i can throw no stones

in answer to the question, 'do bad cooking days happen at roundtree cottage?' i give a most emphatic yes. today was just such a day, the rest of it happened to be pretty well a pooper too, so this was just icing on the cake. the meal i planned: grilled lamb ribs, grilled butternut squash, and grilled ears of sweet white corn on the cob. the meal i got: flaming lamb ribs, squash hockey pucks, greasy smoked corn. it was going to be a beautiful treat for my husband (the lamb lover) for whom every menu item is a favorite. plus no pots or pans for me! the simple prep: mix marinade as follows in a food processor juice of one lime, 1/4 onion, 4 cloves garlic, 1 table spoon dried crushed mint, salt, pepper, cumin, cinnamon, olive oil. put ribs and marinade in plastic bag, go to church. here's the first hiccough, we couldn't find the church we were aiming at going to for the first time with high hopes today. by the time we walked in on a funeral and circled Folsom for an hour we missed services at every other church we could think of. so, strike one. we go to visit the newest little roundtree, my nephew, and in all the fluster i don't ask to hold him, again. bringing me to the stunning total of NEVER. strike two. we come home via the grocery store where i'm to aim for under 100, i spend 120, strike three. we get home with the intention of a nap, the babies successfully resist arrest and no naps are had. strike four. i take a bath and drink a beer, forgetting my book out in the living room. strike five. i dry off and go to walmart to make two measly purchases and get accosted by a weirdo demanding to know why there are no address books that will fit in her purse. strike six. we make a stab at helping my brother in law with his move, only to discover that we have no key to the new house. strike seven i come home and ask my husband to light the grill, he agrees to do such and disappears into the garage, the grill remains cold. strike eight. i light the grill, let it heat put on the squash (slightly precooked in the microwave and slathered with olive oil) and ribs. tantalizing aromas fill the air. i argue with husband about how long to cook the ribs, due to the fact that they have bones in them and i think (correctly) that this means they should cook for just a titch longer. i flip the ribs and squash, put the corn on the top rack (we like it lightly cooked, just warmed really) and go back to the husband eating garage. the neighbors start blasting pink and other club music. strike nine. i get distracted by husband and bad music and suddenly look up and see a column of smoke from the back yard. skip cursing, blowing out ribs, and washing greasy black stuff of corn. serve my husband the rack that wasn't too bad and take my fussy (all day strike ten) baby to my room to nurse and blog. urgh. if the ribs had gone maybe ten minutes bones down and five meat down, with out lighting up, this would have been a whole different story.

pulled chicken sandwiches

pulled bbq chicken, does it get better than this? well, let's be brutal, yes. pulled pork for instance. however, i am recovering from having thing three (disaster) and both the lower fat and less work qualities of chicken appeal to me right now. so, dice one onion, dice one bell pepper, put them in your crock pot with 8 boneless skinless chicken thighs, top with 1/4 cup of dry bbq rub (there's a blog out there for it) and cook until they fall into strings when you stir them. add one fresh sliced nectarine and one fresh sliced peach, choose firm ones if you can, and about 1/4 cup bbq sauce and one or two table spoons of cornstarch, stir thoroughly and cook about 30 mins more with the lid off. scoop on to a bun, top with coleslaw and if you want to go wild and crazy another little squirt of bbq sauce. simple, delicious and easy.

my best fried chicken on record

so, fried chicken. always good, less often spectacular. sometimes really gross. if there's one thing i can't stand (and there are many such things) it's soggy, greasy, or flavorless fried chicken. this has been the foremost reason that i don't make fried chicken that often, although the result tends to be 'okay' it has not been much to write home about. well, no more. i have come across a method which produces crispy, flavorful chicken that is neither greasy, soggy, nor dry. we start with 8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs. combine one egg, 1/4 cup evaporated milk, and one teaspoon dijon mustard. pat the chicken dry and put in a bowl or plastic bag with the egg mixture. mix 1/2 cup all purpose flour with 1/2 cup whole wheat flour season with garlic salt, black pepper, rubbed sage, paprika, and parsley flakes. don't be afraid of the seasonings either, remember this is the seasoning for the whole batch. put the flour mixture into a shallow dish, and dredge each piece carefully patting flour into all the nooks and crannies, then place them on a tray to rest for a minute. heat about 1/2 cup canola oil in a non stick pan (get your nose out of the air and go with me on this one, please) to a medium high heat. pre heat oven to 350, and prep a baking pan with some slightly crumpled heavy duty foil. the purpose of the foil is to create ridges and pockets, to allow the chicken to drain as it finishes in the oven. if you want to mess around cleaning grease and bits of breading off of a cooling rack you could rig something up with a cooling rack in a roasting pan, i leave it to you. now check your chicken, there are probably spots where the egg has soaked through the flour layer leaving sort of soggy places, gently pat a bit more flour on any such soggy spots you come across, with out knocking the flour off the rest of the piece, it's not necessary to re dredge the whole lot. now fry in small batches until brown on both sides (about 3 minutes per side) removing to the foil lined pan. be sure you don't crowd the pan, the pieces of chicken should not touch, and should be surrounded completely by oil. bake at 350 uncovered for about 30 mins to finish the cooking and drain the oil from the breading. even if you have a method of making fried chicken that you love, i encourage you to try this, there's something different and very tasty about the result, maybe from the evap. or maybe from the mustard, either way it's delicious.

English style beef ribs

i have mentioned that every year my husband and i buy a half a beef from some friends of ours who raise them locally, this year in discussing the cutting method with my butcher he asked me if i wanted the short rib strips or the english style short ribs. i was intrigued. he warned that they were slow cookers, not bbqers and that they might be tough. thus faced with a challenge i really had to order them and see what could be done. can such a cut be purchased from your local butcher or meat counter? you'll have to ask. what they look like is thin broad blades of bone, about 4 inches long with a good amount of meat on them, but also quite a bit of membrane and also fat. here's what i did to make them tender and also delicious: heat crock pot to high, salt and pepper the ribs liberally. throw them in with the fattiest side down. peel a head of garlic. no joke. if it's a particularly large bulb, perhaps 2/3 would do, but you need about 12 cloves or so, crush them with the flat of your knife and add them to the pot. add 1 cup strong coffee, and 1 or 2 cups of water. bring to simmer and turn crock down to low, cook for 6 to 8 hours or until falling apart. the juice will be quite fatty, but really delicious from the significant amount of bone, strain it, skim it and make deletable gravy with it. serve with buttered egg noodles and enjoy!

not tuna noodle casserole, tuna pasta

dinner tonight needed to happen fast. my husband left his lunch at home (again) and called on the road to say he was starving. mr. hyde has nothing on my sweet, scholarly, husband when he's hungry. so, pasta it was. and oh, what pasta. when i waitressed at an italian restaurant during my misguided youth this particular pasta was one of my favorites. it also happens to be one of the first things i made for my husband, and consequently, one of the reasons he didn't head for the hills when he got to know me better. it's simple and tasty, just heat olive oil in a pan, before the oil is hot put some red pepper flakes in so they will flavor the oil, which by the way, is the sauce so don't be stingy with it. when the oil is nice and hot add plain ol' canned tuna. if you want to spring for it you can get the stuff packed in olive oil and add it with the oil it came in, if you're like me (cheap) press as much water out as you can before plunking it in the pan, mince a clove or two (for us three) of garlic and put it in at the same time as the tuna. you still want the garlic to be sharp when you serve it, not sweet and browned. salt to taste. give the pan a couple of good shakes and heat the tuna through. squeeze some lemon juice in once it's hot and sprinkle with some dried parsley. could you get cute and use fresh parsley? sure. don't get carried away with the lemon or the parsley though, the star here is the pepper flakes and tuna. pour over the pasta of your choice and serve with grated cheese and fresh lemon slices. if it looks a little dry when you toss it together just add some olive oil on top.

chili verde, the second generation

so the recipe for the chili verde is already out there, it's one of our favorites. usually when i make this, as i believe i stated in the recipe, i use a rather large pork roast, usually butt, cushion, or picnic shoulder. this being the case when i made a batch a few weeks ago i had about a quart of leftovers, which i put in a plastic bag and threw in the freezer. last night i wanted mexican food badly, as only a pregnant lady can, and decided to try something new for the leftovers. i'm going to level with you, mostly i wanted to cut down on the dishes i had to wash. so here's what i did: i warmed about 9 small corn tortillas, i mixed the chili with a hand full of shredded 'taco' cheese and rolled enchiladas in my 8x8 glass casserole dish, nothing fancy. it wasn't greased, there wasn't any extra sauce to layer under it, it just all went into little rolls crammed into the pan, i put a little warm water in the bag the chili had been in and swished it around to get all the sauce out and poured that over the enchiladas. i spooned refried beans right out of the can all over the top, used my scissors to chop some fresh cilantro over the beans, and topped with cheese. cover with foil and bake for about an hour, maybe only forty-five minutes, until heated through. i just served it with chips, a tub of salsa from the store, and a chopped up avocado. yumm!

thing three update

well, our wonderful OBGYN got us in monday afternoon to talk over the ultra sound. our regular appointment was for wednesday, so it wasn't really that early. after i once again checked out right on target for weight and blood pressure and tummy size the dr came in and cheerfully said, "well, there is nothing else wrong in your ultra sound, so this means nothing. it can be cause for concern, but not to you, you're fine." he did say that he might (might!) send us to a specialist for a detailed ultra sound to track/compare baby's growth in 6 weeks, but that would be after next months appointment. so, after about three more rounds of the "you're fine, your baby is fine" litany he smiled, shook our hands and said, "see you in a month!" our feelings afterward: let down. hunger. we shuffled off to wendy's saying things like, "well it's a relief, of course, but i knew we were fine." and "see i told you, we're all good, the baby was fine all along." because these are the brave things you say after a long weekend of trying not to worry, because worry wont help.