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​Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day and some may say it might be one of the most stressful days to dine out. With that in mind, have you considered having a special dinner at home? I did.
 
While food shopping yesterday at my local Wegmans, I came across pre-made Beef Wellingtons. I noticed when I was perusing through their app earlier, there was even a digital coupon for $5 off. The cost for the entree was $15 per portion. A quick text to my husband and he was agreeable to this special dinner.
 
With my entree chosen, I went over to the produce department and selected a pound of Brussels sprouts for roasted sprouts topped with pomegranate molasses. The molasses are available at Wegmans in the international aisle. As I had some fresh rosemary in my refrigerator, I thought roasted rosemary potatoes would be a great accompaniment.
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This past Sunday was my granddaughter's christening. What better way to celebrate this momentous occasion than to make some special cookies for the event. A cookie I haven't made in over twenty years or so are my mother's wands. 
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In doing a bit of research you can compare wands to the Polish chrusciki bow tie cookies. Other Italian names for this cookie are chiacchiere (to chatter), Cenci (rags) or Wandi.
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​The roast left from supper the other evening was thinly sliced awaiting a reincarnation in another meal. As I was watching my granddaughter for a bit today, I thought I would make paninis with the leftovers. 
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​Recently my husband and I were watching Christopher Kimball's new cooking show on Public Television called “Milk Street”. The particular night we were watching they were demonstrating how to make a prune, peppercorn and fresh herb-rubbed roast beef. It seemed like the oddest thing to have a rub that included prunes. The other unusual ingredient in the rub is anchovies along with soy sauce, black peppercorns and fresh rosemary and thyme. The trick to making this roast moist is you have to pierce the meat all over so that the marinade penetrates through the outer surface
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My granddaughter’s christening is coming up soon. I’m baking cookies for the occasion. As I did for my daughter’s wedding several years ago, I’m baking light colored cookies for the christening. I’ve already made anise seed biscotti, my aunt’s recipe for butter cookies and on Sunday I made both Italian sesame seed cookies and knots. 
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I remembered a recipe that I had that was made with boneless, skinless chicken breasts and wild rice. If I have one chicken recipe, I have dozens. I can’t recall who gave me this recipe or where I found it. When I dug it out of  my recipe box, I forgot that it was called Chicken Marsala. 
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The month of January has several family birthdays in it. My late mother-in-law was born January 3rd, my birthday is the 23rd and my son's birthday is the 27th. This past Sunday I had my family for dinner. I decided to prepare baked ziti with mushrooms, peppers and parmesan. The recipe appeared in the January 1998 issue of Gourmet Magazine.
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This past Sunday while shopping at Wegmans, I was trying to decide what to make for supper. Wegmans has a terrific seafood department. Their prices are competitive and they carry some local seafood. I love their crab cakes; you can purchase separately for $11 each or in their meals to go for $12 (an entree and two sides). After going back and forth with so many options, I decided on monkfish fillets.
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In the January 9th issue of the New York Times, Margaux Laskey published an article called, "The "Gold Standard" Meat Sauce." Ms. Laskey was referring to the late Marcella Hazan Bolognese style meat sauce. 

After reading her article, I got inspired to make Ms. Hazan's ragú, but instead of beef, I was going to use ground venison. Someone had given me ground vension, but I couldn't decide what to do with it. It sat in my freezer until I got the idea to use it for this ragú.
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Now that the holiday retail season is over, I have more time to try new recipes. In my cookbook collection I have Michael Chiarello's book, The Tre Vigne Cookbook: Seasons in the California Wine Country." Being winter, I gravitated towards that section of the book to find a decidedly different type of pasta dish to make. The recipe, Broccoli and Cauliflower with Shell Pasta sounded intriguing. Ingredients called for broccoli, cauliflower, chicken stock, shell shaped pasta, fresh rosemary, orange zest, raisins, pancetta or bacon. I used Wegmans uncured bacon, applewood smoked.


​meet donna

A former teacher, shop-a-holic, empty-nester redefining quick, family approved dinners.

​If you have questions or comments, click on the envelope icon above to contact me directly. 

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