Guido Dressing, Eggplant Croutons and Persimmon Mojitos

Sometimes I find a recipe that replaces an old favorite.  More often than not, though, I make a different version and really wish I'd made the old favorite.  So, it's always a tough call.  Do I try for the BBD (bigger, better deal) or do I stick with old faithful.  When it comes to a basic vinaigrette I've always done the red wine vinegar, tarragon, sugar, Dijon mustard and extra virgin olive oil one.  But, recently I've been experimenting.  First it was a vinaigrette with maple syrup.  Then, one with cumin.  And, then another with sherry vinegar.  Now, I'm pretty well convinced that my favorite vinaigrette is EVOO, sherry vinegar, cumin, maple syrup and Dijon.  And, ya know what?  One of my favorite sister-in-law is named Sherry.  And, she goes by Guido.  So, this is Guido Dressing.  And, BTW, I have six sisters-in-law.  They're all my favorites so don't even THINK I'd play favorites here.  But, I will say that Guido and Ken are amazing cooks.

Now, the next thing I've found is eggplant croutons.  I was feeling pretty darned smart to have thought them up.  Then, after serving the salad tonight, just for grins and giggles I looked them up on the internet.  Yup, a whole herd of recipes for eggplant croutons.  Oh, well.  

I failed miserably on the photo front here.  I was down to my last eggplant crouton and said, "OOPS."  So, you'll just have to visualize here...  And, no, I didn't measure for the dressing.  So, taste it and make sure it meets your taste.

Salad with Eggplant Croutons and Guido Dressing

Ingredients:
Serves two

spring mix
1 large leaf Swiss chard
2 oz. semi-hard cheese - we used a Tomme but Swiss or Gruyere would be just fine
2 small beets
1 chicken thigh
1/2 small eggplant
milk
1 egg
panko
Creole seasoning


Guido Dressing
1 T maple syrup
1/2 t cumin
1 t Dijon mustard
3 T sherry vinegar
3 T EVOO

Directions:
Put a handful of spring mix in each bowl.  Dice the chard leaves and the stems separately.  Toss the leaves on top of the spring mix.  Dice the cheese and toss it on the greens.

Pan saute the chicken in a small amount of olive oil.  Just as the chicken is done, toss the chard stems into the pan and let them soften a bit.  While the chicken is cooking, make the eggplant croutons.  Peel and dice the eggplant into about 1/2" pieces.  Toss them first in a milk and egg mixture.  Then, into some panko with a bit of Creole seasoning tossed in.  We make our own Emeril's Seasoning.  Brown them well in olive oil.  I put enough in the pan to have it about 1/8" deep then turn the croutons regularly until they're nice and brown and crispy.  

Cook the beets while you've got everything else going on.  My beets were really small with very thin skins so I just cut off the tops and bottoms and popped them into a bowl with a bit of water and nuked them.  Once they'd cooled a bit, I chopped them up and tossed them on the salad.  

Once the chicken is done, shred the meat and put it on the salad.  Top with the dressing and then the chard stems followed by the eggplant croutons.  

While we were cooking we enjoyed a cocktail.  It's about the fifth time we've made this particular cocktail.  Connie actually processed the last couple persimmons and popped the pulp into the freezer so we can have some more soon! 

And, I can't post this without telling a great story.  We went to a new place for dinner the other night.  I ordered a cocktail with bourbon and toasted marshmallow syrup.  Connie ordered one that was their take on the Mai Tai.  It had  a HUGE sprig of mint.  He took it out and wrapped it up and I tucked it carefully into my purse.  It went into the fridge and is happily helping us make cocktails!

Here's what he had to say:

Loosely borrowed from KANGARHUBARB at food52.com

Being from Boston, I wouldn’t know a persimmon from a lychee.  However, in Indiana, this is a display of total ignorance.   Persimmons are adored and persimmon pudding is ambrosia, the food of the gods.  Kate proved this by taking it to my cousins’ Thanksgiving feast a number of years ago.  What is this, they asked?  It didn’t matter.  They gobbled every last bit.

The persimmons came from a tree we planted at our prior house.  The tree is still there but the persimmons are no longer ours.  Alas, but we have planted another, and in 10 years or so, we will have our own persimmons again, unless the stupid squirrels eat them all before they fall to the ground. 

Undaunted, Kate bought some Fuyu persimmons at Costco and tried to make the best of it.  It was not the same.  Okay, but not great.  Trying to salvage the persimmons, we turned to cocktails.  This actually worked out very well, but we didn’t follow the prescribed process, so I’ll give you our take on persimmon syrup and a persimmon mojito.

They tell you to make a persimmon syrup, which involves boiling water, sugar and persimmons.  

Instead take a Fuyu persimmon, remove the stem, quarter it, add 4 oz of sugar and pulse it in a bullet or mixer.  Now you have persimmon syrup.

And, at least I did get a photo of the drink.  Lousy photo, but something to post!

Persimmon Mojito (for two)

Mint leaves (it’s December, I found enough off my plants to satisfy, do your best)

Lime zest (they call for a pinch, not too much, not too little)

Muddle those

Add 4 oz of persimmon syrup and a “pinch” of ground ginger, cinnamon, clove and nutmeg

2 oz spiced rum (we used Captain Morgan)

2 oz lime juice

Shake with ice and strain into a glass

Add club soda if you wish (we did not)

Toast the one you love and enjoy

Eggplant Happiness

Eggplant.  Hmmm.  I wanted nice crispy, crunchy fried eggplant.  I also wanted the warm, flavorful bowl of ratatouille.  Or, maybe I’d do some mushroom pesto with the fried eggplant.  We have oodles of basil so pesto was a great option.  On to eatyourbooks to no avail.  You know what comes next…  I made up a recipe.  Not quite sure what to call it because it had so many pieces and parts! 

Here’s what I did:  I peeled the eggplant and sliced it into four planks.  Then, I put a couple of eggs in a bowl and whisked them with a fork.  Into another bowl I put a big handful of panko and a big handful of coarsely grated asiago cheese.

Then, I picked a big handful of basil.  Half of it got julienned and half went into the bullet. 

A big handful of pine nuts went into a dry skillet to brown.

A big skillet went on the stove with a good glug of olive oil.  Into that went two portobello mushroom caps, half a big zucchini, half a big yellow squash, half a red onion, one of the end pieces of eggplant and about 10 cherry tomatoes.  Everything got diced about ¼” to ½”.  When it got too dry, I poured in some water.  The julienned basil went in too along with a handful of capers and a couple of cloves of garlic finely minced.

Half the pine nuts went into the bullet along with an equal measure of coarsely grated asiago, a small pour of olive oil and a tablespoon of melted butter.  That all became pesto. 

The eggplant planks got dunked in the egg wash then the panko/cheese mixture and plopped into a skillet with sizzling olive oil.  Those got sautéed until the exteriors were golden and crunchy and the interiors were creamy.  If you stick a fork into uncooked eggplant it’ll resist.  When it’s done it’s like putting a fork into custard.  No resistance.  Now, as I cooked the eggplant some of the panko/cheese mixture fell off and became a lovely crunchie.  I scarfed it up and had an ah-ha moment.  Pour the rest into the skillet!  I did and drizzled it with olive oil.  Those became lovely golden crunchies!

Time to put the dish together.  Eggplant plank on the plate.  Topped with the ratatouille.  Then, the rest of the toasted pine nuts, the crunchies, the pesto and finally some more coarsely shredded asiago.   (Can't get this one rightside up!)

We rated this a five out of five. It does use up pretty much every dish and skillet in the kitchen and isn’t a quick dish.  But, it’s SO worth it!

Eggplant Lasagna Rollups

Sometimes leftovers dictate the meal.  Like the jar of Rao's Eggplant Sauce that I'd used a third of.  Way too expensive to waste.  So, I went into the old memory banks and thought about the pasta dishes I'd made.  We had some baby eggplants on the deck.  We'd used one and it wasn't ok with the seeds in.  How about if I'd roast three of those and mix them with some cottage cheese and a few other things and make lasagna rollups?  Like the mushroom pesto lasagna rollups? 

The eggplants were trimmed of their tops then halved and coated with olive oil.  20 minutes at 400 and they were perfectly roasted.  I scooped the seeds out then put the flesh into about a cup of cottage cheese.  Remember, these were baby eggplants so there was about two tablespoons of flesh per eggplant.  Some z'atar and garlic got tossed in.  Then, about half a small red onion that I'd minced for the sage/onion bread I made along with a couple of sage leaves got sautéed and tossed in.  And, for good measure I diced a couple of big cremini mushrooms and sautéed them before tossing them in. 

Lasagna noodles got cooked then drained and cooled.  The sauce was smeared on the noodles and they were rolled up.  Topped with the eggplant sauce and baked.  About five minutes before their 20 minute cooking time I tossed on some shredded mozzarella. 

Lasagna rolls, warm mushroom salad topped with St. Agur blue cheese and toasted sage/onion bread.   Dinner was served!  And, that was a good thing since we were at the office until about 6:30... That's on a Sunday evening.  But, we got a lot done and will be going into Monday feeling better about our tasks!

Asian Halibut with Bok Choy and Eggplant with Peanut Sauce

My 99 cents find is managing to leave all the other cookbooks in the dust!  The Frugal Foodie Cookbook was published in 1999 by a couple who had a blog of the same name.  At one point they moved from BlogSpot to WordPress.  Now, all I can find is the old BlogSpot blog.  So, I'm hoping it's because they found themselves with wonderful, busy careers and a couple of kids and they just don't have time to blog anymore.  We've made two more dishes from the cookbook and both were clearly a five.  And, we've got a couple dozen more that I've listed to try.  Actually, I'm blogging instead of doing my grocery list for the week.  I like to have my menus and grocery list done by Friday but that wasn't happening this week.  A very dear friend had a house fire.  She's in the burn ICU and her house is going to need a lot of help.  Her brother is down in Louisville so we'll be the point people for heading there every day and checking out the progress.  She's doing better and may actually have her breathing tube out by today so she can talk.  It's going to be a long and rocky road!

Well, let's get back to happier news.  Like good recipes.  The most recent recipe was for a dinner party.  I managed to snap a photo as I was cooking the halibut but not as I plated it.  The goal was to get dinner on the table while warm :-)  Along with the halibut I made our new favorite salad - Endive with Blackberries and Blue Cheese.  For dessert - super simple angel food cake with frozen berries, whipped cream and toasted almonds.  I whirred the berries with a bit of liqueur in the food processor and added a bit of the same liqueur to the whipped cream.  But, the star of the show was the halibut.  This was a restaurant quality recipe.  And, shockingly, I made it almost as written.  I know, that never happens.  LOL  I'd not had the recipe handy when I made the grocery list for Connie.  So, I had him get a head of bok choy.  I used four big leaves instead of the baby bok choys.  And, we were out of lime juice so I subbed in lemon juice.  The recipe said four servings would run $27.  Wrong.  The halibut alone was $56.82.  But, it was worth every bite.

Halibut with Warm Mushroom Salad

Ingredients

6 head baby bok choy, leaves separated and washed
1/2 c water
4 T soy sauce
4 T white wine
2 t fresh ginger, minced
2 lbs halibut, divided into four pieces

for the mushroom salad:

4 T olive oil
6 c mixed mushrooms, coarsely chopped
4 T white wine
1/2 c soy sauce
6 T rice wine vinegar
1 T fresh ginger, minced
2 T chives, chopped very finely
juice of one lime

Directions:

In a large skillet - preferably one that has a lid - lay the bok choy.  Let it steam uncovered for a few minutes until it's softened just a bit.  While it's steaming, make the sauce with the soy sauce, white wine and ginger.  Then, lay a piece of fish on each leaf or piece of bok choy.  Pour the sauce over, cover and steam until the fish is flaky - about 6 minutes.  In another skillet, heat the olive oil then sauté the mushrooms.  Make the dressing and set it aside.  To plate the dish, put a fish filet with it's bok choy in the center of the plate.  Scatter some warm mushroom salad over then pour on some of the mushroom salad dressing.


The other recipe we made was for Japanese eggplant with a peanut butter sauce.  Connie got kind of a funny look on his face when he started eating it.  I said, "What's up?"  He said, "This is turd sauce."  I'm thinking ooops, he really doesn't like this stuff.  Then, he goes on to say, "You could put this on a turd and it'd taste good."  Ok then, we have turd sauce.  I'm still laughing at that one!!!

Japanese Eggplant with Peanut Soy Sauce

Ingredients:

2 eggplants, cut lengthwise into 1 1/2" thick slices
2 T peanut butter (I used crunchy since that's what we have on hand)
1 1/2 T soy sauce
1 1/2 T sake (or dry white wine)
1/2 t sugar
1/4 t chipotle chili powder

Directions:

The recipe called for steaming the eggplant slices in the microwave for 2-3 minutes, then rinsing under cold water to stop the cooking.  Then, it called for mixing the sauce in a small saucepan on medium heat for five minutes.  I first tried grilling the eggplant and when that didn't work, I sautéed it.  Next time I'll steam it! 

Eggplant Salad with Peppers, Mint and Caper-Feta Vinaigrette

Where to start...  We got most of the house done.  Parties do wonders for creating deadlines.  Big parties do even better.  Big parties with lots of folks who've never been to your house.  Well, let's just say we had incentive to get as much done as possible.  MANY boxes of wall art are still to be unpacked.  Some linens.  Connie's shoes.  But, for the most part, we're done.  And, the old house finally sold.  Closing in a month.  Hallelujah! 

Why were we having a party?  Our friends Joseph and Juan got married about a year ago.  Their friend Dave, the judge, pulled them out of the line at the City County building and took them up to his chambers and performed the marriage.  You see, there was this one day that Indiana joined the ranks of the states that allowed gay marriage.  Before another judge shut it down.  Then, it became legal again.  But, Joseph and Juan got in on that first day.  After 25 years together it felt really good for them to be married.  The interesting part of all of this is that Joseph is the chef at our favorite restaurant.  Juan is the best waiter in the world at the same restaurant.  Because we've gone to their wine dinners for so long, we've gotten to know a bunch of the other folks who go to the wine dinners.  And, for the last few years we've all been hanging out together.  Sushi on a Sunday.  A trip to Jungle Jim's followed by a pitch-in at Ed and Cynde's.  Lunch at a dive bar.  A limo up to Perkinsville for dinner at Bonge's Tavern.  These folks have become friends.  How often do you find a group of friends who hooked up because of a restaurant???  Not often, I'd imagine.  At any rate, I said to Joseph, let's have a pitch-in at our house!  That was back when I was still delirious and thought I could get all of this stuff unpacked in less time than it took to pack it.  LOL. 

July 12th was the date.  By Friday the 10th I was getting a bit panicky.  The house was not ready.  NOT ready.  By Sunday morning, I was fine.  We could do it.  And, with 20 minutes to spare we sat down to read the papers.  Amazing.  Everyone brought a dish and some wine.  We provided some champagne and a beautiful cake (thanks to Taylor's Bakery!)  Judge Dave presided over Joseph and Juan renewing their vows.  We drank great wine and ate great food. And, decided this needs to be an annual event! Here's what the party looked like:

 

Monday evening Connie played bridge.  I washed some of the wine glasses but spent most of the evening trying to get the living room computer to connect to the network so I could do the work I brought home.  Tuesday was a totally crazy day at work.  Five appointments.  Which leaves just enough time for potty breaks.  We got home and I had nothing thawed.  A couple of really fun dishes on the menu.  But, nothing to make them with.  Except for the veggies for the week's side dishes.  Tomatoes and eggplant.  And, a pile of cucumbers from a volunteer vine at the old house.  Vegetarian it was then.  Connie kept pushing me to make a dip with the eggplant.  But, I was fixated on a recipe I'd found in one of the New York Times emails.  Eggplant salad with peppers, mint and caper-feta vinaigrette.  Sounded fabulous.  The tomatoes were for tomato and goat cheese napoleons.  A recipe we had several times last summer.  And, to round out the meal, thin spaghetti with garlic oil, pasta and grated gruyere. 

What did we think?  Connie was pretty darned glad he didn't win the eggplant battle!  This was a five.  Simply amazing.  And, so simple to put together!  Toss the eggplant with olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper.  Roast it.  Cool it.  Toss it with the rest of the ingredients.  Inhale.  This is one we'll make and make again!

Eggplant Salad with Peppers, Mint and Caper-Feta Vinaigrette

Ingredients:

2 T extra virgin olive oil
1 T lemon juice
salt and pepper
one eggplant, trimmed and cut into 1" cubes (not peeled) (the recipe called for 1 3/4 lbs, but the eggplant we bought was closer to a pound)
3 oz crumbled feta cheese
1 clove garlic, minced
1 T capers
1 yellow or red bell pepper, chopped
1 c cherry tomatoes, halved
6 T extra virgin olive oil
2 T fresh lemon juice
1/4 c fresh mint, chopped

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 425F.  Toss the eggplant cubes with the 2T evoo, 1 T lemon juice, salt and pepper.  Roast for 30 minutes.  The cubes will brown just a bit.  Remove the pan from the oven and set aside to cool.  While it's cooling, mix the other ingredients.  Then, mix in the eggplant and serve.  This is a dish that'll be just happy as all get out in the fridge for a day. 

adapted from the New York Times


 

Ricotta Dip and Ratatouille

Football season.  Our Colts are now three and two.  Robert Mathis was back on the sidelines.  Andrew Luck ran in for a touchdown.  The opposing quarterback got sacked three times.  Yeah, it was a fun game.  Now, they're playing a Thursday night game and I'm beyond nervous...

Friday we met some friends at Taverna.  It's a restaurant close to  our home.  We keep meeting friends there hoping that they'll go back and take other friends.  We'd love to see the place packed.  Actually, Friday there was a MUCH better crowd than most evenings.  I had my favorite meal:  grilled wedge salad with parmesan feta dressing, kona crusted filet with red wine/chocolate sauce, mushroom rice, creamed spinach and bread pudding.  Actually, the last three are cooling their heels in the fridge.  Lunch was too late for me to be very hungry. 

Saturday I had appointments all day.  Then, we headed over to Uncle Lou's for dinner.  Lou used to office on the same floor so we got to know each other riding the elevator up and down.  He lives about five minutes away.  And, did I mention that he's a total hoot to be around?  He made fabulous poached salmon and a pasta/herb/veggie dish. 

Dessert was cannoli cake.  He had a heckuva time talking the folks at the grocery into selling him the pieces and parts of cannoli instead of the completed dish.  The cake was AHMAZING!  I took an appetizer.  Turns out one of the guests was allergic to garlic.  That limited my choices.  Fortunately, I was reading the latest edition of Food Network Magazine and found a ricotta dip.  It was perfect. 

Then, Sunday was the Colts game.   I got up really early and worked for a few hours before it was time to leave.  Then, during timeouts and halftime I thought about dinner and the next week's lunches.  What did we have?  Leftover ricotta dip.  That'd make great homemade ravioli.  With a lemon cream and asparagus sauce.  That'd also take a LOT of time.  We had about ten basil plants to pluck and make pesto with.  There were also about half a dozen little eggplants I'd picked before the threat of frost.  Those would make great ratatouille. 

And, there was white rice from last week's garlic chicken and pork fried rice carryout.  That'd make great fried rice with mushrooms, carrots, celery and zucchini.

We also had Uncle Lou's leftover pasta.  But, that was earmarked for Monday evening when Connie was playing bridge and we needed a super quick dinner. 

Around our house, leftovers are lunches and revised dinners.  We work seven days a week so being smart about cooking is important.

So, let's talk about recipes.  Ratatouille first.  It's one of those dishes I like to make a lot of and freeze in pint containers for lunches.  I love that it's so incredibly flexible...

Ratatouille

Ingredients:

2 T olive oil
1 large eggplant, peeled and diced
1 large yellow onion, diced
2 zucchini or yellow squash, diced
1 green pepper, diced (optional)
6 oz button or cremini mushrooms, diced (optional)
2 ribs celery, diced (optional)
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 T Italian seasoning
1 8 oz can V8
salt and pepper

Directions:

In a large saucepan, heat olive oil to shimmering.  Add vegetables and sauté until softened.  Add V8 and simmer for about 2 hours.  This is a dish that needs to simmer for a long time.  Add more V8 if you want to keep it moist enough.  I think it's better served the next day.


Ricotta Dip

Ingredients:

2 lb container of ricotta cheese (NOT lowfat)
zest of 2 lemons
thyme (2-4 teaspoons)
rosemary (2-4 teaspoons, chopped finely)
crushed red pepper (1/4 - 1/2teaspoon)
1 c finely grated parmesan cheese
1-2 T extra virgin olive oil

Directions:

Mix the ricotta, lemon zest, thyme, rosemary and crushed red pepper.  Put the cheese in a baking dish.  Sprinkle with the shredded parmesan.  Bake at 350 until bubbling.  Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil.  Serve with sliced, toasted baguette or really good crunchy crackers (we like Triscuit.)

adapted from FoodNetwork Magazine

Savory Muffin Tin Bread Puddings and Eggplant with Feta and Honey

Connie likes tomatoes.  I LOVE tomatoes.  Therefore, at this time of year I'm just kind of getting tired of them.  He's ready to move on.  His least favorite foods, soup and fruit would be fine alternatives.  Just please turn down the level of the tomatoes.  Well, except for the BLT's.  Those have bacon you know.  That makes up for a LOT of food problems.  I suppose if I wrapped these beautiful Indiana peaches in bacon he'd be happier.  Or, maybe I could put a bit of bacon in the gazpacho?  Whatever.  It was time for a break from the tomatoes.  I'd seen a recipe for savory bread pudding with sausage in it.  I'd bought the sausage and sour dough bread.  All was good except for the fact that I couldn't find the recipe.  I went back through all the magazines in the car.  Nada.  Checked all the cookbooks I'd been reading in the car, family room and on my bedside table.  Nada.  Well, I didn't check ALL the cookbooks.  I omitted the cocktail one.  Then, I realized the cover said Cocktails and Appetizers.  Ah hah!  There it was. 

Connie'd cut out a recipe for eggplant, feta, honey and thyme.  That'd be perfect with this.  And, no tomatoes.  I read the recipe thru and just had to add some grated gruyere.  About 1/2 - 3/4 c of grated cheese.  Because the bread puddings cooked at 325 and the eggplant was supposed to roast at 400, the eggplant went on the grill.  It was probably more brown that it was supposed to be but still tasted fabulous.  The bread puddings?  Five out of five.  I'm not a huge fan of those bread stratas.  The kind the family serves every Christmas morning.  I find them gummy and tasteless and try and grab a corner so there's at least something I'm semi happy to eat.  These are cooked in muffin tins with nice crusty bread.  Read, chewy.  Yummy and chewy.  With sausage and cheese.  Yup, these were a five.  And, one of the best parts is that the leftovers are in the freezer.  They can be nuked one or two at a time and will be perfect for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Savory Muffin Tin Bread Puddings

Ingredients

8 oz sweet Italian sausage
8 oz sliced button mushrooms
1 T canola oil
1 clove garlic, crushed
2 c milk
4 eggs
1 c grated gruyere cheese
1 t Italian seasoning
1/2 t salt
1/4 t freshly ground pepper
1/2 loaf sourdough bread, cut into 1" cubes

Directions 

Preheat your oven to 325.  Crumble the sausage.  Brown and drain the sausage, mushrooms and garlic.  Beat the eggs and mix in the milk.  In a large bowl combine the sausage mixture, egg mixture, grated cheese, Italian seasoning, salt and pepper.  Use 2 1/2" muffin cups.  Coat 12 with butter.  Ladle the bread pudding in. 

Bake for about 40 minutes.  The tops will be a bit puffy and brown when they're ready.  We froze the leftovers and have found that they reheat perfectly well in a toaster oven.

 

adapted from Cocktail Time by Sandra Lee


Eggplant with Honey, Feta and Thyme

I have no idea where I got this recipe...  It's so easy.  You can either peel the eggplant ahead of time or leave the peels on and nibble around them.  Either way, slice the eggplants into 1/4" - 3/8" rounds.  Drizzle them with olive oil.  Grill both sides until they're nice and brown.  Turn off the heat to the grill, sprinkle the eggplant rounds with crumbled feta cheese and close the grill lid.  Let the cheese get happy for a few minutes.  Serve drizzled with honey and fresh thyme.

Celebrating Summer!

About a month ago I started keeping a food journal. For years I've made my menus on the back of our grocery lists.  They'd get lost.  I'd get frustrated.  There was no way to go back and find recipes I'd wanted to try but hadn't.  What my eighth grade drafting teacher would've called a mell of a hess.  Turns out one of the reps had brought me a journal.  A blank journal.  Perfect.  Now, when there are photos that I can't quite figure out I can go to the journal.  I can also keep a list of the things that need to be used up.  For example, today's list was:  chicken stock, bbq pork and beef, peaches, cabbage, corn, pesto potato salad, fresh mozzarella, panzanella salad, pickled beets, eggplant involtini, pesto, grilled zukes, rhubarb, chanterelle mushrooms, tomatoes, sweet cherries in port, meringues, eggplant spread and asparagus.  Quite the collection, eh?  I've got four dinners to plan from that.  Plus six lunches.  We'll be eating well, won't we?

Now, the other great thing about the journal is that when I make up a recipe I've got a place to record it without having to actually write a blog or create a document in Word.  Saturday evening is a great example.  Eggplant involtini was on the menu.  It's one of our favorites.  Turns out there was an old eggplant in the fridge downstairs.  It was on its last legs and there was no way I could use it for involtini.  So, I created an eggplant spread.  First I peeled and cubed the eggplant.  Then, I tossed it with olive oil and roasted it for about 25 minutes.  After that it went into the food processor with about 2 T of tahini, 2 chopped garlic cloves, 1 t of lemon juice, 1/2 t of cumin.  That all got processed.  Then, I drizzled in 2T of olive oil.  It was fabulous on some nice crackers but would be equally good on fresh veggies.  Or, on a sandwich...  It wasn't much too look at but made up for that in taste!

About the same time, I thought about the sweet cherries in the fridge.  They really needed to be used up.  And, I had two leftover egg whites.  Those got whipped with a smidge of cream of tartar and enough sugar to make a nice meringue.  I piped that mixture onto a baking sheet and baked it at 250 for 25 minutes then left them in the oven with the heat off for another hour. 

The cherries were stemmed and pitted then cooked down in a couple of teaspoons of butter. 

Once they'd softened nicely and released a bunch of juice, I added some sugar and port.  That was thickened with corn starch and served over the meringues. 

Without the journal I'd not have a clue in a month how in the world I made those.  As I type this my favorite hot curried peaches are simmering on the stove - with the addition of a couple of cups of chopped rhubarb and a bit more brown sugar to offset the tart rhubarb. 

Shredded cabbage is draining for cole slaw.  I'm not sure if we'll be trying a new recipe or going back to one of the old faithfuls- Mrs Huber's slaw or barbecue slaw.  Mom got me a cookbook titled, "How to Cook a  Porcupine" at the church rummage sale and there's an interesting slaw recipe there so I may have to try something new.  (nb - it wound up being new/old with a regular creamy cole slaw and a 4oz jar of pimentos tossed in)

Connie wants leftover eggplant involtini for dinner.  I kind of wanted to do just bbq favorites.  But, we can do both within reason. 

See the serving from Saturday?  Two eggplant rolls...  For our bbq dinner we each had half a roll.

Tomorrow we'll have Caprese salad and pesto pasta for dinner.  Lots of basil.  Reminds me that I saw a fun basil butter corn recipe on Food 52.  Might try that tonight...  Then again, maybe not. 

Now, before I post this, I've got to add that the Caprese salad was fabulous.  In addition to the usual suspects of sliced tomatoes, basil, fresh mozzarella, extra virgin olive oil and balsamic glaze, I added a smidge of lemon salt.

Along with the salad we had some pesto pasta, sautéed mushrooms and some onions from our garden.  I've never had better onions!  They were sautéed with butter and salt and stole the show.  We each ate about half of our pasta but cleaned up our onions!