After a long rainy day and a bunch of work, I wanted comfy Tex-Mex. So, my sweetie and I agreed to go to Herrera’s, an excellent place nearby. Probably due to it being Cinco de Mayo weekend, we had to wait for a table. Totally worth it. My sweetie had a #6 - crunchy taco, cheese enchilada with beans and rice, I had a #11 - two crunchy tacos with a guacamole tostada, The salsa served with the chips was deliciously hot, and not fucking around at all. My only regret is that I can’t realistically eat there tomorrow.
I’m sitting here this morning unsure about dinner tonight. I am once again due for a fairly big grocery shop, but it’s gloomy out with rain showers predicted, so I may just be a lazy old dog and stay in.
In which case tonight will be spaghetti (actually, spaghettini, as always chez Wolfpup) and I shall crack open the jar of Carbone Delicato – the (hopefully) mellow sauce with carrots and celery but lacking any onion or garlic. But I’m adding a pile of tasty meatballs from the local deli (that I previously froze) so it may not need additional flavours. A taste test will determine how to proceed. If necessary, I’ll sautée some onions in garlic butter. No fresh mushrooms on hand, sadly, but lots of real Italian Parmigiano Reggiano.
Today and tomorrow are food prep day. So I’ve just made a big batch of my serrano-habanero-garlic-peach hot sauce, bought a bunch of 505-branded roasted diced hatch chiles, and secured 3-4 pounds each of boneless chicken thighs and rockfish. That plus what I have in the fridge means I’m prepping, vacuum sealing, and freezing.
Several portions of tandoori chicken thighs (Penzy’s Tandoori spice mix, whole fat plain yogurt, lemon juice, salt + the chicken).
Several portions of Roasted Green chile rockfish (505, lime juice, extra powdered garlic and onion).
Several portions of Chile & Peach marinated rockfish.
Leaving me to decide what to make for tonight. I have about 2 servings of each protein left. I could absolutely make some lovely street tacos, a salad with any of the above flavors of protein added, or some tostada style with some refritos from the pantry.
They are really nice, surprisingly. I wasn’t especially hopeful the first time I tried it, but in my quest to replace some regular white flours with acceptable substitutes in hope of keeping Type 2 diabetes at bay, I thought I’d give it a go. Chickpea flour turns out to be a fine substitute!
My wife uses a lot of besan (chickpea flour) for any “pan fried” food for the extra nutrition - especially dredged, pan fried tofu slices, and I’ve found the flavor fully acceptable in that application. She’s also used it in cookies in some locations where a lower-carb options was already involved, subbing out for almond flour as an example.
Of course, the best chickpea option was some lovely Pakora:
But, well, deep frying is a lot of work and mess. 
One thing I took away is that chickpea flour tends to be more “crunchy” than “crispy” in pan or deep fried foods. So it’ll break off in chunks, so smaller, one or two bite servings were the best.
That sounds delicious! But yes, deep frying is a lot of work and mess, and I’m rarely moved to use it as a preparation method.
When I am so moved, it’s usually for very non-healthful homemade fish and chips – which is kind of stupid, because we have some fabulous local places for that with super fresh fish off the docks.
I did very simple steak tips in butter and garlic with baked potatoes on the side. They were delicious.
Was listening to NPR a while back and heard an interview with Eric Adjepong, who had put out a cookbook, “Ghana To The World”. Found the lamb burger recipe they talked about, really liked it. Checked out the cookbook from the library, and plan to eat for the week on his “East End Wings” recipe, “Crispy Baked Wings with Berbere Honey Glaze and Fried Garlic” We’ll see if I can execute well 
This sounds very tempting. I have a Penzy’s Berbere spice mix in house, honey, and plenty of flash frozen from the garden garlic cloves, as well as some frozen chicken wings set aside…
Hmmmmm.
-puts in “to-do” cooking plans sometime in the next week or so-
-1 point.
You were supposed to say “I guess I’ll have to see if I can wing it!”
Very little will be had for dinner tonight. Possibly some baked French onion soup. While I was out around midday today, I’m a little embarrassed to admit I had a bit of a hankering for the ultimate crap junk food – a McDonald’s quarter-pounder that I literally have not had in many years. Even when I want fast food, McD’s is usually my last choice.
As usual at this particular location, the drive-through lines were long. I just don’t get the incredible popularity. I got home anxious to dig into this unhealthy tasty treat, and got constantly interrupted by various things, not to mention that Lawn Guy picked this very moment to do the mowing, and I had to trudge over and unlock the gate.
Anyway, this poor little burger, now starting to get cold, was pretty tasty. I think McDonald’s changed something a few years back – like for the quarter-pounders the patties are fresh and no longer frozen or something. But still, it will be a long time before I have another – the stuff is just outrageously unhealthy in many different ways!
You say true 
I did have to - wasn’t going to go clear downtown to the Ethiopian grocery looking for the spice, couldn’t find fenugreek locally, used a recipe I found online for the spice mix, and substituted toasted yellow mustard seed & fennel seed for the fenugreek. Can’t say how well it mirrors the real thing, but turned out tasty nevertheless - one that will go in the rotation.
Well, I’ll take that as a must-make then.
Is the option you’re using close to/the same as this one from Food Network?
Today we had grilled brats and onions on bollio rolls. Delicioiso, looking forward to finishing them off tomorrow for lunch.
Further to my previous post, I did indeed have baked French onion soup for dinner after the rare (for me) McDonald’s lunch. But having woken up at 3 AM and seeing your post, plus the tempting picture posted later by @ParallelLines, I wanted some of those wings real bad!
Cannot be done at 3 AM, but fortunately I had Buffalo chicken wings in the freezer, so I just did half a dozen of them in the air fryer (the President’s Choice brand) with Renées Ranch salad dressing for dipping to offset the hotness. OMG I love my air fryer!
Pretty much exactly word-for-word, but they left out the initial step - marinating the wings in pureed garlic and ginger for 24 hours. I bought the Spice World (?) minced garlic and minced ginger. Even used the minced garlic for the fried garlic, let it drain in a sieve to get rid of much of the liquid before frying it.
My wife is going to kill me. She’s cut down on garlic due to work related issues, but I am under no such restriction. So, the version from Food Network has 15 cloves of pan-fried garlic chips as a topping, how much (approximately) garlic and ginger did the original use for the 24 hour marinade?
Yesterday we ate out and I got Guatamalan Hilachas de Carne - shredded beef mixed with carrots, potatoes, and green beans coked in a red sauce, with corn tortillas that weren’t flat like the ones I’d expect with street tacos, but thicker and more doughy. The meal was delicious!
Chicken and rice tonight, simple, good!
I’m getting ready to enjoy a splurge tonight.
I had errands in town and found myself near our local fish market. I couldn’t resist a portion of some breathtakingly-expensive-but-oh-so-delicious fresh Chinook salmon. I’ll grill it and make a mushroom cognac risotto on the side, along with some simple steamed green beans.
There will be leftovers for tomorrow – which I will appreciate as I suffer through Shingles Shot #2.
You have both my envy and sympathy. Envy for the lovely piece of fish, sympathy for the second singles shot. It was unpleasant but not unbearable for me for 48-72 hours with a very noticeable but not dangerous fever.
If Oregon was getting the cold drizzly weather Colorado is right now (tomorrow it’ll be 46F as the HIGH, lows of 36) I’d say it was a perfect day to justify our mutual fondness for junky ramen carbs…