I took the chowder out of the fridge at about 5:30 and put it on the stove to heat up. Again, Greg had the power seat. I asked him how it tasted and he said, "fine, great, don't change a thing." I took a bowl and added some sherry and mixed it with the chowder and Greg said, "hmm, yeah, thats better, don't change a thing" Accckkk, what am I supposed to do with that??? So I floated about an 1/8 of a cup of sherry in the middle to the chowder and didn't stir, but rather let it permeate the broth.
All I know is that there were 4 clean bowls at the end of the course, and one guest said "more salt" two guests said "salty already" and Greg who said: "funny, I wouldn't change a thing, its just right." My hero.

Enjoy,
Seth

Spent the morning making crabmeat chowder for dinner tonight. I was able to taste the chowder base until I put the crabmeat in, (for those of you who don't know, I'm allergic to seafood) and I thought it was pretty flavorful. I gave Greg a taste and he said it was good....I said "not great, not wow this is the best chowder ever????" and he said "yeah, its uhhh really good" I asked about what it needed and he said "nothing." How am I supposed to work with that???
Well, this is essentially my clam chowder recipe with crab instead, so I figure it has to be good seeing as most everyone raved about that recipe when I used to make it by the barrel. The only difference is that I didn't use clam broth as the base, but used turkey stock.

I will wait to see how it reheats after I've cooled it in the fridge for 6 hours. Hopefully the flavors will meld well and come out stronger. Here is what I did...with all the chopping and such, it only took about 30 minutes to make.

Sauteed 1/2 an onion in butter and when transparent, added finely chopped fresh sage and thyme and two chopped stalks of celery with salt and pepper to taste, then added two cloves of garlic. Cubed several pounds of Yukon Gold potatoes (they are the creamiest) and added them to the pot to sautee a few minutes before adding about 4 cups of homemade turkey broth made with just a touch of yellow curry. Bring to a boil and then turn to simmer to let the potatoes soften. When soft, take a potato masher and crush some of the potatoes to release their starch into the chowder base (serves to thicken). Added 14 oz of fresh picked Maine crabmeat and simmer before taking off heat. I made this at noon for a 7pm dinner and have placed the pot in the fridge to cool and meld flavors. Will reheat before serving. Might add either heavy cream or Sherry before serving, but perhaps not. This is our appetizer tonight before the rest of dinner.

Enjoy,
Seth

I've had a couple of comments on the roast chicken and the chicken curry salad, which I can't find on the blog either. The roaster we usually use is between a six and eight pounder, so its enough for dinner, at least lunch the next day and then into the pot for a great stock. I wait until the roasters go on sale and get them for about 68 cents a pound. So for 6-7 bucks you get three meals for 2 people or more.
I get the roasters with the pop up thermometers, but my rule of thumb is the average time for cooking is 2 hours. We also do the same thing with turkey breasts, which I'll get and pop in the oven in the morning so there is fresh hot turkey for lunch.

Regarding the curried chicken salad (or turkey salad for that matter) The ingredients really depend on what I have in the house. The base is picked chicken or turkey that I cut into small cubes with a pair of kitchen shears, and I make it in small batches, enough for two sammiches. then adding about a teaspoon or more of yellow madras curry powder, salt and pepper to taste and perhaps a dash of celery seed or celery salt. If I happen to have real celery, then that goes in and grapes taste great in it too. Another favorite would be an addition of toasted pecans. Its pretty simple and fast to make. It makes Greg's day when I make it, and of course thats the most important part!

Having people over tonight for dinner and thinking about doing something with crab for an appetizer. We'll see.

Enjoy,
Seth

Welcome to another episode of "cooking by the seat of your pants!" I found a recipe for pork chops that sounded excellent and tasty too. The recipe called for pan searing and slow cooking the pork in butter and when cooked, making a sauce with chicken broth, cranberry sauce, tawny port, and fresh rosemary. In my infinite wisdom, I thought "well, I don't have any of that, but I bet I can wing it" Call it cook's challenge. So, I marched into the kitchen and found two pork chops, frozen cranberry juice, Orange Cointreau, some fresh curried turkey broth that I just made, and dried rosemary. What the hell, I started out with melting the butter and then searing both sides of the pork for a couple of mintues a piece, then added about a cup of turkey broth, two tablespoons of frozen cranberry juice, about the same for the Orange Cointreau and a handfull of crushed, dried rosemary. I then slow cooked the meat until slightly underdone and then took it out the pan to keep warm on a plate (remember that pork keeps cooking and will be the perfect doneness by the time the sauce is ready) I added a rou to the pan for thickener and then salt and peppered for flavor. I added the chops back in to bathe in the glaze and then served with peas and stove top sauteed steak fries. The result, as Greg noted, was a lightly fruity (great for summer) zesty sauce that worked really well with the meat.

Enjoy,
Seth

My head was in the clouds this weekend as I got rave reviews for the third time from friends who came to dinner about three weeks ago when Greg and I were having "little chicky," or a Hannaford roasting chicken that has been a staple in our weekly menu for a while, mostly because Greg likes my curried chicken salad the next day for lunch (thats another blog post in here somewhere)
Anyway, I have really simplified this roast chicken thing and have it down to a science, so I thought I would post it here again for all of you who have tried it in the past. I used to stuff the bird with citrus fruits and yellow onion but one day found that I had the chicken, but nothing interesting to stuff it with. I wasn't really in the mood to cook, so I drizzled olive oil on the whole thing and then sprinkled liberally with sea salt....into the oven in a roasting pan at 350 for approximately 20 minutes a pound with an average time of about 2 hours to roast.
The meat comes out so tender and flavorful, almost like brining, but without the mess.
One friend repeated tells me its the best chicken she has ever had...at 60 years old, thats quite a compliment!

Enjoy,
Seth

Greg and I took a friend up on her offer of having us up to her house in Winter Harbor where she has a fantastic 19th century house built in the style of a Swiss Chalet. Unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate and we hardly saw through the fog for two days. There is not much to do in wet weather in the middle of nowhere, so we drove around and looked at the fog in different places on the coast. The running commentary went something like this "This is Scoodic Point which has a stunning view of the ocean, too bad about the fog" "This is Winter Harbor, there are some beautiful boats in the harbor, which you could see if it wasn't foggy" "I'm giving the boys the third floor bedroom which has the best view of the water...of course you could see it without the %$#*# fog."
After driving around and around for miles, we came back, changed our clothes and went out to dinner in Gouldsboro at a place called Bunker's Wharf. The interior was really cozy with a big stone fireplace and cathedral ceilings with exposed beams. The menu had a lot of seafood, and just a few choices for us meateaters. Greg split a plate of crabcakes with our hostess and they were marvelling about the taste because it was just all crab and spices, packed together without breadcrumbs or mayo. Apparently the spinach salad is famous, but I had a ceasar salad with homemade crutons and hardly any dressing, it was extremely dry, kind of too bad.
Our dinners arrived and Greg had steamers while our hostess had carmelized scallops. Both said the taste was great but that both the scallops and the steamers were gritty. They need a lesson from David Carlson and his two tank grit remover!
For non seafood, there was either a fillet for $28.00 or a pasta dish with chicken and sausage and a cream cheese sauce both of which sounded too country club buffet for me that night. So, I ordered one of the dinner specials which was a pair of porterhouse pork chops grilled with fresh rosemary, accompanied by roasted potatos and fresh veggies. The dish looked fantastic and smelled terrific, but when I cut into them, both were raw on the inside. Yuck, nothing worse than raw pork! I sent the plate back and the chef apologized, grilled them again, b ut failed to warm up th plate so that the sides were cold. I was also a bit nervous to eat the meat at that point. Oh well.
We ordered their speical dessert when we ordered dinner, so what arrived was homemade ice cream sandwiched between two pieces of frozen flourless chocolate cake. It was good, but would have been better had the cake been a bit less frozen. I think ice cream between two slices of warm chocolate cake would've been better.

So, I give the place a thumbs up for seafood lovers, but a definite thumbs down for landfood lovers.

Enjoy,
Seth