Monday, October 24, 2011

Monday's Menu

We had a great cooking week this week. With the warm weather (even in the evenings) we have been using the Weber BBQ to cook as much as possible.

I think this regular post is helping us raise the bar, we’re thinking about trying new recipes and making the food we eat more presentable. I’m very thankful to have a husband who loves to cook for me, and that it’s a passion we can both share. I have to say that he introduced me to good food, although I was interested in cooking before I met Rob, he made me think about making the most of every meal we eat.  Sorry just a little sentimental moment there; back to the food.

After our lunch party last weekend, we enjoyed the left over cheeses, with a salad for dinner on Monday night.
One of our friends had given us a selection of her chutneys and relishes on Sunday, and I desperately wanted to eat them with some good sausages, sadly by the time we got to the butcher, Rob decided to skip the sausages and buy rib-eye steak. So he cooked it on the Weber, and we ate it with some cubed potatoes and wilted spinach.
Wednesday night we were home quite late (Rob had been up to the Tarn Shelf at Mt Field setting up a transect to measure with his students), so I quickly cooked us puttanesca.
Thursday was our show day holiday, it was a perfectly sunny day, Rob decided to brush cut the orchard, so I stayed inside to keep the dogs away, and with the sea breeze I could feel my hay fever symptoms flare up. So I thought I’d make us a quick Lebanese feast for lunch. I’d made some lavosh for a work lunch the day before, and we already had some labneh balls in oil in the fridge, so I rolled them in za’atar. I made a batch of hummous and our favourite red pepper and walnut dip. Then I put together a green salad with lots of mint and a sprinkling of sumac. That night it was Rob’s turn, our new favourite recipe for the BBQ is chicken wings marinated in lemon (juice and rind), olive oil, garlic, thyme and chilli flakes. We served them with some grilled Asparagus.
We bought a pizza stone a couple of weeks ago (our oven has a pizza setting we were yet to try) so we thought we’d give it a whirl. Rob made up a batch of dough and we used up all the bits and pieces in the fridge, tomato passata, olives, anchovies, grilled red pepper, labneh cheese, and parsley as a topping.  The first one we tried to move from a tray onto the hot stone, which was quite unsuccessful, it just stretched the already thin base out so we rolled up the edges and left it on the tray.
The second one Rob quickly put together on the stone. They were different, I quite liked the one with the bready edge, but the one baked on the stone was super crunchy. Maybe we have a new Friday tradition?
We were slightly indulgent on Saturday morning picking out a selection of cupcakes from Jo and Michelle’s Salamanca stall.  Rob had a lemon curd and berry ricotta crumble cake, whilst I couldn’t go past the vanilla and rhubarb and the chocolate and honey. They are so good, that neither of us really want to share! We have to wait and hope that they’re there next week.
We ate a dinner of couscous, Lebanese green beans (cooked in tomato and onion with allspice), and grilled eggplant, zucchini, fennel, peppers.
Finally Sunday, the trial run of the chicken wings had gone so well we ate them with some roasted kipfler potatoes, watercress, a garlic and rosemary ciabatta. Our friend's children loved the wings (even with the chilli).  Then the cake.

What was on your menu this week?

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3 comments:

Katrina said...

Yum, yum, YUM! It all looks so delicious! I love the sound of your red pepper and walnut dip :) And the sumac and mint combination sounds fabulous ... might have to give that one a try!

We were camping from Wednesday night at Freycinet so we had to make do with a lot of pre-packaged food this week, but we did fit in a yummy wood fired pizza and fish and chips on the beach!

Apart from that, I celebrated my first asparagus purchase of the year and made a spring vegetable risotto, a raspberry clafoutis, a tomato and lentil soup for work lunches, and last night I attempted to make a creme caramel (my first attempt - we'll see how it goes tonight ...).

Hope you have a wonderful week!

Anonymous said...

Looks great!

We regularly cook on the pizza stone and have found baking parchment a great way to transfer pizza from the bench to the stone - it allows the pizza to crisp up even more if you pull the parchment out after a few minutes. Also, put the pizza stone into the oven when you turn the oven on - it seems to help the stone hold the heat for more than 1 pizza without a period of re-heating.

Gavin - Sydney

Marian Hazel said...

What great weather you would have had in Freycinet? Oh now I want to have a spring vegetable risotto Katrina!
Thanks for that tip Gavin! We'll have another go tomorrow night I reckon.

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