Friday Food: The Easter Lamb

Friday

Short version: Shrimp tacos or burritos, refried beans

Long version: Last meatless Friday in Lent! We had been the lucky recipients of wild, USA-caught tiny "salad" shrimp from the excess commodities this week, which is what I used to make dinner. All I did was saute them with taco spices. My sister, who was visiting, encouraged me to add butter and parsley, too, which I did.

To make the refried beans, I used one quart jar of my home-canned pintos in a pan with oil and sauteed garlic, mashed and simmered until thick. So good.

We had lots of avocados to make guacamole, too, which always elevates this sort of thing.

Some had flour tortillas (burritos) and some had corn tortillas (tacos), and all enjoyed their meal. I know I did.

Saturday

Short version: Pork, cornbread, green salad with vinaigrette, rice pudding

Long version: Pork butt is so useful. I make this meal a lot when we have guests. It can be made mostly ahead, with minimal work at dinnertime, which is nice when there's a lot going on. It is also good for people who have dietary restrictions, as there is no gluten, alliums, or dairy if you avoid the cornbread and rice pudding. And it makes a LOT of food.

Sunday

Short version: Easter lamb, pita bread, potatoes and onions, tzatziki sauce, hummus, chiffon cake with strawberries and whipped cream, sugar cookies

Long version: Would we have anything but lamb for Easter dinner? Of course not. We had kept one of the back leg roasts bone-in just for Easter dinner when we were butchering a couple of week ago.

I used this recipe for it, except--there is always an except with me and recipes--I was preparing the garlic by hand, rather than in a food processor because the pieces of mine were in the dishwasher at the time. So I only did six cloves of garlic instead of 15. Also, I used the juice of only half a lemon, I didn't use the mint or nutmeg, and I didn't measure the other things. 

That's a lot of excepts.

I did put garlic in slits all in the meat, though, which is always a good idea.

I had room in the Pyrex with the lamb, so I cut up a few potatoes and an onion to go in there, too. Rather than doing a separate spice mixture for that, I just used some of the lamb spice mixture. Very good.

I use this recipe for pita bread, this one for tzatziki, this one for hummus, and this one for chiffon cake.

My garden-nerd goal is to use something from the garden for every major holiday meal. Easter was early this year, but I did have parsley and green garlic to use. I put those in the tzatziki.

A modest first harvest.

The sugar cookies were extra undecorated ones from St. Patrick's Day that I had in the freezer. I let Poppy decorate them with colored sugar, and they were very colorful.

All together, a very nice meal.

Monday

Short version: Fried pork 'n' cornbread, leftover shrimp, green salad with ranch/tzatziki dressing, chiffon cake tower

Long version: We had quite a bit of cornbread left, which gets pretty dry if it's not fresh. I solved that problem by frying cubes of it in a bunch of bacon grease and butter in a skillet, to which I also added the leftover pork with a bit more salt and maple syrup. This was quite popular.

I turned the tzatziki sauce into something like ranch dressing by adding some mayonnaise to it. One child had the last of the shrimp in a tortilla with this dressing in the wrap.

I also had some chiffon cake left over. A. had thought it would be good sliced into layers with whipped cream and strawberry jam between the layers. It was very good that way, but also pretty much impossible to cut neatly.

A towering pile of sugar and deliciousness.

Luckily, our family doesn't care what it looks like if it tastes good. And this definitely did.

Tuesday

Short version: Lamb curry, rice, crackers

Long version: All the lamb left from the leg, plus the curry powder left from dying eggs, plus lamb stock I had made with the bone, onion, carrots, potatoes, green peas, and cream.

It's so handy that I have both lamb and curry powder left over after Easter. Dinner in the following days is foreordained.

I also spent my entire morning rescuing failed sourdough (it got overheated when I put it on the woodstove to warm up) by making hundreds of crackers. I hate making crackers because it is very tedious, but the children enjoyed them.

So many crackers. Luckily, they freeze well.

Wednesday

Short version: Leftover curry and rice, bread and butter

Long version: Nah.

Thursday

Short version: Pizzas, green salad with ranch dressing

Long version: There were only five of us at home, so I thought I could just make one half-sheet-pan pizza. But then I was afraid that wouldn't be quite enough, so made a pizza in a 14-inch cast iron skillet. 

The big one had bacon; the one in the skillet was just cheese.

Refrigerator check!

Middlin'.

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