I've been off lately. This weekend we had lots of company and my dinners just didn't fly....I'm going back to cookbooks for recipes I guess. This making dishes with a little of this, a pinch of that, a lot of this...sometimes just doesn't work. I'm also off on planning. We had some new friends over for dinner with their 13 year old son who, hopefully, will be the focus of a whole series of posts here called "cooking with Wes" Wes is homeschooled and I offered to teach him how to cook...his mom is super excited! Anyway, knowing Wes doesn't like vegetables too much made dinner a challenge. How could I get Wes to surrepticiously eat vegetables? Soup was my first thought, so I made a good batch of curried potato leek soup. I decided to wing the recipe rather than go look up my favorite, and it was good, but I forgot to put in that bit of garlic that brings everything together. I followed up soup with pizza...soup and pizza you ask? It didn't occur to me how wierd that was until the guests showed up. Anyway, I was able to hide some orange peppers in with the sausage pizza, so Wes probably got at least a 1/2 serving of vegetables (whatever he didn't hide in a pile on his plate) My crust was off though and it didn't rise as much as I wanted it to, so the crust was super thin. Add to that the fact that I didn't keep and eye on the crust and you have very crispy pizzas!
My apple crisp had too much ginger in it, though it did have a nice subtle taste without a bunch of sugar...a bit o ice cream would have been good on top, but I wasn't thinking again!
Sunday night I wanted to make Shepard's pie with a puff pastry crust. I didn't have any butter to make the rou with, so I made it with olive oil. We didn't have any cream, nor much milk, so I used chicken broth and lots of cheese. Well, the mixture separated when it was cooking in the oven, so I drained off most of the liquid and served the mixture: ground beef, potatoes, carrots, purple broccoli, leeks, and peas with the crust and it was actually pretty tasty since the cheese had soaked into the mixture and made it nice and tender and flavorful...just no creamy sauce....oh well...time to start eating out again.

Enjoy,
Seth

Greg and I drove to Portland last night to see David Sedaris with my sister and a friend of hers. We met at Portland Flatbread Co. for dinner and I have to say, I really like this quirky place. Its easy to meet people there, centrally located, and the pizza is ok too. All I wanted was cheese, so I ordered a half asiago and mozzerella with herbs. Excellent. Greg had the carmelized onion and sun dried tomato and as he said, "I burped up onions all night after that" We got up after the meal and went to sit in front of the pizza oven (they have a big piece of granite to sit on) and watched. Of course I wondered if it was hot enough to fire ceramics in!
One whole pizza (organic sausage) and two half pizza, two salads and four glasses of wine came to $75.00. A bit on the hefty side for pizza, but what do you expect, its the big city!!!

Enjoy,
Seth

One of my deep friends gave me her deep fat fryer today. This opens a whole new field of home cooking!!!!

We were in Bermuda last week and had the great fortune to have dinner at a five star restaurant called the Newport Room. The Newport room is an homage to all the sailors who sailed in the Bermuda Race from Newport to Bermuda (my father did this race three times), however, my mother was agast that the place looked more like the interior of an ocean liner. I loved the warm rosewood and brass interior and felt as if I was on the Queen Mary or something, the effect was pretty cool. We arrived to be one of the only table of diners in the place, but by the time we left three hours later, the place was packed. Coat and tie was the norm, however there were some black tie clad tables.
There were six of us (my whole family) and we were presented with choices of: 1. a seven course meal with wine parings that would take somewhere in the neighborhood of 4 hours to eat ( my dad would never have the patience for that...though I know of a local couple of friends here in Belfast with whom I would love to share the experience); 2: a three course meal for $75 a person ; 4. a four course meal for $100.00 a person. People chose what they wanted, I ended up having the four course meal. The whole experience was very theatrical and the staff really relished the drama surrounding the food to the point that when our main course was served, everyone's arrived at the table covered with silver domes. When all were in place, the server said "ladies and gentlemen, dinner is served" and all the domes were wisked away to a golf clap round of applause on our part. I chose to order the butternut squash tortolini with parmesan foam that was good but nothing to write home about, the truffle and porcini powder mushroom soup which was just amazing, the seared lamb shoulder and the chocolate souflee...why not? My dad, who doesn't believe that food should cost so much and is really happy when the server is attentive to his drink needs and his steak is cooked properly had his usual salad with rocqufort, steak, and chocolate soufle. Greg had his lobster bisque flambeed at the table, and a monkfish napoleon that he said was out of this world. My sister Jennifer asked for wine parings with each course, speaking in Arabic to the Egyptian sommolier, who thought my blond haired sister a goddess because she spoke his language. Talk about drama, she made a big production of being a vegetarian that night.."I don't eat fish" she sniffed at one point and then pleaded with all of us not to order meat. (I'd be a bit more sympathetic if she hadn't ordered the beef tenderloin our last night out at dinner) My mother had the lobster hot and cold which consisted of a lobster salad and tempura lobster with olive oil and rosemary sorbet to start and then the Dover Sole which she said was quite excellent.
What was perfect about the place was the European portions. My tortolini dish had three pieces of pasta, not two dozen as in America. My lamb was also very small proportion wise. It was really nice to be taken care of by seven servers who made sure that the bread plates were full and the water flowed.
The bill was about $1000 by the time we had coffee and tea and dessert. Our chocoate souflees were decadent! Warm cream was poured into the top and a plate of white and dark chocolate shavings with candied orange peel went around the table as sprinklings.
The courses were spread apart by an amuse bouche of basil custard with an anchovie breadstick and a palate clearer of mango juice with a lemon foam. Just and incredible experience I wish everyone could have at least once in their lives. This is the way to eat!

Enjoy,
Seth

I was asked by a friend to make her wedding cake, which sounded great until her fiancee asked me if I could make a representation of a Sudanese Pyramid (with or without the temple door?) because he is an archeologist working in the Sudan. So though I am happy to do what I can, how does one make a pyramid and make it look good...where does the plastic bride and groom go, and do I tint the frosting to look like dirt, what can I make look like sand...raw sugar? and can anyone help me with the hierogriphics?....how high does the pyramid have to be to feed 100?

Answers to these question and more will be answered next season.

Enjoy,
Seth

There is a sign in the window of Murphy Coffee House in Belfast that says "who cares?" Apparently the owners and the staff inside! We tried to go down to Dudley's for breakfast on Sunday and there was a line out the door. While circling, we saw the breakfast sign at Murphy Coffee House (There was no " 'S " on the end of Murphy) and so decided to try. They have a wonderfully intricate front porch with lots of nooks for two over 6'3" guys and their 2 Giant Schnauzers. It was a gorgeous day to sit outside. Too bad the tables weren't set up, umbrellas weren't open, and the day's dew hadn't been dried off the seating area.

Inside, there was a long line in front of us and one server behind the counter. We waited about 10 minutes and then I went and got the dogs out of the car and we cleaned off an area outside ourselves. Greg waited to order and got us a rag for the wet table and chairs. When we finally got our breakfast, my scrambled eggs were overcooked, flat, and skimpy and my home fries were just plain grill fried potatoes, no garlic, or onions or other spices. Dry is about the way my mouth felt after two bites of breakfast. When our inquiry about jam was rebuffed, with "we don't have that right now" said with attitude, I had had enough of the place. Greg paid ($17.00 for self serve ordering of two plates of scrambled eggs and bacon (fatty) with homefries and toast, a cup of juice and a cup of coffee) and decided against a tip. Heres my tip: One more server at least during sunday morning hours, a server who gives a F*** about her customers, better food, and an exterior seating area where 5 tables of diners don't have to set up their own tables!

Enjoy,
Seth

We're off on vacation today, back next week with tales of decadent island eating adventures.
Think Dark and Stormys with conch salad (or burgers for me) mmmmm....Margaritaville, here we come

Enjoy,
Seth

We were invited to attend a 60th birthday dinner party last night for a good friend. The party was at Natalie's at the Mill in Camden, a restaurant that both Greg and I have been wanting to try for a while. The birthday party was a suprise, organized by our friend's brother and sister-in-law, so we had to get there early. We had a big, festive party of 12. The restaurant is very warm and inviting inside, perfect medium soft lighting, a feat when the ceilings are so high. The art was extremely tasteful and blended into the decor rather than overwhelmed it. We got there and had drinks seated in the leather furnitured lounge area.
We had a table in the back for all of us. The restaurant accomodated us by adding two more place settings at the last minute. The service, which I've heard was great, was not so attentive at the beginning. Our host got annoyed and went out to speak with the hostess at the front of the restaurant. He wanted champagne for the table and three different wines. After that, service was better, but we had to wait quite a while for our entrees. We were served an amuse bouche to start of one thinly sliced sauteed shrimp with a caviar beurre blanc which I guess was tasty though I gave mine across the table to Greg.
I ordered the butternut squash and carmelized apple soup with a confit of phesant which was delightful, quite excellent in fact. For dinner I had the crispy Duck with a sweet potato confection of some sort and a huckleberry quince sauce that was really fantastic.. I tend to like my duck cooked, and ordered it medium, though the chef recommends it medium rare.
One of the great details they have at Natalies is small baskets of hot bread with individual ramekins of soft butter....Score one for the restaurant there in my book.
Everyone seemed to order oysters which looked fabulous, though there were only five to a plate (cost cutting measures? low on the count this evening? I dunno) Greg said the oysters were the best part of the meal, lightly cooked and with a small salad on top. They were better than his fish entree which he said was a bit skimpy.
Dessert was a chocolate layer cake with mocha frosting and curried truffles on the side. Very nice.

My only beef was the price, which seemed excessive, especially when we all split the bill. It came to about $130.00 a person, which I really think is too much for the food and service that we got.

Enjoy,
Seth

Ode to Dave's at Willy World

Oh Dave, your food was so good

It was excellent to have a such a cozy place in our hood.

Because you've closed down

I write this with a frown

we are sad to see you go

cause we so wanted you to grow

What a dream

Paying one price for salad bar, entree and ice cream

But that kind of quirk

just didn't work

If it were our place

we would've kept pace

putting the cars in front and the deck out back

It can be ours if the price is right

try as we might

Does the big screen TV come with the deal?

Come on, Open for one last meal!

We never got our chance to say "so long"

Goodbye to Dave's at Willy World

Sniff :-(

MMM, The other night we had some friends over and I made this spiced chicken and lentil dish that turned out to be so tasty. It was a takeoff on a recipe I found for Moroccan chicken, but since I didn't have some of the ingredients and I had others I thought might work, I changed it round.
The recipe relies on the tang of vinegar to really make the lentils flavorful.

I washed and trimmed four large boneless, skinless, breasts and then cut them into strips that I marinated in oil, garlic, 2 tablespoons chili powder, corriander, and salt and pepper. Refrigerate for several hours.

I cooked a pound of organic green lentils in turkey broth (found them in the new bulk section at Hannaford's) until tender and then transferred them to a bowl and dressed them with 1/2 cup olive oil, 1/4 cup red wine vinegar, 1 tablespoon chili powder, and a sprinkling of corriander, salt and pepper to taste all wisked together (you can add some cumin too, but I didn't have any) Set bowl aside.

Saute about 1/2 an onion over medium heat until translucent and soft and add the chicken, letting it get good and colorful. Cover and cook for 2 minutes and then if you want add more spices and some chopped dried apricots and turn to coat and cook another few minutes until chicken is just cooked through and tender. Take off heat and let sit for a few minutes while you get the lentils ready to assemble the dish.

Mound lentils in the center of a large platter and then add chicken around the outside of the platter. Set in the center of the table with serving spoons and let everyone help themselves. Serve with sauteed vegetables (I did squash, zucchini, colored peppers, and fresh tomatos sprinkled with garlic and oregano).

Enjoy,
Seth

The YMCA pig roast was on Saturday, and though I couldn't go, I told them I would make some pies...five pies to be exact.....What could be easier than making a few pies for a dinner? Well, the darn task took me all day. As Greg said, "if you charge your hourly rate, you just gave $1000 to the Y!" .....grumble grumble...I guess that I should have cheated and bought the pie crusts. What you see in the photos is three of the five, I made two apple with oatmeal brown sugar crusts, two peach caramel lattice pies and one open-faced wild blueberry. I want to make the peach caramel again so that I can try it and may do it for tomorrow night's dinner. After tossing the peeled and sliced peaches with sugar, cinnamon and cardamom, you let the mixture sit and sweat juices for 30 minutes while you make caramel sauce. To the caramel, you add cornstarch dissolved in water, whipping cream, and then the juices from the peaches. Pour back over the peaches and then put into the partially baked shell. Lattice the top and bake for 45 minutes or so, tenting the top with foil so that it doesn't burn.

Hope the folks at the Y liked em!

Enjoy,
Seth

I made a disasterous dessert for a friend's birthday party. Another friend called and said that she was making a Mexican fiesta night dinner and I said "Let me make a Mexican cheesecake" It was my first time cooking with gelatin, and it will be the last too. The cake tasted fine, it was just the texture that got me. The gelatin didn't distribute evenly and so there were what felt like big balls of gelatin in every bite. I thought, well it could just be me, but when someone said "this is delicious! Whats in it besides gelatin?," I knew I was in trouble.

Oh well, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right?

Enjoy,
Seth

I scored a beautiful piece of meat yesterday. While shopping through Hannaford in Belfast, a huge steak, something that I don't normally purchase, stared me down in the meat aisle. I don't buy steak because I'm not really sure about cuts, etc. plus the expense is too much for me to think about. However, a gorgeous angus sirloin that musta weighed 3 lbs had a $4.00 off coupon on it, bringing the price down to $10.00. I couldn't pass it up after figuring that it would last us at least 2 meals for the both of us and maybe more. I ground fresh pepper over the whole thing and broiled it for about 12 minutes and it was perfect: a beautiful cut of meat. While coming home from the gym, Greg expressed dismay over steak sandwiches for lunch because we had to work to make the sammies and couldn't just have them made and ready immediately upon getting home.
I told him that I would make a suprise lunch for him if he would just disappear upstairs to his studio for a while.

So, here is what I did. I had the bright idea to make the Maine cheese steak sandwich which entailed slicing the sirloin, grinding it up in my tiny cuisinart that I got from my credit card company for trading in points (yes, sometimes those point things actually work!). I took the ground steak and sauteed it with garlic, olive oil, and oregano, added a bit of chicken stock to keep it moist and then added about a cup of shredded, white, cabot, curiously sharp, cheddar cheese. Placed a lump on mayoed toast and added slices of our organic tomatos grown with love and llama poop. Delicious, and there is still a hunk of steak left over.

Enjoy,
Seth

I just signed up to make five pies for the YMCA auction on the 16th of Sept. Any suggestions for pie types? I've already got requests for apple and blueberry....other thoughts and recipes?

Thanks.

Enjoy,
Seth

Greg and I were speeding along to the Union Fair the other day with thoughts of hot, fresh, fried dough in our minds when we happened by two adorable tykes at the end of their driveway with a sign I couldn't read held up above their heads. Greg looked at me and exclaimed that they were selling peaches and we should stop. Unlike my dad who usually says, "We'll stop on the way back" while trying to figure a new route back, I turned around and dropped him off to pick some peaches.
He returned to the car $2.00 bucks poorer with a huge plastic bag holding, count 'em, five anemic-looking, bruised peaches. I shook my head at Greg and asked why he didn't deal the tykes down to $1.50 or something. "But they were so cute" (the kids, not the fruit) said Greg.
We got home and I shoved em in the fridge with hopes that they wouldn't rot too fast.

I had a work-related meeting here the other day and my colleague brought a pint of fresh picked blackberries with her (can you see where this post is going?) and I shoved those in the fridge 'cause the fruit flies were salivating.

So yesterday, we were invited to dinner and I said I would bring dessert. I decided to make a crumble with all the fresh fruit that I stashed in the fridge in the past week. One recipe I found was a fruit tart in a oatmeal cookie crust, and I thought it would make a must better topping than a crust.

Ok, so into a large bowl I sliced the peaches and pitted them and tossed them with a pink of blackberries and two sliced plums. Throw into this 1 tablespoon of cornstarch, 2 tablespoons of lemon juice and 1/3-1/2 a cup of granulated sugar to taste.
In another bowl I put 2/3rds cup flour, 3/4 cup brown sugar, 1 cup quick cooking oats, a dash of cinnamon, a dash of allspice, some ginger, and some nutmeg. Add to this a stick of melted butter and then mix until the topping resembles coarse meal.

Place the fruit in a baking dish and spread the topping evenly on top. Bake in a preheated 350 oven for 1 hour or until golden.


Serve with vanilla ice cream

Enjoy,
Seth

OK, I have to toot my own horn here. (so, what else is new?) I chefed for a private function tonight and was asked to sit at the dinner table. The minute I sat down, the woman next to me, who owns a restaurant in Belfast, said that she and her husband had ordered my clam chowder several years ago when I was cooking in Belfast. She said it was truly the best chowder she had ever tasted, "simply the best" were the words she used. She said they came down to the restaurant several times just for the chowder. To have a foodie restaurant owner to tell me that was really cool!

For dinner, I grilled two pork tenderloins that I had marinated in a confit of apples, garlic, rosemary and sage. I cooked the confit in a pot on the stove by boiling four chopped apples (skins on) in about a cup of water with a bit of sugar, about 1/4 cup chopped garlic, 4 tablespoons rosemary, some chopped sage left over from the aioli I made for the crab cakes, and salt and pepper to taste. After trimming the tenderloins, I poured the "applesauce" over top, covered and chilled for several hours. When I put the tenderloins onto grill, I placed the baking dish with the apple confit in the oven to bake.

I found that the secret to keeping the crab cakes from falling apart is to make them several hours ahead of time and then chilling them in the fridge. They work great this way.

Enjoy,
Seth

I made enough food last night to feed a few extra people, so lunch today was crab cakes for Greg and tortolini with the asiago cheese sauce for me! Of course cheesecake was for dessert....and I was going to go to the gym today...perhaps a nap instead.

I am chefing tonight for a private party, just the first and second courses. So the crab cakes last night were an experiment for tonight, since I have never made them before. I was told to leave out the fresh tarragon, which I did, since it apparently overpowered the crab. Greg seems to think that they are really good, so I am encouraged for tonight.

Also making pork tenderloins with garlic and apples. Decided to make a garlic rosemary applesauce for marinade. We'll see how it does and I'll report back tomorrow.

This for Flatlander...Old Bay is mostly sodium, celery seed, and pepper flakes, our Maine crab is pretty salty, so adding more salt is right out for me. Use fresh instead. Panko is a must as it makes the cakes very light and crispy.

Enjoy,
Seth

Greg's birthday is today and since we are busy with something else going on tonight, he decided that he wanted a few people over for dinner last night. Initially, this suprised me because usually, Greg doesn't just have a birthDAY, but rather a birthWEEK. Every day in the week he reminds me that its his birthWEEK and thus things need to be extra special. Much to my delight, this birthday seemed to quell that impulse to be a birthWEEK brat. He didn't even give me the list of too expensive presents that he just had to have and instead told me that he just wants an updated Gazettier for his car and then he informed me that he was throwing some chicken on the grill and had invited two friends for dinner.

I inquired whether he would find offense if I just jumped in and took over dinner from him, it was after all, his birthday. So my menu grew from chicken on the grill to:

crabcakes with sage aioli on a bed of baby arugula
chicken poached in lemon and white wine
tri-colored tortolini with an asiago cheese sauce
sauteed baby asparagus with roasted red peppers

His birthday cake was a New York cheesecake (extra crispy on the top) with fresh strawberries marinated in dark rum.

I made my crabcakes with fresh crab, scallions, celery, cayanne, powdered mustard, light mayo, egg as a binder and panko (Japanese breadcrumbs) sauteed in butter. I was told they were very good, though I cannot back that up since I can't taste them without having an allergic reaction.

Enjoy,
Seth

My parents are inveterate drivers when they are on vacation. They used to be golfers, but now they prefer to drive long distances in their car, have lunch somewhere, and then return back from whence they came. They are here for the week with a couple whom I find incredibly annoying, so it was with much fear on my part that I packed myself into the annoying couple's car for a jaunt down south to find a spot for lunch. The car was packed with me, my parents, the annoying couple, and Charlie, the evil clown dog. Charlie is a miniature poodle with a severe underbite, making him, perhaps, the ugliest dog in the world. Poor Charlie looks like an evil clown. We tried to take the ferry to Vinalhaven, but the couple didn't want to leave their car unattended in a strange parking lot for the day (you see what I mean about annoying???) so we decided to drive to Port Clyde via Tenant's Harbor, a name that didn't please the annoying man, he said he'd only ever live there if the name was changed to Landlord's Harbor..hardy har har har.....in the immortal words of Bugs Bunny "What a maroon!"
During our journey, the annoying man spotted a sign for "Dip Net Restaurant...10 miles" He pronounced that our journey's end was going to be at the Dip Net. He then invented a song about it, which I won't go into. Between sips of beer, while driving, he sang and yodelled....uggghh.
The closer we got to the Dip Net, the more animated the annoying man became, annoying me even more. The annoying woman kept wanting to stop the car at every house with lobster traps so she could buy some "bobbers" as she called the lobster buoys. (she with the incredibly thick, upper-Midwest, flat, farm-girl accent--think Fargo). We finally found some for sale on the side of the road for $3.00 and she loaded up, thinking how unique they were.
So, down to Port Clyde we went and found the Dip Net, the ultimate stopping point for the annoying man. The restaurant is actually an outside deck above the water, overlooking the piers, behind the general store. The place has mostly picnic tables to share and some round tables made out of old wooden cable spools. The restaurant building was a shack off to the side. Kind of charming, very Maine, very touristy. We found a nice spool table to ourselves in the sun and the shade and sat down. The annoying man started to complain almost at once. All the tables were full, about 45 to 50 people with 2 servers. The AM wanted alcohol fast so he ordered it from both servers to see which one got it out first.
The food took a while and was not stellar. My dad and I both had the chicken basket which arrived with three pieces of mostly breaded chicken over a basket of underdone fries. the AC both had the lobster roll which was mostly mayo and lettuce and my mom had the fresh swordfish salad which was a piece of swordfish 1.5" x 1.5" over a bed of vegetables with some green sauce over the whole thing. My advice is to stay away from this trap and find another.
I had a headache from all the complaining at this point and I quietly said, here we are on vacation in a beautiful spot on the water, how lucky we are. This could be so relaxing if we just let it be. Then I told the AM to put himself in the server's shoes. full tables, two servers, not their fault if service isn't fast enough....I don't think he heard me because he has turned with his finger raised in the air, calling the server over from across the deck.....
So much for paradise!

Enjoy,
Seth

My parents arrived yesterday for a week. Last night we had a delicous dinner (Thank you David for your amazing part in our dinner.....my mom was SOOOOOO happy!!!!!)

We are having a dog picnic today at their rental house in East Belfast with my sister, her dog, Chowder; our two giant black beasts; and my parents Westie, Charlie.
I have about three cups of leftover couscous from dinner the other night and I made a couscous salad that is lowfat and very tasty. There is now a tri-colored cousous on the market that makes the dish very festive. I added a handful of fresh finely chopped basil, about a 1/4 cup green scallions, a cup of diced dried apricots ($1.99 for the imported Turkish kind at Ocean State Joblots in Belfast), and some cinnamon and allspice, a smattering of olive oil and salt and pepper to taste. Its fabulous! You can add something like pistachios for protein. I found this recipe at epicurious and just adapted it to what I had on hand.
I am serving with my curried chicken salad and good fresh bread.

Enjoy,
Seth