Cooking when you’re Staying home

The cold weather seems here to stay, finally. It’s officially cooking season in my household. Let the winter weight pile on!

I made shrimp and grits on Friday night, it was so good, and so easy.

I used this recipe: https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/bobby-flay/shrimp-and-grits-recipe-1911862

Dinner last night was a tortilla espanola with potatoes, spinach and the dregs of a bunch of different cheeses that needed to get used up. Served it with a homemade rosemary focaccia.

Vegetarian chili and cornbread tonight.

I had to look up what burrata is.

Love burrata. We use a lot in summer with spinach and peaches salad, drizzled with balsamic reduction- yum. Also good on bruschetta.

Burrata is a great creamy addition to dishes from skillet meals to salads to pasta.

I recommend buying a container (it often comes in a plastic container like cottage cheese or fresh mozzarella balls, in a liquid) that has like 4 individual balls as opposed to just 1-2. That way unless you’re making a very large serving you can have it on hand for 2 meals.

I like burrata and am partial to this brand: http://www.maplebrookvt.com/burrata

It’s 48 degrees in my part of MA and I made French Onion soup for dinner tonight. The recipe calls for homemade beef stock–I’m using stock that I bought in a local butcher shop. They do a much better job of making beef stock than I do.

I also made French Onion soup last week, in the instapot. Last night I did chicken stew in it and tonight it’s spaghetti and meatballs also in it. DD’s shift was changed to 10:30 to 7:30 so she doesn’t get home until almost 8. Dinners this week have to be easy hold or reheat ones. When it’s my turn to cook it’s almost always in the instapot. I’m lazy ?. DH does his turn on the grill.

My H made a fantastic chicken cacciatore earlier in the week and we’ve been eating leftovers for a couple of days. Ready to move on, LOL.

We are back to a few days of good grilling weather again here. Debating whether to defrost any of the mundane things I’ve got in my freezer (burgers, chicken thighs, salmon fillets) or head out and splurge on something indulgent with the hope that there is election news to celebrate tonight.

We’ve decided to do something decadent for dinner tomorrow night to go with our champagne.

We’re making two huge bowls of lobster mashed potatoes. Yep, with sour cream, tons of butter and garlic, claws, and tails. And then we’re just going to dig in and enjoy every happy, caloric bite.

Goulash, noodles , and red cabbage tonight . Comfort food while we wait , and wait, and wait!

^^^ Goulash when I was growing up with like macaroni with sort of a marinara and ground beef???

@ChoatieMom whoa is that a thing? Lobster mashed potatoes?!!! I’m IN!!!

Here we are, November 6 and while we will use our grill on and off during the winter in Ohio, tonight was like a summer dinner with ribeyes on the grill, potato wedges with olive oil and fresh herbs from my garden which still thrive, and fresh tomatoes from my garden turned red in a box in my house! Summer always tastes good. :slight_smile:

@abasket I use Knorr goulash mix , Hungarian goulash - stew meat, wide noodles.
My mother made a concoction of ground beef, tomato, macaroni occasionally -slumgullion- not one of my favorite things!

Lobster mashed potatoes definitely are a thing:

Ingredients
3 pounds medium Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and quartered
2 sticks unsalted butter, divided
1 pound cooked and picked lobster meat*, claws reserved, with the rest cut into bite-sized chunks
1 cup milk
1 cup sour cream
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Instructions
Put potatoes in a 4- or 5-quart pot and add water to cover by about 1 1/2 inches. Set pot on high heat and bring to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer and cook until potatoes are tender when poked with a thin knife, 15 to 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a medium skillet, melt 1 stick of butter over medium-low heat. Add the lobster meat and cook, stirring, until just heated through.

When the potatoes are cooked, drain them, reserving the cooking water in a bowl, and return them to the pot. Set over medium heat and cook, stirring, until they turn floury and begin to coat the bottom of the pot, 5 to 10 minutes. Use a potato masher or ricer to mash the potatoes until smooth.

Set a small saucepan over low heat and add the remaining butter, along with the milk. Heat until butter is melted. Using a wooden spoon, add the milk mixture to the potatoes, 1/4 cup at a time, beating to combine. Add the sour cream. Stir lobster and butter into the potatoes, reserving the claws for a garnish. If the potatoes still seem dry after adding all the milk mixture, add a bit of the cooking liquid. Add salt and pepper to taste. Garnish with lobster claws and serve warm.

*More lobster is (always) better.

I think the ground beef one is American Chop Suey, sometimes aka American Goulash.

It’s never really fall in AZ, but we’re going to pretend it is. I thought I’d also make these baked apple cider donuts that were featured in the NYT today to enjoy with tea/coffee:

https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1019593-baked-apple-cider-doughnuts?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20201106&instance_id=23862&nl=the-morning&regi_id=65166409&segment_id=43736&te=1&user_id=a75aa67c80bae48a922541a44ed4ec79

I’ll probably put half of them in a bag and leave them on my mother’s doorstep as we don’t need that much joy. I envy all of you who are enjoying the color change and a chill in the air. Fall back east was always my favorite time of year. I miss those trips to the cider mill with their greasy bags of cinnamon-cider donuts.

Thanks @ChoatieMom - just saved the Lobster Mashed Potato recipe. H would love that, though we will have to wait until our shellfish allergic son is no longer staying with us.

S cooked some kind of Vietnamese beef dish with steak, rice noodles, pickled veggies, etc. for dinner tonight and it was delicious.

@ChoatieMom my kids love apple cider donuts. My husband just sent me the same recipe yesterday, suggesting we make them. If you do make them, please let me know how they turn out.

Can’t see the nyt recipe. It’s behind a paywall. ?

Here are the ingredients for the apple cider donuts. I don’t want to plagiarize but thought perhaps you could figure out the recipe if you had the correct ingredients.

Nonstick cooking spray
1 ¾ cup/225 grams all-purpose flour
1 ¼ teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon fine sea salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1 cup/225 grams unsalted butter (2 sticks), at room temperature
¾ cup/165 grams light brown sugar
¾ cup/150 grams granulated sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ cup/120 milliliters apple cider

@ChoatieMom Sounds like we live in the same area. Good news is that it is finally getting cooler! Where did you score your lobster? ?

I bought the lobster from our club restaurant. During the pandemic, we’re able to buy meats, seafood, vegetables, alcohol, and other food prep items from the club kitchen.

AJs and Costco (when available) are our other two good courses for quality seafood.