God love Danny DeVito and Limoncello…
I wish I could pound back a few with those two…
Posted under Random Thoughts, celebrity news/gossip
This post was written by Amy on November 30, 2006
Royal Shoulder of Lamb with Saffron, Raisins and Pistachios and Lemon Coriander Basmati Rice
Royal Shoulder of Lamb with Saffron, Raisins and Pistachios and Lemon Coriander Basmati Rice
See the recipe on the website there’s a video there too.
By Daniel Boulud as shown on the Today show.
Greg and I made this last week after I saw it being prepared on the NBC Today show. It just looked too good to pass up. It was.
I will say that it was not cheap. The lamb leg alone (we got leg instead of shoulder at the suggestion of the butcher) was $23.00. But it made a huge meal. It would be for four people I would guess (unless one of those people is Greg). I know the recipe says 6 and perhaps if we used shoulder it would have been. But instead we used 4 pounds of lamb leg. It fed both of u s for one meal and Greg alone for the second.
I know this looks complicated, and I admit it has a TON of ingredients, but don’t let that prevent you from making it. It’s delicious. Yes, it’s putsy, but it’s not hard at ALL. It was too long to show all here, so click the [more] link to see the recipe and photos.
This post was written by Amy on November 29, 2006
Buy the Book
Oh and in case you are interested…
Here’s the book that the braised lamb recipe came from:
Braise by Daniel Boulud
Posted under Cooking, Cool Stuff to Buy
This post was written by Amy on November 29, 2006
Roasted Acorn Squash stuffed with Basmati Coriander Rice
Acorn Squash stuffed with Basmati Coriander Rice.
Hopefully you read the recipe for the braised lamb I posted earlier. Also hopefully you made it, or plan to.
It made enough rice and sauce for a small village. So needless to say we had leftovers. Well, I love squash and Greg hates it. So last night instead of ordering a pizza, I got a little creative.
I cut an acorn squash in half, scooped out and tossed the innards. I put some butter (well, olive oil margarine) on each half, sprinkled with salt, pepper and coriander. I then roasted it at 425 for about 35 minutes. Could have been longer, I honestly wasn’t counting. I just kept checking it and turned it off when it was brown on top and soft when I grabbed it with tongs.
Meanwhile I put some leftover rice in a saucepan and poured over some of the leftover sauce. Just enough so it held together. Heated it until hot all the way through.
Greg heated the leftover lamb in the micro and had some of the rice with it.
I spooned the rice into the “cups” of the squash and sprinkled some pistachio nuts on top. It was wonderful. And since Greg won’t eat squash, I have the other half for lunch today!
Posted under Cooking, Vegetarian
This post was written by Amy on November 26, 2006
Baked Spaghetti and Meatballs
Meatballs
1 pound ground beef
1 pound ground turkey
2 eggs
½ cup Italian seasoned bread crumbs (or use regular and add Italian seasonings)
1 teaspoon salt (maybe more?)
3 slices of Onion 4 cloves Garlic
¼ cup Parsley
Sauce
2 cans (14 oz each) canned diced tomatoes
1 (12 ounce) can tomato paste
½ can (from the paste) of water
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
Italian seasoning
½ cup black olives sliced in half ½ cup green olives sliced in half
Parmesan cheese
Fresh mozzarella cheese
In large bowl combine beef, turkey, and eggs.
In food processor chop the parsley. Add that to the meat. In food processor combine onion and garlic and process until really chopped, almost paste. Add that to the meat mixture. Add enough breadcrumbs to make it stick together and have the right consistency. I did not measure, but I would guess it was somewhere around a half cup.
Form the meat mixture into balls, mine were about the size of a ping pong ball (they shrink quite a bit when you cook them) and place on a baking sheet or roasting pan. I have the kind of roasting pan that is like two pans but the top one has slits in it. This worked well. The kind with a grate/rack would not unless you make the balls really big.
Broil the meatballs until done. You might have to turn the pan around mid way through. I had to make them in batches because I only have one pan, but it took around 15 minutes per batch.
While they are cooking assemble the sauce. In the crock pot, add the tomatoes, tomato paste, water, salt and pepper, black olives and green olives and any other veggies you want in there. I threw in some mushrooms too. If you want the veggies crispy, don’t add them yet. Turn on the crock-pot and let it cook
When the meatballs are done. Put them into the crock-pot with the sauce. You can let it cook as long as you want to. I left it about an hour, but it certainly could have cooked a lot longer. Taste and adjust seasonings.
Just before serving, add some Parmesan cheese to the pot. Shred some more for serving.
Cook pasta. Drain. Put pasta in an oven safe bowl. Spoon the sauce and meatballs over the noodles. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Place slices of mozzarella over the top and broil until the cheese is bubbly and beginning to brown. Sprinkle with more Parmesan and serve.
Posted under Beef, Cooking, Pasta, Random Thoughts
This post was written by Amy on November 24, 2006
Naughty dogs
As if my day yesterday wasn’t going along badly enough already***…this is what I came home to:
***I will fill you in on the new episode in this saga in real life. I can’t say much here, but call email me and I’ll fill you in. Suffice it to say some people are jerks and have NO heart at all.
But I did a little retail therapy after happy hour. I got a new coat that I have been eyeing for a few weeks. Here Greg models it:
Happy hour was fun. We walked in and heard Rachael Sage on the speaker system. Awhile ago Tom asked me to create a mix CD that he could play at the bar and I did that last week. It was so cool to be sitting in my favorite bar, watching a movie (no sound), having a drink, pizza and listening to Terami, Regina, Imogen and my other favorites. Ah I love Aura.
Posted under happy hour, pets
This post was written by Amy on November 8, 2006
New Sarah McLachlan tune!
OK well a sample of it. [Read more and get the link to the song on Collected Sounds]
Posted under Music
This post was written by Amy on November 8, 2006
Face Cookies
I read this in an article about Flavor Flav:
Asked in September to describe his dream girl, Flav told PEOPLE: “I want a girl who looks good when she wakes up in the morning. We could take her face and dip it in dough and she’ll make some nice face cookies. Some girls wake up, man, you could put their face in dough and you’ll get a gorilla cookie, for real!”
Statements like this are why I found myself watching his show…more often than I care to admit.
Posted under Random Thoughts
This post was written by Amy on November 1, 2006