Highlight reel

So, I have been remiss in my posting duties; I apologize. In the interest of getting back on track and going to go through some of the highs and lows of the past few weeks.

First the lows: listen when you're always swinging for the fences sometimes you strike out. The first was when I attempted to make a surf and turf. I'll talk about the steak later, but it required a white butter sauce for the shrimp. Well, it was supposed to come together if I heated it slowly, emulsify if you will. It did not, I ended up with melted butter with wine pooled on top and we ended up with just plain shrimp. The second dish was perhaps the worst thing I've ever made. Luckily, it was just for me. I was trying to make a crab salad but didn't realize at the grocery store that in terms of crab, you get what you pay for. In other words the cheapo "pink crab" (rather than lump) that I bought made me want to gag. My inability to throw away food led me to put mayonnaise in it, which made it edible. The final dish was not horrible but it could be better. It was called Mexican lasagna. Basically a casserole. It was extremely, extremely bland. I would recommend the filling (chicken, corn and beans)for burritos or tacos however. Refusing to throw away the leftovers (noticing a theme)I ate it for lunches this week. Once it sat and kind of let the flavors combine more it tasted a lot better.

On the positive notes I made a pretty decent steak. I served it with a red wine sauce that was delicious. I don't think I let it reduce enough but it still tasted pretty good. I tried to halve the recipe but ended up with enough sauce for 4 steaks. I will definitely be cooking it again. This is the recipe that the shrimp was supposed to go with it. I think it was actually better with just the steak, but that's probably because I have a weird phobia about mixing food (watch me eat sometime it's kind of funny). I used some of that shrimp to make a scampi which is seriously one of the better things I've made. I could eat bowls of it. Another classic I made was Chicken Divan. Maybe I've been watching too much Mad Men (no such thing!) but I felt like making a Americana dish. I use to have it all the time when I was little so it is the epitome of comfort food for me. It's chicken and broccoli with a curry sauce, I served it over egg noodles. Graham says it's the best thing I've made yet, the recipe is a family recipe so my dad just emailed it to me. Finally, I made an orzo pasta salad for a cookout with my friends. I feel like it was a success because I was excited to have leftovers. I really really like cooking for people, it's how I show I care. I'm going to have really fat kids.

This week I'm going to try and recreate a dish I had a restaurant, wish me luck. I've only done that once before with goat cheese mashed potatoes; we'll see how it goes.