What's for Dinner?

[orthodoc]

Thank you! I love quinoa, especially the red kind. Haven't made it in ages. Maybe I'll try making just one dish this weekend.

[Sundae]

See, I like so much for that's good for me.
Peppers, onions, garlic, quinoa, brown rice, seafood, houmous (in small portions - even if want to eat the lot!) most pulses, cottage cheese etc etc

I just get stuck in a cycle of "Well I've already failed, let's fail some more" where I'm not even enjoying what I eat. That McDonalds McMuffin I had the other day - bleurgh!
Oof- depressing.

The 'rents cried off going to Milton Keynes because it was so cold waiting for the bus and when it arrived it was full. Tcha. I'da made someone stand up for my Dad. He's 73 you know - and when he's cold he looks older. So no food prep for me today. Am probably going to have tinned soup - 3 Bean & Tomato. Or Indian.

Still, I'll be baking, so check that thread

[DanaC]

Yeah...I get into a similar rut.

I was kind of glad of the horsemeat scandal really. Not that I have a particular problem with eating horse (though...it fucking reeks when you cook it as I recall from one of my Dad's cooking experiments - though not as much as the puffball steaks he tried drying out to use as an alternative fuel for the beehive smoker), but I do have a problem with not really knowing the provenance of my food. And I hate the idea that a burger is probably made from the mixed flesh of several cows. Add in the barnyard of other animals that may be in that burger and it's really started tolose any of its appeal.

The scandal has provided a nicely timed and graphic reminder of what I don't like about fast food and heavily processed food.

The hardest thing is getting through Leeds train station without going to Mac D's. I always go and get my lunch at MacD's on the station on the two days a week that i go into uni.

Last week i went and got a fillet'o'fish, but I found myself repulsed by what I was eating. Suddenly I started to wonder about the fish...yeah. Nice thought.

So this week I've been to uni twice and each time I've gone to the little Cafe Ritazza and got a cheese and tomato flatbread with a danish and a coffee. Slightly more expensive that the small mountain of fats, sugars and assorted fauna I usually get at MacDonalds, but very tasty and filling. Without that bloated feeling.

And then last night I cooked a proper meal for my tea. Lamb chops, potatoes and asparagus. There were three chops in the pack...two for me and one for the Carrotmonster.

[orthodoc]

I'll check the baking thread and daydream ... I'm not supposed to eat refined sugar anymore, along with a ton of other stuff. And since chemo I find that soy gives me migraines, which it never did before. It limits my choices to the really healthy stuff.

At the moment I'm in a rut of homemade salad, microwaved veggies, and hard-boiled egg whites (usually in the salad). There's next to no prep work or mess and no major clean-up with those things. By next week I hope to add a bit of salmon or haddock to dinner.

[busterb]

Large pot of dirty rice.

[Sundae]

Mum made spaghetti last night and saved me the leftover sauce.
I kept seeing it in the fridge and thinking it was chilli. I might have to chillify it up tonight so I'm not disappoint.

I have a can of adzuki beans crying out to be used, so I'll whack those in so I don't need pasta. Ha! Just caught Dad before he headed off to Tesco. One carrot added to the shopping list. Is good to sneak in extra veggies.

[orthodoc]

Salad. And a pinot gris from Oregon to make the day go down better, because the day sucked. But that's for another thread.

[Big Sarge]

Elizabeth is cooking spaghetti, garlic bread, and a salad. It is so nice having someone to cook for me. BTW, she's studying to become a dietician

[Sundae]

Elizabeth is studying again?
That's great news, Sarge.

I made the cobbled-together chilli for lunch, then had a kip and woke up surprisingly hungry. So I had baked carrot with honey & mustard glaze and roasted red onion on top of the ubiquitous quinoa. Oh I like the look of those words together!
I had a very windy evening.

Did a proper freezer dive and found one last portion of chicken curry and lentils and a carton of soup - BBQ Pulled Pork & Bean (from the New York Soup Company no less.)
Both now defrosting.
One of them gets added adzuki beans to finish off the tin.
Weather forecast? More high winds.

[Trilby]

Sundae----when we get our castle in the clouds-type home together, you can do all the cooking/baking EXCEPT no fish/sea monster or similar.

I'll wash up.

[Sundae]

You'll have to move here. I'm not sure I can take the emotional stress of being away from the British Isles. But we'll have plenty of culinary adventures in order to seduce you to our (my) way of eating. Thanks to the Cellar I know at the gourmet end, the UK is similar to the US after all.

And we'll be close enough to London and Oxford - American enclaves - so that you don't get too food/homesick. Anyway, it's not completely Baby Jane territory, you can come and go as you please.

You wait til we tour Northern Europe or the Med. I'll get you eating fishbits my girl.

Haven't eaten yet today.
Think it's going to be the curry and chappatis.

Got another week til the 'rents go away.
I'm so excited about my 24 hour cooked pork. Which is silly as I bet the soup is far nicer...
Still - if'n I don't get maximum pleasure from the pork (bought discounted after all) at least I'll have had pleasure from the planning. It's been like a little nugget of gold inside my head these last few weeks.

Oh, the soup was discounted too.
I have such a beady eye for the freezeable sign on packaging.

[chrisinhouston]

Back on Oahu, Hawaii for another 3 weeks. We got our apartment kitchen stocked with basics and fresh produce and found some really fresh marlin so I got a nice 2 lb loin, about 7 x 3 x 3 inches.

I made a fresh teriayaki glaze and basted the fish, I also prepped some firm tofu for later use this week and made a nice marinade with extra V olive oil, fresh herbs and some rice vinegar.

Grilled it all up on the public grills here at the Marriott resort. Served it with some nice short grain brown rice, fresh sauteed beet greens with bacon and a tropical salsa of mango, pineapple, sweet onion, capsicum, and minced parsley and cilantro and a dash of lime juice. Washed it down with a Cote de Rhone.

Wish you all could have been here!!

[chrisinhouston]

Big lobster tails tonight, I think they came from Brazil but were similar to the ones we had in Australia and probably spiny lobsters not like the ones with claws from Maine. I split the tails open to expose the meat and basted in a a mix of olive oil and fresh basil. Grilled them on an hot grill and basted with a garlic/shallot/butter and wine mix until done.

Served them over some fresh mashed red potatoes with a side of grilled beefsteak tomatoes and grilled capsicum.

A nice Cote de Rhone on the side. Hawaii rocks!

[Sundae]

Chris you have me swooning.
Blimey.

Monday night I cooked for Mum and me.
Baked salmon marinated in garlic, ginger and soy sauce, served with salad leaves on a bed of lemon, mint and parsley couscous. Mum wasn't that keen on the couscous ("the grainy stuff"), but didn't leave anything. I overcooked the salmon by my standards, but I know Mum is paranoid about anything undercooked. So I found it a little dry around the edges, but she declared the fish perfect.

Last night I had spelt with roasted red pepper and onion. I had intended to eat it for two meals, but it was so good I polished it all off in one sitting. Greedy guts. Checking the nutritional values it wasn't too bad - not like having two roast dinners or two Big Mac meals for example. And still within nutritional guidelines for losing weight.

I will buy it again. Perhaps when I am cooking for Mum again. So that way I can't trough the lot without scratching and biting.

NB, there was a supermarket discount on Ainsley Harriott (UK TV chef) dishes. They're good stuff. 'Cepting that they are generally packaged for two, which makes it hard to resist an eat-a-thon.

[orthodoc]

The salmon on couscous sounds fantastic. Ditto for the spelt dish. I haven't tried it before. Still eating salads and microwaved veggies. I plan to cook things and then don't have enough energy at the end of the day.

Going to go and have some berries and then fall into bed. Maybe tomorrow I'll cook something.