What's cooking?

Karen, the small bulbs are typically both sweeter and much tenderer than the larger ones. Nothing there that should make you toss, unless you simply don't care for raw fennel. You can tame the flavor with a bit of citrus juice, but it isn't going to make that sharp licorice flavor go away. It's probably a love-or-hate kind of item.

I love fennel cooked but was very surprised at the taste of it raw...I am going to try again, with the hope that there may have been a problem with the last batch.
To me, it was a rather sour taste.

[Robin Garr]

A variation on Indian Saag Paneer, with fresh spinach, and strips of lemon-garlic tempeh substituted for the usual yogurt-cheese paneer. 

Last night I cooked a pan full of green and yellow zucchini, onions, garlic, carrots, Anaheim peppers, jalapeños, cauliflower, and heirloom tomatoes. Fresh oregano, French Thyme, hot and sweet curry, salt and white Sarawak pepper, were added. I sautéed in an Asian stir fry oil which is a combination of peanut, sesame, and soy. It is infused with ginger, and green onion, and I love it. At the end, I threw in some halved cherry tomatoes, a sprinkle of fresh parsley, and a bit of fresh lemon juice. It was served over toasted Israeli Couscous. Delicious!

Tonight it is rack of lamb grilled to med. rare. I picked up some great looking broccoli at Farmer's Market and, have a romaine salad made, with marinated onions, peppers and heirloom tomatoes. I also made one quesadilla, with jack cheese, marinated peppers and fresh cilantro, which Gene and I will share.

Haven't really cooked in some time, so last night felt very good. We started with 5 Spice Pork Rillettes, a homegrown tomato caprese and homemade sourdough baguettes contributed by pal Nilo, and pears and bleu cheese contributed by Annie and Kristen. With the starters, we had several cocktail options including the Introduction to Aperol, Sidecars made with applejack, and Nilo's homemade Cocchi Americano. Supper was snapper with Jeff's Salsa Veracruz, Ridiculously Easy Potatoes, and a salad with peas, snap peas, green beans, greens, and nigella seeds. Dessert was fig-ricotta ice cream with a ginger crisp on the side. All was yummy.

[Robin Garr]

I just made this up on the fly last night to take to a buff-ay today. I was in the mood for deviled eggs but didn't want to fool around with either stuffing them or transporting them, so the crazy notion of making a deviled-egg salad popped into my mind. As I toyed with it, the further nuance of mixing the egg salad with fine-diced potatoes to give it a little more heft came to mind. From there it was easy-peasy: Dice and simmer potatoes; hard-boil and dice eggs; toss them gently together with a deviled-egg-flavor dressing.

Here's sort of a stream-of-consciousness "recipe" without exact proportions - just go by feel and taste. Waxy potatoes, peeled and fine dice, simmered just tender, then cooled with ice water and drained; hard-boiled eggs cut, eggs hard-boiled, shock-cooled in ice water, peeled and cut into same-size dice. Make a dressing of minced sweet onion, olive oil and lemon vinaigrette with a little sweet chopped pickle and pickled banana pepper, seeded mustard (Zatarain's), S&P and toss gently so as not to mash the ingredients too much. Refrigerate overnight to let the flavors blend, then whack it with a little mild Spanish paprika and garnish with parsley. Nothing foo-foo about it, but the combination of deviled egg flavors into a fine-dice potato salad worked out really well, I thought.

deviledpotatosalad.jpg

[Jenise]

Haven't really cooked in some time, so last night felt very good. We started with 5 Spice Pork Rillettes, a homegrown tomato caprese and homemade sourdough baguettes contributed by pal Nilo, and pears and bleu cheese contributed by Annie and Kristen. With the starters, we had several cocktail options including the Introduction to Aperol, Sidecars made with applejack, and Nilo's homemade Cocchi Americano. Supper was snapper with Jeff's Salsa Veracruz, Ridiculously Easy Potatoes, and a salad with peas, snap peas, green beans, greens, and nigella seeds. Dessert was fig-ricotta ice cream with a ginger crisp on the side. All was yummy.

What a great dinner! I'm enchanted by seasoning on your rillettes. What a cool thing that would be to serve with an Asian-French fusion meal.

Thanks, Jenise. The 5-spice in there ends up being subtle but still noticeable. I liked it a lot.

[Jenise]

We're going to a friend's house for dinner tonight, and when she described the various elements of the meal--grilled salmon with a black olive-fennel topping, pork tenderloin with oranges and mint--I offered to make the bread because I've been dying to make a green olive and rosemary fougasse. It's a low-profile bread, contains yeast but it remains relatively flat like a pizza dough, although it includes eggs, and traditionally it's supposed to look like a leaf--rolled out flat with slits cut in before it rises. It's not a bread type I've ever made before, but it's been on my to-do list for some time. I made a double batch--if they're about to go in the oven--if they're successful, I'll post the recipe.

An array of tomatoes tonight with home grown pesto, and two colors of basil. Drizzled with evoo, and a sprinkle of Maldon salt and gr. pepper. So pretty, so tasty.

[Robin Garr]

An array of tomatoes tonight

YUM!!!

I had an outstanding Caprese-style salad made with mixed heirlooms and fresh fior de latte mozzarella at a trendy new spot called The Garage Bar the other night. I could eat about 10 pounds of this.

garage heirloom.jpg

Tonight's dinner will be kung pao chicken.

-Paul W.

An array of tomatoes tonight

YUM!!!

I had an outstanding Caprese-style salad made with mixed heirlooms and fresh fior de latte mozzarella at a trendy new spot called The Garage Bar the other night. I could eat about 10 pounds of this.

garage heirloom.jpg

Of course I love all the flavors too, but the colors just wows me. The summer tomatoes are always the huge show stopper when serving guests a big platter of a myriad of colors and sizes, with the beautiful green, and also the burgundy basil leaves.

[Jenise]

I'm making persian food today. An artichoke stew (Koresht Kangar) and the bases for several other dishes I'll serve on Saturday along with what everyone else brings for Bellingham Supper Club II!

We had a cold snap in Pinehurst right in the middle of our member/member tournament yesterday. Could not thaw out, so decided on stick-to-your-ribs beef stew. I didn't use a recipe but we loved it. Chunks of chuck roast, plus a pound of small ox tails thrown into the mix (for me). Assorted mushrooms, carrots, onion, beef stock, red wine and almost a whole bottle of Guiness, added a few peas at the end. It cooked for about four hours so the meat just melted and the stew part extremely rich and beefy. Served it over very heavy egg noodles that were almost like dumplings.

We live in an environment where we can't grow much, woodland and wildlife that eat everything. But, I must say, that those photo's above of the tomatoes’, basil and all look incredible....I'm so envious.

Pulled another rib eye from the freezer, nice and thick which, again we will share. Rubbed it down with fresh garlic made into a paste and some sort of chile pepper flakes, (a Mexican lady gave me) cooked in oil with a few spices to make a paste. She called it chile carivi. Gene will grill the rib-eye, corn on the cob. I'm sautéing red onions, mushrooms, thyme with a little red wine. A butter lettuce salad with fresh pineapple, mandarin oranges, cashews, with a huckleberry/Thyme vinaigrette. Unusual with a steak dinner, but Gene requested it....

[Robin Garr]

Finally! A night without a class or a review visit, so I can get into the kitchen with veggies from the garden and whomp up something interesting. Garden okra and tomatoes with browned onions and garlic and Cajun spices. Served with rice, it's sort of like a quick jambalaya.

[Jenise]

Going to a brunch this morning, and will be taking a whole filet of silver salmon plated on a long narrow rectangular platter on top of a cucumber salad. Dinner will probably be leftovers from last night's Persian dinner, and then we're off to see Pat Methany.

Grilled rib eye over charcoal and mesquite chips, with blue cheese; also corn-on-the-cob, and salad completely from our garden. Washed it down with Samuel Smith Nut Brown Ale.

It's cold here and I'm looking at a very busy week so I made beef broth with some very meaty organic shanks; stuffed red peppers with lamb and bulghur; braised beef short ribs in ancho chile/coffee sauce. I've got some leftover porcini risotto for the broth one night and some roasted butternut squash for mashing as a bed for the ribs. This will see us thru till the weekend when my grapes will be harvested for Schiacciatta con uve- the typical Tuscan grape harvest foccacia. I'll try to remember to get some pictures.

[Robin Garr]

Wieners and kraut, or to be more precise, a sautéed mix of sweet onions with equal amounts of very thin-sliced fresh cabbage with sauerkraut and chunks of hot dog, er, LightLife Smart Dogs.

Tonight is leftover roasted Tuscan Chicken, with a beautiful orange acorn squash with a brilliant orange inside, roasted with warm spices, butter and and brown sugar. I've never seen this orange acorn squash before. It is stunning.

I saw beautiful red bell peppers at the Farmer's Market and bought two. We are sharing one tonight, split in half and stuffed with ground turkey, brown bismati rice, green onion, garlic, sweet Carmen peppers, French Thyme, Parisian Spices, and tomato sauce. I then mixed home made tomato paste with white wine, and a little chicken stock to top dress the peppers. A sprinkle of Havarti cheese the last 15 minutes will top them off. As a side, Brussels Sprouts, cut in half and roasted with an Asian Stir Fry oil, salt and pepper, and finished with fresh lemon juice. These sprouts are so huge. I got them from a local grocery store that has gone mostly organic, plus offering non-gluten foods, par cooked breads of all types (they are so good) desserts in very small portions from a bakery in San Francisco, locally raised pork, beef, chickens, eggs, etc.