Spanish Potato Salad

Saturday 30 June

This is one of our warm-weather Spanish staples, so Holt took the opportunity to put it together while our friend David was cutting Barbara's hair this afternoon.
It's nice when the hot chorizo can be mixed with the hot potatoes immediately, so they soak up the spicy oil.  The onion was all white, so we added celery (no bell peppers available), and threw the hot sausage on them first to tenderize a bit.  Then the potato got mixed in and the whole thing sat awhile in its oil and sherry vinegar marinade.  It didn't need to be refrigerated, as we ate it only a few hours later. 

Gazpacho with Cheese Croutons

Friday 29 June

Temperatures look to be in the high 90s all this week, so we wanted something cold and immediate for dinner, especially considering that we had a big Floyd's chicken lunch with Lynne and Tom today.

The solution was gazpacho.  We could have used both tomatoes and tomatillos, but since we had tomatillos yesterday, we stuck to puréed Roma tomatoes and chunks of local cucumber, scattered with scallions, sherry vinegar and good oil, and topped with croutons made of defrosted crescia al formaggio from Easter.

Nacho Mama

Thursday 28 June

This is something we do with vaguely Mexican leftover ingredients when it's too hot to run the oven for Chilaquiles.

In this case, we fried up a half pound of Charles Bare bulk sausage, seasoned with ground cumin, coriander, and a little medium Chimayo chile.  Then we made a salsa of Farmers' Market tomatillos (Holt bought out the stall on Saturday) whizzed up with white onion and cilantro, and dressed with lime. 

The drained juice from that salsa, incidentally, made a very refreshing drink when chilled and mixed with reposado tequila and ice; Holt thought it should be named something like Colorless Green Ideas Sleep Furiously (he is a linguist, after all), but Barbara voted for Tomatillaquila.

Oh, back to dinner.  A layer of tortilla chips got spread on two oven-proof dishes, topped with the drained salsa and now-chorizo-like sausage, and scattered with a mixture of cheeses, jack and colby eked out with swiss (too thick, but it's what we had).  Then the dishes sat under the broiler until the cheeses melted, and we snarfed them down with a couple of beers.

Salmon with Root Rubies and Pearls

Wednesday 27 June

On the day that our mortgage disappeared, we had to have some sparkles to celebrate, i.e. Segura Viudas cava.  There was also an opportune sale on salmon fillets at Kroger, so we got about a pound, cut it into two portions, and patted them with thyme, salt, and a sprinkle of sugar to make a perfect crust when pan-fried. 

Our side dish was extra special too: "Rubies and Pearls" - tiny beets and baby red turnips, each roasted in foil packets until tender, skinned (though the turnips didn't really have to be), dressed with oil, chilled, re-dressed and topped with turnip shoots from the garden.

A special meal for a special occasion.

Steak and Salad

Tuesday 26 June

Defrosted one of those Kroger's extra-thick strip steak, and just seasoned and grilled it. 

Served it with a salad of cucumber, tomato, and garden lettuce.

Simple.

Incidentally, here Barbara shows off the entire produce of her purple bush bean plantings, which the evil rabbits have been nibbling since they poked their first leaves out of the earth. 

One bean, which we split and ate raw.  

Cod Pieces and Compote from a Historical Novel

Monday 25 June

As we're stranded in the middle of the country, our seafood options are generally based on what Trader Joe's can supply.  This time, it was Pieces of Cod (that pass understanding), defrosted, dredged in seasoned beaten egg, rolled in seasoned panko, and shallow fried in oil.  Nicely crunchy, though finer breadcrumbs would have stuck to the fish better.

Our side dish was fictional: our friend Karen sent us a historical novel called Signora Da Vinci (and now we know why Lorenzo de' Medici was called Il Magnifico) which included a recipe for grape-olive compote.  Unfortunately the amounts were vague, but in a casserole, we combined about a cup of seedless red grapes, about 2/3 cup of pitted Kalamata olives, 2 Tbsp. each of olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and a Tbsp. of fresh thyme leaves.  It baked for an hour at 350º, getting stirred about every 20 minutes. 

The grapes gave off a fair amount of moisture and made it very juicy, so you could halve the oil and vinegar amounts.  But it was sweet, salty, and made a good side dish for the crunchy fish (Lorenzo's very active cod pieces).  It could also be served as bruschetta scattered with crumbled goat cheese, as you like.

Sunday at the Opera

Sunday 24 June

Our niece Caroline had a triumphant debut as First Ragamuffin in the Southern Illinois Music Festival Children's Chorus of La Bohème.  Her co-stars were former Cincinnatian and CCM graduate Gary Seydell as Rodolfo; Gina Galati as a touching Mimi; our nephew Jacob's voice teacher Eric McCluskey as Marcello; and Ashley Wheat stealing scenes as Musetta.

We were in happy emotional rags when we got home - and the temperature outside was in the high 90s - but we had a glass of wine and heated the oven nonetheless to make kale crisps, with kale that Barbara grew and smuggled across state lines, as an appetizer.

The main course was Becky's own pesto and grape tomatoes on whole wheat pasta. 

Bravi tutti!