Cooking with Reality Television

Lately our television forays have included reality cooking shows.  Hells Kitchen, Master chef, etc.  They irritate me and inspire me at the same time.  I want to try out. I can't believe how whiny people are. And on and on.

It's gotten me thinking about cooking something in 1 hour. Something better than putting grilled chicken on a salad.

So this week, I've been challenging myself to cook a little bit better.

I practiced one of the mother sauces: Béchamel.  Once you get the hang of it it's really easy.  My old cookbooks have notes in them from Family members called "white sauce".  It's basically that, a sauce that is made up of butter, flour, and milk.  Technically you season it with a little nutmeg alongside the required salt and pepper.  There is so much you can add to this sauce - thus the mother sauce.  My favorite happens to be known as Sauce Mornay, or cheese sauce.  Basically, you make the béchamel, add a bunch of cheese and voila Sauce Mornay.  This folks, is also known as the base for macaroni and cheese.

Boil pasta, toss in Sauce Mornay, slap it in a casserole dish, top with bread crumbs and bake.  Eat awesomeness and call it a good dinner.

I added some grilled chicken that had been marinading in some barbecue sauce.  Yum.

Here's a recipe I found for Bechamel.  I just wing it, and it's usually fine. This week I used low fat milk and it wasn't as heavy.

Ingredients

5 tablespoons butter
4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
4 cups milk
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg


Directions
In a medium saucepan, heat the butter over medium-low heat until melted. Add the flour and stir until smooth. Over medium heat, cook until the mixture turns a light, golden sandy color, about 6 to 7 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat the milk in a separate pan until just about to boil. Add the hot milk to the butter mixture 1 cup at a time, whisking continuously until very smooth. Bring to a boil. Cook 10 minutes, stirring constantly, then remove from heat. Season with salt and nutmeg, and set aside until ready to use.

If you want to make this into a cheese sauce just whisk in some of your favorite cheese while the sauce if hot.  I used cheddar and parmesan, and added some dijon mustard to add a little zip.

Tuesday Dinner pt. 5

Break out the fancy plates and eat!

Tuesday Dinner pt. 4

Salmon
Heat a combination of sesame oil & olive oil over medium heat. Season fish with salt and pepper.
Set fish in the pan and leave it alone for a couple of minutes. It's okay! It won't burn!
Flip fish over with a spatula being sure to flip away from yourself so you won't splash yourself with hot oil.
Cook until fish is cooked through. Farmed salmon will take a little longer than wild. Actually we prefer to eat wild salmon not quite fully cooked to retain some of its flavor and texture.

Tuesday Dinner pt.3

Soba Noodles!
Cook noodles as directed on package.
Heat sesame oil in a pan over medium heat. Add garlic and ginger and cook for just a few seconds.
Add noodles, cilantro, and 2T of soy sauce or worstershire sauce. You may also add some spicy stuff like sriracha or red pepper flakes.

Tuesday Dinner pt. 1

Mise en place. Chopped garlic, oil, squeeze tube of ginger (it was all I could find), fresh cilantro.

Tuesday Dinner pt. 2

Baby Bok Choy from Pork Hill Farm in Ossipee, NH.
Combine in a all bowl-
1/4 t sugar
1T fish sauce
3T water
Set aside

Heat oil over medium heat. When hot add Bok Choy. Sauté until bright green.
Add some garlic & ginger. Cook about 1 minute. Add fish sauce mixture. Cook 1 minute more. Remove from heat and set aside.
I put my oven on the "keep warm" setting and just shove the whole pan in there.

Tuesday

Every Tuesday I have a little dilemma. It's time to get back into work mode and I'm really not into it.  One full day off driving to the nearest Sysco hub to pick up part of an order on will-call does not an awesome day make.  Jim puts up with me wonderfully every week as I bemoan spending a few hours setting myself up for reopening on Wednesday.  As long as he has the gas fireplace to keep warm, and his phone to read.

Usually I knit as I whine, and today has been no different.  I've started my first hat.  The pattern I've been using called for size 11 needles, and I've got size 7.  So in kitting talk, I had to cast on 120 stitches instead of 80 or so.  We'll see how it goes...

Tuesday is also my day to start thinking about food for the week for home.  It's more of a "what can get used up around here" rather than a "what do I want to cook".  I just remembered we got some local baby bok choy from the farm last Friday.  I also found some soba noodles in the pantry.  I can't remember the last time I bought soba noodles, so they must be old.  Time to get used up!

So here's the plan-

Soba noodles, with baby bok choy, sauteed salmon.

I'm winging a couple of recipes from Martin Yan's Quick & Easy.

I will season the salmon with salt and pepper, and saute it in a hot pan with oil.  If it wasn't freezing rain out today I would grill it.

For the noodles I will cook them according to the package, then toss them with some sesame oil, fresh ginger, some minced fresh garlic, and chopped cilantro.

For the bok choy, it will get cut in half, washed, and cooked with more garlic, ginger, and some boxed stock and Mirin.

Hopefully, it'll be good.  I'll post pics when I'm cooking tonight.

For the rest of the week, I usually rely on staples.  Pasta, tacos, cheese and baguette.  Most likely we will eat bakery leftovers for dinner on long days.  Sandwiches and pizza are typical as we try to get to bed by 8.  On the long days we get home at 6:30, and by the time we deal with getting pets fed and walked there's not much time for food.

On the plus side, we've hired a kitchen employee and have a good lead on a counter person.  Hopefully this will help us retain some sanity, even if it means balancing a tighter checkbook.