What do you do with too many leeks?

Since moving to Chicago I have been happily utilizing the delivery services available to us at every opportunity -- one of those delivery services is Peapod groceries. I love that they will bring the groceries up into my kitchen, are always friendly and quick and shopping online for the groceries I need is really easy. I love checking to see what is on sale each week and planning my menu around it.

Husband and I have decided to attempt the South Beach Diet for a few months -- possibly longer depending on how well it works out. In anticipation of the healthy choices we are going to have to make from now on we decided to have one last carbohydrate filled week of food. Included in this week is potato & leek soup (potatoes are a no-no for the first two weeks, and white potatoes are a no-no for the whole plan). While choosing my groceries I made the mistake of ordering two orders of leeks -- thinking that it would be two large leeks. The mistake became apparent when I was putting away my groceries and pulled out two bunches of leeks, each with three and four leeks banded together!

I texted husband soon after -- "I ordered too many leeks" and he responded "there is no such thing."

So, the question was -- What do you do with too many leeks?

One answer came tonight while I was putting together dinner.

White Cheddar Macaroni & Cheese with Leeks

Ingredients:

3 tbsp butter

3 tbsp flour

3 cups whole milk

1 large egg, slightly beaten

1 tbsp dried mustard

1 large leek sliced thinly (only the white and light green parts)

1 bay leaf

1 lb sharp white cheddar cheese, grated

1/2lb elbow macaroni

Directions:

Boil macaroni as instructed on the box until al dente.

While water is boiling melt butter over medium heat in a large sauce pan. Once butter has melted sprinkle in the flour, one tablespoon at a time, while whisking. Continue whisking the roux for a few minutes until slightly browned -- make sure there are no lumps of flour.

Add the leeks to the pan stirring and cooking slightly for about two minutes.

Sprinkle in the dried mustard, slowly pour in the milk and bay leaf while whisking the mixture.

Reduce the heat slightly and continue whisking the mixture until it begins to thicken into a sauce-like consistency (this will take a while, be patient and resist the urge to turn up the heat because it can burn and ruin very quickly).

When the sauce has thickened begin adding the cheese, one handful at a time. After each handful whisk to combine. Once the cheese has completely melted into the sauce add in another handful. Repeat this until the entire pound of cheese has been melted into the sauce.

Temper* the egg and stir into the sauce.

Remove the mixture from the heat and pour the al dente pasta into the pan mixing to combine.

Pour the mixture into a 2 QT baking dish. If desired combine a half cup of panko breadcrumbs with a couple tbsp of melted butter and sprinkle over the top.

Bake in a preheated 300f oven for 45 minutes until top is golden brown and pasta has set. Let sit for about five minutes outside of the oven before serving.

*tempering the egg is essential if you don't want to end up with mac and cheese and scrambled egg. Just take a bit of the hot sauce and while whisking add to the egg in a separate bowl one tablespoon at a time until the egg is the same temperature as the sauce.

Chowder

Peppered Smoked Rainbow Trout Chowder

It's a mouthful, but a tasty one at that!

Since moving to Chicago I've made a very good friend who is able to bring me the occasional care package from her job -- not sure I should go into many details here about what exactly she does, but I will say it is an incredibly kind service. Anyway, among the many wonderful foods in my last care package she included a Peppered Smoked Rainbow Trout. It looked delicious but I was completely clueless as to what to do with it... until tonight of course.

Chowder!

My recipe:

8oz peppered smoked rainbow trout

2c water

1.5 russet potatoes, chunked (if I had red or yukon gold potatoes I would rather have used them, but these worked.)

1 carrot, diced

1 celery stalk, diced

1 garlic clove, diced

1/2 Spanish onion, diced (equaled to about a cup and a quarter or so)

1.5c butternut squash, chunked

3c 2% Milk

1tbsp butter

Directions:

In a medium dutch oven melt butter over medium heat and cook onions and garlic until slightly softened and fragrant. Add celery and carrot and stir occasionally until lightly browned. Add water, potatoes and butternut squash and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about ten minutes. While vegetables are simmering tear the trout into bite sized pieces and combine with milk in separate container. Add milk and trout to the simmering vegetables after the ten minutes are up. Simmer the soup for 30-40 minutes to combine flavors. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

The only difference I might make is adding some fresh dill as a garnish, but I didn't have any tonight.

Serve with a toasted bread or oyster crackers and enjoy!

I won't bother adding photos because if you've seen one chowder, you've seen what they look like -- delicious!

Quick lunch...

Didn't get enough photos of my lunch today before I snarfed it up, but I wanted to write it down so I don't forget to make it again!

Everything is approximate estimations because I almost never measure ingredients...

Ingredients:

1 tsp Prepared Horseradish

1tsp Olive Oil Mayo

1tps Mustard

4 slices thin-cut black forest sandwich ham

2 slices good bread (I had sourdough that needed to be used up)

5-6 slices portabella mushroom

2 leaves romaine lettuce

1/8 cup shredded mozzarella (or whatever cheese you have around)

2 tbsp salted butter separated

Directions:

1. cook mushroom slices in about a tbsp of butter over medium heat until browned and cooked through but not mushy, remove from pan and set aside.

2. in the same pan brown your ham slices, it'll take about a minute. Remove and set aside

3. mix together horseradish and mayo in a bowl. Spread mixture on one slice of bread.

4. On another slice of bread spread the mustard

5. stack the ham, mushrooms and cheese on the bread, mustard and horseradish sides inside. Butter the outside of the bread. Toast the sandwich over medium heat until bread it browned and cheese is melted.

6. Remove sandwich, add lettuce, slice in half and enjoy!

The mixture of mushrooms, ham & horseradish was amazing. The lettuce added a much needed cool crunch and the mustard added a vinegary flavor that helped to pull it all together. All in all the sandwich took maybe ten minutes to make and was absolutely worth the effort.

Pork Tenderloin Stir Fry

When I was growing up my mom used stir-fry as a week-day dinner at least a couple times a month. She would take whatever vegetables were left in the fridge, some leftover rice, soy sauce and a couple eggs and dinner would be ready in ten minutes. We always loved it. My husband has a different opinion about stir-fry (as in he isn't as huge a fan of it as I am) so I have to limit how often I make the dish.

There are several wonderful reasons to make this dish; its easy, its fast, its cheap and it is versatile because you can use up whatever vegetables and/or meat you have in your fridge or freezer. Plus it almost always ends up deliciously.

I don't normally buy bottled sauces for such a dish, but I found a bottle of interesting sounding sauce -- on sale -- so I though I would give it a try.

In my preheated wok I added about two tablespoons of canola oil and let it heat up. Into the oil I added garlic, about half of a red pepper, half of a medium spanish onion and about one sliced carrot. I let those cook for a few minutes before adding one stalk of celery, a couple handfuls sliced mixed mushrooms (I had a package containing crimini, oyster, etc) and half a zucchini.

We've been trying to eat more whole grains so in my rice cooker I added one cup long-grain brown rice with 2 1/4 cups water (if you are looking for more flavor to your rice cook in chicken or vegetable broth) a splash of sesame oil, some dried cilantro (though next time I wouldn't bother with the dried and would instead chop up some fresh and add it in at the end) and some soy sauce -- just a few shakes. Set the rice cooker and forget. Seriously, rice cookers are amazing.

While the vegetables were cooking I sliced about half a pound of pork tenderloin into thin-but-not-too-thin strips and poured the stir-fry sauce over them letting it sit and combine while the vegetables cooked in the wok.

The sauce I used ended up being pretty nice. I found it a bit too salty for my general liking, but I did salt the vegetables while they were cooking -- which I probably wouldn't do next time.

The night before husband stopped at Walgreens and picked up their new store-brand lager (think they're attempting to compete with PBR). For $2.99 a six pack the stuff isn't too bad, perfectly drinkable indeed. One for the cook!

When the vegetables were just a couple minutes from done I added in the pork tenderloin and sauce tossing and stirring. The pork cooked up in just a couple minutes and everything was done.

The finished product:

Not the prettiest meal on the plate, but it was damn tasty! Honestly, aside from adding in the cilantro to the rice as I said earlier, I don't think I would bother flavoring the rice again because the stir-fry had enough pop on its own.

Getting back in the kitchen...

This poor blog has sadly been abandoned these past months and I feel awful about it. Between moving, job hunting and adopting a puppy, blogging has been the last thing on my mind. But I'm back!

About a day after we found out we were moving the previous tenants backed out and decided to stay. Since we had already given our notice to our landlord we quickly had to make a decision -- sign another year long lease with our current place or move to Chicago on a whim. We moved to Chicago. We moved in August 1st to our new Chicago flat. The two bedroom apartment is pretty cool with lots of original wood work including two pillars with sconces and a built in cabinet that works out perfectly as our bar. The kitchen, however, leaves much to be desired -- small apartment sized fridge and stove/oven, almost no counter space and no dishwasher.

We have adjusted, of course. Ikea, honestly, has been a big help -- we are using a table as counter space, added shelving and bought a portable dishwasher off of a friend. The biggest adjustment, however, has been the 24 hour available delivery of whatever food you could hope for. We spent the first couple months living here ordering everything we could ever want... luckily it has gotten old (and expensive) so we are back to cooking at home more often than not.

I've been trying to get back in the habit of cooking at least five days a week. Not all of my meals are interesting or blog-worthy, but here are a few I've taken note of the past couple weeks:

This isn't a meal, of course, but I bought these awesome looking raspberries and blackberries and decided to make a cake!

Blackberry & Rasperry Upside Down Cake turned out delicious! Just top with some home-made whipped cream (I always mix with a bit of vanilla and powdered sugar and it turns out perfectly.)

I didn't have an 8" pan so I just used my 9" and it turned out just as well -- I think.

I did cook it at a lower temperature the entire time -- I just kept it at 350f the whole time it was baking and left it in just a few minutes longer. The cake was certainly cooked completely through and was deliciously moist and soft.

Ideally this would be amazing right out of the oven topped with some vanilla ice cream or cold whipped cream -- I had to wait for the husband to get home before I was able to try it, which nearly killed me with the delicious scent! If I had thought of it at the time I might have warmed it in the microwave before serving -- but we didn't even get a picture of it before we scarfed it down!

I didn't get photos of our dinner that night, but it was tasty as well. I cooked up Roasted Chicken Pcs with Balsamic Vinaigrette , without the sauce. I didn't really feel that the sauce was needed because the chicken produced enough liquid with the marinade. All I did was pour a little of the leftover cooking juices over the chicken and it was delicious. I did cook the chicken at a lower temperature than the recipe called for, though, at 350f and added an extra 15 minutes on to the total cooking time. The skin still came out crispy and the inside juicy and tender.

I should have poked some holes in the larger chicken pieces because the marinade didn't penetrate enough for my liking.

With the chicken I roasted some baked potatoes (rub with olive oil and kosher salt and bake at 350 for an hour, haven't found a better recipe for a baked potato yet) and steamed some peas (covered in butter of course). All was delicious.