Tag: dinner time

Barefoot Contessa Recipe 41: Salmon and Melting Cherry Tomatoes

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This recipe can be found in Foolproof, page 150.

Saturday was my day to cook last week. And even though it wasn’t Friday, I still made fish. Okay, I’ll be honest, we ended up not cooking the fish Friday due to our schedules. But, it was defrosted and we didn’t want to lose it.

Luckily for me, Ina has a handful of recipes that call for salmon as the main star. I was glad I finally got to make this recipe since I had been eyeing it for some time. Salmon with Melting Cherry Tomatoes didn’t disappoint. In fact, it included a few new techniques for me which was great!

The dish begins by having you render onions and garlic in some olive oil until the onions turn sweet. Then you add in some sliced cherry tomatoes and let those cook down for about 15 minutes. While they are cooking, some of they become mushing and split even further, which gives them the appearance of “melting.” Hence the name! Towards the end, you add in balsamic vinegar and basil and voila you have an easy and flavor-packed side dish.

For the star of the dish, the salmon, you start by pan-searing it in a very, very hot cast iron pan. Then the salmon is baked in a hot oven for less than 10 minutes. This was a new technique for me. I had seen and read recipes where chefs sear something in a pan for a few minutes, then throw it in the oven to finish the cooking process. But I never really had the chance to try it for myself until this recipe.

Honestly, I was a little skeptical at first. When I pulled the pan out of the oven, I didn’t think the fish was going to be done. But I trusted Ina and the recipe. After letting the fish stand for a few minutes with a tented piece of foil, it came out wonderfully tender! The simple combination of olive oil, salt, and pepper are really all you need on this salmon. The real flavor punch comes from the tomato “sauce.”

One of the things I loved about this recipe was the fact that it came with a built-in vegetable dish. So, I only had to make an additional starch to round out the meal. That dish became recipe #42, which will be published later this week!

Salmon and Melting Cherry Tomatoes. The couscous side dish is recipe #42.

Barefoot Contessa Recipe #38 Chicken Thighs with Creamy Mustard Sauce

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This recipe can be found in Cook Like a Pro, pg. 91

I had off from work on Monday, so I was asked to make dinner. Of course, I obliged. Usually, when it’s my turn to make dinner, I get to decide the meal from scratch entirely. But not Monday. I already the main ingredients to work with: chicken thighs. So, naturally, I seized the opportunity to cross another Barefoot Contessa recipe off the list.

Using the Master Recipe Index, I quickly found a recipe that would work. It was even better because we had nearly everything to make it. I only had to purchase one ingredient. Score! The creamy mustard sauce recipe calls for two types of mustard. One of which is one my family doesn’t really use. The amount in the recipe was only a teaspoon, so I opted to leave out the whole grain mustard entirely. But, you wouldn’t know the difference anyway.

This recipe cooked up nice and quick and was packed with so much flavor thanks to the Grey Poupon dijon mustard. The sauce was creamy despite not having any dairy product. This meal serves a crowd and it will definitely be a crowd-pleaser!

Overall the cooking time was off from what the recipe said it would be. I’ve found this to be typical of Barefoot Contessa recipes. However, in this case, I think it was due to the fact that I had really GIANT chicken thighs to cook. I had to spread them over two pans! They were so large and there was so many!

But, I just adjusted the recipe to compensate for the large number of thighs and went with it! This dish has so many different flavors that it will leave you wanting to have seconds…maybe even thirds.

I made dessert, too! That was the original plan for Monday. Just make a dessert. I chose to do something I’d never done before and make meringue. Check back tomorrow to see how they turned out!

Barefoot Contessa Recipe #32 – Panko Crusted Salmon

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This recipe is from How Easy is That?, page 152

For Friday night dinner, I made my first fish recipe in the Ina cook-through saga. My family usually eats fish about once a week, typically salmon. So, a salmon recipe seemed like the logical choice. We already had the fish and almost all the ingredients to make the panko crust. I think I only had to buy a lemon for the zest.

This recipe is pretty straight forward. But, to be honest, it’s nothing special. The dijon mustard does give the salmon an extra flavor and it plays nicely with the panko crust. The panko prevents the salmon from drying out which, obviously, make it more flavorful. If you’re looking to dress up your run-of-the-mill salmon filet, then definitely try this one. One of the perks is all the ingredients are pretty standard, so it won’t break the bank either. That was a nice reprieve from some other Ina recipes.

To my dish, I decided to throw in some of the pine nuts I used for the gremolata I made a few weeks ago. Those little nuts are expensive and I don’t want them to go to waste!

In addition to this recipe, I made a side dish. That recipe review will be posted later in the week.

See ya then!

Friday Recipes

Published on by RJLeave a comment

Well, here we are again.

Friday.

And that means I get to (have to?) cook for the family once again. This week was a tricky week when it came to deciding what I wanted to make. Since I only was able to do one recipe last week (read the post), I felt I needed to knock out at least three this weekend.

While I’ve not given myself an “official” timeline, I am trying to do at least 100 recipes over the course of the next year. That comes out to about two recipes per week. Which I think is doable…for now at least.

I was feeling kind of down for most of the week. I’m not sure if it’s the seasonal change or the pandemic. Most likely both. So, I decided I was going to make something sweet to have as a dessert over the weekend!

And I think I found the perfect thing: Apple Pie Bars

This recipe is featured in Cooking For Jeffrey which is one of the books I haven’t made anything out of yet, even before this project began.

I chose this one for a number of reasons. First, it seems pretty easy. Second, apples are in season here in New England this time of year. And finally, because who doesn’t love apple pie? I mean, I know it isn’t truly apple pie. But it’ll give me the feeling of eating apple pie.

At least I hope so!

Now, the next challenge was what would I make for dinner?

After looking through some of the cookbooks I have yet to cook ANYTHNG out of, I decided on something from Foolproof. It is a pasta dish that I’ve wanted to make for a long time: Straw & Hay with Gorgonzola. I then decided to make a a salad to go with it. (I’ll have my three recipes!)

I went Back to Basics and found a tasty-looking autumn salad that I think will complement the pasta nicely. Roasted Butternut Squash Salad with Warm Cider Vinaigrette just screams Fall. Doesn’t it?

I can’t wait to try these tonight. Now, off to get the ingredients I don’t have.