What are you cooking?

[Fishmanic]

I use a meat thermometer to check doneness of a steak.

 

[Fishmanic]

To many it does not matter but I started cooking commercially in steak houses.

Oh… so you DID work in a restaurant as a cook. With all your gourmet meals that you cook, I figured that.

 

[jaylach]

I use a meat thermometer to check doneness of a steak.
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That works but my personal training was testing buy touch and I'm more comfortable that way. Again, though, using a puncture thermometer still causes a loss of juice but it would be so minor of a loss that it really would not matter unless cooked it a REALLY high end place where you were paying $100.00+ USD for a filet magnon. Personally I don't even like filet.

Oh… so you DID work in a restaurant as a cook. With all your gourmet meals that you cook, I figured that.

LOL! I admitted to that way back when. I would not say that I worked in REALLY high end places... Let's call them medium high. I've also done more than just being a steak cook. When in Florida I worked a place that I usually did meat but they had a Sunday Brunch thing going. I would do most of the cooking for that. Shoot, the biggest cooking complement I ever got working commercially as a cook was at the brunch place. There were some customers that would come in and ask if I was cooking. If I was off shift they would leave. I don't think it wrong of me to be rather proud of that.

I've never had any formal cooking schooling but my mother taught me the most important thing needed. My mother was a wonderful cook but never taught me one single actual recipe. What my mother taught me was to NOT be afraid of food and to experiment. I actually had a place add one of my personal recipes to their menu.

 

[jaylach]

The probable for tonight is a smoked pork chop with mashed taters, corn and gravy.

On the other hand I have a vacuum bag of sketti sauce thawing so who knows If it ends up sketti there will likely also be some chicken parm.

What isn't done tonight will be tomorrow so it really doesn't matter.

 

[Cisco_Ray]

Sweet and Sour Pork with sweet peppers, Rice, Roasted Veg and Avocado for Dinner

 

[Cisco_Ray]

Left over pork from yesterday.

 

[jaylach]

Was going to be Fettuccine Alfredo with grilled chicken and broccoli but, as often happens with me, a change of plan.

Had a +NEED+ for some egg noodles so it is cut up chicken tenders with broccoli, pearl onions and, mayhaps, some sliced black olives with a sweet onion sauce.

Alfredo is likely a go for tomorrow.

 

[Cisco_Ray]

Curry Chicken, Rice, Roasted sweet peppers, Avocado and green bird peppers.

 

[jaylach]

Had a rib eye steak and mayo based pasta salad using Miracle Whip and shell pasta for NFL football dinner. Was going to have a baked tater but had a craving for pasta salad. The salad included shredded carrot, hard boiled egg and bacon. I like onion in such a salad but add that on a per meal basis as I made enough for 3-4 meals and, if you add the onion all at once it causes the mayo to break down and separate.

Sad part was that I threw out a perfectly nice rib eye and had to thaw another. I pulled the scrap rib eye yesterday to thaw but, since I was using my kitchen counter for something else, put it where I'm not used to and forgot about it. When I went to get it out of the fridge it wasn't there. It had been sitting out for roughly 36 hours. It was probably still fine but I didn't want to take the chance and pitched it. I figured better safe than sorry.

 

[Cisco_Ray]

Quick dinner today.

 

[jaylach]

Tonight looks like a bacon, Swiss Cheese, burger with sauteed onion and shrooms on an onion roll with mayo based pasta salad.

For some reason I prefer Swiss or Provolone Cheese on a burger over American or Cheddar cheese. If you ever want a twist on your cheeseburger try using Feta Cheese. Sounds odd but is really good. I also like Feta on a pizza.

 

[jaylach]

Another red sauce pasta tonight with chicken parm. The last minute question will be what pasta. The choices are cheese raviolis, shells or thin sketti. Shells are probably out as I usually do shells in a bowl which would not match well with the chicken parm unless I used, both, a bowl and small plate.

Ravioli will probably win as I'll be watching a baseball game and they are the easiest as I can just dump the raviolis in the sauce to cook leaving one less pan to worry about. Just spoon the raviolis out of the sauce and put next to the chicken parm. This makes the raviolis already sauced and saves cleaning an extra pan.

As a note, if you are like me, we like a heavy dose of sauce on our pasta. Still, I suggest to always add and toss some sauce in your finished pasta. This assures that all the pasts has some sauce. Plate and add more sauce on top along with meatballs, chicken, sausage or whatever is going with.

Sorry that I must add that you should never add sausage to the main sauce pan as it will add a lot of grease. Once your sauce is fully spiced put some in another pan with the sausage and let cook down. This allows you to have your sausage while keeping the grease out of the main pot of sauce.

 

[fishorama]

We're having leftover chicken chow mein stir fry tonight. It was new yesterday with brown rice & a sprinkle of chow mein noodles. No rice leftover so just more crispy noodles like in olden times, lol. I went to the Chinese market this week, so many options.

I'm still having post-vacation trouble getting back into cooking & posting here after a month. Not that we've starved either, lol. I made broccoli/rye/cheese casserole & some other stuff from the freezer (spag sauce, meat loaf, etc). Cheese steaks for opening night football!

 

[jaylach]

Thursday is going to be a strange dinner day. I have several items that I need to use in my fridge but no clue what to do with the stuff. I DO have a thawed chicken breaded cutlet for protein but no idea as to what to do with the other stuff such as onion and bell peppers.

Mayhaps I'll cut up the chicken cutlet and add a bunch of the other stuff to make a hash and crack a couple runny yolk eggs on top.

 

[jaylach]

Change of thought for Thursday dinner. Looks like it will be chicken Stroganoff, yes chicken instead of beef. I actually sort of prefer chicken with Stroganoff over beef. Chicken just goes well with a cream based sauce and, with the sour cream, Stroganoff is definitely cream based. While it can be served over taters or rice my preference is to do with egg noodles.

Old school Stroganoff is really simple with just meat, shrooms, wine and a bit of nutmeg.. the nutmeg gives the touch of flavor that makes the dish unique. It isn't really traditional but I'll likely add either broccoli or peas.