Some Saturdays you have loads of bok choy…
I began this stirfry by sautéing the thinly sliced pork in a little oil and pepper. Just for a minute on each side and let it sit on the side while you cook the other ingredients. Its not essential to get the pork perfectly cooked, because I chopped it up and added it back into the wok and cooked for a little longer.
In the wok I cooked garlic, diced bell peppers, mushrooms and a Japanese white sweet potato (from my CSA). Then I added in the diced pork and chopped bok choy (also from my CSA) and cooked for a little longer. I seasoned with some soy sauce, a pinch of sugar, sesame seeds, sesame seed oil and some cayenne (for heat!). Serve with rice, and enjoy with friends… or savor all by yourself.
—jk
Some Saturdays you celebrate with salmon!
I’ve recently been considering the renaming my blog because it hasn’t been very consistent with being “penniless”. True, I started this back when I was getting my master’s degree and had no money; I had to be much more frugal and creative back then. But now, its a different story, I’m able to buy much nicer produce and higher welfare meat.
Though, I’ve always required the highest possible quality fish. This is because of my childhood. In short, I rarely rarely buy fish in the store. This is only possible because my father has regular access to the freshest, wildest, best fish there is possible. You hear stories of store-bought salmon being dyed pink because the farmed fish don’t eat their natural diet. So fish tends to be something for special occasions.
This however was wild-caught salmon had a beautiful depth of pink with an almost terracotta/persimmon red quality. Yes I’m getting artistic with my words here.
I baked this salmon in foil pouches, with a bottom layer of lemon slices. I brushed a combination of mustard, olive oil, and dill onto the fish. And then topped it with onion and fennel. I baked the fish at 400°F for about 18 minutes, while I cooked up some asparagus.
—jk
Some Saturday’s you just want comfort food…
Its one of those chilly spring days where winter seems to creep back in. I had the Ws over for lunch a few weeks back and made this potato soup. I had asked T what I should make for the Ws, his response was “Potatoes with a side of potatoes.”
So of course potato soup seemed like a natural fit, along with some cheese and bacon of course. I did sneak in a bunch of other veggies into this soup to try and make it “less bad”. Because there’s no way this is healthy.
First:
Bring a large pot of water to a boil (this will take quite a while) and cook the peeled potatoes until you can easily pierce then with a fork. I boiled about five pounds of potatoes.Next:
While the potatoes are boiling. Take one chopped onion, three chopped carrots, one chopped parsnip, and 1/2 chopped celeriac and sauté. Add the tender veggies that has 2 qts of heated chicken broth. Puree together with an immersion blender until smooth.Then:
Make a roux in a large soup pot, I used 1/2 cup butter and 1/2 cup flour. Melt the butter add the flour evenly and mix together, let it cook for about 30 seconds, and slowly ladle in the pureed chicken broth. Make sure to continually stir the butter/flour mixture so that it doesn’t get lumpy. Once you’ve added all the chicken broth, add the potatoes, and bring back up to a boil.Finally:
Add a cup (or so) of heavy cream into the soup, stir and season with salt and pepper. Serve with shredded cheese and bacon; and know all your friends are jealous!—jk
Some Saturdays you make Zucchini Cheddar Muffins…
I made these muffins for Easter and they turned out exactly what I wanted! The recipe came from a website called Kill The Microwave, which then I adapted since I then altered since I needed to double the recipe and I didn’t have all the ingredients. (The name of this website also made me think about how I haven’t owned a microwave for a year now. I haven’t particularly missed it yet.)
Zucchini Cheddar Muffins - Makes two dozen muffins.
Heat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease a muffin tin.
Mix together in a bowl:
3 cups white flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher salt
Fresh cracked black pepper to tasteIn a separate bowl beat four eggs, 2 cups heavy cream, and 2 tsp lemon juice.
Pour the liquid ingredients into the dry ingredients, and stir just five times. Add 2 cups of grated cheddar cheese (I used a really sharp raw cheddar that really stood out), 2 cups of chopped green onion, 2 cups of grated zucchini. Mix ingredients again, as little as possible, until just incorporated.
Spoon the mixture into muffin tins and top with more cracked black pepper and a smattering of coarse sea salt.
Bake in the oven for 20 minutes and enjoy!
—jk
EDIT: WOW, so many ‘likes’ and ‘reblogs’! Again I’m speechless. Thank you everyone!
Lamb and Barley Stew
2 lbs lamb shoulder trimmed and cubed
3 carrots cut in 1/4”(ish) circles
1 yellow onion
1 Potato chopped into small cubes
Salt
Pepper
Flour
Olive Oil
Oregano
Bottle of dark beer
4 cups chicken/beef broth
1 cup of pearl barley or barley grits (check at the natural grocery stores)
Very simple hearty stew, cooked in a dutch oven
heat oil on stove till shimmering
dredge the lamb in flour salt pepper mix and brown on all sides in oil remove and set aside when browned.
saute onions and carrots in oil and drippings remove and set aside.
I deglazed the drippings with a nice dark porter but this is a completely optional step (optional but why wouldn’t you? drink for me drink for the stew!), if you do choose to deglaze use a beer or broth, its supposed to be a pretty simple tasting dish and wine ruins that.
add the lamb veggies and barley to the pot and mix all together. add the broth and bring to a boil. Once boiling bring the heat down to low Cover and simmer. let it cook for at least 45 minutes at which point the lamb and barley should be tender. 5 minutes before the stew is finished add the oregano.
Some Saturdays it finally warms up… (though it should be raining all day)
So what better to do but have lots of fresh fruit and veg. The B’s came over and I wanted to cook something fun, lots of color, flavor, and shapes. I also had some halibut left over from my Alaskan adventure, so it was decided… Fish Tacos!
It can be a challenge to cater to everyone’s food needs and desires which is what makes tacos such an appealing meal. At the table everyone can assemble their own food and put how much or how little they want.
The fish I cooked rather simply: some olive oil, cilantro, lime juice, white wine and adobo seasoning. And then served it with, well just look at the photos. Cabbage, beautiful tomatoes, monterey jack cheese, black beans, avocado, salsa, more cilantro, and more lime. We filled them into corn tortillas and bit into a little bit of joy.
I had a few manadrin oranges to serve as a ‘desert’, again something fresh but sweet to savor.
—jk
Some Saturdays you get to try out a new gadget…
I finally bought a set of biscuit cutters. After years of using glasses and jars I will finally have the easy of making them large or small.
So in light of this new acquisition I made biscuits for breakfast and served them with Lingonberry jam.
It was a fairly easy task, I’m sure you could google a recipe fairly quickly. What I did was take 2 cups of flour, 1/2 tsp salt, 1 tsp baking soda, and 4 tsp baking powder. I rubbed in 5 tbls of butter into the mixture and then added scant 1 cup of milk. Using a spoon I worked the dough into a sticky mess and then kneaded it just enough to get it to roll out nicely (around 10 times). After cutting the biscuits out I baked them at 450 for about 8 minutes.
I’ve been noticing my oven’s temperature is off, so keep watch to make sure you don’t burn them.
Enjoy,
—jk
Some Saturdays need simplicity…
This past weekend I had more friends over and in the rush of life I needed something easy to make but TASTY. Hugh’s Three Good Things is a cookbook focused on three main ingredients to make a delicious dish. This one is his Tomato, Bean, and Olive Oil recipe.
I didn’t follow his recipe, because I never do. But here’s the general gist of what I did:
Step One
4 - 6 garlic cloves chopped
Saute in Olive Oil until just starting to color.Step Two
Add 4 cans of white beans (drained and rinsed).
Add just barely enough water so that the beans are covered.
Add 2 bay leaves and a bunch of stalks of fresh thyme.
Boil for five minutes.Step Three
Remove the bay leaves, thyme, and half the beans.
If there are any thyme leaves left on the stalk strip them off and put back in the soup.
Puree the remaining half of the beans and water together with an immersion blender.
Put the first half of the beans back into the soup with the bay leaves.
Add 4-5 chopped tomatoes and cook for about 5-7 minutes.Step Four
Season with salt and pepper.
Ladle into bowls.
Drizzle the best olive oil you have on top of the soup.
Serve and enjoy!—jk
Some Saturdays you admire the beauty of new life in your home…
This post is in honor of the Chinese New Year, last Sunday, and I had some friends over to try a new recipe. It called for sprouts, so what a perfect way to use the sprouts from my window box, for friends!
—jk
PS: For some reason when I create a link with this new theme it doesn’t underline the words to show its a link. So here’s the Jamie Oliver recipes. http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/pork-recipes/oriental-pork-with-noodles
Some Saturdays you reflect over the past year…
It was back on 21 January 2012 that I began to intentionally take pictures of my food, so happy anniversary to me! And it is with some coincidence that this post harkens back to my first post of english muffins and raspberry jam. I still think that first picture is one of my favorites. I didn’t plan this connection, but it sure makes me happy. Years come and years go, but in the end every Saturday is a good day to have bread and jam for breakfast.
I was rushing home from work on Friday evening, stopped by the grocery store, picked up some necessities, but when I got home realized I was out of bread! In my rush I had totally forgotten this essential. Have you ever done that? I do it all the time.
It was a stressful week at work, so baking a loaf of bread was the asnwer. With no time to lose, I began on correcting my forgetfulness. 250g White Flour, 250g Whole Wheat Flour, 5g Yeast, 10g Salt, mix well and then add 1.33 cups warm water and kneed for about ten minutes. Oh and I threw in a couple handfuls of wheat bran for a little extra fiber. Don’t worry I didn’t kneed by hand, I was tired from work of course! I just used my stand mixer. After letting the bread rise twice, I proofed the bread in the pan and baked until finished.
There’s so much more that goes into bread making, that its best to read through the process in a book. The River Cottage Bread Book is perhaps my favorite. Yet despite the intimidating nature of bread, nothing is simpler. When I come home from a day of trauma and chaos, it restores my soul by exercising a little faith and trust. Yes faith and trust. You have to have trust in the process, there’s no immediate gratification in bread making. You have to have faith in your ingredients, the flour, the yeast, that it isn’t until the end that one finds out the product of one’s labors. Bread makes life real again.
—jk
