partners in crime......

So, every time I sit down at the computer to add a new blog, I have a little help...

There she sits...The queen bee, in between the screen and my keyboard..... such an inspiration!  And then there is Lucy...

She, of course being the new addition to the family, knows her place in the scheme of things..... on the floor at my feet!

The things we do to stay positive....

So, I must admit I am a bit stressed tonight, staring down my procedure tomorrow, so I try to think of what to do that will make me relax.... cook!  A no-brainer....

I have alot of zucchini in my fridge from my early morning farmer's market run in Boston on Saturday, so I try to figure out how to make it a main course.  Besides the zucchini, I also have leftover bolognese sauce from last night.  Zucchini + bolognese sauce = some kind of lasagna.  Rut roh... here we go.

I blanched a bunch of zucchini, heated up the sauce from last night, and quickly cooked some raviolis (to use for the pasta and ricotta cheese part of lasagna).

I have to tell you, the sauce with the lamb in it makes this dish and the one last night delicious...  I start layering everying:  sauce, zucchini, raviolis, cheese, sauce, zucchini.....

Finish off with sauce and cheese and into the oven....

I have to say, this had to be the easiest, yummiest meal.  And as far as leftovers go.... I am SO having this heated up for lunch tomorrow!

Just please tell me that you will make your meat sauce with beef, lamb, carrots, celery, onion, crushed tomatoes, thyme, garlic, red wine, and heavy cream (using chicken broth if it gets too thick).  This is the BEST SAUCE EVER!!!!  Wish me luck tomorrow...I'll need all the prayers I can get!

Stand-by Dinner

Probably should have done this one this dinner first, see as it was Saturday night.... Oh well, better late than never!  So, Saturday was a day to go through old files and throw stuff away... I hate clutter with a passion, and have been chipping away at a bunch of saved stuff.  So, needless to say, I was thrown into dinner time unprepared!  Went to my "pantry" and found some chicken thighs.  Decided this dinner was going to be a tried-and-true quickie because we had to head out at 7:00...drowned the thighs in Mr. Yashida's wonderful sauce and after an hour, on the grill they went.   In the mean time, I pan seared some potatoes and roasted some asparagus....

     

  

This dinner is what I call my "stand-by" dinner....good every time!  

been thinkin about this dinner since yesterday....

About a month ago, we went to a local establishment, Porter Cafe, for a quick bite.  The special was pasta with bolognese sauce.  Now, if I were in the North End, I would have jumped all over that sauce, but West Roxbury???  well, I figured I would take the chance.  It had to have been one of the best sauces I have ever had.  I spoke to the chef, of course!, and he actually told me the recipe!  Since that night, I have made it twice. The first time it came out amazing.  So, are you ready for this? Cook ground beef and lamb.  Then cook onion, carrots, celery, and thyme.   Add crushed tomatoes, s&p, red wine, chicken broth if too thick.  At the end, add heavy cream and parm cheese.

The flavor of this sauce is amazing.....truly memorable!  I spooned some over plain pasta for my daughter, the rest went over spinach ravioli...

I swear it is the thyme and lamb that makes this sauce!  The second time I made it, I used ground pork instead of lamb, and it just didn't taste as good!  So, there you go....You need to taste it as you go along....

So, early Saturday morning, we ventured into downtown Boston to the produce market.  It is a bit early in the season for this, but it was amazing what they had!

  

I got some ginger root, fresh rosemary, parsley, egg plant, baby zucchini, cherry tomatoes, oranges, and boxes of strawberries.  Everything was $1 each!  Alot of stuff was overly ripe, but if you knew what to look for, it was a bargain!  Will make eggplant parm tomorrow...Hope I am feeling up to it!

ox

the brown dinner.....

So sorry I have been away!  Three days in a row I have been out to dinner, and I have to say, restaurants really need to sample their meals before they serve them!  There HAS to be flavor, personality, taste involved with your meal you are serving someone....it just seems like such a natural thing to think about! I am soooo totally disheartened....

Oh well, sorry.  This is just such a sore spot with me!  I have been introduced to a few restaurants that have been amazing.. truly dreamy meals!  which is the way it should be when you got out to eat!  A treat that gives you a night off from cooking.  It should definitely be the norm!

So, the title tonight is a brown dinner.... my risotto was made with beef broth, carmelized onions, bella mushrooms that were warmed by the hot risotto, and seasoned with a sprinkle of parm cheese and anyone that truly knows me will know that taragon will surely finish it off with perfect flavor!

I decided to make pork tenderloin medalions tonight...I guess back by popular demand.  They are truly individual nuggets of deliciousness!. Decided to make mushroom risotto to go with it.   My ingrediants are bella mushrooms, vidalia onion, pine nuts, beef broth, garlic, and shallots.

The risotto was simmering away in beef broth......

When it had totally absorbed the broth, I started on the pork.  Sliced, coated with ceasar dressing and dipped in seasoned flour, I cooked each one to perfection....

Sprinkled with tarragon and parm cheese....

Risotto with pine nuts, warmed bella mushrooms, and a little parm cheese....oh, and I had to add a touch of tarragon, only because it is my all time favorite flavor...

As  I said at the beginning.... a brown dinner!  no time for any veggies tonight, but no one seemed to miss them except me! 

So there you have it.  We didn't eat til about 8:30 but it was well worth the wait!  This meal is definitely a lot of work, but well worth it!  ox

Take the bad with the good....

After a long week of work, CSS Profiles and FAFSA apps, we thought we would go out for a bite to eat, considering that no one was home!  We found this restaurant in Hyde Park that had changed hands since the last time we ate there.  After sitting down, they brought over this poor loaf of bread with olive oil dumped all over it...

Didn't make too much sense to me....cut the bread, get oil all over your hands?  Oh well, I stayed away from that.  This was the first restaurant that I could not find one thing that sounded good on the menu!  Was going to go with a burger...figured that was safe!  Bob said why not go with mac and cheese because I always love that!  It said Gourmet 4 cheese macaroni with sausage.  So.....I went with it.

This is my dish when I was finished!  Seriously?  Where was the cheese?  It was as if they threw it in the oven with some mozzarella sprinkled on top and 4 pieces of sausage.  Like I said, seriously?

I can't stand going out to dinner and having a meal that I could never prepare and feed to someone, let alone pay for it!  When asked if I wanted to wrap it up, I said No, thank you!  

So, last night my Skidmore daughter came home for the weekend.  Poor thing doesn't eat enough protein, living with non-meat eaters!  So, this was a no brainer!  Rib eye steak on the grill, ginger jasmine rice and roasted brussel sprouts (my usual!)

Sometimes practicality over rules creativity!  She was thrilled with dinner, so there you go!  Sunday dinner?  Turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce.... the works!  Enjoy the rest of the weekend and eat well!

Tuesday night with nothin but a bunch of wrinkled red peppers.....

Sorry for the late post! I really thought I had done this one last night. Guess I got too sleepy! Anyway, I had about 5 red peppers in my fridge (thanks to my son.. he buys them for some vitamin benefit, but never seems to eat them all!), that were getting extremely wrinkled. I knew he would NEVER eat them because of how they looked! So, I had to come up with some way to use them up........ pepper steak! why not? I had some steak tips in the freezer that I could defrost and slice up. I have a really easy recipe that calls for peppers, onions, steak, soy sauce, and canned tomato soup. So easy! cook the steak in a hot pan, cook the peppers and onions, fresh garlic, and then quick steam the broccoli.. Fold everything together, add soy sauce, white wine, and rice vinegar.

I cooked some rice, but you could serve this with noodles, polenta, or whatever you like!

Sad Tuesday!

Sorry guys..... today turned out to be a bust for me.....literally! Had a repeat mammo and it turns out they want me to go in for more tests.... SHIT! This is the news you never want to hear. So, I come home and put a pot on to boil. I turn on the Forman grill, throw some sweet Italian sausages on, and boil some pasta. Open a jar of really yummy Napolitana sauce by Barilla, and poof! Instant meal with no character....no me!

Like I said, I am sorry to disappoint. I promise tomorrow will be much better. Hope y'all have a wonderful yummy night...

Thought I would close with a really cute picture of my kitten right before we brought her in to the vet to get spayed this morning...

She did really well and is a trooper.... We are so glad the moaning and howling will stop!

Precious girl..... hope she bounces back!

Marathon dinner truly a marathon dinner! ate at 8:00!

Today was a great day to have off! Went to Carson Beach in Southie....baked for a couple of hours, truly relaxing! Came home and had a hankerin' for some grilled chicken. I wanted a new marinade so off I went to the internet. Thank God for Google! A little bit of this and a little bit of that, and BAM! Instant delish! Here's what I did....

I marinated my chicken thighs in the following:

1/4 cup soy sauce

1/4 cup white wine or sherry

1/4 cup of brown sugar

3 tbs. lemon juice

1 clove garlic crushed

1 tbs. chopped fresh ginger (the killer ingrediant!)

1/4 tsp ground black pepper

1 sweet vidalia onion, sliced

I marinated for only an hour cuz that's all I had!

Threw everything on the grill...

Broiled some broccoli with lemon juice, s&p, white wine and olive oil, and made some pine nut rice pilaf...

I have to say, this dinner came out delish!

Put it all together and... voila!

At this point, I am spent!!! am going to watch the rest of the Bruins, now that my dishes and blog are done! Hope you have a wonderful night and got to bed feeling full and happy! Have no idea what tomorrow's dinner will be!!!

Who Ever Heard of Braised Lamb Shanks on Sunday Night?

Ok, so I don't know why I am constantly on the lookout for Lamb shanks, possibly because I love them so much and have such fond memories of my mom making them way back when.... Regardless, I found me some not too long ago and had a hankerin for them today! Braised...... browned on all sides, into a pot.... cook onions, carrots, leeks, garlic....into the pot, 1 bottle of red wine and water added to cover, and cook the heck out of them! 3+ hours. Made garlic mashed and roasted green beans...

You can't really see the shanks, but they are definitely "meat falls off the bone!" Below are my "famous" garlic mashed potatoes.... the secret ingrediants? Sour cream, cream cheese, and parm cheese.... to go along with the butter and garlic... I've had people come back 3 and 4 times for more of these suckers!

And the finished product:

So, I am washing the dishes and scrubbing the pans, when I see my only daughter living at home, craving a chocolate dessert....not just chocolate, but something with liquid chocolate! So I think, Lava Cake...... chocolate with liquid chocolate inside, easy and quick.... so, no problem!

Well, there you have it..... Sunday dinner at the Lawlers....Hope you all enjoyed this amazing summer day! can't wait to crank up the grill and fire table! ox

Good night for soup!

Well, I spent the day today, recovering from our huge Jesuit GALA which was last night. I registered about 1100 folks, then watched them all eat dinner and enjoy our presentation. Sooooo much work......all the details and planning. I am so relieved it is over! So, after all that, I just felt like a bowl of soup and some grilled garlic bread tonight!

It's funny.... I started making this sausage soup after I had it at Bertucci's. Their soup is basically chicken stock, rice, sausage, and tomato. I decided to kick it up a notch, so I add fresh spinach, garlic, onion, parm cheese and a sprinkle of crushed red pepper. The fam seemed happy with it, so I guess they will keep me around for yet another meal!

Now, what to make for dinner tomorrow...............

Working with Easter leftovers....

Well, I certainly misgauged how much pasta salad to make on Sunday! I figured, with about 15 kids and 6 adults, all mostly over 6' tall, that they would eat a ton. Besides the traditional ham and a turkey breast, I made meatballs, bought bagels, and made this huge pasta salad (2 lbs of pasta!), thinking all these kids must have hollow legs....

Well, everything pretty much got eaten, except for my pasta salad! I don't know....maybe they just weren't in the mood for it? Let's face it. It's only April, and folks usually have a hankerin' for pasta salad in the summer, so.....maybe that's why. Anyway, I have a ton of leftover cooked pasta that I need to use somehow! So, here you go...

So I get home from work at around 7:30 and have to figure out dinner.... quick! I decide to "regift" the cooked pasta into a dinner. I cook some Vidalia onion, red pepper, garlic, s&p, basil and some parm cheese. I thaw some cooked shrimp and cut up. Throw in some black olives and a partial can of tomato and basil bisque soup I had open in the fridge. Now I add the leftover pasta salad, which consists of pasta, tomatoes, fresh basil, artichoke hearts and fresh mozerella. I know it sounds wierd, but when you see the end result, you'll understand!

Pretty tricky..... They'll never know they are somehow eating leftovers!

Mussels from Heaven

I was out shopping at BJ's for Easter meal stuff, when I stumbled across a counter where they were sellin mussels for $2 a pound..... how could I resist? Now I knew what I was going to make for dinner! I made up this brothy sauce out of onions, tomatoes, loads of garlic, white wine, chicken broth, and seasoning like rosemary, basil, thyme, and s&p. Added parm cheese and some extra tomato sauce I had in the fridge.

Dumped the mussels in and voila...

Loaf of Italian bread for dipping, and thou baby!

Next I decided I needed something else to go with this. What's better than risotto? I can't think of anything! So, away I go...

Once the risotto absorbs all the chicken broth, I roasted some broccoli with olive oil and s&p, and folded that in. Hmmmmm, it needs one more thing. For some reason rosemary ham popped into my head, so I tear a whole bunch up and put it all together...

So there you have it... Easter eve at the Lawler's house. From the looks of the folks below, me thinks they were happy!

Well, I was supposed to meet my really good friends from the Class of '76, over in Dedham (Alison, Margie, Karyl, etc...) but after a sleepless night last night, I figured I'd better come home from work, whip up dinner, and hit the hay incredibly early...

Ahhhhh, my last meatless Friday dinner in Lent! I'll tell you, unless you order pizza or cook pasta, one tends to run out of ideas of what to make that doesn't involve meat....

I honestly don't think the Christian faith intended us to eat things like lobster or shrimp on these special Friday nights.... aren't we supposed to be suffering a wee bit?

Well, tonight we are definitely not suffering! I decided to make stuffed manicottis, but instead of using pasta, I opted for making crepes... a tricky idea I am not sure where I got, but I have to tell you, they are so much better than pasta! Look.....

The crepe recipe: 4 eggs, 1/2 cup milk, 1/2 cup water, 1 cup of flour in a blender. Just blend long enough to mix everything up. Makes about 15 small crepes.

I have a small pan and pour a small amount of crepe batter, and just keep making them til the batter is gone. Then comes the best part....the stuffing: ricotta cheese, parm cheese, fresh spinach, fresh mushrooms, fresh garlic, S&P, 1 egg, and some mozerella cheese. When it's not Lent, I usually add sausage...Spoon some on each crepe, roll up and put in a pan. When done, cover with sauce, cheese, and bake for 15 minutes... I gotta tell you, it is so much more flavorful than using store bought manicotti!!!

I will post the results when they are done! What does Julia say? Bon apetit! ox

Well, everyone who ate this, said it was delish! The bad thing about making this, is that no matter how much I make, there are never any leftovers! I have to say it really did come out good!

Pork Tenderloin is so user friendly!!!

Tonight I decided to cook one of my favorites.... stuffed pork tenderloin. My stuffing always seems to come out the same, although tonight I added some leftover ginger jasmine rice I had in the fridge. That, along with a little Pepperidge Farm stuffing mix, fresh spinach, craisins, fresh garlic, parm cheese, almonds, thyme, S&P, fresh mushrooms (not cooked) and sauteed onion.

Then I butterflied the tenderloins, stuffed them and cooked them. Yum... also roasted some beans and brussel sprouts, and voila! instant dinner at about 8:15! Oh well, I must work on my timing!

Tonight was a cooking "night off" for me. My sister and I get together once a week for dinner, so we can catch up on whatever...I decided to atleast give you something to look at! These are all cakes I decorated for my kids. So this first cake was from the show Kelsey worked on at Noble and Greenough. I tried to copy the picture on the program!

This cake was again for Kelsey and was when she loved the HBO show Pushing Daisies. So.... not knowing what to decorate her cake with, I chose the show. You can hopefully see the picture from the show stuck into the cake!

I thought this cake was really cool. No matter where you stood in the room, it looked like this guy was looking right at you! Jillian loved the Avatar series. I found one of the DVD covers that had a cool picture of one of the characters and decided to try to copy it.