What's cooking

(Editor's note: meant to post this to my other blog, but then I thought, what the hell, maybe these other people would like a recipe or two...)

Made a couple good dinners that I thought I'd share. Last night's was throw whatever vegetables I had on hand into a stir fry, and put it over brown rice. I used asparagus, red onion, snap peas and cauliflower. First I sauteed garlic in sesame oil, then I added the onion, then the cauliflower and then the peas and asparagus. I tossed in some Thai peanut sauce I had, some hot spicy red sauce like Tabasco or that Chinese one I can never remember how to spell, and then added chopped cashews and sesame seeds. I think if I'd added tofu it would have kept my belly full all night. As it was, I felt great after eating it but hungry in the middle of the night!

Tonight was more filling: fried 1/4 lb. of pancetta (can also use bacon). Drained it on towel and then added 2 cloves of garlic to the hot pancetta oil. After a minute or two, I added 2 cans Canelloni (white kidney) beans. I let it sit while I made the dressing, then added 1/3 finely chopped red onion to the beans. I mixed the beans/onion with a bag of Arugula. Here's the dressing: 1/4 cup olive oil, 1/4 cup red wine vinegar, 1/4 cup freshly grated parmesan and 1 clove of garlic (all of which I put in the blender). To the dressing, I added 2 TBSP freshly chopped basil. Toss the dressing with the beans/onion/arugula. On top of that, put the crisp pancetta and a bunch of grilled asparagus. (I par boiled the asparagus first for about 2 minutes til tender, then plunged them in ice water, then dried them and added olive oil and salt and grilled them for about 3 minutes til they blackened.) We had this with a bottle of 2004 Argentine Merlot.

I am adding to my garden every day. I have a bunch of seedlings, but am so anxious to get planting my herbs and vegetables that I can't stop myself from buying a few more every day. They're doing pretty well, although looking a little yellow so I added organic fertilizer to my organic mulch and soil. Fingers crossed. I thought my tomato seedlings were ready to plant (3"), so I did...and now they're very sad looking. I think it's still too cold for them (40 degrees). They were all flopped over today, so I tried resurrecting them with a covering of plastic wrap! We'll see how they look tomorrow. I might have done them in for good. Good thing I didn't plant them all!

Enjoyed half of a Toblerone bar while I wrote this post. Seems I can't eat so healthy after all. Still need that fat and sugar!