Gleanings of Wheat

Tonight I'm making an old favorite. Both portions of the dinner are from Giada, you can find the links  here and here . I made this for the first time about 4 years ago and it was such a hit I made it two nights later for some friends. I've been craving it lately, so I decided tonight was the night to make it again. Chicken Saltimbocca 6 (3-ounce) chicken cutlets, pounded to evenly flatten Salt  and freshly  ground  black pepper 6 paper-thin slices prosciutto 1 (10-ounce) box frozen chopped spinach, thawed 3 tablespoons olive oil 1/4 cup grated Parmesan 1 (14-ounce) can low-salt chicken broth 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice Place the chicken cutlets flat on the work surface. Sprinkle the chicken with salt and pepper. Lay 1 slice of prosciutto atop each chicken cutlet. Squeeze the frozen spinach to remove the excess water. Season the spinach with salt and pepper. In a small bowl, toss the spinach with 1 tablespoon of oil to coat. Arrange an even, t...

I have a seven year old. How did that happen???? And what a boy he is. When he got up this morning he told me he'd been dreaming of "Batman's car" and that it was just the right size for him to drive. I was exhausted, I'd been up about 24 hours at this point, spent 3 or 4 hours pushing, and still ended up having a c-section. This is one of my favorite photos from just after William was born. His uncle (who was like 10 at the time) came over to visit and William kept crying when DJ would try to hold him so we stuffed DJ's shirt with a pillow and after that William was fine.   December 2009

This made me angry, really angry. Driscoll and Macdonald also saw a glimpse of what lies ahead for many young girls. His posting on line: If u want a phone, cigarettes or a teenage girl you can get them here in Port au Prince. Like the American who said he's on a relief mission and bought a hungry girl despite our confrontation. I asked Driscoll more about that scene in a brief phone interview with him last night, minutes after his return last night to the USA. We were downtown loading up our film crew. There were no police, no medics, to be seen by a huge park with hundreds of people camping out with no where else to go. There was a little cart with a red umbrella and a man selling cell phones and cigarettes -- and a few young girls. "You want to buy loving?" the guy asked me. I said, "What in the world are you talking about?" But there was another guy there, who claimed to be a translator for a relief agency, who was negotiating a price for a girl. I...

Ok, I did this dinner like a week ago, I just keep forgetting to post. I was feeling incredibly lazy when I did this, and it turned out great. I had some frozen (uncooked) jumbo shrimp in the freezer that I wanted to use up, but I didn't really have anything that felt like it went with it. Problem, yes? Not for super me! I ended up dicing one small onion, mincing two cloves of garlic & browning them in a skillet. Then I added sliced green bell peppers and cooked that for a few minutes. Pull it out and keep it near. Add the shrimp to the same skillet, sprinkle with lemon juice, once the shrimp were almost opacque I added the pepper, garlic, onion mixture back to the skillet. Meanwhile I cooked up some white rice. Once everything was done I threw it all on a plate with some lettuce & topped that with oilve oil & vinegar dressing. Super yum, guys, super yum. AND it looked pretty. And it only took about 20 minutes. Sorry about the lame picture, I couldn't find my...

As promised, here is my first experiment! I wanted eggs for lunch (I had cookies for breakfast) so I decided to attempt making hash browns for the first time and decided to dress it up a bit by adding cheese & onions. I started off by dicing 1/4 of an onion I had sitting in my fridge and adding it to a hot skillet with a tablespoon of butter. I cooked the onion till they just started to brown - about 3 minutes. Meanwhile I got my handy IKEA cheese grater * out and shredded a small potato over it. I tossed that into the skillet and mixed up the contents and let it cook for about 5 minutes before adding a handful of shredded cheese to it. Results Honestly? It was pretty ugly looking. Not golden brown like I'm used to, but it tasted great! Next time I think I'd use 1/8 of a onion or a larger potato, I'd also let the onion cook a few minutes longer. Other than that it was great. Went great with the eggs. I'm pretty happy about it. Next experiment will be posted ...

So I've decided to do a mini series of posts where I'll be cooking using no pre-existing recipe. Just gonna make things up as I go with whatever I have lying around and then I'll post about how it turned out. Good or bad. I'll do at least one breakfast, one dinner, and one dessert. Look for the first installment on Monday!

This one come from Alton Brown of Food Network! 2 tablespoons olive oil 1 1/2 cups diced onions 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt 1 1/2 cups sour cream 3/4 cup mayonnaise 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder 1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt In a saute pan over medium heat add oil, heat and add onions and salt. Cook the onions until they are caramelized, about 20 minutes. Remove from heat and set aside to cool. Mix the rest of the ingredients, and then add the cooled onions. Refrigerate and stir again before serving.