Kitchen gadget

A great kitchen gadget is something that you can use for any meal, no matter what time of day. I have been looking to get an indoor grill/griddle for quite some time. I nearly purchased one from Crate & Barrel only to find when I got to the cash register that it didn't work on my glass-top stove.

I kind of forgot about the quest for a while until I was flipping through my Costco coupon book and came across the Cuisinart Gourmet Griddler 4-in-1 grill/griddle. At $79.99 with coupon it was a little more than I'd wanted to spend, but after using the new gadget 3 times in one day I was convinced that it will be a good investment in the long run.

Meal: Breakfast
Setting: open griddle


I LOVE banana pancakes and was so excited that all of my pancakes turned out perfectly golden brown on my new griddle. I set the temperature at high, as recommended by the instruction manual.


Meal: lunch
Setting: closed grill/panini press


I didn't have any artisanal bread so I just used some of the whole grain sandwich bread I had in the refrigerator. On my panini I put turkey, Gouda cheese, mushrooms and avocado. I lightly spread some butter on top of the bread before putting it on the grill.



Meal: dinner
Setting: open grill/closed grill


A few weeks ago a friend of mine passed along a bag full of lemons. With those lemons I made a fantastic lemon & asparagus pasta dish. Since it was such a light and delicious meal I decided to add a few ingredients, including grilled chicken and zucchini.

2 small to medium sized chicken breasts

1 medium sized zucchini, cut in rounds then in half again (half-moons)

1 1/2 pounds asparagus, trimmed and cut diagonally into 1/2-inch-thick slices

1 pound bow-tie pasta

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

3/4 cup heavy cream

2 tablespoons freshly grated lemon zest (from about 3 lemons)

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup finely chopped fresh parsley leaves

Accompaniment: freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Grill or bake chicken. Season with pepper and lemon juice.

Grill zucchini or add it with asparagus in steamer. In a steamer set over boiling water steam asparagus, covered, until crisp-tender, about 3 minutes. Transfer asparagus to a colander and rinse under cold water to stop cooking. Drain asparagus well.

In a 6-quart kettle bring 5 quarts salted water to a boil for pasta.

In a deep 12-inch skillet heat butter and cream over moderately low heat until butter is melted and stir in zest, lemon juice, and salt. Remove skillet from heat and keep sauce warm, covered.
Add pasta to boiling water and boil, stirring occasionally, until al dente. Ladle 1/4 cup pasta water into sauce and drain pasta in colander.

Immediately add pasta and asparagus to sauce and cook over moderate heat, tossing, 1 minute, or until heated through. Add parsley and salt and pepper to taste and toss well.

Sprinkle pasta with a little Parmesan and serve more Parmesan on the side.

Monday Night Meals

Lots of love and lots of lemon went into the making of these Angel Whisper thumprints.

This week’s Monday night meal came in a backward sort of way. I made dessert before the meal. Hey, life’s too short, cook dessert first, right?

Even though I’m not a huge baker, ‘tis the season to do so. There’s something about the holidays and cold weather that gets my baking juices flowing and every cookie recipe I see I want to make. So this year it was tough to narrow down the pot to just a few delicious recipes, but alas, the two I made Monday were Angel Whisper cookies and Peanut butter-Chocolate fudge. Mmmmmm, my mouth was watering before I even mixed the first ingredients.
The fudge was super easy to make and as someone who doesn’t like a) nuts in her baked goods and b) fudge in general, I wanted to gobble up this entire batch. Alas, I used some restraint and only had two pieces. I didn’t take any pictures of this fudge because the pictures provided on the like above are much prettier. I got 49 pieces out of one batch.

Mmmm, don't those look good enough to eat? I thought so and snuck a few in before making dinner.

Next I made Angel Whispers. The dough was only a few ingredients and while it was chilling for an hour, I was able to make the lemony filling. I really liked this recipe because it required very few ingredients and all the lemon flavoring came from natural lemon, not extract. Because I wanted to get more bang for my buck, instead of making sandwiches like the recipe asked for, I instead made bite-sized thumbprint cookies. The filling had just the right amount of tart and sweet. The recipe made 36 thumbprint cookies.

After baking the afternoon away (I should also add that I cooked the day away while there was a leak in my kitchen ceiling, not fun), it was time for a 30-minute meal to satisfy my belly a little further. In store for the evening was Cuban Surf and Turf. I came across this recipe last week while flipping through one of my Rachael Ray cookbooks and had to make it this week.

After making a batch each of fudge and cookies, this dinner was a welcome treat.

This recipe will be made again. I loved the lightness and wonderful citrus flavors. The leftover factor will be tried out tonight. I decided not to mix the pineapple and scallions into the rice so that I could re-heat the rice easier then add those ingredients each time as to keep them more fresh and crisp.

While eating dinner, I watched Heroes. My friend over at I Watch Lots of TV has a great hate for this show right now and each time I read one of his blogs about the show, I tend to nod my head in agreement on most of his points. This episode was so-so. I’m happy to see that the “Villains” chapter is over, but I’m not so sure about the next chapter “Fugitives.” I liked Nathan Petrelli and now he is going to be the one leading the hunt to contain everyone with powers. Now I don’t think I’m going to like big brother Petrelli so much. I was also sad to see Benjamin Knox (the human fear detector) killed off leaving no more former players from The Wire on the show. Darn shame. We’ll see what the new year has to offer for Heroes, but I’m not holding my breath.

Jamie Hector, formerly of The Wire, was killed off in this week's episode of Heroes.