My gf’s brother (my BIL) helps his neighbor who raises Black Angus and is getting up in years. The neighbor’s wife died recently, so BIL has been helping even more than usual. The neighbor gave my BIL a huge amount of beef as a thank you, but the beef was butchered/packed the way neighbor likes it, which is all ground beef. The guy doesn’t like steaks, so they get ground along with whatever normally is ground for ground beef.
Unbeknownst to the neighbor, my BIL has cut his red meat consumption way back for health reasons, so BIL brought us 40 pounds of ground beef in 1.5 pound packages. Last night I made one burger for me, one for my gf, and three for our three dogs. Everyone loves me now.
I snagged a some of the Aldi Red Bag Chicken yesterday and will be making those into, from what I have read, is a reasonable copy of Chik-fil-a. And a big ol’ salad.
Heheeh, you’re very welcome. Sadly, since we’re on the verge of moving, my cooking has mostly devolved into clearing out the freezer in recent days. A lot of frozen pizzas and other frozen dishes. Last night, we indulged in nachos made from deli chips from Albertson’s, and HEB refried beans, which were delicious.
Back on Saturday, we indulged in a snacking dinner of home made soft pretzels where I substituted about 1/5 of the bread flour in my usual recipe with rye. They were tasty, and we scarfed them heavily, but they didn’t brown as nicely as when I used all bread flour. I’m going to have to tune that recipe for that modification, I think.
Last night was Tomato soup from a can and grilled cheese. I fancied them up a bit with potato scallion bread and smoked havarti , and added a generous helping of parsley, oregano and tarragon to the soup.
Tonight is coquilles St.Jaques, crusty bread and green salad. Probably a Miraval Rose and chocolate something for dessert.
About to go harvest the leeks we planted back in April last year for the potato and leek soup we make for superbowl watching. Alas the potatoes and sweet potatoes were killed by some wild rabbits ( we live in suburban Houston ) and we really need to get a dog again but so far that’s a no go.
Anyways potato and leek soup soon and tomorrow will be a couple of ducks on the rotisserie and then crisping them up for crispy duck with ho sin sauce and pancakes .
Tonight probably burgers. I have a griddle on the gas grill so I have been experimenting with cooking burgers on griddle with the onions , then flipping them over to the burner side to get some flame grill searing , then back to the griddle on residual heat with the goats cheese and a melting lid to melt the cheese a bit.
Probably way too much hassle but it does get the centers well cooked, a seared outside and melted cheese without it all running through the grate. Maybe I just like to fiddle with stuff too much.
I changed my mind last night. The sloppy joe thread inspired me to make joes (joe’s?). Or really just one joe. Ground beef, spice mix (dry mustard, cumin, white pepper, paprika), brown sugar, ketchup, worchestershire, a splash of cider vinegar.
So tonight is the Red Bag Chicken sandwich and a big ol’ salad.
Wow, everyone is posting such great meals!! I’m having some leftovers, but very good leftovers, and prepared by somebody other than me, which makes them even better. With some nice Prosecco.
Tomorrow, I’m aiming for grilled cheese, with either whole wheat or sourdough bread and some bleu or gorgonzola cheese. And tomato soup, of course!
Well burgers turned into fajitas after protests from the older kids , although the cooking method was almost the same, marinated flank slab on the grill to sear then over to the griddle with the onions and peppers to cook through , slice n serve.
No goats cheese or aioli
This morning, we were actually planning to have heat n’ eat tamales from Central Market. But, in the middle of our early morning news watching, I blurted out, “I want chicken and waffles.” Now, we’re still in the middle of packing 18 years of stuff for the move, so there was no way we were frying chicken, and we don’t own a waffle iron. We came up with the plan of buying deli fried chicken strips from Central Market and HEB brand frozen buttermilk waffles. My darlin’ bought them and the tamales for later in the week in the morning, and we crisped and toasted the waffles and chicken this evening for dinner.
Yeah, not a healthy suggestion by any means. but my satisfaction has no regrets. The CM chicken was a little soggy in its native form (it was bought so early, I can’t imagine it wasn’t from yesterday), but our air fryer made them crispy and perfect. A few splashes of Tapatío and reasonable helping of what I admitted during dinner to my wife was the first bottle of genuine maple syrup I’ve ever owned, and it was as good as I’ve had in any restaurant. Best deli fried chicken I’ve ever had, and the waffles were again another HEB home run in the frozen food department.
So what did you think of the Red Bag chicken? I heard about it a couple of times a month or two ago and finally bought some several weeks ago. I’ll offer my observations after I hear yours.
Not sure what today’s dinner will bring, but the onion thread had me cooking up some French onion soup on Saturday. It was delicious. I had some leftover pot roast with lots of natural broth/gravy leftover, so I used that broth and water as the liquid base for French onion soup, although I have done versions before with just straight water, and they can be quite good. The older onion soup recipes in French cookbooks used water as the liquid, but the version with the toasted crouton and Gruyere cheese that seems to have originated in Paris in the mid-1800s used beef bouillon.
I like doing the onions over high heat and paying attention to them rather than the hands-off slow cooker or oven method. It cuts the time from a couple of hours to about a half hour for five or so pounds of onions.
For all the fussiness with the crouton and the cheese – and I know people love dipping their spoon into the crock and breaking that browned Gruyere seal – I might just forgo that from now on and serve it with a grilled Swiss or Gruyere cheese sandwich instead. I’ve never tried it before this way, but why not? I guess having the bread in the soup does add to the soup’s body, but if you’re eating it with a sandwich, does it matter? We’ll see next time.
I thought it was ok. I’ll get it again, but it’s not something that would seem to me to inspire the raves it is getting. As I mentioned, I made a sandwich out of it. I much prefer the green bag chicken. Parmesan herb tenders.
I enjoyed it, with some caveats. It’s an easy “I don’t feel like cooking” meal, slap some mayo and pickle on it, put it in your preferred bun, and you’ve got a decent basic chicken sandwich. I didn’t think it really tasted much like Chick-Fil-A. Felt more like in the KFC direction of spicing. I kind of want to deep fry the sucker one of these days. (That said, if I’m deep frying, I might as well make my own.) Oh, and that’s the other thing, it’s fully cooked, but takes 40 minutes in the oven to heat and crisp up. Unfortunately, I don’t have an air fryer or something smaller, so I have to cook it up in the oven. It gets somewhat crispy on the edges, but really needs the fry treatment (whether oil or the “air fry” method) to really crisp it up (I did try the convection setting on my oven, but it didn’t do the trick.)
So on 1-10, I’d put it about 7-ish. Definitely worth having a bag in the freezer just in case. I haven’t tried the green bag chicken, though, so I’ll give that a shot next.
Tonight is sloppy joes w/ aged cheddar, not inspired by the thread, and perhaps some savoury coleslaw that I really like*. Suspect dessert will be satsuma oranges and a piece or two of goat brie. Cold Lake Lager for me and a glass of Syrah for SWMBO.
Today I made this chicken and broccoli Instant Pot meal. Very easy and a bit tastier than I had expected. I would use a little less liquid next time (maybe cut the water by a third to a half), although if you like very saucy American-Chinese style food, it’s fine as-is. The only change I made to the recipe is to use thighs instead of breast, so I upped the cooking time to 9 minutes.
I’ll see how my wife likes it, but I’m pretty sure this will be a keeper. And I only dirty two pots: the Instantpot and the rice pot. (Today it was brown rice, as that’s all we had left. I forgot how much I actually enjoy brown rice, but I only make it using the pasta method, as the regular stove-top method is unreliable for me.)
