We went to Penn-dutch meats yesterday and I was inspired by all the
lovely fresh (cheap) produce and meats they had...
Last night I made whole baked snapper, fresh broccoli, and baby
potatoes tossed in a herbed cream sauce. The snapper were so small
that they got rather overcooked even in just 30 minutes (which I would
have thought was the bare minimum oven time!) but it tasted better
than it looked...
http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/photo/2787043580015899315LDqAkV?vhost=home-and-garden
And today I made slow-cooked ****k spareribs, carrot salad, potato
salad with fresh herbs, and spinach/golden tomato/mushroom salad.
http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/photo/2199130880015899315hBBsEu?vhost=home-and-garden
I haven't made carrot salad in YEARS and I couldn't remember what it
was mama used to put into it. I used grated carrot, dessicated coconut
(NOT the sweetened kind), raisins, orange juice, and chopped dried
apricot.
The potato salad was pretty basic but I tried to lower the calories...
instead of just using mayonnaise I made a dressing from reduced-fat
sour cream, 2% milk, seasonings AND light mayonnaise. It tasted pretty
good after it had sat in the fridge for the afternoon and I was
pleased with myself that I managed to keep the potatoes whole instead
of ending up with herbed mashed potato!
And the spinach salad was just because I needed something else to put
on the plate. Fresh spinach, a chopped up golden tomato (tastes pretty
much like a regular one but it's a different colour and not very
acid), a couple of sliced mushrooms and a little bottled Italian
dressing (shhh, I can't make dressing!) and I sprinkled it with
peanuts at the last minute.
And I made my own bbq sauce the same as always - a can of tomato sauce
mixed with a bit of this and a bit of that until it tastes right... I
tried boiling the ****k to see if it would come out any more tender
than it usually does but it didn't make any difference that I could
see. I usually put the ****k on at lunchtime and slow-cook it for about
five hours, so all the boiling did was to make it cook faster and end
up a bit dried out because it was in the oven too long! I think I'll
go back to boneless country spareribs next time and skip the boiling.
And here's my dinner plated up... it was a lot more time-consuming
than te dinners I usually make, because I had to get everything done
early enough for it to sit and meld the flavours, but I think it was
worth it.
http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/photo/2399254060015899315RJtomF?vhost=home-and-garden
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