Chicken and gravy with mashed potatoes and broccoli. 4/26/25

Posted on April 27, 2025 by Beebamom
Chicken, gravy, mashed potatoes, broccoli

We are finishing up our cooking week with a homey kind of dish that you might expect your mom or grandmother would make. This is especially true if you come from a very bland, non-ethnic background like I do. Growing up in our house, pasta was about as exotic as we would get. My mother would serve a plate of spaghetti with stewed tomatoes on top. I think my older sister still cooks mainly like our mother used to although she has reported cooking chili with grape jelly. Zounds!

I have to admit though, chicken with gravy, mashed potatoes, and broccoli makes me happy.🙂

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Seared tuna with stir-fry vegetables and rice. 4/25/25

Posted on April 26, 2025 by Beebamom
Seared tuna with stir-fried vegetables and rice

This was a pretty easy and quick dinner. John was in charge of the tuna and I was in charge of the sides. He marinated the tuna briefly in soy, garlic, and ginger. He added sesame seeds before putting it a hot frying pan for a short amount of time. It came out really good! I made a sauce for the vegetables consisting of oyster sauce, soy sauce, sesame oil, fish sauce, and a little water. I took a shortcut by buying a bag of fresh stir-fry vegetables and some pre-shredded carrots. John had made the rice earlier in the day so all I needed to do was heat it up in the microwave.

Posted in Asian, Easy, Fish, Methods, pescatarian, rice, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Dining out: Tasca Tasca. 4/24/25

Posted on April 26, 2025 by Beebamom
Roasted beet salad, pork slider, caldo verde, piri piri chicken wings

Tasca Tasca is a Portuguese tapas restaurant in downtown Sonoma. We have not eaten there for a while and the idea of ordering a selection of different things appealed to us. The menu offers tasting plates of 3,5, or 7 items. I decided on 3 and John on 5. Then I got talked into also getting the soup so I actually had 4 items. The items come in ramekins and you would think that it is not so much food. But it is a lot of food! I am glad that I got the soup, caldo verde (hot green), but I ate that first and then I was pretty full before I even started. Everything was tasty. I gave part of my pork slider to John and traded him my chicken drumsticks for his flats. Even with the trade I could not finish the chicken wings. I also could not eat all the beets. They were in really big chunks.

Clockwise from soup – Caldo verde, piri piri chicken wings, Monterey squid salad, braised trip

John chose the soup and chicken wings like I did along with a squid and white bean salad and braised tripe. His favorite was the squid salad. For his fifth item he got olive oil ice cream to share with me.

We were so full from our lunch that neither of us wanted any dinner! We do not dine out often so it was fun going out to lunch.

Olive oil iced cream
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Stuffed peppers again. 4/23/25

Posted on April 24, 2025 by Beebamom
Stuffed pepper and tabbouleh

The problem with making ten stuffed pepper halves is that they wipe out your dinner plans for the next few days. So here is what we ate on our leftover night. I took one of the halves and topped it with more sauce and cheese and microwaved it for two minutes. Along with the pepper we shared the leftover tabbouleh from Monday night. I think the peppers were even tastier than they were last night and the prep and cleanup was minimal.

Posted in American, Beef, Easy, Italian, leftovers, Leftovers For Dinner, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Stuffed peppers. 4/22/25

Posted on April 23, 2025 by Beebamom
Stuffed pepper

While perusing the shelf full of various overpriced orange, yellow, and red bell peppers I noticed a bag of colorful peppers on the shelf above. These actual looked healthier than the expensive ones on the shelf below. Usually I make three halved peppers at a time but if I buy the bagged ones not only will I save at least $1.50 but I will also get five peppers or ten halves. Of course I am making more work for myself but I will probably have six halves left over for another dinner and probably a lunch too! Win, win!

I browned one pound of ground beef and added onions, garlic, and oregano. Then I mixed in a cup and a half of rice that John had made a few days ago. Next I mixed in a jar of Rao’s tomato and basil sauce which I bulked up with tomato purée, tomato paste and red wine. That mixture cooked together for 20 minutes before I stuffed the bell pepper halves. I had par-cooked all the bell pepper halves in the microwave for six minutes. The whole 9 x 13 dish went in the 350F oven for about an hour.

John said these were the best stuffed peppers I had ever made!

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Hummus, pita, tabbouleh, and red cabbage 4/21/25

Posted on April 22, 2025 by Beebamom

Clockwise- hummus, pita, tabbouleh, and red cabbage

Except for the tabbouleh this was kind of an open packages and arrange on plate kind of dinner. The hummus was Sabra garlic, the pita was Toufayan whole wheat, and the red cabbage came from a jar that John got for Christmas. The tabbouleh I made with bunches of parsley and mint, garlic, tomatoes, lemon juice, and green onions all mixed with bulgar wheat and olive oil. I had to get out my food processor to get everything chopped up. It turned out pretty good although the lemons were Meyer lemons and did not add quite the level of acidity that I was looking for.

Posted in Grains, Hot weather meals, Legumes, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, Vegan, Vegetables, Vegetarian, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Weekly Menu. April 21-27, 2025

Posted on April 20, 2025 by Beebamom
Screenshot
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Shrimp tacos with mango salsa and black beans 4/18/25

Posted on April 19, 2025 by Beebamom

Tacos are a fun dinner any night of the week. Sometimes we make beef tacos, sometimes chicken, or fish or shrimp. Tonight’s dinner featured shrimp with a mango/tomato salsa. The yellow honey or Southeast Asian mangoes were on sale for 2/$1 so I gave them a try. They tasted less sweet and more citric than the green/red Indian mangoes that I usually buy. To make up for the difference I added a little sweetener and oil to the salsa along with a couple of tomatoes, cilantro, red onion, and a squirt of sriracha. John was in charge of cooking the shrimp which he did perfectly. I added a can of Rotel to my can of black beans as well as onion, cilantro, and garlic. Altogether this was a good dinner, the kind you wish there was more of!

Posted in American, Easy, Legumes, Mexican, pescatarian, Shellfish, Southwest U.S., Vegetables, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Spaghetti with feta and cherry tomatoes. 4/17/25

Posted on April 18, 2025 by Beebamom

Thursdays are Sarah’s nights to cook. Tonight she made a pasta dish with spaghetti, roasted cherry tomatoes, olive oil, and feta. It was delicious!

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Leftover lamb, potatoes, and broccoli. 4/16/25

Posted on April 17, 2025 by Beebamom

The broccoli was freshly made for tonight’s dinner but everything else was a leftover. We made the lamb by grilling it on Sunday and the potatoes came from last night’s dinner. To reheat the lamb John set up the sous vide apparatus and warmed the meat at 125F for 90 minutes. When it was done it was still pink and juicy. Nothing tasted like a leftover!

Posted in American, Easy, Grilling, Lamb, Leftovers For Dinner, Methods, sous vide, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , , | Leave a comment