Menu Four

It's been quite a while since I've done any of these, so here's hoping I remember how they turned out.

Apple and Horseradish Glazed Salmon with Sweet and Sour Red Cabbage: The salmon was amazing. It was so easy to make and incredibly yummy. The sweet and sour cabbage was not as fantastic. The idea is great, I've had it before. But apparently this wasn't the recipe for it. It wasn't zingy enough. Plus, I think we sliced the cabbage too thick. It never got wilted enough. So, I'll make the salmon again and find a new recipe for the cabbage.

Crustless Broccoli Cheddar Quiche: Unfortunately, this was very blah. It didn't taste bad, it just didn't have much flavor. For some reason the egg taste neutralized all of the cheddar and broccoli flavor, and all of the seasonings we put in. I might try working with this recipe, adding more herbs and salt and pepper but if I find a recipe that looks more interesting, I'll try it instead.

Cornbread and Bean Skillet: This was fantastic. It was kind of dreary out, and I was having a crummy day and this was such good comfort food. Amazingly enough, it was incredibly healthy too. Basically, I dumped a bunch of spicy beans into a pan and made Jiffy cornbread with cheddar cheese. The raw dough was put on top of the beans and then simmered over the stove until it cooked through. It was warm, and the mix of spice with the cornbread was delicious. I might put in one can of regular tomatoes in place of one of the two cans of tomatoes with green chilis. It was a little overwhelming. This also made great leftovers.

Warm Spinach-Pear Salad: So good, and so simple. We made it with a bowl of leftover squash soup. Mmm. The salad was fairly substantial and with the soup was plenty for a meal. I love hot dressing salads. For once, I found one that doesn't involve using bacon grease as part of the dressing, so that was exciting also. I will definitely make it again.

Chicken with Tomatoes and Mushrooms: This was very good too. It needed some time to cook, but the actual preparation was simple. It didn't call for very many ingredients either, which was nice. I was pretty much guaranteed to like this recipe though, anything that calls for two pounds of mushrooms is fine by me.

Black Bean and Sweet Potato Chili: This recipe didn't taste exactly how I thought it would, but it was amazing. It had a very mexican flavor, which I don't normally associate with sweet potato. It also had a garnish of a little bit of sour cream mixed with cilantro. I added lime juice, and it was even better. I'll certainly make this again.

Feta, Olive and Spicy Sausage Pizza: Using pre-made crust, we brushed olive oil on it and sprinkled garlic, salt, pepper, and rosemary on the crust. We baked that for a few minutes and topped it with feta, black olives, spicy sausage, tomatoes and mushrooms. We baked that for a little bit longer and it turned out AMAZING. Really quick and incredibly good.

Roasted Chicken Noodle Soup: I roasted a chicken, fairly early in the day. I stuffed it with fresh basil and rosemary and put carrots, onions, celery and garlic around it. After it was done roasting, I put the whole thing in a pot of water with all of the drippings and let it boil for about 5 hours. By the end of the night it had completely fallen apart and the whole apartment smelled good. We strained the liquid, and saved it, picked apart the chicken for the good meat and put it back with the broth. We added more herbs and vegetables and noodles and let it cook for another fifteen minutes or so. It was probably the best soup I've ever had. We made a ridiculously large amount of it, so we've been having leftovers all week, and we even froze some.

Curried Cider-Braised Pork Chops and Horseradish Smashed Potatoes: Both were delicious! The pork chops were simple to make and curry is so yummy with cider. It probably would have been even better with sliced apples. I invented the recipe for the potatoes and they were superb, if I do say so myself. I boiled potatoes and then smushed them up with milk, a little sour cream and butter, rosemary and horseradish. The horseradish added a really interesting flavor to it but it wasn't overwhelming at all. Katie tried them, and she really liked them, which is saying a lot, because she's the pickiest eater I know. Luckily, this time she ate something I made, it didn't make her throat close. Hooray for food allergies. No peach shakes for Katie I guess...

There were also plenty of meals of leftovers, and dinner at my parents' house, and I was gone for a while and even a night of sushi. Mmm, sushi. So there aren't as many recipes as there would have been otherwise. I might have forgotten something I made too...