Tacos

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Today I decided to try making my own taco seasoning mix. Buying a package from the store resulted in rather bland tasting tacos last time I gave it a try. A Google search turned up a woman's web site with plenty of low carb recipes. As a bonus, she awards each recipe she tries with a rating and her comments. The taco seasoning was rated high by her, and it definitely turned out better than the pre-packaged variety I used. There are plenty of other recipes listed on her site. I have a feeling they will be showing up in my kitchen shortly.

Tarragon cream chicken

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Tonight's menu features tarragon cream chicken with a side dish of steamed cauliflower and broccoli. I had a bit more time this evening to stop at the grocery store. However I still was not looking forward to an elaborate meal. This is one of those dishes which is not very complicated to prepare but still tastes pretty good.

Dirty eggs

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Another late night at the office. Luckily I had the same ingredients at home that I used to cook a spinach omelet a couple weeks ago. No need to stop at the grocery store! This time I was not feeling quite up to the effort of producing a nice omelet. Rather I went with mixing the filling items in with the eggs. Omelets certainly look nicer, but it still tastes great with only a slight change in texture.

Big ol hunk a meat

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Tonight I wanted some beef. Nothing quite like a good steak. Threw in an obligatory side of creamed spinach to complete. Just to top it off, I also whipped up some mock mashed potatoes. Nice!

Omelet

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

I remained at work longer than expected today. One of my co-workers wanted to submit some significant changes to our data entry process, and I offered to review them since I really wanted to use them. I was in the mood to head straight home once that task was complete. In addition, I was anxious to use up the last link of turkey sausage before it went bad. This all led to me cooking an omelet for dinner again. It was the usual mix of the sausage, red bell pepper, green bell pepper, red onion, and mushrooms.

More chicken mole

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Tonight I heated up the chicken mole left over from yesterday. I also added a bit of ground cayenne pepper for some heat. This did help a little, but not enough for me to try this recipe again in the future. Hopefully I will get a chance to experiment with different versions soon.

Chicken mole

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

My friend Ben suggested we eat lunch at Taco Deli, a local restaurant serving soft tacos. He mentioned really liking their mole tacos, so we all purchased one of those. They were indeed quite delicious! Jump to this afternoon when I was paging through my cookbooks looking for dinner ideas. A recipe for chicken mole from the South Beach Diet Cookbook stood out in my mind. It seemed fairly straightforward, so I decided to give it a try. My house was smelling great by the time the sauce had completed simmering! Sadly the sauce turned out to taste rather bland. I guess that is what I should have expected from the simple recipe, but I had gotten my hopes up. Oh well.

Stuffed salmon

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Tonight I wanted to steer away from chicken after eating it the past few evenings. I was able to leave work at a reasonable time which allowed more cooking time than some nights. I decided to bake feta-spinach stuffed salmon along with the recommended companion little mama's side dish. You may have noticed this is a meal I frequently return to. The only negative is the baking time required. It is not something I can quickly whip up when I am hungry, so it was nice to have the free time to enjoy it today.

Dijon tarragon cream chicken

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Tonight is using up the last chicken breasts I purchased a couple days ago. Since I did not enjoy last night's bourbon cream recipe, I decided to cook dijon tarragon cream chicken as it is a known winner. Nothing else too interesting to add here. I did steam some broccoli and cauliflower for a side. There was some extra sauce which I poured over the top of that.

Bourbon cream chicken

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

Yesterday's shopping trip yielded enough chicken for several meals. A bit of browsing Google results produced a new bourbon based chicken recipe to try this evening. This one uses cream as a sauce component which I was looking forward to. It also called for igniting the bourbon to burn off the alcohol. That was quite fun. Unfortunately I was not as happy with how the sauce tasted. I ended up increasing the cream, onion, and spices to help offset the bitterness. Everything tasted okay in the end, but this is not a recipe I will be trying again. There are plenty of other bourbon and cream based chicken recipes available for future experiments. Hopefully those are more enjoyable.

Bourbon pecan chicken

Soundtrack: Dresden Files: Proven Guilty audio book narrated by James Marsters

It was another fairly long day at work today, but I was in the mood for a richer meal this evening. I decided to cook pecan encrusted chicken breasts with a bourbon sauce. This is a recipe I found a couple years ago when I craved a pecan based meal for some reason or another. Turns out I enjoyed the bourbon sauce more than the pecans. Funny how things work out sometimes. Back to tonight's dinner now! In addition to the chicken, I steamed some cauliflower and broccoli as a side. There was a bit of extra sauce, so I poured it on top of the vegetables.

Blackened salmon

Soundtrack: None Shall Pass by Aesop Rock

Freedom from chili con carne! I enjoy that dish, but I am also happy to introduce some variety into my dinner again. To that end I chose to stray away from a standard meat entree. A long day at work did not leave me in a mood to prepare an elaborate meal this evening. Instead I purchased some salmon and spinach on the way home for blackened salmon. This let me cook everything in one pan for a simple yet tasty result. While the fish and spinach finished cooking through, I decided to whip together some mock mashed potatoes too. These only take a few minutes to prepare, so it timed out perfectly.

Chili con carne

Soundtrack: None Shall Pass by Aesop Rock

Don't worry. I am getting as tired of photographing chili con carne as you probably are looking at the results. Thankfully I finished off the last bit of leftovers tonight. Here you can see some monterrey jack cheese melted on top of a bowl of chili con carne. I heated them both up together in the microwave before assembling another soft taco type meal as seen in last night's post. The original recipe results in far too much food for a single meal as I am sure you have noticed. I usually only make a full batch if don't mind eating leftovers for several days, though I sometimes eat it for lunch while cooking new dinners.

Omelet and chili con carne

Soundtrack: Definitive Jux free sampler

Here is an extremely rare image of food in actual sunlight. Generally my dinner is ready long after the sun has set, so I took advantage of the light streaming through my kitchen window after preparing an omelet for breakfast. This one wash packed with turkey sausage, diced red and green bell peppers, diced red onion, and some white mushrooms. Some shredded cheddar and mozzarella cheese was also melted on top. My original thought was including this picture would help to break up the monotony of chili con carne shots. I realized afterword there are quite a few photos of omelets during the previous week, so it might not be as effective as hoped.

Dinner was more of the leftover chili con carne. This time I took a photograph of the final soft taco sort of construction. There is some monterrey pepper jack cheese melted on top to add a little kick. Also added was shredded lettuce, diced red onion, and a bit of sour cream. (I used the last of my avocado last night.) It was quite nice to have some food which could be heated up quickly tonight. I spent most of the afternoon shopping for yarn with a friend who asked me to knit a hat, and this evening was spent at an Aesop Rock concert. That did not leave much time for actual cooking.