Pan con tomate, pot stickers, and hot and sour soup?? 2/12/17

Posted on February 13, 2017 by Beebamom

Tonight is a night for nibbling. We start with a Spanish tapa, pan con tomate. (Bread with tomato) We had this especially in Barcelona when we visited Spain back in 2010. Here’s the picture of our tapas from the restaurant, Matamala.

Assorted salami and pan con tomato at Matamala in Barcelona

Assorted cured meats and pan con tomato at Matamala in Barcelona

And here’s our pan con tomate tonight! It is much cheaper to vacation eating in our own kitchen!

Pan con tomate

Pan con tomate

It is really simple, just rub some toast with garlic and tomato and brush with olive oil.

Now we switch gears for a couple of pot stickers compliments of the frozen bag of LingLing Potstickers in our freezer. First you steam them in some water and oil and then after the water boils away, you brown the bottoms.

Potstickers (we were a bit over-zealous with the browning)

Potstickers (we were a bit over-zealous with the browning)

Finally we have hot and sour soup which is our planned-over from our Chinese dinner last week. The dinner tonight  keeps us busy cooking and eating for a long time!

Hot and sour soup

Hot and sour soup

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Turkey meatloaf -2/10/17

Posted on February 12, 2017 by Beebamom
Turkey meatloaf with broccoli and carrots

Turkey meatloaf with broccoli and carrots

Boy, do I love meatloaf. But meatloaf is not a friend of trying to eat healthier. So I have been working on a ground turkey version.  We ended up making a large meatloaf using 2 lbs. of lean ground turkey. This way we will have lots of leftovers for sandwiches. Along with your usual meatloaf ingredients, I added 1 lb. of mushrooms chopped finely in the food processor. I cooked these until they stopped exuding liquid. They have good umami flavor. I also added about a teaspoon of fish sauce which also deepens the flavor.

I cooked the meatloaf in a cast iron Dutch oven. It was supposed to get to 170F but the first time I stuck in my Thermo-pen, it was already 190F so it turned out a little drier than it should have. I need to make a note on my recipe sheet to test it earlier.

Another way I am trying to cut down is by having plenty of vegetables instead of a starch on my plate. We’ll see how this goes as I am an avid carbohydrate lover.

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Out to lunch – 2/9/17

Posted on February 10, 2017 by Beebamom

Here it is Friday and I haven’t made dinner for two nights in a row. I think before Wednesday I had cooked twelve days in a row so I guess I am entitled to a rest. Wednesday we had Moo Shu Pork and Mongolian Beef from our local Chinese restaurant and on Thursday we went out to lunch so we just picked at things we had  in the refrigerator for dinner.

Here is what I had for lunch at Posada –  Contemporary Southwest, a restaurant in Livermore, CA.

Mahi mahi fish tacos with watermelon salad

Mahi mahi fish tacos with watermelon salad

Two things first off, the picture was taken with my husband’s phone and it is not nearly as good as my iPhone for photography.  Secondly, that is his beer. I drank water.

The dish consisted of pan fried chipotle mahi-mahi atop corn tortillas with chipotle mayo, pickled cabbage slaw, smoky sweet pepper sauce and side of watermelon salad. It was all very good. The fish was not at all greasy and was moist with good chipotle flavor. The corn tortillas were small but delicious! The watermelon salad was fine. I am not a big watermelon fan so John ate half of mine.

Good lunch with good friends makes for an enjoyable afternoon!

 

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Chicken Tuesday – 2/7/17

Posted on February 8, 2017 by Beebamom

I pushed Chicken Monday to Tuesday this week because we needed to eat up the leftover fish stew. (And it was easier to heat up something rather than make a whole new meal!)

Boneless skinless chicken breast cooked sous vide and rutabagas and broccoli

Boneless skinless chicken breast cooked sous vide and rutabagas and broccoli

Once the water comes up to temperature we sous vide the chicken for an hour and a half. It is important to remember to start early or else you’ll be eating around 8 PM! I cooked the rutabagas for 20 minutes in the microwave after they were peeled and cut in fairly small pieces. I also added some kale to the broccoli for some dark greens power boost!

I don’t usually post any recipes on my site because most of the food we make is pretty straight forward. I sometimes use a recipe when I am trying something new but we always end up changing it as we go along tasting our results. I keep a binder full of recipes that I have copied off the internet. The most important thing about them is that I record how I changed the recipe to suit our taste. So what my point is – start with a recipe as an idea but make it your own!

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Augmented fish stew – 2/6/17

Posted on February 7, 2017 by Beebamom
Roasted cauliflower

Roasted cauliflower

Cauliflower has been on sale this week – 2 heads for $3! I bought a couple to have for snacks.  John and I enjoy our “cocktail hour” and instead of eating some chips or cheese and crackers with our glass of wine sometimes I make roasted cauliflower. After preheating the oven to 500F convect, I pop in a sheet tray of cauliflower florets that have been tossed in olive oil and salt. It takes 15 or so minutes.  When it looks like it is burnt, it’s time to enjoy your vegetable snack. So good!

Here is our pot of fish stew left over from last week. John added some additional cod and shrimp and I added a leek, drained tomatoes, celery, and a half of a yellow pepper. We warmed it up and enjoyed it a second time. Now there are more leftovers! I think we’ll freeze those.

Fish stew simmering on the stove

Fish stew simmering on the stove

It tastes great with a couple of pieces of good bread

It tastes great with a couple of pieces of good bread

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Pasta with sweet Italian sausage – 2/5/17

Posted on February 7, 2017 by Beebamom

Remember the chicken cacciatore from Friday night? Here is the sauce from that dinner being used again in a yummy pasta dinner.

Pasta with sweet Italian sausage

Pasta with sweet Italian sausage

We had part of a box of cellentani, three sweet Italian sausages, and a little of the cacciatore sauce. Sounds like a dinner to me! I added some additional tomatoes to the sauce and some water to thin it out. It worked fine with the sausage.  The fennel in the sauce really complemented the sausage. John browned the sausage first and then we finished it in the cacciatore sauce. After adding the al dente pasta everything was ready.

We avoided watching the Stupor Bowl and thus eating all the snacks that might have come with it. Good for us!

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Hamburger on a bun – 2/4/17

Posted on February 7, 2017 by Beebamom
Hamburger on a bun

Hamburger on a bun

I have to admit it, I do love a hamburger on a bun with some mayo, ketchup and onion. We started tonight’s dinner with a salad and followed it up with this lovely fellow. Tasty!

And speaking of tasty, here’s what is on the menu for this week –

Kap'n Mom's Kitchen Menu

Kap’n Mom’s Kitchen Menu

I guess you will notice that there is nothing vegetarian or vegan for this week. Several of these meals are adaptable, though. Pasta with sweet Italian sausage can be made with a vegetarian sausage instead and same thing with the lentil stew. The shrimp and white beans could be tofu and white beans.  It’s up to you!

 

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Chicken cacciatore with pasta – 2/3/17

Posted on February 4, 2017 by Beebamom
Chicken cacciatore with pasta

Chicken cacciatore with pasta

Just like yesterday’s meal this is a dish that includes a lot of chopped vegetables. I chopped up onions, fennel, leek, herbs, olives, and tomatoes. The original recipe called for a whole chicken set upon all these vegetables to cook. Since we were only cooking for the two of us we made three boneless, skinlesss thighs and since I didn’t want extra fat, I roasted the vegetables in the oven and John cooked the chicken thighs sous vide.

vegetables ready for the oven

vegetables ready for the oven

Chicken thighs sous vide

Chicken thighs sous vide

When the chicken was almost ready we cooked up some pasta and adjusted the vegetables to a sauce like consistency with some tomato paste and petite diced tomatoes. After nestling the chicken in the vegetables and pasta and adding some fresh herbs on top, it was dinner time!

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Mediterranean fish stew – 2/2/17

Posted on February 3, 2017 by Beebamom
Mediterranean Fish Stew

Mediterranean Fish Stew

Here’s a look at what we are eating this week. You’ll see that Kap’n Mom has been pretty close to the original plan. Only thing different is that we switched around the Pasta with Peanut Sauce and the Mediterranean Fish Stew because John was working on Wednesday and he likes to be involved when we make the fish stew.

Kap'n Mom's Menu

Kap’n Mom’s Menu

This is a recipe from Rick Stein’s book, Fruits of the Sea, adapted for what seafood we have in the freezer. Here is a link to his recipe called Mediterranean Fish Soup. https://www.lifestylefood.com.au/recipes/4896/mediterranean-fish-soup

I like this recipe because it involves a lot of chopping up and also because it is low in calories. I had to chop up onions, fennel, leeks, bell pepper, potatoes, tomatoes, garlic, orange zest, and celery. They are all supposed to be about the same size (except for the garlic and orange zest) so that made the chopping more interesting. John sautéed the vegetables first in a little olive oil.

Sautéing vegetables

Sautéing vegetables

John also made a shrimp stock out of the leftover shrimp shells that we keep adding to in the freezer until we have enough to make stock. The shrimp stock was the basis of the dish. In our freezer we had Pacific cod, shrimp, and scallops so that is the seafood we used for this. Rick Stein’s recipe calls for all sorts of seafood like red mullet and baby octopi but we are fine with just using what we have.

After the potatoes are cooked through (new potatoes cut in fourths) it is time to put the seafood in. It cooks in no time and it’s time to eat!

Mediterranean Fish Stew

Mediterranean Fish Stew

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Pasta with broccoli and peanut sauce – 2/1/17

Posted on February 2, 2017 by Beebamom
Pasta with broccoli and peanut sauce

Pasta with broccoli and peanut sauce

Wow, we are eating vegetarian two days in a row! Tonight after a beforsie of roasted cauliflower, we continued our meal with an easy pasta with broccoli and peanut sauce. Included in the sauce was about 3/4 cup of pasta water. Some sliced green onions completed the dish.

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