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Easy chili. 9/26/25
Sarah did the cooking tonight. Using Muir Glen chili starter simplified the dish. After browning the ground beef she added beans and the chili tomatoes. Since this can of chili starter was mild she added some chipotle powder. I served mine over kale to increase the vegetable portion. We also had shredded cheese, tortilla chips, and sour cream. Easy and delish!
Posted in American, Beef, Easy, Legumes, Mexican, Southwest U.S., stew, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners
Tagged black beans, ground beef, kale, tomatoes
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Grilled lamb chops, new potatoes, broccoli. 9/25/25
Lamb is our favorite meat to grill. The grilling, along with lamb’s slight gaminess, is a great pairing. We buy these loin lamb chops at Costco. They come from New Zealand and are reasonably priced. John does a great job grilling them to medium rare. For my part I steamed some broccoli and microwaved new potatoes until they were just done through. John then put them on the grill for a delicious char.
Posted in American, Easy, Grilling, Lamb, Methods, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners
Tagged broccoli, Grilling, lamb chops, new potatoes
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Shrimp and rice in a saffron Pernod cream sauce 9/24/25
This shrimp dinner is always a hit at our house. This time I doubled the delicious sauce so we would have plenty. I have posted it before so if you’d like to see the recipe refer to my earlier blog post.
Two, too hot days. 9/21/25 and 9/22/25
Ah, it is Autumn and the leaves are changing color and the temperature hovers around 100F. I have explained in the past how September is really hot in Northern California. On Tuesday we experienced the hottest day of the year and Monday wasn’t much better. If you do not live in close proximity to the ocean you can expect to be really hot in September.
Foodwise this means that I need to find dishes that do not take much cooking and definitely do not need cooking in the oven. Here’s what we did to beat the heat.
Monday we augmented and heated up in the microwave the Sicilian swordfish sauce from last week. This time we put it on quickly seared tilapia and precooked rice
On Tuesday we experienced a “Smart Day.” This is when PG&E, our electric and gas utility company, asks us not to run appliances and air conditioning during peak usage hours. So we started out the day by going out to lunch at a sushi restaurant where we enjoyed a bento box.
Keeping in the spirit of not cooking and not using electricity we had hummus, pita, tabouli, and tomatoes for dinner.
On Wednesday it is supposed to cool down and we are really keeping our fingers crossed that this spell of hot, hot weather is the last for this year.
Posted in Dining out, Easy, Fish, Hot weather meals, Japanese, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, rice, Salad, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners
Tagged hummus, Salad, tilapia
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Autumn soup and challah. 9/19/25
We did our celebrating of Rosh Hashanah on Friday night because on Monday, the actual date, it is supposed to be in the upper 90s and too hot for baking and making soup. Sarah made a lovely round challah in the morning and I made our usual Autumn soup and a plateful of symbolic foods. We toasted each other and hoped for a more compassionate and peaceful 5786.
New England clam chowder. 9/18/25
It has finally cooled off for a few days so I thought I’d make soup. This clam chowder is one of our favorites. Here’s the recipe from my blog entry last January.
Oops! I did not post the recipe in January so here it is instead—
Posted in American, pescatarian, Shellfish, soup, Vegetables
Tagged clams, leeks, potatoes, soup
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Grilled NY strip steak. 9/17/25
John grilled the steak, I made the potato, and Sarah assembled the salad. Fast, easy, delicious dinner for a hot night.
Posted in American, Beef, Easy, Grilling, Hot weather meals, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners
Tagged Beef, Grilling, potato, Salad, Steak
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Chicken ramen noodle salad – 9/16/25
Sarah made her dinner a couple of days early since she was making a salad and it is very hot here this Tuesday. She found a recipe for a ramen noodle salad which reminded her of the days when I used to make something similar. I looked through my blog but I have not made it since I started this blog in 2011. So I think I made it as a kid friendly dish probably before we moved to California some 30+ years ago.
The ramen noodles are used straight from the package and they soften somewhat in the vinaigrette. She used cabbage and kale for her greens, leftover rotisserie chicken chunks, shredded carrot, cucumber, and cherry tomatoes. It is a fun crunchy salad to eat and we got to talk about “the old days” when she and her brother were kids.
I cannot find a digital version of the recipe from Better Homes and Gardens but here is the recipe that she used. https://www.budgetbytes.com/ramen-noodle-salad/
Posted in American, Easy, Hot weather meals, Pasta, Poultry, Recipes, Salad, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners
Tagged chicken, ramen, Salad
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