Saturday, 6/28/25

 Somehow had two evening engagements? The first was a reunion of guys from Jason's old Frisbee team, so Jason dutifully baked a couple loaves of bread and off we went. It was pleasant enough (I did know several people), but we couldn't stay long because we had dinner with Jen and John as well. For the record, Jason had a hotdog and he and I both had some potato salad and a bean salad. 

At J&J's we had cocktails, bread, cheese and olives on the porch since it was such a nice evening, then I tackled the two Blue Aprons: pork loin with a fig glaze, green beans (the beans were pretty sad looking) and corn cakes, and skirt steak with a shallot-mustard cream sauce, roasted carrots and mashed potatoes. The sides (except the beans) were all great, but I may have slightly overcooked the steak. I had made another strawberry spoon cake (which was better than my first one; I followed the directions better and was careful not to bake it too long). Funnily, Jen had made one a few days earlier; they claimed mine was better but then again, I doubled the berries. Fun but very late night.

Friday, 6/27/25

 Dinner with Jay and Jodi and Carter; Jason thoughtfully made pita and hummus instead of crusty bread, for my benefit.  Plus we had a little Caprese salad and some stir-fried bok choy with rice. Instead of doing much to the bok choy, we just put all the condiments on the table and had DIY.

Thursday, 6/26/25

 Snacks with Jennie and David in lieu of dinner. I felt like an idiot eating only the inside of the bread, but Jason was happy enough to eat my crusts. Was still a little peckish when we got home, so I had some yogurt with maple syrup, which is my new favorite.

Wednesday, 6/25/25

 Burgers and asparagus soup, which was a slightly odd combination. Jason was so excited to have burgers since for some reason it has been a long time. I made soup figuring it would be easier to eat (I ate the burger by cutting it into tiny little bites).  

Tuesday, 6/24/25

 How many times have I made green chili macaroni and cheese? And why do I still have to look up the recipe? Anyhow, I did skip the chicken this time, and made the usual modifications: swapped cotija for the American, and doubled the pasta. Since it is so dang hot, we did the whole thing in the pressure cooker on the porch. For future reference: 1 minute is plenty of time for little pasta like small shells. Maybe even zero minutes.  I did not make my own salsa verde this time around. Don't care. Although one of these days I will do the whole poach the chicken, make the salsa routine, but not until farm tomatillos come in.

Monday, 6/23/35

 Dental surgery in the morning (note to self: find out what was in that IV. Very relaxing!), so I was glad that I made a batch of chana dal (Made in India; just added spinach) on Sunday. It will be a challenge not have overly hot food and beverages for a couple of weeks!

Sunday, 6/22/25

 I made a salad from the NYT, but I took so many liberties with it. My "Corn Salad with Halloumi" contained no corn, used a facsimile of halloumi from Aldi, used lime instead of vinegar in the dressing, and added cherry tomatoes and radishes. Also skipped cilantro because we didn't have any. But I felt like it was true to the concept, anyway. I kept the cucumber, mint and mango (although I had to use frozen because the ones in the market were shitty). It was very good and refreshing! It also called for pita chips but I skipped that too and didn't miss them.

Saturday, 6/21/25

 Pizza night....Jason was scared because it was so hot out, but he bravely made it anyway (double standard!). Italian sausage, yellow bell pepper, tomato sauce, ricotta and mozzarella. It was nice, but ricotta never brings much to the party, even though I think it will.

Friday, 6/20/25

 Filled up on the hotel breakfast, and then went to Mass MoCA. By then Jason was looking a little twitchy so we took our leave and headed home. What  a fun trip! I really hope we make it a new tradition (although I also enjoyed camping). We showed up empty handed for dinner with Jay and Jodi; Zack made delicious tortellini with pesto and Calabrian chilis and a salad (Jason's parents brought rugelach but I didn't try any so I can't say how they were).  We were tired so headed home on the early side and off to bed.

The robe gang

Thursday, 6/19/25

 After a really lovely day (hiking on Mt. Greylock, poolside Big Y lunch, trip to the Clark, drinks at The Airport Rooms) we walked over to Public for dinner. We shared a cheese plate (only married by cheap-ass bread), a burger, fish and chips and a campanelli with peas, asparagus and ricotta (my favorite). The Airport Rooms is a little restaurant attached to Tourists, and was charmingly dilapidated. I wish I had taken a picture. Then we watched some of a lousy movie and hit the hot tub one last time.

Wednesday, 6/18/25

 Porches! We had a two part picnic dinner; part one out by the pool was chips and dip, plus french fries, Philly cheese steak and chicken tenders from a little place by Mass MoCA. I wouldn't call it amazing, but I'm pretty much always here for a chicken tender. Then we had cheese and bread and blondies back in the room. The two bedroom suite is awesome. Quite a step up from camping!

Tuesday, 6/17/25

 Pasta with artichoke hearts and lots of charred scallions. Jason was only meh (but I thought the flavors were great). If I made it again, I would do the scallions on a pan on the grill, as it was very messy in the Dutch oven. I would also chop them smaller..

Monday, 6/16/25

 Tofu and broccoli with lemon-miso sauce, from the NYT. I only had red miso, which wasn't really the flavor profile I was looking for, so if I made this again I would skip it unless I had white miso on hand. I just steamed the broccoli instead of sauteing it, but otherwise followed the recipe pretty closely. The key was being patient enough to let the tofu get nice and crispy....and painstakingly flipping every little cube. This was a good addition to the tofu-broccoli-rice repertoire.

Sunday, 6/15/25

 Corrina, Ramona and I had a nice visit with my dad and a trip to Look Park, and then I came home and Jason and I made millions of wontons. Some were classic crab Rangoon, some were an invention with ricotta, Italian sausage and peppers, and some were sweet, with a ricotta filling. I made some duck sauce for the rangoons (cobbled from a couple of sources but pick one with apricot jam) and that was maybe my favorite part? And once again I failed to strain the ricotta so it wanted to leak out of the wrappers. This was all very time consuming, but tasty and we froze lots of leftovers. So next time it will be as easy as throwing them into the air fryer. I doubled Saturday's strawberry spoon cake, so we had some of #2 for dessert.

Saturday, 6/14/25

 Hot pot at Jay and Jodi's, with all the boys in attendance. Since we had two pots going this mine, we made one spicy and it was very, very, spicy. I regretted adding chili crisp to mine. Still fun and tasty, though! I brought a strawberry spoon cake (from the NYT) for dessert and it all got eaten which is a good sign, I guess. In my mind not quite as good as rhubarb spoon cake, but I was also careless while making it and made a couple of small errors. Worth making again, at any rate.

Friday, 6/13/25

 Friday night pizza! We went old school with mushrooms, pepperoni, banana peppers and bell peppers. It sounded like a lot, but wasn't overly heavy. 

Thursday, 6/12/25

 Snacks for dinner with David. Jason made bread (but I didn't have time to make anything). So I pretty much had cheese for dinner but who is complaining? A nice treat was that Kalyani was there, who we literally hadn't seen in years.

Wednesday, 6/11/25

How could I resist something called "butter-soy chicken with asparagus"? It sounded so inviting! Basically a stir-fry with velveted chicken breast, asparagus, mushrooms and peppers. As written, the recipe (from the NYT) was a little lame, I thought. 5 spears of asparagus? 6 mushrooms? Who writes that? I upped all the vegetables and added garlic, as a lot of commenters noted that it was fairly bland. This reminded me of the kind of Chinese food you order when you are a kid, but it was pleasant enough.

Tuesday, 6/10/25

 Mujadara, which could be described as the Lebanese version of Egyptian koshari. They both feature lentils, rice, lots of fried onions and cumin. This recipe didn't call for pasta, but it would have been good, too. I think I should have done almost twice as many onions, but overall this was very good. We served it with plain yogurt which was a surprisingly good addition. Bonus: used up a lingering half bag of brown lentils. My only other note is to use basmati rice next time, for more flavor.

Monday, 6/9/25

 Another round of kimbap; not many changes except that we bought some pickled radish from Mom's, and used spinach instead of cucumber this time. Mostly you just taste the beef. They turned out well, even though Jason is still making his too big and unwieldy. Might be a fun dinner to do with Jay and Jodi some night?

Sunday, 6/8/25

 A long day of cleaning out the apartment for Zac and Corrina, so just nachos, with some leftover taco meat. I say "just" but of course we scarfed them all down. I am counting fresh jalapenos and tomatoes as our vegetables.

Saturday, 6/7/25

 Dinner with Jodi, Zack and Carter. We made bread and rhubarb spoon cake. Then Zack and I made an enormous veg stir-fry with cabbage, baby bok choy, broccoli and onions, all over soba noodles. A tasty collaboration. I was happy to see the cake get completely demolished (I admit, it was my best version to date).

Friday, 6/6/25

 Somehow even though it was still hot we were allowed to make pizza? Who am I to question. A taco pizza with ground beef, diced tomatoes and cheddar, plus some broken up tortilla chips on top, just to be festive. Predictably a little greasy and heavy but super delish.

Thursday, 6/5/25

 Another hot night, so more sandwiches. Nothing overly thrilling (salami, provolone, banana peppers, lettuce, sun-dried tomatoes), but good, quick and most importantly to Jason, didn't heat up the kitchen. I could not tell you what, if anything, we had with them.

Wednesday, 6/4/25

 Grilled cheese sandwiches (outdoors, of course. Fortunately the electric skillet really shines in this job), plus maybe some fruit? We had a really nice pineapple. Jason's slightly holey bread let cheese seep through here and there and form lovely crunchy cheese spots. I put some banana peppers in mine and regret nothing.

Tuesday, 6/3/25

 A reprise of cabbage salad with grilled chicken; this time I made extra dressing and used that to marinate the chicken. We had it with some leftover pita and some random yogurt-tahini sauce I had made. The salad is spicy, crunchy and makes excellent lunch leftovers.

Monday, 6/2/25

 Leftover jjajangmyeon (still not great; gochujang helped) and leftover kimbap which would have been terrific if we had remember to take it out of the refrigerator earlier; the rice was unpleasantly cold and hard (careful microwaving helped a bit).

Sunday. 6/1/25

 We were finally home long enough to make kimbap, which Jason has been wanting to do for a while. We used: seasoned ground beef, carrots, some leftover cucumbers, egg, and pickled radish from Mom's. Our rolling technique wasn't the best, but. the taste was great! It really is surprisingly different from sushi. The flavor profile is decidedly Korean.  We will definitely make this again soon.

Jason told me to take a picture so here is a sucky picture

Saturday, 5/31/25

 Long day going down to Bridgeport to see my dad in the hospital, then potluck farm dinner (Jason jumped on bread before I could even open my mouth to propose anything). Fun evening with the farm folk and some tasty dishes.  My only regret is not eating more dessert (a creme caramel and a chiffon cake).

Friday, 5/30/25

 Dinner with Jay and Jodi. Zack was home and made hot pot for everyone which was both very fun and delicious. We used a couple of types of tofu/soy products, taro, napa cabbage,  baby bok choy and some surimi, and each added our own condiments (soy sauce, hoisin, cilantro, garlic, chili crisp, etc).  We all really enjoyed it and I am impressed with Zack's cooking skills.  Jason made some of his garlicky flatbread; I was working so didn't have time to make anything.

Thursday, 5/29/25

 Pizza night with a repeat of the most excellent spinach and feta. For home I really like a no red sauce pizza; it really brings out the best in Jason's crust.

Wednesday, 5/28/25

 We had been wanting to make this noodle dish we are always seeing on our Korean shows, jjajangmyeon, and finally (sort of) got around to it. I was not happy with the execution at all: most recipes call for pork belly, but we inexplicably used tofu instead. Big mistake as it doesn't add any flavor at all. I knew Jason was wrong about this but he wouldn't budge. We also used spaghetti instead of real Korean wheat noodles (another battle I lost). The final straw was my own fault; I didn't let it simmer and reduce long enough. Since neither of us had ever actually tried this before (although I may have at UMass) I felt it wasn't fair make so many substitutions. ANYWAY, it was a little bland and a little sweet. Some chili crisp and more black bean paste helped, but I wasn't impressed. I think we should try again but following the recipe more closely (I used a combination from the NYT and from Maangchi). More rhubarb spoon cake for dessert so at least that was good.

Tuesday, 5/27/25

 Jason and I made a big batch of lasagne together on Monday afternoon, so that was dinner. We added mushrooms, spinach and spicy Italian sausage, plus used up a half jar of Rao's tomato sauce we had leftover (don't want to waste it at that price). I experimented with soaking the noodles for about a half hour instead of cooking them and it seemed to work fine. My only complaint was that I felt the whole thing wasn't saucy enough, and that I should have also added one more sausage. But Jason really liked it and it provided plenty of leftovers.