Ingredients

Ingredients, Made at home

Gluten free gnocchi with cannelini and chanterelles

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

continuing my holiday catch up Posts from the past two weeks ….  This was Christmas week.  I actually took the time for a mise en place as I prepped my gnocchi.  This gluten free gnocchi I buy from Amazon in a four pack which is fare less expensive than the gluten free one at sprouts or whole foods as is the olive oil that I have on Amazon subscription.  

I sautéed the elephant garlic, beans and chanterelles in olive oil with the penzeys pasta sprinkle spice mix
  

Boiled my gnocchi

  

Added the garlic greens
  

Added a quicks salad with olive oil and balsamic
 

And I had a quick weeknight dinner with minimal pots to wash

Food related, Ingredients

Fun food finds 1/2/16

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

 We were Santa Monica farmers market bound today and since winter is usually bland I wasn’t taking any pics until I ran into this this thing so I started with the food pics….

Having no idea what it was, I bought some.  Wikipedia and several sites have cleared up my lack of knowledge…Mountain yams are a Asian tuber that turn into goo if you grate and get mucilaginous plus have an itchy skin that needs soaked in water and vinegar to neutralize…sounds like a winner here :-p

  

Kohlrabi are also in season as I found baby ones last weekend

Sun chokes have been about for a month or so but few in attendance this week–one vendor said the ground was too frozen to harvest  

  

Sweet limes…which I always look at but never buy….and they aren’t green!
  

Unhusked walnuts which I haven’t seen in person since I used to have to collect them from my grandpas yard

  

Mushrooms!  Including white truffle which I passed on hoping for black truffle soon…but I picked up some hedgehogs

  

My favorite cheese vendor provided me with a raw 1year aged white cheddar

  

Jim found giant macaron that are gluten free at the newly opened Lemonade
  

And I picked up the foodies coloring book at Barnes and noble!

 

Ingredients, Made at home

Green tomato and mushroom/nut burgers

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

I was watching tabouli on tv the night before I made this and was thinking what to do instead of bulgur ….so I searched my fridge and came up with this pretty salad of Italian parsley, cannelini beans, tomatoes, olive oil and lemon juice…a tad of red onion   

Oven fries coated with olive oils and franks red hot (a new kind with ginger in it and a sweetness)
    

Baking the lentil/mushroom/nut loaf while baking the burgers
  

Ian’s gluten free bread crumbs on the green tomatoes waiting to be oven fried

  

Finishing
  

I totally forgot the brand of buns

  

The new spice pickles from vlassic 
    

  
   

Ingredients, Made at home

Mushroom-nut loaf nights

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

Made a mushroom but loaf last night (which is one of my favorite roast like meaty dishes) and it was a fail in texture and was crumbly so today I took a piece of it and mushed it up with a little egg and a little grated cheese…   
  And made little mini meatloaves  
And the texture worked!  This ended up being the most meaty textured loaf I’ve made before

And gravy to go with the loaf and some potatoes 

The gravy was Powdered no chicken broth from whole foods bulk bins that I love with some tapioca starch stirred into olive oil.  I added a tad half and half and the rest was water…this worked out well and tasted good

    
My completed meatloaves

 
My pretty lettuce

   
The salad gets the tarragon vinegar and olive oil treatment

   Look close for the tiny cilantro micro greens which is code for coriander sprouts
 

Ingredients, Made at home, Uncategorized

Food Club!

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

i was reading the new zingermans catalog today and saw the cheese of the month, olive oils of the month, sausage of the month, etc clubs…and I thought OMG we could have an ingredient of the month club!  Everyone could join a “of the month club,” or rotate choosing ingredients, or if they are local ingredients we can set a price limit and the chooser could ship to everyone and we take turns or whatever!

Being internet based, we could share pics and recipes each month in a yahoo group or blog or something…and if people live near each other they can do mini potlucks and share with each other and share pics and recipes!

I’m sure I am not the first person to think of it, but it’s totally knew to me and I’m excited and the first friend I told, Zinna, said “I’m in!”

We could theme a quarter like grains or brassicas , cakes, etc. or whatever we decided!

Who thinks it’s worth exploring!?!?  Maybe we call it “food friends” or “friends in food” 

Ingredients

Penzey’s adventure 11/21

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

You get to see me spend the most I have ever spent in this store….even though I love this store….I have a project that requires 1/2 cup of 13 spices and spice jars and spices that I just needed or wanted. You will bear witness to my 11/21 Penzeys spice excursion:  

If you have never been to a store, they have jars of each spice for you to sniff and get a feel for the flavor notes  …they also have tissues because sometimes you sniff too much!  
    
 

 This is it:   This is my haul today! (Well the right half)7  
This is the left half of my haul!

 

Ingredients, Uncategorized

Heritage turkey

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

i just crossed a line.

I only ordered a heritage turkey for the first time in life..:not just free range, not heirloom, but a free range heritage bird which is something I’ve wanted to do for a few years 

This bird cost as a much as a whole thanksgiving dinner.

When did I become the person that doesn’t flinch at an expensive turkey yet drives a car nearly 11 years old?

I will let you all know how it turns out because I will be posting my annual grilled turkey process and product as usual…

Ingredients

Farmers market 11/1

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

whats this?

  

Can you see the lines that run along it?  It sorta looks like a long bean but not really and it has basically no smell…anyone?

Also the radishes and carrots are in which are pretty

   
    
  
    
    
 
Persimmons and apples

  

I did get onion sprouts and wheat grass (the latter for the cats)

  
 

Ingredients

Food finds 10/31

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

So today was more foodventure than normal…started out like a Saturday with a trip to Santa Monica farmers market…which blossomed in whole foods (a new location) and Bristol Farms which I didn’t even know what still around!

Leaving home a tad later than normal meant that Starbucks was insane so we had to hit the one at third street promenade inside Barnes and noble.

  
(He hasn’t had coffee yet)

Which led to me buying the new George RR Martin book and, I believe , my 30th consecutive Food and Wine magazine thanksgiving edition

  
Santa Monica farmers market Saturday is always one of the biggest around and the weather can’t be beat!  
This week I took some random shots of interesting things:   
Fresh peanuts, some baby jicama near the back    
I just loved the color of these…they weren’t the deep purple of all the others

    
 

Notice the quail eggs too…
   
Picked up some spring hill garlic jack

 

Kinda the last remaining non hothouse tomatoes…

I ended up with a few things…Thai green onion, garlic jack cheese, tomatoes, eggplant and that about it.   I’m still missing the avocado!!!!

Next stop was a whole foods bigger and larger than the one in downtown Santa Monica for a change…and boy was it a change!  They had things that my uber large new store in Tarzana doesn’t even have and I loved it! This is going to be our new goto Whole foods

 Look!   Mochi !  
Macaron!   
The olive bar was large than normal and I left with Castelvetrano olives 

    
   And the cause of much excitement resulting in it being our dinner tonight—gluten free gnocchi! 
Somewhere I thought I took pictures of cheese–and oh yeah we bought some because this store has samples unlike ours so I end up buying any cheese I sample!

  
 I grabbed this for dinner or maybe a wine but I couldn’t find any decent lambrusco–last time, I ended up having a case shipped from Italy because it’s so hard to find any here that’s not Riunite…but I digress

 

  
The jackfruit faux meat is in many recipes as being yummy so we are trying it out without the elbow grease of making it from scratch  So driving onward towards the 405…I spy Bristol farms  I had no idea one was here…I thought they close down! So in I pulled

   

Omg

Baby cauliflower and romanesco…but 2.99 each I could buy a whole romanesco
    
    

Radishes!!!!!  It’s better than the farmers market today!
    
  
Gluten free ravioli  
  

The high end tequilas locked in a case….I have the Don Julio Real and am eyeing the 1942 and the 1800 milennia, and the stuff from San Miguel de Allende (my friend just moved there so I’m hoping for the peso price not the dollar price)

  
  

Holiday chocolate treats

  
   

I think there is more but I’m simply overwhelmed by the bounty and all the new finds.  We have a whole new way to venture home after the farmers market now….wow!

Ingredients

Farm fresh to you week of 10/28

Aside | Posted on by Brian and Jim

  
Once again there is all kinds of stuff

I added on blackberry honey which is yummy but I think wildflower is still my favorite (yes, the box arrived a few minutes ago and I already have sampled the honey)

Also added is the chai current oatmeal 

As for the rest:

Delicate squash

Butternut

Cabbage

Persimmons

Green beans

Fuji apple

Purple daikon…yep purple daikon

Kale

Red leaf lettuce

Potatoes

Grapefruit

Beets

Tomatoes….um they are not meant to be green so I’m gonna deal with that.

Lots of good things to make:-)