Skip to main content

Weekly Check In

Image
By
It's that time again - let's see how we did with our meal plan last week.

Meal 1 - Christmas lima beans with caramelized onions and bacon, spinach salad
I had been curious about heirloom beans and was poking around on the interwebs when I found the Rancho Gordo site. They have an almost rabid following and I decided to give one of their samplers a try. These are expensive beans, so I was hoping they would knock my socks off. Either beans are beans or I have a terribly unsophisticated palette, because I truly didn't notice much of a difference between these and other dried beans (now these beans and canned beans, no contest. The Rancho Gordo beans kick canned beans in the .... well, can). It is important to me to support small farms and it's VERY important to keep heirloom varieties around (we don't want another potato famine now, do we?), so I'll probably keep heirloom beans in the pantry along side the conventional dried beans. I would like to find a producer on the east coast though - know of one?

OK, enough of the heirloom bean talk. The actual dish we made was based on a recipe from thekitchn, which in turn was based on a recipe from the Rancho Gordo cookbook. And it was good. Really, how can you go wrong with bacon and caramelized onions? And the spinach salad was a traditional spinach salad with bacon, hard boiled egg and red wine vinaigrette. Delicious!

Meal 2 - Kale, potato and sausage soup, shredded carrots with tahini dressing
This soup was based on the Portuguese soup, caldo verde. It was ok, a little bland. I'm going to try it again with a few tweaks and if I like it, I'll share the recipe. The tahini dressing on the carrots is from Karen Solomon's book Jam It, Pickle It, Cure It. Honestly, this isn't my favorite cookbook and I don't make much from it, but this dressing recipe was worth the cost of the book alone. The dressing tastes just like Annie's green goddess dressing.

Meal 3 - Italian turkey sausage and onions over polenta, spicy coleslaw
We made this with the leftover sausage from the soup. A classic and very tasty. The spicy coleslaw was based on a recipe from the Alice Waters book Chez Panisse Vegetables.


Meal 4 - Red lentil bake, cabbage and corn salsa salad
The one meal that we didn't make. You'll see this on this week's menu.

Speaking of this week's menu, check back shortly to see what we'll be eating this week!


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bacon Makes it Better - Roasted Cabbage with Bacon

By
As I mentioned in this week's check in , roasted cabbage with bacon is one of my favorite dishes. The sweetness of the cabbage and onions with the smoky saltness of the bacon just can't be beat. There are a bunch of very similar recipes all over the internet, but I first saw it over at the kitchn . Roasted Cabbage with Bacon adapted (slightly) from Faith Durand 's recipe at thekitchn.com 1 head of green cabbage, outer leaves removed, cored and quartered (I've made this with red cabbage and it's just as good) 2 red onions, peeled and quartered 5 slices of thick bacon, cut into large pieces Salt and Pepper Heat the oven to 450. Place the cabbage and onion in a large roasting dish. Drape the bacon over the veggies. Please in the oven and cook 15 minutes. Flip the cabbage and onion and place back in the oven for another 15 minutes. Check your cabbage - if it's roasted to your liking, toss with salt and pepper to taste and serve. If it needs furth...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mushroom Soup

By
It's been a while since our last post, as our friends Gabriel and Tracey were visiting from San Francisco last week.  They are two of our most favorite people; smart, funny and fun to be around. If you get a second, you should check out Tracey's blog, warm as toast . She writes tidbits about her life and things that inspire her. It's the first thing I look for when I log in to google reader. While you're at it (and while I am shamelessly promoting my friends), check out u-dot music to listen to some of the music Gabe has worked on. Gabe and Tracey love food as much as we do, so we spent the better part of the week drinking a bit too much and eating way too much. To counterbalance the week of excess, I was in need of something nutritious, earthy and easy. The answer: mushroom soup and green salad with red wine vinaigrette (if you are looking to move away from packaged/processed/pre-made foods, salad dressings are the easiest place to start....more on that later). I...
Post a Comment
Read more

Red Wine Vinaigrette

By
If you are trying to get away from pre-packaged, processed foods, salad dressings are the easiest place to start. Any dressing can be made at home, from a simple vinaigrette to a creamy blue cheese. My current favorite is a red wine vinaigrette. This couldn't be easier to make and I always get a ton compliments on it when I serve it to guests. Here is a rough guide (it's not exact enough for me to really call it a recipe - adjust the amounts depending on how much dressing you need at the moment). Red Wine Vinaigrette garlic, one clove roughly chopped salt dried oregano dried basil fresh ground pepper red wine vinegar olive oil The trick to making a yummy salad dressing is starting with a garlic paste, using a mortar and pestle. Place the chopped garlic and a few pinches of salt in the mortar. Using the pestle, grind into a paste. It should look something like this: Once you have your garlic paste, put in whatever container you are going to use for storing and serving the dressi...
Post a Comment
Read more