All-By-Yr-Lonesome Dinner: Salmon + Cream Sauce!

Okay so the fancy, super-detailed name for this recipe is "Parmesan and Basil Encrusted Salmon with White Wine Cream Sauce" but I don't really think of it that way, and I don't want to name my food something that belongs on a trendy menu (matte, cream, minimalistic, only one page) that doesn't list prices at all, or instead puts the price a subjectively reasonable distance to the right of the food's name, dollar sign omitted, obviously (dollar signs on the menus are the surest sign of an unhip restaurant). 

So, this is Salmon and Cream Sauce, and it tastes way more deliciously complex than it is to make, which is all that I really need to know.

Also, this is a recipe for one, a.k.a. an "ALL BY YR LONESOME DINNER!" Fuck you, people who never have to eat alone. This recipe is not for you companied ingrates! This recipe is highly political in that it rejects the notion that spending time with yourself and doing daily activities alone is embarrassing or sad or pathetic. On an apolitical level, this is a creamy, wonderful dinner for you alone and no one else! Best enjoyed in your underwear with copious amounts of wine and music. Eat chocolate with your bare hands afterwards.

Honey Pecan Banana Bread

It was so good that I didn't even get to take a picture before it was half gone! This banana bread is simple, delicious, uses lots of bananas, and doesn't use any oils/shortening -- just butter.

Garlic Fettucine Alfredo with Sautéed Greens

Let me just say that this is a quick and cheap recipe. I'd like to post again when I can make everything from scratch (well, except the fettucine; I don't have a pasta attachment for my Mixmaster yet!), but right now that's not an option, even though I'd like it to be. Another time.

How to Boil an Egg/Egg Salad Sandwich!

So, I've never boiled an egg before. I had to text my Mom to ask her how to do it. It's just one of those things that I've never done, so doing it right on my very first try felt downright triumphant. Why did I think boiling eggs would be a delicate process?

Egg salad is the easiest, most prosaic meal ever. It's so comforting.

Ingredients

Makes 2 Sandwiches

4 slices of whole wheat bread (the more fiber, the better! The nuttier the better! If there's wheat berries in it, awesome!)

5 eggs

1/3 c. mayonnaise

2 t. mustard

three shakes garlic salt

Here's how my mother boils eggs (verbatim, from her text): "Put eggs in cold water in pan. Start boiling on stove. When @ fast boil turn off cover and let sit 10 min. Put in cold water until completely cooled."

That's what I did, and it worked like a charm. Peeling off the shells, on the other hand, was a pain in the ass. I hear that putting a dash of salt in the pot before you boil the eggs helps? I'll try it next time and let you know.

Then I mashed the eggs, mayo, mustard, and garlic salt in a bowl. Before I actually started mashing, though, I threw my bread in the toaster oven to toast as I mashed. I like my egg salad a little chunky and less like an egg purée so I just mashed with a fork and the strength of my wee little arms.

Once my bread was toasted, I buttered it lightly, covered one slice in leaves of fresh spinach, and then spooned loads of the egg salad on. It was excellent. 

P.S. I hope that we can all laugh about how embarrassing it is to use the RetroCamera app on my phone for blurry pictures of egg salad sandwiches. 

Breakfast Burrito!

The Eggs

2 eggs, scrambled

basil + parsley

small pat of butter

1 clove garlic, minced

In the Tortilla

one whole-wheat tortilla

a few smears (not too thick!) of authentic refried beans

pepperjack cheese

handful of diced tomato

You will need two pans: one small, for scrambling the egg; one larger & flatter, for grilling the tortilla. 

First, assemble the tortilla by lying it flat and spreading the small portion of refried beans + chunks/slices of pepperjack cheese down the direct center. Begin heating the bigger, flatter pan to low-medium heat. 

Scramble two eggs with basil and parsley in a small bowl or cup. Then, in the smaller pan heated to medium, add a small pat of butter and the minced garlic. Let the garlic begin to sautée, but just as it begins to start browning, add the scrambled egg mixture. Cook the eggs to your version of perfection. Keep an eye on them; if you have to scrape at the bottom vigorously, you haven't paid enough attention, in my cooking opinion.

Your bigger pan should be adequately heated by now. Put the tortilla open-faced into the pan and let it hang out until the cheese is melty and the bottom is crispy. The eggs should finish before the tortilla is done grilling, so put the finished eggs directly onto the open-faced tortilla and let them hang out by the melty cheese and beans (mmm).

Once the tortilla is adequately melted on the top and grilled on the bottom, your breakfast burrito is ready. Add some diced tomatoes, and/or cilantro, diced peppers, avocado slices, etc. Eat with sour cream and hot sauce.

P.S. For cheese, I actually used a delicious Chipotle Havarti from Forgotten Valley Cheese in southern Wisconsin. So spicy, and much more buttery than pepperjack, with larger chunks of pepper. It helps clear up my sick sinuses, too!

Chicken Salad Melts

So, this is just a tiny cooking adventure. More like a cooking jaunt? On this day, the first day of the year that truly feels like fall, we opened our windows (all two of them) wide and let the air that so immediately reminds me of apples into this little apartment. I cut myself some blunt straight-across bangs, and then remembered how limited our food options were because of the bullshit electrocuting stove we have. Last night I all but touched the burner, and I got electrocuted. It's a wiring problem and it'll get fixed, but until then, no stove. No range, no oven, no nothing! Luckily, we have a toaster oven, so that's how the chicken sandwiches got melt-y. If you don't have a toaster oven, AND if you have a broken bullshit stove like we do, then you'll have to eat these sandwiches cold. Pretty sure they're good that way too, just forget the cheese and pile on more crunchy vegetables, like cucumbers, peppers (I like that in some places outside of the U.S., the kind of peppers that you eat plain or in dip are called "capsicums" because I hate not having a way to verbally distinguish between the type of spicy peppers you add to things and the kind that you eat plain), or avocado! Next time I should mix avocado into the chicken salad mix -- you should, too. See, we're learning and growing together, I think.

Chicken Salad Melts

About 15 minutes to make

Makes 3 sandwiches

1 can of fully cooked chunk chicken breast (10 oz)

1/2 cup of Hellmann's Olive Oil mayonnaise (I would recommend using however much floats your boat, though, people are picky about mayonnaise)

2 t. basil (fresh, if you can!)

1 t. dried onion

1 t. oregano

1 pinch of garlic powder

1 T. yellow mustard

some ground black peppercorn

one shake of Lawry's (optional)

two shakes of red pepper flakes

Oroweat Oatnut bread (found at Target or any typical chain grocery)

Pepperjack cheese

Drain the can, mix all of it together. Mash up the chicken a little so you don't get huge, unmixed chunks of dry chicken. It's unpleasant. Spread this on a slice of bread, thickly if you're like me (I made more like 2.25 sandwiches out of the mix), and put relatively thin slices of Pepperjack (melts better) on top of the mixture that's on top of the bread (it's like Inception, in case you need clarification). Put the top slice of bread on, and put on toast setting in your toaster oven for about 5 minutes, or on your functioning stove low-and-slow for about 10, with a cover so everything melts and heats properly. When it's all finished, add tomatoes and lettuce and maybe an avocado slice or two.

If you'd like to be fancy, cook a fancy chicken breast and then put it in your fancy food processor. Really, go for it! But I don't have thawed out chicken (it's the last break before school! As if I'm going to have the foresight required to do that for a meal in the middle of the goddamn day, come on) or a food processor, so eat me.

Also, substitute mayonnaise for whatever sort of -naise you eat. Veganaise? Miracle whip (may the good Lord help you)? Whatever you prefer, but I can't vouch for anything flavorwise unless you use Hellmann's Olive Oil Mayonnaise. Same goes for the Oroweat Oatnut bread, which I highly recommend, for reasons both financial ($2.99 at Target!) and flavorful.

We ate these tasty sandwiches in bed while watching Netflix (King of the Hill!), and then had Door County peaches from this Saturday's Farmer's Market for dessert, and some pretzel M&M's. Overall, a really relaxing Labor Day.