You Are What You Eat: August 15 through August 28
1. The "days without takeout" reset at 29 days and now stands at 5. The "days without eating in a restaurant" counter now stands at 174.
Technical both days without takeout were in the same week, that would trigger my resolution not to eat out twice in a week this year. However, since we didn't actually order the takeout in either case, I think we'll take a pass on that one. For our wedding, two different sets of friends delivered food to our door the day of the wedding.
The fabulous Eli (formerly rishu73) and Gaela dropped off a bunch of gifts on our porch, including three loaves of crusty bread from Blackbird Baking. We ate of them Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, but I'm only counting it as takeout for Sunday. I mean, I suppose I could call it grocery delivery, but whatever, it was delicious. As always, if you don't like how I count things, you can count your stuff however you like!
The second takeout package was a six pack of cupcakes from KB Confections that Laura & Hannah dropped off. There were six different flavors, all good in their own way. I'm personally partial to dulce de leche, but all were tasty.
Restaurant Stats
Just Me and M, or Just Me (non-concert, non-ballgame, non-travel): 11 (+2)
-- Twice in a Week Resolution Breaker: 1 (+0)
With Friends/Family (non-concert, non-ballgame): 7 (+0)
Concert/Ball-game drinks: 5 (+0)
Travel: 15 (+0)
People over for food: 3 (+0)
Longest Streak of no restaurant - 174 and counting.
Longest Streak for no takeout - 98.
2. I made nine new recipes in this segment. That takes the total for the year to 81. All but one of them was from Eating Well, which my mother just renewed for us for another year. The only real problem I have with all these new recipes is that M likes most of them, and I don't want to cut everything out of the magazine.
- The July 2020 Eating Well gave us a salad restaurant from a BBQ joint in Minnesota called Handsome Hog Chopped Salad. I made cornbread the night before so that we could have cornbread croutons on the salad. With black-eyed peas and red cabbage, this was a filling salad. If I make it again I might just buy croutons to save on baking bread, but other than that no complaints.
- I went back to the March 2020 Eating Well and knocked off a few recipes I hadn't made it to. The first among these was a recreation of an Egyptian street food called Hawawshi. Basically, you stuff a pita with filling and put it on the Griddler. This may be the first time I've ever actually used the Griddler for actually cooking a sandwich. I used tomato paste instead of tomato, which made the filling stick together and kept it from falling out of the pita during grilling. These were quite filling. We'll do this again.
- M loves sauces of all kinds so the Traditional Greek Tahini Dip was right up her alley. It was fast and easy to throw together and was delicious with some of the aforementioned crusty bread and crudites.
- I realized that I had all the ingredients to make a new to me Lentil Soup from the March 2020 Eating Well. It was fine, but I don't know that it would replace my current lentil soup offering.
- If there is something M loves more than sauces it is a good slaw. Moving forward to the May 2020 Eating Well we find the Chili-Rubbed Chicken with Coconut Rice & Mango Salsa. I have no complaints about the chili-rubbed chicken or the coconut rice, but the real star here was the mango, bell pepper and onion salsa, which was completely delicious.
- The brand new September 2020 Eating Well had Chicken Cutlets with Artichokes & Lemon-Dill Sauce. The heavy cream sauce with lemon and dill was tasty, but even with a can of artichoke hearts the recipe was otherwise uninteresting, and I don't know that we'll make it again. I might try the sauce on rice or some other grain though, especially if I have heavy cream I need to use up.
- M also loves banana peppers, and I love roasted cauliflower, so clearly I needed to make the Roasted Cauliflower with Banana Peppers, also from the September 2020 Eating Well. Neither of us was disappointed. I'll probably add it to the long list of different ways I have to roast vegetables.
- My father emailed us this recipe, which he said they got from my Aunt Joanne. I don't know if she found it somewhere or if she invented it, but as far as I'm concerned it's Aunt Joanne Salad.
2 cups chopped cucumber
1 cup halved cherry tomatoes or chopped fresh tomatoes
1 1/2 cups cubed avocado ( 1 large )
1 cup pitted and halved or 1/2 cup sliced black or green olives
1/2 cup feta cheese crumbled
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons EV olive oil
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
The instructions beyond the ingredients are "toss together in a bowl." As you'd expect, this was a nice easy salad to make. We enjoyed it and will have it again.
- For our wedding dinner, we went with Scallops & Cherry Tomatoes with Caper-Butter Sauce served over angel hair pasta. Fortunately, it was delicious, because can you imagine if I'd screwed up our wedding dinner? It was also easy, at least once you've procured scallops. For all that it was very good, M's favorite scallops recipe is still from 660 Curries. I'll have to post that one some time, as it may be M's favorite single thing I've ever made for her, and it's one of the very few things she ever requests by name.
Technical both days without takeout were in the same week, that would trigger my resolution not to eat out twice in a week this year. However, since we didn't actually order the takeout in either case, I think we'll take a pass on that one. For our wedding, two different sets of friends delivered food to our door the day of the wedding.
The fabulous Eli (formerly rishu73) and Gaela dropped off a bunch of gifts on our porch, including three loaves of crusty bread from Blackbird Baking. We ate of them Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, but I'm only counting it as takeout for Sunday. I mean, I suppose I could call it grocery delivery, but whatever, it was delicious. As always, if you don't like how I count things, you can count your stuff however you like!
The second takeout package was a six pack of cupcakes from KB Confections that Laura & Hannah dropped off. There were six different flavors, all good in their own way. I'm personally partial to dulce de leche, but all were tasty.
Restaurant Stats
Just Me and M, or Just Me (non-concert, non-ballgame, non-travel): 11 (+2)
-- Twice in a Week Resolution Breaker: 1 (+0)
With Friends/Family (non-concert, non-ballgame): 7 (+0)
Concert/Ball-game drinks: 5 (+0)
Travel: 15 (+0)
People over for food: 3 (+0)
Longest Streak of no restaurant - 174 and counting.
Longest Streak for no takeout - 98.
2. I made nine new recipes in this segment. That takes the total for the year to 81. All but one of them was from Eating Well, which my mother just renewed for us for another year. The only real problem I have with all these new recipes is that M likes most of them, and I don't want to cut everything out of the magazine.
- The July 2020 Eating Well gave us a salad restaurant from a BBQ joint in Minnesota called Handsome Hog Chopped Salad. I made cornbread the night before so that we could have cornbread croutons on the salad. With black-eyed peas and red cabbage, this was a filling salad. If I make it again I might just buy croutons to save on baking bread, but other than that no complaints.
- I went back to the March 2020 Eating Well and knocked off a few recipes I hadn't made it to. The first among these was a recreation of an Egyptian street food called Hawawshi. Basically, you stuff a pita with filling and put it on the Griddler. This may be the first time I've ever actually used the Griddler for actually cooking a sandwich. I used tomato paste instead of tomato, which made the filling stick together and kept it from falling out of the pita during grilling. These were quite filling. We'll do this again.
- M loves sauces of all kinds so the Traditional Greek Tahini Dip was right up her alley. It was fast and easy to throw together and was delicious with some of the aforementioned crusty bread and crudites.
- I realized that I had all the ingredients to make a new to me Lentil Soup from the March 2020 Eating Well. It was fine, but I don't know that it would replace my current lentil soup offering.
- If there is something M loves more than sauces it is a good slaw. Moving forward to the May 2020 Eating Well we find the Chili-Rubbed Chicken with Coconut Rice & Mango Salsa. I have no complaints about the chili-rubbed chicken or the coconut rice, but the real star here was the mango, bell pepper and onion salsa, which was completely delicious.
- The brand new September 2020 Eating Well had Chicken Cutlets with Artichokes & Lemon-Dill Sauce. The heavy cream sauce with lemon and dill was tasty, but even with a can of artichoke hearts the recipe was otherwise uninteresting, and I don't know that we'll make it again. I might try the sauce on rice or some other grain though, especially if I have heavy cream I need to use up.
- M also loves banana peppers, and I love roasted cauliflower, so clearly I needed to make the Roasted Cauliflower with Banana Peppers, also from the September 2020 Eating Well. Neither of us was disappointed. I'll probably add it to the long list of different ways I have to roast vegetables.
- My father emailed us this recipe, which he said they got from my Aunt Joanne. I don't know if she found it somewhere or if she invented it, but as far as I'm concerned it's Aunt Joanne Salad.
2 cups chopped cucumber
1 cup halved cherry tomatoes or chopped fresh tomatoes
1 1/2 cups cubed avocado ( 1 large )
1 cup pitted and halved or 1/2 cup sliced black or green olives
1/2 cup feta cheese crumbled
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons EV olive oil
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
The instructions beyond the ingredients are "toss together in a bowl." As you'd expect, this was a nice easy salad to make. We enjoyed it and will have it again.
- For our wedding dinner, we went with Scallops & Cherry Tomatoes with Caper-Butter Sauce served over angel hair pasta. Fortunately, it was delicious, because can you imagine if I'd screwed up our wedding dinner? It was also easy, at least once you've procured scallops. For all that it was very good, M's favorite scallops recipe is still from 660 Curries. I'll have to post that one some time, as it may be M's favorite single thing I've ever made for her, and it's one of the very few things she ever requests by name.