Sheperd's Pie

This meal used the lamb left over from the roast listed a few days ago. To start, we went to Foods Down-under, http://fooddownunder.com/ , one of the most extensive list of recipes we have ever seen (almost 500,000). There were 150 recipes for sheperd's pie. This is a combination of many of them.
Dice a large onion, two carrots and 2 generous cups of meat. We used lamb but many recipes used beef or chicken and some were even meatless. Prepare 4-5 potatoes for mashing. Make a roux by melting 2T butter in a pan and adding 2T flour. stir until bubbly. Add 1C stock and 2T Worchestershire sauce. While the sauce is warming, blanch the vegetables for 2-3 min in boiling water and then add 1/2C frozen peas. Continue boiling for another 2 min. Mash the potatoes adding one egg yolk 2T sour cream and 2T milk. Assemble the pie by mixing the vegetables and meat in the sauce. Pour into a 9" pie plate and spread the mashed potatoes over the top. Sprinkle with sweet paprika and place under the broiler until the potatoes are a golden brown. Top with chopped parsley. We served it with a green salad, crusty bread and red wine.

Leg of Lamb with Cauliflower, Broccoli and Greens au gratin, Twice Baked Potato and Salad

We had dinner with our friends Marsha and Myron. Marsha made the salad of mixed greens, red onion, mandarin oranges and slivered almonds dressed with a ginger oriental vinaigrette.
The leg of lamb was boned and butterflied. A Tuscan grilling paste was applied and the leg was tied with butchers twine. It weighed about 7 pounds and was cooked on the Weber for about 1 1/2 hrs. The twice baked potatoes have appeared here before. The potatoes are baked, cut in half and the pulp removed. It is mixed with sour cream, salt, pepper and chives, mixed well and put back into the skin. They are topped with shredded cheese and rebaked at 350 F for about 25 min. The recipe for the vegetables was adapted from Bon Appitet. 2 1/2 C of broccoli and 2 1/2 C cauliflower are boiled until just tender. The greens, in this case swiss chard, are wilted in a hot skillet. Make a bechamel sauce from 6T butter, 1/4C flour and 2/3 C milk. Stir in 2/3 C parmesan cheese. Combine with the vegetables and bake at 350 F for 25 min. We served a big red such as a cabernet or merlot or a zinfandel.

Lamb Chops with Pasta Beet Salad

This meal features the beet salad. The lamb chops were salted, peppered and sprinkled with fresh rosemary and grilled on the Weber, about 5 min. per side for medium rare. The beet was baked at 400 F along with a clove of minced garlic in a covered dish with 2C of water until just tender. The penne was prepared according to package directions. The beet was peeled, diced and added to the pasta along with 1/4C crumbled blue cheese. The dressing was made by mixing 1/4C orange juice with 3T olive oil and 1/2t ground coriander. This recipe serves four generously. The orange and coriander goes nicely with the rather earthy flavor of the beets. The greens and tomatoes were dressed with 1/4C olive oil and 3T balsamic vinager. We drank a Concha y Toro Cabernet/Merlot blend.
http://www.conchaytoro.com/

Chicken, Mushroom, Barley Soup with Dill and Lemon - Adapted from Bon Appetit, 1994

This is another old favorite. We used leftover chicken and sauce from the Coq au Vin recipe posted here as the base for the soup. Saute about 1/4C each of onion, carrot and celery in 2T of olive oil. Add 2 cloves of minced garlic and 8oz. of sliced mushrooms and continue heating until the vegetables are tender. Add 1C diced chicken. At this point we added the sauce, 14 oz. chicken stock and about 24 oz. water. Starting without the sauce, just add 2 14 oz. cans of stock and a can of water. Bring it to a boil and add 3/4 C dry barley. Cover and simmer for about 45 min. or until the barley is tender. Finish with 3T fresh lemon juice and 2T dry dill. A dry white wine is a nice accompaniment.

Ground Turkey Pie

The origin of this recipe is another that is lost in time. Put a pie crust in a 9" pie plate. It is best if you slightly cook the crust, perhaps 5 min. at 400 F. Set the crust aside. In a skillet, brown 1 lb. of ground turkey and then drain it. Add to the turkey 1 can of cream of chedder soup, 5 1/2 oz. unsweetened condensed milk and 1 generous cup of mixed vegetables. Mix well and transfer to the pie shell. Bake at 400 F for 30 min. We serve it with a green salad or just sliced tomatoes.
The dish is a bit too thin to maintain a pie slice shape so we just scoop it out with a spoon. Comfort food all the way.

Coq Au Vin Nouveau - Adapted from The Fifth Taste, Cooking with Umami

This is a new twist to the classic French recipe for chicken in wine. The recipe calls for a higher baking temperature and shorter cook time than we used. Brown 3 or 4 slices of bacon in a dutch oven. Remove the bacon, crumble and set aside. Add 3T of olive oil to the bacon fat and brown the chicken (four thighs served two nicely) which has been salted and peppered and dredged in flour. Remove the chicken and add a carrot, a rib of celery 1/2C diced onion, 4 cloves of minced garlic, 1C chopped mushrooms and some fresh thyme. Saute gently for 3-4 min. Add 1/2 can of chicken stock and 1/2C white wine. Return the chicken and bacon to the pan. Place in a 275 F oven for 3 hrs. Remove the excess fat from the cooking liquid. We made a roux by mixing 3T flour with this fat and using the resulting mixture to thicken the cooking liquid. We served edemame with the chicken and pasta but mashed potatoes would be wonderful as well. Serve it with a chilled dry white or rose wine.

Pork Tenderloin with Radicchio and Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Pork Tenderloin is one of our favorite meats. It is versatile, relatively in-expen-sive, tastey and has little or no waste. We marinated the pork over night in 2C orange juice, 1/3C balsamic vinager and some chopped pineapple sage. The meat was salted and peppered and browned in a bit of olive oil. It was then placed in a 400 F oven for 15 min (internal temp 140F). The marinade was reduced and used as a topping for the meat and radicchio. The radicchio was quartered, drizzled with olive oil, salt and peppered and placed in a baking dish in the oven with the meat. The garlic mashed potatoes were leftover from Outback Steakhouse. We drank a dry white wine with it but a nice rose would be good as well.

Dining Out Pizza

We live in Cleveland Ohio and by far our favorite pizza is at Mamma Santa's in "Little Italy" on Mayfield Rd. But, when we can't get there, we have to admit to eating Pizza Hut hand tossed pizza. Jim's favorite is pictured....Anchovie and Jalapeno. The salad bar and a Bud Lite finished it

Penne with Tomatoes, Olives and Cheeses - Adapted from Bon Appetit

This is one of our favorite meatless pasta dishes from a 1995 Bon Appetit. We serve it as a main course but it could be used as a side. Also, the addition of some diced chicken or sausage would be good. Cook 1 pound of penne pasta according to package directions, drain, and toss with 3T olive oil. While the pasta is cooking saute a diced large onion and 3 cloves of garlic in 4T olive oil. Add hot pepper flakes to taste, we use about 2T and stir in 3 cans of plum tomatoes. Bring to a boil and then add 2C stock, again, we use chicken but vegetable stock would be good as well. Reduce this mixture to 6C. Mix the sauce with the pasta and stir in 2 1/2C grated havarti cheese. There are many varieties of havarti containing herbs. Any would work well in this recipe. Transfer to a baking dish and bake at 375 F for 30 min. Top with sliced kalamata olive, 1/3C grated parmesan cheese and fresh basil. It serves 6 generously. We serve it with a green salad and any wine you wish, red or white.

More New England Dinners

New England Vacation Dinners

We recently went to New England to enjoy the sights and tastes. This is typical scenery along with food like fried clams with slaw, lobster roll with onion rings, steamed little-neck clams with broth and, of course, steamed lobster with slaw and corn on the cob. If you haven't enjoyed New England and its food, put it on your list of things to do.