Frozen dinners

At this time of year, I obsess about what I can make and freeze so my husband doesn't starve over the summer. Now there actually aren't any pilots (ahem! Captains) at Big Giant International Airlines who have starved to death when their wives departed the sandlands for the summer, that we know of...

But, I am really good at having things to obsess over and I've discovered these small aluminum baking dishes with lids you can get here in the supermarket for about 10¢.

Soooo what are we assembling then?

Green chili chicken enchiladas with pumpkin

Red chili beef enchiladas.
Sautee 1lb of ground beef with cumin, coriander, garlic and onions. Spoon mixture into soft corn tortillas. When dish is filled with rolled tortillas, pour enchilada sauce (this is a nice recipe for home-made sauce, otherwise, I think Old El Paso Sauce is just fine) over the top of the dish. Sprinkle with green onions and fresh coriander leaves. Top with grated colby or jack cheese. Cover in foil- freeze.

Bean and cheese enchiladas.
Same process as above, if you have them, its nice to layer the beans with roasted peppers and other veg. 

Spinach Canneloni or lasagne. Just follow package directions here, Barilla brand pasta has a good recipe on the box.

Chicken pot pies.
This is the easiest dish. Fill your baking dish about 1/3 with frozen mixed vegetables. Bake 6-8 chicken thighs until just cooked (@ 30 min). Cut up one or two potatoes and add them. Add cream of chicken soup mixed with milk. When ready to cook, bake uncovered for about 45 minutes at 350. Remove from oven and top with frozen puff pastry sheets. Bake 15 minutes more or until puff pastry is browned.

Chicken curry.
Cook one cup of brown basmati rice. Bake 4 seasoned chicken breasts and two chicken thighs in the oven until just under- cooked (15min). In a large sauce pan, cook one onion in 1tsp neutral oil, until beginning to brown. Add two tbsp mild Thai Yellow curry paste. Cook the curry paste until it is well blended with the onion and oil. Add one clove of garlic, finely chopped. Slice your chicken and add it to the curry mixture with any chicken pan drippings. Cook, stirring constantly, until chicken is cooked through (5min). Add one 8oz can cocoanut milk to the chicken. Add broccoli florets, one green pepper, some zucchini and some frozen peas. Continue to cook until the vegetables turn bright green. Fill your baking dish with rice, pour curry over. Top dish with chopped green onion, fresh cilantro and holy basil (sometimes called Thai-basil). Cover and freeze. This dish is best 1st defrosted, then emptied into a pan for re-heating. (Veg tends to overcook in the oven).

Meat loaf - that's 50's, right?

Day two of this menu planning program went something like this:

Breakfast:
Cereal with milk
Poached eggs

Lunch
PB&J on toast
Turkey and camembert (just brought in from Lyon)
Pasta with butter
Its a bit of a restaurant here at lunch.

Snack
Popcorn & Juice

Dinner
Meatloaf (1lb meat, 1 egg, 1/4 cup breadcrumbs, tbsp katchup, tbsp brown mustard, pepper, 1 clove garlic, 1/2 onion)
Steamed broccoli
Steamed brown basmati rice

Plus leftover dahl curry & chana masala for the grownups on their rice.

Other things I'm doing to create a harmonious style are getting dressed to shoes each morning and making the beds. I've also got the boys putting away their own laundry and clearing up after dinner... swanky.

I think I can (be Donna Reed), I think I can....

Can she do it??

Trying to collect daily menus in advance of my DH going off to Big Giant International Airline Captain Training School (its as terrifying as it sounds- at least Medium-Sized American Airline put them up in a hotel during training). So I will be attempting to be Donna Reed and provide a smiley demeanor, clean laundry, a reasonably well organized household and good food for three months.

Breakfast:
1/2 buckwheat, 1/2 wholewheat pancakes
syrup
milk

Lunch:
Turkey and Goat Cheese with mustard, spinach & tomato

Snack:
Mango banana smoothie

Dinner
Lamb and tomato stew
steamed green beans
Mashed potato

Easter Dinner- Roast Lamb

So Easter dinner was the traditional leg of lamb. Usually, I smother the thing is mashed garlic, olive oil and Herbs de Provence. This time out, I had a ton of pre-chopped onions which were stinking up my kitchen something fierce so I added them to a bunch of parsley with some lemon and olive oil. It seemed too thin; pistachio nuts went into the food processor to give me the pesto above.

On a 12lb (bone in) leg of lamb, I used approximately 1 cup of this sauce and just spread it everywhere with my hands. Roasted the lamb at 180 for roughly two hours. It cooked very fast, much faster than I expected, so I wonder a bit if my oven is not correct any more.

The onion parsley mix is tasty, but the meat still needed salt.

Camp food

I've been really busy and this blog keeps falling off my to-do list, which is no good. I've got a pot of meatballs on the stove and a little bit of time while my children play in the road with the other neglected neighborhood beasts...
So I will tell you about a recent camping trip across the Omani border and what we ate...
In addition to cheese and crackers, sausages and bread etc.. which I brought because I had no clue what I was doing (I'm not really an outdoorsy gal, if you haven't noticed...). Our friend and de facto hostess, they go all the time, made up this tasty

Fireside Clam Chowder
2 cans of clams in their liquor(or 2 pints Quahogs if you live in the greatest little state in the union...), chopped.
2 cans sweet corn in water
3 or 4 medium yellow potatoes. cubed
two large brown onions, chopped
three or 4 cloves of garlic or a head of roasted garlic
about 1 cup of butter/flour roux- cooked to nearly done.
a good size bunch of green onions
thyme

Sautee your onions in about 1tbsp olive oil until well carmelized. Add the roux and the garlic stirring until roux is cooked to your taste. Add the clams, corn and potatoes. Cook for about 30 minutes until potatoes are fork tender, stirring occasionally. Season with green onions and thyme.
Black pepper to taste.

Keep it Simple, Stupid.

Sometimes, and maybe this is a condition of living in Dubai where you can literally get almost any foodstuff that exists (except black beans, there is a black bean shortage again), I forget that the easiest, simplest food is often the best tasting.

Winter Vegetable Bake

1 large parsnip- sliced

1 large carrot- sliced

1/2 butternut squash

1 small head cabbage- sliced

2 cups of brussels sprouts- whole

1 small sweet potato- chopped

1 small beet- chopped

1 red onion- chopped

4 cloves garlic- chopped

1 thumb of ginger- chopped

3 tbsp olive oil

salt and pepper

Put it all in a bowl. Add the oil, salt and pepper. Toss to coat. Roast in a shallow baking pan for about 35min or until vegetables begin to brown.

Broccoli & Brown Rice

1/2 large head broccoli- chopped into small florets and steamed.

1 cup brown rice

2 cups vegetable stock + more as needed

pepper flakes

Bring rice to a boil in stock, simmer until 1/2 the liquid is absorbed. Uncover and cook, stirring constantly until the remainder of the liquid is mostly absorbed. If the rice is not quite cooked, add another 1/4 cup stock, keep cooking and stirring until the rice is cooked to your taste. There should be some liquid remaining. Add broccoli, serve.

Antonio Mendosa would like an enchilada!!!

My friend Mrs. A. made amazing sour cream enchiladas last night. I wont give you the exact recipe, I haven't asked permission to post it, but here's a variation which is just as yummy.

4 whole chicken breasts
8 medium sized whole wheat tortillas
1 12oz container of sour cream (plain greek yogurt would work here too)
2 tbsp flour
8oz shredded cheddar cheese
1 package of baby spinach- steamed
2 cups chicken stock
1 head roasted garlic (you could use raw- 4 cloves very finely chopped)

Season the chicken breasts with salt and pepper. Place on a baking sheet and roast in a 350 degree oven for 20 min or until just cooked through (they are going to bake again). Heat your chicken stock in a saucepan with your garlic. When just boiling, add the sourcream and the flour, turn the heat WAY down and season with salt and pepper. Wisk together until smooth.
In a bowl, shred the chicken, add the spinach and the shredded cheddar (reserve 1/4 cup). Take a tortilla and place it on a plate, ladle some of the sour-cream sauce onto it and flip to coat. Fill the tortilla with a generous handful of the chicken mixture, roll and place in a baking dish.Repeat with other tortillas until the pan is full. Pour any leftover sauce over the enchiladas, top with the reserved cheddar. Bake in a 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes. Top with chopped fresh cilantro and spring onions. Serve with salsa.

Jet lag party

I woke up at 10p, the kids got up at 11. It is now 3:17a and we are all wide awake, trying to figure out what to do with ourselves while being quiet enough not to wake the man of the house. Not fun.

This evening, we're having some friends over for supper in the hopes that this will motivate us not to sleep all day.

Click here for cool info-graphics on jet-lag


The menu

French bread toasts with goat cheese & tomato, tuna & capers, and blue cheese & green apple

Pan fried sausages with bakery rolls. I have to try to find some decent non-pork sausages here.

Lentil soup
8 cups chicken stock (making it right now)
2 cups red split lentils, washed
1 large onion
1 head of roasted garlic
1 8oz can chopped tomato & green chili
1 large carrot
2 medium stalks of celery
salt & pepper to taste

Chop onion, garlic, carrot, celery finely. Saute them with the lentils in a large stock pot with about 1 tsp olive oil. When onions begin to brown, add the tomato & chili, the chicken stock and salt and pepper. Simmer for an hour or so.

Spring mix salad with
golden raisins
apples
pear
pumpkin seeds
blue cheese
balsamic vinaigrette

Good bye 2011. Bring on 2012! Happy New Year to all y'all.

The Wedding of the Century (cont.): Rotisserie Chicken- coming clean.

So we originally wanted to spit roast a lamb for this wedding. Unfortunately, the 'lamb weirdos', as every farmer who deals with lamb in the tri-state area (CT. MA. RI) will forever hence be known, were ultimately unable to come through with the beast. So, we decided on pork loins. But, given that there were a fair number of Jewish and Muslim guests, we thought we'd serve some chickens too.

Now, we did rent an absolutely enormous rotisserie grill on which we did cook a truly enormous amount of pork. What we did not actually do, and I'm using the royal we here since I only had kitchen help on the last two days (Thanks H. & P.), was rotisserie cook a dozen chickens. What we did do, was call Price Chopper and order them.

Wait, before you boo and hiss, we did make a sauce:
One rotisserie chicken
1/2 cup green olives (pitted)
1/2 cup roasted garlic
1 lemon - grilled
1/4 cup of olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Chop olives, garlic and grilled lemon, mix into oil. Salt and pepper to taste. Pour over rotisserie chicken. Pretend you made it yourself...

The wedding of the century (cont.)- Side dishes

So originally, we thought we'd make Quinoa, but one of my brothers referred to this most ancient and venerable grain as 'repulsive' so, it was decided that couscous would substitute.

Fall Couscous
1 cup cous cous
1/4 cup dried cranberries
1/4 cup toasted crushed pecans
1/4 cup carmelized red onion
juice of 1/2 a lemon
two tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp ginger (toasted)
1/2 tsp cumin (toasted)
salt, pepper to taste
Prepare couscous according to package directions. Blend in other ingredients. Season, serve. This dish has a warm, fall taste to it. Originally, I thought to add something green and crispy to it, but its lovely as it is especially with a tangy main dish (wait for it...)

Orzo with cheese and peas
2 cups cooked orzo pasta
1/4 cup mixed cheese (parmesan, pecorino, asiago)
1/4 cup butter
peas
salt and pepper to taste
No tricks here, just mix it all up when the pasta is hot.

Roasted Vegetables
Season your choice of vegetables (red pepper, we had some lovely black peppers, eggplant, squashes etc.) with vinaigrette (nearly empty mustard jar, 1/4 cup cider vinegar, 1/2 cup olive oil, salt, pepper, crushed garlic clove, finely chopped shallot, any fresh herbs you have around) by tossing in a large bowl. Spread on a baking sheet, bake at 400 or so for about 35 - 40 minutes. Serve hot or cold.

T'aint a party without buckets and buckets of hummus.

Hummus is not precisely a healthy food. Because it is generally a whole food, it seems very healthy. But the fact of the matter is that delicious hummus is delicious because it is absolutely loaded with olive oil, and sesame oil, and salt.

Healthy hummus
2 cans chick peas (rinsed)
1 tbsp sesame tahini
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 clove garlic
juice of a lemon
salt and pepper to taste
Blend ingredients in food processor. Add water to correct consistency. Feel virtuous.

Actually Delicious Hummus
2 cans of chick peas, drain one- keep liquid from the other
4 tbsp of sesame tahini
1 large bottle of olive oil
2 cloves of garlic (boiled and peeled)
juice of a lemon
salt and pepper to taste
Blend up your chick peas and sesame tahini with the lemon juice, it will be sort of chunky. Stand over food processor with bottle of olive oil and pour it into the hummus while it is running. Continue pouring until you feel like you have to look away because you are using so much oil.
When hummus is whipped and creamy, add salt and pepper to taste. Be smug as skinny people gorge on your hummus because 'hummus is healthy' teehee....

Wedding of the Century (cont.)- Cold Appetizers

Love the cold appetizers on a hot day, which mercifully, it was for only about an hour...

Deviled eggs
Boil and peel your eggs.
Mix the yolks with equal parts mayo and mustard. Add a splash of vinegar. Season with salt and pepper. Fill your egg halves with mixture. Top with crispy bacon. Top with rolled fillets of anchovy. Top with chopped chives. Everyone (except the bride) loves deviled eggs...

Bean Bruschetta
Two cans of white beans (cannellini). Blend one in a blender with some olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper. Fold the remaining beans into the blended bean mix.
Set aside.
Chop some tomatoes and spread them on a baking sheet. Top with oil, red onion, salt and pepper. Bake until cooked and beginning to carmelize. Set aside.
Slice a baguette thinly. Spread bean mixture on rounds. Top with a fresh basil leaf and a dollop of the tomato jam.

The wedding of the century, only smaller....

Post hurricane Irene, we are gearing up to get my sister married. It appears that all caterers in my little town believe they are Escoffier and think it is therefore appropriate to charge thousands upon thousands of dollars for food and labor. One proposed paying the waiters a little less per hour than we pay our attorney! with a mandatory 18% gratuity tacked on. Who knew so many culinary movie stars could be packed in such a small place?
And getting slowly to the point of this post, I'm doing it myself...

First up- Two Hot Appetizers....
Sundried tomato and goat cheese tartlets.
2 large logs of goat cheese
2 packages of cream cheese
4 eggs
2 8oz jars of chopped sundried tomato in olive oil
fresh herbs (marjoram and thyme, in this case...)
pepper and garlic powder (tsp. each?? to taste)
Blend all ingredients with a hand mixer, spoon into prepared puff pastry cups (c'mon I'm not THAT good...) garnish with herb leaves. Bake at 350 for around 6min, longer if freezing first. (makes 120 bite size, or 60 muffin-cup size)

Broccoli Rabi Stuffed Mushrooms
2 large heads broccoli rabi
1/2 cup prepared roasted garlic (chopped)
salt & pepper, olive oil (a lot)
1/2lb ricotta cheese (season with salt and pepper)
camembert cheese (1.5lbs)
6 LARGE boxes of button mushrooms
Chop rabi finely. In a large sautee pan, fry the rabi and garlic in oil until well mixed, and rabi are beginning to soften. Season with salt and pepper.
Spoon ricotta mixture into mushroom caps, top with rabi.
Coat the bottom of a baking sheet with olive oil and assemble the mushrooms. Bake at 375 or so for around 40 min or until mushrooms are tender. Top each with a dollop of camembert. Try to serve them before you gobble them all...

My camera seems to have disappeared in the festivities, so you'll have to imagine. I can tell you it all disappeared mighty quickly...

Enchiladas

I've been avoiding this blog for a while. I've just had too much going on. Too much fear and too much sadness. Things are looking up, though, and I'm feeling rather blessed by my immediate and extended family. As part of the post-traumatic event doings, we are having lots of guests which has me in the mode of preparing food in advance so I don't have to worry too much about feeding people while they are here.

I made these enchiladas last night and enjoyed them with good friends today for lunch.

Spray an 8"X8" glass baking pan lightly with cooking oil spray (I avoid the ones with silicone and/or propellants and just buy the supermarket version with only oil). Cover the bottom of the pan with corn tortillas, break them up to get into the corners. Top with black beans, shredded leftover chicken or pork and some cheddar soy-cheese (or real cheese if your guts haven't betrayed you...). Keep layering like this until the pan is about 80% full. You can also take each tortilla and fill it with the beans, chicken and cheese and roll them up individually, but I find the lasagne method a little faster and easier (tastes the same...)
There are lots of options for the sauce:
11/2 cup green chile salsa, blended with 1/2 cup pureed pumpkin and two garlic cloves
2 cups chunky 'fresh salsa'
2 cups classic red enchilada sauce

Whatever you make, top the enchilada with it, cover with foil and either refridgerate or bake at 350 for about 30minutes. Serve with sour cream, chives and some cold salsa.

Cheese Weasels

The Cheese Weasel is the nerd Easter bunny who leaves a slice of American cheese under the keyboards of good IT geeks on April 3. I don't know how I got into the habit of calling these Cheese Weasels. I think I just never had a particular name for them and 'cheese buns' don't really give you a sense of the fabulousness awaiting you...

2 1/2 teaspoons regular instant yeast or active dry yeast*
1/2 tsp. honey
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
3 cups Whole Wheat Flour
1/2 tsp powdered ginger
1/4 cup + 1 tablespoon lukewarm water
3/4 cup lukewarm milk
3 tablespoons butter, softened or melted
about 1 cup shredded best-quality cheddar

In a large bowl, combine yeast, honey, salt, and flour. Add the water, milk and butter, and mix until cohesive. Knead the dough on a lightly oiled surface till it's smooth and supple. Its ok if the dough is a bit sticky, your rolls will be more tender with a stickier dough.
Transfer the dough to a lightly oiled bowl, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and set the dough aside to rise till doubled in bulk, 1 to 2 hours.
Divide the dough into 16 pieces. Shape each piece into a thick disc. Place the cheese in the center of each disc and pinch the dough closed around it.
Lightly grease a 9 x 13-inch baking pan. Space the rolls in the pan (pinched side up), cover them with lightly greased plastic wrap, and allow them to rise for another hour or so, until they are puffy and touching one another.
Bake the rolls in a preheated 350°F oven for 20 minutes, or until they're golden brown. Remove them from the oven, set them on a wire rack to cool, don't eat them right out of the oven, the cheese especially will be too hot and burn the top of your mouth...

Party Food!

Suddenly, we are awash in social events. Tomorrow, I have to bring lunch for mine plus extra for about 10 people to a homeschooling event.
Menu: Turkey and cheese sandwiches with mayo or mustard, lettuce and tomato. (Muslim country, no salami, poor Mr. Dumpling...)
I'll bring a bag of apples and a batch of oatmeal chocolate chip muffins.
1 cup oatmeal
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup applesauce
1 egg
1/3 cup melted butter
1/4 cup milk
1/2 cup each chocolate chips and walnuts (with a walnut alert sticker on the tupperware).

Then, Friday night we have our neighborhood Halloween do. I'll probably bring hot dogs for the kids to grill and then we are supposed to supply a side dish. I'm going to make this spinach and egg pie, just don't call it a quiche, manly airline types might not want to eat it...

One 8oz package spinach (thawed).
8-10 eggs
1/2 cup mayonnaise (I know, but this is why it is really good!)
6oz grated cheddar cheese
salt and pepper to taste
1 lg. frozen pie crust OR you can make Martha Stewart's pate brisee, which is the most reliable one I've found.

Pre-heat oven to 350.
Grease and press pie crust into a 12" tart pan. Do this quickly so it doesn't warm up too much, it doesn't need to be perfect, just covering the bottom.
In a blender, mix eggs and mayo.
Pour egg mixture into a bowl and fold into spinach and all but 1/4 of the cheese. Add salt and pepper.
Bake for about 1 hour. At 50 min. top with remaining cheese. Bake for 10 min more, let cool. It is ok if a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out a little eggy. The tart will continue to cook for a bit after its out.

Chicken Biryani

Chicken biryani, it's what you have, Indian, Sri Lankan, or Local Arab, when you are having a bunch of folks over.
I've made it only once myself, but I've tried my fair share. I think the key is to make sure you have enough of the sauce so that the rice is not dry, but also to be careful about oil so it isn't greasy either. Here's something akin to the process, step by step... It should serve about 4, although it's a lot of work no matter how many people, so go for a big dinner party.

Take a chicken, cut it up.
Wash it well in warm water and a bit of salt.
Dredge your chicken lightly in flour, some turmeric, black pepper, a bit of curry powder or what have you, and fry just until its crispy on the outside, in oil or ghee. Chicken does not have to be fully cooked at this point, because it will get cooked again. Set chicken pieces aside.

In a different pan cook together, 1/4 cup vegetable oil. 5 small onions, 5 green chilis, 5 red chilis, 2 tomatoes, 4 or 5 cloves of garlic. Now here is where it gets tricky and personal. Everyone seems to have different ideas about what spices go into the biryani. I'd go with ginger, cumin, cardamom and cloves. But some people also use cinnamon, caraway seeds, and bay leaves too. When you have a nice thick spicy onion mixture, add the chicken and cover on low heat until it is cooked through. Finish with a generous amount of fresh coriander and serve over basmati rice. More authentic Biryani calls for par-cooking the rice and letting it finish in the sauce mixture, but I cant taste the difference, perhaps because it is quite spicy.

5:28am lentil soup

Because of this whole Julia Child thing, I really want to cook. I really want to cook for a lot of appreciative gourmet types. I really want to serve my cooking on china with linen table cloths, excellent wine and sophisticated conversation (truth be told, sophisticated conversation usually leaves me fuming, but I'm working on a vision here...).

The fact of the matter is, however, that I am home in Dubai in a semi-furnished house with three young children who are currently sleeping from four in the afternoon until two in the morning. Our tableware runs the gamut from chipped Ikea plates and Nutella jelly glasses to company-issued flatware which is falling apart... We need to make a few changes in order to bring the dinner party vision to fruition.

In the meantime I'm eating spicy lentil soup in the belief that spicy food will hasten the shedding of Eastern Standard time and get me onto GMT +4...

Curry Lentil Soup
1 carrot
1 large shallot
2 cloves garlic
1 thumb ginger
1 stalk of celery
1 tsp. olive oil
1 cup red (or French) split lentils
4 cups vegetable stock
8oz sliced mushrooms (button, shiitake, crimini etc.)
1 tablespoon yellow curry paste or more to taste.
2 cups cooked brown rice
green onions
coriander

In a large stock pot, saute the vegetables in the olive oil until softened and slightly browned.
Stir in the lentils until well coated with oil
Add the vegetable stock and turn the heat down to a simmer.
When the lentils are soft, add mushrooms and the curry paste.
Simmer until the mushrooms are cooked through.
To serve, mix in 1/4 cup cooked brown rice, top with green onions and fresh coriander, a dollop of plain yogurt or a splash of lemon juice would be nice too.

Day six- flunked

So we kind of failed. Its day six and we were having guests over so we went and got all kinds of things and are down $250. Now, if we dont eat out, and we dont go back next week we will be ok. I have definitely decided, and learned it is possible not to go to the market more than once a week. Although we already have three things on the shopping list.

We have lots of leftover barbecue chicken because our guests were vegetarians, which I forgot.

Barbecue sauce for one chicken. If you are going to grill, it is worth it to ask your butcher to remove the backbone for you. Most of the time, they are happy to do this for no extra charge and it cuts way down on cooking time...

1/4 cup ketchup
1/4 cup molasses
2 tbsp vinegar
1 tsp black pepper
2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp powdered ginger
1 finely chopped shallot

The longer it marinates, the better it will be, baste it as you go.

In-law Palooza

The in-laws are descending. Tonight, burgers on the grill. My DH, who has been away too long, picked up the bathroom copy of Ina Garten's Barefoot Contessa At Home (which every family needs). He has become fixated on a delicious-looking blue cheese burger. I'm not about to impose my new-found veganism on my husband (or his family for that matter) so I'm making them.

I'm modifying her recipe a bit, using 1 lb ground turkey and 1lb ultra-rich ground beef from our town farmer's market. Mixing them up with 1 egg, a generous bunch of garlic powder and some fresh basil and oregano.
These went on the grill for 5 min on one side, 3 on the other and were topped with tomato, lettuce, onion and blue cheese. I hear they were good. I ate a grilled portobello mushroom which was tasty but wasn't a burger...