Monday, 7/29/19

Dinner in Whately: the Blue Apron was a pizza with tomato sauce, fresh mozz & fontina cheeses, and caramelized onions. Jason made some more pizza dough (and a loaf of bread) and we scrounged up some more toppings. Pretty good. The fresh mozzarella is so drippy, but I love the flavor and texture.

Sunday, 7/28/19

Dinner at Jen and John's: Jason made a couple of pizza (including an EXCELLENT goat cheese and onion that I don't know why we never have at home), Jen made a a salad, and I made cupcakes with chocolate frosting. I had a frosting recipe from Serious Eats that I wanted to try, so I focused on that, and just made the cupcakes from a mix (since blind testing has shown that Jen prefers the mix anyway). It was an American buttercream with cocoa powder mixed with a dark chocolate ganache. I was a little concerned since my ganache broke, but it whipped up beautifully. Very silky and smooth, not too sweet. Still don't love chocolate desserts....

This may have been the moment when I got 5 mosquito bites

Saturday, 7/27/19

Quintessential summer meal: tomato-mozzarella salad and corn, pus Jason made a couple of experimental fougasses. We took the extra time to go to Smiarowski's for corn, and it was worth it. The breads were nice, good flavor, but still a work in progress.

Friday, 7/26/19

Aldi had giant spare ribs on sale last week; I had never cooked them before but figured it coulnd't be much different from baby back ribs, right? So, we tried them in the Instant Pot (of course), with a recipe from Leite's Culinaria. Just stack them vertically in the pot with a little beef broth (I also added Liquid Smoke) and cook for 25 minutes, then finish in the broiler. No easier than the oven, but quicker (and cooler). They turned out really well, although poor Carter had a piece with a lot of cartilage. Served with Serious Eats roasted potatoes (that I once again tossed with olive oil, rosemary and garlic after roasting, rather than before. I also forgot to put baking soda in the cooking water and it didn't make a noticeable difference) and a quick salad with ersatz Caesar dressing.
And for dessert, I finally tried an Instant Pot cheesecake, using a recipe from a Melissa Clark cookbook. I did have to buy a new small springform pan, but luckily TJ Maxx came through for me. Just mix up the ingredients and 20 minutes in the pot! The hard part was waiting for it to cool. Carter was thrilled! Who knew he was such a cheesecake fan? So far I think the cheesecake and the fettucine have been the biggest Instant Pot winners.

Thursday, 7/25/19

Jason made our dinner tonight (although I did most of the prep in the morning) and it was an Instant Pot success! Fettucine alfedo with broccoli; all the ingredients are just dumped in, including uncooked pasta! I was dubious, but it was actually delicious. The only things we would change are maybe using more noodles, and a bit more chicken stock, as it was quite rich (duh). This recipe was an IP win, for sure.

Wednesday, 7/24/19

On Tuesday evening, Jason and I made two giant batches of tomato sauce in the Instant Pot (both from Serious Eats, with only minor tweaks. I didn't have fresh basil, and left out the fish sauce), with the only difference that one batch used whole canned tomatoes that I quickly threw in the blender, while the other used a can of diced and a can of crushed. Jason has this weird thing where he didn't want to dirty up the blender, so wants me to use already chopped tomatoes? I don't know why that would be important, but...anyway, they actually came out very different. Batch 1, with the crushed tomatoes, burnt a little, and came out very dark---it tasted to me a bit like the kind of sauce you get in a not-great Italian restaurant. Batch 2 came out a lot more like my regular sauce. I can't imagine why they were so different, and honestly, I didn't love either of them. In the end, we combined them and no real conclusions were drawn.
Which brings me to tonight's dinner: ravioli with tomato sauce. It was fine (except I had to eat in a hurry and mine was a little rubbery from re-heating cause it was Ultimate). I think I would stick with my regular method since it took nearly an hour in the IP. Or try a different recipe.

Tuesday, 7/23/19

Moong dal with spinach, from Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Instant Pot cookbook. Very easy and quick, if not super exciting. I would have to say we all thought it was fine. Served with the rest of the leftover naan.

Monday, 7/22/19

Dinner in Whately. We had only one Blue Apron, but it was grilled cheese (with pickled shallots and sauteed mushrooms), so we supplemented with a bread, more cheese, and some corn.The sandwiches were great, but the red cabbage slaw was only meh. I thought the corn wasn't quite as good as the batch we got from Smiarowski's last week, but it was fine.
It was so easy only making one Blue Apron!

Sunday, 7/21/19

Don't remember the last time I cooked dinner! Tried the new Instant Pot again to make butter chicken from a Madhur Jaffrey Instant Pot book. I opted to grill the chicken pieces instead of saute them in the pot (since that would have entailed standing over the hot pot while cooking several batches of chicken), and the sauce took under 5 minutes in there, so I am not convinced of the utility of the I.P. in this instance. It was tasty (if overly lemon-y; my fault), especially with homemade naan (from Made in India) that I also grilled. I think Jason was irritated that I didn't have him make pita, but I wanted naan. Threw a lot of spinach into the chicken to make it a full meal, plus we had a little leftover basmati rice.
I also made a couple of frozen watermelon mojitos from Smitten Kitchen. Very refreshing!

Saturday, 7/20/19

Yes, another party, our friend Sue's house (a wedding party for their son). It was so, so, so hot, but there was good food (and hard cider), and a sprinkler and interesting people. The best part was the cheese----so many different cool local cheeses and many delicious accompaniments and homemade crackers. I could have plopped down there for hours. And thus ends my unusually social week.

Friday, 719/19

Another work party! Anna's goodbye. Potluck, as usual. This time, I brought blueberry crumb bars, from Smitten Kitchen (since we still have a lot of blueberries. I think they are my favorite dessert fruit). I thought they were good, but we ducked out on the early side, so I don't know how they were received.

Thursday, 7/18/19

Ultimate night, so Jason kindly made us grilled cheeses, which were delicious. I made a big salad in the morning, so that was dinner.

Wednesday, 7/17/19

I had a work party to go to, so I ate there and Jason and Carter presumably had leftovers. I brought a coconut milk rice pudding to the shindig. Tried out the Instant Pot. The good news: 5 minutes! Of course, the warm up and cool down take some time, but still. Unfortunately, I found it a little too thick and hard after sitting on the fridge all day (I don't like a very firm rice pudding, personally), but people seemed to like it. And it was vegan, to boot.

Tuesday, 7/16/19

I read about kasha varnishkes somewhere and just had to make it. Maybe not the best plan for a warm weekday night. I had to: toast the kasha, then boil it, cook pasta, saute onions, and roast mushrooms. By the time all that came together (plus broccoli), the kitchen was VERY WARM. it was tasty, but in a cooler months kind of way. I should try to remember to make it again in say, November. It needed a fair amount of butter, parmesan and salt and pepper (plus a very nontraditional bit of bacon fat and some sriracha) to punch up the flavor.

Monday, 7/15/19

Dinner in Whately: two Blue Aprons. One a tilapia with togarashi, rice, and a cucumber-radish pickle, plus a pasta with tomatoes, pork, onions and olives. Both good. Plus bread from Jason anbd a blueberry crisp from me. We always pick too many blueberries!

Sunday 7/14/19

I made a repeat of the celery-chicken stew from Bottom of the Pot. Still delicious, and Carter still liked it!  Jason made us some pita, we had fresh corn off the cob, a tomato-feta-cucumber salad, and blueberry pie for dessert! Nice summer meal. I finally bought an Instant Pot, so Jason and I had fun playing around with it. All we tried for today was rice (which came out perfectly), but I am looking forward to trying more recipes with it.

Saturday, 7/13/19

Jason and I made a batch of blintzes, mostly because he had made a lot of raspberry jam (our bushes are prolific this year). Served with double-smoked kielbasa from the little market in South Deerfield, and another salad.
We had gone blueberry picking in the morning, so I made a blueberry pie for dessert. It's not a traditional two-crust pie, but semi-cooked filling made on the stovetop, served in a regular pie crust or graham cracker. This time I used Maria cookies to good effect. Since it was so hot, I didn't cook the crust at all, just threw it in the freezer for a while. The only minor problem was that the pie didn't really have a chance to firm up. So we just ate it in a bowl.

Friday, 7/12/19

Kalyani came over for dinner (!), so Jason made a couple more pizzas. I made a salad, and we had s'mores for dessert. Then we watched a movie that turned out to be sad; I hope it didn't traumatize her!

Thursday, 7/11/19

I got stuck late at work, so Jason and Carter ate some kind of leftovers (I presume) and headed to Ultimate. I came home and had leftover grilled vegetables and chicken, then walked over to meet them.

Wednesday, 7/10/19

I was home from work in time to make dinner, so i made a batch of black pepper tofu, served over rice. I was going to serve it with roasted cauliflower but it was too hot to put the over on again. So I don't remember if we had a vegetable or not.

Tuesday, 7/9/19

Pizza night, courtesy of Jason. Ours had pepperoni, mushrooms and a mozzarella-provolone-parm blend and it was excellent. I meant to only have two slices but somehow ended up eating three...

Monday, 7/8/19

Back to work after two weeks off meant I was tired and in no mood to cook dinner. so we finished up the pulled pork, I ate some of the grilled chicken and the broccoli-rice salad. Always good to clear out some leftovers!

Sunday, 7/7/19

Busy day! We met at my dad's house with some family and friends to do a little ash-spreading. My mom is now hanging around the backyard, the library and the cemetery. we then all went to Tom's for lunch. Jason had the biggest Reuben I have ever seen; Carter and I had burgers (well, Carter ate two burgers, fries, and a coffee milkshake. To be a 15 year old boy!). So that was nice.

Then dinner with Jen and John.  Jason made bread, I cooked up two Blue Aprons (a shakshuka with chick peas and a tilapia with lemon/caper sauce, over orzo and vegetables) that were both delicious. I also brought a rustic cherry tart with fresh ricotta, from Martha Stewart. Also pretty good.

Saturday, 7/6/19

Unbeknownst to anyone, Jason and I went to Priya for lunch while Carter was with his grandparents. We (naturally) gorged ourselves and weren't hungry for dinner, so I grilled some chicken for Carter and we just had a little fruit for dinner.

Me: Why two dosas??

Friday, 7/5/19

I went to my dad's for dinner; he had some hamburger, I picked up corn, and Corrina got chips and buns. So it was a nice summer meal---the first corn of the season and it was excellent! Sure, I had to drive almost to Greenfield to get it, but that's OK. Carter and Jason stayed home, ate leftovers and watched Stranger Things. Their loss!

Thursday, 7/4/19

Pulled pork sandwiches, watermelon, a broccoli rice salad and coleslaw for Jason. I marinated the pork in  a sort of mango/OJ/garlic sauce, then cooked it in the slow cooker (used Carter's favorite brioche rolls). The rice salad had sauteed onions, pecans, dried cranberries and some oil and vinegar. I just kept adding stuff until it tasted good. Good dinner before a hot night at Ultimate.

Wednesday, 7/3/19

Seared tuna steaks, oven roasted potatoes, cabbage sauteed with garlic, onion and sambal oelek. I used the potato roasting technique from Serious Eats, but I tossed them with garlic, olive oil and rosemary after roasting instead of before. Probably my favorite part of dinner. No leftovers!

Tuesday, 7/2/19

Headed home (after a brief delay with a dead battery. Thank you, AAA), but not without a last stop in South Portland for lobster rolls! We stopped at a little place called Bite into Maine. They were so, so good. Didn't bother getting Jason one this year: he just ate a leftover sandwich.
Then home: unpacking and laundry, dinner at Jennie and David's. Jason didn't have time to make bread, but I made some peanut butter cookies from SK, and we brought a bag of our Canadian potato chips. Good to be home.

Monday, 7/1/19

Last night of vacation! We mostly just tried to eat what was left in the fridge: cheese, bread, hardboiled eggs, and salad. Naturally, Jason said it was his favorite meal. Sheesh.
We weren't super hungry since we had lunch at a cute place called Taco Trio (awesome salsa bar) and then I ate a giant peanut butter/hot fudge sundae from a place called Red's Dairy Freeze. It was good, but I sincerely regretted not just getting a cone.

Sunday, 6/30/19

Not having learned my lesson with the hipster pizza, I brought us to not one, but two upscale donut places. Jason may never recover from the sticker shock. I probably should have gone out and brought them back? The donuts (we tried many varieties) are good, but perhaps not 2.5X as good as Tim Horton's.

Jason and I took a walk over to South Portland to pick up a few things for lunch and dinner, I toured a cool Victorian mansion (called Victorian Mansion), took a little walk around the neighborhood, and got poured on. Dinner was hamburgers on our last giant grinder roll, spinach salad, and baked beans. Hooray for green vegetables!

Saturday, 6/29/19

First night in Portland. I dragged Carter and Jason to a hipster pizza place called Slab, which specialized in giant slices of Sicilian pizza. I think if they had air conditioning we would have had a better time (it was actually hot for the first time on our vacation). The pizza was pretty good (we tried the plain cheese, which was my favorite, a white with mushrooms and red onion, and a spicy meat with peppeoncini), and downtown Portland is cool, but I should have known I was pushing my luck with fancy pizza.

Friday, 6/28/19

Left Hopewell in the morning, heading down to an overnight in St. Andrews. We forced Jason to stop at an A&W and to everyone's shock, he loved it! When you eat there, they use real plates, glasses, and silverware---that won him over. We ended up getting two more orders of poutine (it was surprisingly delicious; their fries were crispier and that was nice).
After exploring the very cute seaside town of St. Andrews, we just had sandwiches (that I had made in the morning) in the hotel. I kind of wished we were staying a little longer, as there was lots to explore.

The bay at low tide, from our hotel window