The Grill is Open and We Have A Facebook Page

This has been a long week of Vegetable Stew and Farro Stew so I have been looking forward to tonight's dinner. Luckily the weather cooperated. Chris grilled sirloin steaks and zucchini. My contribution was roasted potatoes. I know I make them all the time but I like them! Back to the steak. There is nothing like a steak on the grill. So tender and the bits of burned fat. I almost ate all of mine. And the veggies were as good as they were last summer. The potatoes were of course delicious. Nice and crispy and seasoned with salt, pepper, rosemary and sage and olive oil.

And as an added treat I pulled a bottle of wine off the rack and popped it open. Tomaiolo Riserva 2003 Chianti. It was perfect with dinner. The black cherry was so predominant. Talk about wine pairings!

And on another note I have been wanting to make a granola bar for the longest time. I found this recipe a while ago and finally had time to make them. It is really hard to eat just one!

Oh wait one more thing... the Facebook page! Yep that is what I did today. Hope you stop by and visit! And don't forget to like it... I am sure you will!

Chicken Piccata with Capers

Tonight's dinner was the result of a Google search. I typed in chicken and the choice of Piccata presented itself. I had everything in the house so no run to the store at lunch was necessary.

I opted for couscous in place of the spaghetti and sauteed some zucchini and yellow squash for a side dish. Another simple Friday night meal! Click here for the recipe.

Leftover Minestra di Verdure Stile Ribollita

Notice anything different in tonight's photo? Yes pasta! I was off today so I made a dish of baked macaroni for later in the week, or I may freeze it for much later next week. Anyway I had too much pasta (too much pasta is a good thing) so I added it to my Minestra di Verdure Stile Ribollita leftovers. Excellent addition!

Minestra di Verdure Stile Ribollita

Minestra di Verdure Stile Ribollita or Ribollita Inspired Vegetable Soup comes from Briciole. Briciole is a blog that I just started following. The photo is what caught my attention first, then the fact that I love Ribollita. I think my choosing this recipe has to do with the weather. This past week has been so cloudy and chilly made me want a pot of soup for the week. Of course the day I made this soup, Sunday, what was in the sky? Yes the sun!
Here is the link to the recipe, this way you can read the story about the soup too! The only change I made was using canned pinto beans. 

Lazy Lasagna

Brilliant! I found tonight's recipe on A Season For All Things. I had all the ingredients in the house except the ground beef. But I had sausage! I also opted for homemade sauce.

Lasagna in a flash. I would not call it lazy. It needs a more positive name. Time Saving Lasagna. Speedy Lasagna. Only One Skillet and One Baking Dish to Wash Lasagna. Yes that's it! Can you tell I really hate doing dishes?

Stuffed Chicken Thighs in a White Wine Caper Sauce

Stuffed Chicken Thighs in a White Wine Caper Sauce. I know you are probably saying the same thing Chris said, "Chicken Thighs?" Yes chicken thighs. I just prefer them to the breast. And they are inexpensive. So lets give them a try.
I found this recipe on Italian Food Forever. If you have time you should spend a little visiting the site. It is packed with lots of recipes I would like to try.
Tonight's dinner was more on the fancy side for a Sunday night in our house, the is the home of Sunday night pizza.

So why stop at the stuffed chicken thighs, I had some fennel left over from Friday night's dinner so I made Braised Fennel. It was okay. But I would have been happier with zucchini.
And with all this stuff I decided to keep the starch simple. Perfectly cooked Arborio Rice.

And before dinner we had a couple of visitors. First there was the turkey.

Then there was the duck who did not know what to make of the turkey so she left rather quickly.

And as I was getting ready to post this Chris said the male and female duck were back. I am sure the male duck did not believe his mate when she told him about the turkey!

Foodstock and Butternut Squash Ravoili

Let's start with dinner. First of all I was exhausted. For some reason I woke up at 3:30AM and did not fall back to sleep. Grrrrrrrr.
And today was Foodstock, more on that later.

I needed something fast for dinner. The less pans involved the better. No I did not order pizza, tempting as that was. I had some Butternut Squash Ravioli in the freezer. We had this back in March. Followed the same sauce recipe. Yes it was just as good. How could you go wrong with butter and cheese and sage.

Now on to Foodstock. What a fun day. A day surrounded by food writers and bloggers and restaurant owners and reviewers. And best of all was a seminar with Molly O'Neill, yes Paul O'Neill's sister.

The day started with Faith Middleton interviewing Ruth Reichl. They talked about a wide range of topics. One thing they brought up which I never thought of before was prepared organic food in the freezer section that is microwaved in plastic containers.
Another topic they touched on is aging wine in water. Did you know Thomas Jefferson had wine put on ships that sailed back and forth to Europe to help age the wine?
Another topic was the industrialization of organic food, or that organic food they sell at Walmart. Lets just say it is not recommended.

Next up was Eric Asimov. One thing he stated was that bottles of wine are products of thought and work.
Champagne and potato chips? Both he and Faith said yes. Something about wine, salt and fat... I will have to check on that one.
New best wine values are from Spain and Italy, Sicily to be exact.

Lunch break. Food truck galore.

I picked the grilled cheese truck, The Whey Station. Grilled Brie and Bacon Marmalade. I love brie and it was the first time I have had Bacon Marmalade. Lets just say it won't be my last!

Then we came to Molly O'Neill. In the kitchen there is a beginning, a middle and an end. Cooking equals power. And being terrified at times is great. The food you eat shows who you are, what you have and where you want to be.

Okay I will not go on. All I can say is today was a great day! I even met some cool people. Judy from Milford, Joan and Jay from NY, and Lee White who is a food writer for the Shoreline News. And wow I am beat.

Will I make it to the super moon... I will let you know tomorrow.

Baked Flounder with Tomato Caper Sauce

I googled baked flounder and found this recipe on Epicurious.com. Do you are remember when we use to have to dig through cookbooks to find recipes?

I can not begin to tell you how delicious this was. The sauce was all I needed, well with Italian bread of course! It was light and on a scale of easiness I would give it a 9, 10 being having dinner delivered!

I picked up some fresh peas at the store and made Minute Rice for side dishes.

Coming up tomorrow.... Foodstock!

Black Bean Soup and Chicken Parmesan Subs

Black Bean Soup. This is a meal that took less then a half hour to make. Recipes like this make me wonder why everyone can not put a home cooked meal on the table at night. I will get off my soap box now.... What no photo! Sigh. Well trust me it was delicious!

And about the Chicken Parmesan Subs. I had those chicken cutlets in the freezer and some homemade marinara sauce so presto we have Chicken Parmesan. We put the cutlets on a small sub rolls.
Another winner!

Sausage and Tomato Bake

The first time I made this was way back in April of 2009. This meal has appeared many times on this blog. Still good and still a super easy clean up. And for a mid week meal that is important.