To my surprise, I found it at Walmart, and it was half the price that another supermarket was asking.
I got some of these and took them to work so I wouldn’t eat all of them. They kind of taste like Froot Loops, in a good way.
I made some Lentil Tikka Masala from a recipe online. Pretty good (not great, but nice enough). Enough left over for some work lunches next week.
Liver, bacon & onions, with mashed potatoes, gravy, and roasted corn with honey-butter.
Earlier this month I posted a poll asking what I should deep fry. Calabash style shrimp did not win, but screw that; I made it anyway. And hushpuppies. The shrimp tasted pretty much like I remember fried shrimp tasting when I was growing up in North Carolina. I recall hushpuppies having more of a oniony flavor, though (I just ordered some hushpuppy mix from the internet). Next time I think I’ll try adding a bit of onion powder to the mix.
That is a must, finely chopped.
Tried a new (to me) recipe from Mark Bittmann yesterday: Lamb stew with cinnamon and lemon. Very easy prep and basic ingredients, strong flavor, just needs a little time like most stews. I would definitely make it again. My only issue is that he has you chop up the whole lemon and stick it in there, rind and all, and we ended up with just a bit too much bitter flavor from that. (Of course, that could be because we made it a little early and let it sit warming for an extra 90 minutes before eating, but still, next time I might put in a little less lemon).
Yeah, like I said I just bought a commercial hushpuppy mix, and just assumed that it would already contain some sort of onion flavoring. But I looked at the ingredient list just now and it in fact does not. I also have some cornbread mix from the same brand, and the ingredient list is exactly the same. Which makes me wonder if they’re the same stuff, just with different instructions. As one might expect, the hushpuppies came out tasting basically like fried cornbread balls, which isn’t bad, but not the flavor I expect from hushpuppies.
My go-to for commercial mix is Louisiana brand, which has corn flour in addition to the cornmeal. They come out a little denser, which I grew up with, and prefer. I also like their fish fry mix, both for fish, and for fried okra. Readily available in the grocery stores around my area.
Greens & Beans, with Italian sausage grilled and added. Vodka & Lemon Juice to drink.
Shrimp Creole.
Well, I’m out of food and it’s raining out – a bad combination! Every time the rain seems to let up, back it comes again. So I’m staying in and foraging for dinner.
I have the makings of beans with sauteed onion and barbecue sauce, potatoes for homemade fries, and it now occurs to me that I have frozen pork chops in the freezer. So never mind. Imma taking 'em out of freezer now and when thawed, will marinate in jerk sauce, and that will be dinner with barbecue beans and homemade fries – always a delicious combo. Leftover chops will be good with ramen.
Due to bad planning, I had thrown a whole package of pork chops into the freezer last week, and of course they were now welded together. With the aid of a microwave, four big thick chops were separated out without defrosting them. Two are now back in the freezer, properly wrapped. The other two I completely thawed, and are now in the fridge marinating in a potent jerk sauce, well covered in plastic wrap! Normally I’d grill them on the barbecue but it’s almost out of propane and the weather is shitty, so I’m oven-baking per these useful instructions that I’ve posted before. Nothing is as good as outdoor grilling but this method works well in bad weather (or when you’re low on propane, dogblasit!).
Currently the potatoes, sliced into fries, are soaking in water and the chops are marinating in the fridge. Soon it will be time to sautee onions, start simmering the beans, and put the chops in a hot oven for just about the same time as it takes the air fryer to produce fresh fries!
Trying a new discovery tonight, a fairly expensive but looks like good quality braised beef short rib pot pie. I was going to make fries with it but I see from the ingredients list that it already contains both sweet and regular potatoes. along with onion and mushrooms in a beef gravy with wine. So basically a beef stew in a pastry shell. Should go well with Penfold’s Koonunga Hill Shiraz-Cabernet.
Report on the previous beans, fries, and pork chops: the homemade fries were amazing as always, the beans were great*, but the pork chops were somewhat overdone, I guess because they were a bit thinner than the instructions I was using assumed. But at least the jerk marinade was excellent, so I just need to be more careful when I do the other two chops later on.
Also, I made two dinners out it, separated by a few days, and while I sliced and tossed in oil an entire potato, I only fried half. The other half sat in the fridge for two days in a plastic bag. There are reportedly all sorts of horrors that occur if you refrigerate raw potatoes (starches turning to sugars, etc) but the result from frying the refrigerated potato slices was every bit as good as always – and so convenient, too, just dump contents of bag into air fryer basket and turn on!
* Except for the spider that may or may not have fallen in – fully detailed in the February mini-rants! 
Wow, that was one of the best meat pies I’ve ever had! Delicate, buttery pastry – the kind that makes me love meat pies – and as one would expect of a quality product, the filling was almost all braised beef, with just an appropriate amount of mushrooms, and the potatoes were a barely noticeable accent. Fries would have worked with it, except the pie itself was more than sufficient. And it did go well with the Shiraz-Cabernet. Finished off with a glass of rum and a Lindt chocolate.
It comes from a small local outfit called “The Pie Commission” that mostly does takeout and catering, but ships limited amounts of frozen product to retail grocers. My nearby supermarket only stocks three of the wide variety of products they actually make, but I’m glad they at least have some.
On a different topic, I’m anxious to try out this seaweed brown butter pasta recipe, since I love pasta and the picture looks enticing. Except that the red seaweed called dulse will probably be hard to find and I may end up having to get it from Amazon, where I’ll have to buy 100x what I actually need. Also white miso, while more readily available, seems only to come in huge buckets.
Going simple tonight. Have a mini-tube of croissants in the oven, and a mix of various cream cheeses and some cold cuts (o.k. sliced smoked salmon, cuz I bougie like that) to go with it.
ETA: the 1st one just came out (I like to pull them at different times so one is super soft, the last one is really crispy, etc.) Just slathered it with slices of cold brie and a bit of apricot preserve (o.k. a packet of duck sauce) and yum!!
That sounds amazing - do you recall the brand or where you found it?
(I’m assuming this is a frozen-in-a-box item…?)
I explained that in the next post. It comes from a little local joiint called The Pie Committee that does takeout and catering and also supplies some supermarkets.
Temps are going to get up around 60 today, so I thought I’d throw some ribeye steaks on the grill. For a change, I’m marinating them in a bulgogi-style sauce.
For a side, I’m going to try a sort of Asian-Greek fusion pilaf: rice and broken-up ramen noodles cooked in some stock with peppers and mushrooms.
Dinner tonight will just be a sub that I picked up while grocery shopping and some tomato bisque, but the main reason I went out was to stock up on those amazing meat pies from The Pie Commission. Got two more braised beef rib, two pulled pork, and a chicken pot pie. All are made with expertly blended ingredients and the most amazing flaky buttery pastry. I’ve already raved about the braised beef rib; the pulled pork is made with their own barbecue sauce, tomatoes, onion, cumin, and other interesting stuff. I’m not particularly a big fan of chicken pot pies but I trust these guys to make this one delicious! One of these days I’m gonna drive down to the actual bakery, which is some distance away, and pick up a much wider variety.
I’ve consumed the first two braised beef rib pies and did not make fries for either of them. My usual approach with meat pies is to throw some fries on the plate and squirt some ketchup beside them. To inflict ketchup on these glorious meat pies would be sacrilege!
I’m having essentially italian sloppy joes. I made a thick spaghetti meat sauce last night, and am adding some more sausage to it, cooking it down a bit and throwing it into a baguette with some parm and fresh basil.