I made up a batch of the Pantry’s Coleslaw to go with the shrimp and fries. I had some potstickers leftover so I put a fresh scald on them and then remembered to finish off that kimchi that was made a month ago. Made a nice spread.
shrimp
Gumbo Triple Delight
In keeping with the spirit of Gumbo, this one has leftover smoked pork, some beef in its own stock, crawdad tails, and shrimp.
Tidbits
Moar Gumbo! This one is shrimp and crab, with the last of the dark meat turkey. When folks ask for recipes I usually point them to NOLA Cuisine. That is for chicken and andouille but there are links there for his Cajun/Creole recipe page. I would encourage y’all to go there.
Mrs J brought some small pet beds up from her sewing room for a quick wash and fluffing in the dryer, they will go with her to the shelter when she pulls her next shift. The top one is called a “cuddle cup” and the other two are “pumpkin” beds. Patterns are available online.
Chicken biscuits! These are from a recipe in the food section of the NY Times. The biscuit recipe seems familiar:
BISCUITS:
- 3 cups/450 grams all-purpose flour
- 3 tablespoons/37 grams baking powder
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt
- 7 tablespoons/100 grams cold unsalted butter, cubed
- 1 ½ cups/360 milliliters whole milk
Bake in a 425 oven until they brown on the top, it took about 17 minutes in my convection oven. They do puff up quite a bit, I cut 8 biscuits from the dough, each 3-1/2″.
I could have gotten 10 or more by rolling the dough a tad thinner, the ones I made by rerolling the scraps were especially thick and nearly toppled themselves in the oven.
There was a bit of dough left over even after rolling out the scraps from cutting out the biscuits. I like to make cinnamon rolls from that. Just roll the dough fairly thin, brush with melted butter, and cover with a thick coat of cinnamon sugar. Roll into a long tube and slice that into little wheels, drizzle with more butter, and bake them along with the biscuits.
Kroger offers these telera slider rolls as a “take-and-bake” item – they are sold par-baked and just need a finish. They are a smaller version of these rolls. The crispy crust holds them together very well when making sammiches that are very juicy, like sloppy joes or Italian beef. Of course, they are good for little cheeseburgers, too.
Moar kitteh! Ollie likes ice cream. We all like ice scream.
Moar Gumbo
Shrimp Lo Mein
The Allrecipes site is one of the better places for recipes and that’s where I found this one. Nearly any fresh veggie will work in this – I had onions, broccoli, celery, cabbage, and a red bell pepper. I used their sauce recipe with the addition of a tablespoon of sweet soy sauce.
Nearly any pasta, too, will work. I browsed the pictures people sent in and there were a couple of them that had used pasta shells although I’m not sure that one could be properly called lo mein. The recipe’s author used angel hair pasta, I used noodles bought at the Asian foods store, they are wheat noodles, thin and flat rather than round.
Tidbits
We don’t have much info on Cleo, AKA Grumpy Kitty. She’s an older kitteh and hasn’t been at St Francis long.
Stir fry chicken and broccoli is a favorite around here. This one has red bell peppers, red onions, and mushrooms in a brown sauce with noodles.
I mentioned doing a brisket in the smoker and finishing it in the toaster oven set to slow cook. Here it is after a night in the fridge to firm it for slicing.
I said the new counter top oven would fit a 10″ cast iron skillet, here it is with beans ready for baking. I use the same skillet for cornbread.
This is the same puppy we last saw with her head in a bag full of chicken. She is a chihuahua mix with what may be terrier of some sort.
The local Kroger has sales on boneless rib eyes pretty often, not sure why that cut is featured above others but they can count on me to grab extra every time.
We often buy frozen shrimp already butterflied and breaded but these I did myself. Dust the prepared shrimp with seasoned flour, dredge in beaten eggs, and then coat with bread crumbs – on these I used panko and they came out great after frying in 350 oil for about 2 minutes.
This is Roma. She’s 4 months old, very affectionate, and would be thrilled to go home with you.
Tidbits
It’s never a bad idea to lead off a post like this with kittehs! These came available to adopt today, three boys and a girl. The girl has been spoken for already. I have no idea which of them is the sister kitty.
The dirty dishes from this dinner are still on the table as I type this. I can’t take much credit for anything here, the tater tots and the breaded shrimp came frozen in plastic bags. I can say that I mixed the batter for the broccoli, adapted from a Betty Crocker recipe. I used a lemon-lime soda instead of the beer and made it a bit thinner so that you could see it was broccoli you were eating rather than an anonymous fried lump. Oh! I almost forgot – the cocktail sauce was made with my homemade ketchup! Mine on the left in the emptied Heinz bottle, the new bottle of the Heinz product for comparison:
I saw someone on one of my TV cooking shows make chipotle flavored ketchup that looked good so I stopped and started the DVR while scribbling down the ingredients. No real info on the quantities so this is a best guess as to ratios, I used: 4-15oz cans of tomato puree, 1 small can of tomato paste, 1 big onion, 1 small can of chipotles in adobo sauce, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/2 cup cider vinegar, garlic powder, onion powder, Worcestershire sauce, ground allspice, ground cloves, nutmeg, cayenne, salt, and pepper. Chop the onion and sweat it down in oil, then add everything else. You are going to have to wing it, too! Let’s just say, add those additional spices “to taste”. I used a stick blender to break down the onions and the chipotles and simmered the sauce for a half hour or so. Great Success!
We made some banana bread and added some frozen blueberries. Worked fine but nothing to shout about. The cinnamon crunch topping was pretty good. Cut 2 tablespoons of cold butter into 1/4 cup each of flour and sugar with 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon and sprinkle over the batter. I made the first batch and used way too many blueberries, Mrs J made the bread pictured above using 1/2 cup of berries. Mine tasted good but wasn’t, ah, photogenic.
We had waffles, sausage and eggs for supper the other day. Great any hour of the day.
Mmm… pastrami for lunch today. We made everything here but the bread and the thousand island dressing. That’s the last of the pastrami, I hope they have another sale on beef roasts, I’ll snag a big one and and get the brine going.![IMG_20151201_115053755[1]_Snapseed (1600x1200)](https://whats4dinnersolutions.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/img_20151201_1150537551_snapseed-1600x1200.jpg)
Time for another kitteh! This is Maisy, she’s five months old and was adopted Tuesday. Yay!
I’m going to call this a quesadilla – it has roast pork, some leftover beans and corn, a ton of cheese, a dab a the last batch of chili, a few chopped peppers, and a nice squeeze of my sweet habanero sauce.
Lo Mein Double Delight
Years ago we used to frequent a Chinese restaurant where I almost always ordered their “Kung Pao Triple Delight” – a Kung Pao chicken dish that also included shrimp and pork. The triple delight referred to the three kinds of meats. This was the place (and the dish) where I learned there could be a huge difference between ordering extra peppers and extra hot. The waitress was kept busy refilling this red faced and sweaty (and stubborn!) patron’s glass with ice water.
The double delight in the post title reflects the shrimp and chicken in the dish. I do have a little heat in this one via a dollop of chili garlic paste in the sauce and a couple of jalapenos with the veggies but not so much that Mrs J noticed enough to mention. The chicken was dredged in corn starch and then fried in oil and set aside until the dish came together in the wok after the veggies had cooked down for a few minutes. The noodles were pre-cooked and oiled to keep them from sticking together. The chicken, noodles, and shrimp were all combined with the veggies and the sauce to warm them all for the platter.
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