Sausage Stuffed Eggplant

In another successful attempt at using what we had around the house, we made sausage stuffed eggplant. I will confess I had to stop to get mozzarella cheese but I picked that up on Monday with the other few things. Originally the idea was Chris' but with no real execution plan. I did some Google researching and found a few ideas and made a few improvisations. In the end along with the sausage and the eggplant, I added marinara, bread crumbs, an egg, onions and mushrooms, and the mozzarella. It was even better than I thought it was going to be. We got another eggplant from the CSA on Wednesday and in the end this was so delicious I am tempted to make it again. Next time I will pay better attention and not let the cheese get so brown.

40 Clove Garlic Chicken

Doesn't that look amazing. 40 clove garlic chicken tends to be one of our staple chicken dishes. We went to Charleston for the weekend and on Sunday when we got back, I was not really feeling the grocery store and Chris was feeling it even less. So he decided to put a meal list together for the week that would require no trips to the grocery store.

This one really is tasty, and as long as I have chicken, I always have all the ingredients. I use the William and Sonoma recipe but I know there are several others that are very similar out there. Garlic (lots), rosemary and thyme (always in the herb garden), white wine, chicken stock and butter; I mean every well stocked kitchen should have these. The sauce you make at the end to go over the chicken (and mashed potatoes if you are me) is sooooo good. I made a few minor changes this time and probably could have ate the sauce by the glass.

I started by browning the chicken in garlic infused olive oil. I picked this and a few other delicious olive oils up at the Olive Oil Shop in Charleston. The second change I made was accidental and I suspected it the night before when Chris laid out the two bags of chicken but one of the bags had two quarters in it- they were duck and not chicken. So I am sure all that lovely duck fat made for some complexity. The third change was I let the sauce simmer alot longer probably another ten minutes on low. This was more so that Chris would be home when it was hot than actually on purpose.

As an aside I did actually stop by the grocery store Monday after work. At a minimum we were in need of milk and cat litter. Needless to say I walked out spending $30 but overall that's not too bad.

Ricotta Gnocchi

We made this dish a while back and the gnocchi was light and delicious; so I wanted to do it again. It was just as creamy and wonderful as it was the first time. The original recipe came from Bon Appetit. It starts with making your own ricotta, which is surprisingly easy except for one part. This time we had no problems but make sure you are using a large enough pot when boiling the milk because the first time we made ricotta and added the acid (lemon juice) it immediately went crazy and we had curds everywhere. Needless to say since I was concerned about the mess factor I did not get any pictures of the process but here is the ricotta.

After the ricotta sits over night you can begin the gnocchi. Basically you add flour, egg, Parmesan cheese, and olive oil and mix it all up. Then you roll out the gnocchi and cut them into little bite sized pillows.

The actual recipe called for the gnocchi with lots of mushrooms.

Spatchcocked

Spatchcocked is such a funny word to say- it seems completely inappropriate but isn't. Basically it means you cut the spine out of a whole chicken. It makes the chicken cook quicker and all of the skin gets that yummy crunch. This is the second chicken recipe from Bon Appetit from this month. Also very delicious. Chris thought this was even better than the prosciutto wrapped, but then he really likes baked chicken. Well baked chicken done right anyways.

Here's the finished product- very golden and beautiful.

As an aside, Ina Garten (Barefoot Contessa) says on her show frequently that she always cooks her husband roast chicken on Friday nights. Can you imagine how amazing that would be knowing you have a yummy roasted chicken waiting for you?

Prosciutto-Wrapped Chicken

This month's "Bon Appetit" magazine has a section on the top 10 chicken recipes at various restaurants around the country. This is one of the two that I decided sounded delicious and needed to make it on the dinner menu for this week. This particular one was a winner because 1. I love prosciutto 2. the chicken is stuffed with cheese 3. the chicken is wrapped with prosciutto 4. the side dish was eggplant panzanella 5. did I mention the prosciutto?

Also an added bonus I got Japanese eggplant in the CSA last Wednesday and needed something to cook them in. As you will see in the chicken picture I kept some of the eggplant out of the panzanella- they were so delicious on their own I could not resist.

Overall this meal was really amazing. I mean there is cheese inside that chicken and that chicken is wrapped in prosciutto how can it not be one of the most wonderful things you have ever put in your mouth. Delicious. We will definitely be cooking this meal again sometime. Chris and I also felt the panzanella would make an awesome appetizer.

Lobster

This week we had a Bloom grocery store open up near us. We decided to do our shopping there this weekend especially because they were having a lot of awesome sales. I went with a grocery list as I always do. However there was an addition to that list of lobster- they had lobster on sale for $6.99 a lb. That is really cheap for around here so I could not resist.

Meet Larry and Curly - they look delicious don't they. So one of my favorite lobster dishes that Chris and I have cooked together is from the French Laundry cookbook. Butter-Poached Maine Lobster with Cream Lobster Broth and Mascarpone-Enriched Orzo.

Here are a couple pictures of the lobster broth in process as well as the de-shelled lobster. The lobsters are steeped so you can remove them from their shells but leaves the meat mostly uncooked so it pulls in more flavor when you actually cook it. I leave the meat removal to Chris because he does it so beautifully.

And the final result. Quite delicious and very pretty on the plate- topped with a parmesan crisp.

CSA Day 8/12/09

There was excellent bounty to be had from the CSA today. Today we got lettuce, eggplant, radishes, basil, tomatoes (lots of them), cucumbers, okra, and edamame.

The edamame is most exciting. I find them quite addictive when we go out to eat for sushi so they are a pleasant addition that will probably not make it too long around here. I was amazed at how fuzzy they are when they are fresh. Bring on the steam!!!

I went ahead and froze two 20 oz bags of tomatoes tonight- that's a lot of tomatoes and they are great to have in the freezer during the winter for soups, chili, and sauces.