Man that sounds good…
My chicken is in the oven - I ended up adding some celery too, and sadly figured out I’m out of potatoes. I’ll probably toss in some of the roast ones from last night once it’s closer to done. I just ladled out a ramekin of the juice and man oh man how good. A tiny bit of sweetness from the wine plus the savory yummy stock - wow!!
Going in the total opposite direction, tonight I made my first box of Hamburger Helper. I think the flavor was ‘patty melt’. Tastes like ass!
no, really, it wasn’t that bad, but it wasn’t good. Maybe I overcooked it.
I have had a horrible, terrible, suckass couple of weeks, so tomorrow I am fixing one of my all time favorite-comfort-clog-your-arteries-foods…
Fried macaroni.
Start off by frying up a pound of bacon. Crumble. Cook a box of macaroni while bacon is frying, drain well. Chop up a big ol’ white onion. Dump the macaroni & onion in the bacon grease. Fry until brown & crispy, salt & pepper to taste, add the bacon back into it.
Pig out.
I fix it MAYBE once or twice a year. But ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh so good…
It comes out pretty good if I do say so myself.
Some stew meat and fingerling potatoes. My local supermarket sells bags of pre-chopped vegetables for soup so that gives me a mix of carrots, onions, celery, leeks, peppers, and cabbage. Throw in a couple of cans of tomato paste and some red wine. Add some spices. And cook on low heat for six hours. I’ve got meals for the weekend.
I’m making stuffed peppers. I have tons of fresh garden peppers this year, so I’m going to stuff all kinds of peppers with all kinds of delicious meaty and cheesy creations and wrap them in bacon and bake them all up. My son is coming home from college for the weekend! Yay!
“YAY,” indeed!
2 things recently, the first was an idea I came across here on the dope, couldnt find a name so I call them “Mufflets”
(note you can skip the smoker part of this recipe and just cook the ordinary way)
Smoke up Bacon, Mushrooms (shitakes work great) and a couple jalapenos for an hour or so.
chop into smallish pieces.
while thats all going on,
in a skillet lightly cook green/string beans, onion, bell pepper (your choice in color) zucchini.
the idea is to start the cooking process but not finish
in a large bowl beat 12 eggs and add some chopped chunks of cheese (pepper jack :))
bring everything together in the bowl then use a ladle to pour your omelet into a muffin pan, or if you want to get creative use a mini muffin pan
cook ho 325 for 30 min or so, they freeze great and the mini mufflets are perfectly bite sized.
the other thing I made up tonight was roasted veggies with (again the smoker) smoked bacon, chicken, and mushrooms) lots of garlic.
the veggies are actually pretty light on the meat, thats one reason I like the smoker so much, it makes the meat and mushrooms super meaty tasting so you can get away with a lot less meat over all.
Nothing interesting today. Just breakfast burritos. Four small home-grown eggs, eight slices of bacon, shredded Tillamook medium Cheddar cheese, one King Size flour tortilla, Tapatio. I made one big burrito, cut it in half, and shared it with roomie.
Not terribly exciting but I made a pumpkin pie today. Mostly standard pumpkin pie recipe but I did add extra nutmeg. I love nutmeg. 
It’s cooling on the counter as I type this. I need to go get some whipped cream before we can eat it. Can’t have pumpkin pie without whipped cream!
Ravioli from scratch, using the Kitchenaid pasta roller. Filled with a combination of butternut squash and sweet pumpkin; sauce made with olive oil, butter, shallots and sage.
The food ended up being poppadoms with raitha, mango chutney and mango salsa, followed by chicken tikka masala, lamb jalfraizei, chana masala, dhal and naan bread. I think it counts as as an adventure.
I’ve been having night sweats thinking about cooking Thanksgiving dinner for ten at my son’s house in the midwest. His wife wants me to teach her how to do it, and I know that her kitchen is ill-equipped since she’s a terrible cook. The one time she tried this meal, it was apparently a disaster. A turkey dinner is no big deal unless you have to use a paring knife for prep.
Bring your own knives! I mean yeah, you can’t bring every single thing you will need, but at least you can do that. (I once brought a hand mixer and cake pans in my suitcase to my aunt’s house in Florida so I could make Grandmom’s famous chocolate cake for a holiday. Got a lot of funny looks in the security line, but it was fine otherwise. Of course, then I had to go buy a measuring cup because they didn’t have one, but that’s a rant for another day…)
Not necessarily interesting, but the kids and I just put our first ever batch of calzones in the oven. Ten minutes into baking, it looks like they’ll be messy - a couple are a bit overstuffed, and we didn’t seal the edges quite well, but they smell great. And it’s finally cool enough to use the oven - hooray! Good thing, too, since I have a birthday cake to bake this weekend… I can’t believe my baby boy will be 14!
Use a melonballer on the apples. Dip the apple “balls” in the caramel and then dip or sprinkle them in whatever topping you like.
I actually didn’t care for them. I made them for a party and they were okay when fresh but didn’t hold up over time.
Found an old 60s recipe for a cranberry mince pie. WAY too sweet and way too much clove in the recipe. I’d make it again but cut the sugar down by a 1/3, cloves by half and may add a leetle nutmeg.
Today is meatless Monday. I made my own sesame garam masala earlier today, toasted the seeds and spices and ground it up myself using a mortar and pestle. Because I don’t have a coffee grinder.
This’ll go into the peas and potato samosas I’m making at this very moment. Gotta go!
Okay, they weren’t beautiful, but those were some mighty tasty calzones if I say so myself! Since tonight was the first attempt, and I pretty much just “winged it” instead of going by a recipe, we kept it simple, but my son the budding chef and I have already decided how to improve the next batch.
Now I want dessert. Guess I’ll go root around in the pantry for something to bake. Seems a waste not to, as the oven is still warm… I’m not a glutton, I’m just making wise use of resources!
Christ, the worst thing ever for my cooking was him moving away to law school. I feel like a hobo single person again, barely cooking because cooking and cleaning is so onerous.
I made him a double batch of this 3 bean chili over the weekend during my visit and froze it in Gladware in individual servings. I actually halve the tomatoes (and suggest everyone does; I love tomatoes but the full amount turns it into a lackluster tomato soup). So since I doubled the recipe I actually used the 28oz can but if just doing one batch, use a 14oz can. Certainly use the upper end of the spice recommendations, add in your favorite hot sauce, at least a tablespoon but 2 or 3 wouldn’t hurt it either. Use two or three jalapenos, though none is also acceptable. Use a sauteed onion and no bell peppers; they get too soggy.
For kidlets to like it, add some shredded cheese when serving 
Quinoa works beautifully as the starch; brown rice also works well.
Is everyone apprised of the delicious bag of sweet potato spears at Trader Joe’s near the other packaged veggies? Sprayed with some olive or canola oil, sprinkled with kosher salt and roasted at 400 or 425 for 20 minutes and you’ve got healthy and tasty sweet potato fries. Made those this weekend as well. Really only enough for two in the bag 
Finally let go of the recipe on this one and it came out much better - basically browned then steamed white fish with a fresh salsa. Spicing was just right for us (warmish) and the whole thing is pretty healthy.
Saute a red onion, cut in fairly large wedges, with 4 cloves chopped garlic, salt and pepper, set aside.
Chop/dice one large anaheim, one jalapeno pepper (not seeded) and a tomato.
Mix chilies, tomato with some chopped cilantro and a bunch of lime juice, plus a bit of salt.
Dust halibut or snapper fillets with flour, cayenne (we also used jalapeno powder).
Saute fish in separate pan with olive oil until golden on both sides.
Place fish on top of onion in original pan, pile the salsa on and around it. We added additional lime juice here, which creates a yummy fond.
Cover and steam for about 8 minutes.
Serve over rice.
I had a heart attack dinner tonight. Wings, potatoe skins & coleslaw.
For the skins I used a baked potatoe. Dug out the middle with a spoon. Brushed on a vegetable oil, parmesan cheese, garlic powder, pepper, chili pepper flakes mix. Then in the oven at 425 for 15-20 minutes. Take out, add chedar cheese and dutch bacon then back in the oven for 5 minutes. Take out add a dollop of sour cream and sprinle with green onions.
Store bought naked hot wings cooked a little longer than instructed because I like them crispy. With sour cream and hot sauce on the side.
I feel like a fat bastard.
Turtle head.