Tuesday, 3/31/26

 Time to clean out the freezer! We didn't completely succeed, but made headway. Eggplant fries (from Aldi; tasty but they never get truly crispy), a few corn fritters, and what looked like crab rangoon but turned out to be a sort of dumpling/tiny calzone situation with sausage, peppers and ricotta. Served with the rest of the cucumber salad and a variety of dips.

Monday, 3/30/26

 Tofu, rice, peanut sauce, cucumber salad. It may not be novel. but it is easy and delicious. It's more fun if you call it a "tofu rice bowl". Our peanut sauce has been better since I just started following the recipe from the NYT dumpling salad.

Sunday, 3/29/26

 It was game night, so we were a bit rushed; luckily I had had time on Saturday to do a fair bit of prep, so  we didn't have to eat in the car or anything. Another recipe from my trusty favorite, "I Dream of Dinner": blistered peppers with chick peas, fresh mozzarella and croutons. Definitely giving panzanella. Super easy: I just roasted the peppers and chick peas in a bunch of olive oil  with whole garlic cloves, red pepper flakes and smoked paprika. I made croutons from Fridays bread, and tossed everything together (her plating was more layered and fancy but this worked great). I didn't bother to toast any nuts but did top with some chopped smoked almonds I found in the freezer. I loved this dish so much...the spicy crispy chick peas, the toasty croutons, the sweetness of the peppers. It was a meal unto itself and I will be sure to make it again. I really ought to buy that book.

Saturday, 3/28/26

 Chicken with asparagus, turmeric, honey and black pepper, from the NYT. I liked the asparagus a lot, but the overall effect was a little gloppy. Probably my fault...maybe I dredged the chicken with too much flour? We were getting tired of rice so we had angel hair instead. I basically liked these flavors but maybe wouldn't use flour at all if I made it again. My favorite part of dinner was a batch of oatmeal cookies (also from the Times). Even though I have similar recipes, I was helpless in the face of : chewy, glazed and cinnamon. Jason didn't want icing on his and as usual he is wrong. I thought they were great.

Friday, 3/27/26

 After a somewhat fruitless and irritating appointment of H & R Block, it was nice that dinner (bread and lentil soup) was already prepared. Just a usual recipe from the times. Jason accidentally overcooked his bread but it was fine.

Thursday, 3/26/26

 Farewell pizza dinner for Sam, who was headed back to college. We made 6 so I will be hard-pressed to say what was on all of them. One was definitely scallions, cream cheese and jalapenos; several had various sausages, some had mushrooms; there were peppers and onions and pineapple. All in various configurations. Jason's parents brought an angel cake since it was also Jodi's birthday. I made her her own jar of hot fudge (SK's "improved" recipe which I used because I had extra cream; I stand by the opinion that the older recipe is better).

Wednesday, 3/25/26

 I still had all the ingredients, so I made another batch of Japanese curry. The good: par-cooking the potatoes and carrots was the way to go (although I made too much of both). The bad: I accidentally added way too much black pepper. You never really think about how spicy black pepper is until you are hit with a blast of it.