Fresh Ginger

Ok, I know I am a day late here with my menu of the week (see the next post), but I have a good excuse.

Saturday afternoon, my boyfriend decided that he wanted to cook brunch for everyone (8 of us) on Sunday. He started picking up my recipe books and started making a grocery list. Then, we went shopping. Mind you, I did not know what we were shopping for except for the items on my list. I only knew that he was going to make some wheat free bagels. So of course I had to make some nifty cream cheese spread to go with the smoked salmon I had on store just for that moment. Apparently we purchased groceries for about 15 different items, as there were other things that he wanted to make during the week. When your boyfriend gets a baking and cooking bug, you go with it. You do anything you can to encourage it. Be the lovely sous chef and make him coffee or cocktails, whatever he wants, just to keep him in the kitchen. It feels so great to have someone cook and bake for you!

While I was in the shower (so that we could go to the store) he made a batch of brownies. That quick folks, from scratch. So, while he was focused on what to make for our friends, I focused on what to make for dinner.

Singapore street noodles with shrimp and chicken. Thankfully PF Changs is in the habit of listing their main ingredients and these were the noodles I wanted to replicate, but not the ones with the GF sauce, rather the curry sauce (it had been several years, but I had that curry memory in my head….). So that I had to wing, my winging needs a bit of tweaking but it was pretty good.

Singapore Street Noodles for 4

Purple cabbage, shredded (probably 1.5 cups worth); julienned carrots (one carrot); chopped green onions (a bunch and 1/2) (whites and greens separated); one tomato de-seeded and sliced; shallots (4), cilantro (a good large handful); and marinated thinly sliced chicken(two small breasts) and shrimp (I used 14, don’t know why). I used brown rice vermicelli and soaked it for 5 minutes in cold water and then drained it. The purple cabbage was so striking in the stir fry, I highly recommend using it, but if you have green on hand, then use that up. I marinated the chicken and shrimp in garlic, ginger, GF tamari and a dash of curry powder (Penzey’s sweet curry would work great here, if I had the forethought to get some.). For the sauce I used GF tamari, toasted sesame oil, a dash of rice vinegar, lime, freshly grated ginger and garlic, szechuan peppercorns, some curry powder and chicken broth.

In a wok, I sauteed the chicken, then shrimp and set aside and sauteed the cabbage, shallots and carrots, and set those aside. I then tossed the noodles in and gave them a go around. Add the white parts of the green onion and the tomato for a few seconds. Then back in with the previously cooked ingredients, sauce, and add the dark green parts of the green onion and the cilantro, toss, toss again and then serve. It came pretty close, and I will keep experimenting to get that curry taste down pat.

Since blood oranges seem to be cheaper than ever, I have been stocking up. The blood orangeito was tasty. When I ran low on blood oranges, I began squeezing tangerines to mix with vodka:

So that was dinner. By this time, my bf was ready to offer up what he had planned for Sunday morn and prepping began in earnest. Here is the list of what we had all wheat free/gluten free of course:

Wheat free water bagels (from whole spelt) with plain cream cheese or my spread with fresh dill, red onion, lemon, capers and black pepper (all things that go great with smoked salmon) and pepper smoked salmon. Can I just say how great it was to eat a somewhat normal bagel? It was chewy and flavorful and they were fun to make.

Ginger Daddies - giant ginger molasses cookies that tasted just like lebkuchen in Germany

Irish Soda bread

Build your own burrito with corn or spelt tortillas, cheese, breakfast sausage, eggs, oven roasted hash browns and New Mex red chile sauce.

Candied bacon - wow, is this a treat. We coated some of our own bacon with brown sugar and three types of red chile and baked it. Spicy, sweet, smoky, salty. Need I say more?

Maple Sausage links

Wheat free beignets with powdered sugar

Fruit cobbler made in a dutch oven on a charcoal grill

Mimosas with orange or grapefruit juice

Home roasted free trade coffee

And the brownies can’t forget about those…

Do you notice the lack of fresh fruit or vegetables? That is because he was in charge and he has a big sweet tooth. I was in charge of the bagel spread, potatoes, candied bacon, red chile sauce and frying up the sausage for burritos. He did the rest.

Did I mention this was a brunch? Guests did not leave until 7:30 pm! That’s right, by then it was dinner time. When I started to throw together some vegetable beef soup with lots of tomatoes (canned from the garden) after all those carbs, they went running. My sweetie collapsed on the couch. It is hard to drink home brew all day long! Once we finished one bottle of champagne off with mimosas, I wisely stopped drinking. They all powered through!

So my menu of the week is late due to the fact that we are entertaining fiends! I forgot to take any pictures! Now, to work on my menu…

i’m out

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