Friday Food: Reunited, Finally

Friday 

Short version: Leftovers

Long version: The children had leftover sausage, curried split peas, and rice. Plus frozen green beans. Cubby remarked as we were sitting down, "Leftovers can be either great or horrible. They're great if it was something delicious. They're horrible if it was something not good."

Luckily, this meal fell into the first category.

I had a salad. Who's surprised?

Saturday

Short version: Waffles, bacon, carrot sticks with curry dip

Long version: The kids had the carrot sticks while I was making dinner which was, yes, waffles.

A. and Calvin were supposed to be home for dinner this day, but American Airlines canceled their flights and rescheduled them for Sunday. This made no one very happy, so I thought it would be a good idea to use the remainder of the waffle batter from breakfast on Friday and let them have a treat.

Jack had requested the waffles, and I finally found a recipe I like. This one does indeed make very crispy waffles, as promised. I used about half yogurt and half milk, and I definitely did not whip the egg whites separately. I see this direction in a lot of waffle recipes, and although I'm sure it makes for ethereal waffles, I can't imagine going to that much trouble first thing in the morning.

Anyway.

When I pulled out the leftover batter for dinner, there wasn't quite enough, so I added a bit of extra flour and milk, but nothing else, and they were still crispy.

"It looks like a picture in a magazine," said Jack. Possibly the first time anyone has ever said that about my very, um, rustic cooking.

I had the last of the pot roast with some frozen stir-fry vegetables. 

Sunday

Short version: Cubby's tomato soup, salami and cream cheese roll-ups, peanut butter balls

Long version: Since Calvin wasn't here to either clean the toilet or choose dessert (he and A. were stuck in Washington, D.C. overnight), I let Poppy choose. She chose peanut butter balls, which I had mentioned once we used to have when I was a kid. I have no idea how my mother made them, though I clearly remember the chocolate chips in the peanut butter and that the balls were rolled in granulated sugar. So I just mixed peanut butter with powdered sugar to make it less sticky, then added chocolate chips, formed the balls, and let Poppy roll the balls in sugar.

Not as good as the chocolate-covered peanut butter balls, but definitely eaten with no complaints.

I was going to make bull-meat stir-fry for dinner, but I always put peanut butter in my stir-fry. I figured that might be a bit of p.b. overload, so I let Cubby make the tomato soup from his kids' cookbook. The one that's thickened with bread. It has no protein in it, so the kids also had slices of salami rolled around cream cheese.

I had . . . yeah.

And now a break for a portrait of the salad-eating cook:

In the world's dorkiest (but shady!) hat.

Monday

Short version: Leg of lamb with potatoes, roasted carrots, frozen peas

Long version: A. and Calvin were supposed to get home on Saturday. But thanks to a series of unfortunate events courtesy of American Airlines, they didn't get home until this day. They were very, very tired, and I thought they needed a good, hearty meal to recover.

This was hearty.

I thought we were done with the leg of lamb roasts, but I forgot that the back leg roasts that A. boned out of the ram we butchered last November were so big that he halved them. So we had four of them, not two. I marinated this one in olive oil, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, and a lot of garlic, and just roasted it with some potato pieces around it until it was done.

Tuesday

Short version: Breakfast sausage patties, garlic bread, green salad with ranch dressing, homemade ice cream sandwiches

Long version: This was Calvin's birthday dinner request. Luckily, I had everything for it. I bought the ice cream when I went to the dentist a couple of weeks ago. I have to plan out that far for things like birthdays.

I didn't know he would want salad, but I managed to get just enough lettuce and beet greens out of the garden to make a salad.

I used this recipe for the ice cream sandwiches. It wasn't hard, but I think maybe I overbaked the cookie part a bit, because it was sort of dry. To be honest, I like purchased ones better.

Wednesday

Short version: Lamb curry, leftover rice, vanilla ice cream

Long version: I had quite a bit of lamb left after Monday's dinner, so I used that to make curry with a bunch of random stuff in the refrigerator--half an onion, the carrot sticks the MiL sent with A. and Calvin, a bit of Cubby's tomato soup, some of the potatoes we dug out of the garden (hooray!), frozen peas, the remainder of a jar of rooster stock from when Cubby made his soup, and sour cream.

It turned out very well.

I had promised ice cream to all children who cooperated with our unexpected afternoon trip to the mechanic an hour away to pick up the van. Because bribery is an integral part of my parenting philosophy. 

No one was pleased about that trip, but they all cooperated, so they all got ice cream. Everyone but Calvin had maple syrup on their ice cream, because maple syrup on vanilla ice cream is delicious. 

Dark maple syrup, of course.

Thursday

Short version: Roasted chicken with carrots, roasted potatoes, carrot sticks for the kids

Long version: Our elderly neighbors brought us two more roosters their daughter didn't want to deal with. Luckily, they brought them by on the very day A. arrived back home. He killed them Tuesday night, plucked them on Wednesday, and I cooked them this day. 

I squeezed lemon juice over the skin, then rubbed on butter and olive oil and sprinkled them heavily with salt. In the cavities I put the spent lemon skins, fresh rosemary from the garden, and a clove of garlic. Then I just roasted them until they were done. In the same pan were carrots--the remains of the carrot sticks I had brought to the pool party I took the kids to earlier in the day--and a head of garlic to roast along with the chicken.

The potatoes--our garden potatoes, with just olive oil and salt--roasted in a separate pan. I find when I roast them in the same pan as the meat, the meat juices keep the potatoes from getting crispy enough.

It was really good chicken. They were young roosters, so they were quite tender. As Calvin was eating his, he paused and asked, "Is that a feather?"

I shrugged and said, "Well, it's a chicken. They have feathers."

He nodded and kept eating. (Although he didn't eat the skin.)

And that's what it means to know where your food comes from.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?