Category: home cooking

goat cheese, avocado, celery, walnut pesto, watercress – that’s just on the bread

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> ok, that was a little excessive. We are back into Tom Colicchio’s book tonight for dinner and having the goat cheese, avocado, celery, walnut pesto, watercress on fresh bakery brown bread sandwich. You toss the celery and watercress in a brightly acidic lemon vinaigrette that cuts the richness of goat cheese, avocado and walnut pesto. If that wasn’t enough, we are having Nordstom’s Kalamata Aioli and shoestring fries on the side. Totally fresh luxury.

Nordstrom’s Kalamata Aioli Recipe, adapted from Tastebook by Allison Maxwell

3/4 cup Mayo
1/4 cup roasted garlic puree
1 fresh clove garlic
1 to 1/2 cups pitted Kalamata olives

Preheat oven to 350°F. Cut the top off of a whole head of garlic; drizzle with olive oil and wrap in foil. Roast for an hour. May be done ahead of time.
Puree the olives and 1 fresh clove of garlic very well in a blender or food processor. Place in a bowl and add garlic puree, lemon juice, and mayonnaise, Mix well with a whisk. Adjust for salt and pepper.

Walnut Pesto

1 cup walnuts
1/4 cup Olive Oil
Freshly Ground Black Pepper and Salt
Place ingredients in blender or use immersion blender to puree. Try not to lick the bowl.

fish and chips

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working through all the random proteins in the freezer before they get freezer burned or tossed because they are mysterious and last night we had fish & chips.
The fish were a couple of haddock fillets that I sliced down into goujons and and triple dipped in flour, beaten egg and panko.  I shallow fried them in my favorite pot in canola oil for just a few minutes. The fries a bag of Alexia waffle fries we baked in the oven.  We had a lonely jalapeno that I sliced down and combined with olive oil mayo in lieu of tartar sauce.  I didn’t go totally Brit and wrap it up in a newsprint but it tasted good all the same.

pancakes or waffles

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all kinds of debate about this at the office today.  Which is easier?  Which is better?  What might be good or bad about the Waffle House?  Chocolate chip or Pecan?  I don’t know if waffles are easier or not but they are more complicated and have their own machine.

double dark chocolate banana loaf

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we saw this loaf (well, not this one but a nice looking one at the market.)  We wanted to get it but I said, ‘well, we have frozen bananas in the freezer at home.’ Z said, ‘I’ll just make it at home then.’  Z made this chocolate banana loaf with dark chocolate chips on Sunday.  There are several great things about this.

  • people in his office think I made it
  • it has the word loaf in the name
  • he bakes
  • chocolate
  • he is an awesome baker
  • it is a good way to use random bananas I throw in the freezer when they get squashy

There is one bad thing.

  • this photo 🙂

1 stick butter, softened to room temp
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
2 large overripe bananas (mashed)
1 t. vanilla
1 cup flour
2 T baking soda
2 T cocoa powder
1/2 cup sour cream
1 cup of chocolate chips (we used dark)

preheat oven to 350.  Lightly grease a 9 X 5 loaf pan (we used three mini’s).  In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar.  Stir in egg, squashy banana, sour cream, and vanilla until well mixed.  Add baking soda, cocoa and flour and mix a couple of minutes with mixer (kitchenaid or hand blender). Add chcocolate chips and give a quick stir.
Pour bater into pans and bake for 45-50 minutes.  I don’t know what sea vs mtns does to this but ours took 45 minutes.  We checked at 30 and 40 minutes with a bamboo skewer for gooey ness.  Remove from oven and cool on a rack for 10 or 15 minutes before turning out.   Share.

Z found the original recipe on savorysweetlife.com

picadillo

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there have been quite a few things to steal my cooking and adventuring thunder lately.  Namely the heat and humidity of summer and a deeply rooted tiredness that comes with hard work.  Most of my energies have been expended in reviewing and updating a warehouse, reviewing new point of sale software and cross training and blending a staff while I learn the ins and outs of numerous inventory systems, printing and publishing books and keeping up with an astonishing staff of volunteers, long time missionaries and new ones.
Recently on Facebook I saw that someone I work with had noticed she had taken something of a blog break this summer and I can see where I have done the same.  I think this is life in a nutshell; to have ups and downs alongside times of busyness punctuated by slowdowns or at least the brief distractions of rest.  I am hoping the weather cools soon although it being July in Florida that is a vague dream.  I am hoping my internal fires get stirred up for cuisine and cooking a bit more than they have been.
We made a slow cooked picadillo last night which is a sweet Cuban chili type dish served with arroz amarillo.  Not Z’s favorite with it’s sweet undertones of raisins and salty hits of pimiento stuffed olives but I can see where it is a pantry cleaning comfort dish when topped with a fried egg (a cabello-on horseback).  It takes me back to a rice dish I had in Spain of rice that had been shaped in a mold and filled with an egg and lightly sauced with red sauce that I remember as a revelation which fills me with hope that things will be looking up as long as I am.