I was feeling like a late-night snack so I made a sort of impromptu fried rice. I had some leftover vegetable-broth rice with porcini mushroom, and some leftover jerk pork chops. So I thinly sliced the pork chop, fried up some chopped white onion in olive oil and set aside, fried a scrambled egg and set aside, added a bit more oil to the frypan, then the rice, egg, pork chop, some nuked frozen Asian veggies, and a bit of soy sauce, and stirred until hot.
It turned out to be a surprisingly good version of pork-fried rice, all the more so when topped with a bit of Huy Fong chili garlic sauce.
Last night there was some kitchen competition. I had some banana peppers and ground hot sausage, so I prepared stuffed banana peppers In tomato sauce as an appetizer. My gf asked that I keep it low carb, so no rice in my stuffing.
Meanwhile she had picked up another nice eggplant (2023 will go down in history as a great eggplant year). She sliced, breaded, and sautéed eggplant rounds then baked them in sauce and cheese for an eggplant parmigiana.
She clearly won. Her sauce was an artisanal jarred pumpkin-tomato sauce that was spectacular and seasonal. Her cheeses were foodie grade Parmesan, Romano, and mozzarella. My stuffed peppers were delicious, but suffered in not having rice in the stuffing.
To drink we had Dark & Stormys. Our friends gave us a few cases of ginger beer that wasn’t selling in their market and my gf picked up a handle of Spiced Kraken.
Last night was leftovers from our cook off, and I’m happy to say I was the clear winner!
My gf’s eggplant Parmesan’s delicate breading suffered from sitting and reheating. What was a delight the previous night was a gloppy mess (though delicious).
Meanwhile, my stuffed banana peppers improved a bit! They were out of this world! If the stuffing contained some rice they would have been perfect.
The pizza steel is currently getting hot in the oven. I’ve got dough (cheated and am using TJ’s), pepperoni, pineapple, and feta, to go along with the standard red sauce and mozz. I do raw red sauce, just crushed tomatoes with s&p, plus some fresh basil.
I used to do a very similar eggplant parm. It was very time consuming, cuz you had to fry off all the eggplant rounds before assembling the bake. Also messy, with all the frying. I recommend some feta chunks in there too.
Last night was sushi night. We enjoyed Ôra King Salmon Sashimi along with Poke Bowls: yellowfin tuna, pickled red onion, pineapple, fermented seaweed salad, tobiko, roasted macadamias, and ponzu.
Leftover lowbrow chicken casserole, which started out as:
2 chicken breasts, cooked and cubed
1 can of peas
1 can of Cream of Chicken with Herbs Soup
1/2 soup can of water
1 package microwave rice, cooked
Combine in a pot, and bring to a boil, then simmer for a few minutes
It came out a little bland (needs more herbs than what is in the soup), and the peas overpower it.
Ain’t no sin to randomly add capers to any dish except ice cream. I’ve done this and then had people commenting about “oh, cool, what is this I’m noticing?” (And they were smiling when they asked)
Feeling kind of tired after a covid shot. Picked up a package of burdock gimbap, which is a Korean sushi roll of rice, fish cake, egg, cucumber, carrot, burdock, pickled radish, and seaweed wrap. Very good, I wish I’d picked up a 2nd package.
I love grilling burgers for dinner, but my gf wanted to make it more healthy. So, we ditched the buns and use turkey burgers.
She calls this hamburger salad. A bed of shredded Romain with onions and tomatoes is topped with a Turkey burger or cheeseburger. Last night I grilled feta spinach turkey burgers. In place of dressing we used burger condiments (mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise, pickles).
Love the pics! Your dinners are a class act. I’d like to dine at your house sometime!
Dinner tonight chez Wolfpup will be much more modest – pizza. But the nearby supermarket that fortuitously makes such good subs and sandwiches also makes a really good fresh pizza, probably the closest I’ve yet come to stuff from a good pizzeria. The trick is a pizza stone, a really hot oven, and then finish with a quick two-minute high-temperature broil to bubble and brown the toppings.
This one may or may not turn out better than the others, because all I could find that I liked was just plain pepperoni and cheese. So I’m adding fresh mushrooms and thinly sliced green pepper. I happened to see some interesting-looking jars of anchovies when I was picking up pickled herring, and I regret I didn’t get one – some anchovy would have added some nice extra zing!
Takeout pepperoni pizza with hot pepper sprinkles, Caesar salad and a glass of ice water. (Spaghetti sauce to dip the pizza crusts in, naturally). Later, dark-chocolate limoncello balls, with a glass of milk.
Tonight I made jambalaya with chicken, andouille, and shrimp. I had some fresh tomatoes that needed to be used up, so I diced them and used them in place of the canned tomatoes I usually use when I make jambalaya. But honestly canned tomatoes work better.
Dinner last night was half of the leftover pizza, which had actually turned out pretty well. The leftover was treated in my usual fashion: heat in microwave, then crisp the crust on a hot crepe pan.
The late-night snacks suddenly turned ethnic Eastern European, for no particular reason except what I had lying around. First, potato pancakes (made with grated potato, egg, onions, and spices, and served with sour cream – aromatic and delicioius!). Then pickled herring and sour cream. The high point of pickled herring is that it goes very well with vodka on ice, which I’m currently prescribing myself for my aching back!
Chicken stir fry with pineapple and broccoli, over rice noodles. Or perhaps the noodles will go into the stir fry. Sauce of soy, pineapple juice, rice wine vinegar, garlic ginger, etc. A new one for me, hope it turns out well.
