Suddenly its Fall!
And suddenly, we have to figure out what to eat all over again. Gone are the cucumbers, tomatoes, eggplants, and peppers from the backyard. Now we are craving warm food, and turning on the oven is fun again.
Aaron had a great idea of how we should stay on track with our good eating habits. We made a list of all the Fall staple dinners that we like to eat over and over again & that are affordable (and included a category for sides). So each Sunday we sit down and look at the list and see what looks good for about 3-4 nights for the upcoming week. We have 1-2 nights of new recipes, and if any of them stick we add them to the "staple" list for the season. We usually eat with A's parents 1 night a week, and don't really have any kind of formal meal on Saturdays. So, here's the list w/ notes:
Red beans & rice (one of my signature dishes from my grandmother)
Pizzas w/ block mozzerella--we make a dough, divide it into 4 balls, and freeze 2 of the balls. You can also keep the dough balls in the fridge overnight.
White beans w/ sage & ham--this recipe changes every time I make it, but it makes me love my crockpot.
Midnight breakfast--this term was taken from Chef Jamie Oliver. It's basically a frying pan with all your breakfast stuff cooked together (eggs, sausage, tomato slices, mushrooms, etc), kinda like a traditional "English" breakfast fry.
Garlic & Olive oil over pasta--just as plain as it sounds, with a light protein on the side + veg.
Jumbalaya--another one from my grandmother.
Baked beans & hot dogs--now that I can make baked beans from scratch, this one is great to freeze.
Red sauce pasta--there are so many varieties of red sauce to make from canned tomatoes, and the leftovers can be used as pizza sauce the next day.
Sides:
pureed butternut squash, roasted acorn squash, ceasar salad, sweet potato fries, apples & pears, roasted roots & tubers, quick pickles, spinach/feta/pea salad.
Aaron also spends sunday or monday roasting/smoking some variety of meat such as pork shoulder, a whole chicken, chicken quarters, bone in pork chops, or ribs. We also buy meat on sale and freeze it to make hamburgers, bacon, and sausage. He also makes sandwiches: rubens & hot ham & cheese.
Noah and I have a few staples of our own including: quesadillas, sandwiches & tomato soup, baked potatoes, w.w. mac & cheese w/ peas and tomatoes, eggs, turkey bacon, quick fried tofu w/ dipping sauce, french bread pizza (when i'm really feeling lazy).
We are also making focaccia bread to subsitute for crackers, and you can use the leftovers for croutons--yum!!
I might add more as the season moves on.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
taco sauce
Aaron has made several rounds of this yummy taco sauce using our end-of-summer tomatoes. The recipe came from the October 2008 issue of Eating Well magazine. If you have never seen this magazine, you should definately pick it up. It focuses on seasonal ingredients in each issue---and seasonal produce is always the least expensive in the grocery store.
1 T olive oil
1 c. diced onion
2 medium chili peppers (poblano, new mexico, or anaheim) diced [we used the banana peppers from our garden]
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 lbs. tomatoes, diced (about 4 1/2 cups)
1 T. ancho chili powder or chili powder
1 t. ground cumin
1 t. salt
1/2 t. cayenne pepper, or to taste
1/4 c. fresh cilantro
2 T. fresh lime juice
Cook the onions, peppers, and garlic in the olive oil until onion in soft and beginning to brown.
Add tomatoes, chili powder, cumin, salt, and cayenne. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tomatoes have broken down and thickened slightly.
Transfer to a food processor (or blender) and pulse to desired consistency. We whiz it till it is all smooth with no chunks.
Sit at room temp till cool (about 1-2 hours), add cilantro and lime.
NOTE:
This sauce is excellent for freezing!! Just don't add the cilantro and lime. Instead you will add those ingredients when you thaw it out. A little bit of this sauce goes a long way, so you can freeze it in quart sized ziplocks, and it will keep for 6 months.
Super yummy on scrambled eggs & sliced avacados.
1 T olive oil
1 c. diced onion
2 medium chili peppers (poblano, new mexico, or anaheim) diced [we used the banana peppers from our garden]
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 lbs. tomatoes, diced (about 4 1/2 cups)
1 T. ancho chili powder or chili powder
1 t. ground cumin
1 t. salt
1/2 t. cayenne pepper, or to taste
1/4 c. fresh cilantro
2 T. fresh lime juice
Cook the onions, peppers, and garlic in the olive oil until onion in soft and beginning to brown.
Add tomatoes, chili powder, cumin, salt, and cayenne. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tomatoes have broken down and thickened slightly.
Transfer to a food processor (or blender) and pulse to desired consistency. We whiz it till it is all smooth with no chunks.
Sit at room temp till cool (about 1-2 hours), add cilantro and lime.
NOTE:
This sauce is excellent for freezing!! Just don't add the cilantro and lime. Instead you will add those ingredients when you thaw it out. A little bit of this sauce goes a long way, so you can freeze it in quart sized ziplocks, and it will keep for 6 months.
Super yummy on scrambled eggs & sliced avacados.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Notes from tonight's dinner--early fall
We had a great dinner tonight! I figured I better jot down some notes about it so that I remember it for later. The whether has started to get chilly outside, so its time to make some changes to our usual dinner staples (bye bye cucumbers).
I think its good to make some notes, especially during the season changes, so I can look back and see what was working and what wasn't. Aaron has been trying to remember all day today what sandwiches he made last year during the cold whether.
Lunch first: I had maple ham and swiss cheese sandwiches using the sandwich press. I don't like one of those fancy "panini" presses. I prefer the old style one that is sandwich-bread shaped. Aaron had his first ruben sandwich of the fall. He makes it with corned beef and saurkraut, russian dressing, swiss cheese, and rye bread. He heats up the kraut and corned beef in a pan together. (Noah had a PBJ, which he has about 2-3 times a day now...)
And here's dinner:
Aarron had some chicken quarters that he slow-roasted all day after brining for about 36 hours. The brine contained salt, vinegar, 3 T ketchup, 3 T dijon mustard, 1/3 c. lemon juice. I think he basted it all day as well with butter, wisticher sauce, sugar, dijon, and salt.
I made a few odds and ends. We had some sweet corn and eggs from a farm we visited yesterday outside of Harleysville. I turned the eggs into deviled eggs (yolks, mustard, mayo, pickles, salt, pepper, and paprika) and just steamed the corn. I had some local red bell peppers in the fridge that needed to be used asap, so I roasted them. They were amazing! I threw them in the toaster oven on "grill" for about 15 minutes, then put them in a paper lunch bag and closed it for another 15 minutes while cooling. I skinned the peppers (its really annoying) then sliced them thin. I put them in a tupperware with 2 parts olive oil, 1 part red wine vinegar, and salt. They will stay good in the fridge for about a week. I have a recipe for canning them somewhere, but I haven't done that yet this season. I'll be sure to report back when I do.
There was also some feta cheese hanging out in the fridge that I needed to use or loose, so I marinated it in olive oil, vinegar, oregano, basil, dill, salt, and pepper (all dried herbs). This should also stay good in the fridge for about 10 days.
We also had a baguette available for soping up all the yummy juices from everything.
Anyway, its worth noting to hang on to the pepper recipe. They were the best batch I have ever made!
I think its good to make some notes, especially during the season changes, so I can look back and see what was working and what wasn't. Aaron has been trying to remember all day today what sandwiches he made last year during the cold whether.
Lunch first: I had maple ham and swiss cheese sandwiches using the sandwich press. I don't like one of those fancy "panini" presses. I prefer the old style one that is sandwich-bread shaped. Aaron had his first ruben sandwich of the fall. He makes it with corned beef and saurkraut, russian dressing, swiss cheese, and rye bread. He heats up the kraut and corned beef in a pan together. (Noah had a PBJ, which he has about 2-3 times a day now...)
And here's dinner:
Aarron had some chicken quarters that he slow-roasted all day after brining for about 36 hours. The brine contained salt, vinegar, 3 T ketchup, 3 T dijon mustard, 1/3 c. lemon juice. I think he basted it all day as well with butter, wisticher sauce, sugar, dijon, and salt.
I made a few odds and ends. We had some sweet corn and eggs from a farm we visited yesterday outside of Harleysville. I turned the eggs into deviled eggs (yolks, mustard, mayo, pickles, salt, pepper, and paprika) and just steamed the corn. I had some local red bell peppers in the fridge that needed to be used asap, so I roasted them. They were amazing! I threw them in the toaster oven on "grill" for about 15 minutes, then put them in a paper lunch bag and closed it for another 15 minutes while cooling. I skinned the peppers (its really annoying) then sliced them thin. I put them in a tupperware with 2 parts olive oil, 1 part red wine vinegar, and salt. They will stay good in the fridge for about a week. I have a recipe for canning them somewhere, but I haven't done that yet this season. I'll be sure to report back when I do.
There was also some feta cheese hanging out in the fridge that I needed to use or loose, so I marinated it in olive oil, vinegar, oregano, basil, dill, salt, and pepper (all dried herbs). This should also stay good in the fridge for about 10 days.
We also had a baguette available for soping up all the yummy juices from everything.
Anyway, its worth noting to hang on to the pepper recipe. They were the best batch I have ever made!
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