Grilled flank steak with grilled russet potatoes and sherried B. sprouts
Here is how this dinner shaped up. John marinated the flank steak which is a lean but tasty cut of beef which is tender when you slice it across the grain. Then he grilled it to a perfect medium rare.
While he was doing his thing I microwaved the potatoes until they were almost done and then sliced them in half and smeared on some olive oil and salt. At this point I handed the potatoes off to John for some grill time.
While he finished up grilling, I started the sprouts in a large covered pan with the cut sides facing down. I added about a cup of water, a quarter teaspoon of sugar, 2 teaspoons of butter, salt, and maybe two tablespoons of dry Marsala wine. These ingredients cooked covered until the sprouts were almost done and then I took off the lid and let the water evaporate. The sprouts then browned in the butter and sugar. They were super yummy.
We opened a bottle of 2005 Robledo Cabernet Sauvignon and toasted farewell to what we hope will be the last week of a pandemic heavy restrictions. All our adult family is now vaccinated and the grandkids are now eligible and will get their first shots on Monday. It is a time of celebration indeed!
Roasted sheet pan vegetables (and a little tofu) with crispy chickpeas
If you are a vegetable lover like I am then this plateful of vegetables, a little tofu, and chickpeas makes your eyes widen and your mouth water. And if you are someone who likes minimal mess and dinner on the table in short order then this dish is for you.
I cut up the vegetables and tossed them along with the chickpeas and a couple pieces of leftover tofu in some olive oil and salt. I put everything on a sprayed, aluminum foil lined sheet pan. Next I popped the sheet pan in a 425F oven for 25 minutes. And then I was done.
I chose onion, cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage and carrots for my vegetables. Their oven roasting time is close enough for them to go on the sheet pan together. The chickpeas developed a slightly crisp skin and were a bit denser. Along with an apple for dessert I definitely got my servings of fruits and vegetables in for the day. Plus I felt good about what I was eating!
Tonight we made a new recipe. The original recipe is from the Food Network by Geoffrey Zakarian. I have included my slimmed down recipe for 2 servings below the picture.
Our spaghetti dish turned out super-good. We used whole grain spaghetti, cut down on the oil, and the amount of pancetta. The only difficult part of this recipe is getting the timing right. You want to put the cooked pasta into the vegetable/shrimp/pancetta mixture when the shrimp is not quite cooked. I was glad I had John to wrangle the pasta while I made the sauce.
It is fun to try something new rather than always rely on the same-old same-old. Since Wednesday is my slot for pasta, I can easily add this to my rotation. And by slimming down the recipe, I can totally eat this without any guilt at all!
Whole grain spaghetti with shrimp, pancetta, and Fresno chiles
Spaghetti with pancetta, shrimp, and Fresno chiles. Serves 2
For the pasta pot:
Kosher salt
6 oz. whole grain spaghetti (or whatever you prefer)
For the sauce
Olive oil spray
2 ounces pancetta, cut in small to medium dice
¼ cup chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
Dash of red pepper flakes
1 Fresno chile, seeds removed sliced thinly in half moons
12 large shrimp, sliced lengthwise
Zest of 1 lemon
2 tsp olive oil
Garnish
1/2 cup freshly grated Pecorino Romano or Parmesan
1/2 cup roughly chopped fresh basil
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. When you have finished saute-ing the vegetables in the next step, put your pasta in and cook until al dente. Reserve 1 cup of the pasta water
Spray with olive oil spray a skillet or Dutch oven and place over medium to low heat. Cook the pancetta to render the fat and crisp it, Remove the pancetta from the pan when crisp but leave the fat in the pan. Turn up the heat to medium and saute the onion, followed by the garlic, Fresno chile, and red pepper flakes. Be sure to not let garlic burn.
When your pasta is almost done add the shrimp to the vegetables and put the lemon zest and cooked pancetta in the pan. Cook the shrimp until it is slightly undercooked.
Drain the pasta reserving 1 cup of pasta water and put put the pasta directly into your saute-ing pan. Stir everything together. Add the two teaspoons of olive oil and enough of the pasta water to make a little sauce.
Garnish the plates with the torn up basil and the grated cheese (if desired.)
Usually LFD (Leftovers For Dinner) happens on Saturday night but we ended up with some bits and pieces from last week’s dinner and decided to incorporate the leftovers into an actual weekly menu dinner.
Our leftovers were some chicken gravy, mashed rutabagas, and farro. To this we added some pre-cooked chicken from Costco and mushrooms for the gravy and the new broccoli,
Chicken in gravy, mashed rutabagas, farro, and broccoli
Looks pretty good for a bunch of leftovers doesn’t it? It tasted pretty yummy as well and was ready in the time it took to cook the broccoli and get everything else hot. Try looking in your refrigerator for vegetables that are getting tired and a little of this and that from dinners past and create a whole new dinner with very little effort!
Pan-seared salmon and mango salsa, white rice, and green beans
John brined the salmon before starting it in a cold pan and it worked out much better than his last attempt at not overcooking it and keeping the white goop from seeping out.
When he was at the grocery store the other day mangoes were $.77 and he could not resist. So I made a mango salsa. In fact the whole dinner was based around needing to do something with the mango. The sweetness of the mango, the tartness of the lime juice, and the spiciness of the Serrano chile were perfect with the salmon.
The giant pile of green beans exists because I bought too big a package last week. I knew they were not going to last in the refrigerator much longer. I finished them with a bit of butter which is pretty exciting after not using real butter for over a year.
John made the rice which is something along with chopping up garlic that he likes to do on the non-protein side of things. Who am I to object!? All in all this was a delicious, colorful dinner.
In a departure from my usual egg dish on Sundays (Breakfast For Dinner or BFD), I had dessert for dinner! Since it was Mother’s Day my daughter made me this Italian confection from Mantova. Years ago she, John, and I took a trip to Italy and stopped in Mantova (or Mantua in Italian) to visit a ducal palace and we ate dinner there. As an aside, John and she ordered donkey for dinner! Since we had never heard of sbrisolona we ordered a piece for dessert. It was soooo good!!
She used a recipe from The NY Times Cooking site where they described it as “a big cookie whose texture is a cross between a perfect shortbread and the best crumb topping you can imagine. The addition of almond flour and cornmeal is partially responsible for the cookie’s wonderful texture.”
Sbrisolona
It is supposed to break into pieces and be messy to eat but oh, the flavor! Not too sweet and perfect with a cup of tea or some Vin Santo. We three managed to eat almost a whole 9X9 baking dish!
It had two egg yolks in it so I guess I can count it as a BFD dish!!
This week is a slight departure from our norm. After suggesting that planning for leftovers is a good idea, this week I did not do advance planning for Saturday. So by the time Saturday rolls around I will be checking the fridge for bits and pieces and if there are none, we’ll be having scallops. (I hope that there are no leftovers, LOL.)
Chand dal (dried chickpea stew) with raw kale and cauliflower rice
It looks familiar because this is the other half of the double portion of Chana dal we made on Monday. What a pleasure to know that Saturday night’s dinner only needs a reheat and a little time spent taking the stems off the kale and defrosting and microwaving the cauliflower rice.
Tonight’s Chana dal is a little softer and perhaps a little more flavorful since it has been absorbing its liquid and spices since Monday. There was quite a bit in our leftover portion and we both enjoyed a second helping. Instead of ordering in some expensive take-out we enjoyed our LFD which was way more nutritious and economical!
John and I kind of invented this dinner on the fly when we were thinking about our weekly menu. We talked about wanting to use tofu and farro and decided that a stuffed pepper would be a way to combine them both.
After using the food processor to chop up the mushrooms, onions, and garlic into equally sized pieces, I sauteed them. Earlier in the day I had made farro using the oven-method. I mixed the farro in and added very small cubed tofu, and some spices, a little tomato paste, and a can of diced tomatoes.
We microwaved the bell peppers until they were pliable and stuffed the farro mixture into them. I cooked the stuffed peppers at 350F for 35 minutes.
This was a tasty, inventive, and filling vegan dish.
Oven roasted Chileans sea bass with sheet pan green beans and potatoes
Using this frozen Chilean sea bass from Costco makes a pricy fish affordable. We probably have some rendition of this dinner every two to three weeks. It definitely does not get old!
To keep the number of pots and pans down to a minimum we decided to sheet pan cook the potatoes and green beans. Normally I would have set the oven for 450F but because we were cooking the fish at 400F we cooked everything at a lower temperature. I think that is why the potatoes did not brown as much as I would have liked. But they tasted good and that is the main point.
Everything in the oven cooked in about 15 minutes
I have always been a little fearful of cooking fish. Growing up we never ate fish. My father was forced by his parents to eat fish as a child and he hated it with a passion. Our poor cat, whose real name was Pixie but went by the moniker Old Kitty, was never allowed to eat any kind of cat food that had fish in it. There were no tuna sandwiches at our house. In fact, I really did not eat fish until I went away to college and fish was served on Fridays. Luckily for me, John has no problems cooking fish and I have no problems eating it.
This dinner was easy-peasy to make, a snap to clean up, and a delight to eat!
