Plenty of Time ...

For cooking, but not for blogging! Wow has this week gone by quickly. I cannot remember for the life of me what I made this week. I did not take pictures or anything! Tonight, however, I did:)

We had a dinner guest coming over around 7pm. I'd already pretty much decided what I was going to make but had not had the time for shopping. So, I was out of work a little after 5pm, on my way home, and realized I needed to go get dog food. Well, my dog has tummy issues and only one specific kind of dog food works for him -- at Target, the opposite direction from where I was going.

I turned around, went to Target, got what I needed, and headed for the grocery store. It was nearly 6pm by this time. I went through the grocery store, somehow not forgetting anything, and went home. My family, thankfully, cleaned up the house quite nicely (yay!) and so I was able to go straight to cooking. The menu tonight was all vegetarian, because it is Friday and we are Orthodox Christian (if you don't know, the Orthodox tradition is to abstain from meat on Wednesdays and Fridays -- generally). In any event, here was my menu:

- Olives, peppers, and marinated baby artichokes (from the deli counter)
- Grilled Zucchini
- Green salad
- Mushroom Stroganoff with wild rice
- Pumpkin seed brittle and Adult Syllabub

I largely borrowed from Nigella Lawson here (she is a lifesaver!) in her book Feast. She has a section labelled "Vegetarian Feasts." I regularly refer to this section when I need to prepare a very quick but nice vegetarian meal. Anyhow, I changed the type of salad I decided to make because of what I already had on hand.

Grilled Zucchini

Slice a smallish zucchini or two longways about 1/4 of an inch thick (or as thin as you can). Heat a grill pan (or even a skillet -- it doesn't really make that much of a difference here; I just love the way the zucchini is flavored by the cast iron grill I sit on top of my stove) and lay the zucchini on the pan. Turn as needed so that the zucchini is cooked but not to the point of being mushy -- this is really only for practical reasons! If you let them cook too much you will not be able to get them from the pan. Layer the zucchini on a pretty serving dish, sprinkle with salt and pepper then drizzle with lemon juice, extra virgin olive oil, and a little chopped parsley. It is absolutely wonderful any time of year!

Green Salad

I keep bags of pre-washed lettuce in the refrigerator. I buy them at Aldi for $1.99. Tonight, I squeezed about 1 1/2 or 2 lemons over a little more than one bag, drizzled some olive oil, and turned the leaves around with salt and pepper (to taste).

Mushroom Stroganoff

Ingredients:

1 largish onion
2 good sized cloves of garlic
4 packages of assorted pre-cleaned and sliced mushrooms (lifesavers when you are short on time!)
Vermouth (or white wine, or water, or vegetable stock)
Paprika
Nutmeg
Salt & Pepper, to taste
Heavy cream
Wild rice, cooked according to package instructions

Chop the onion and cloves of garlic then soften in a pan with some oil, salt, and pepper. Drop into the pan the mushrooms and stir occasionally. The mushrooms will eventually release their juices but it won't be enough to give a sauce. Help them along, once they are "wilted" with a little vermouth, white wine, water, vegetable stock (the choice is yours). Simply pour in whatever you think is enough to reduce down a bit and give you a nice little sauce -- you don't need much here, just enough to have almost a gravy. Let everything reduce a bit, sprinkle on a little paprika, nutmeg, and more salt and pepper as needed.

Serve over the rice with some freshly copped parsley.

I do not feel at liberty to copy the recipe I used for the pumpkin seed brittle as I used Nigella Lawson's directly. You can look up how to make brittle (it's very easy, don't be intimidated!) and switch out whatever nuts or seeds the recipe calls for with some pumpkin seeds.

I also decided to make an Adult Syllabub again as I published the recipe for here, but I used clementines instead of lemons and did not take the time to include any zest from the clementines.

All in all, my total time was right around 45 minutes to make everything. The brittle, of course, I made and then allowed to sit and cool while we ate dinner. Cooking time though was overall very short. I love to get olives and other things like marinated garlic, peppers, whatever from the deli at the grocery store and set them out as a beautiful starter to any meal.