SGOTW #63: Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant

Well, better late than never.....but Harry Potter is currently taking up a lot of my computer time.......


So, last week Cookieee, our SGOTW hostess, posted that the number drawn was #141. In my Excel spreadsheet, #141 comes out to be Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant. This is yet another book in the Moosewood collective series, this one focusing on regional and ethnic cuisine. Each chapter starts off with a summary of a particular region - India, Japan, The Caribbean and the British Isles to name a few - with the author often sharing experiences of their own family heritage and/or their experiences traveling to these particular regions. The summaries are followed by a sampling of recipes from each region.

I have to admit that I am practical above all else and I tend to prefer that cookbooks be organized by course - appetizers, main dish, desserts, etc. - so it took me a while to get used to having to thumb through each region to see what recipes were offered. It is interesting to see a sampling from various parts of the world, though, and this is a great cookbook to actually sit down and read. I've skimmed here or there, but I really need to go back and take a good look at it.

Curried Avocado Soup

As I scoured the cookbook for interesting recipes, I kept being drawn in the by the soups and had a very hard time deciding on one to make, so many of them sounded so wonderful. I finally decided on something that sounded unusual and different - a chilled avocado soup, from the Caribbean. This soup has a very short list of ingredients and comes together in just minutes. Although I am a huge fan of curry powder, I held myself back to 1 teaspoon and this ended up being the right decision - 1 teaspoon gives the soup added taste without overpowering the delicate flavor of the avocado.

I have to admit none of us were quite sure what to make of this soup - we liked the taste quite well, but it just didn't seem quite like a soup to us - almost more of a dip - or at the very least, it was soup to be eaten in very small portions. I don't know if thinning it out with a bit more stock would have made a difference or if it just wasn't the soup for us. Or perhaps a bit of garnish such as chopped tomato or toasted, spiced tortillas strips? We did decide that it would make a fantastic dip for shrimp fondue.

Green Bean and Tomato Salad
(Ensalada de Porotos Verdes)

In addition to the soup, we were able slip in another very simple recipe from this book to make use of some beautiful green beans I scored at the Farmer's Market last week. The recipe I chose also made use of my best Farmer's Market find - fresh, ripe, juicy, delicious tomatoes. From the region of Chile - this was again, simple and delicious, making great use of summer's bounty.

I'm getting behind on sharing recipes - stay tuned for blueberry ice cream, blueberry french toast, blueberry cookies and an excellent tandoori chicken recipe..........

SGOTW #62: The Greens Cook Book

It certainly has been a while since I had time participate in SGOTW. I was making out my weekly menu for a trip to Wegmans this afternoon when I realized that I hadn't checked the CLBB for this week's SGOTW posting. This week we are to pick a recipe from cookbook #98 which, for me, happens to be The Greens Cook Book by Deborah Madison. Deborah Madison was the founding chef of Greens Restaurant in San Francisco.

Over on Amazon, I see they have a new release of this cook book, but I have this older 1987 version:
When DH and I first got married, I did not eat meat. Not for ethical reasons, I just suddenly became disgusted at the sight or thought of eating meat. I began to think of it as dead cow instead of ground beef. I was not technically a vegetarian, however, because I did still enjoy seafood. It wasn't bloody like meat. My SIL also did not (and, unlike me, still does not) eat meat and she introduced me to several vegetarian cookbooks.

My meatless days were also the days when I really challenged myself with cooking. I wasn't satisfied with serving the same old, same old, I wanted to try things that were new (to me) and more challenging. I guess that's why I bought this cook book. My style has changed over the years - now I tend to favor foods that require a lot less time in the kitchen. This cook book is a bit fussy. Flipping through the pages, there are very long lists of ingredients and quite often, within the already long list are embedded recipes from other parts of the book (broths, sauces, etc), making for some pretty time-consuming cooking. Still, the recipes themselves are excellent, if you're willing to invest the time.

Wilted Spinach Salad

Determined not to be daunted by long ingredient lists, I searched for a side dish that might compliment one of the main dishes (in this case, a grilled salmon dish) I had already chosen for my weekly menu and settled on a simple Wilted Spinach Salad. It did not disappoint. The salad calls for a unique method of preparation - the addition of hot olive oil to the fresh ingredients to slightly wilt the fresh spinach. The only major modification I made was to cut back on the olive oil and the feta cheese to make it a bit more healthful. This salad is excellent and simple to prepare, ensuring it a spot on our regular rotation.

I go back and forth about whether to keep this book or not, but since my tastes and style of cooking seem to go through changes over time, I think I'll keep this one around, just in case.

Since I usually post the Sunday AFTER the new game is posted, I'm a bit ahead of myself this week. I'll post the rules of next week's game on Sunday and get back to my usual schedule.

I will be back to post the salmon recipe tomorrow and there will be a lot more grilling to come this week including turkey burgers, steak, and a vegetarian sandwich. It's good to be home and cooking again!

SGOTW #57: Cooking Light Annual Recipes 2000

While I've been MIA from blogging, I've also been missing out on the SGOTW games! I did get in a quick and simple dish for this week's game sometime earlier this week.

For this week's game, we were to go to cookbook #143 which, for me, turned out to be my Cooking Light Annual Recipes 2000. It was yet another busy night and I needed something healthful (to counteract some of the less-than-healthful eating we've been doing on the run lately), quick and easy. While leafing through the cookbook, I came upon a recipe for grouper or any white fish (I had tilapia on hand) that called for a charmoula (chermoulla, chermoula) sauce. Charmoula is a Moroccan marinade made up largely of parsley - another bonus since the parsley I planted is doing pretty well.

I did have to, as is often the case, change the recipe around a bit. First, I did not have any cilantro on hand, so we skipped it and add more parsley. Instead of using the charmoula as a marinade, I used it as a sauce. I didn't read the recipe correctly and did not have time to marinate the fish first. Besides, the sauce seemed to delicious to simply throw away after marinating the fish. Just as the fish was getting close to being fully cooked (I cooked it on the stovetop in a nonstick skillet), I added the charmoula and simmered it just long enough to heat through. This worked quite well and if I made it again, I'd be tempted to do it the same way.

Tilapia (Grouper) with Charmoula

This is a great sauce for fish - it's very easy to throw together - just toss the ingredients in your blender or food processor and give them a whirl. Simple and delicious.

Don't forget to stop by the CLBB to see what others made for SGOTW #57. Cookieee has posted for SGOTW #58 and the number is 70. Until next week...........

SGOTW #54: Emeril's Potluck

This past week we were to got to our #23 cookbook, which for me meant Emeril's Potluck: Comfort Food with a Kicked-Up Attitude. I don't remember where this cookbook came from.......maybe my mom gave it to me?? As I looked through it, several recipes vied for my attention, but since I haven't been making many sweets lately, I decided on a recipe for Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie. Interestingly, all of the recipes from this book are on Emeril's website!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie

This pie starts off with a cookie crust, calling for a combination of graham crackers and Oreo cookies with the cream filling removed. Well, why use Oreos if you have Nabisco's Famous Chocolate Wafers available? A lot less work (though my youngest happily volunteered to remove all the cream from the Oreos, if necessary) and I happened to have a package of these that I intended to use last fall for a pumpkin treat but never did. I would have liked to have done an all-chocolate crust (I really don't see the need for the graham crackers - they just get in the way of my chocolate), but I didn't have quite enough for 2 1/2 cups of chocolate crumbs, so I used a 1/2 cup of graham cracker crumbs.

Once the crust is done, there is no more baking time, making this a great pie to make when you don't want to heat up the kitchen too much. The filling gets creamed together, spread onto the crust and then the pie is chilled for at least 4 hours.

What really struck me about this pie is that the peanut butter flavor REALLY comes through. I find that when I bake with peanut butter, I'm often disappointed that its flavor seems to get lost - I'm almost always left wanting more peanut butter flavor. Since the filling does not get baked, I wonder if NOT baking peanut butter is what helps its flavor shine through? The cream cheese keeps the filling firm and gives the pie a little cheesecake-type tang.

I skipped the chocolate sauce because I usually find that a sauce on a rich pie like this is just too much. (Well, if you didn't make the chocolate sauce, then what's that chocolate stuff drizzled in your photo you say? Shhhh....that's just a little Hershey's syrup put there to add interest to the photo.) I'm thinking that was a mistake. While the peanut butter shouts out, the chocolate gets a little lost and a little drizzle of rich chocolate sauce might be just the thing to send this pie from very good to out of this world.

Game #55 comes with a twist. This time, we are to pick the cookbook with the best looking recipe on the cover. Extra points if you make the cover recipe.

SGOTW #53: Anniversary Edition

First, a shout out to all of the mothers out there - Happy Mother's Day. We are headed to brunch today.

This week we are celebrating the 1 year anniversary of SGOTW over on the CLBB. For this game, Cookieee had us go back through the old games and choose a recipe that was submitted by another player. I was determined to go through every old game and I did, but it took quite a long time! There were many tasty looking recipes, but I ended up choosing a pasta dish that was looked easy, tasty and a little different than other pasta dishes I've tried in the past.

The recipe I chose not only sounded delicious, but it also satisfied several other attractive criteria - I had the necessary ingredients on hand, it helped me use up some ingredients that were in danger of going past their prime - some goat cheese and a bag of spinach - and it also was a recipe from a chef that I like, but don't normally cook from - Giada de Laurentiis.

Anyway, I chose the Penne with Spinach Sauce that was originally posted by Tkay on Game #43. This was very easy to throw together and we all liked it a lot. Especially my youngest - he ate at least two helpings and raved over it!

Penne with Spinach Sauce

I didn't mess with the recipe too much, but unfortunately I was out of multi-grain pasta, so I had to used plain old white pasta. I also inadvertently used 2 ounces of cream cheese instead of one and for a bit more flavor punch, I used a bit more Parmesan than called for. Also, in keeping with advice from reviews on this thread, I reduced the amount of garlic - I don't tolerate raw garlic very well - it does a number on my system.

I didn't measure the salt and pepper - I just added those to taste, so I can't comment on whether or not her measurements are well-balanced or not. I use Kosher salt and a little goes a long way, so I can't really go by recipes or things will end up way too salty.

Easy and delicious. A great way to get spinach into spinach-wary eaters as the spinach in no way dominates this dish. I am already imagining quite a few variations on this dish that I can't wait to try.

Don't forget to check out what everyone else made for this week's game.

Now on to SGOTW #54. Cookieee has posted and the number is.........23. Hey, I actually have a cookbook #23! Hmmm...I think it's going to be a toughie...........

If you have just heard about SGOTW, check out this link for the games I have played so far.

SGOTW #52: The Good Carb Cookbook

So, it's Sunday and that means it's time for SGOTW. The number drawn for this past week's game was #73. #73 ended up being Sunset Vegetarian, a cookbook I have already cooked from for this game. Since I've only been playing a few weeks and since I'm not really thrilled with that book, I generated another random number for myself and ended up with The Good Carb Cookbook by Sandra Woodruff.
I don't really remember why I bought this cookbook! I've never gone low-carb though I did toy with the idea. I think I might have bought this hoping it would contain a lot of recipes for using whole grains in everyday dishes, but this did not turn out to be the case. What really turns me off about this book is the use of things like reduced-fat or fat-free dairy products and the heavy-handed use of egg substitute. I like to eat healthy, but I can only go so far before my eyes begin to roll back in my head due to utter boredom. In my opinion, you're better off using naturally low-fat foods, like fresh vegetables and fresh herbs, to achieve a great low-fat, low-carb dish than to try to take something that relies on fat for flavor - such as cheese sauces - and try to dumb down the flavor. Sometimes it can work, but most of the time it doesn't.

Broccoli Rabe with Garlic and Olive Oil

In any case, I did find a recipe that intrigued me, mostly because it's one that involved a veggie that we have never tried - broccoli rabe. Broccoli rabe looks like a cross between a dark, leafy green and broccoli. My family was more than a bit skeptical - nothing like the word "broccoli" to activate up their veggie-wary radar. Maybe I should have just called it rapini. I was happy to see, though, that they managed to keep an open mind and give it a fair shake and in the end, they liked it. The preparation was simple - the broccoli rabe was lightly steamed and then sauteed in olive oil and garlic. We did not find the flavor to be overly bitter, maybe just a bit, but nothing unpleasant or overwhelming.

I am happy to say that broccoli rabe has now been added to our list of healthful vegetables that are welcome at our table. However, I think the cookbook will be hitting the garage sale pile. In fact, this game is really opening my eyes to the fact that I have a bunch of books gathering dust on my shelves and not just because I don't think to use them, but because they really don't grab me at all. As this game goes on, I'll bet I'll be getting rid of more than a few of my 26 cookbooks and making room for something a little more exciting........

SGOTW #53 is going to be the Anniversary Edition. We are going back through all of the old games and selecting a recipe - as always, one we've never tried before - from the recipes that were posted over the last year. You can find a list of the past SGOTW here.

Don't forget to go over to the CLBB and check out the thread for SGOTW #52 to see what everyone else made.

SGOTW #51: Moosewood Restaurant Simple Suppers

Normally I post my SGOTW recipes on Sunday, but I didn't get around to making last week's recipe until last night and actually I snuck in my recipe for game #52 too, but I'll save that until Sunday.......
Anyway, I was so excited for last week's game because the number picked just happened to be my newest cookbook, Moosewood Restaurant Simple Suppers: Fresh Ideas for the Weeknight Table. This cookbook actually comes with a story too!

A locally owned kitchen store in our area - Now We're Cooking - offers cooking classes. Well, more like cooking demonstrations since most of the classes are not hands-on. I was not happy about this at first, but the classes have grown on me. The first class I attended was a sushi class. I was really hoping to get a chance to try rolling myself - you can only learn so much from watching - but alas, it was a demonstration-only class. A local chef came in and prepared several different sushi rolls for us and as I sat there eating the sumptious morsels that were put in front of me, I realized that even if I wasn't getting any hands-on experience, it certainly wasn't an unpleasant experience to sit and be served fantastic food from a great chef! Almost like a private chef's table tasting. (A big thanks to my MIL for giving me a gift certificate for these classes for my birthday last year!)

Anyway, back to Moosewood...........

One of the classes they offered last month featured a chef/owner/cookbook author from the Moosewood Collective, David Hirsch. The class offered a full dinner prepared by David, as well as a signed cookbook. No way could I resist this one! I have two other Moosewood cookbooks, Moosewood Low-Fat Favorites and Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant. I have to admit that I don't cook a lot from either one, but then again, I don't use my cookbooks much at all which is why I am participating in SGOTW in the first place.

It was a fun evening - David Hirsch entertained us with stories from his experiences while he prepared us a lovely vegetarian meal. The first two courses were hands down the hightlights for me - they were fantastic. The meal started with an appetizer of Sicilian Chickpea Spread - a hummus-like bean dip, minus the tahini, enhanced with pine nuts, roasted red peppers and fresh basil - really delicious. Next up was my other favorite of the evening, a Caesar Salad topped with tofu "croutons". The tofu was diced, tossed with a sauce and then baked in the oven. The results were delicious - so delicious that I am inspired to cook once again with tofu, something I used to try to make at home, with mixed results, but have been avoiding in recent years.

After the salad, David served up Red Bean, Potato and Arugula Soup - I loved the peppery bite of the arugula - a very simple but fairly tasty soup. Alas I have to admit that I was not wowed by the main course - Spring Vegetable Sauté. It's a simple dish of carrots, asparagus and artichokes in a simple vegetable-broth based sauce. There was nothing bad about the dish, it just didn't have anything that made it stand out or shine. I think that it was a little too light on the salt - David talked quite a bit while he cooked and I know that I often lose track of what I'm doing if I talk when I cook, so I have a feeling that something went a little wrong with this one.

The meal ended with a yummy Mango Coconut Sorbet. I have a coconut-mango recipe that I actually like a bit better, but it uses Cream of Coconut, a product that contains trans fats, so this sorbet, which contains coconut milk instead, would be a more healthful alternative.

On to the recipe I tried! I had originally intended to make the salad with tofu croutons, but was missing the fennel seeds which I think are pretty essential in this dish, so I opted to make a salmon dish instead. Salmon? That's not vegetarian! Well, although the Moosewood offers primarily vegetarian fare, they do serve fish 5 nights a week at the restaurant, so their cookbooks do include a few fish recipes.

Oven-Roasted Miso Sesame Salmon

This recipe calls for a simple miso-mirin glaze and a short baking time in the oven - very simple. It was a lovely day outside, so we opted to grill the salmon instead of baking it. The dish was good, but I didn't think the miso glaze shined enough for my tastes. I tend to prefer very strong flavors with salmon, so this may just be a matter of personal preference. Of course the miso glaze might have shined through more had I remembered to slash the salmon first, as it says in the recipe. Evenings have been prettied harried around here lately and I've been making a lot of those kinds of mistakes - misreading or skipping over whole parts of the recipe. Ah well, at least I'm still getting nutritious, from-scratch meals on the table most nights!

The Moosewood Restaurant is a very interesting place to read about - it's run by a collective composed of about 12 people who run the restaurant and also serve as chefs and/or cookbook authors. Ithaca, NY is only about 2 hours north of here, and I hear that it's close to NY wine country so I think a weekend trip to the Moosewood is definitely in our future........

Before I go, I should mention that this week's number (for game #52) is 73. I'll post about what I made on Sunday......

SGOTW #50 - Newspaper Clippings

Every 5 weeks, Cookieee, our gracious SGOTW hostess, picks something from the "other hat". The "other hat" is filled with various ideas that stray from the cookbook theme that is followed most of the time. What a fun idea!

The idea that came out of the "other hat" this week was Newspaper Clippings. When I saw that, I thought I would have to bow out for this week as I rarely clip recipes from the newspaper. For one thing, recipes in our local paper rarely catch my eye and for another, I'm very anti-clutter - I hate having scraps of paper all over the place. And really, between the internet and the cookbooks I own, aren't there already more recipes than I can ever try in my lifetime?

Shrimp and Corn with Basil

Surprise, surprise - I did end up finding something in my recipe binder - a recipe for shrimp, corn and basil that sounded delightfully simple and summery - perfect for this warm weather that has finally arrived. It is in fact very simple to pull together, but it was a little bland in my opinion. I suspect that is because the corn wasn't the freshest. It's way too early for good, fresh corn in this part of the country, so this recipe, which really relies on very fresh flavors to carry it off, might be best saved for later in the summer when excellent corn can be had. It says it serves 4, but I'd say it was 4 rather small servings - which worked out fine for us since we had large side salads to fill us up, but if you're feeding a crowd of big, hungry guys, 4 servings would really be stretching it.

Each week I wait in excitement for the announcement the new SGOTW number! And I am very excited by this week's cookbook number which is #52. This happens to be a new cookbook that I acquired this past week that I am dying to cook out of and there's a fairly interesting story to go along with it. Now..............what to make, what to make?

And don't forget, SGOTW #52 is a special game. We are to go back and pick a recipe from one of the previous games - you can find all the games listed here. If you participate and want me to include a link to your blog, just leave me a comment here or over at CLBB and I'd be happy to include you.

SGOTW: Listing of all games.......

In an effort to make the Anniversary SGOTW a little easier for everyone, here is a list of every game. I will try to keep it updated. Let me know if any of the links are not working.

Sunday Game of the Week #50 04-15-07

Sunday Game of the Week #49 04-08-07

Sunday Game of the Week #48 04-01-07

Sunday Game of the Week #47 03-25-07

Sunday Game of the Week #46 03-18-07

Sunday Game of the Week #45 03-11-07

Sunday Game of the Week #44 03-04-07

Sunday Game of the Week #43 02-25-07

Sunday Game of the Week #42 02-18-07

Sunday Game of the Week #41 02-11-07

Sunday Game of the Week #40 2-04-07

Sunday Game of the Week #39 1-28-07

Sunday Game of the Week #38 1-21-07

Sunday Game of the Week #37 1-14-07

Sunday Game of the Week #36 1-7-07

Sunday Game of the Week #35 12/31/06

Sunday Game of the Week #34 12-24-06

Sunday Game of the Week #33 12-17-06

Sunday Game of the Week #32 12-10-06

Sunday Game of the Week #31 12-03-06

Sunday Game of the Week #30 11-26-06

Sunday Game of the Week #29 11-19-06

Sunday Game of the Week #28 11-12-06

Sunday Game of the Week #27 11/5/06

Sunday Game of the Week #26 10-29-06

Sunday Game of the Week #25 10-22-06

Sunday Game of the Week #24 10-15-06

Sunday Game of the Week #23 10-08-06

Sunday Game of the Week #22 10-01-06

Sunday Game of the Week #21 9-24-06

Sunday Game of the Week #20 9-17-06

Sunday Game of the Week #19 9-10-06

Sunday Game of the Week #18 9-3-06

Sunday Game of the Week #17 8-27-06

Sunday Game of the Week #16 8-20-06

Sunday Game of the Week #15 8-13-06

Sunday Game of the Week #14 8-6-06

Sunday Game of the Week #13 7-30-06

Sunday Game of the Week #12 7-23-06

Sunday Game of the Week #11 7-16-06

Sunday Game of the Week #10 7-9-06

Sunday Game Of The Week #9 7-2-06

Sunday Game Of The Week #8 6-25-06

Sunday Game of the Week #7 6-18-06

Sunday Game Of The Week # 6

Sunday Game of the Week #5

Sunday Game Of The Week #4

Sunday Game Of The Week #3

Sunday Game Of The Week #2

Sunday Game Of The Week #1

SGOTW #49: Cooking Light 2002 Annual

Well, I managed to squeak in this week's recipe yesterday, so here we go......

Last week's number ended up being #191. For me, this translated to my 2002 Cooking Light Annual. Not technically a cookbook - really a collection - but I have so few cookbooks that I'm using anything that will remotely qualify.
I had to choose my recipe in a hurry and decided on a quinoa dish. For those who don't already know, quinoa (pronounced KEEN-wa), though usually classified as a whole grain, is in fact a seed, according to The World's Healthiest Foods:

We usually think of quinoa as a grain, but it is actually the seed of a plant that, as its scientific name Chenopodium quinoa reflects, is related to beets, chard and spinach. These amino acid-rich seeds are not only very nutritious, but also very delicious. Cooked quinoa seeds are fluffy and creamy, yet slightly crunchy. They have a delicate, somewhat nutty flavor. While the most popular type of quinoa is a transparent yellow color, other varieties feature colors such as orange, pink, red, purple or black. Although often difficult to find in the marketplace, the leaves of the quinoa plant are edible, with a taste similar to its green-leafed relatives, spinach, chard and beets.

One of the unique things about quinoa is that it is one of very few non-meat sources of complete proteins and so can play an important role in the diet of vegetarians. It is important to rinse quinoa before cooking as processing methods can leave behind a bitter compound. Quinoa can be cooked just like regular white rice, but with a 1:2 ratio - 1 cup of quinoa to 2 cups of water.

Wild Rice and Quinoa Garden Salad

This is a chilled salad with quinoa, wild rice, a few veggies and a balsamic-Dijon dressing. Unfortunately, we did not have much time to chill the salad, so we didn't get to taste it properly last night and I reserved final judgement until I tried it today, thoroughly chilled.

Overall, I'd give this yet another so-so rating. There's nothing terrible about it, just nothing that really grabs me and makes me want to make it again. DH was in charge of the dressing and put in the full 2 cloves which he chopped fairly large. When I use raw garlic in a dressing, I rarely use more than once clove and I put it through a garlic press so that you don't bite into any big chunks. As much as I adore garlic, I find raw garlic to be quite overpowering and this recipe was no exception - the garlic overwhelmed the other flavors. Even so, I don't think that cutting back on the garlic would save this recipe for me.

Still, I would like to start cooking with quinoa more often. We tried a delicious quinoa dish over Easter that I'll be posting here sometime later this week.

As for SGOTW #50, there's a twist this week. There is no number pick - this week we are to cook a recipe from a newspaper clipping. Great idea, only I rarely clip anything from the newspaper, so this could be a tough one for me. I think I have something lying around though.........

Heads up for SGOTW #52. Cookieee, the game's gracious host, decided that we are to make one of the recipes already posted (not your own) in any of the 52 games we have played. If you'd like to join in, I have listed all the games above to make browsing a little easier.

Stay tuned this week as I catch up recipes from Easter, a stuffed chicken breast recipe and a preview of the May issue of Cooking Light............

SGOTW #48: Sunset Vegetarian Cooking

For those of you who missed my first post and don't know what SGOTW is, check out this post.

This week, the number was 121. My #121 turned out to be Sunset Vegetarian Cooking. I can't believe that Amazon still lists it, but there it is - and for .01! This really is more of a supplement, but I'm using it darn it - I have so few cookbooks as it is!

Not the most attractive cover ever, eh?

No real story behind this - it was just an affordable addition to my collection of vegetarian cookbooks. And I did get at least two recipes out of it that became part of my regular rotation when I didn't eat meat - a veggie kabob and a zucchini fritatta. I haven't made them much lately, but I do use the kabob marinade now and again - it's very good.

Alas, the recipe this week - I made it Wednesday night - didn't turn out all that well. It was one of those that sounded like it could go either way - it could be bad or it could have surprised me. And as I was making it, the sauce tasted pretty good, but after it baked, something happened and it didn't taste as good out of the oven.

Green Enchiladas
(Sorry, there just doesn't seem to be any way to make these look appetizing.)

The recipe was Green Enchiladas - cheese and onion enchiladas with a green sauce overtop. I did stay pretty true to the recipe, but made two changes. First, I used less cheese - 9 ounces instead of 12. We didn't have enough jack cheese and I decided not to supplement with other cheeses because it would help cut down the fat. I also used light sour cream in place of regular. I don't think that changing either of these two things would save the recipe, but it's possible.

It wasn't terrible, it just tasted muddled - no one flavor really shined through. I think maybe the culprit was something I was a bit afraid to use in the first place - the dreaded cream of mushroom soup. I tried to elevate the status of this ingredient by using an organic version, but I'm thinking maybe the yuckier Campbell's version might have worked better! I also think that using fresh spinach would help quite a bit - but that would also make this recipe a lot more time consuming.

Anyway, I liked it okay, DH liked it okay, my youngest really liked it (go figure!!!!) and my oldest didn't like it much at all - but he ate it. I don't think I'd make this again, but I'd really like to find a good recipe with this basic idea - but instead of tweaking this one, I'd be inclined to look for a whole new recipe.

If you played this week and would like me to include a link to your blog, just leave a comment or contact me over at the CLBB and I will place a link here on this post.

To see what others cooked for this week's game, check out this thread on the CLBB.

On to next week. Drum roll please.................the number for next week is: Stay tuned for the announcement of this week's number...................I will post here once it has been posted on the CLBB.

SGOTW #47: Moosewood Low-Fat Favorites

So, the pick this week was for #34, which for me happened to be the Moosewood Restaurant's Low-Fat Favorites.

Out of the 25 cookbooks I own, 7 are vegetarian. Vegetarian, however, does not always mean healthful and lowfat, so I bought this cookbook in an attempt to find more low-fat vegetarian recipes. As I said earlier, I'm still not quite sure what I think about this cookbook, but I'm not ready to give up on it.

Mushroom Wheat Berry Pilaf

I chose this recipe - Mushroom Wheat Berry Pilaf - because my recipe repetoire is lacking in interesting side dishes and I have never cooked with wheat berries before. At first I didn't think I would be able to make this recipe tonight after all - it called for soaking the wheat berries for at least 8 hours and then cooking them for at least one more hour. Different sites on the internet said different things, most indicating that wheat berries could take hours to cook, thus the suggested soaking time. To make it more confusing, the bag I bought - simply labeled whole wheat (I had to make and educated guess that this was the same thing as wheat berries) - had no cooking instructions whatsoever. I had hoped to cook both the wheat berries and the brown rice in my rice cooker, but I decided to cook the wheat berries on the stove and put them on in the afternoon, just in case they really did take hours to cook. As it turns out, they only took one hour to become tender, so I really could have cooked them in the rice cooker along with the brown rice and will do so next time.

The rest of the recipe came together easily and it turned out quite well. I don't know if I'd call the recipe fantastic, but it was quite good and we really enjoyed the chewy texture of the wheat berries - I look forward to including them in more rice dishes and perhaps even a stew.

Chicken Thighs with Sweet Red Onions and Balsamic Vinegar

The wheat berry salad wasn't the only new dish we tried tonight. I stocked up on chicken thighs at Sam's Club not too long ago, but haven't made anything using them recently. I decided on a recipe from Cooking Light that seemed simple, yet tasty. It was very easy and quite good. Again, not a knockout recipe, but very good. The boys loved it.

Along with the chicken and rice, I served roasted green beans tossed with chopped kalamata olives, crumbled feta cheese, salt and pepper.

To wrap things up, Cookieee has posted the number for this week's SGOTW and it's 121. For me, this means my Sunset Vegetarian Cooking and I've already picked a recipe. I won't say what yet as it will be a very busy week and there are no guarantees that I'll even get around to it, but I certainly hope to. If you'd like to rediscover the cookbooks on your shelf, I invite you to join in. Join us on the CLBB on this thread and if you have a blog, send me your link and I'll post it, along with my recipe, next Sunday.

SGOTW

SGOTW? What is SGOTW?

SGOTW stand for Sunday Game of the Week, a brain-child of Cookieee, a member of the CLBB. It's a weekly game designed to get us using those cookbooks that may be sitting on our shelves, gathering dust. Obviously I'm a little late to the game, as they are already on #47! I hope you will bear with me on this long post as I attempt to explain this game and why I want to play.

Here are the basics behind this game:

How to play "Sunday Game of the Week"

1. Pick a number from 1 to ? (depending on how many COOKBOOKS you have) or if you want, I will pick the number. (At this point, she is picking the numbers for us.)
2. Go get the COOKBOOK
3. Pick out a NEW recipe
4. Post what COOKBOOK you picked, TELL US SOMETHING ABOUT IT, what year it was published, the author, what kind of book, it's history with you, whatever personal information you would like to share.
5. Post the recipe you picked and tell us why, if you want to.
6. Sometime this week, make it.
7. Post a review, hopefully before the next weeks game starts

SUNDAY GAME OF THE WEEK is open to anyone that would like to play

YOU ARE ALL WELCOME

There are 2 "hats". One holds suggestions on different ways to play the game and is used every 5th game. The other holds numbers of books that people submit that they would like to have drawn. These all may be made at anytime from anyone.

If you don't have as many cookbooks as the number drawn, just keep counting what you do have, over and over till you reach that number. We want everyone to be able to play.

As I've mentioned before, I don't buy a lot of cookbooks. I have 25, to be exact. That sounds like a good many to me, but when I read that some people own 100, 200, even 800 cookbooks, I am stunned. I'll never own that many, and frankly have no desire to, but I would like to expand my collection a bit.

To clarify how to number your cookbooks: You can either count them as they sit right on the shelf, or you can put your titles into a spreadsheet or list and number them. If you count them as they sit on the shelf, you would need to be careful to shelve them exactly the same way each week to avoid repeats. I decided that a spreadsheet is easier - I never re-shelve my books the same way each time. Since I only have 25, and many of the numbers they pick are higher than that, I simply repeated my list all the way up to 200.

My reasons for joining in this game are twofold. For starters, even though I don't own many cookbooks, I'm not even making good use of the ones I own! I rely so much on the internet to search for recipes, that I tend to not even pay much attention to what's sitting right on my bookshelf. While it is much easier to search the internet when you are looking for a specific recipe, rather than leaf through cookbook after cookbook, there are many treasures behind these pages, just waiting to be found. This game will be a great way for me to sit up and take notice of things I have been overlooking.

Secondly, as much cooking as I do, I tend to rely on the same sources over and over. While I love Cooking Light and rely on it heavily, I'd like to expand a bit and try recipes from other sources more often. I think it will also help me realize which cookbooks I really like and which cookbooks I could probably get rid of. And perhaps I will finally discover a cookbook or two that I really, really enjoy.

This game relies on using cookbooks only. At some point however, maybe starting next week, I'd like to expand on this idea and start trying out a new recipe from a chef or internet site that I don't normally cook from. I don't know if this would be a weekly event or what, but I'll post with more details when I get it figured out.

If you'd like to join in SGOTW, just look here each Sunday - or over at the CLBB - for the newest number pick. I'll be posting both here and on the CLBB each week, so please come join us. If you're a blogger who would like to participate and would like me to include you in my weekly SGOTW post, just send me a link and I'll be happy to include a link to your blog. But please remember that this is a CLBB event, not a Savory Notebook event - I just thought it would be interesting to post about here on my blog too.

If you have any questions about how to play this game, you can read this thread on the CLBB where I asked quite a few questions before jumping in.

Last week's cookbook number was #34. For me, this ended up being Moosewood Restaurants Low-Fat Favorites.


I have not made more than one or two recipes from this book. Truthfully, I really can't tell if I'm all that crazy about it, but I'm not ready to give it away yet. I need to break out and try things that don't normally appeal to me - such as recipes that aren't loaded with carbs and cheese - and I think this cookbook would be a good one for that.

Anyway, the recipe I picked is Mushroom Wheat Berry Pilaf and I will be making it tonight. Ideally, we'd have made our recipe and posted a review about it on the CLBB by now, but my dinners got pushed back due to several unexpected baseball practices last week. I guess the good news is that, as a result, most of my meals are already planned for this week!

I'll be back later to post my review on this recipe and to let you know what's happening for next week's game.