Last night we roasted a bunch of hothouse tomatoes in The Egg and then chopped them up and combined them with some sauteed onion and garlic and the first of our own basil. Not too bad a pasta sauce if I do say so. Next time I might forgo the oak chips in The Egg, though. It was a wee bit smoky.
Filed under: Food
Not sure why it had to be done but it has. The NYT has combined all their Dining and Drinking blogs into one blog. I only really read Bitten but now I will have to sift through the others to get to him. I suppose I will check out the other posts but enjoyed the unfiltered variety of blog.
Our current favorite band excels at face-melting bluegrass music. But it turns out mandolin player Jeff Austin is also quite accomplished in the kitchen. We should have known when we saw them last summer they talked about the great restaurant down the street from the venue. A restaurant a friend had recomended to me and we passed up. Just think! We could have dined with the band!
Great interview on Epicurean Musician.
The recent cold weather in Florida has caused a major shortage of tomatoes in the rest of the country. This has caused some fast food restaurants to stop using tomatoes in their food unless specifically asked to. Not that this is a bad thing based on how bad those tomatoes usually are.
On the bright side, I’ve ordered my seedlings rather than starting seeds this year. With so many varities available as live plants it seemed like too much trouble to start my own. But the snow had better melt soon as I asked for a “first half of April” delivery.
What was I thinking?
We were saddened last November when our favorite Vietnamese restaurant Little Saigon closed. Great food, great Pho and really close by in Montclair.
To our delight we received word last weekend that, as rumoured, they’ve reopened in nearby Nutley. Same menu same smiling faces welcoming us. For those of you who are nearby they’re at 358 Passic Ave in Nutley (sorry, no website).
And somehow in the process of figuring out where they were I stumbled upon this wonderful site: Pho Fever. Primo’s already got his eye on a “Pho Shizzle” t-shirt.
After a wonderful Christmas in Colorado which found the Principessa conquering high-altitude Yorkshire Pudding, (which turned out great at an altitude of 8500 ft. I might add) and Segundo and TB making a gingerbread village we returned to a mailbox stuffed with seed catalogs. I promised The Principessa I would only grow 2 kinds of tomatoes this year. The red kind and the not-red kind.
Sunday was the annual football banquet. As the coach said when sent out the note asking for contributions “not everyone can bring soda”. There were four options for contributing entrees: Baked Ziti, Lasanga, Sausage & Peppers and Meatballs. You know the kind of banquet we’re talkin’ ’bout.
So we signed up for meatballs. We made about 60. Those puppies lasted about 30 seconds around all those 7th and 8th grade linemen.
Filed under: Garden
The turkey was succulent. The sides were better. Our own fare consisted of Brussels sprouts and herbs.
Some pics from T-day.
Filed under: Garden, Kitchen | Tags: brussels sprouts, Garden, herbs, Kitchen
4 days and counting. The long range forecast is not looking great for the frying of the bird. We’ll keep you posted.
On the other hand, this year may be our most bounteous harvest yet for the holiday table. In the past we’ve had little more than a few herbs to use for the big feast but this year we’ll be able to serve our own Brussels sprouts as well as lettuce if we went nuts and decided we needed to ruin our holiday meal with a salad. There are also a few shallots poking their fronds up from the soil.
Alas, it doesn’t look like the beets I planted in late August are going to amount to anything. Maybe enough for a garnish at best. I’ll wait until Thursday to pull a couple and roast ’em up real fast if there are enough to make a side.
In preparation for the arrival of friends and family we gussied up the yard this weekend. Mowed, fertilized, raked the remaining leaves. This year we only threw out one bag of leaves, the rest went to the composting bin to be used over the course of the year.
Also, on Friday I stopped by our guys at NJ Grinding to get our knives sharpened for all the food prep we’ll be doing.
JerzeeTomato 