Going to the Game!

Got to go to see Lincecum pitch against the Dodgers at ATT Park. Here's what I brought to eat.

Now I am a foodie, and I love to grow my own food. I use very few ingredients in most of my cooking and hardly ever anything from a box or a can. My heroes are the great natural food philosphers and chefs.

That said I love ballpark food. All of it. Junk or not. There is something about being at a game that makes me hunger for It's Its, dogs with kraut, all that stuff. And being a cheapskate I could spend a week's income and eat a year's worth of calories and salt in a single inning.

Getting it ready for the ball park!

So to counter that I have to bring food that I just will love sitting and eating. I try to load up on healthy things, even eating too much, if it keeps me from cashing in my retirement to buy a burrito.

I try to bring things that take a while to eat, have strong flavors and have lots of crunch.

Here I have lamb leg steaks (my butcher calls them sirloins but they are cut from the leg), some Kalamata olives, a sliced carrot, some raw cabbage and an apple. I also brought a couple of pieces of Thunder Chicken and some crackers and dried apricots. The only thing I bought was some ice cream - and at $9 it cost more than all the other food I brought combined. If only I could bring my own parking...

And no - I didn't eat all that lamb! So far is has served 3 meals and there are leftovers.

Kitchen Sink Pasta

Thank god for leftovers.

This is one of the house favorites, Kitchen Sink Pasta. We also make Kitchen Sink Soup, Kitchen Sink Salad, etc.

Leftover pasta with Stuff

To make this particular dish I dry-fried some onions cauliflower and carrots. When they were slightly burned I added the asparagus, diced smoked pork and a bit of olive oil and orange zest. I let it cook for a few minutes then turned the heat off and threw in the leftover campanelle and some toasted almonds.


On top is some shaved fennel and dried apricots.I squeezed the juice of half the orange over the whole thing.


You can make this kind of dish in just a few minutes. I try to include different textures and colors and cooling foods like the fennel and rich savory tastes like the almonds. This dish improves if you let it sit a while.

You can easily make it vegetarian by leaving out the pork. You could add shredded tofu or smoked tofu. You could substitute fish for the pork or bbq chicken or whatever you have. If it's dull add some flavors and colors and crunch or juice or something!

Pack a Great Lunch

A crunchy, flavorful, satisfying meal

Some people are embarrassed to take lunch with them to work. If you don't want to be embarrassed don't bring embarrassing food! Your food should be your bling! Bring a steak! Bring these salads!


This is a lunch you can take anywhere and it will pack a lot of flavor and crunch. I will admit that when I sat down to eat this I really wanted something hot and filling but I changed my mind after a couple of bites. This is an outrageous meal.

The idea behind this lunch was to have a good number of different flavors and textures and colors. I went to a new market in the neighborhood that I had been meaning to check out and I approve!

Here are the flavors and textures: romaine lettuce, carrots, kalamata olives, boiled potato, 2 different cheeses I picked up at the market, toasted almonds, fresh flat leaf parsley, smoked herring, satsuma tangerines and a vinaigrette made with olive oil and fig balsamic vinegar.

I know what many of you are thinking - smoked herring? Isn't that really strong and fishy? Yes, but with the combination of the bland potato, crunchy lettuce and the sweet and sour dressing it tastes fairly mild, sort of like a smoked salmon but admittedly stronger. I love it and talk about cheap! Cheap!

The cheese I bought was an aged white cheddar and a cheese that was simply marked 'Italian table cheese' but it was made here in Silicon Valley so I had to try it. Funnily it tastes just like the cheddar!

I made the dressing with fig balsamic vinegar which, while sort of stuck in the 1980s, can be a very tasty food.  It is rather sweet so I cut it in the dressing with the juice of an unripe orange from my tree.

This looks pretty good but it tasted way better than that

I was lucky to have this leftover pasta, too. It's mini bow ties that I dressed with onions, walnut pieces and corn sauteed in walnut oil the night before. Perfect for a picnic it doesn't contain any ingredients that will go bad quickly.

The combination of the pasta and vegetables with the crunchy nutty almonds and the salty olives was very tasty.

To make this meal vegetarian you could substitute smoked tofu for the fish. If you did that and left out the cheese it would be vegan.

This is a relatively low fat, low sodium meal and there is a lot of nutrition here. Total cost: about $2.50. What you would pay in a restaurant for this? Ten, fifteen, twenty bucks?

A Fast but Great Lunch

Just a few minutes and loads of crunch and taste

Today was one of those 'I have nothing to do but I am really busy' days. I didn't have anything on my schedule until evening rehearsal but managed to keep busy playing with the dog, planting cucumbers and tomatoes and making a simple lunch on the first hot day of the year.

Despite the ridiculous price of produce right now I found these nice red leaf lettuces for a buck and a half each. Here I am serving myself one half of one. Notice the core of the lettuce is trimmed but still attached. It's my favorite part.

The sandwich is really thin ciabatta bread waved over a burner and seasoned up with dabs of strawberry preserves from a student of mine and a bit if Dijon mustard. I sliced some left over turkey and some cucumbers as a filling.

The salad got dressed with this Morrocan olive oil I found in the clearance basket at the market. I am not sure it is good enough to go back and buy more. I also used lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Another Classic - Pork Chops with Apples

What's a chop? What's a steak?

A bone in beef rib-eye is a steak. A pork loin cut is a chop.  A beef T-bone is a steak, a lamb T-bone is a chop. Huh?

The pork in this recipe is a sirloin chop. Or steak. Who knows. It depends on what the butcher thinks he can get more money for.

Another great, fast, inexpensive meal

Here we have a great lunch, spicy pork chops with apple and yellow beet salad.

The pork is seasoned simply with olive oil, chipotle powder, garlic powder and salt and pepper then grilled in a cast iron pan.

The salad is dressed with walnut oil and this great French cider vinegar. Each of these is expensive but the amounts used  on this plate costs pennies.

The bread is a ciabatta toasted over a gas burner. It stays soft in the middle but the outside gets crusty and smokey.

The beets are raw yellow beets that I sliced so thin you can see through them.

The pork is easy to make if you have a heavy bottomed frying pan. You can use a non-stick pan too if the bottom is not too thin.

You want to take the pork chops out of the fridge at least ten minutes before you cook them. If you take them right from the fridge they won't be as tender.  Cook them over medium heat so they brown and take them out just as they firm up. Let them rest for a couple of minutes before you eat them.

A hunk of meat, crusty bread and a flavor salad in about 15 minutes. Total cost for the meal: about two bucks!

Family Favorite - Orange Chicken

We have this huge Valencia orange tree in our backyard, which means lots of free food to a cheapskate like me.

We juice them. we eat them, we use the zest. I throw them into sautes and the things I brown on the stove then finish in the oven.

This is not a difficult dish to make although it might take some practice to get the timing down.

Orange chicken, brown rice risotto and dry fried asparagus

I put some of my spice rub in a big mixing bowl and added a couple of tablespoons of the old extra virgin. I had bone in, skin on chicken breasts. You can use boneless and skinless if you want.

The chicken pieces were large so I cut them in half with a big knife. Then I used one of them to mix up the spice rub and olive oil. I got my big cast iron pan hot on the stove and turned the oven on to 350°.



I rubbed all the chicken in the spice mix then laid the pieces skin side down in the pan.

After they had browned a few minutes I tossed a couple of oranges in the spice oil and threw them in the pan.

While the chicken was cooking I made dry fried asparagus. Dry frying is using a hot cast iron pan with no oil, butter or fats to cook vegetables. They cook in a few minutes, steaming in their own juice.

As soon as they are just done they are seasoned with salt, pepper and (optional) a tiny bit of butter.

Dry frying works great with many vegetables like green beans, squash, carrots, etc. It imparts a slightly smoky flavor.

Along with the chicken and asparagus I had leftover brown rice risotto and one of the cooked oranges, which I squoze over the chicken and rice.

Low in fat (especially if you remove the chicken skin) high in nutrition and cost about $2.50 for the whole shebang.

Brown Rice Risotto

If you are an Italian grandma please sit down and clutch your heart. I made risotto with brown rice. No expensive little packages of special rice from the north of Italy. I actually like this best made with brown basmati rice but I didn't have any.

Rachel and I had a California Pops rehearsal. All big band music for this show, which is sold out. I made this risotto right before we left I just had a bite of it and left it for my snack after rehearsal.

Brown rice risotto, onion and potato soup

This is an unusual recipe for me.  It takes over and hour. Although there isn't much work to do you do have to be close by. Every few minutes you have to stir the rice and add liquid when it needs it.

The process is the same as making a traditional risotto. I started by sauteing an onion in olive oil, then I added the brown rice and some thyme and sauteed them too.



I boiled some water and added an ounce of dried mushrooms.  When the rice had changed color I added a enough of the mushroom stock to cover the rice, a clove of garlic and stirred like mad.

So for the next 50 minutes or so I alternated between practicing and stirring and adding stock.

At the end I added some sliced water chestnuts, salt and pepper.

Tonight after rehearsal I sat down and heated up some of my leftover onion and potato soup, added a bunch of the now rehydrated wild mushrooms, a dash of Madeira and seasoned it. I reheated some of the risotto and added it to the soup.

Easy, Fast, Tasty Pea Soup

Scarf!

This is a great soup, easy and CHEAP to make. It's half an onion, half a carrot, a bag of frozen peas and some garnishes. It takes about ten minutes to make. The color is bright, bright green. It's low in fat, high in fiber and vitamins and is filling enough for lunch. Get the recipe here.

Pea soup. Ten minutes to make. Tastes great!

Off to the theater to play a matinee. This is a perfect lunch before a concert. Not too heavy but a lot of slow release energy. It can be completely vegan, though I did put a dot of butter in it to finish.

The garnishes I used here are bits of home cured ham (yes, I do throw that on just about everything), walnuts and chunks of Meyer lemon.

Ravioli in the Garage

Teaching, practicing, playing Brahms and going to the dog park doesn't leave a lot of time to make lunch. I ate in the garage today taking bites in between doing other stuff.

Apples and walnuts with walnut oil, ravioli with home smoked pork and peas

I had a box of locally made ravioli so I poached them and in another pan I sauteed some onions and tomatoes in olive oil, threw in some peas, rosemary from the garden and some thin slices of home cured and smoked pork. The salad is just apple and walnuts with a little walnut oil and lemon juice and black pepper. Dash of salt on the salad but the ravioli didn't need it.

My wife loved it. I scarfed it. Cost per serving: about four bucks, mostly for the ravioli.  Time to make it: about 20 minutes.

If I am so Frugal why do I use Truffles?

I am frugal; I like to think I got to retire from high tech because I was cheap, not because I was rich. But I also think life is too short to eat bland food.

I have a nice little collection of fine ingredients that I use on a regular basis. Truffles, nut oil, salt packed capers, Greek olives, fine cheeses and expensive vinegars frequently find their way onto my plate.

A fourteen dollar bottle of walnut oil might seem like an extravagance but if it enhances fifty meals out of it it works out to 28 cents per meal. And it tastes great.

I love condiments made out of boiled down grapes, from the balsamico we know to unusual items like must, which is simply boiled down grape juice. A drop of that on a plate packs a lot of flavor. I love putting just barely a drop on a piece of apple or cheese or a slice of beef. Sweet and sour with a lot of depth it's really worth looking for.

Truffles are the sign of a special meal here. They have the cachet of being rare and expensive but if you use them right they can be a very cost effective way of packing some powerful flavors. I buy jars of truffles or peelings to make sauces for beef or chicken or vegetables. Just a dollars worth sauteed in a little butter in a pan where a steak had cooked will make your whole house smell like truffles and with a few drops of cream you have as good a sauce as can be made.

One area I don't suggest spending a lot of money on is fancy salts. I have tried grey salts, pink salts, sea salts from all over and cheap salts. Use a good brand of kosher salt for most things or everything and you'll do well. There are some fun salts like Maldon, which are little crystal pyramids and crunch when you eat them, but is that worth the bundle of money it costs? Maybe, but it's hardly frugal and doesn't pack a flavor punch.

So if you don't know what to get or how to use it I suggest you start with a single item like a good nut oil or maybe an aged balsamic vinegar. Spend ten or twelve bucks. Then taste what you have been missing!

Crazy, rainy day means Turkey

It's been one of those days - I played two concerts at a high school this morning and on my way back I got a call from my dentist. My 18 year old son fell ill as they started to work on him. Rats!

I dashed over there picked him up and ran home. The pediatrician's office was closed for another hour so I slapped lunch together, called them and they gave us an appointment for late in the afternoon. I canceled all my students. As I was getting lunch on plates they called back and said to bring him right it.

The good news is that he's fine and it was probably a one time event. The bad news is that I had to eat in the car.

Sorry about the lousy picture - had to rush to the doctor..

Today I make potato and onion soup and turkey tenderloins. The soup is really easy. I sauteed up a large onion, put 5 potatoes in cut into fourths, with the skin and added boiling water. Today just for kicks I added some dried porcini mushrooms. It simmered while I made the turkey. When the potatoes and mushrooms were soft I used a stick blender and pureed it. Add some salt and pepper and it's ready. I garnished it with a little of my home smoked pork belly.


I love the contrast of the rather bland soup and the strong flavored pork.

I had some turkey tenderloins, which is really part of the turkey breast and not a tenderloin at all, but tenderloins sounds expensive so that's what they call them. They have virtually no waste. I just rinsed and dried them, poured olive oil over them and some of my spice rub. I browned them in a cast iron pan and finished them in a hot oven. Let them rest a few minutes and away we go.

Total cost for today's treats: about 2 bucks.

I don't like to eat before concerts or rehearsals so I will have a snack around 6 then eat a light snack when I get back. Tonight's Symphony Silicon Valley concert is special by the way: Thursday concerts never sell well so they have opened the house to the public for free and will be asking for donations to help the victims of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.

It's Sushi Day

(Note: I wrote this onstage in the middle of Brahms' German Requiem, waiting for my cue. Right in front of a large, strong, well rehearsed choir and a fine, large orchestra. Not bad place to be.)

If you think you need years to learn how to make sushi you are dead wrong. In Japan sushi is restaurant and home food. It was originally a way of preserving food for lunches. Think of it as their version of a PBJ.

Simple ingredients. Great food.

 I was lucky enough to have friends of Japanese ancestry when I was growing up and I ate plenty of raw fish back when most Americans thought it was poison.

In 1980 I got to go to Japan with an orchestra. I was the only one who who was used to Japanese food. After a few days whenever they served us something they weren't used to they would all offer it to me. Awesome!


 I remember when we got served huge, incredibly fresh prawns. Oh man oh man.

If you have never eaten octopus you are missing out. You buy it already boiled and tender at the Japanese market but my favorite way to make it is getting it raw and grilling it for a long time in olive oil. Some other time..  

Like so many Americans now my kids grew up eating and loving sushi.

Making it home is easy, fun and way cheaper than eating out. I spent 20 bucks on fish for this lunch and it made a lot of sushi for 4 people and yes, we have leftover ingredients like rice wine vinegar and nori.

Notice the knife blade is almost parallel to the cutting board.

Aside from the fish you need some short grain rice, a bit of rice vinegar, sugar and the Japanese ingredients, none of which cost more than 2 bucks, and there is plenty left over.  To make the seasoning for the sushi rice, we put a little water in a bowl and add the sugar and rice vinegar in small amounts and keep adding until it tastes right.  I know it's not traditional but I like to put a little fresh lemon juice in the solution.

Spreading the vinegar mixture over the rice.

The rice takes 20 minutes to cook, 10 minutes to rest and a few minutes to cool off. Traditionally the chef cuts the rice and sprinkles it with the vinegar mixture while the apprentice fans it to cool it quickly.

Today my son Phil helped out, waving the Gordon Jacob horn concerto frantically at it while I cut the rice and mixed in the solution.

I'm sure my critics would say that's how I play the Gordon Jacob concerto.

With rice and condiments, here is lunch for 4.

Here is a finished serving plate. It really doesn't take much time as aside from making the rice all you have to do is slice stuff up.

The fish we have here is hamachi, octopus, scallops with the roe and innards and marinated mackerel. To make them more interesting I floured and lightly fried the scallops.

Along with the fish we have shiso leaves,  nori seaweed sheets that I waved over a flame and shredded, sliced cucumber, wasabe, pickled ginger, and takuan, which is daikon pickled with rice bran.


On this plate, starting at the top is the fried scallops on top of shiso leaves, then on the left is takuan and on the right is cucumber and below the scallops are octopus, yellowtail and vinegared mackerel.

Today we served sushi Chirashi or 'scattered' style. Instead of making rolls or lumps we simply put the rice in the bottom of a bowl and topped it with the fish and stuff.

This was Phil's bowl. Not a bad lunch.





I have a hot tip for you today. We use Kikkoman Organic Soy Sauce. Not because it's organic, but because it tastes awesome. A really fine flavor unlike the usual dull soy sauces.  It smells and tastes great.

Since it was an insane day

The day involved playing Wagner and Rossini in the morning in Fremont, running back to Saratoga to lead my elementary school band, then home for an hour before leaving to play Brahms downtown. Lunch was provided by the symphony and it was nice but no pictures or recipes. Instead I'll share one of our favorites.

The recipe is almost as I sent it to a flute player friend of mine. It's from a period when my kids were little and I would do just about anything to get some plants into their diet. Hence the boatload of garlic and two cups of herbs. I'm not kidding around.

Maybe it's because I know the charming lady involved it seems funny and quaint to me. And the dressing is quite tasty. We use it to marinate meats, dress bruschetta, grace salads, perk up guacamole, etc.

Scott
_______________________________________

Hartman House
Dressing/Marinade/Cheap drunk

1 liter     Kalamata Olive oil (1)
1 cup or so cheap balsamic vinegar
1 large wine glass     Latour '63
4 or 5  anchovy fillets, or smoked herring (see NOTE)
1/2   Lemon
1 big blopping tablespoon     Dijon mustard
1 Boatload     garlic, peeled,  little brown umbilicals and any brown spots cut off (2)
1 Boatload     fresh herbs (3)
Wooooseeestershire sauce to taste, probably a teaspoon or so
Freshly cracked black pepper to taste
One nasty little pinch of sugar
Salt to taste

1) Juice the lemon and if you want, chop up a teaspoon or so of the zest. Rinse the herbs and dry them on a paper towel. (4)

2) Put the garlic, mustard, anchovies, herbs, lemon juice and zest into a food processor. Add enough balsamic vinegar just to cover it and chop the bejeezes out of it. It doesn't need to be pureed,  it should have lots of little pieces in it.

3) With the motor running if possible, add a few drops of olive oil. Let it process for a few seconds to start the emulsion. Slowly add more oil, waiting for it to process every few seconds.

I don't have a big food processor, so at this point I put it into a large bowl and use a wire whisk to beat it like DELETED as I slowly add the oil. You'll want to add more vinegar.

4) Call me first, then rush like hell over to my house so I can have the Latour. Hmm, maybe I'll make myself a steak to go with it. Thanks!

5) Add the Woosterstuff sauce, pepper and sugar. Mix it up and taste it (I like to use a cucumber stick or jicama, but a clean finger works well) before you add any salt, or more pepper or other stuff.

(1) OK, so you'll need a little less than that.
(2) 1 boatload equals a dozen big cloves or so. At least.
(3) A bunch of basil and half a bunch of parsley does well. I use about two cups of herbs.
(4) You don't have to go crazy drying the herbs, they're full of water anyway.

 NOTE: If you are using canned anchovies or anchovy paste you don't have to rinse them. If you are using the fancy salted anchovies then soak them for five minutes in water, then pull their little spines out, pinch off any bones or guts that are left on them (this is why anchovies don't like humans) and rinse them well. You can also use smoked herring, which is really cheap and you can get it in any market. A can costs about a buck. Sometimes they are called kippers or kippered herring. Use the ones in oil, not sauce.

NEXT NOTE: It hardly ever stays emulsified so don't worry about it.

EVEN MORE OF THESE DAMN NOTES:  You might notice that I have these NB type notes and the numbered notes above. I noticed that too. Too much Fledermaus will do that to ya.

SIGH - MORE NOTES:  If you are going to use a different oil, I would recommend cheaper rather than more expensive. You are going to process it with a boatload of garlic and anchovies. Any subtle flavor derived from the precious volcanic soils of Vesuvius are going to be smothered by the fragrant tang of the fruit of Gilroy.

A Thrown Together Lunch - 30 Minute Spaghetti and Meatballs

Charlie on his first day with us.

It's going to be one of those crazy busy weeks. I taught this morning until 1, played with Charlie, our lab, smoked a batch of bacon, and drove my daughter to ballet and back then went to rehearsal. I hadn't really planned on what to have for lunch and my time was limited.
.
I had some ground chuck so I decided to make spaghetti and meat balls. I sauteed up some onions with some onions and peppers. I threw in some ground cumin and some celery seeds and a cup of cheap red wine.

Pretty darn tasty for something thrown together.

I toasted a couple of slices of sourdough and whirled them in the food processor. I mixed those crumbs with the chuck, more cumin, salt and pepper and some juice from the can of tomatoes I was using for the sauce.

I chopped a handful of parsley. I added the chopped stems to the sauce and the leaves to the meat balls.

There were three things cooking at once (pasta, sauce, meatballs) but they all take about the same amount of time.


Total cost for today's lunch: About 3 bucks.

Slabs of pork sides. It's like really meaty and smokey bacon

I also had the smoker going today and here is the result. I used to call this bacon but it's side pork which is like bacon but there is a lot more meat than bacon. Bacon comes from the bottom of the belly of the pig, side pork is from the side.

I lightly cure it then smoke it pretty heavily so the texture is not too dry and the smoke flavor is strong.

We like to use it as a garnish for soups and salads and sauteed vegetables. I made some onions and Brussel sprouts with bits of the smoked pork and even my kids liked it!

Now if you don't care about things like your aorta, you can cut the rind off the pork and cook it in a heavy bottomed frying pan with a light weight (like another pan) on it. You'll render out a lot of the fat and get crisp smoked pork rinds. So bad for you but sooooo tasty.

The Cure for Bland Food

Today I was inspired as I set slabs of bacon to cure in my fridge. I actually took my son out for Japanese food for lunch today. More on that later.

I know what a lot of you are thinking - there's a lot of sodium in them thar foods. It's true of you ate nothing but cured food you'd be in salt overload but that's not how I eat. These foods are condiments or sides designed to make other food taste good.

Well known cured foods include ham and salami and lox.

Some of my favorite cured foods

 

Curing is the rubbing or soaking food in substances that remove moisture from the cells of the food and through osmosis replaces the moisture with a solution that is downright inhospitable to bacteria. Usually it's sugary or salty. It's a method that has been used for thousands of years to preserve and improve food.




Pickled foods are almost always cured. Pickling is the action of acetic acid (vinegar) on foods. Some pickles don't list vinegar as an ingredient. In that case the vinegar comes as a result of the action of beneficial bacteria created in the salty environment.

My mom used to make great pickles in a ceramic crock in the garage. She's British and the spiciest thing I ever saw her eat is ketchup - except for those pickles, which she cured with jalepeños. 

Here we have some of my favorites including my ubiquitous peppers and onions, boquerones, salt-cured capers,  Trappey's pickled tobasco peppers and my mother's recipe for quick cucumber and onion pickles.

Salt cured fish are wonderful. Not only do they have a wonderful flavor but the enhance the taste of other food.  These boquerones aren't too fishy, like some anchovies or oilier fish like herring or mackerel. 

These fish also bring umami to your food. Umami is the mouth-watering flavor that seems to have the effect of bringing out the savory qualities of other food. It's found in many seafoods including oily fish, clams, seaweed, etc.

Trappey's pickled tobasco peppers are a nice treat. They are spicy but not really frightening. The liquid they come with is a handy seasoning, a little bit spicy and sour from the vinegar. I love to eat them with fried chicken or well cooked meats.

Capers are a fun food, at once flowery and salty. They are the unripe bud of a small bush. I planted two of these in my backyard last month. It will be years before I get any buds.  The ones in the picture are salt-cured, just packed in salt with no water or vineger. They taste more flowery than the ones packed in water or vinegar.

Of course you see one of my favorite cured foods, onions and peppers.

The cucumbers on the plates here were pickled overnight in a solution of salt and sugar. I make it like my mom did, simply slicing the cucumbers and onions and adding salt and sugar to the water until it tastes right. I've never measured it but you can tell when you taste it if is right. There was almost always a bowl of these in the fridge when I grew up.

Slabs of my home cured, hot almond smoked bacon

Note: For lunch my wife and son and I went to one of our favorite local restaurants, a place serving Silicon Valley for many years. Tomisushi has the usual Japanese menu items but the qualtity is there in everything.

It's the kind of place where everybody at the table says 'you have to try this' when the food arrives. Even the miso soup is delicious. Chicken teryaki tastes smoky and not too sweet. The sushi is always high quality and the fried foods come out greaseless and crunchy.

One of the World's Best $2.50 Lunches

Beautiful, cheap and delicious. Just like me!

Oh yes, here it is. The chicken is really high quality fresh chicken I bought at my favorite Chinese Market.


I poured some olive oil in a bowl and mixed in some of my spice rub. I rolled the chicken around in it and rubbed it into the skin. I put it on a foil lined tray and into a 425° oven for five minutes, then I turned the heat off.


When they just firm and done all the way through I took them out. Simple and delicious.

Cost: at $.89 a pound they were a real bargain. The two cost about $.60. Let's add a tablespoon of olive oil and some spices and call it $.70.

Lettuce is really expensive right now and quality is difficult to find. But I found these little gem lettuces for $1.59 each. It's dressed with hazelnut oil and a 10 year old balsamic vinegar. Not trendy right now but very tasty. On top for a quirky garnish is some enoki mushrooms and below is a few sliced almonds to add some depth.

Cost including the few drops of expensive oil and expensive vinegar and the mushrooms and almonds: about $.85

The sourdough was toasted over a flame and topped with onions and peppers and boquerones, those fishy little fish from Spain.

Cost: about $1.

Yum factor is very high for this meal. Cost is really low. I made a big pile of this chicken since the whole family is here all of a sudden. While the chicken was in the oven I made the onions and peppers.  When the chicken was done I cooked the Branzino I had for lunch yesterday. There were a lot of good textures in this meal too. The chicken skin was cruncy and flesh nice and moist. The bread was really crunchy and had a flame-toasted flavor. The lettuce was cruncy too and the little bit of hazelnut oil on it make the almonds taste really nutty.

Good stuff all around. Glad I got to eat it.

Good food is back back back!

I love the Asian markets!

I went by my favorite Chinese market today because I had been cooking for one and today my wife came home from playing concerts in Dresden and Prague and tomorrow my son comes home from college. Better fill the fridge!

Today I picked up two delicacies, a branzino and a pound of live shrimp. The branzino was flown in from Greece. I don’t know where the shrimp came from but it is unusual to find them live here.

I made a classic court-boullion to cook the shrimp. I got a pot of water boiling and added a bay leaf, a couple of crushed garlic cloves, some aromatics, a few peppercorns and some lemon juice. I boiled it for a few minutes then dumped the shrimp in. They cooked just for a minute and I took them out and let them cool in a mix of the court-boullion and water.

The branzino I simply rubbed with  olive oil, sprinkled with salt and put it under a broiler for a few minutes.

I also made a snow pea salad dressed with walnut oil, red wine vinegar, salt and pepper and lemon juice. I had a couple of slices of wine, wheat walnut bread to fill it out.

This was an expensive lunch for me. The branzino is not a cheap fish. Altogether I spent about 6 bucks.

Lamb Flank Steaks!

Hi everyone! Today I had a real actual meal; the first one I've had since last Tuesday. Lamb flank steaks, potatoes, onions and parsnips and a raw asparagus and red pepper salad.

If you're market doesn't carry them you might have to have your butcher order lamb flank steaks.  There is practically no waste and they can be elegent and served on fancy menus or used for a quick sandwich.
They cook in a minute and are very lean.


The asparagus and red pepper salad  was dressed with toasted sesame oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper. So simple. So delicious!


I love to mix two starches like the potatoes and parsnips. They and the onions were sauteed in olive oil and seasoned with a little of my spice rub mixture, which is mainly paprika, smoked peppers and cumin.

Total cost of this meal: about $3.25. There are only 11 total ingredients in all of this: asparagus, red pepper, a potato, half a parsnip, a small onion, lamb, olive oil, sesame oil, lemon juice and salt and pepper and some of my spice mix.

Thank (whatever you pray to) for artichokes!

Soon my pretty friend will be overloaded with thistles!

I grew up a 45 minute drive from Castroville, a picturesque farm town of rolling hills covered with artichokes. Driving along Highway 1 towards Monterey you see miles and miles of artichokes between the highway and the sea.


I heard Alton Brown on the Food Network say that 100 percent of artichokes grown in the US are from Castroville. Not quite; our two plants may not equal one percent of the nation's product but it seems like it.

By the way the first Castroville Artichoke Queen was a young actress named Norma Jean Mortenson, soon to be known as Marilyn Monroe.

Artichokes are amazing plants. Once the season is over you cut them back to practically nothing. The first time my wife did it I was sure she killed them but they come back vigorously.

Artichokes are nutritional powerhouses! One large artichoke has 25 calories, 6 grams of fiber (more than a cup of prunes) and lots of nutrients.

I was shocked the first time I saw a cook on TV describe how to deal with artichokes. He cut off the outer leaves, chopped the top off, peeled the base and wound up with the heart, some stem and a bit of the leaves. Heresy!

In my house growing up you cooked artichokes by dropping them whole into boiling acidulated water. The leaves were the best part! For a kid what better food could there be than something you picked up with you hands, dipped in butter and lemon juice then scrape the meat off the leaves with your teeth. You get to the bottom and easily scrape out the choke and eat the heart and as much of the stem as you can smoosh with your teeth.

How to cook artichokes
1) Get the freshest, best artichokes you can. If you pick it up and squeeze on it should squeak. Now they sell 'frost kissed' artichokes and claim they are the best ones. Nice try, artichoke marketing people. Look for nice firm green heads.

2) Start a big pot of water boiling. When it is boiling squeeze the juice of a lemon in there but do not drop the whole lemon into the pot which makes the artichokes bitter.

3) Sometimes artichokes house insects. While the water is heating up get a big bowl of cold water and add a handful of salt. Put the artichokes in and weight them down for 5 minutes. Take them out, rinse them well and check between the leaves for insects.

4) Have a cut lemon ready and wipe it against any surface that you cut. Cut off the end of the stem to get rid of the brown part. If you want take a large serrated knife and cut the top off to get rid of the spines. If I am cooking for myself I don't bother.

5) Drop the artichokes into the boiling water and cover. The cooking time will vary but it's not hard to tell when they are done. As soon as you can easily pull one of the leaves out it is done. Don't over cook them or they will be soft and tasteless.

If  you are going to eat them later cool them immediately in an ice bath or cold running water.

We like to eat them with lemon juice or melted butter. I like a good vinaigrette with them.

You know you have done it right if everybody produces a big pile of leaves.

If you get the tiny artichokes that grow lower down on the plant they are good stuffed. The choke hasn't developed and if you cut the tops off frequently you can eat them whole. I used to stuff them with bread crumbs, garlic (we are close to Gilroy, too), mushrooms and pine nuts.

And I leave this for last, the bad news. They are so much better right off the plant and cooked right away it is like a different food. And I mean right away. Cooked ten minutes later they don't taste the same and the texture is not as good. We are so spoiled...

Still not eating but will post some new recipes

Hi,

I thought about blogging my meal yesterday but I couldn't figure how to make a picture of some dry toast, half a grapefruit and some pretzels look inviting. I have lost over 12 pounds in the last 5 days.

However I am posting a bunch of new recipes here: http://mydailylunchrecipes.blogspot.com/

Short hiatus

Hi everyone,

I am so sorry but I am on a 3 day hiatus. Nothing dishonest here. I actually haven't eating anything since Tuesday other than pills, a tablespoon of store bought chicken pot pie and half a pretzel. Nothing like a virus to help one lose weight.

So blank space actually describes my daily lunch for the last few days. Hopefully we'll  be back tomorrow.

Oh man oh man oh man

Looks so simple. Tastes fantastic. Costs pennies.

I took my squeeze to the airport late this morning as she went to concertize in Prague and Dresden. I had to teach soon after but I managed to squeeze a pretty tasty lunch in there. Simple and delicious.

The chicken is stuffed under the skin with home-made hot almond wood smoked bacon and dipped into olive oil laced with my spice rub. Then it's cooked in a cast iron pan to brown and roasted in a hot oven for a short while. The lemons were also tossed in the oil and roasted along with the chicken.

Some of the juice in the lemons carmelizes so after cooking it's sweet and sour. I squeezed them right over the chicken. The skin is crisp and the bacon adds a smoky flavor. The sweet and sour lemon really brings it all together and makes it taste clean.  If I had been a good boy I would have removed the skin but, well, I guess I'll confess. I made two of them. I have no leftovers. I picked them clean.

Along with the chicken I had one of those weird generational foods I grew up with. My dad likes mashed potatoes with peas and so do I. Today I cooked a couple of parsnips with the potatoes and whipped them.

It took 45 minutes for me to make this lunch but a lot of it was spent waiting so I got other things done like practicing and playing with the dog.

If you enjoyed the recipe or have any comments I'd love to hear them.

Lamb and clams!

It was a busy day, with teaching in the morning, a trip to the dog park and general running around. Still I managed to produce a pretty tasty lunch.

I cooked up a batch of red pepper and onion oil. The peppers and onions get really sweet and I used them on a flame toasted piece of bread.

The meat is a lamb sirloin steak, tied in a circle. I let it rest, coated it with olive oil and seasoned it with salt then browned it in a cast iron pan. I finished it in the oven and served it with my intense sour cream dressing.

While the lamb was resting I quickly cooked the green beans in the same pan. They were fantastic.

I also made Clams with Celery and Vermouth.

In case you can't tell from the picture, it was fabulous! All of it.

Sloppy seconds

Saturday was a busy busy day. Teaching at home then off to De Anza College for rehearsal then concert. Romeo and Juliet, Rhapsody in Blue and Tchaik #6.

Lunch was fast. A coulotte steak sandwich and black bean soup (click for recipe). I like to make things like bean soup when I am teaching. I love things I can throw together and stick in the oven for a few hours.

Today I am teaching in the morning then over the hill to play in Santa Cruz County Symphony. I'll probably have left overs when I get home. I'm looking forward to it.