Notes from the Kitchen Table: no. 03
Well it seems I still haven’t gotten into a regular schedule here, but I’m working on it. That might have been an ambitious goal during summer break. The last two weeks of summer break were very busy, trying to cram it all in before three of mine went back to school.
We had friends visiting, a family of five, so I was cooking dinners for 11 people, details on all the meals are below. And lots of pictures of some of the fun we’ve had.
We had lots of pool time, a couple of trips to our beautiful Yuba River, went to the county fair. We did a couple of movie nights by the pool which was utterly amazing - the best movie viewing experience ever. Such a perfect summer night activity. It was a super fun way to close out the end of summer break.
I got my crazy little dog in the pool. Well almost in the pool. He has discovered that he likes floating on an inflatable with me and it’s totally adorable.
The deer have come back, we didn’t see them as much for the past month or so, maybe because it was so hot. But these last few days have been cooler and I’ve seen a lot of deer.
Cooking for the crowd was fun. I enjoy the challenge of figuring out what to cook that will 1) appeal to a lot of people, and 2) not have me in the kitchen for hours and hours. So it’s all about easy, crowd-pleasing dinners, which are some of my favorite kind to cook.
Here’s the recap of what we had, with more details following below:
Sunday: burgers
Monday: budget paella
Tuesday: carnitas taco bar
Wednesday: oven fried chicken, potato salad, kale salad
Thursday: takeout Chinese
Friday: our company left and we were all exhausted so it was frozen pizza
Saturday: leftovers
Sunday: carbonara
Now to the start of another week, and the last couple days before school started.
One of my girls has been in high school for two years, and my next two were about to start high school after homeschooling for five years. To say they were nervous was an understatement. We’d done everything we could to get them ready, so we tried to enjoy the last couple of quiet days at home.
I did a lot of food prep to get ready for school. My goal is to make it easy for my teens to get up and have a healthy breakfast and grab a healthy lunch, and to help minimize their stress especially at the start of a big new adventure.
Here’s what I prepped for them for school days:
Smoothie packs: bags of of frozen fruit & greens, just the right amount to dump in a bullet blender and combine with a yogurt and a juice for two servings of smoothie.
Egg bites: I’ll share my recipe for these soon, but you can google plenty if you want.
Burritos: When I make Mexican rice and black beans I always make extra and then I can make up a stack of bean burritos. They freeze great so the kids can just take one out of the freezer to defrost before School.
Tuna salad: Easy to make quick sandwiches for a few days if the tuna is already made.
Boiled eggs: Great for snacks or quick egg salad.
Rice crispy treats: A first week of school treat!
For dinner this week I’ve stuck to some comforting favorites:
Comfort food is what kids need the first week of school.
Monday: baked potato bar
Tuesday: chicken taco bar
Wednesday: leftovers
Thursday: egg roll in a bowl stir fry
Friday: homemade pizza
Saturday: Mac & cheese & nuggets
Sunday: roasted salmon and veggie fried rice, and I’m making homemade ice cream, by request from a couple of kids.
In other news:
I have for the first time in my life, at 53 years old, successfully fried eggs in a cast iron pan with exactly zero sticking. If you’ve tried and failed with cast iron, you’ll know what an accomplishment this is. It’s now my new favorite thing.
Back to lunch packing:
Now that I have three back in school I thought I’d get back to sharing some of my old lunch packing pics and tips. If you need help figuring out lunch ideas, you should definitely follow me on Instagram because I’l be sharing there. And as always you can find all my lunch posts here on the website.
Meal planning for the coming week:
Here’s what’s on our menu this week. I’m trying to get back to having my kids each help with dinner one night a week. They are all teens now so I have three motivations for this:
They really do need to start learning how to cook.
It’s nice to have a little help and they are actually helpful now that they are older.
Selfishly, it’s a really nice way to get 1:1 time with each teenager. That’s a rare commodity these days.
So I let my helpers choose which night they wanted, and I’m trying to have them participate a bit in choosing the meal we are cooking on their night. Here’s the menu:
Sunday was roasted salmon and veggie fried rice.
Monday: Pasta with bolognese sauce, garlic bread
Tuesday: Chicken & black bean enchilada (using leftover chicken and black beans). Not sure yet if I’ll do real rolled enchiladas, or a layered enchilada casserole. Or sometimes I more of what some people would call a wet burrito, where the fillings are wrapped up in flour tortillas. It’s usually a game time decision.
Wednesday: leftovers
Thursday: Lasagna, made with the bolognese from Monday and a béchamel, and probably some grilled zucchini or eggplant, or maybe both.
Friday: Pizza
Saturday: probably burgers, I have some salmon and some chicken burgers from Costco.
More detail about the meals I cooked the past two weeks:
Paella:
I called this budget paella because I kinda did it on the cheap and took some shortcuts. I asked for ideas on Threads about meals to feed a crowd and someone suggested they made paella with packaged yellow rice. Well I had just happened to buy some so I thought I would try it. It was super easy and turned out great. I made the yellow rice per the package, with some chicken broth and diced veggies, and I added pieces of Costco rotisserie chicken and cut up polish sausage. I kept it not spicy because I was feeding kids, and served it with a bottle of hot sauce on the side.
Carnitas taco bar:
This is my favorite thing to make for a crowd. It’s so easy to make and everyone always loves it. To make carnitas I use pork butt or shoulder. I usually by the whole big ones, but lately I have been getting what is called country style pork ribs, which aren’t actually ribs but are just thick cut strips of the pork butt. It's nice because it just shortens a step and the pieces cook faster. I season the pork well with cumin, chili powder, garlic, onion, salt, and pepper. Sometimes I throw in a cut up onion and a cut up orange, and then I cook until the pork is falling apart. Low and slow in the oven is my favorite way, 300 for 5-6 hours. I keep it covered for most of the time and then uncovered for about the last hour to let the juices concentrate. If you like some little crispy bits you can turn up the heat for the last little bit. Shred it up with tongs and serve with all your favorite taco fixings.
Oven fried chicken, potato salad, kale salad:
I had actually intended to actually fry this chicken, but I got lazy at the last minute and stuck it in the oven instead. I did you classic buttermilk overnight marinade, which makes it so tender and juicy. You can find plenty of recipes for this online, but I just did buttermilk with a little salt and pepper, and then I made a mixture of flour, seasoned bread crumbs, salt to coat the chicken pieces in. On the side was my classic potato salad for which no recipe exists but maybe someday I’ll write it. The secret is the juice from a jar of dill pickles. I mixed that with mayo, chopped up boiled egg, chopped celery, some dill, salt, pepper, and a little celery salt. I cannot abide sweet potato salad, it must be tangy and salty. I also strongly recommend you cook the potatoes in very salty water, it adds so much flavor. Some famous chef said salt should be IN the food, not just ON the food and I totally agree.
Carbonara:
I think I’ve written about this before, so just a quick recap. I use my one pot pasta method for this, and add about a half cup extra water because the carbonara sauce is made with starchy pasta water. Cook the bacon ahead of time, leave a little bacon grease in the pan, and add the pasta and water. When the pasta is mostly done I take out a half a cup or so of that starchy water and whisk it with several eggs and a generous handful of shredded parmesan or Romano, some salt and pepper. Turn off the burner and then pour that “sauce” back into the hot pasta, along with chopped bacon, and toss it around with tongs to cook the eggs and coat the pasta. Top with a little more cheese and fresh ground pepper. Some people add cream to this, but I don’t think it’s strictly necessary.
Baked potato bar:
There are plenty of ways to cook baked potatoes, but I’ll keep coming back to the old school oven method. Perfect potatoes that are creamy on the inside with flavorful and slightly crisped skin. I wash the potatoes, dry them, poke with a fork, rub all over with olive oil and then generously season with kosher salt. Baked on a parchment lined baking sheet for one hour. I do 350 for small/medium potatoes and 375 if I get the really big ones. I try to get all the potatoes about the same size so the cooking time is the same for all. I serve these with a variety of toppings to suit everyone’s taste. I made extra bacon the night before to have on the potatoes, and I had some extra polish sausage to use. My husband and I like cheesy broccoli on ours, I used to buy frozen broccoli in cheese sauce, but really it’s just as easy to microwave plain broccoli and then stir in a little American cheese to melt and become the cheese sauce.
Chicken taco bar:
Easiest dinner ever - frozen pieces of chicken and a can of enchilada sauce. This time was boneless thighs and red enchilada sauce, but I do it with all kinds. You can do this in the instant pot, in a pot on the stove, slow cooker, or in the oven. Just cook until the chicken is falling apart.
Egg roll in a bowl:
Another one that’s always a hit and so easy. You can google recipes, but I don’t use one. It’s a great way to make an asian rice bowl type meal when you have ground meat you want to use. I use the food processor to chop up whatever veggies I’ve got - this one had broccoli, carrots, cabbage, mushrooms, onions. Saute it all together in sesame oil and season generously with ginger, garlic, soy sauce, white pepper, sometimes a little fish sauce and lime juice is nice.
Roasted salmon:
People do too much to salmon, in my opinion. I don’t need elaborate recipes or lots of seasoning. I want to taste the salmon. I season with just salt. I pretty much always cook whole filets. I like to start with the fish at room temp, it cooks more evenly. Take it out of the fridge about an hour before you want to cook, put in on a baking sheet on a piece of foil or parchment, and season generously with salt. To cook in the oven I do it very hot, like 500 degrees or as hot as your oven will go. This gets you as close to grilling as you can get in the oven. Put the pan in the upper third of the oven, for about 7 minutes for a thinner piece and maybe 9-10 minutes if it’s very thick.
Ice cream:
We really should be making more homemade ice cream. It actually is quite easy. And ice cream maker is one of the few single use gadgets I keep in my kitchen. I’ve kinda perfected my recipe over the years and my technique is a bit unconventional. I make a custard style ice cream but I’ve figure out how to not fuss with having to temper the eggs yolks. I make this base and usually divide it into three containers for three flavors.
Lisa’s Easy Custard Ice Cream Base
Ingredients:
4 cups of heavy cream
2 cups whole milk
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
12 large egg yolks
Instructions:
My technique is a little different but I think it’s much easier than having to add hot liquid a tiny bit at a time to temper the eggs.
Combine milk, sugar, and salt in a pot and heat over low heat just enough to get the sugar and salt fully dissolved.
Turn off the heat and stir in your cold cream.
Add the egg yolks directly to this mixture and whisk well to combine.
Turn the burner back on to medium/low and whisk / stir constantly as this heats up and begins to thicken, to about 175 degrees.
Turn off heat and continue to stir for a few minutes as it starts to cool.
Transfer to containers and let cool completely in the fridge before freezing in your ice cream maker.
Now you have your cooked ice cream custard base that you can add flavors to. Of course you need an ice cream maker. I have had mine for 20 years and it’s still going strong, here is the current model of the one I have.
Until next week!
Phew, I think that’s all for this time. Lots of pictures!
