The Kitchen Post
Becoming Foodies
Flank Steak Dinner
Aug 16th
This was a very quick dinner to prepare. The flank steak was grass fed and brought to us via the Braise RSA. The corn came from a trip to the West Allis farmers market last Saturday. And, the Tomato Tart? Well, that was from Kelley’s work on Sunday night (the tomatoes were from our garden).
Everything was delicious. The corn was super sweet. The meat was nice and beefy. And the tart was refreshing and fruity!
Doesn’t this look delicious?
Aug 16th
Kelley whipped this Tomato Tart together on Sunday night, but got a bit of a late start, so we didn’t eat any of it until Monday. It was delicious!
Just testing what ‘display as asides’ does
This is a test.
Please ignore me.
CSA 2010 Box #1
Jun 8th
This is our third year as CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) members, and our third year with Tipi Produce as our CSA of choice.
For those who haven’t tried a CSA, we couldn’t recommend it more highly! We get a much wider variety of food than we could (or would — I mean, salad turnips? who knew?) grow ourselves, we get fresh veggies earlier (because they have things like greenhouses that wouldn’t fit in our backyard) and we’re supporting a great farm.
We have always signed up for the every-other-week share, as opposed to every week. That frequency has worked well for us with all the goings on of summer, not to mention the fact that even with an every two week delivery, there are still times when we don’t use everything in the box.
Our first delivery was scheduled for May 21st, but we were still on our honeymoon then, so we rescheduled our first delivery to the following week.
CSA Box #1
Pick-up Date: May 28th, 2010
Contents: asparagus, spinach, white salad turnips, red bibb lettuce, green garlic, arugula, escarole, and chive flowers
What we made:
- We grilled the asparagus
- We made a spinach-strawberry salad for my new niece’s baptism
- I ate the white salad turnips as a snack (Kelley doesn’t care for the consistency)
- We made a garden salad with the red bibb lettuce
- I used the arugula in a grilled chicken dinner
- The escarole and green garlic (in place of scallions) went into a very tasty Pork & Escarole pasta dish
- and, finally, the chives have been used (and are still being used) in a variety of dishes
The verdict:
This has to be right up there with the highest usage of a single box in our CSA history. Everything was delicious, and unlike last year, the salad turnips were maggot-damage free, which improved their psychological taste considerably.
Next box: June 4th (with strawberries!)
Honeymoon Dining Diaries: Afternoon Tea in London
Jun 8th
The Date: May 17, 2010
The Place: The Georgian Restaurant at Harrod’s
The dining room had a great atmosphere. Not shown here — the piano player.
The “Meal”: We ordered one full-blown afternoon tea, featuring a plate of sandwiches, a plate of breads and a plate of pastries. Then, we ordered one additional tea with a single course of sandwiches.
Our platters — sandwiches on the bottom, scones in the middle, pastries on top
Kelley exhibiting some fine tea sipping form.
Paul with the pinky extension
Everything so clean and shiny
It was all delicious — Kelley wanted to lick her plate clean!
And then there was the table next to us, which featured two women and one little girl, maybe 4 years old. Well, she wasn’t quite into the classy tea experience. So, she played with her food. At the end of their tea time, their table looked like this:
For comparison sake — this is the final view of our table:
Meet Our Garden
Jun 7th
On a warm weekend in mid-May, we made an impromptu decision to go to the garden store. Several hours (shopping, digging, planting), we had a garden. It was later that week that we wondered if we had made a huge mistake (since the latest frost date in our area is typically thought of as Memorial Day, which was about three weeks after our planting). Well, as it turns out, we were quite fortunate, and our garden is doing really well, as you can see in this little photo blog entry!
Our garden — based on what we found when digging here, we’re pretty sure there used to be a big tree in this general vicinity. If we continue to enjoy this gardening thing, we’ll probably build a raised bed and create some real soil. But, that’s a post for another time.
Onions that we planted for use as scallions (off frame to the left are some we planted to let grow to full onion size)
Strawberry plants — you can see some runners already coming off these. Why those runners went to the fence I have no clue.
Spinach — some Popeye bug or something seems to like these leaves
Tomatoes
Swiss chard
Mixed lettuce (primarily a mix of red and green leaves, but there might be a head or two growing in there too). This is going to be ready for a salad soon.
Beets!
Radishes — I think we might be harvesting these this weekend.
In the back center, we have a lavender plant (to attract the “good” bugs) surrounded by 4 pepper plants (green, yellow, red and purple, I think)
And, finally, we have two blueberry bushes. We weren’t expecting fruit this year, but it sure looks like some berries are taking shape here. The other plant is a little more bald than this one because there’s a bunny that has been visiting our yard and must have taken a liking to blueberry leaves. We now have a trap setup (thanks to neighbor Jill) in the hopes of catching that formerly cute, now super-annoying rabbit.
Oh! I almost forgot, we also have arugula in the garden. I didn’t include a picture because we chopped most of it down this weekend to make a potato and arugula salad. Both Kelley and I love the peppery taste of arugula, so we’re hoping to get a few rounds of leafy deliciousness before it gets too hot.
The Kitchen Post is on Twitter
Jun 3rd
Are you on Twitter? If so, you can follow our kitchen adventures there as well.
http://twitter.com/thekitchenpost
(the most recent tweets will also appear here in the right-hand column)
Twitter will be the primary place for sharing links and quick soundbites. This blog will focus on the more in-depth articles and pictures!
Honeymoon Dining Diaries: Night Two Dinner in London
May 27th
| The Date: Sunday, May 16, 2010
The Website: http://www.theebury.co.uk/
Overall, the atmosphere was very upscale/casual/modern, the crowd was small (it was a rainy Sunday night, after all) and trended to roughly our age range. The menu was classy, and we were able to select a nice bottle of wine. Kelley’s Main Course: Risotto primavera: peas, broadbeans, fresh mint, spring onions. This was really tasty, and Kelley has never met a risotto she didn’t like, so this was a hit.
Paul’s Main Course: Roast lamb rump, olive oil mash, olives and sundried tomato au jus. This was also quite delicious. The olive oil mash was a nice complement to the tangy sweetness of the au jus.
Dessert: Kelley got an espresso that she poured over a scoop of ice cream. She loved it. I got a glass of port wine. I loved it.
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Honeymoon Dining Diaries: Night One Dinner in London
May 26th
| The Date: Saturday, May 15, 2010
The Place: Some pub in London Appetizer: Duck Liver Pate – this was quite delicious. In fact, it was Kelley’s favorite part of the entire meal.
Paul’s Main Course: Burger and Fries – Yeah, a pretty boring selection, but this was after some 12 hours of traveling, two airplane meals, and a bunch of walking in London. So, I was hungry and a burger sounded great. It hit the spot.
Kelley’s Main Course: Kelley was looking for something like Shepherd’s Pie, and this sounded like it on the menu. It turned out that it was more of a Chicken-Asparagus pot pie. Combined with the “bitter” London beers that she didn’t like either, Kelley was pretty disappointed.
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Cardamom, Pistachio, Ginger and Oatmeal Cookies
Apr 18th
This is part 1 of 2 posts for the weekend. While the second took place on our block, this first one had us venturing outside of our zip code to a place that uses a reverse osmosis water system – Waukesha!
Some friends of ours are raising adorably cute TWIN 6-month-old boys and had us over for dinner and game night. Dinner was served on a raclette, which was a first for me and the Mister. It’s a great tool for dinner parties, and since we were playing a board game while eating, it was perfect for small plate dining as well. If you’ve never eaten off a raclette before, it’s like a two-in-one grill oven. The grill on top cooks your meat, while the trays below the are heated to cook vegetables and melt cheese. Our busy parents/hosts had a tasty spread of seasoned meats, vegetables, cheeses, breads, AND cilantro. It was fun, and must have spurred the Mister onto his Settlers victory (or was that the pin on his lapel?).
We brought along some of my favorite cookies. They are more or less adapted from a traditional oatmeal cookie recipe, but rather than adding chocolate, nuts or raisins, I added chopped pistachios, dried sugared ginger, and cardamom. The exotic smoky spice adds an amazing twist that never ceases to delight those that enjoy them. But, I have to tell you that these cookies almost didn’t happen. My sister shared this recipe with me several years ago, but sometime in the last year I seemed to have misplaced it. She was out of town when I called, but luckily her sweet fella was able to provide me with the recipe. Disaster averted! Another interesting tidbit for these tasty morsels – the cardamom and ginger were taken from a wedding gift we received last year. It was part of a spice gift box from the local Spice House, and they may have gone bad had it not been for these cookies.
There are easier ways to go about these cookies (like buying the ingredients pre-ground and chopped), but the prep for this batch was a time suck – the Mister even had time to make a loaf of bread while I finished the chopping and grinding. Not only did I need to shell the pistachios, but I also needed to crack open the dried cardamom pods to get the seeds. I wasn’t sure if these were past their prime, but once I used the mortar and pestle to grind the seeds, their potent smell that permeated the downstairs area of our house had me think differently.
Cardamom, Pistachio, Ginger, and Oatmeal Cookies
Mix the following 5 ingredients together
1 stick unsalted butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
In a separate bowl, mix the following 6 ingredients
1-1/2 cup white flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
2-3 teaspoons ground cardamom
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients.
Once combined, stir in 3/4 to 1 cup pistachios, 1/2 to 3/4 cup dried sugared ginger and 1 cup old-fashioned oats
Form dough into small balls, place on greased sheet (or use a Silpat!), and bake at 350 for 20-23 minutes until surface of the cookie is still soft. These tend to get hard quickly, so I usually put them in a container with a piece of soft bread.
