Farsi Chicken and Grilled Peppers

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Sunday Dinner – 26 August 2018

Chicken and Peppers

We’re celebrating Aunt Pat’s birthday this week, so we made barbecue chicken for Sunday Dinner. Last weekend I told her the story of our Farsi Chicken recipe, so Claudia and I decided to go with that. Luckily this time I was vigilant, and didn’t burn it to a crisp.

Claudia made Basmati rice with Garam Masala, and we also grilled some peppers as a side. I made two of our favorite Wisconsin Supper Club appetizers, marinated olives and marinated mushrooms, and also churned up some lemon custard ice cream for dessert. The wine was an exceptional 2010 Côtes du Rhône.

Everything turned out just about right.

Filed Under: Memorable Meals

Deutsche Senfbraten

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Sunday Dinner – 19 August 2018

Senfbraten

Still clearing out the freezer, so I decided to make pork roast with mustard gravy this week from a five pound pork loin.

The recipe came from The Daring Gourmet. Essentially, you slather the roast with mustard, brown it in a Dutch Oven, add some aromatics, wine and broth, and cook it at 325 for three hours. When everything comes out, you add a flour and stock slurry and simmer to thicken the gravy.

This is the sort of simple, savory food that my mother would have prepared when I was a child. I don’t remember her ever cooking this particular recipe, but the flavors brought back memories nonetheless.

Grampy’s 80th birthday is coming up in a few days, and he does love his pork, so I figured it would be a fitting dinner this weekend.

Aunt Pat had other family obligations today, so she didn’t join us, but we did have a chance to get together with her and Claudia’s cousins, Dan and Monica (and Monica’s husband, Ron) Saturday evening for a bit.

We served a Columbia Valley Riesling from Aldi’s with the Senfbraten, and I went easy on it because I may have been overserved Saturday night. It rarely happens, but it does happen. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Grammy brought a super delicious cherry pie for dessert.

Filed Under: Memorable Meals

Pork Chops and Hasselback Bakers

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Sunday Dinner -12 August 2018

Pork Chops Hasselback Potaotes

This was a simple, delicious meal. We had some pork chops in the freezer, so I decided to use one of my favorite brines for pork from Vrobel. We were out of Bourbon, so I used dark rum in the brine, and also omitted the glaze.

For the Hasselback Potatoes, we used bakers. I made slits in them 1/8th inch apart, sprayed them with olive oil, and sprinkled with onion powder, garlic powder, salt and pepper. They went into a pan on the grill over indirect heat for 30 minutes, then got hit with olive oil again, roasted another 20 minutes, then I put them over direct heat for another 15. I’d put some cloves of garlic in olive oil in the bottom of the pan as well.

The pork chops were on for maybe twenty-five minutes total over direct heat. Claudia cooked some corn that had been put away last year, and made a nice fresh green salad. She also baked a banana cake from scratch earlier in the day for dessert.

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Chicken Vesuvio

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Chicken Vesuvio

This made a delicious meal, and only took about an hour from start to finish.

Although the traditional steakhouse version uses bone-in thigh quarters or half chickens, I used boneless skinless breasts so I didn’t have to worry about crisping the skin. I cut two 3/4 pound breasts into sixths, seasoned with garlic powder, salt and pepper, and browned for five minutes per side in a skillet with some olive oil. I removed the chicken and sautéed the halves of maybe ten small Yukon Gold potatoes cut side down for ten minutes. After removing the potatoes, I added a teaspoon each of oregano and thyme, a little salt, plus two pressed cloves of fresh garlic to the pan, and cooked until they were fragrant (less than a minute). Then I added 3/4 cup of Sauvignon Blanc to deglaze, and a cup or two of chicken broth. Then the chicken and potatoes went back in the pot to simmer for maybe half-an-hour. Finally, I reserved those to a platter, and finished the pan sauce with a little butter and a cup of frozen peas that had been thawed.

The only complaints were that there should have been more peas, and the potatoes were a little unevenly done. Next time I’ll double the peas, and maybe cut the potatoes in fourths instead of halves.

Chicken was done and flavors were perfect, though.

Filed Under: Quick Weeknight Meals Tagged With: ,

Grilled Veggie Sandwiches

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Sunday Dinner – 5 August 2018

This week we grilled a bunch of veggies and made sandwiches.

Neither of us can remember precisely when, or why, we started making this particular meal, but we know that it goes back at least a decade to when we were living in Mattoon, Illinois. It’s basically a huge mess of vegetables, grilled in batches and put between bread with cheese and returned to the grill to get gooey.

We included eggplant, Portabello Mushrooms, zucchini, red and orange peppers, red onions and tomato slices. These were all seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic powder and Herbs de Provence, and grilled with liberal spritzes of olive oil. Once they were grilled, Claudia and Aunt Pat assembled them with Provolone slices between the halves of three loaves of Italian Bread, and wrapped them in aluminum foil, and then we put them back out on the Weber Genesis to warm through. Datsa Sanguige!

Prepping Sandwiches

We also grilled some halved nectarines for a few minutes, then topped them with Mascarpone, Balsamic Vinegar and honey before taking them out to finish.

Aunt Pat also brought a delicious lemon meringue pie for dessert.

We served a couple of bottles of rosé (once from Lodi and one from France) with the meal. Mrs. Noe and I aren’t huge fanatics for blush wines, but I do like them every now and then in hot weather (which was certainly a feature of this weekend).

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