What are you having for dinner? (wanna share your recipe?)

[Friday]

Basic Asian Dressing - For Salads

Equal parts
- Soy Sauce
- Sugar
- Rice Vinegar
- Neutral Oil (2 parts if noodle salad)

- DASH sesame oil, a small dash, sesame oil is flavor on steroids
- (optional) Sesame Seeds, mostly for pretty / helps innthe shaking

Fancied Up
- Ginger & Garlic (to taste, go wild)
- Chinese Hot Mustard & Honey (to taste, essentially a squirt of each)
- Half parts Pineapple Juice & White Vinegar (sweet & sour)
- Sriacha (bit of a kick to it!)
- Sriacha & Plum (Vietnamese kick)
- Dollup of peanut butter & coconut milk & squirt of lime (Thai)
- 1 part Korean BBQ sauce (bonzer on sweet pork salads)

Oil Choices
I usually use Saffola, but here are some others I’ve experimented with
(never use olive oil :wtf: it challenges the gag reflex )
- Rice Bran Oil (Japanese oomph, I save mine for gyoza & such)
- Grape Seed Oil (Lively/Bright, hates ginger)
- Soybean Oil (heavy, thick, substantial... sticks to my teeth which annoys me)
- Sunflower Oil (nutty)
- Peanut Oil (peanutty ;))

I generally make a part about 1/2 cup / 75ml... and keep in a mason jar in the fridge (lasts for weeks) and fancy up whatever I’m about to use, as I’m using it, in a small dish.

 

[littleoc]

That sounds amazing with peanut oil :0!!

 

[Teasel]

Basic Asian Dressing - For Salads

Saving this, thanks

 

[Friday]

I make this for the kiddo’s NYD brunch most years (used to be for me, too, but as I can’t eat eggs it’s just for others now), it’s a smashing way to use up the last little bit of leftover champagne...

This recipe is assuming you already know how to make scrambled eggs. If not? Google first.

Champagne Scrambled Eggs w/ Chantrelle Mushrooms
(Or with Smoked Salmon & Crème fraîche)
(Or Strawberries & Chive)

Eggs
Champagne*
Chanterelle Mushrooms
Butter
Shallots
Parsley
Nutmeg
Salt/ Pepper
Chives
(Optional) Cream
(Optional) bit of minced garlic added to chanterelles cooking doesn’t go amiss

-or-
(Minus Mushrooms ... Cold Smoked Salmon, Crème fraîche)
(Minus Mushrooms ... Fresh strawberry slices, cracked pepper, and extra chives)

Spoiler: Long version

Notes

Spoiler: Long version

Use about as much champagne as you’d use cream or milk. Few table spoons for one serving, half a cup or more for large servings. One can also add just a little tiny bit of cream to the eggs when beating them, but I’m fairly lazy, and usually don’t.

Most important note is save adding champagne to the very last moment to super-fluffy your eggs. Unless you’ve left the cork off all night, in which case it still tastes lovely, but the super-fluffy component will be missing. Unless you’re feeling perky and want to make a meringue / stiff peaks of your whites, & fold in the yolks, but this recipe is mostly for the non-perky (and slightly seedy, whilst the horribly hung over should do the sautéd sausage pepper potato scramble) using up leftovers, and taking shortcuts ;)

Last note... I usually aim for omelettes, but after a long night out, followed by rising early with kids? Let’s face it... by keeping the name “scrambled” in the expectations, we aren’t setting impossible standards.

- mix up your eggs, and add a small pinch of nutmeg
- sauté the chanterelles in butter, minced shallots, salt & pepper
- Set aside mushrooms but don’t wash the pan if you want the extra flavour (but rustic looking eggs, wipe out the pan if you prefer prettier eggs unstained by mushroom juices)
- Add a little more butter to the pan, and as it foams turn temp down to med low & pour in eggs.
- Slowly pour in champagne and watch it foam up crazy like :D
(my fav part) give a slight stir after a moment
- When it’s ready to flip, feel free to give it a bash, (and if you succeed place mushrooms & herbs, Creme & lox, or strawberries, black pepper, and chives down then center, fold over, & plate)
- or just say screw it, toss in your mushrooms and herbs, scramble, & plate

(save other two *options* and add to plate once eggs are cooked, as the creme will melt & salmon get greasy, or strawberries turn your eggs pinkish orange), stir about to finish cooking scramble, and plate.

***

If using strawberries? Scatter over plated eggs & Crack over some black pepper (it’s absoltely bizarre how much strawberries love black pepper) and make festive with chives over the top.

If using creme & salmon? Plate eggs, lay salmon, dollup with creme, scatter chives, & bliss out.

 

[Friday]

Sausage Pepper Potato Scamble
(Hangover Cure #212)

If you have access to the Jimmy Dean premade bag of this? For the love of Mike, use it! If not?

(( same token... Make up the everything but the eggs in advance of a night out drinking, freeze, break out the morning after. Just cook the frozen part first, scoot over to half the pan, pour in eggs, let set a minute, scramble, and eat. Bonus points for putting it in a bowl before eating ))

Half a dozen or more eggs, beaten together in a bowl
Breakfast sausage
Chopped green & red peppers
Chopped onion
Chopped potatoes or home fries (ie chopped potatoes :rolleyes: )
Olive oil
Salt & pepper

- Fry potatoes in oil, and set aside
- Brown sausage,
- Add onion & peppers to sausage & cook till translucent (or slightly charred, this is a hangover cure, after all, time gets wobbly, and there’s nothing wrong with caramelized onions).
- Add potatoes back in
- Scoot over to half the pan
- Pour eggs in other half of pan, and allow to set a minute or three
- Gove the whole thing a stir to combine & finish cooking eggs.

 

[intothelight]

Spicy Cuban Black Beans

2-4 cloves of garlic minced
1 large shallot
12 cherry tomatoes halved
3-4 cups of spinach
Large can of black beans rinsed
2 cups of long grain rice
Goat peppers or other pepper to taste
Cumin
Kosher Salt
Red Pepper
Chili Pepper
Fresh Cilantro
Fresh or canned diced pineapple

Start a pot of boiling water and cook rice. While the rice is cooking, in a skillet add minced garlic and diced shallot. Cook until tender,and add tomatoes until they blister, Add salt, peppers, and spinach. When spinach is wilted add in the beans, and add spices to your taste. When the rice is done stir is in with the cilantro. Garnish with some of the pineapple.

 

[Teasel]

Tried a few new recipes today & yesterday. Mixed results :laugh: One I messed up due to lack of concentration & Mr chewing my ear off (He talks non stop). One because I think the recipe wasn't all that great.

But one was delicious! Shall make again.

Bean Salad with Hazelnuts
Serves 4 - 6
500g French Beans
50g Roasted Hazlenuts
2 shallots, finely sliced
1 tbsp chopped parsley
1 tbsp chopped tarragon
1 baby gem lettuce shredded
3 tbsp classic vinaigrette
Salt & pepper

For the vinaigrette
20ml white wine vinegar
Salt
100ml olive oil
1/2 tsp dijon mustard
(Mix salt in vinegar then mix in other ingredients)

Simmer the beans for 4 minutes then refresh them in iced water.

Mix everything in a bowl.

 

[blackemerald1]

Thanks @Belinda! I'm way into salads right now but it's been very boring. That recipe sounds yum.. I'm going to try it. I could change the hazelnuts for another kind of nut.. couldn't I?

 

[Teasel]

Course you can @blackemerald1 :)

 

[Lucycat]

Shepherd's pie tonight. Simples!

 

[Friday]

Chicken Chow Mein / Lo Mein (Yankee style ;) IE I used spaghetti!)

This chick totally cracks me up because she cooks like I do (here are the ratios and how to screw with it, using the same things, 6 different ways).

There are only 2.5 differences in her recipe and mine...
- for light soy sauce (which I never buy) I use half regular soy sauce half Agi Mirin and a dash of sugar
- Instead of Chinese noodles, I nearly always use Italian (thin spaghetti or cappelini)
- If I don’t have Shaoxing Wine I sub Sherry instead of Sake (works in reverse, too, for recipes calling for sherry, these 2 things are weirdly close to each other... frequently makes me wonder if sherry & shaoxing are a Silk Road thing, and if so? Which came first!)

Chow Mein | RecipeTin Eats

Real Chinese All Purpose Stir Fry Sauce | RecipeTin Eats

 

[Friday]

Sweet & Sour (Chicken)

Sauce
1 cup pineapple juice.
1/2 cup packed brown sugar.
1/2 cup rice vinegar.
1/4 cup ketchup.
1 tablespoon soy sauce.
3 drops red food coloring
1 tablespoon cornstarch + 2 tablespoons water.
(Optional)
1 cup chopped pineapple
1/4 cup chopped green pepper
(Sub)
Plum sauce instead of ketchup + an extra dash of sugar
Tamarind jam instead of ketchup + an extra dash of sugar

Heat for a few minutes on the stove or zap in the microwave. Same results. Which is so rarely true that I love nuking it in the mason jar I’ll be storing leftovers in, just because it saves me a pan to wash.

Chicken
In parenthesis above because what I actually did was grab a bag of frozen deep fried chicken (TraderJoes Orange Chicken in this case, saving the other sauce for later), bake at 400F/200C for 20 minutes, plate and ladle sauce over. Yay! EasyEasy.

Starting from go?

Boneless Skinless Chicken Thighs
Tempura Batter + a few tablespoons of wheat flour (color & crunch booster)
Oil for deep frying or shallow frying
Salt

- Third a packet of boneless skinless chicken thighs (cut off small end, cut large end in half)
- dip in batter and deep fry or shallow fry in batches until crust is golden brown and internal temp = 180F / 80C
- Drain on paper towels and salt lightly
- Either use immediately, or allow to cool, ziplock bag & freeze for later use (bake at 400F / 200C for about 20 minutes).

I refuse to deep fry indoors, and it’s dangerous to deep fry in the rain so I only ever do this in the summer. Which means I’ll often do batches of 20-25 pounds (about 10kg) of chicken thighs at a time. I didn’t do that this summer. So TraderJoes Chicken it is! :p