! So I guess I would suggest using the guard when using a mandolin.
The results of trying to slice a hard vegetable without the guard on a mandolin
I did manage to cook the broccoli with some of the sautéed shallots without further incident.
Broccoli and shallots
Usually our dinners are protein, starch, and vegetables. This dinner featured two vegetables and a protein. Having the excellent carrots took the place of the starch. We did not miss it at all.
Another Sunday and I am trying to think of something appealing to do with my eggs. The best I could come up with was stir-frying a bunch of assorted vegetables and topping them with scrambled eggs. The vegetables I used are mushrooms, onions, carrots, celery, broccoli, and cabbage. I cooked the vegetables in one pan in the order listed above and I scrambled two eggs in a separate pan and laid them on top. The vegetables were seasoned with salt, granulated garlic, rogan josh, and soy sauce. I garnished the finished dish with sriracha.
This clam chowder recipe is an adaptation of Gabrielle Hamilton’s from an article in The NY Times. Hers, I am sure, is delicious but contained way too much cream and oil for us. So I slimmed the recipe down to where it eats more like a Connecticut or Rhode Island clam chowder which is much more brothy and lacks the thick cream sauce.
The recipe only calls for 2 tablespoons of heavy cream. It is enough to give it a silky texture. I tried using twice the amount of half and half in the soup on Friday but it is actually better using the smaller amount of the real deal heavy cream.
Lightened clam chowder with optional crouton
2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, minced
2 ribs of celery, minced
2 leeks, dark, woody green parts removed, ¼” coins
10 ounces golden new potatoes, medium dice
2 sprigs thyme, picked
2 sprigs tarragon
6 ounces dry white wine
2 bottles/16 ounces clam juice
Juice from 2 cans chopped clams (~8 oz.)
Salt and pepper
2 tablespoons heavy cream
12 ounces chopped clams (2 cans, reserved liquid, see above)
3-4 slices hearty bread, toasted
In the Dutch oven, heat the olive oil, and add onion, celery, leeks, potatoes, tarragon, and thyme, stirring to coat. Season with salt, and cook over low heat until the vegetables have just started to soften, taking care not to brown, about 5 minutes. Deglaze with white wine and then add the clam juice and reserved clam liquid. Simmer until potatoes are al dente.
Stir in the cream, and simmer until vegetables are cooked through, taking care not to boil. Add the chopped clams, and season to taste with salt and ground black pepper. Remove from heat.
Toast the bread until golden, and place each piece in a bowl. Add a ladleful of chowder around the toast. Add another ladleful partially covering toast.
Roasted tilapia with red lentil sauce, roasted mashed butternut squash, and sautéed Frenched green beans
Since I knew I was going to be busy towards the end of the day, I starting doing my prep for dinner in the morning. First up was the butternut squash which I split in half, scooped out the seeds, scored and seasoned with salt and nutmeg before putting it in a 425F oven for about 40 minutes. While it was still hot from the oven I scraped out the pulp from the skin and seasoned it with salt and some faux butter.
Dismantling the roasted butternut squash
While the butternut squash was roasting I Frenched my unpalatable looking green beans. I have a special gadget that slices the green beans length-wise and removes the string at the same time. When I was a kid my mother always made green beans this way using a three-bladed contraption that was mounted on the end of her peeler. Actually both types for making French green beans are available through Amazon. (Look for bean slicer)
Green beans slices length-wise with my bean slicer
At dinnertime all that was left to do was a quick cook on the beans, and a reheat in the microwave for the butternut squash. John took care of the fish which he seasoned with salt, Old Bay, garlic, and a little olive oil and roasted in a 400F oven for 13 minutes. He suggested we use our leftover red lentils from yesterday as a sauce so I added some additional lemon juice and whizzed them to sauce consistency with a plunge blender.
Our dinner not only tasted good but was visually bright which is always a sign that you are getting some excellent nutrients from your veggies!
Omnivore 