More grillin'

For the second Sunday in a row, Warren fired up the grill. I hope that this is the start of a trend.

We had a ton of shrimp in the freezer and a pork tenderloin, so those were the main attraction.



However, I took advantage of the situation and asked him to throw on a few peppers I got at the MFM last week. I'd been eying a recipe in Food & Wine. With Warren handling the only part requiring cooking, I was able to do it quite easily. These yogurt stuffed grilled peppers would make a great appetizer at a party.



Warren and I ate them as we stood over the grill and watched the shrimp cook.



Since he made a ton of shrimp, I added them to my salad the next day.



And for Tuesday night's dinner, they were the inspiration for a Tom Yum style soup, chock full of tofu, veggies and mushrooms (the shrimp are underneath the broth).



Thursday the leftover pork landed on a salad.

Grilling Up a Storm

Warren started to feel guilty that I hadn't posted here in six months, so he totally stepped up his game last night. He went on a grilling spree--hot dogs, beef tenderloin, corn, brussel sprouts, oysters, peaches, and figs.

Before:


During:


After:

Epic Pot Roast Tacos

Warren has been in the field for weeks now. Last week, one of the other archaeologist brought a crock pot full of chili (or something) to share with everyone. Warren's boss cleverly told him that his coworker thought he was a better cook than Warren. Warren's response? "How does he know he's better than me if he's never had my cooking?" Then it came as no surprise when Warren spent the bulk of the weekend and Monday preparing a meal of epic proportions to take in the field with him this week. Luckily, he shared with his family before hitting the road!

Because most of the magic happened while I was sleeping or at work, I failed to get any good shots of the sauce that made the pot roast so exquisite. Here are a few action photos, plus the final product.

Mochi and Sweet Adzuki Beans

First meal of 2011: homemade red beans and rice Japanese style--Mochi and sweet red adzuki beans--good eating for good luck!

Hot Sauce

Warren made some fermented hot sauce with the habaneros that we grew in our garden this year. He added some kombucha for the fermentation, sugar, salt, ginger, and garlic.

Caramel Apple Pie

Best. Apple pie. Ever.

Pickles

Warren's latest batch of pickles used up the last of the CSA cucumbers.

Carnitas

Pork butt never tasted so good. Warren cooked it down in a crock pot all day and then pan fried it.

Sushi

Warren has been in a sushi zone and I love it.

He's been fiddling with the somen noodle rolls. He added carrots, cucumber, and sesame seeds on top.



And a first--seared beef sashimi.



Another first--a dessert roll with black rice and mango.

Shojin Platter

Warren prepared the first course for our bi-monthly supper club meeting. His first component-a crunchy daikon roll-took almost a week to make! He had to dehydrate the daikon for several days before rolling orange peel inside of it. Then he had to dehydrate it some more before marinating it in rice vinegar. It was definitely worth the wait! He also make marinated lotus root and somen noodle nori rolls with a balsamic soy reduction. YUM!

Breakfast of Champions

For breakfast on Sunday, Warren made omelets stuffed with beans and peppers, topped with homemade salsa, with a side of fresh tortillas.

MFM & CYFM 9-6

If they're yellow, do you still call them cherry tomatoes? I don't know, but the ones we got in our Whitton Farms CSA are SO good. Yum. We also got squash, potatoes, okra, basil, green beans, and purple hull peas. (Lordy we have a lot of these!) In addition, I bought a dozen eggs and a half gallon of milk from Evergreen farms (omg I love raw milk!), Groovy Granola, and chips and guacamole from Las Delicias.


We also picked up the Majors' Downing Hollow CSA at the Cooper Young Market. It contained a dozen eggs, a loaf of bread, squash, okra, cucumbers, peppers, shitakes, pears, and a melon that didn't look like a cantaloupe from the outside but looked (and tasted) exactly like one on the inside.

MFM 8-28 + Backyard Action

Red potatoes, arugula, squash, okra, green beans, purple hull peas, carrots, green pepper, and basil.


Plus raw milk, eggs, granola, peaches, and corn.


Tomato bounty from our garden.

MFM 8-21

We had our usuals--potatoes, green beans, carrots, tomatoes and basil--plus a few, new and exciting items like eggplant, petite squash, and green peppers. Also I've successfully switched the kids to skim raw milk, so I bought extra this week. The Evergreen Dairy also had eggs, which was good since my usual source sold out before I got there. We're also getting quite addicted to Cucina bread.

Watermelonapalooza

My friends Amy and Justin recently wrote about using an entire watermelon to make several dishes in the Memphis Flyer. After reading it, Warren waited about five minutes before he made his own version of their watermelon gazpacho.

A week later, I was inspired to make a couple watermelon treats of my own.

One of my favorite commentators on NPR was talking about her watermelon, feta, and black olive salad on Friday (Thursday?) when I was driving home from the gym. I just had to make it.


The next day, Warren made a watermelon pico de gallo from a recipe he saw in the Sacramento Bee at his brother's house. It's amazing how the watermelon blends in with the tomatoes.


I couldn't let him outdo me, so I went all out and made watermelon sorbet! All I had to do was blend up some watermelon with some lime juice, strain it, and add a little simple syrup. So easy and so good!

MFM 8-14

This week's CSA had some really nice looking cucumbers, more potatoes, carrots, basil, tomatoes, green beans, green peppers, and purple hull peas. I also picked up a couple dozen eggs, some raw skim milk, two baguettes, a cheddar jalapeno loaf, and some chips from the Las Delicias booth.


With a bunch of lovely tomatoes and jalapenos in our CSA haul, and chips for dipping, I set out to make salsa. I cut the tomatoes a little too big, so I think it was actually more of a pico de gallo. I left in some skin and it had a nice spice to it.


I ate a lot on the chips, but for Warren I put some pico on leftover grilled chicken and wrapped it up the blue corn tortillas we picked up at Trader Joe's on our cross country trek.

Blueberry Gelato

On Sunday I made blueberry gelato. It's the same color as my favorite cashmere sweater. Luckily it tastes a lot better.


I used this recipe, except I had to substitute a lemon for a lime.

I hope I've inspired Warren to one up me. He came home with a lot of fruit so I know he's thinking.

Veggie Burger and Gazpacho

When we picked up our CSA last Saturday, I suggested that we make veggie burgers out of the purple hulled peas. Warren scoffed and said we should in enjoy them in their natural state. But I persisted and on Tuesday he made them. I believe he threw in some oats and carrots and some other things. Whatever he did, worked because they were great. He had his with a fried egg and home made pickles. I had mine with ketchup.


Here it is all put together.


To go along with it, he made some gazpacho with our CSA tomoatoes and jalapenos and some watermelon. (We were inspired by the Flyer's watermelon story this week.) It had great texture and flavor.

Potato Squash Soup

Potato soup is a Team Oster favorite. This batch was made better with the addition of squash. And of course, it tastes even better with cheese and bacon on top.

Parfaits & Chai

I used up some of our farmer's market fruit--peaches and blueberries--this morning in a parfait. I used Greek yogurt, a banana, and some Groovy Granola too. It was really good! On the side we had some Chai made from a Trader Joe's mix.