What did you cook today?

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salemj
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by salemj »

ronnie_suburban wrote: Thu Jun 25, 2020 8:38 pm
Charcoal-Grilled Chicken Thigh, Jalapeno-Cheddar Sausage (of unknown origin) and Smash & Fry Fingerling Potatoes (6 minutes in the Instant Pot, then fried in peanut oil). I wasn't planning on cooking any sausage but the fire on the Weber kettle was so perfect, I just had to put something else on after the chicken came off. I found these -- vacuum-sealed and unmarked -- in the back of the fridge and grilled them up. Unfortunately they were pretty weak but the rest of the meal was top-notch.
That is one hell of a chicken Thigh. That thing looks like it was prepared for a food stylist and not to actually eat. Well done!
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

salemj wrote: Thu Jun 25, 2020 9:14 pm
ronnie_suburban wrote: Thu Jun 25, 2020 8:38 pm
Charcoal-Grilled Chicken Thigh, Jalapeno-Cheddar Sausage (of unknown origin) and Smash & Fry Fingerling Potatoes (6 minutes in the Instant Pot, then fried in peanut oil). I wasn't planning on cooking any sausage but the fire on the Weber kettle was so perfect, I just had to put something else on after the chicken came off. I found these -- vacuum-sealed and unmarked -- in the back of the fridge and grilled them up. Unfortunately they were pretty weak but the rest of the meal was top-notch.
That is one hell of a chicken Thigh. That thing looks like it was prepared for a food stylist and not to actually eat. Well done!
Thank you, for the kind comment. Our west-facing kitchen table gets great light at dinner time (filtered by heavy foliage) and my Galaxy S10 has a fine on-board camera. Camera-wise, it's no Pixel but at least the rest of its features actually work. ;)

The chicken turned out really well and had a super crispy skin. I just seasoned it up with one of my rubs and cooked it, covered, on the indirect side of a 2-stage fire (lump charcoal) for about 25 minutes. Easy-breezy. Was able to come inside and fry both batches of potatoes while it cooked.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by Jeff B »

Looks great Ronnie, as usual! I grilled some thighs tonight too but I'm too much of a scatterbrain to ever remember to photograph my food. Probably a latent insecurity that I'm unwilling to face. :P
If God wanted me to be a vegetarian he wouldn't have made animals taste so good.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by timos »

still messing around with the serious eats deep dish recipe.
its been alot of fun making random pizzas with whatever i have on hand.
this one had alot going on.
sliced and sauted portobellas, buffalo chicken sausage
diced bell pepper, pickled red onion
generic tomato sauce with some crushed red pepper flakes and dried oregano from the garden
and your run of the mill low moisture whole milk mozz

the dough also store bought, its not bad at all but ended up being a tad dry.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by cedarhouse »

Ronnie you're killing it. We need to rename this thread after you.

I'm kicking myself, this is one of my favorite places to contribute and I shit you not, I have planned to take a picture of dinner every night for the last five nights and I forget every time!
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

cedarhouse wrote: Fri Jun 26, 2020 10:17 pm Ronnie you're killing it. We need to rename this thread after you.

I'm kicking myself, this is one of my favorite places to contribute and I shit you not, I have planned to take a picture of dinner every night for the last five nights and I forget every time!
I hope you start remembering because I love seeing what everyone is cooking and it's a great source for ideas.

One thing I cook about every 10 days or so is a pot of beans. Please note, these are not unctuous! :lol: Nor are they particularly photogenic. But between my farmer hook-ups and my Rancho Gordo Bean Club membership, I always have something good on-hand. And one thing I like to do with the beans is have them for breakfast. This morning I finished up my most recent pot, some Azufrados from Rancho Gordo . . .

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Azufrado Beans & Eggs
Over-easy, garnished with chives and cotija. A delicious, filling and hearty breakfast.
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Altadan
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by Altadan »

Wow, I don't think I ever had beans for breakfast 🤔 except perhaps back in Dallas, in a taco, possibly.
Looks scrumptious 😋

On a different note, over this weekend I got to eat two bottom round roasts, one I made (see photos) and the other (this evening) by a friend who owns a proper smoker. Needless to say that if you've ever smoked a bottom round, then you'll be able to guess at least or two of the mistakes I made with mine.
That being said, iswas more than edible, and the Keto friends that came over were very generous with their compliments.

I think I made two main mistakes; first I seared the outside (not bad in itself), and then I threw it into an overly hot oven 450F/230C for a few minutes before lowering down to 170F/70C and preparing for a few hours' worth of slow cooking. Heating the oven that much was redundant after the pan searthe other mistake was to use the convection program...
In short, it was just short of dry, and just short of chewy, but the rub of garlic, herbs, s&p and evoo made it good enough for lunch.

Now, are you feeling inspired Ronnie? 😎
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by salemj »

My recent meals have not been photo-worthy, but I'll mention them in case they inspire. First, I made a batch of some Indian food because I found a hunk of lamb on sale. I made some Rogan Josh, some orange lentils, and some potato and chickpea curry. I tend to always make three or four Indian dishes at a time, which means leftovers for days even when I make smaller amounts. This is usually photo-worthy if I also make rice or naan and have a garnish, but I didn't do any of that this time.

I was far more excited to buy my first avocado in months. Like many of you, I have been asked to not be choosy at the grocery, and I am just not comfortable picking an avocado without a gentle squeeze. Well, I finally just decided to pick one I new would not be over-ripe and just live with a couple days if necessary. It resulted in some chopped salad with cucumber, grape tomato medley, and some baked chicken, all with a balsamic dressing. This kind of food fits the category of "grub" in my house: mixed in a stainless bowl and not pretty, but delicious, nutritious, and worthy of a repeat. It has the bonus of going really, really well with bread and butter. :) Anyways, thank goodness for avocado...O how I've missed you!
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

Altadan wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 2:54 pm Now, are you feeling inspired Ronnie? 😎
LOL - as a matter of fact, I am. I love the idea of doing a low & slow roast on my Weber kettle and may give it a whirl next week. I've never smoked a bottom round roast or think I've ever knowingly had a smoked one. Brisket, yes. Clod, yes. Whole Strip Loin, yes but never a bottom round. How did that turn out?
salemj wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 6:16 pm My recent meals have not been photo-worthy, but I'll mention them in case they inspire. First, I made a batch of some Indian food because I found a hunk of lamb on sale. I made some Rogan Josh, some orange lentils, and some potato and chickpea curry. I tend to always make three or four Indian dishes at a time, which means leftovers for days even when I make smaller amounts. This is usually photo-worthy if I also make rice or naan and have a garnish, but I didn't do any of that this time.
I definitely don't make enough Indian food. I have some great spices that a biz-friend in India brought to me. I really should put them to good use. I may hit you up via PM for some recipes, if that's okay.
salemj wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 6:16 pm Anyways, thank goodness for avocado...O how I've missed you!
Totally understood. We've been fortunate to have had pretty much uninterrupted access to most ingredients. There have been a few gaps but for the most part, it's been steady. There were a few weeks there when I could not get bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs, which we make a lot. Now that they're steadily available again, I've again been making the regularly. What used to be a weeknight default is now something to look forward to. I doubt I'll ever take them for granted again.

Seeing your shrimp earlier in the week reminded me that I had some in the freezer. But after thawing them, they weren't as wonderful as I'd hoped, so I decided the best course of action was to make shrimp balls out of them and serve them in miso soup. Started by making my own dashi. Parlayed that into miso soup. Made the shrimp balls using an amalgamation of information I gleaned from a few youtube videos and some common sense. Overall, not bad considering the number of first attempts the meal included . . .

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Shrimp Ball Miso Soup, Bowl #1
Garnished with homemade chili oil, scallions, chives, napa cabbage and minced up toasted nori

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Shrimp Ball Miso Soup, Bowl #2
Yeah, I had 2 bowls. So what?! :P

Oh and one gratuitous prep shot . . .

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Minced Shrimp & Large Takeda Stainless-Clad Deba
The shrimp were still partially frozen and the recipe called for this portion of them to be as cold as possible, so the deba seemed to make sense.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

I'm not a huge fan of waffles or sweet breakfasts in general. As it turns out, neither is my family but I'd been in the mood to make waffles for a while and today was the day I finally got it out of my system. And it's nice to know our waffle iron still works after being idle for at least 15 years . . .

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Buttermilk Waffles
Recipe from the Joy Of Cooking (© 1975). The highlight here was the Brick Chapel NY State maple syrup, which was given to me by friend. The three of us shared this plate 'hot off the iron' and enjoyed the rest of the batch after dinner, for dessert.

After the waffles, I made a breakfast that was more up my alley . . .

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Leftover Hot Dog & Cheese Omelet w/Buttercrust White Toast
This was going to be a scramble but I left it unattended in the pan for too long while I fussed with the toast, so I decided to omeletize it instead. Not pretty but really hit the spot.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by Bob Z »

Ronnie; try adding some carnation malted milk powder to them. Made a big difference for us.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

Bob Z wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 5:26 am Ronnie; try adding some carnation malted milk powder to them. Made a big difference for us.
Great suggestion, Bob. Do you just add it in or do you dial something else back? At this point, I'm thinking any near-term waffle exploration for me is going to be on the savory side.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by Jeff B »

Thought I'd pop in and see what was new in the "Ronnie Cooked Again" thread. Looks delish Ronnie, even the "omeletize it." :D
If God wanted me to be a vegetarian he wouldn't have made animals taste so good.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

Question: Are fresh fava beans worth the effort?
Answer: Absolutely not! :lol:

Even if it had gone the other way, they are a ton of work. I spent well more than an hour -- probably closer to two -- getting these shelled and peeled. Not saying it wasn't relaxing in a Zen-like kind of way but I also know I wouldn't want to do it on a regular basis . . .

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Fava Beans
Still in their pods, this was approximately four pounds. The first pound, I received in my CSA box. The rest, in a moment of temporary insanity, I purchased as an add-on.

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Unpodded Favas
To say that I was halfway home with the favas out of their pods would be a gross overstatement. One task down, ~80% of the work still to come. :evil:

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Ready For Shelling
My 120mm Konosuke HD2 Petty was effectively powerless against the favas. :o :( Actually, the the tip of knife worked well versus the leathery fava skins but it was an incredibly inefficient approach slitting the sides of the beans one at a time. In the end, this task required a couple of thumbnails and a whole lot of patience. I considered using the 'blanch & pinch' method but since I wasn't sure how I was going to cook them, I decided that might lead to too much moisture. In other words, I overthought it.

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Shelled & Peeled Favas
I really do think it took about two hours of work to get them to this stage. Four pounds of whole favas yielded 13.8 ounces of usable bean meat (~21.5% yield). I still wasn't sure at this point what I was going to do with them. I ended up using half of my hard-earned trove in a simple cook . . .

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Saute
A 50/50 mix of butter and bacon fat, and some crushed garlic

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Simmer
I added probably about 2 tablespoons of homemade mixed meat stock. Just enough to soften the beans slightly and impart some flavor without leaving too much residual moisture behind. I added some salt and pepper, too.

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Prepping The Garnish

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Plated Up
Garnished with chives

They made their way into our dinner and they fit just perfectly with a bunch of other meh items . . .

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Dinner
Fava beans with pan-seared, boneless, skinless chicken thighs (I'd planned to use these more imaginatively but they got to the 'freeze or use' point before I had time for that), sauteed creminis, a piece of buttered toast from a Hewn Bakery (Evanston, IL) boule, the still-never-ending purple cabbage and some leftover morels.

The favas pretty much tasted like English peas, maybe not even that good. They were more bitter than I remembered them, too. And even though I think I got the cooking just about perfect, they did nothing notable in the texture department, either. At least peas provide little textural pop. In the end, it really wasn't worth the effort. I'll probably try to use the rest of them in a batch of quinoa or other multi-ingredient assembly. I do think I got something out the exercise but the reward was in the doing, not so much in the result.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by Altadan »

What a great post.
I can totally see my mother, in the days before these things were sold pre-shelled, sitting there with her little Chicago Cutlery parer, opening these things up for hours, just to end up adding the to a couscous where their presence is sorta forgettable (though the ensuing gas is not!).

Freeze-or-use really can be a fork between a totally meh dinner or a super experimental one (which might still turn out meh!).
Thanks for the write up and photos
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

Altadan wrote: Tue Jun 30, 2020 1:51 am What a great post.
I can totally see my mother, in the days before these things were sold pre-shelled, sitting there with her little Chicago Cutlery parer, opening these things up for hours, just to end up adding the to a couscous where their presence is sorta forgettable (though the ensuing gas is not!).

Freeze-or-use really can be a fork between a totally meh dinner or a super experimental one (which might still turn out meh!).
Thanks for the write up and photos
Thanks, for the kind comments. The story of your mom's couscous sounds a lot more interesting than anything I could ever post.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

Took another swing at the remaining slab of A-5 tonight, with much better results. Started out with prepping for the quinoa . . .

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Knob Onions
From Three Sisters Garden in Kankakee, IL. This farm is owned and operated by Tracey Vowell who was the managing chef at Frontera Grill before leaving the industry to become a farmer.

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Knob Onions & Kono SKD Tsuchime, 210mm
I've been enjoying this knife a lot lately. The profile is an excellent match for my natural motion. I love its weight, and it's beautiful, too.

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Sauteed
First the whites, then the greens.

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A-5 Miyazaki Wagyu
The end of strip loin I split with my friends a couple weeks back. The vacuum sealer did its job and I did mine, managing to get the beef properly butchered for efficient cooking.

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Sear, Side One
Just salt on the beef. I didn't expect it to stick but I swabbed the hot pan with a chunk of trimmed fat before I cooked the meat, just in case.

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Sear, Side Two
Probably about 1 minute per side.

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Ready To Serve
I didn't want to hold it long but it needed to rest for a moment and I did have one other component I wanted to add . . .

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Spanish Onion
I couldn't possibly waste that delicious rendered fat, so I sliced up an onion and cooked it hot and fast while the beef rested.

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Sauteed Spanish Onion
Absolutely worth the 3 minutes it took from start to finish.

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Plated Up
With quinoa (knob onions, leftover sauteed creminis & the notorious fava beans), the finally-finished purple cabbage (yay!) and the sauteed Spanish onion.

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Interior Shot
Happy that I managed Round 2 much better than Round 1. Btw, those Daovua leaf spring steak knives are a ton of fun. :D
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by Bob Z »

ronnie_suburban wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 9:41 am
Bob Z wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 5:26 am Ronnie; try adding some carnation malted milk powder to them. Made a big difference for us.
Great suggestion, Bob. Do you just add it in or do you dial something else back? At this point, I'm thinking any near-term waffle exploration for me is going to be on the savory side.
Malted waffles are most popular at many establishments including Disney, and its just a matter of adding a few tbsp to your batter. Here is what they are copying:
https://www.amazon.com/Carbons-Golden-M ... B00T6YT6D8
Here is a link to a recipe:
https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/24059 ... d-waffles/
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by ronnie_suburban »

Bob Z wrote: Wed Jul 01, 2020 5:51 pm
ronnie_suburban wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 9:41 am
Bob Z wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 5:26 am Ronnie; try adding some carnation malted milk powder to them. Made a big difference for us.
Great suggestion, Bob. Do you just add it in or do you dial something else back? At this point, I'm thinking any near-term waffle exploration for me is going to be on the savory side.
Malted waffles are most popular at many establishments including Disney, and its just a matter of adding a few tbsp to your batter. Here is what they are copying:
https://www.amazon.com/Carbons-Golden-M ... B00T6YT6D8
Here is a link to a recipe:
https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/24059 ... d-waffles/
Thanks, Bob. I'm scheduled to receive some malted milk powder in my next grocery delivery (presuming it's in stock). Gonna give this a whirl.

With apologies to all the fried rice purists, it was clean-out-the-fridge Fried "Riced" Cauliflower over here once again tonight . . .

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Mise En Place
Well, most of it, anyway. In addition to the self-explanatory items, there are some leftover sauteed creminis and a cut-up leftover sausage I grilled the other night. I love these shelled peas because they're nice and firm, and remain perfectly taut even after they're cooked.

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Not-So-Secret Ingredient
One of my favorite pantry items: homemade chili oil using my friend Gary Wiviott's recipe. I used 2 of those ladles in the batch (2 pounds riced cauliflower) and it packed quite a punch. And yes, that is a half-gallon Ball jar. I made a big batch! :D

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Spam
The featured ingredient and my Shibata Kashima R-2 Gyuto (210mm) . . . probably a bit of overkill for the Spam ;). It did a very nice job on the carrots and scallions, though.

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Plated Up
A comforting crowd-pleaser. Not that he's picky but my son ate 3+ helpings.

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Salad
Greens and tomatoes from our Nichols Farm CSA box. I can't believe I'm saying this (again) but these greenhouse tomatoes from Nichols are really good. I've actually been enjoying them, not just tolerating them. Getting a decent tomato around here in June or July is typically not possible.
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Re: What did you cook today?

Post by Jeff B »

Clean-out-the-fridge Fried Rice, a favorite around here!
If God wanted me to be a vegetarian he wouldn't have made animals taste so good.
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