Weekend Food

We had a wonderful weekend filled with lots of food!

Eggs Benedict

Tom makes wonderful eggs benedict. We use smoked turkey instead of Canadian bacon, Tom poaches eggs perfectly and tops it with homemade hollandaise.

Spanish chicken with refried beans and rice

There is a wonderful Mexican restaurant close to us that does a chicken dish called Pollo Arriero. I order it every time, so Tom decided to try to make it. The chicken is marinated in hot sauce and butter, topped with sauteed onions and cheese. Then its baked. Its served with homemade refried beans and confetti rice.

Eggs, bacon, and toast

This was Tom's Sunday breakfast. 3 eggs over easy, 1/2 pound of bacon, and toast.

Potato Corn Chowder

I made dinner tonight! A potato corn chowder, topped with cheese and cayanne. Here's the recipe!

Ingredients
3 tablespoons butter

1 yellow onion chopped

1 tablespoon flour

32 ounces vegetable broth

2 1/2 cup diced Yukon Gold potatoes (bout 4 large)

2 cups frozen yellow corn

2/3 cup milk

1 1/2 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese

Salt and pepper to taste

Pinch of cayenne pepper (garnish)

Chopped parsley (garnish)

Method
In a large saucepan over medium high heat, melt butter and sauté onion about 5 minutes, until tender. Mix in flour, coating the onion. Add broth and bring to a boil, whisking constantly until smooth. Reduce heat, add potatoes and simmer 20 minutes until tender. Slightly mash potatoes in soup, then stir in corn and milk. Cook another 5 minutes, remove from heat and stir in cheddar cheese. Season with salt and pepper. Garnish, if desired.

Not Thanksgiving

Roast Chicken, Broccoli, Polish Stuffing, Gravy

Plated

We're doing Thanksgiving at my mom's house this year, which means no cooking for Tom. So tonight he roasted a chicken, which he stuffed with onions. The broccoli is just steamed with butter. The Polish stuffing is incredible. Its a bread and potato dressing cooked next to the bird, from Tom's great-grandmother's recipe. The gravy is made with the chicken drippings, giblets, and a roux and its the best gravy I've ever had.

Moving

As many of you know, we've recently moved. So, we haven't had much in the way of cooking because we've been surrounded by boxes. Tom got a little bit of cooking in once we found the kitchen, so I took some pictures. When I found the camera. We're getting a new kitchen in December, so we're only kind of unpacked. We did get a fancy new stove today though, and its gas instead of electric!

Marinated Chicken with broccoli in cheese sauce

Chicken thigh marinated in homemade italian dressing. We had some frozen broccoli and needed some green.

Chicken in creamy marinara on pasta

Tom's homemade marinara sauce with some cream in it, peppers, onions, mushrooms, and other stuff. Served on angel hair pasta. This was so amazingly good. Tom is the best.

Fancy New Stove!


BAR!
Our basement has a bar in it! As you can see, we still need to put carpet in, but the walls have been painted. Tom put up the lighting and glass shelves. I think we'll get good use out of this area.

Football

Sunday is football day, so Tom made football food!

Chicken "Wings"

A few months ago Tom made some buffalo chicken in the oven and I told him I liked them as much as regular wings. So he made them for me today! I got excited and ate some before I remembered to take a picture. They are breaded and baked and then dredged in hot sauce.

Pizza

This is the precooked pizza. Tom-made dough and sauce. I topped my pizza with cheese, garlic, onion, scallions, mushrooms, and turkey pepperoni.

Cooked Pizza

Tom's Pizza

Tom put some of the leftover buffalo chicken, bacon, onions, scallions, and mushrooms on his pizza.

Teriyaki

Teriyaki chicken sausage...

This is teriyaki chicken sausage over confetti rice. Its served with veggies in a thai peanut ginger sauce topped with scallions.

Salsa Corn Chowder

Salsa Corn Chowder

Tonight I let Tom take the night off and I cooked dinner. We have a freezer full of corn from this summer, so I decided I needed to find some way to use it. At least some of it.

To make this, I cooked onions in butter, added flour, chili powder, and cumin. Then I added chicken broth, salsa, and corn. After that boiled I poured it over cream cheese and added milk. Its topped with sour cream and fresh diced tomatoes (from the produce auction, of course).

This was super easy and really good, I'm sure I will make it again.

Fried Chicken

Fried Chicken, Broccoli Salad, and Tossed Salad
Another Tom creation. Fried chicken that has been marinated in pickle brine. Breaded with italian seasoning, cayanne, and dill. He used boneless, skinless chicken thighs for this and pan fried them. So amazingly good.

I went to the produce auction today and brought home a lot of broccoli, so we had broccoli salad. Made with mayo, sour cream, cheese, and pepper.

We had a basic tossed salad as well, we needed to use it or toss it. We opted for use it.

Breakfast!

Eggs and Grits and Toast

This is one of my favorite breakfasts. Eggs are over easy, the grits are cooked by replacing 1/4 of the water with butter, and the toast is italian bread. So easy (especially when Tom cooks it) and so yummy.

Breakfast and Dinner

On weekends Tom usually makes incredible breakfast, he even took pictures of cooking it!

Onions cut paper thing and sauteed long enough to turn clear.

The frittata in the process of being cooked. It has smoked turkey, scallions, the above onions, and boursin. And its amazing.

The finished product! So so good!

And on to dinner...

And after that breakfast he cooked an incredible dinner! Green beans with a black bean sauce. Fingerling potatoes, which turned out to be like sweet potatoes. They are in olive oil, lime juice, garlic, salt, and pepper. And salmon broiled with salt and chipotle powder . The salmon is topped with a lime chipotle hollandaise sauce. I am so lucky.

Simple and Yummy

So we were out of town for a week and have just been crazy busy, so dinners have been easy and boring. We've also been so hungry that we forget to take pictures! This is just a simple dinner that's quick and easy for the nights we don't get home until after 7.

Pasta with homemade sauce and freshly shaved parmesan. I brought home 50lbs of tomatoes earlier this summer and told Tom he should make some sauce. Now that tomato season is basically over, I love being able to pull the sauce out of the freezer and have a quick and homemade meal. I think next year I'll have to bring home more tomatoes, the sauce is going quickly!

Now that its apple season, I brought home a bushel of Jonogold apples. Half went to Tom's sister (who swears she is making applesauce) and we have the other half. Today I slacked off from the gym and came home and made apple muffins! They are so simple and easy, yet so good. They have a cup of sour cream in them, it seems to make such a difference. I used all of 1 apple in this recipe, which ended up being about 2.5 cups of chopped apple. I think this weekend I'll try to talk Tom into making an apple pie. And apple butter. And anything else we can think of. Suggestions?

Pizza Casserole

When Tom cooks dinner, we get fancy dinners. When Leigh cooks dinner, we get casseroles. This is a pizza casserole, using egg noodles, ground turkey, turkey pepperoni, onion, garlic, and homemade marinara (made by Tom of course). Its topped with mozzerella. Next time I think I'll add some mushrooms. It was easy and quick and Tom says its an approved use of his kitchen. This and peach cobbler.

Pollo mole' poblano
I have been attempting mole' (poorly) and decided to remind myself how I wanted it to taste, so I begged my favorite restaurant to sell me a half pint and they did =) The yellow tomato is dressed with a lime-and-chili vinaigrette. The buttery caramelized onions were a very nice texture counterpoint to the chicken.


Parmo

A regional British dish based on Chicken Parmesan in which the chicken is breaded and fried, topped with thick bechamel sauce and cheddar, and then broiled. It is served with chips (not crisps!).