What's For Dinner Tonight: Episode 2021 – A New Hope

I picked up a Mexican Torta Adobada: a sandwich on a large soft roll with mayo filled with Adobada (diced spicy pork), refried beans, lettuce, tomato, & guacamole. It hit the spot!

Roast chicken breast stuffed with garlic sausage, fries and a Greek salad on the side (feta cheese, black olives, red onion, and cherry tomatoes tossed with lettuce and Renee’s feta Greek salad dressing). If I’m feeling decadent, maybe some turkey gravy over the chicken and fries.

This prepared chicken dish comes with fettuccine alfredo, but that’s way too much food for me, so the fettuccine alone makes a nice dinner the following day, with a bit of broccoli smothered in garlic butter and well sprinkled with good Italian Parmesan.

Sounds delicious! Though, I’d be concerned that the moisture in the spinach would cause the quesadillas to turn out saaggy :blush:

My wife is doing a Costco run today and I asked her to pick up a beef tenderloin, so tonight I may finally attempt Beef Wellington. Or possibly tomorrow, since it seems like more of a Sunday dinner. I’ll report back as to whether it turned out Wellington or Unwellington.

I had a Costco run myself and picked up a pork tenderloin package. I’m not the biggest pork fan, but the tenderloins are so mild and tender than they make nice little roasts. And it’s awfully hard to resist $3/lb! So yesterday I cooked it in a pan on the stove top, since once I’d seared it all over, it was nearly done anyway. Served it like a lamb roast with mint jelly and pan gravy stretched with a little Better Than Bouillon beef base.

Tonight’s dinner is cubed chicken and chopped cabbage with peanut sauce and noodles.

All is going according to plan – the comfort food of a nice fettuccine alfredo is on tap for tonight. And yes, I did feel decadent last night, so poured some deliciously savoury turkey gravy over the chicken breast and fries, and froze the rest in individual portions for all manner of future use. The packaging and freezing is a bit of a nuisance, but the availability of individual portions of this marvellous turkey gravy – the elixir of the gods – is priceless!

-groan-

Fine. You win.

Yeah, you can’t get much more bang for the buck than pork tenderloin. It’s still inexpensive and it’s delicious, especially if you cook it to the modern guidelines of no more than 145F internal temp.

Alas, my wife reported back that Costco did not have any beef tenderloins. I could have made a run to a local meat market, but I took the lack of Costco beef tenderloins to be a sign that it just wasn’t the time yet for Wellington.

Or, it may have just been laziness on my part.

–checks freezer and fridge–

Three frozen tenderloins, one “fresh” cryovac in the fridge.

Apparently we agree once more.

Tonight I’m once again roasting my favourite boneless skinless chicken breasts in a curry marinade. After half the roast time, one will be cut up and simmered in a Vindaloo curry sauce. The other chicken breast will finish roasting. Fortunately the weather will be sunny and warm so I can open doors and windows to air out the stench of curry – delicious, but stinky!

Chicken curry will be served over white rice. The other chicken breast will be for ramen noodles.

There’s usually enough leftover curry for another dinner the next day, but this time, just to be different, I think I’ll reheat the leftover curry and add leftover roast potatoes and make a chicken curry stew, as pictured below from a recipe site – not my pic.

I had a coupon for a free Marie Callender frozen pot pie (beef), so tonight I will be reliving my childhood.

Leftovers from last night:

Boneless, skinless chicken breast (Perdue), dredged in AP flour with garlic, salt, smoked paprika and cayenne. Browned in a skillet with some olive oil, then removed. Deglazed with a Sauv. Blanc, with a touch of fresh squeezed orange juice (most of the orange used later). Added salt, 6-8 dried chiles de arbol, and splash of mirin plus a bit of the leftover dredge for thickening.

Simmered 2/3 of a fresh orange in thin slices in the pan sauce, then all of it poured over the cooked chicken. Served with some cubed butternut squash sauteed in a bit of browned butter and seasoned with salt and honey/ginger balsamic vinegar, and a bit of leftover homemade (by my wife) rosemary-garlic-tomato focaccia.

It should have been an A- to A dinner, but the salt shaker lid came off during seasoning the pan sauce. Still edible, but too salty, dropping it to a B to B+.

I made chicken cacciatore, of course, it was 80 degrees here, and it’s not really the time of year for it anyway. That said, it’s been on my mind. It was delicious.

A nice store-made meat lasagna with ricotta and mozzarella that I froze over a week ago and just pulled out of the freezer. Far better than mass-produced stuff. But to start, pickled herring fillets with onion and sour cream.

We’re going out tonight before seeing a play, and utilizing a gift card to a local Italian place. I will probably have a caesar salad, and then either their gnocchi sorrentina, rigatoni fagioli, or maybe go wild and do their fried calamari as my main. Now that I’m looking at their menu, I’m reminded that their chicken marsala is really excellent, so maybe that, however it is priced pretty ridiculously, so that might just be a dish of theirs I never eat again.

It will be the pasta with poached salmon, cream, dill, a bit of grated Romano, and a bit of ground nutmeg that I was going to make yesterday.

We had bacon swiss burgers and homemade macaroni and cheese. I grilled the burgers, she baked the mac. Washed it down with homemade lemonade. Delicious way to start the weekend!

Chicken breast stuffed with cheese, apples, and cranberries. I was trying to approximate a frozen one I had a few weeks back. Came out very good, but not perfect (yet). I need to put more effort into the breading.

Mmmmm, chicken and waffles tonight.

Tomorrow will be homemade pizzas. One hot Italian sausage and olive, the other pepperoni and mushroom.

Had a big lunch today (turkey sub) and am not really hungry, but there’s the lovely spicy orange-curry chicken breasts in the fridge that I bought yesterday and have a best-by date of tomorrow.

I think I’ll roast them tonight and follow my usual recipe. Roast one breast for half the time, slice, and simmer in Vindaloo curry sauce while the other finishes roasting. This time, put all of the Vindaloo curry away in the fridge, and have a few slices of chicken with ramen noodles and sliced mushrooms for dinner. Tomorrow I’ll make rice and there will be prepared curry and rice for the next few days.

We went out and had kung pao chicken and Szechuan eggplant. Also some pork shumai.