Clam Linguine Alfredo with bacon and mushrooms

This is officially my new favourite pasta recipe. Just....wow. I wouldn't have thought that canned clams would figure in a such labeled dish, but there it is. Another great idea from SO - this turned out not too creamy or rich, but full of rich flavours with just a tiny bit of pop from dried chilies. Cooking things up in the fat from the double-smoked bacon turned out to be the first good idea. The second, I finally got a chance to try some of the black garlic I got from Chef Michael Smith's Flavour Shack in PEI, where we visited recently. Finally, fresh linguine was on sale at Sobey's today. Perfect!

Sauteing the clams with bacon and mushrooms

Mmmm, the smell of bubbling garlic, mushrooms, clams, bacon.....this will be good. Assembling it with the fresh pasta, and we have one fine Sunday dinner.

A nest of linguine with clams, bacon, and mushrooms

Next time: wouldn't change much! Maybe fresh clams, but that would be a lot more trouble.

me: 10/10

SO: 10/10

SSO: 7/10, but that was the plain pasta with butter and salt, the clam part was probably 2/10

Scalloped Potatoes

I don't usually make good scalloped potatoes. There, I said it. But it's true - usually over/under cooked, curdled sauce (as SO reminded me), or just plain boring. Well this was none of those things, an actually very tasty. Cheesy, but not too much, cooked just enough, and flavour to boot. This was actually a sit-down Sunday dinner type thing, one of our stand-bys - a ham from the butcher, some form of potatoes, and peas. Is cheap to make, and there's always lots of leftovers for lunches. And to think I didn't even use cream this time - didn't really need it. No really!

Scalloped Potatoes

I have to say the key was both bacon and the cheese combo. The bacon - although somewhat redundant because of the ham - replaces the usual butter and gives lots of yummy flavour. The cheese combo was good quality old cheddar and Parmesan.  The cheddar gave it a bit of ooey gooey, and the Parmesan browned a bit and gave even more flavour. I'm going to make it like this from now on.

Scalloped Potatoes with Ham and Peas

Next time: wouldn't change much I don't think

Me: 10/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 1/10

Pan-fried Brussels Sprouts with Bacon

Here's one of those veggies that nobody seems to like very much. I think they are making a come-back of sorts, I've seen lots of articles and recipes trumpeting their health benefits and flavour. I'm not sure what people don't like about them; I guess if you don't like cabbage you won't like these - but then again, it's all about how you cook them and what you put on them. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of mine, but there are thousands of photos I found through a Google image search that all look pretty much identical - so I borrowed one.

Pan-fried Brussels Sprouts with bacon

This recipe is so simple, yet really tasty. I ended up making this as one of the sides for Christmas dinner. Forget the mushy peas and boring carrots!  I've also seen an intriguing version that is baked and has a sweet and fiery sauce which I may have to try, but this time around it is all about the bacon!

Next time: Will try them baked with a vinegar/chili sauce, but honestly this was good as it was.

Me: 10/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 5/10

Fast, Low-Cal Spaghetti Carbonara

Uh-oh, the fridge is empty. Well not empty exactly, but you know, not a lot in there for a creative pull-it-together last minute supper. Two apples. Half an onion. A bit of lettuce. Part of a green pepper. Some cheese, eggs, milk. Not a whole heck more, not counting condiments, pickles, etc. Oh wait, some left-over cooked bacon (no really! how did that happen anyway). I think there's some "crappy" pre-grated parmesan. What about a carbonara, suggests SO. Unfortunately there is no cream, half and half or even cream cheese. So I'll try a simple white sauce thickened with flour, with a bit of  butter and milk? Close enough. Hopefully it is edible.

Basic white sauce, looking good.

So the basic sauce went well enough. Usually I either burn something at this point or have lots of lumps that just won't go away. Being thus paranoid, I used a really low heat, and added the flour very slowly to the melted butter. I should credit our awesome gravy/sauce making flat whisk at this point. Something like this. I didn't cook it long enough before slowly adding the milk, so next time I'll watch for that. Next comes the parmesan and bacon.

White sauce with parmesan and bacon. Looking better!

At this point, it is easy to add a little more milk if too thick. Added this to the drained pasta, and voila, quick decent dinner. By the way, I say "low-cal" as a relative term here. Milk and a couple Tb of butter compared to a cup of heavy cream and gosh knows what else. 

The finished dish - Fast, low-cal Spaghetti Carbonara

Next Time: maybe 1% milk if we had it instead of skim; fresh parmesan would definitely help.

Me: 8/10

SO: 7/10

SSO: n/a (as usual, he had most of this in deconstructed fashion: bacon on the side, etc.)

French Toast with Apple Topping

French Toast with Apple Topping and Bacon
(I had already eaten all my share of the
bacon except for one piece)

I love Brunch. It's not breakfast, and it's not lunch. And what could be easier than throwing some bacon in a pan, and frying up some french toast. I've started buying this "naturals" bacon, seems to have much less preservatives and "stuff" (nitrates, phosphates, etc). Is the same price as regular bacon, but comes in 375g packages instead of 500g. I'll buy a few packs when on sale, then cut them in half and put in freezer bags. When I'm ready to have some for brunch, I whip out half a frozen pack, defrost a bit, and Bob's your uncle.

Anyway, I noticed a bunch of apples sitting in the fridge, so I thought I'd make up something. It turns out that peeling apples with a potato peeler is actually really fast and easy - I always would have just used a knife before. So peeled, cored and cut, they are ready to be thrown into a saucepan. Also, it amazes me how complicated people like to get with French Toast - all these ingredients, and soaking overnight, blah blah. Egg, milk, dip and fry. Done in 10 minutes. Happy Family.

Next Time: a bit less corn starch, more bacon

Me: 8/10
SO: 7/10
SSO: 8/10

Bacon-wrapped Adobo spiced Chicken

This recipe actually started off as Chicken Legs stuffed with herbed rice, marinated in pomegranate. I neglected to leave enough time for marinating though, and I was going to the grocery store 2 hours before dinner. Oh well, save this for next week.  Since the chicken legs were thawed out, might as well search for something a bit easier. It's amazing, once you start surfing around, what you manage to find.  Lots of really cool ideas, that's what.

I started the surfing safari (a nod to the Beach Boys, whom my Evenko email notification told me are playing at the Bell Centre in Montreal in June) when I noticed bacon-wrapped. That's all it took to get me started on the journey. From there, I ended up reading about southern cooking, then on to Spain and Latin America.  Then the two merged, and I found this recipe.

Bacon-wrapped Adobo chicken legs with a colourful
medley of potatoes and onion. This is the 'before'
photo, the 'after' looks almost exactly the same.

Long side note: as I like to do when searching for recipes, I'll try to find 4 or 5 variations of the same dish and either pick the one that stands out, or merge my fav 2 or 3. It's amazing what crazy silly things some people do to perfectly good recipes. I actually saw one recipe that really looked promising, until it mentioned melting Velveeta cheese on each chicken piece. What The Face.  In any case, I've noticed a great many recipes on other food blogs seem to cut & paste almost verbatim from one of Allrecipes, Cooks, Epicurious, etc. I've seen the same mistake/typo from one place to another. I guess people don't like to surf much beyond the first page of google results.  I have nothing against those websites, I go to them a lot, I even have the "app" for two of them. Ah well. The cookbook isn't dead in any case.

One easy way I try to improve the taste of a recipe is with fresh ingredients. Duh.  But not always obvious. For the Adobo spices, popular in Spanish, Latin American, and Filipino cuisine, use fresh spices. I had some cumin seeds in the cupboard, so throw those in the spice grinder instead of using  ground cumin. Try to grind pepper, not shake it. Same for salt, unless you use Kosher or a flaky salt such as Maldon. For the oregano, get some fresh leaves and sprinkle. You have to adjust quantities since dry and fresh differ in potency, but the result is definitely noticeable. The general rule is 3 to 1 for fresh to dried, although the dried stuff loses potency as it gets old.

Next Time: I'd sprinkle the Adobo lightly on the chicken before wrapping, rather than after; would put more onion but in coarser pieces; I'd take some fat off the bacon and possibly some of the skin on the chicken; actually, I'd try chicken breasts or thighs

Me: 8/10
SO: 8.5/10
SSO: 5/10 (not much except chicken fingers gets more than a 5)