French Lentil Soup

I made French Lentil soup. It was nice, but man did it take forever. Barefoot Contessa says you can find French Lentils in specialty stores or order them online. As if? Lucky for me our local market had some. I thought the soup was good, but not great. Mom and Lamont liked it though. I guess that counts for something.

My newest kitchen-aide.

My handy onion chopper. No more tears for me!

Sauteed onions and French Lentils soaking.

Everything mixed together.

Aoife's new favorite spot.

The taste testers.

Ugh!

So I have excuses as to why I haven't cooked anything for the last week and a half.
#1 I've been sick. Who wants someone with bronchitis hacking into their food? No one.
#2 It was Thanksgiving and French Lentil soup isn't exactly considered standard for the soiree.

I'll get back to it soon enough though. Gimme a break Barefoot Contessa, won't you?

Lots of cooking in one week end!

Ahh - so last week end I did quite a bit of cooking. One of my friends was out of town so her husband and kids came over to hang out (and be my tasters). I made Guacamole and Crab Cakes with remoulade sauce. The Guacamole is a pretty standard thing that I have made in the past with a different recipe but thought I would give it a try. It turned out pretty good and was enjoyed by all who tasted it but I think I will stick to the recipe I have used in the past, good ole moms.

The crab cakes were TONS more work. I felt like I was in the kitchen chopping forever! So many ingredients! The guys had also ordered a pizza so they were too full to try the cab cakes that day so I ended up making them the next night for dinner. The cookbook said you could keep the formed crab cakes in the fridge overnight and fry them up the next day. Phil loved them, it made all the chopping worth while. He even brought some over to the neighbors house for them to try. They insisted they were too full but tried them anyway. More rave reviews. The sauce was a hit too.

On to the soups:


So I pretty much do not like split pea soup at all and really do not like looking at it, but for the sake of love I made it for Phil. He really likes the stuff. It was pretty easy to make and I did not need to do much chopping, thank goodness, and I did not have to buy any super crazy ingredients. The soup also got a thumbs up.

I made the croutons to go with the soup, the picture was so nice looking, the croutons only okay. It is a lot less work to just use the store bought ones.

Kelly and Barefoot - All the cooking I did tasted good and I would make it again. The crab cakes were tons of work and I would only make them for a special occasion. I should also tell you that Phil really was not on board for this cooking blog thing but has definitely changed his mind!

Finally...something I love!

Mmmm French Onion Soup...
While this recipe called for a whole lotta crap I didn't have, the amounts were the right size. I was able to buy what I needed and not have stuff I'll rarely use sitting around going bad (aka the chicken stock from the last recipe. 2008 is "pretty close" to 2000 when you consider how long the Earth's been around).

I chose this recipe because Monty LOVES French Onion Soup. See what a good wifey I am? I made this FOR HIM. I should totally get birthday or anniversary credit for this!

Thanks to the neighbors for keeping "the good stuff" on hand when it comes to needing 1/4 cup of Courvoisier on hand. Thanks for tip about "taking a nip" before using it for cooking. It was smmmooothhh (cough, cough)

Barefoot Contessa--another bone to pick with you. You should address how to dispose of ingredient parts not used in the recipes. For example, lets say "someone" had a ton of onion parts left over and didn't want to put them in the compost bucket because, well, it would stink-to-high-heaven-and-we-fight-over-who-takes-that-nasty-bucket-out-and-it-gets-all-moldy-before-one-of-us-breaks-down-and-begrudgingly-does-it. But, I digress. "Someone" might find it easier to toss them in the sink and rinse away the cares of stinky onions in their garbage disposal. (Really, isn't that why we buy those things?) Why not mention that onion skins can stick to the sides of the drain and cause the sink to back up? Why, really? I mean, isn't clean up part of cooking? Just one little side note would really help a sister out, ya know?

The clean up crew.

Um...remember that part about "I made this for you." I'd like to use that credit now.

Oh yeah...I MADE those croutons, too.

I shared a bowl of the soup with my neighbors who gave me the Courvoisier. I was told (and I quote) "That soup was delicious." I think I could get used to this.

Smellevision would behoove us all!

Smellevision- the ability to not only see something, but smell it through the tv.

Each of the recipes I've attempted, while not the best in taste tests, fares extremely well in the "odoriferous" category. If only the cyber-gods would allow that to come through you'd be so much more thoroughly impressed with my culinary skills. The tasting part, meh, not so much.

With these recipes, I'm posting while cooking and will also post afterwards. So far, I'm disappointed by the level of culinary awareness required to just prepare the recipe. I had to LOOK UP how to cut fennel. What average American knows that, Barefoot Contessa? Huh? Also, since I don't keep green onions just hanging around the kitchen, it seems a bit wasteful to have to buy an entire bunch of them in order to get 1 TBSP for the herb butter spread. C'mon!

My internet friends who taught me how to cut fennel.

The fennel and yellow onions were SUPPOSED to be the same amount. Oh, well!

I invited our good friend Amy over along with her cute kiddos, Ava & Kamari. They were my guinea pigs for smoked salmon tea sandwiches and roasted potato & fennel soup.

This is what they looked like BEFORE eating the sandwiches & soup!

Amy--if you read this posting sorry. I used expired bouillon for the stock in the soup. Really! Who knew that stuff expired? Never mind that the measuring spoon BENT while I was scooping out the powder. The soup tasted great anyways. You'd have never know if I hadn't told you.

Expiration, smexperiation.

All was well. I guess I can't be too surprised that Ava preferred PB & J to the smoked salmon tea sandwiches, but I guess you can't please everyone!

Would this be considered "room temperature?" Apparently the microwave fails miserably at getting butter to room temperature. Again, Barefoot Contessa, how would I know that?

The smoked salmon tea sandwiches placed against my fall decorated table.

These recipes were great. I can see making the sandwiches for a get together. They were easy and tasty. Smoked salmon makes them seem fancy. BONUS: smoked salmon means a trip to Trader Joes! The soup was also quite easy--with the exception of fennel and my lack of knowledge about how to cut it. I had less than 1/4 of what the recipe called for. I wonder how the full amount would change it?

I'll be taking my leftover sandwiches to work on Monday to share with a coworker. He's pretty interested in my cooking attempts!

Some new taste testers

This time around I made turkey tea sandwiches and sun-dried tomato dip. I had some new taste testers. I was a little worried when I mentioned to Phil and my Dad that they would be tasting tea sandwiches I would get a "not a chance, I am not trying that", both surprised me and jumped right in.

The turkey tea sandwiches were first, a little Halloween lunch. They were pretty easy to make and I used fruit nut bagels and a little raisin bread we had on hand. The secret to these was the scallion cream cheese. Everyone loved them and had one the next day! Phil liked the cream cheese spread so much he has mentioned how great it was numerous times, sometimes at very odd moments. I will definitely be making these again. Very easy and makes for a little different spin on a turkey sandwich.

The finished product

You want me to try a tea sandwich!?!?!?!?

This is great!

Grace liked it too.

The sun dried tomato dip was a little appetizer before dinner. I cut the recipe in half since there were only three of us trying it. This was pretty easy as well and did get eaten. I served it with pretzels, regular potato chips, and tostidos, but I am sure it would be good with some veggies. It was not quite the hit as the sandwiches but did get a thumbs up. I deleted the only picture of the finished product I had. Oops.

Yum!

Kelly and Barefoot Contessa - These were very easy to make and I will be making both again in some form or another! Also I have been using low fat or reduced fat in all the recipes when possible as I have high cholesterol. I am not sure if they would taste any better and since I have not had them the other way. I will continue to make them with the lower fat ingredients.

I am glad that both recipes were good otherwise I think I would be down a taster.

Too soon to improvise?

My two recipes this week were Pan-Fried Onion Dip and Hummus. I made the dip for a small soiree. It was eaten, but not devoured. I thought it was alright. I'm not a huge onion dip eater, but it wasn't too bad.

Here's my unhappy assistant. She spotted her new favorite "toy" on the counter while I was trying to take this picture. You can see her hands signing, "Please" to ask for it.

Ahhh--so happy. Our old digital camera is her new favorite toy. She agreed to document my progress on the onion dip.

The true sign of a delicious concoction? A sizzling pan of butter!

SUCCESS! Poppy eats it and doesn't gag!

I guess I forgot to take a picture of the finished product. Oh well. As I said, it was just alright.

The Hummus.

First off, let me say that I have yet to learn to check to ensure I have ALL the ingredients for the task at hand. After I had added EVERYTHING to the mixer I realized we didn't have any lemons! I contemplated mixing everything together and adding the lemons later. I then thought to myself, "Hmmm, I wonder if lime juice would work? What the heck! I'll try it with some lime juice." Oh--let me mention that the recipe said, "Barefoot Contessa likes really lemony hummus."

Umm, yeah. Here's how that worked out. It was heinous! Ugh...I couldn't stand it!

So I got up uber early on Friday to re-make the hummus for a work event. The second batch was better, but still just alright. The recipe suggests using 6 TBSP of lemon juice (2 lemons). Seems like a lot, right? That's what I thought. Well, I added only the juice from one lemon and nearly gagged on the taste test. Lemony hummus blows! So since my improvisation worked so well with the first batch, I decided to give it another go. I added about 1/4 c more chick peas and 2 TBSP of tahini. It was a little better now. I decided a little fire would help it out as well. I tossed in a pinch of Cayenne Pepper. A pinch and man or man did it add some heat! I really liked it. Apparently, so did all my coworkers because the hummus was all gone by the end of the day! Hooray!

Notes to Sonya & Barefoot Contessa;

The onion dip was good, if you like onion dip. I think that cream cheese, mayo, sour cream trio throws off my mojo. The hummus was alright. I don't think I'd make it for myself again--at least not that recipe. Too many culinary decisions to be made. I didn't get into cooking because I wanted to think more!

Kelly

Some cooking on a rainy Friday afternoon.

Today my assistant and I whipped up some lamb sausage in puff pastry and grilled lemon chicken with satay sauce. In preparation for the new adventure I had to make room for the numerous new ingredients I would need by throwing out some of my VERY expired spices and such. I am sure I have more lurking in my cabinets but that is a project for different day. So we made our list and headed to the grocery store, we managed to find everything except the sausage. I decided not to use lamb sausage and try some other variety (lamb sausage is not so easy to find and probably not quite our taste) with our additional stop I decided to try turkey sausage Italian style. Off to the kitchen for some cooking. My assistant was excited at first but like a typical three year old lost interest after a period of time. We had fun but I did feel like I spent the majority of my afternoon cooking or cleaning.

The finished products:

Lemon grilled chicken with satay dip

Sausage in puff pastry

Thumbs up for the lemon grilled chicken

Kelly and Barefoot Contessa - I really enjoyed trying something new. The lemon chicken was great and the kids enjoyed it. I did not grill the chicken and just cooked it in the oven which seemed to work fine. I will for sure make the chicken again probably for dinners. The satay sauce I liked but the kids did not, kind of surprising since it tasted a lot like peanut butter, a big favorite in our house. The sauce was a little thick, maybe next time not so much peanut butter. The sausage thing pretty much a bust. Italian sausage is NOT the kind of sausage to use, the flavor was not right and the sausage was a little dry. I might try this again with different sausage. MAYBE.

More of a procrastinator.. .

I am very impressed with Kelly's get right started attitude. I took the week end off, but plan on getting some cooking done this week so stay tuned. . .

And so it begins...Kelly

Today is d-day (not even sure what that means, but it's appropro). I'm taking on a roasted eggplant spread and lobster salad with endive. So many words here I'd never thought would be a part of my vocabulary. Enidve, really?

Before I get to what's on the menu let me first say that weeks ago and managed a true not-a-cook fete! Not only did I make crab cakes, but: husband went out in boat and caught the crabs, neighbor came over to teach how to deshell? take apart? whatever take the meat out of the crabs, and then I made 'em FROM SCRATCH! Here are the pics from that endeavor. More than enough crab cakes for 6 adults and one onry little bean. Notice the beautiful mango salsa that accompanied the crab cakes. While the dinner was wonderful, I did question the satisfaction of a fantastic meal with a 2-hour prep and making. I'm still not sure it's worth it other than once in a blue moon.

Look! Smiling faces, not swollen glands, not gasping guests! A success, indeed. Note to self: Do I tell the readers this was taken before anyone ate? Naaahhh!


Onto the task at hand:

My new Santoku knife. I guess these things are sharp and good for cooking.

My secret for not actually mincing garlic. Love this stuff!

Nerts! My first mistake. I wasn't supposed to chop up the onion. It was supposed to be in 1 inch cubes so it could be roasted with the eggplant & red peppers. Oh well!

Can't you see these veggies trembling with the Cuisanart looming in the background? Prepare to meet your makers, veggies.

Finished product. Note to self: the pitas are better toasted. How do you like the Habañero accent. Nice touch, huh?

This is the finished Lobster salad in endive. Meh, it was alright. Look at that chopping job I did on the fresh dill. All thanks to my new, super-sharp knife!

Dear Sonya & Barefoot Contessa-

This was fun. However, neither of these dished will be making a repeat performance. They weren't terrible, but not good enough to want to have it again. Oh, by the way, I substituted crab meat for the lobster (as the Contessa suggested) because I'm not made of money.

Kelly

Fun food pics!

Pics of our offspring "enjoying" the fare we pass off on them.