Can you see those luscious pink-edged, big shrimp curled in the middle of this dish? I should have done a bit more primping and fussing with the food, moving rice kernels over, positioning the cashews and the cilantro, moving the long strand of caramelized onion to be more visible for the photos. But I didn’t. It was hot and ready to be whisked to the table before the food got cold.

The credit for this recipe goes to my friend, Kunda S., a native of India. Among other accomplishments, she’s also a PhD microbiologist that I met in one of my art classes some years ago. We’ve become friends, sharing lunches occasionally. Kunda and her husband Sunat (he’s a PhD physicist) came over for dinner recently, to share some travel information with friends of ours who are venturing to India and Bhutan in January and welcomed any helpful hints about travel in northern India. We had a wonderful evening with them.

It was earlier this year I was at Kunda’s house and she gave me a little container of this rice dish she’d made. Knowing how much I enjoy cooking (and that we enjoy Indian food) she thought I should taste this dish. Oh yes! She also gave me a little bit of her garam masala, from her mother’s prized recipe. Kunda’s sister (who lives in India) makes it from their local spices, and each time Kunda visits home, she brings a new stash of garam masala.

So how was it? It was scrumptious. Kunda gave me the recipe, but she was hesitant for me to post it without trying it myself. So I finally got around to it the other night. I made enough to feed an army, so we had a couple of nights of leftovers too. Every bit as good as the first time around.

As Kunda explained to me, in the Indian culture, they take their rice very seriously. If you’ve ever been to a market with plenty of Indian products, you’ll notice lots of different rice types and brands. Most of them basmati, but from different areas. Some more expensive than others. And this dish, combined with an onion-coconut paste that you make, a marinade for the shrimp, soaked basmati rice and coconut milk. Oh my. Absolutely wonderful. My DH said “this is stupendous.” His words. It contains garam masala and turmeric, similar ingredients to the Bal’s No-Butter Chicken I made a couple of weeks ago. But this dish is altogether different.

This recipe does have several steps to its preparation. I managed to make it all in one pot, by removing the different sections as I made them, like the onion-coconut mixture. Same with the shrimp and onions later, also removed to another bowl to set aside. Finally I made the rice and at the end you combine everything so the flavors of the individual parts are still there without becoming a homogenous blend. The rice is rinsed 3 times, then left to soak in warm water for awhile (I did that while I made the other two parts of the recipe). So when you finally begin cooking the rice, it doesn’t take all that long – less time than usual if you were to start out with dry, unrinsed rice.

The dish also requires raw cashews. I’m sure I could find them, but didn’t have them on hand, so I used roasted cashews, and rinsed off the salt. I also didn’t have a fresh coconut, but I did have unsweetened grated dry coconut in the freezer, so used that instead. The coconut is browned, so it should have been very similar. Don’t, however, use sweetened flaked coconut in this – it would make it way too sweet. If you’re absolutely desperate, though, wash the sweetened coconut type. This is not a sweet dish, except for the natural sweetness from the coconut milk.

Similar to an Indian curry, you can serve this with condiments. I didn’t have the ingredients to make them (a coconut raita, chopped peanuts, minced cucumbers and more jalapeno), for one, didn’t want to make a trip to the market, so we made do without. But, I was perfectly content with the dish as is with just cashews and fresh cilantro on top. So, thanks Kunda, for this great recipe. I’ll be making it again. Maybe even for guests. It’s not all that hot, just mildly so. Kunda makes hers much hotter than the recipe below – she adds more cayenne. And if you want to make your own garam masala, click here for the recipe I posted recently.
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A year ago: Unstuffed Sweet & Sour Cabbage (stay tuned, I made this again, and will be posting it)
Two years ago: Ina Garten’s Lemon Cake

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This sort of looks like a sirloin steak, doesn’t it? Nope. It’s a huge, thick, tender, fresh halibut steak that was just falling apart. Good kind of falling apart. Full of flavor. I forgot to put some more green onions on top for garnish. They’re in the sauce, but hardly visible in the photo.

This recipe came via our daughter-in-law Karen’s mother, Barbara. She got it from a cookbook:  Elena’s Favorite Foods: California Style by Elena Zelayeta. Barbara served this one night when we were all together for a dinner. So, I asked her for the recipe! And when I tell you this is EASY, please believe me. It’s truly easy and comes together in less than 10 minutes. I served it with pan-sautéed zucchini and a veggie-laden green salad.

So what’s in the amber sauce? Nothing but soy sauce, sherry, lemon juice (I used lime) and green onions. How cinchy is that? The halibut is dipped in seasoned flour (seasoned only with pepper since the soy sauce provides plenty of sodium) and pan fried in a little oil. After browning both sides the sauce is added and you steam it until it’s just done. I removed the center bone afterwards, which is why it began to fall apart. Our steak was large enough for two people, so I probably should have cut it in half before cooking. Once cooked the bone didn’t cut apart with any ease. So, whack that steak in half first. Our neighborhood Costco had these fresh Alaskan halibut steaks for $6.99/lb.
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A year ago: Thai Pumpkin Shrimp Soup (oh, that was so delish – I need to make that one again)

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You can count on one hand the number of recipes on this blog using canned tuna. And I don’t know about you, but mostly I use canned tuna for sandwiches, or salad, but not much else. The other day I ran across a recipe from w-a-a-ay long ago. Back to the 1950’s when my best friend Linda C. and I used to spend hours and hours every day together. We were young teens then, too young for boyfriends. So we played Parcheesi, and Monopoly, and watched Linda’s older sister get ready for dates. Linda’s mother would fix lunch for us sometimes, and occasionally I’d spend the night at her house too, and usually I was invited for dinner, or Sunday breakfast. Or both.

The Sunday breakfast was almost always waffles and homemade sausage gravy that was served on top of the waffles. Linda’s dad was the Sunday breakfast cook, and he was really proud of his waffle spread. Brings back lots of nostalgic memories thinking about that. Linda’s mother, Van, was a good cook. I have one other recipe of hers – a Lamb Curry, with about 21 condiments. It’s been years since I made that. Linda’s parents used to entertain with some regularity and the 21 curry was a favorite. Sometimes Linda and I would help in the kitchen mincing and chopping.

But one of their family favorites was this tuna dish. And I used to fix it every so often, although I’d lost track of the recipe until I found it in MY mother’s recipe box a few weeks ago. As you can imagine, it’s an inexpensive meal, what with just a can of tuna and some English muffins. The other things usually were readily available too. This does contain the ubiquitous cream of mushroom soup, which I keep in my pantry – you just never know when you’re going to need it. Like I did the other night when we returned home from a weekend away. We weren’t overly hungry, so as I stood in the pantry I spotted the tuna. Aha moment.

This recipe is WAY EASY. Probably takes about 10 minutes to make if you’re slow. Toast the English muffins (I used some seeded baguette thick slices that I toasted in the oven) and the tuna comes together in about 7-8 minutes, I’d say. Van’s original recipe didn’t call for peas, but somewhere along the line I added them, and have continued to use them. Her recipe also called for a huge amount of sliced black olives. They aren’t my favorite thing, so I reduce the quantity a lot and add Kalamata instead, but you can use whatever you want to. The fresh lemon juice is key – it gives the sauce a nice tang, although it really isn’t noticeable. So this recipe is a salute to my friend Linda, and her Mom, Van.
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A year ago: Soup Season

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Surely over the years I’d read about shrimp and grits, but for whatever reason, it never appealed to me much. Or let’s say it didn’t appeal enough to make it; nor had I ever ordered it on the rare occasions when it might have been on a menu. But looking at what I had in the refrigerator to serve alongside some shrimp for dinner the other night, I decided I’d adapt an internet recipe from Bobby Flay. Not only was it easy, but it was downright delicious. Fabulous, actually. We both sat in contented silence relishing each bite. Until the two bowls were slicked clean.

So what exactly was it that made it so good? Well, there’s no question the butter, milk and grated sharp Cheddar cheese helped the grits (aka polenta) along the path to outstanding flavor. That served as the bed for the quickly-made shrimp with bacon, lemon juice, garlic, Italian parsley and green onions. There’s really not much else to it. I made creamy grits/polenta (using half milk, half water), and I added more lemon juice and parsley than Flay’s recipe. Actually I used fat-free half and half for the milk, but 2% milk is just fine.

I also made some sautéed Swiss chard too, thanks to Karen, our daughter-in-law who shared bounty from her garden and her sister’s veggie patch. To serve, I scooped the grits into the bottom of a wide deep bowl (a pasta bowl), then placed the shrimp on one side and the Swiss chard on the other. You can’t quite see the chard in the background of the picture, but that dark unfocused blob is it.

It helps to get all the ingredients ready before you begin – or at least while the polenta is simmering, gather up everything else since once you start cooking the shrimp it’s quick. I needed to add some water to keep the polenta creamy during the last 8 or so minutes of the 20 minutes of cooking time. The Swiss chard takes but a few minutes – we like it with some texture still remaining, so cooking it for only 4-5 minutes is max. I’ve included that recipe below – it’s ever so simple.
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A year ago: Baked Eggs with chorizo & cannellini beans
Two years ago: Chicken with Lemon and Garlic Crust

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The salmon didn’t take all that long to make. And it was really scrumptious. It has a sweet side, but often salmon can handle some sweet. Remember when salmon on a plank was so popular? Often

served with a fruit based sauce like blueberries or lingonberries. This is similar. The recipe was from a Tyler Florence program on the Food Network (from 2005, recipe no longer available online).

He explained that slow roasting salmon retains more of its moisture – and all the good oils. It makes the salmon more succulent. This was baked at 225 F for about 20-23 minutes. And that’s not a typo, it really is baked at TWO TWENTY FIVE.  The rule of thumb at that temperature is 20-25 minutes per inch of thickness rather than the normal 10 minutes per inch. These wild Coho salmon fillets were just under an inch thick, so the timing was just perfect.

Here you see the salmon fillets just out of the oven. I determine whether salmon is cooked through by the amount of the white stuff – whatever it is – that bubbles up through the fish. This was JUST cooked through. The dark spots are the chipotle chile pieces. Note that I used some of the chiles too, not just the sauce (because when I froze the contents of the canned chipotle in adobo sauce into individual pepper pieces, most of the sauce was dissipated. I didn’t keep the sauce – now I’ll need to save it with future cans since I’ll be making this again). But we didn’t dislike the little pieces of chipotle – maybe didn’t look so attractive, is all.

Above is the sauce – it’s VERY simple to make – white wine, fresh grated ginger, sugar and lime juice, reduced about a third, then butter and cornstarch added in, with green onion tops added just before serving. The sauce took about 10 minutes to make, max. The recipe indicated to broil the fish just at the end with some of the reserved chipotle sauce just until it browns. I forgot that step – I probably would have liked that, as the fish was truly soft cooked. So if you want an easy and very good salmon preparation (and appropriate for guests), try this one.
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A year ago: Chorizo & Eggs (breakfast or brunch)
Two years ago: Pizza with Chicken, Red Onion, Olives & Pesto

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Back in 2001, Joanne Weir published a cookbook, Joanne Weir’s More Cooking in the Wine Country. I bought the book back then, attended a cooking class where Joanne was a guest chef, and at the end of the evening she happily autographed copies of the cookbook to one and all. This recipe, I believe, came from that cooking class. And I’d written notes about it back then, saying it was a stunner. It’s abundant with flavors. It has a myriad of textures too. Refreshing with the arugula and herb salad on top. If you’re a Joanne Weir fan, she just got married about 2 weeks ago and actually blogged about it and their Greek honeymoon, in case you’re interested.

Back to the recipe at hand . . . at the headpiece of the recipe, Joanne wrote about some of the Moroccan ingredients:

• “In the  Moroccan marketplace, it is not unusual to find spices piled high by their vendors, who appreciate the role these intense colors and flavors have in the cooking of their country. In this dish, lentils cooked with an assortment of Moroccan spices set off a salmon fillet that’s crisped by rapid cooking in olive oil.”

I started the dish the day before by cooking the lentils. You use the tiny, French ones, the de puy type, if you can find them. If not, use what you have available. They’re simply cooked, but with a modicum of whole cloves. They provide a very interesting fleeting flavor in the dish. When it’s all finished, you can’t really discern the cloves, maybe just a distant hint. Then you make a soupy kind of mixture with onions, garlic, cumin, ground ginger, turmeric, paprika, cayenne, canned diced tomatoes, fish stock (or bottled clam juice), parsley, cilantro and lemon juice.  All that gives the lentil mixture a scrumptious taste. You can eat them by themselves. Or add more broth and eat it as soup. I used some half-sharp paprika I bought in Budapest on our last trip, and I had diced tomatoes with green chiles, so perhaps the lentils were hotter than the original recipe intended. But I really like it. If you’re sensitive to heat, just don’t use any hot sauce at all.

Joanne had used gorgeous, thick salmon when we sampled it at the cooking class. I had small, thin wild salmon, so it’s maybe not as spectacular looking as she might have made it. I don’t buy farm-raised salmon anymore except on very rare occasions. If you have thicker salmon, by all means pile the top with more herb salad than I did. The salmon is very simply pan sautéed in olive oil and seasoned with salt and pepper. The hot lentil mixture goes onto a hot plate first, then the sizzling-hot salmon fillet, and an herb salad – arugula, parsley, basil and mint (more like a generous pile strategically placed right in the center) goes on top. Serve immediately! Joanne recommends serving it with Sauvignon Blanc, although my cooking class notes say Pinot Noir. We had the latter since we’re red wine drinkers.

This dish has lots of character – meaning that there are plenty of layers of flavor. The spicy lentils are one thing – and as long as you don’t overcook them, they have lots of tender chewiness to them. Then there’s the salmon. And the herby salad on top with a lemon-centric dressing, adds another layer of flavor and texture too. So if you have big salmon fillets, do make more salad and its accompanying dressing.
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A year ago: Bouillabaise
Two years ago: Fennel Fritters (oh these were tasty morsels, mellow, delicious)

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I’m hoping that you’ve been recording Melissa d’Arabian on her new Food Network show, $10 Dinners. Melissa has just really gotten into the whole TV stuff, with her easy conversation and helpful hints. She makes one dinner for four people for under $10. She relies on us being able to buy most meat on sale. Or produce in season when it’s at its cheapest (like asparagus). But reasonably-priced dinners, nevertheless.

This last weekend she did a dinner of salmon cakes, a creamy orzo risotto, and the asparagus with a lemon vinaigrette. Now, it’s been years since I’ve cooked with canned salmon, but I just happened to have some in my pantry that I’d purchased recently at Costco. They have a stack of 6-ounce cans (6 of them,  I think it was). This recipe requires you to use two of them. These cans are wild salmon to boot, which makes me a happy camper, with my Omega-3’s.

The SECRET to this recipe is the bacon. Oh yes, bacon, bacon, bacon, as the commercial goes. What a difference a bit of bacon goes. I’d never have thought to use it with canned salmon. So that’s why Melissa’s on TV and I’m not!

These salmon cakes aren’t exactly quick – considering that you start with already-cooked salmon. But, it probably doesn’t take more than about 15-20 minutes to get the salmon cakes ready to cook. I made the orzo (also from the show) at the same time, and learned that I needed to have everything all ready to go because once you’re cooking, I felt like a one-armed paper hangar. Also trying to slice a big red tomato and make a caprese salad at the same time.

First you need to cook the onion and bake the potato. I cooked a potato in the microwave oven for about 3 minutes, drained it, then mashed it. Then you start adding the other things. The cooked bacon, the cooked and cooled onion, the egg, mayo, lemon zest, Dijon, and a dusting of sugar (I used Splenda). Then you add the crumbled salmon. It’s a very wet mixture at that point. Meanwhile, you mix up some bread crumbs (I used panko) and grated fresh Parmesan. I probably used more than 2 tablespoons. Very carefully you make small mounds of the salmon mixture into patties and coat them with the panko mixture. They’re quite fragile, so you must be gentle with them. Actually I used less potato than the recipe called for, so that’s likely part of the reason.

I think you can use less vegetable oil to fry these little puppies (the recipe indicated 1/2 cup, or at least 1/4 cup), adding more when you do the 2nd batch. Supposedly the concoction makes 12 small patties. I thought mine were small, and I got 8 out of them. But no matter, two patties was plenty for us as a serving.

The result? Just delicious. I liked them, and so did my DH. I topped them with a cucumber raita (yogurt and chopped cucumber) and we gobbled them right up. And now we have enough for a second dinner. Yes, I’ll be making these again. Maybe not for guests, but certainly for a weeknight dinner!
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A year ago: South Seas Salsa (a Caribbean-type salsa)
Two years ago: BLT Salad (one of our favorites – like the sandwich, but in a salad instead)

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I don’t get very many comments left on my blog. To those of you who do leave them occasionally, a thank you is in order. But when I read other people’s blogs, and write a comment there, some people have 30-80 comments on each one. Some of the comments don’t say a whole lot (like “looks good,” or “great photo,” or perhaps the most common . . . “can’t wait to make this.” But I get the feeling that those people aren’t really going to make the recipe, whatever it is. They’re just saying something nice.

Some people, I assume, are scared to leave comments – they’re not very savvy about blogging, and want to protect their anonymity. Comments left here on my blog go nowhere but here on my blog. No one tracks them, sells email addresses or anything like that. It’s just little-old-me. And you can leave a comment without your name appearing, although your email address is required to submit a comment. But it doesn’t get published with the comment. Lots of people have screen names they use like “cookiebaker,” “grillerman,” “sadiesmom,” etc. That’s fine. Some bloggers and commenters use their real names, others don’t.  I guess it’s up to you. I do approve/screen all the comments, so I won’t get any crackpot messages. Spam is something you don’t see on my blog – I get somewhere between 60-100 a day left on various posts on my blog. Fortunately some free software called akismet runs in the blog background and captures those, which I delete every few days. I don’t even look at them anymore, just do a global delete.

So all that rhetoric is a preface to say that last week I was absolutely thrilled to receive a comment from Joanne Weir. She’d read my write-up about one of her recipes (stewed eggplant & tomatoes) from one of her cookbooks. Although I’ve attended numerous cooking classes with her, she doesn’t know me at all. Her classes were always very full, and I was just another face in the crowds. I’d drive miles and miles to go to a Joanne Weir cooking class, if she’d ever have any here in Southern California. She lives in San Francisco, and you can see her PBS TV series (filmed in her own kitchen) if you hunt for it in the listings. She has her own website – and does offer culinary tours in Italy and France, but they’re very pricey. Two or three of my friends and I keep up with anything-Joanne-Weir. We tell one another if we’ve made another Joanne recipe from one of her books (I don’t own her newest book Tequila).

So, I was very presumptuous and sent her a private email. Thanked her for leaving a comment, told her I was a huge fan of hers, owned most of her cookbooks, and that my all-time favorite recipe of hers (and expected her to laugh) is Sicilian Tuna Salad. I also asked about her fiancé (she’s recently engaged). I follow her own blog too. She was kind enough to respond back, and said “Sicilian Tuna Salad?” What cookbook of mine is that from, she asked? Well, it’s not in any of her cookbooks that I can find. But it was at one of her classes. Or perhaps it was one of the Sur la Table’s group recipe classes – where the staff combed through and demonstrated their favorites from all the cooking classes that year from various chefs. But the recipe was credited to Joanne. Unless the folks at Sur la Table made a mistake. Well, it’s still a favorite anyway.

I do have some other favorite Joanne Weir recipes – some of them I haven’t posted here on my blog – note to self – make the warm chocolate cinnamon and coffee tart sometime soon. Also the white peach belllinis. Check out the fiery Feta & pita bread appetizer. Maybe the escarole salad too. Nevertheless, it’s still the tuna pasta salad that trumps them all. It’s just so simple, really. I decided to fix the salad, because I haven’t made it in a long time. I posted about it in 2007, but I’m going to repeat it here since I know I have new readers who likely haven’t read through my ancient posts.

If you like tuna and pasta, but don’t like the usual mayonnaise-based gunk that goes on it, you’ll enjoy this salad. It’s full of herbs (basil, cilantro and Italian parsley) and a bit of capers too. And lemon juice. All those kinds of things that make it Sicilian. It’s a relatively dry pasta salad, so if you prefer a wetter one,  add some more olive oil just before serving it. I make it with pennette (little penne) as my first choice of pasta.
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A year ago: Apple Buttermilk Scone Round

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I don’t know about you, but I don’t buy very much shrimp anymore. According to the shrimp police, or the fish police, or the FDA?, eating almost any kind of shrimp is questionable because of the raising conditions, what they’re fed and what kind of unhealthy minerals we then ingest. I read recently that U.S. grown shrimp are safe, though. But, it’s hard to find U.S. raised shrimp these days. I’ve been looking, but haven’t found any in several months of inspecting labels in minute fine print at my local stores. Of course, I don’t (won’t) buy shrimp from the regular grocery stores anyway. Those shrimp don’t even look appealing, sorry to say. Usually I trust Trader Joe’s, but these shrimp pictured above came from Thailand, I think. Probably not a good source, either. So right now my freezer is empty of shrimp, and may be so for awhile. Makes me sad, because I really like shrimp. Sigh.

Well anyway, I decided to whip up something with this last bag. I went to my to-try recipes and found something called Southern BBQ shrimp. Well, these aren’t like any kind of “barbecue” I know. They don’t even make a fly-by over an outdoor grill. They’re broiled. (And no, you wouldn’t want to grill them because they’d burn with the amount of brown sugar in the marinade.) So how come the name? Well, it’s a southern (American) tradition – making a “barbecue” kind of sauce with Worcestershire sauce, butter and brown sugar. This recipe also had lemon juice, and some seasoning too. Whatever it’s called, it was easy to make. And QUICK. The recipe came from Bon Appetit, in July, 2006. With a nice multi-vegetable green salad, this was dinner. The article recommended some baguette slices on the side too. I used shrimp with only the tail shells attached, but the recipe calls for raw, full-shell types. Some of these versions of Southern BBQ shrimp came from shrimp boat chefs, when they were out at sea. Maybe somebody who reads my blog and is from the South will weigh-in on the origin of this kind of barbecue . . .
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A year ago: Greek Pita Sandwich
Two years ago: Roasted Poblano Asiago Soup (oh, a real favorite)

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Did you know it’s halibut season? At our local Costco, they have fresh Alaskan halibut that is unbelievably fresh and tasty. Most of what they have is in large portions – I should have invited some guests to come over as we have leftovers to serve probably another 4 people. The fish I bought was $20. What a bargain.

Now, if I can just get you to make this recipe. I think it’s going to have to go into my favorites list, it’s that good. Will you trust me about this? And, the recipe came from Cooking Light, too! Imagine that. Healthy and tasty too. According to the write-up from September of ’07, this recipe was created by Lia Huber and first printed in the magazine in March of ’04. The recipe received the test kitchen’s highest rating, and continues to be a staff favorite. I can see why. This may be my new, forever go-to recipe for halibut.

This  is VERY easy to make. Truly it is. Trust me on this too. The aioli is just mayonnaise, minced fresh cilantro, a bit of fresh minced chile (serrano) and a minced garlic clove. The breading is merely flour and cornflake crumbs (with salt and pepper added in). You dunk the halibut into a mixture of milk and egg white, then into the breading mixture. You pan fry the halibut about 4 minutes per side, put on a dollop of the sauce and it’s done. How easy is that?

My DH made mmm noises all through dinner. A good sign. I served the fish on a bed of mashed potatoes (a real treat) and alongside I served some fresh asparagus, made according to Marie’s recipe from over at A Year from Oak Cottage. It’s called crumbled asparagus, and it’s become one of my favorite ways to make asparagus. So now, will you please go out and buy some halibut and make this?

A few changes have been made from the Cooking Light recipe: (1) I used less serrano because it was way too hot; (2) a full cup of milk is more than needed for dipping; (3) less cornflake crumbs were needed; (4) I also made this with regular mayo since I didn’t have any fat-free, and I made more sauce than the recipe called for. So those changes have been incorporated into the below recipe. The nutrition count below assumes you eat all the dipping and dunking mixture, which you probably won’t.
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If you really like halibut, and have time to make it, I have one other recipe here on my blog for Halibut Osso Buco.

A year ago: Shrimp, Bacon & Vegetable Chowder

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