Sherry – Page 24 – Rosemary and the Goat

Peanut Zucchini and Cucumber Spiralized Salad

Isn’t this a beautiful spiralized salad.

Wow, my blog caught up with me. I had this salad ready to post but had not written anything about it. We had an earlier than I thought trip to Austin to welcome our new grandson (#6). Our daughter was in labor all of about 30 minutes before delivering little Frankie. He’s just the cutest thing.

Then we had a trip to Missouri to check on my mother-in-law and spent a week there, all the time I never looked back at my post to see what was coming up.

So, here’s my newest salad using my spiralizer. I kind of put the device back in my closet and forgot about it until one weekend we had friends over and I thought how good a refreshing salad would be made with cucumbers and zucchini.

March 18, 2017 By Sherry

Appetizers/ Entree/ Poultry

Crispy Buffalo Wings with Two Sauces

Who doesn’t love chicken wings?

I love, love, love chicken wings. Put a bone in it and I like it. Pork chop bones; great to try and get all the meat off it, chicken necks (yes, fried chicken necks; that’s the best part of the chicken.), and those crispy little wings. My favorite part of the wing is actually the flat part and not the little drummy part.

Seems like years ago when people made buffalo wings they put a flour coating on them kind of like KFC and then I started seeing “naked” wings advertised. I don’t like the wings tossed with the sauce; too messy and sticky to eat. So, when we go to our favorite place, I ask for extra crispy wings with sauce on the side. One reason I ask for extra crispy besides that is the way I like them is that you are getting fresher wings and not something that’s been sitting back in the kitchen soaking up all that hot sauce.

I have a confession and this is hard to admit. I love celery with either blue cheese or ranch dressing but when I order it at our wing place, they give you a container of dressing and like 5 short pieces of celery. I eat as much celery with my wings as I do the wings. So now when I know we are going there, I take a bag of celery sticks (a lot), I order one dressing/celery and when I finish their celery, I take out my own and put on the plate. I know, that is pretty cheap of me but I’m not spending six bucks to get as much celery as I want. Ok, I guess I am cheap.

March 12, 2017 By Sherry

Beef/Veal/ Entree

Stir-Fry Beef and Japanese Noodles

What is easier than a stir-fry?

This dish started off as a sous vide steak. What’s a sous vide steak you say? Look at the link I just gave you because Chef Steps can explain it better than I can.

The Joule sous vide was a xmas gift from son, Scott and so far I’ve cooked an egg, steaks two different times and some coconut custards. In case you didn’t read the definition, sous vide is a way of cooking food in a bag in water. The pan or even plastic container is set on the counter, not the stove, and using an app on the phone, the thickness of the steak and desired degree of doneness is chosen and once you click set (1 1/2 hours) you walk away and don’t look back. Literally, you do not have to give it another look and my medium rare doneness that I chose was perfect. After removing from the zip-lock back, I simply gave it a quick sear on all sides in a hot skillet and it was ready to eat.

March 6, 2017 By Sherry

Soup

Tuscan Tortellini Soup

Feel better with some soup!

I love making soup and cool weather or not, if I feel the urge, there may be a pot of something on my stove.

It’s a wonder we don’t stay sick all the time here in Texas. I just took a look at the weather channel for a 30 day plus outlook. Well, our temperatures may be 60’s, 70’s and 80’s for the next three months. We were 80 here just a couple of weeks ago and next week it’s up and down all week. The freezes we had this winter killed about 1/4 of our plants outside even though they were covered. We aren’t used to more than one night below freezing in a row and if we get that the plants start to droop and say “bye bye, make a better choice next time.”

February 27, 2017 By Sherry

Appetizers/ Bread/ HotApp/ Side dish

Crawfish Hushpuppies

My contribution to a cajun or Mardi Gras dinner.

Mardi Gras is almost here. I’ve never been to a Mardi Gras and I guess I don’t care if I ever go to one but I do love cajun cuisine. When we were in New Orleans last summer we had all kinds of cajun food and a few things I made after I got home.

I picked up these decorations/props at my craft circle. There’s a room bigger than my whole house (maybe twice over) full of supplies that we can go back and get for any project our group is working on. The little jester, mask and beads came from the floral department. And, since they weren’t using them for a few days, I thought I would borrow a few things and use for props. Just look at that little girl with her hand out, just waiting for a hushpuppy.

My local HEB had a guy out front last week with a big contraption that he was cooking crawfish in; so I decided to buy them and not fool with cooking such a small amount. I only bought a pound which didn’t make nearly enough meat. I’m putting 1 – 1 1/2 cups of crawfish tails in the recipe because that’s what it is going to take to make these delicious. At $5.99 a lb, and I bought only a pound and got 3/4 cup of meat, I’d go for the ones you cook yourself next time because they are going to be about $2.00 a pound, maybe less depending on where you live or you can buy crawfish tails in the freezer section.

February 21, 2017 By Sherry

Appetizers/ HotApp

Walnut, Fig and Goat Cheese Phyllo Rolls

Crunchy and delicious!

I love just about every kind of sushi and even unagi which is freshwater eel. So, what does eel have to do with this recipe? Well, for years of watching cooking shows and hearing the word Umami I’ve been hearing “unagi” and thinking where’s the eel.

Over the last few years I’ve discovered how wrong I was and that the chefs are actually saying “umami” which is the fifth taste. We all know sweet, salty, bitter and sour but did you know there was a fifth taste called “umami” and it wasn’t a recent discovery.

I seems like a hundred years after Escoffier wrote his cookbook (where he identified this new flavor) scientist finally agreed with him on a new flavor “savory” or umami. Read this article called “Sweet,Sour, Salty, bitter and Umami” and you will find out everything you need to know about this new/old taste. There’s an article in The New Yorker you might be interested in reading; I don’t want to just copy what they said so go to their website and have a good read if you’re interested.

So, the umami part of this recipe would be the prosciutto which is a smoked meat and falls into the foods that have a lot of umami flavor. I’ve read also that if you crush up some dried seaweed (chips) into your hamburgers you will get a great tasting burger. Continue Reading…

February 15, 2017 By Sherry

Beef/Veal/ Entree/ Morning Foods/ Pizza

Parmesan Naan Breakfast Pizza

Steak and eggs, what could be better for breakfast?

Are you one of those people that take home leftovers from a restaurant because you couldn’t possibly have eaten another bite off your plate? Sometimes I ask for a box when they bring my food just so I’m not tempted to eat the whole thing.

My husband is always bringing home something from Mexican restaurants and sometimes they actually make it into the refrigerator. Once I went to get in my car to go someplace and the most horrific smell hit me in the face. Guess what, it was HIS Mexican food in the back seat. I’ve gotten where I order everything a la carte from Mexican restaurants because I can get exactly what I want and not so much that I’m not finishing it because I have eaten too many chips and bowl(s) of salsa.

Well, if you happen to have left over steak, I’m sure it will make it into the house. There probably won’t be enough to make a meal out of it but you can make this breakfast pizza that is made with naan for the crust. You can really add whatever ingredients you want; I didn’t add a lot of cheese (just parmesan) because it was for breakfast and I just didn’t want a real cheesy pizza.

February 10, 2017 By Sherry

Cookies/ Dessert

Linzer Heart Cookies

Sweets for your sweetie.

Don’t you just love Valentine’s Day. For some it is a good excuse to go out to dinner or to give someone special a gift, some red roses, or box of candy. For me it is a challenge to cook a new recipe and come up with a very nice dessert.

Back in the day when schools allowed parties for all occasions plus birthday parties, there were room moms just waiting to sign up to bring homemade treats. Valentine’s Day was my favorite holiday when I was a kid and when I volunteered as a room mom for my kids.

In our younger years we (seem to always refer to myself as “we” since I have a twin sister) made valentine boxes to put our valentines in that we would be getting from fellow classmates. I particularly remember one year my mother helping me make ruffles of pink and red crepe paper to glue to my shoe box with a hole cut in the top. I’m sure for the party we had red punch, lots of candy and there were always cupcakes and more than likely we were all wired from all the sugar before we got home; but guess what, we survived.

February 5, 2017 By Sherry

Appetizers/ HotApp

Hot Spinach Dip with Tomatoes

Not your ordinary spinach dip. No Artichokes in this one and one of my favorites.

How many dips can you name from your years of cooking. Onion dip was on top of my list and way back when I used Lipton Onion Soup mix to make it. I can only imagine what a homemade version would taste like; will have to give that a try. Mexican Cheese Dip was always a favorite also. Adventurous wasn’t in my vocabulary back then. I knew onion and cheese dip, that’s about it.

Then one day someone tried putting spinach and artichokes together; who would have ever thought of that back in the day. Aren’t you tired of spinach artichoke dip? You will see it on just about every restaurant menu, but my Hot Spinach Dip with Tomatoes has a little different twist to it with jalapenos and some fresh chopped tomatoes; and I love the homemade pita chips made with butter, lemon pepper and cumin, baked until nice and crunchy.

January 31, 2017 By Sherry

Salads

Almond Slaw with Edamame

Crunchy vegetables and nuts, how easy is that.

Have you made any New Years resolutions yet? or I guess the question is DID you make any New Year’s resolutions and have you broken them yet?

Guess I could resolve not to go to so many movies a week, but why would I do that, I’m over 60 so why not go as often as I want (at least twice a week) until I run out of movies to watch. I could resolve to exercise more but I have to start doing that anyway because my sciatica problem is into its fifth month so why not try a little more moving around to see if it will get better.

I have not really made any other promises to myself than to try and simplify our meal times a little. I don’t mean make easy recipes with 2 or 3 ingredients; but I think I would like to start trying to make some kind of meat dish, or fish or chicken, probably on the grill since I won’t have to do that and make one side dish to go along with the main dish. How easy would dinner be every night if I were to simply make meat and a salad of some sort or throw a vegetable on the grill with the meat.

January 26, 2017 By Sherry

Soup

Lobster and Shrimp Bisque

Creamy and delicious with lobster and shrimp.

Don’t you just love creamy soups? I do and until I really started cooking my favorite soup was “canned” Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom Soup. Believe it or not I still eat that soup; and one day I’m going to make some homemade cream of mushroom soup and may never eat it from a can again.

I don’t know why some recipes refer to a creamy soup as a bisque instead of just a cream soup because the definition of a bisque is that it’s a smooth, creamy, highly seasoned soup of French origin, classically based on a strained broth of crustaceans.

My friend, Peggy, has been trying to get me to try this recipe for a few years. She got the recipe from her daughter who found it at asweetpeachef.com. I can’t believe it took me so long to try it. I didn’t have the three lobster tails it called for so I used some shrimp in place of the third tail.

January 20, 2017 By Sherry

Side dish

Lemon Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Sesame Seeds and Raisins

We have a new woman in our bedroom!

So, let’s talk about this new woman. My husband got her for Christmas and she quickly took up residence in our bedroom. Her name is Alexa and she is the voice that powers the Echo device from Amazon.

When he first got the “new woman” in his life I could hear him talking to her. Sweet nothings like … “Hey, Alexa, What’s up and she would come up with something witty to say, or “Hey Alexa, what’s the weather for tomorrow” and even “Hey Alexa, can you wake me up in the morning”. Ya know, you can even say “Alexa, shut up” and she doesn’t get offended.

Alexa can find you a restaurant or a movie playing near by, she can do math, she can spell, she can give you the results of a sporting event and she can even purchase things off of Amazon for you. What she can’t do is fetch that cup of coffee.

So one day, I decided to give her a try and said “Hey Alexa, what’s for dinner tonight”. This was just a few days after the new year and I guess she was already in the dieting frame of mind and she said, let’s do something healthy tonight.

January 14, 2017 By Sherry

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