What did we cook in OC?, Entirely ecumenical; breakfast lunch dinner + in-betweens and afters

[Priscilla]

As I said over in the Lag Hls farmers market topic recently,

Today another celeriac, nowhere near as big as a man's head, in fact about the size of my smallest cat Nigella's little head. But nice, nevertheless, and speaks to me of remoulade. The gigantor from last week made the MOST beeyootiful soup, cut up and simmered with a sauteed shallot in only water, s & p, freshly ground nutmeg, pureed, pushed through the old tamis, and then benefitting from a judicious amount of cream added. SO GOOD.

Just now I grated that nice little celeriac into a very good remoulade, a dish I hadn't made for a couple of years, I think, but used to make often, in the Madeleine Kamman Elizabeth David Craig Claiborne years.

So good!

I look forward to what next week's celeriac may bring.

The lovely flowery celeryish fragrance is reason enough to be cutting one up in one's kitchen, I have reminded myself.

[Priscilla]

Having broken down the 2 largish pork shoulders that were in the Cry-o-Vac from Stater Brothers for 89 cents/lb., I had some pork to work with.

Carnitas took up quite a bit, and provided fantastic tacos on Margarita, perhaps I should say Orangerita, Sunday, an excellent platform for the salsas we'd procured from El Fenix... we were sampling the full range. So good!

The rest I ground, running 2x through the old KitchenAid as is my habit, first coarse and then the smaller disc. I had in mind porkpetti, polpetti made with pork. Which I did, with a good hit of marjoram from the garden, and the last of my stock of ethereal Cream Pan breadcrumbs. And an extra round of porkpetti for the freezer stock, something to look foward to. I also set aside and froz a pound of meat for a future chili I have been wanting to make.

The final pound went for tiny delicate meatballs for escarole soup with the stupendously wonderful Top Veg escarole.

Pork, it's what's for lots of dinners, to coin a phrase.

So, porkpetti last night, each crowned with a thin slice of tomato and a nice little slab of whole milk mozz and landed on a nice bed of Farmer Mike broccoli, which'd been blanched and socked away on day of purchase OF COURSE, sauteed w/quite a lot of garlic and anchovy. Cream Pan baguette.

Tonight I believe will be the aforementioned escarole soup, waiting quietly in its Cambro in the fridge, mini frisee aux lardons w/poached quail egg, and Cream Pan ciabatta.

[Priscilla]

Another all-Marukai meal, acquisition of ingredients detailed in this post over on the Marukai topic.

Very thin and delicate so-called "Dover" sole, undoubtedly in actual fact one of the Pacific coastal sole relatives, poss. lemon, regardless of labeling typically fresh and delicious, and not so so delicate it couldn't be panko'd and fried.

Served as a donburi with the Shanghai bok choy stir-fried with garlic, ginger, touch of oyster sauce in the trad manner. Not the trad Japanese manner, I knowIknowIknow, but still good. Had an organic farmers market cucumber kicking around, peeled seeded salted dressed with 50/50 mirin/rice vinegar, made for a good addition.

[Priscilla]

The Yukon golds and spinach acquired at Sunday's Aliso Viejo/Laguna Niguel farmers market were transformed into value-added mash in the style of Marcella. Really good-tasting potatoes, NEARLY as good as Zuckerman's, who I buy from at the Saturday Irvine UCI market when I find myself there.

Landed on top was a nicely marinated and grilled lamb rib chop cut from the New Zealand rack we got at Costco, so conveniently right there on the hill above the market. Ivan had made a herby garlicky paste that the chops sat around in, parsley from the market and additional herbs from our garden.

Cream Pan baguette bought that morning at breakfast was so good, just fully developed and roastilicious, like all Yoshi's artisan breads there.

Cocktail hour preceding featured martoonis and hillside viewing. Satisfactory Sunday.

[Priscilla]

Yesterday, rain'd got the creek running a bit, fireplace crackling, kittehs hogging the front row, Uzbeki plov from a Charles Perry recipe.

Necessitated a trip to Mission Ranch Market for barberries and lamb shoulder, among other things, plus I was out of Basmati so had the enjoyable task of picking out a new bag. After ascertaining which were from Pakistan, we chose Fawn Brand. I have bought only Pakistani Basmati for a long time... in talking about cooking years ago, my neighbor's sister told me it was the best. (Is it indicative that neighbor and his sister are Pakistani?) It HAS been very very good, no matter which brand (often Zebra), but I would be open to knowing about Indian Basmatis too.

Yogurt (not for this; we were out), Ritter Sport (same), tin of grapeseed oil, the usual suspects. I also bought new turmeric and cumin for the dish. I'm trying to refresh spices more often; an inexpensive proposition that can mean huge flavor difference.

And it was a very very good plov. 5 big onions cooked down to golden, and that's just the start. Love the lamb-carrot-onion-turmeric-cumin flavor profile. Salade garnish was the pink onion salade also from Charles Perry... white onion sliced thinly and rinsed in water, then marinated with a little pomegranate juice until everybody is pink. A few pom seeds scattered artlessly atop. Just excellent with the plov.

[Priscilla]

Some non-OC procuring resulted in lovely crab Louie salade using the peerless Dungeness meat and proprietary Louie dressing we brought home from Swan Oyster Depot in SF. Even the iceberg we garnered @ Pezzini Farms while otherwise there to get artichokes, Brussels sprouts, tacos and fried artichoke hearts from the nice lady in the truck.

We did use Cream Pan petti rolls howevah.

Thanks to Professor Salt posting on Chowhound we also scored Acme Smoked Whitefish salade @ our Irvine Costco. We'd just seen the Acme fish people on a Tivo'd Martha which made it doubly serendipitous. People, this is a delicious item.

The whitefish salade was enjoyed during Cocktail Hour on Joe Ortiz' Jewish rye brought from Gayle's Bakery in Capitola with icylicious martoonis, which weren't QUITE the same as the ones we had on Saturday night at Tadich Grill but were very very good even so.

And now on to Christmas Eve!!!

[alosha7777]

I have to confess to being a bit jealous right now. I really wish I could cook for the holiday! All your talk here and on FB is making me yearn for some good stuff. *Whine*

Have fun!!

[Priscilla]

Oh Melissa, you too! Part of cooking is partaking graciously of others' cooking, It's just the way it is.

And renewed energy and inspiration when you return to your own kitchen!

Happy Christmas!!!

[alosha7777]

I got to have smoked meats - ham, brisket, chicken and spicy sausage. Blissful southern meat. Meeeeat.

Hope you had a wonderful day!

[Priscilla]

Dang you are lucky with that bbq, Melissa.

IN OC, but bought in Castroville, small artichokes trimmed and braised with garlic (also from Castroville), salt & pepper, olive oil, piled on toasted slices of sourdogh for Cocktail Hour.

Brussels sprouts, see Castroville aforementioned, braised in cream acc. to Molly Stevens, whom many people I know have had a vogue for but I've cooked only a couple of her recipes. Leftover ham, sliced, glazed with hot mango chutney (what's going at this time). Cream Pan petti and butter rolls leftover.

Pulp Fiction, looking like, or more Spaced, which just may be funnier than the original Office, or at least AS funnneee, no mean feat. (Rewatching the Quentin catalogue.)

[Priscilla]

Last evening, vegetarian Indian, the first in a not-carved-in-stone plan to eat veg one or two nights a week in 2010. Rajmah Masala, spiced kidney beans, using the MDH brand spice packet for this dish and generally following instructions from an online acquaintance's family recipe, although the recipe on the MDH box is remarkably similar. Guess that means it's a classic preparation. Had nice organic kidney beans from Whole Foods.

Basmati rice in the cooker, which does a VERY good job on basmati. Raita with a little garlic, salt, pepper, cilantro. Delicious lemon cabbage with brown mustard seed, turmeric, and a coupla miraculous serranos from the garden from a plant that was played out weeks ago already and yet yielded these chiles RIGHT when I needed them... so good! Those $1 cabbages from the farmers market are the biggest bargain, nutritionally and economically, around. Chopped onion and cilantro garni.

Miami Vice Season 1 "Golden Triangle, Part 2"... featuring not only more of EJO/Castillo's back story, but also the stupendously wonderful Keye Luke.

[Priscilla]

Last evening, very thick pork chops from El Toro Meat, (in the flyer this month; $1 off/lb./I'll take it). Braised with a little Lillet and onions on top. Have always had good luck with the pork from ETM.

Also roasted Japanese sweet potatoes and roasted cauli, both procured at Saturday's Irvine UCI farmers market. An accompanying salade from Mario Batali, thinly sliced fennel and supremes of blood orange topped w/Pecorino, punted to another night due to unexpected lateness, kind of a shame because that was my planned relief from the beigeiosity of the dinner. But nobody but me minds a nice all-beige dinner, and the veg of course were very good. Cream Pan baguette. That Mario salade is very very good, however, and will be on the carte tonight if all goes as planned, which it sometimes clearly does not.

[Priscilla]

A trifecta: Farmers market no-brainer, scratches my thrifty itch, AND makes a totally veg meal. Vegetable soup. Of course it's been made, by me and others, since the Beginning of Cooking, but somehow it doesn't pall. Which is sometimes how you can tell something is really good, the lack of palling. Plus the pleasure of breaking down all the component parts with my favorite knife... one of the privileges of cooking.

This week's, yesterday, was composed of 3 Yukon Golds not needed for Sunday's mash, the 1/2 head of my habitual $1 cabbage (EVERYBODY: Just invest the dollar, every week, in a $1 cabbage and I promise guarantee assert that it will improve your life) that didn't go into Asian slaw, a Smith Farms onion, a going-soft Carlsbad tomato plus another 1/2 kicking around in the fridge, a big old carrot from the carrot lady, very leafy celery tops from the earnest young organic people, 3 lonely leftover blanched asparagus spears. Couple cloves of garlic, still working on the Gilroy garlic I bought in Castroville. The remaining half of a big bunch of parsley Gigantica.

Onion, garlic, carrot, celery sauteed a bit, others added as prepped, stirred until cabbage wilts, salt, pepper, hit of red chile flakes, water. Bring to boil, simmer as long as it takes. Flatbread made with Tillamook x-sharp white cheddar kned in accompanying... and that's it for that chunk o'cheddar needing a home.

Don't forget to adjust soup seasoning before serving; sometimes veg want a lot of salt. I ALWAYS want a lot of salt! But I do stop short of salting right up to my own palate's tolerance, which is kind of OTT.

[Priscilla]

The little lettuces from Sunday's Aliso Viejo/Laguna Niguel farmers market have made several very good salades this week.

My $1 cabbage from the market gave its all in an Indian preparation on one of our veg nights... really good, all ghee-ey and turmericey and black mustard seedy. God Bless $1 cabbages.

[Priscilla]

Moules marinieres last evening, prepared by Ivan and Le Mangeur. Nice crispy fennel from Sunday's visit to Aliso Viejo/Laguna Niguel farmers market added in with the shallot (from the potato lady), shower of chopped flat-leaf parsley (etc.). Hit of pastis, splash of cream, Bob's yer uncle. Cream Pan ciabatta. Yummers.

Moules were from Costco, you know how when they have the fish booth person there with the ice they have those bags o' mussels? Pretty nice Penn Cove mussels they were, too. Course they were meticulously gone over by Le Mangeur during prep, you can always count on some klinkers, but good quality and a bargain price.

[Priscilla]

Used my $1 cabbage from Sunday's market (Aliso Viejo/Laguna Niguel) and some mushroom overage from Tuesday's beef Stroganoff for Ivan's Dad's b.d. to make a nice pirog. Fahncy type pirog, as the case was puff pastry, Trader Joe's froz, whose time had come.

Also, it was Vegetarian Wednesday, AND a LOST TV dinner. So, a multi-tasking dish.

Cabbage and onion sauteed until very soft. Mushrooms sauteed separately w/a single garlic clove and a big handful of flat-leaf parsley to finish. Layered in puff pastry with h.b. eggs in between... classically, and the way I like it, eggs are chopped and combined with the cabbage, but Le Mangeur wouldn't have liked that so much. Mild goat cheese crumbled over the top, top crust put in place. LOST logo in puff-pastry letters affixed. Tomato/avocado salade alongside.

The last little less-than-a-quarter of my $1 cabbage might become a veg soup constituent or might become coleslaw or something yet not imagined. Can't really go wrong, with a $1 cabbage.

[Priscilla]

Last evening, cream of carrot soup with the incredibly delicious carrots from the carrot lady who sells at several farmers markets. In all my years of cooking I have cooked with carrots as a main constituent of dishes more in the past few years since discovering these by a factor of 80 million. Of course you can't cook without carrots, I mean, mirepoix for God's sake, but I have for these recent years now been inspired and compelled to make carrot this and carrot that. This is good all 'round, really, because carrots are a superfood on the level of strawbs, avocados, tomatoes in nutritional and economic value. So long as they are GOOD carrots, that is. Stupendous, if you're lucky enough to buy 'em from the carrot lady.

And cream of carrot soup is one of the best applications.

I see the carrot lady at these markets, and it is entirely possible that she sells at others as well that I don't frequent:

Tuesday Old Irvine/Tustin
Wednesday Tustin El Camino
Friday Laguna Hills
Saturday Irvine UCI
Sunday Laguna Niguel/Aliso Viejo

[Priscilla]

Last evening the penultimate quarter of my $1.50 cabbage from last Wednesday's Tustin El Camino farmers market was shredded and used on tostadas.

The whole dinner was virtuously freeeeeee: Refried pintos made from Whole Foods organic beans, the last tomato sitting on the counter, crema kicking around from split pea soup, 3 fat chipotles in adobo waaaaazed as Jamie says in the food processor with some water to make a nice bright red adamantly hot salsa, and 3 lovely Hass avocados from Ivan's parents' tree mashed with a little lemon and salt just like the potato lady at the farmers market demos her Hass. Tortillas crisped in grapeseed oil.

Couple eps of AbFab and Bob's yer uncle.

Tonight I believe the very last bit of my $1.50 cabbage will be transmuted into coleslaw, supported by some very fine, in both shred and quality, carrot lady carrot. And that, as we say, will be that for this week's $1.50 cabbage.

[DanGarion]

Friday night I cooked Artichoke, Spinach, and Feta stuffed shells. A recipe that found from a recent Cooking Light (One dish meals) that I picked up at the store. It was my first experience with making stuffed shells so I wasn't exactly sure what to make of it while I was doing it. The sauce worked real well in this dish, but wouldn't be my preferred option if I was just using it as a marinara. The stuffed shells were great. I used frozen bagged produce from Trader Joe's, along with their light cream cheese, and a block of feta from TJs as well. They didn't have blocks of provolone at TJ so I picked a baseball size round of it at Albertson's. Only changes to the recipe I made were I used just basic crushed tomatoes since I wasn't able to locate fire roasted ones at either of the stores, and I added about 3-4 tablespoons of crushed garlic to the sauce in addition to the garlic in the shells (we love our garlic). It made a lot of food (13x9 inch dish) enough for 6, we've had 4 servings total (with seconds on Friday) and still have some left!

Definitely would use this recipe again.

The whole "One dish meal" thing is a lie though, expect to use 3 dishes just to cook (pan for sauce, pot for shells, glass dish for finished product), along with a bowl for the filling!

This post has been edited by DanGarion: Mar 3 2010, 11:11 AM

[Priscilla]

Hee ain't it the truth about the "one dish meal"! Sure you END UP with ONE dish, but getting there is a whole other thing. At least you had a lot for leftovers, a good thing, to me.

The dish sounds good, too, Dan. I love stuffed rolled filled etc. things. And /feta + tomato you can hardly go wrong, definitely one of those CLASSIC flavor profiles.

I thought Trader Joe's had "fire roasted" tomatoes, either Muir Glen or under their own label, but I haven't looked in a while.

Last evening we had, along with the aforementioned freeeeee coleslaw, so-called self-styled soi-disant "German" sausages from El Toro Meats, which are very very good, extremely well made. Perhaps not going to give Mattern anything to lose sleep over, but so nice to have convenient to my kitchen here. And, as I say, no slouch in the quality department.

ETM makes only 3 varieties, Italian sweet and hot, and this German. It's delicious actually... do NOT mean to seem to damn with faint praise up there, at ALL.

A nice pile of caramelized onions and grainy mustard and rich egg bread for to make sandwiches for those who wanted sandwiches, which was everybody but me, 2/3, a majority, the men of the family, THEM.

And the seemingly requisite coupla eps of AbFab.