7-28: Pork Chops with Rosemary is a pretty simple pork chop recipe that’s good for a quick dinner. We buy the big packs of chops from Costco, so we always have to come up with different ways to prepare them.
Along with the abundance of pork, we’ve been growing and drying our own rosemary–it’s WAY more potent and flavorful than the packaged stuff from the market. If you have to choose, go with the fresh over the dried–it’ll taste so much better.
Here’s one I’ve made in the past–there’s even my Sharpie notations to prove it. I remember making 6-40: Peppercorn Chicken Breasts for my mom, since she’s not a red meat eater and I was making another recipe from this book for everyone else that was heavy on meat. I’ll cover that one eventually, and update this to reflect that. 😉
My notations claim that it’s easy. It is, when you use the right ingredients. If you don’t, it gets a bit tougher…
3-2: New England Clam Chowder is one of two recipes that I cooked and photographed before I took an extended break from cooking for this project. Therefore, my memories of the process of this dish may be a little fuzzy, but I think I’ll make some sense of it.
Clam chowder is something that I’ve loved since I was a kid. My husband is from New England and when we go back to visit, it’s always an anticipated treat. We made a pretty decent clam chowder in the restaurant I worked at, too, and this recipe comes pretty close.
Of course, it’s mandatory that it be referred to as chowdah–say it right!
This one…was challenging. And it seemed so simple! 4-30: Cheese-Stuffed Potato Croquettes are essentially mozzarella sticks with a mashed potato/panko coating. These turned from a quick snack into a multi-day attempt.
Now, before I scare you off this recipe: it was 100% my fault it went south. I tried to improvise in several places, and it proved to be my downfall each time. Sometimes you can take liberties, and sometimes you can’t.
Here’s how you learn those lessons.
5-12: Deviled Eggs is somewhat different take on a pretty traditional dish. Deviled eggs are very commonplace in American cuisine, and there are varying reasons for the name.
Deviled eggs (to me) usually have mustard and mayo mixed with the yolks, and some paprika sprinkled on top. These eggs have NONE of those things (except the egg parts).
If you still have any zucchini or tomatoes lying around from a late summer harvest, this is a great vegetarian recipe with which to use those up. 🍅
Also note the new background: my first entry from my new (hopefully somewhat permanent) kitchen. 🙂
I styled mine in more of a fried zucchini-appetizer way, but the casserole way works too.
I’ve been making a lot of potato recipes lately. There’s a 10 lb. bag in my pantry I’ve been working my way through, so expect a few more potato recipes over the next few weeks. We’ll start here with one I’ve made before–4-11: Potato Soufflé with Onions.
More of my handwriting. I’ve made this one before, and this time I remember the circumstances and my adaptations–see what good notes will do for you?
In 3-13: Velvety Carrot Soup, I talked about how I love old cookbooks for their colorful attempts at trying to make boring recipes sound exciting. Another cookbook “trope” is putting words like easy, simple or quick in the title of a recipe that would otherwise sound…well, not those things.
Sometimes they live up to their titles, and sometimes not. A prime example of the former would be 6-4: Easy Stuffed Chicken Breasts. To be honest, stuffing chicken breasts doesn’t even sound that hard to begin with, so I suppose it didn’t even need that qualifier.
Unless it sounded hard to you–if that’s the case, ignore that last sentence. 🙂 It’s really not that hard, is what I’m saying.
The fourth of the 4 dishes I made before I left for my trip a few weeks ago is from Book 1, Group 1 (Appetizers & Starters), Subgroup 4 (Potatoes & Vegetables), Card #23: Mashed Potatoes with Broccoli. I made this dish to accompany 6-4: Easy Stuffed Chicken Breasts and to use up some CSA veggies.
They ended up being kind of…boring. I realize neither mashed potatoes nor broccoli are EXCITING things, but this dish needed a lot of help.
I jumped several sections ahead a few weeks ago when I needed to make a pasta side dish for something (I don’t even remember what at this point). I don’t have this group scanned yet and I procrastinated on scanning the card–oh well. 🌿
We find 12-6: Seasoned Pasta Toss in Book 2, Group 2 (Main Courses), Subgroup 12 (Pasta & Rice). I still have a ton of parsley in my freezer and gluten-free rice pasta in my pantry, and it’s time to clean house.
Too bad it turned out to be less than impressive. It’s my fault, but still.