Make Again

Yet another really good meal tonight. It was just Larry and I since Jay's out of town. Everything was so easy to make. We loved the potatoes, and the carrots were very sweet but delicious. The halibut, newly in season, could have been cooked plain with just salt and pepper, but it was good like this too. The recipe called for cod, but it was perfect with halibut (the recipe is also in the cookbook Cooking New American.

• Halibut Fillets with Mustard-Tarragon Crumb Crust (Fine Cooking #12, December 1995 2007, p. 49)
• Baby Yukon Potato Salad with Shallots, Chives, Bacon & Lemon Vinaigrette (Fine Cooking #91, March 2008, p. 43)
• Maple Pan-Roasted Baby Carrots (Fine Cooking #85, May 2007, p. 53)

Whole Foods was fresh out of halibut, so I went with my other favorite fish - sustainable Chilean sea bass. We loved the flavors in this fish and I actually think the sea bass was a better choice. We really liked the cabbage, but I will never make it again because the process of cooking fish sauce at a high temperature about killed us (noxious odors and we couldn't stop coughing).

• Chinese Five-Spice Chilean Sea Bass with Pickled Red Pepper & Ginger (Fine Cooking #92, May 2008, p. 47)
• Stir-Fried Napa Cabbage with Garlic, Fresh Chile & Basil (Fine Cooking #84, March 2008, p. 56)

Larry made pork chops for dinner tonight. I pitched in and made the polenta. We really liked the pork chops, and they were pretty easy to make.

• Deviled Pork Chops (Fine Cooking #91, March 2008, p. 86a)
• Trader Joe's Spinach Salad
• Creamy Goat Cheese Polenta (Fine Cooking #57, May 2003, p. 86C)

This recipe called for Haddock or Cod, but halibut season just opened up so I picked halibut instead. We loved this dish. Lucky Amy got to try it early as a Fine Cooking tester, and even got her name in print in the magazine! The mashed potatoes were good, but I prefer the buttermilk mashed potatoes I usually make instead.

• Sear-Roasted Halibut with Horseradish Aïoli & Lemon-Zest Breadcrumbs (Fine Cooking #92, May 2008, p. 48)
• Butter Lettuce with Creamy Black Pepper Dressing (Fine Cooking #51, July 2002, p. 48)
• Creamy Garlic Mashed Potatoes (Fine Cooking #92, May 2008, p. 60)

Wine: Ramazzotti 2005 Zin-Giovese (Dry Creek Valley, California). The article suggested a rosé, which we don't buy a lot of - but this one was nice with the fish.

Larry made dinner again tonight (yay!), and he bravely chose something from a cookbook I just got for Christmas from his dad. He did a great job finding ingredients (Whole Foods had amaranth) and the chili was really delicious. I loved the sour cream and we were surprised that we really liked the amaranth crunch.

Neither one of us had tried amaranth before, but the description in the cookbook says it's earth and kind of grassy - and compares the texture of cooked amaranth to okra. Yuk! But this is toasted and it's delicious. It's about the size of mustard seeds. The amaranth crunch also calls for hulled pumpkin seeds, which we didn't think we'd ever seen in a store, but now we think they're labeled pepitas.

Larry also inadvertently discovered a shortcut in the recipe. As he added the two cups of uncooked pearl barley to the chili, he couldn't figure out how it was going to cook in only 5 minutes (described in the recipe). I had just gotten home from work, and when I looked at the recipe I noticed that it called for two cups of cooked barley. Whoops! No big deal, we added some homemade vegetable broth I had on hand so the extra barley had something to soak up. It only took 20 minutes for the barley to finish cooking. I loved whole grains.

• Barley & Turkey Chili with Jalapeño Sour Cream and Amaranth Crunch (Whole Grains Every Day, Every Way, p. 186)
• Sourdough bread with Sauteed Garlic Butter (Fine Cooking #43, March 2001, p. 49)