Pre-sundown: veg “dry soup“ (broth in the bottom but not a big bowl of water) and pumpkin lasagna. You can tell I wasn't feeling great the day I made the soup. It's a bit wiily-nilly. Fine but not quite as delicious as usual.

Wow, things are moving fast here, and there's a lot of good food happening.

John, have fun at the ski cabin, I'm sure your dinner was delicious in spite of those potatoes. Just tell everyone they are "crisp tender", that'll take care of it, LOL.

Neely, the only way I'll eat okra is in gumbo, I just can't get past the slime otherwise. I do like gumbo though, and yours looks good.

Floral, nice pie and I very much like rutabaga, which is what I think you call swede.

Plllog, I hope you are feeling better. I had some kind of 24 hour bug but I'm fine now. I indulged in my "sick" food, the salty fake chicken noodle soup from the box, not even the can, and some ginger ale.

After that I brined a turkey breast which we had with baked sweet potatoes and a Waldorf salad.

Tonight I made the internet famous "Marry Me Chicken". It was OK, but certainly nothing exceptional. I probably wouldn't bother with making it again. We had pea and peanut salad and some home canned pink half runner beans as sides.

I'll be off at a local waterpark next week Tuesday and Wednesday with Madi and Maci, it's their spring break, so Elery will be on his own. I'm betting he doesn't cook a thing, although he can cook pretty well. It's just not as much fun cooking for yourself, I know. Fortunately there's a frozen pizza in the the freezer as well as cabbage rolls and some chili, and town is only 7 miles away if he wants fast food.

Annie

Thanks, Annie! Yes, thank-you, I'm better. The main symptom was sleepiness. I kind of just survived making the soup, and it shows. But it's still okay. I don't have a current favorite sick food, but two things in the past were the minestrone from a family friend's bistro and TJ's tots. The bistro is gone now, since the friend's passing. I've never been able to replicate the minestrone. One key is too much salt, but past that I just can't figure out what's missing.

Floral, your composed dishes always look menu worthy.

Neely, your scotch egg plate has to be the prettiest, most appetizing looking plating of a scotch egg ever!

John, I admire your ideas for unplanned cooking. Chicken Marbella is a undertaking for us plebes. Or, maybe it feels that way because my recipe is for four chickens? Road food without limits, for sure!

Monday night. Falafel, spinach, carrot and yoghurt salad.

The salad is a Turkish dish of sauteed grated carrot and garlic mixed with yoghurt and a little lemon juice. It's very easy and very delicious

I may not be able to whip up Chicken Marbella on a whim, but Awesome Chicken is dead easy. Only I've been reducing my fridge and there wasn't much to add to the onions and carrots. The sun chokes, natch, needed using and all that, but nothing green except boxed baby spinach and arugula. But too much Italian parsley and celery, so I added some of both. If too weird, I'll discard, but no harm, right? This is just cooking to have it cooked. Meals to be decided later...

Picture is just before going in the oven.

ETA: The parsley didn't even add flavor. The celery is really good, very chickeny, but would have been a lot better is strung…though that probably wouldn't have been adequate. Inside the curl, it's a texture like a slightly overcooked artichoke, on an outer bed of tough and strings. But very tasty. The sunchokes are a revelation. I've never had any so big! Like small potato size. I'm used to walnut size. They just tast like roasted sunchokes….until you let them dive cut side down into the chicken juice. Seasoned chickeny sunchokes are really good! These “heirloom” chickens cook differently than same size regular chickens from the same grower. I'm still adjusting to them. Still, pert near Awesome. ;)

Tuesday night. Tagliatelle with spinach, smoked salmon and crème fraîche.

::snicker:: Floral, as it scrolled by kind of fast, my eyes picked up enough to get "tailgate". The pasta looks good, but do you have "tailgating" there? The tailgate is the drop down end of a pickup truck and some station wagons, off of which people have picnic parties, often including barbecues, in the parking area of a large sports venue before the game.

No, tailgating is not a thing here. First time I saw the expression I had to look it up.

“Tailgating with spinach, smoked salmon and crème fraîche.” Hmm, must be at Stanford or an Ivy!

LOL! JL, you'd be surprised. ;)

Thanks Annie, all has settled down now thankgoodness.

No meat dinner with the ubiquitous ratatouille ( so many eggplants, zucchini and peppers around ) orzo and leek and a small corn.

Tailgaiting in Australia means driving too close to the person in front: driving on their tail. Some insane drivers tailgate trucks by driving very close to get a boost from their slipstream… definitely illegal. And Yes also the the let down rear of a ute ( utility vehicle…pickup truck )

That's (the too close) the original use of ”tailgate” as a verb here, too, but I don't think there was ever a scientific purpose to it, just impatient people being annoying, and dangerous, and thinking the car in front will speed up if they ride it's tail. I think the party kind of ”tailgating” is more popular where large groups of people meet up at the venue, coming from all over. Sometimes, there will even be a pitmaster or other cook or host, who watches the game on a portable device, and stays in the parking area, tending the food and guarding the party set-up. The game, itself, for many, is just an excuse, and a site, for getting together. It's a bigger deal in the vast parts of the country, where people may live spread far from the anchoring venue, with no competing local team, and plentiful, inexpensive parking where it's easier to grab a block of spaces.

We also use the Australian version of tailgating.

Wednesday. Cabbage rolls. Stuffed with brown rice, red lentils, roast peppers, black garlic, onion, tomato.

Thursday. No dinner cooking tonight. We had a pub lunch. Fish and chips and a pint.

Meals this week have included chicken, vegetables, salads, vegetable soup, burgers from the joint with a real char grill, eggs, vegetables, radish/snap pea bread, beans, cheese, fruit, and vegetables. All was good, none unusual. Nothing moved me after the chicken to take a picture, so here is a picture of the gigantor beets that just arrived from the farm. At least as big as softballs, though I think bigger. The greens are very crisp and fresh. By definition, a bunch is three. Whooee! They're too big for my scale...

I love beets and their blood pressure lowering effect. One thing I’ve never verified is whether yellow beets have the same nitrate content as red beets.

I see a portion of Harvard beets, a dish of beetroot hummus, a pan of Bortsch and perhaps a beetroot tarte tatin. And some sweated greens.

First evening of 2025 warm enough for a garden dinner.

Pork sausage and lentils.

Goodness I wrote a whole post and either forgot to submit or it disappeared. So again.

I really like beetroot but somehow forget to buy it a lot.

I also like cabbage rolls and lovely to see your dinner in the garden floral.

Our dinner was my easy satay sauce in which I marinated chicken fillet strips for several hours then grilled/ broiled them quickly. Served with broccolini and rice ( still in the bowl )

Can you give your easy satay sauce, Neely? I'm a big fan of easy anything.

Happy to floral and “metoo” for easy.

Neely’s easy Satay sauce

In a small saucepan mix together

peanut butter depending how much you want say I tablespoon

soy sauce say one tablespoon

Cayenne pepper or what heat source you like and how much you like, I added scant sprinkle.

fish sauce - splash equals about one teaspoon

brown sugar about one teaspoon

ground coriander about one

teaspoon

Stir this till all comes together on medium heat. It will thicken as it gets to boiling point. Turn off the heat just before it comes to the boil let it cool a bit and Taste …. stir in fresh lime juice or vinegar or lemon juice about teaspoon. Taste.

You can serve it warm or cold or as I did as a marinade for grilling either in the oven or outside on a BBQ. You can adjust heat and sweetness how you like it also add more peanut butter for thicker sauce.

Floral, I looked up Harvard Beets. I do ike vinegared beets, but that's a lot of sugar! I do commend you for making lentils look appetizing!

Neely, I know what you mean about forgetting the beets. Out of sight out of mind, right?

My inner cheerleader keeps demanding borscht but I don't actually like it my grandmother's (authentic) way. I'm wondering about something spiced with no sour cream or lumps?

First meal, one of the minions brought jalapeño pupusas with curtido. Yum! Tonight was impromptu with Mr. Picky, for whom I only cook on his birthday, so we ordered in. I had a singularly flavorless patty melt. The onions were practically non-existent, there was a bit of beefy flavor, though no sear type taste, but mosly salt flavor—not oversalty, just under all else, One dry corner there was a rye bread flavor, but it was pushed down where the filling was. The bread couldn't hold its own next to the blandness. Such a sad thing to do to a noble sandwich!

I did make a nice loaf while all that was going on. The pre-f was plain flour plus some whole wheat starter, and the last 8g ww in the jar went in the main dough with pizza flour. The hydration was five tiny mandarins, plus some water and the end of the opened beer. I also stirred in several chipped tortillas, a third of a giant red Anaheim chile, and some epazote. It got very wet so I added more flour. In the end, it was still very slack, but rose and baked well. I'm trying to wait until morning to cut it. Still loving the mix and bake bowl. ;)

Good bread. Nice texture. Could have used more salt and a lot more epazote. ;)

I don't follow a recipe for Harvard beets. I looked a couple up and they seem to have far more sugar than I use. I probably shouldn't call it by that name to be authentic. I boil the whole beets until tender, slip off the skins and dice. Then I make a butter or oil roux with a little flour, add the diced beets and some water. When it's thickened I add a little vinegar and a couple of teaspoons of brown sugar to taste. Since I rarely eat desserts, cakes, sweets or biscuits, don't drink sodas and don't sweeten tea or coffee, I feel I can permit myself a little sugar in a savoury dish.

Another mild evening. Sauteed monkfish, sauteed potatoes and steamed purple sprouting. Caper mayo yoghurt sauce.

So delicious floral and love seeing glimpses of your garden… pots are delightful.

We had slow cooked short ribs , mashed potatoes and Brussel sprouts. It wasn’t a big piece of beef and I first rubbed it with a sauce which I concocted myself and wrapped it in foil to sort of marinate for a couple of hours. Placed in oven 160’C for 3 hours, then opened foil , splashed on more sauce and cooked for another hour. It was fall off the bone tender.

This morning I had left over mashed potato and brussel sprouts cooked up as ”bubble and squeak” with a poached egg on top.

Ooohh. Bubble and squeak and poached egg. Perfect combo. I'm impressed with your shapely eggs. Neatly done. Mine are a bit hit and miss.

Thanks floral … I do the swirl the water in a saucepan and drop the egg into the vortex technique lol!

That's what I do. But my eggs often come out a bit more free form than yours. 😉

Dinner posted here:

https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/6489211/what-spring-foods-are-you-eager-to-eat#n=45

dcarch

Sunday, so it must be a meat night.

Rack of lamb, haricot beans, purple sprouting, spinach, roast butternut and potatoes. Outdoors again! We're having a remarkable spell of weather for April.

Monday. Penne with sardine putanesca.

Tuesday: we had the goose eggs with roast veggies. That's an 11 inch dinner plate.

I am actually quite squeamish about goose eggs and duck eggs … totally irrational but there it is.

Dinner one night was a beef ragu with papperdelle. Another night was beef hamburgers but no photo.

Floral and neely, you are eating with your eyes! Lovely meals.

DD found my collection of Cooks Illustrated magazines and decided to make a Peruvian roast chicken with the standing roaster. Here it is, looking like a horror photo from a war zone. It was spicy and tasty, the best chicken I’ve had in a long time.

Not come across a standing roaster before. Interesting.

Wednesday night. Kidney bean patties, coriander and avocado sauce and kale.

It is a bougey version of a beer can. Google "beer can chicken".

You say bougey I say bougie, tomato tomarto lets call the whole thing off.

Dinner was our usual one lamb chop ( trying not to over eat meat) , salad and nuked potato…. mint jelly and a very small avocado

Another week night dinner was sausages with chilli jam (bought and very nice) fries with ketchup beans.

No picture of last night. Just cheese and spring onion omelettes with allotment kale.

Friday. Pre concert pizza.

I do not often photograph my meals anymore, but I did get inspired last night for the shrimp fried rice that I made:

I cooked it in a large flat-bottomed non-stick wok that I had bought for a previous kitchen reno, and I decided that I do like to use it for stir-fries, as food stays in the pan. I have a wok ring that came with my new cooktop that I could use with my round bottom wok, but I haven't unpacked that yet. In fact, I still have a lot of unpacking to do in this kitchen, and a lot of boxes are still at the other house, waiting to be sorted or moved.

I keep shrimp in the freezer, now that I have found cheap sources for frozen shrimp here, and so I have to use it fairly frequently. The leftover rice that I used for this had been cooked with sausage, but I removed most of the sausage for this recipe and added red bell pepper, green onions, and egg. I forgot to add ginger and garlic, but I decided that I like it this way anyway. I did start with sautéing some white onion, and I added some ripe (red) jalapeños from my patio. They are fairly small, and so I used two, and it still was not too spicy.

Saturday

Penne with chard, peas, salmon, and crème fraîche.

rice, collards, red beans at the table

I want one of these...a saucier pan on steriods. 30 second link in action...FILE

Very nice to see your prawn fried rice Lars, and I do like when you say that you like to use your wok because ’food stays in the pan’.

Snap on the penne floral only I made a ground pork sauce. If I use rigatoni pasta, I call this dish rigatoni saltati, so I guess I could call it penne saltati.

I used to think ’saltati‘ referred to the pork but I have looked it up online and ’saltati can mean ‘ sautéed ‘ or ‘jumped’.in Italian. So I guess after all this time, I was wrong about it meaning something to do with pork. I guess it‘s because I do make this sauce in a pan rather than a pot hence sauteed.

ETA Sleeve posted while I was typing…good soup.

Oh man, this went fast, and so much good food. It's been busy here, normal springtime stuff like planting and fixing winter fence damage. Still, we've been eating.

Salad with leftover chicken, although I don't remember when we had the chicken, LOL.

Steak, roasted potato and cole slaw which I canned. I was pleasantly surprised, the cabbage stayed crunchy and it wasn't too sweet, so I planted extra cabbage so I can make some more this summer and can it.

Burgers and kale salad:

Sheet pan black bean tacos with the rest of the kale salad:

Posole from the crockpot after fixing fence:

A meat "pie" from Mediterranean Island, which I found in the freezer:

Cheese and tomato quiche with a tossed salad and pickled beets:

Amanda, Dave and Bud came for dinner last Sunday, and I didn't take pictures, of course. I did make brownies for dessert, though, and some of the flourless peanut butter cookies.

OK, I'm nearly caught up, although we did have supper and the pictures are still not on the computer!

Annie

Sunday, so it was red meat day. Everything on the griddle. Leeks, purple sprouting, crushed potatoes and venison steaks.

Monday. Back to meatless. Sweet potato and spinach dhal.

Tuesday. Sweet and sour mushrooms. Brown rice.

I love seeing all your food in a row like that Annie, can can’t choose a favourite as they all look good. I can choose a favourite from floral’s fantastic meals, it’s the potato and spinach dhal. Reminds me that I may make a dhal topping for Friday’s fish.

Breakfast

Poached egg, bacon and mushrooms on sourdough toast

Lunch. below

I had some left over black beans from a soup I made, so I looked online and Yes found blackbean fritters which were quite good but it was the accompaning sauce that was a hit … coriander / cilantro sauce. Very easy just put coriander, mayonnaise, juice of a lime and salt into container and used hand whizz blender to a smooth sauce adding more lime juice to make thinner.

Dinner ( these meals were not all on the same day may I add )

Bought fish and chips. There‘s battered flake, a battered potato cake, chips/fries a dollop of sate sauce and a dollop of mixed ketchup and BBQ sauce. The big white ball is a pickled onion traditional for this meal

Neely, I can't usually pick a favorite either, but Floral's venison steak would be Elery's pick, I think, but mine would probably be your bacon and egg, it looks perfect.

Today I made a spinach and artichoke dish with homecanned beans and some gluten free cornbread from a Trader Joe's mix because I bought it for some reason and hadn't used it, and Amanda was here.

I have a chicken brining, so it'll be tomorrow's dinner.

Annie

That gluten free mix corn bread sure looks good.