So...whats for dinner?

Monica, it speaks to your level of pain that you're celebrating having knee surgery!  Sure hope the surgery is successful and that you get relief.

Nance, what an interesting recipe.  Did you put all that together with uncooked linguine?  Or was it cooked in advance?

Bedo, hope your meal tasted good.  You had enough good ingredients to work with.  Playing an instrument must be very enjoyable and rewarding.  I'll bet you're better than you claim. 

Tonight I'm starting with Easter dinner preparations.  The first stage of home-made baked beans is cooking in the slow cooker:  2 lbs of navy beans, 2 large onions finely chopped, 3 garlic cloves, crushed, 3 smoked ham hocks, s & p, and paprika.  Tomorrow I'll add some other ingredients, including brown sugar, and bake the beans in the oven.  On Sunday I'll warm up the beans in the slow cooker. 

I'm boiling two smoked shoulder hams on Sunday morning and making a mac and cheese with wheat macaroni.  I'm thinking I'll break down and buy some velveeta to add creaminess. 

Tonight dh and I will forage.  We're enjoying being "home alone" after a houseguest for several days.  I may make myself some popcorn. 

It looks like this

sounds good. Looks pretty too. 

Much love to all. 

Nance, interesting dish! Do you suppose when I make one of my repetitive vegetable bean soups that if I add the parmesan rind, I am breaking my dairy elimination?! ;/. At every corner I find this dairy elimination thing soooo frustrating. Deciding if I should pack up a vial of almond milk to bring to the neighborhood coffee tomorrow morning. That feels so absolutely weird!

The banana/date/walnut bread I made w/o milk last night was delicious.....but....it had a whole stick of margarine in it....certainly not good for one's health!! Next time I'll use a recipe that calls for milk and just sub with the almond milk.

Still unclear about Easter dinner menu here...too little pressure with just feeding us and DS2. Will hit the store tomorrow to get inspired....have to, they are closed Easter Sunday!

Nite all......

Jasmine Rice and Chicken Salad

I toast a 1/2 cup of pine nuts in a small skillet with a little bit olive oil.  I basically heat the skillet until the oil is shimmering and then toss in the nuts and keep stirring until they look like toasted bread.  I dump the nuts out on a paper towel and let them set.  I've never been able to do anything else while toasting the pine nuts...even stopping stirring for 10 seconds ends up burning the pine nuts. 

I slowly cook a couple of pounds of boneless, skinless chicken breasts in a dutch oven.  I used to poach the chicken, but the dutch oven seems to do a good job as well and the dutch oven is easier to clean.  After the chicken is cooked, it gets shredded...I aim for a quart of shredded chicken.  For what it's worth, I've tried using chicken thighs, but I don't like the taste as much as I do with the chicken breasts.

I finely chop two large onions and saute them, in a pot with a couple of
tablespoons of olive oil and a teaspoon of sugar, until they are soft.
I constantly stir this so it doesn't get scorched.

Once the onions are soft, I add 1-1/2 cups of chicken broth, 1-1/2 cups of water, and 2 cups of Jasmine rice.  The instructions on the rice bag...bring to boil and simmer covered until some...work for me...so far this has always taken about 20 minutes.

I put a 1/2 cup of olive oil, a 1/2 cup of rice vinegar and a teaspoon or so of salt in a large bowl and stir until the salt is dissolved..  I then add the rice, shredded chicken and toasted pine nuts and mix it all together with the oil and vinegar.  I then stir in some grapes and *finely* chopped cilantro.  When there are grapes on the vine outside, I use them, otherwise I use whatever (red or green) is cheapest.

The day after I made the chicken rice salad, I got a phone call while I was on the way home.

"Dad, are you going to cook tonight?"

"No.  The plan was to eat the left over rice and chicken salad."

"I ate it all."

"There was a couple of pounds left."

"I had some at lunch too."

"There's a couple of pounds of pork.

"I ate that too."

"The meatloaf?"

"It's gone and I ate the hot dogs too.  There were only 5 left."

"!???!!!!?????"  :-)

"I'm too tired to cook and mom says she's that way too."

"Dad,  P l e a s e ! ! ! !    I'm starved." 

Since DD started swim practice again, she eats a ton of food.  

Sorry Carole....I remembered the request, I just couldn't find or remember the who part.

I left the turkey bones simmering all through the night.  I've strained out the "chunks" and now I'm letting it cool so I can skim off the fat..and later today I'll get the canner out.   I have almost a gallon of stock, so it will make up quite a few pint jars.  

Today my mom is 96.  She likes to watch and help where she can, so I'll probably take the stock, canner and a portable stove to her place and do it there while I work around her house. The canner has the jiggle weight so I can just listen while I do other stuff.  We'll have her over tomorrow for dinner.

Eric

Grilled brats, oven frIes and a salad with feta dressing for dinner. 

It's beautiful here for the next several days, highs in the 70s, lows in the 50s. I'm afraid to hope that this might truly be spring. The birds sure seem to think so!

We're having the bean stuffed bell peppers finally. I cooked the "rice beans" forever last night. They had been in the pantry forever so no doubt extremely dry. The recipe called for 1 c dry beans to stuff 8 med to large tomatoes (DH won't eat tomatoes like that so peppers is the alternate). No way is that going to stretch for even the 6 peppers I have even with onions added to it. So I will cook some Rose brown rice to add to it. I have 1 large bag and a portion of another. I stock up when I go to a little health food store north of us - only bad thing is when I get there means my car has gone into the Chevy dealer shop there - boohoo.

So last night ended up spaghetti/sauce since the beans were still softening/softening. I have never made real sauce, just bottled Ragu/Classico/Prego. Seems the Ragus I liked I can't find. Had a Prego that sounded good but very bland. There's a Classico in pantry with basil. I don't have good luck with herbs except mint or I would grow my own. Overwintered a pot that is slowly coming back. Have east facing back porch with plenty of sun on southern edge. I did buy sage seeds yesterday. Not sure what that urge came from. My lilliput zinnias in a pot are sprouting. Haven't checked the fruit trees but the tender vege. on shrubs did get frosted last week. Looks like it also got some flowering weeds, not a bad thing.

I have a ham steak and new potatoes for tomorrow with sugar snap peas. Just DH and me. Our grocery closed also.

Eric - I noticed one grocery with turkeys on sale. Is it getting a little warm there to cook something that long? I think the end of next week predicting near 90 here.

LMG, the classic is what I use. I like it the best. It's 40 here today. Every now and then we get a day of 60 and everyone is outside with no coats! LOL

Nance that sounds good!  I think Spring is around the corner but I think she's walking backwards for a bit. LOL

Eric I sometimes just get a turkey breast and drumsticks and don't bother with the whole bird. Oh, and when daughters were spending 20 or more hours a week in dance teaching and practicing,  they ate very well too. 

Carole that brown jasmine rice sounds interesting. I like brown rice. Hmmmm

Lacey, hope inspiration struck! LOL

Bedo hope the soup you made was great!

Minus, I didn't know Coldwater Creek was closing. I loved the styles but there wasn't a store anywhere close and I shop sparingly on the internet. 

Much love and either Have a good Passover or New Moon or Easter! 

I used to like Barilla when I use bottled sauce. I try to keep a jar on hand for pasta emergencies lol. I find that I have to spice it up quite a bit to suit me. Since I got the giant cans of San Marzano tomatoes at Costco, I've had lots of sauce on hand. It's so easy to make and tastes so much better, I may never be able to be satisfied with the already made stuff. Not  judging though, I've used plenty of it in my time, especially when I was working.

I was plenty busy today planting some herbs and cleaning up around the house. I even managed to watch a ballgame some. I got all the fixings together for tomorrow's brisket with onions that I'll start in the slow cooker before church. Tomorrow I'll make deviled eggs, scalloped potatoes and asparagus for our dinner.  Just the two of us, so there will be lots of brisket leftover. That's a good thing. I've been wanting beef potpies, which I'll probably do via the handpie thing.

Happy holidays to everyone and don't eat the heads off too many chocolate bunnies.

Bedo, when I hike rim to rim, and back, of the Grand Canyon, I eat beef jerky and dried banana chips...and drink tons of half strength Gatorade.

Full strength Gatorade for that long seems to be a bit "harsh" on my stomach...but 1/2 strength, plus the other stuff, works well.  No hypothermia nor "stomach bouncing".

HOPPY SPRING!

Happy Birthday to your mom, Eric! 

Your stuffed peppers sound good, LMG.  I've done a similar stuffing with the brown rice and beans, but black beans, and seasoning.  Your dh has a point.  LOL.  Some ground beef or Italian sausage is pretty good in that stuffing. 

Today was a beautiful day.  Just about perfect as far as the weather was concerned.  We had 12 assorted family members at my mother's house for noon dinner.  Enough carbs for the rest of the year along with ham.  I have a ham bone in the freezer, too, Eric! 

Tomorrow's dinner will include asparagus.  I have 2 lbs in the veggie drawer.  I keep seeing it on sale and buy more! 

Nance, hope that Spring has arrived in your neighborhood.  We'll be in the 80's this next week.

Hi to Carrie and Debbie and Deb and Chabba and other folks who haven't checked in lately. 

Dinner was roasted - big chunks of chicken breast, fingerling potatoes, carrots & onions tossed in olive oil, white wine & spices.  I tripled the carrots this time but can't ever seem to get enough - so left over chicken & potatoes only.  It was 84 today & I'm trying to delay turning on the A/C so this may be my last oven dinner for awhile.  

Eric - I agree about the thirst after ham.  I had a can of "Senate Bean Soup" the other day that someone gave me from the US Capitol.  It was over 1000 mg of sodium and boy was I swollen the next day.

Senate Bean Soup.  I wonder if that is the source of the senators' hot air.