After a long absence. . . .

Today was Megan's 7th birthday. She requested Mexican food for her birthday dinner. Most of the meal was "recipe-less," grilled sweet red & green peppers & onion, grilled chicken & steak, lettuce, guacamole & refried beans. However, I am posting the recipe for the Mexican rice. Believe me, this beats any box mix or restaurant Mexican rice. The original recipe is by Mark Bittman, and I have altered it little except for cooking times that seem to work better at this altitude.

3 tablespoons lard or corn oil (Not as healthy, but amazing flavor if you save some of the bits of fat you trim from the chicken & render the fat like cooking bacon.)

2 cups long grain rice

4 cloves garlic, peeled

1 medium onion, peeled

2 large very ripe tomatoes, cored & seeded

1 quart chicken stock, preferably homemade

Salt & pepper to taste

1. Heat oil in large saucepan over medium heat. Add rice & cook, stirring occasionally, until golden brown, about 10 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, put garlic, onion, and tomatoes into a food processor or blender and puree until smooth. Add this mixture to the rice and cook, stirring, for another 5 minutes.

3. Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil, then lower the heat, cover and simmer until the water is absorbed and the rice is tender, about 30 minutes. ( I have found that this time actually varies at our altitude from between 35-40 minutes total.) Fluff with a fork, season with salt and pepper and serve.

Give this a try. It is really wonderful.

Lasagna Bolognese

Last Sunday we made Korean food and had a feast. We had Mark's nephew Daniel and his wife Genny here for dinner. Sometime when I am feeling more energetic I will provide directions for a Korean barbecue meal, but I'm too tired to do all of the explaining this time.

Yesterday we invited Mark's other nephew, Jason, and his wife Mindy and their children Ethan and Katie for dinner. We made lasagna this time. I will include the recipe here, as well as the modifications I made which make it different from the one I used as a map.

Ragu a la Bolognese is a pasta sauce which usually has more than one kind of meat and very little tomato. It usually has milk or cream added at some point. I found this recipe on the Cook's Illustrated website.

LASAGNA BOLOGNESE, SIMPLIFIED

Serves 8

Meat Sauce (Ragu')

1 medium carrot, peeled and chopped (the recipe recommends a food processor--I don't have one. I just diced
vegetables in small bits)
1 medium rib celery, diced
1/2 small onion, chopped
28 ounce can whole tomatoes with juice
1/2 pound ground beef
1/2 pound ground pork
1/2 ground veal (cannot be easily purchased here. I used ground pork.)
1 1/2 cups whole milk
1 1/2 cups dry white wine ( I used 1/2 cup apple juice and 1 cup chicken broth instead)
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

Bechamel

4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 cup all purpose flour
4 cups whole milk
3/4 teaspoon salt

Noodles and Cheese

15 sheets no-boil lasagna noodles
4 ounces grated Parmesan cheese (about 2 cups)

1. For the meat sauce: Either process celery, carrot & celery in food processor or just chop them in little pieces.
Then empty them from food processor if you used it & then process the tomatoes to chop them. I just used my
clean hands to break the tomatoes into little pieces. Don't discard the juice--it will go into the sauce.

Heat butter in heavy-bottomed Dutch oven pot over med. heat until foaming. Add carrots, celery, onion and stir until
softened but not browned. Add ground meats and cook, breaking meat into 1-inch pieces with wooden spoon about
1 minute. Add milk and stir, breaking meat into 1/2 inch bits; simmer and cook, breaking meat into small pieces until
almost all liquid has evaporated, 20 to 30 minutes. Break any remaining clumps of meat. Add wine (or my substitute
apple juice/broth mixture) and simmer, stirring occasionally, until liquid has evaporated again, 20 to 30 minutes. Stir
in tomato paste until combined, about 1 minute; add chopped tomatoes, salt and pepper. Simmer over medium to low
until slightly thickened, about 15 minutes. Allow to cool about 30 minutes.

2. For the bechamel: while the meat sauce simmers, melt butter in med. saucepan until foaming; add flour and whisk about
1 1/2 minutes--do not brown. Gradually whisk in milk, bring to a boil, whisking frequently. Add salt, lower heat and
simmer 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Allow bechamel to cool about 30 minutes.

3. To assemble and bake: Adjust oven rack to middle position; heat oven to 425 degrees. Place noodles in a 13 x 9 inch
baking dish and cover with very hot tap water; soak 5 minutes. Remove noodles from water, place in single layer on
clean kitchen towel and pat dry. Wipe baking dish dry and spray with cooking spray. Stir bechamel to recombine;
mix 3/4 cup of the bechamel sauce into warm meat sauce until thoroughly combined.

4. Distribute 1 cup meat sauce in baking dish. Place three noodles in single layer on top of sauce--they will just fit cross-
wise. Spread 1 1/4 cups meat sauce over noodles, spreading to edge of noodles but not to edge of baking dish. Drizzle
1/3 cup bechamel sauce over meat sauce. Sprinkle 1/3 cup Parmesan evenly over Bechamel. Repeat layering of noodles,
meat sauce, bechamel and cheese three more times. Place final 3 noodles on top and cover completely with remaining
bechamel, spreading with spatula all over noodles. Sprinkle evenly with remaining parmesan.

5. Spray large sheet aluminum foil with cooking spray and cover lasagna, bake until bubbly about 30 minutes. Remove foil
increase heat to 450 degrees and bake until surface is spotty brown, about 15 minutes. Cool 15 minutes before serving.



We served this delicious lasagna with salad and garlic bread. It's a little bit of work, but everyone agreed it was worth the effort.



Here's a bonus recipe for you. I didn't change a single thing about it, and had dinner on the table start to finish within 30 minutes. It's definitely going to be saved in my "let's eat this again" file. Serve it with salad and garlic bread, or a green vegetable like steamed broccoli or grean beans.

SKILLET-BAKED SPAGHETTI WITH MEAT SAUCE

Source: Cook's Country Dec/Jan 2008 p. 24

12 ounces 90 percent lean ground beef
4 ounces sweet Italian sausage (if you buy it in individual sausages, remove the casings)
4 cloves minced garlic
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
1/4 tsp dried oregano
1 28 oz can crushed tomatoes
8 oz spaghetti, broken into about 2 inch pieces ( I put mine in a gallon zip lock and whacked it with a rolling pin)
2 cups water
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 cup heavy cream
6 tablespoons finely chopped fresh basil
1 cup shredded Italian cheese blend

1. Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position and heat the broiler. Cook beef and sausage in large ovensafe skillet
over med. heat, breaking up into small pieces with wooden spoon, until no longer pink--about 5 mins. Remove
meat with slotted spoon and drain on paper towels. Pour fat off of skillet. Return meat to skillet. Add garlic, pepper
flakes, and oregano and cook till fragrant, about 1 minute.

2. Stir in tomatoes, spaghetti, water and salt. Cover and cook, stirring often, about 7 minutes. Reduce heat to med-low
and continue to simmer, covered, until spaghetti is al dente, about 7 more minutes.

3. Stir in cream, basil and 1/3 cup cheese. Sprinkle with remaining cheese and broil until surface is spotty brown,
about 3 minutes. Let cool 5 minutes and serve.

Anniversary Trip

No official Sunday dinner entry this week--it was our anniversary, so we farmed the kids out to friends and spent the weekend in Salt Lake. I'll give a few restaurant recommendations instead. First I have to brag a little bit: Mark had submitted two documentaries to the UBEE (Utah Broadcasters) annual competetion. Each year they arrange for judges from a different state to judge the entries. The judges this year were from New Hampshire. Anyway, one of his documentaries, "Who Goes There," about transportation issues in Utah, won the Gold award (first place). So that award dinner was Friday night.

Saturday morning we had sushi for breakfast (not the raw stuff, but excellent california roll prepared just moments before. We obtained the sushi in the Wild Oats supermarket on 4th south in Salt Lake. If you don't know what a california roll is, in the center is finely chopped crabmeat, cucumber, carrot and avocado. Rolled around it is rice, seaweed and sesame seeds. You garnish it with a little Japanese pickled ginger and wasabe mustard. Very tasty.

We had lunch at a little chinese restaurant in Salt Lake called the Hong Kong Tea House. It's on about 5th south in-between 500 and 600 west. We ate Dim Sum. (We have had absolutely amazingly delicious Dim Sum in San Francisco, and mystifying Dim Sum in Los Angeles, but this is the first Dim Sum we have tried in Salt Lake.) If you don't know what dim sum is, it is "little bites." Lots of different dumplings and bite-sized offerings, usually just served for breakfast and/or brunch. In San Francisco and Los Angeles, the servers parade around past the diners with the various items on a little trolley cart. If something looks interesting, you point to the one you want and they give it to you, marking on a little ticket what they served you. Here in Salt Lake, they had a ticket which they gave out at the beginning and you make your choices and they bring them out from the kitchen as they are prepared. Anyway, we had some steamed pork buns--a sweet dough filled with barbeque pork and steamed. Then we tried a shrimp and chive dumpling. After that, stuffed eggplant and a delicious beef roll: mushroom, carrot, onion wrapped in thinly sliced beef and rolled up about like a taquito, then served in a delicious sauce. We had stuffed mushrooms and an amazingly good scallop and garlic filled dumpling. It was so good that we are going to go back soon and try the evening menu. I would encourage you to try it out if you are looking for something different but tasty. The whole meal, including tip, came to about $25 and we were stuffed.

Later Saturday evening after a concert, we went to the Market Street Grill for seafood, since it is a place we would not normally take the kids to. We had clam chowder and their delicious sourdough bread. Then I had crab-stuffed shrimp with hollandaise sauce. Mark had halibut Oscar, topped with crab, asparagus and hollandaise. Maybe it was too late in the kitchen, but Mark's fish was overcooked and dry. I only give it a 5 out of 10. My shrimp was the best, 9 out of 10. It would have been a 10 if they were a little more careful with the sauce--there was way too much of it. The vegetables were delicious, steamed potatoes and broccoli, both perfectly cooked.

So that's it for this weekend. More next week!

Megan--July 2007 Redfish Lake Trip

Now I know it's only Wednesday. . .

Rainy and cold here. I have just realized that I have only two weeks to get Megan's pink fairy costume finished for Halloween.
Here's my trusty crock pot dinner. Try it--I guarantee it will taste great.

HAM & BEANS

2 or 3 ham hocks (If you don't know where to find them, look in the meat dept next to the ham. They look like the shriveled up ends of a hunk of ham.)
1 large or 2 small onions, chopped
3 or 4 carrotts, chopped
2 celery ribs, chopped
3 or 4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 14-oz can chicken broth
1 tablespoon summer savory (found in the spice department)
1 teaspoon tarragon
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 cup beans--white northern or pinto; I use half and half
2 bay leaves

Rinse beans of grit etc. and put the whole lot into a crock pot. Cover with enough water to cover completely. Cook on low for about 8 hours or overnight. Remove the ham bones (most of the meat will have fallen off by now) and pick out any remaining bones & fat from the pot. If you have cooked it overnight, put it in the fridge until you get home from work & then just warm it up. Serve over rice or make a nice batch of cornbread or biscuits.

Trust me--this tastes delicious, and my kids will eat it!

October 14, 2007: Trauma at the Mall, Greek food for dinner

Alex has been saving his money and wanted a new skateboard. I finally relented and we went to the skate shop at the mall. While we were waiting for the board to be put together, Megan and I took a walk. She said, "I'm ready today to get my ears pierced." "Oh, really?" I responded. We have had this conversation almost daily for two months. "The last time we came to the mall, you were not sure. We wil not get them pierced unless you really want it." "Well, my friends at preschool said I should do it," she replied. "Who is in charge of your life, Megan? You or your friends?" I said. So we walked to the jewelry store and she looked over the earrings and all of the equipment, as we have done several times before, and she said, "Nope. Not ready." So we walked some more and then she said, "I know I am ready. I want my ears pierced today." I sat down with her and talked about how they would clean her ears, and mark the spot to put the hole, and use the piercers to put the earrings in the holes. I told her it would be sore and hurt a little bit. She said, "I want to do it." So we went back to the jewelry store.

Megan sat on my lap, picked out a pair of earrings, and did not fuss. I thought all was well until the entire procedure was over and then she started crying. "Take them out! Take them out!" Big tears and great remorse. I just kept thinking to myself, "Hold on until we get home." We got an ice cream cone, which she thought would help her feel better and then she ate three bites and threw away.

Home we went. She kept pulling her hair over her ears, saying "I don't want anyone to see my earrings. I'm not going to tell Daddy." Of course, the minute Mark came in to the house, she ran to him to show off the earrings. She swings back and forth between being satisfied with her choice one minute and wanting to take them out the next. I am not relenting about taking them out. I know that if I give in now, we will have to go through some version of this again sometime in the future when she decides she wants the earrings. I was close to tears myself a few times, thinking that I must be a pretty lame excuse for a mother to let my daughter suffer so. Then I realize that someone here has to keep an even mind about it. So that's how it stands for now.

SUNDAY DINNER

Chicken and Pork Souvlaki
Tzatziki Sauce
Pita bread rounds
Uncle Quin Fries
Kalamata Olives, Tomatoes, sliced red onion, shredded lettuce, crumbled feta cheese
Sauteed green beans, carrots, onion & cauliflower


I found the recipe for the Tzatziki Sauce on the Allrecipies.com website. It's excellent! Ditto for the meat marinade.

SOUVLAKI by Abby Benner

1 lemon, juiced
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 teaspoon dried oregano
3 cloves garlic, crushed
4 pounds pork tenderloin, cut into 1 inch cubes
(I used half pork tenderloin, half boneless chicken breasts, cubed as directed)
2 medium yellow onions, cut into 1 inch pieces
2 green bell peppers, cut into 1 inch pieces
(I also added 1/2 pound small button mushrooms and about 15 large cherry tomatoes)

1. In large bowl, mix together lemon juice, olive oil, soy sauce, oregano, garlic and cubed meat. (Mushrooms and tomatoes optional.) Cover and refrigerate 2-3 hours.

2. Preheat grill for medium-high heat. Thread pork, (chicken if used), peppers, onions (mushrooms and tomatoes) onto skewers.

3. Lightly oil grate. cook for 10-15 minutes, until desired doneness, turning frequently for even cooking.


TZATZIKI SAUCE

1/2 cup seeded, shredded cucumber
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup plain yogurt
1/4 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill
1/2 teaspoon Greek seasoning
freshly ground black pepper to taste, additional salt to taste

1. Place a medium coffee filter inside a mesh colander, and put the yogurt and sour cream in the filter. Let it drain over a bowl for an hour or so. The sauce will be much less runny that way.

2. Sprinkle the shredded cucumber with the 1 tsp salt and let it sit for 5 minutes.

3. Mix yogurt, sour cream, lemon juice, vinegar, olive oil, garlic, dill and Greek seasoning. Squeeze the cucumber to remove excess water and add to sauce. Season to taste with salt and pepper as desired. Refrigerate overnight.

UNCLE QUIN FRIES

3 or 4 large baking potatoes, sliced lengthwise into about 1/4 inch thick slices
olive oil
Montreal Steak seasoning

Put the potato slices on a plate, cover and microwave for about a minute. (This will partially cook the fries so that it doesn't take so long on the grill.) Toss the potato slices gently with a little olive oil and Montreal steak seasoning (just enough oil to make the seasoning stick.)

Grill potatoes over medium heat, turning over occasionally with tongs, until golden brown and edges are crisp.

THE MEAL:

1. Sauce the night before & refrig until needed.
2. Marinate meat
3. Potatoes first--they take the longest to cook. I assigned this job to Alex while Mark and I put the meat on skewers. Keep them warm on a plate in a 200 degree oven while you do the meat. (You can cook potatoes and meat at the same time if you have a large enough grill, but ours isn't that big and we have to cook in batches.)
4. Simple stir fry the veggies: thinly sliced onion, few cloves garlic. Then add carrots and green beans. When they are almost done, add cauliflower. Steam with a little chicken broth. Salt and pepper and a squirt of lemon & there you are.
Mark handled this job while I grilled the kabobs.
5. Grill the kabobs.
6. Megan made the juice: frozen white grape juice.


At the last minute, when all items are on the table, & the grill is turned off but still hot, put the pita rounds onto the rack and lightly toast.

Take the meat and vegetables from the skewers and put it into a warm pita round. Top with a generous tablespoon of the yogurt sauce, a few slices of red onion, lettuce & some feta cheese & enjoy. It's absolutely delicious.