I Have Been Cooking
Tomato and cucumber salad with feta cheese, sliced turkey, and Castleventrano olives, topped with olive oil and balsamic vinegar after the picture was taken.
Steamed broccoli, Greek style, which means oil, lemon juice, and oregano dressing.
Swiss chard sauteed in bacon fat (I Ieft the bacon in on purpose) with shallots. Intended to be served over rice.
About a month ago, I grilled some filet mignons with lackluster results. I decided to experiment with the two I had left; I sauteed them in ghee and celery tops, liberally seasoned with Herbs de Provence, salt and pepper. The meat was juicy and did not taste like steak, which was not unpleasant, but I sense you steak lovers blanching at the prospect. Nonetheless, they were quite enjoyable.
The sauce and carmelized bits were so good from the filet mignon medallions, I fried some already cooked Korean sticky rice in them. I'm not sure why, but it struck me to add sesame seeds.
A typical side I often cook. String beans with oil and balsamic vinegar. I use lemon juice instead of the vinegar, too.
Beef stew made in the electric pressure cooker using its recommended recipe. I had some sweet potatoes, so I decided to pour the stew over them instead of rice. This turned out to be quite the winning combination.
Cucumber and tomato salad with corn, feta, and pickled chervil from Georgia, the country, that is, not the state.
It looks like glop, but it's really oatmeal with quinoa over pineapple and kiwi fruit. The oatmeal was cooked with cinnamon, cloves, and sugar.
Obviously not cooked, but a simple pairing of red and yellow watermelon. The yellow was infinitely sweeter than the red, in case you were wondering.
It's tomato season. Naturally, I bought a case of Jerseys. Salsa and gazpacho are coming soon.
Diane Kochilis has an excellent program on PBS about Greek cooking. I tried her chicken soup with tomato and honey. That's right, honey is an ingredient. I substituted potato for the pasta, which was a mistake, but it was incredibly tasty, in spite of my caprice. Here is the link: https://www.dianekochilas.com/protoyiahni-tomato-chicken-noodle-soup/
Tomato and endive salad with manchego cheese and some more of that chervil. Oh, and store-bought pesto tzatziki dressing.
Zucchini flowers dipped in egg, then in seasoned breadcrumbs, lightly fried in olive oil. A delicate side dish, to be sure, light and airy.
Mashed potatoes (butter and milk), but I included some leftover potatoes with Peruvian Huancaina sauce, which is made from cheese and medium hot yellow pepper (that is, aji amarillo). This experiment turned out well, creamy and just spicy enough.
Fresh mozzarella, tomatoes, and roasted peppers with olive oil, salt, and basil on top. A typical Italian side dish.
What might you do on a rainy morning? Me? I boil and peel fresh tomatoes (see previous picture of carton I bought) for tomato soup. As long as one is organized (peels right in the garbage bag, for instance), it's not hard to do. That juice you see on the blue dish was put back into the soup, as it is concentrated flavor.
I sauteed shallots, garlic, and ginger in some light oil, added the tomatoes, salt, pepper, celery salt (just because), and some rosemary. I mashed the tomatoes before and during cooking instead of running them through a food mill afterwards, which kept it a little chunky, seeds and all. (Maybe they are stewed?) Seasoned croutons and grated Locatelli on top.
Linguine with fresh mushroom sauce, made with Devon Cream (creme fraiche) and a pinch of nutmeg, as well as my favorite, Herbs de Provence. The peas were not intended, but were added on request. The sauce was not as creamy as I would have liked, but the dish came out just fine.
What I didn't cook, Part 1. Is there anything better than fried chicken? No. I found a chain called Krispy Krunchy Chicken and gave it a try. This is my third order in about six weeks. Maybe your local restaurant does it better, but, for now, this is my go to source when I'm Jonesing.
What I didn't cook, Part 2. Ribs from our favorite Portuguese joint in Newark, NJ, Ferry Street Churrascuria (both loved or hated by patrons, it's one of those). This is HALF the order. A regular platter contains two of the following (your choice): rice, potatoes, and salad. We went with double fries. Just awesome.
Tuna salad, before I mixed it, containing solid Albacore, celery (including the tender, inner leaves), endive, olives, roasted red pepper, good old Hellmann's mayo, Russian style mustard, lemon juice, salt, pepper, and my secret flavor-maker, cocktail sauce. Note the deliberate absence of raw onion, a typical ingredient. I don't like it in ANYthing.
A simple tomato salad with queso blanco, roasted red pepper, hard boiled egg, and pesto tzaziki.
Sometimes, experiments work incredibly well: farm fresh baby white eggplant stir-fried in sesame oil, soy sauce, and chopped garlic. And the original recipe called for added plum sauce, which I did not have, but I did have some plums in their syrup in a jar (from Moldova, of all places), which I used instead. I threw in some sesame seeds, too. Different and delicious. One plum is visible.
Another tomato salad, this time with Belgian endive, eggs, and croutons. Olive oil and vinegar, of course, were added.
A Greek dish: psari plaki, which is any kind of white fish (in this case flounder fillets), sauteed and baked in tomato, oregano, parsley, garlic, onion, and lemon sauce, sprinkled with some bread crumbs. The whole pan went in the oven. The flavors were noticable, individually and collectively. Perhaps the best part, though, was that the aroma made the mouth water. Light, but oh-so-tempting.