Showing posts with label sweet potatoes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sweet potatoes. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Ribs & Lobster - a christmas tradition?


Ribs have been a bit of a family standard for holidays for a while now. My mother has been swearing she will never make turkey again, but every year she feel funny about not doing it- and we have turnkey of some sort. This year however she decided to really do no turnkey and chose to do lobster tails! Trust me i wasn't complaining.




I was in charge of the tails. They were originally frozen, and they suggested you thaw them for at least 8 hours before preparing.



There were so many means of making them, and i had made them once on a bbq - which i liked, but as my parents had a number of feet of snow, i thought it might not be the best idea. I ended up opting to steam them, using white wine instead of water or stock. I had also read that they curl up so its best to skewer them to prevent this.





Steamed Lobster




There were also a number of veggie sides of course. There was a baked cauliflower dish, that had cheese and tomatoes. Almost like a mac and cheese but with cauliflower. There were also these really great green beans that my mother had blanched earlier and then tossed in some sauteed shallots and butter. The beans were perfect!



Caprese Salad and Lemons for the Lobster


Twice baked potatoes - regular and sweet.


Ribs, Lobster and Champers???
(how fancy)


A frozen lemon meringue pie - i think this one was a Bonnie Stern - it had a neat decoration of frozen grapes. I actually didn't try this - i have a limited sweet tooth.




And here was the breakfast offerings the next day. We were all pretty full, so my parents had scones and croissants, fruit plate, and some xmas candy!!!!!











Tuesday, May 4, 2010

Seafood Poached Eggs with Sweet Potaot Rostis




This was a kinda slapped together meal that turned out quite well. There were a couple of influences behind this meal - one was that i had some left over cooked scallops from the ...... of saturday night and i wanted to use them up. Earlier last week i bought some of that fake crab that is really Pollock - i think its a pretty good snack as its low in cals and has protein, so i often snack on it. I thought i would combine the two for either a seafood salad thing or something else.

When i was preparing the meal i remembered a lobster poached eggs dish i had in New York, and thought maybe i could do something along those lines. I thought instead of an english muffins (and mainly because i didn't have one) I would make the sweet potato rosti that i did for my New Years Day Brunch. Who can deny shredded and pan fried sweet potatoes????

I thought i would keep two elements sort of traditional, and i wilted some spinach, but added shallots and garlic. I also poached the egg - i used the silicone ones, since i was preparing so many elements at the same time and didn't need to be stressing about poaching eggs - but they do give them a very uniformed shape.

When contemplating a sauce i realized that i already had a whole lot going on in the dish as i had mixed the chopped scallops and "crab" with green onions, dijon, lemon juice and a little may to help bind it. This along with the sweet potatoes, spinach and the yolk of the egg would be enough, so i left it plain. I think i made the right choice.

Above:

Sunday Brunch
Shredded Sweet Potatoes
Ingredients

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Valentine's Steak Dinner








This Valentine's day, which was also the family day long weekend AND Chinese New Year, i spent up at my parents place. Instead of heading out to a restaurant and having a rushed meal with a bunch of couples who hate each other we decided to eat in. (this also allowed me to save face and not third-wheel with my parents like last year).

Now that i am a meat eater, my mother picked up some HUGE steaks which i seasoned with a mixture of almost any spice i could get my hands on. Instead of digging out the bbq from the snow bank we did them on my mom's indoor grill/sandwich maker. My mom also made a really cool sweet potato and pear side dish along with sauteed king oyster mushrooms, asparagus with Parmesan and a beet and carrot salad.

The meal as lovely, and a lot better than going out!

Above:

Dinner (and my mom's new/vintage Denby plates
Mushrooms
Adding the pears to the potatoes
Steaks
Beet and Carrot Salad
Asparagus