back in my kitchen

In truth, last night was not my return to my kitchen.  Friday was, a simple dinner of turkey meatloaf.  And man, was that good to have.  I've since made us a pasta dinner and now a meal of pork tenderloin.  A regular for us on the dinner table.  Lightly braised carrots on the side along with a shaved Brussels sprouts, celery, and mint salad.  Made for a nice midweek meal whilst we kept catching up on Great British Bake Off.  Just the right thing.

I love dining out.  I love being surprised and amazed and awed and even amused by food.  I love being confounded in all the best ways.  But after days of dining out, I am keen to get home and chuck things in a pan and hope for the best.  One makes me appreciate the other, and vice versa. 

third weekend in September

Sunday evening as I write this, Monday when I post it.  I feel a little overwhelmed with the trip ahead (three weeks out of country!) and Conrad still getting over Covid.  He's better, not 100%.  Hooray for improvement!

Anyway, let me check in on how things are going here!

For one thing, a lot of shopping online.  Clothing and other items for the trip.  There we go, the trip again!  Also, laundry.  Cooking meals for us.  Napping.  Flu and Covid shots.  Watching a lot of Cougar Town (how the heck did I never watch that before - man, that's an awesome show!).  But I'm honestly bored without Conrad to be with.  I love his company, simple as that.

Anyway, a snippet or two of the weekend that was.

There were some mild morning walks.  I have had difficulty waking up early since my time with Van, darn it.  So, no early morning walks, but some shorter walks.  I did walk back and forth to massage on Saturday and flu vaccine on Sunday, and that added up nicely.  Sunday morning walk, I took a few photos of the sights of Pasadena. 

A grey morning, but some nice things to see in the area.

And, hey!  Cute t-shirt, right?

I didn't photograph the chicken meatloaves I made on Saturday, but I did get shots of Friday (pork tenderloin with roasted cabbage stuffed with prosciutto)

and Sunday (shrimp cooked in a Creole sauce with rice and a little cole slaw) dinners. 

I've already posted the cocktails from the weekend.  Not bad, I have to say.

And that's the weekend.  Again, Sunday evening as I write this, so I might dig into some cards and post cards and send out pre-travel hellos to folks! 

fourth weekend in August

Most of the week gone, almost the next weekend, the last weekend in August.  What better time to check in on the previous weekend, right?  And I know, I know.  Maestro and Amara again, right, Peter?  Well, yes.  Unapologetically.

So let's kick it off with the usual:  seats at an end of the bar late Friday afternoon/early Friday evening at Maestro. 

I did NOT, however, go with the usual drink.  A Guayabita for me this time to start with,

followed by a glass of rose. 

Sometimes it's good to switch things up!  We ate relatively light, given the heat.  Oysters to start,

some chicken mole to share. 

Did we have queso as well?  No photo, but I dimly recall we may have, which totally makes a lie of the eating light.  We came home and watched some television, winding down, having a mellow time of it.

Saturday morning there was a mild walk, but yep, Amara.  Lattes and a shared burrito (they're pretty filling for one). 

Back at home, there was the usual assortment of things to get done, and I added the baking of two banana bread loaves to that list. 

Check!  They'll make for nice slices some mornings with coffee.  By early evening, we were swinging by Bristol Farms and picking up fixings for dinner.  Van wanted shrimp cocktails, and we obliged. 

I also bought a nice piece of coho salmon and served it atop a warm okra salad and Israeli couscous.

After dinner the guys showed me the photos of their recent road trip, telling me more of the stories.  Nice to see.  No television after they were done - it was too late for that.  We headed to bed.

Sunday morning I didn't get up early for a solo walk despite best intentions.  I slept really well, but when I finally got up, I soon heard Conrad.  And if Conrad gets up, that means Olive is awake with him.  She really loves him.  A short walk for the three of us, then a further short walk for me to get some more steps. 

Conrad and I had coffee while Van slept in, then the four of us headed off to Starbucks because we weren't quite up for a big breakfast at home.  Conrad and I got home around noon, and then it was an afternoon devoted to online happy hour.  Sushi and television to finish the day.

That, friends, was a very regular, normal, no-frills weekend for us.  Nice one, I have to say.

pork and cabbage

Another short post, another photo of a dinner I made.  Wednesday night dinner at home, accompanied by television and time with Conrad.  As tempting as it was to go get sushi again or otherwise go out, we stayed in and I cooked.  Pork tenderloin first seared then popped into the oven.  A wedge of roasted cabbage each.  And a loose puree of cauliflower, onion, and yellow carrot that functioned as starch and sauce both.  Nice little meal for a midweek evening. 

a basic dinner

What a nice, simple, easy Tuesday at home last night.  Conrad and I continue to work our way through the series Cougar Town, watching it while we eat dinner.  That dinner last night?  A basic corn and zucchini risotto with a few sweet Italian sausages.  I made the risotto, I only cooked the sausages that I bought from the store.  Nothing too fancy, just Tuesday dinner. 

Tuesday night dinner in

Hello!  I'm taking a midweek day off today to go enjoy the city a little with Van - all too often it's either the weekend or holidays when we have that opportunity, and we thought it would be nice to take advantage of the slowness of summer at work to grab a day off at a not-usual time for us.  Should be fun!

Van, however, is not a morning person, and although I've been up for about 4 hours now, it's before 9:00, and it's unreasonable to expect him to be up.  So I've had my walk, I've had a Starbucks decaf latte, and I've had some oatmeal.  Now to blog a little before I head out to meet him....

A quick post, then.  Dinner last night. 

Slices of pork tenderloin atop a farroto (sure, let's call it that), a mix of farro, pancetta, onion, peas, and corn.  A relatively light meal, and a nice one to enjoy together sitting out on the deck.  Now to think about what to cook for tonight! 

third weekend in July

Hey, it's the weekend update!  Lucky y'all, right?  Here we go!

Friday started out with me doing a mighty mighty long morning walk:  just shy of ten miles.  I was understandably a little worn out the rest of the day, but I rallied for dinner at Maestro.  No Van this time - he was a little under the weather - but we did have a nice time with Stephen. 

Ah, Stephen, someone we didn't see often enough despite him living just over in Glendale.  And now he is all packed up and moving to Texas.  This week.  We wish him well there, what with the new job and being much closer to his daughters and grandson.

Anyway, it was a nice evening outside. 

I stuck with the Maestro margarita, a hibiscus-flavoured drink, and we shared some good food:  guacamole with plantain chips, oysters, the roasted beet salad, and the cochinita pibil.  

I really love that last dish.  Yum!

Conrad and I came home from dinner, poured a little wine, watched some television.  An easy Friday done.

Saturday started out with less walking than the day before.  And, of course, we ended up at Amara.  Rather than having my usual arepa, I split a breakfast burrito

with Conrad. 

Have no fear:  there was a decaf latte for me.

Saturday then unspooled through a day of groceries, some laundry, and tackling some of the accumulation in the one storage room.  That felt good to get done.  Eventually I took up residence in my kitchen where I cobbled up from dim memory a lentil and bacon tart

to serve at room temperature for dinner and served that along with a salad platter (no lettuce - we are being wary of that like many other people) of burrata with crispy prosciutto, tomatoes, nectarines, basil, and mint. 

We had barely finished when Erik from next door showed up at the door to say hello.  That turned into a longer evening with him and his friend, Barry, joining us.  And then, because the dishwasher is on the fritz, I was up until after 11 washing and drying all the dishes by hand.  A lot of time on my feet despite a shorter walk that day, and man oh man, was I exhausted by the time I went to bed.

I let myself stay in bed longer yesterday, and our morning walk was meager.  It was nice to get a morning with some oatmeal and decaf and writing a few notecards to friends.  I made some dinner for Conrad to reheat tonight while I'm at Van's, then set to work on the happy hour cocktails.  That was fun.  Van stuck around for sushi after drinks, and then he headed home while Conrad and I finished up with some travel planning we'd been doing earlier in the day.  To bed after that.

Just a rather ordinary, easy weekend for us.  Nice to have! 

a Friday off

Friday was a day off.  A holiday, Juneteenth, it meant not needing to go into work and not needing to pay attention to work stuff.  So what did I do most of the day?  Work with Conrad on a professional development related trip to come in October.  He'll be tagging along, and then we'll build a vacation on to the end of it.  We spent much of the day doing some registration things and finally settling on some airline tickets.  That ate much of the day for us, and that was fine.

But before that, a walk.  I actually got out the door into the June Gloom and had a little stroll in the neighbourhood without Conrad, then came back for him.  We drove down into the Arroyo and parked by the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center, then more or less did the loop around the stadium and through the golf course. 

Nice walk on a cool, overcast day.

Van was feeling better, he said, and he asked if he and Olive could come over.  Of course, I told him.  Conrad and I dashed out to pick up a few things, and that resulted in a large, rich dinner of braised lamb shanks with a parsnip puree. 

Very tasty, but I couldn't finish it all.  Leftovers for Conrad, perhaps, or lunches.  Nice meal, though, and good to see them.  Before dinner, as we sat and got caught up, I made myself a blood orange negroni, a nice pre-dinner sipper.

Friday felt like Saturday, I tell you.  I was confused all day about what day it actually was.  But it was a good day.  The trip planning is exciting!  Wait until October to read about that one.

Onward with the rest of the weekend.... 

basic pasta

Conrad is in Chicago.  Van is under the weather.  Peter threw together a basic pasta dinner.

The underlying recipe involves caramelizing some cabbage and some onion, adding some pasta water, tossing in the pasta, and serving it up.  But I want to add a little protein, so I topped it with some peas and pancetta and Romano cheese.  Simple, tasty.

And hooray!  Leftovers for lunches the rest of the week!

a Thursday night dinner in June

The slew of posts on the Nashville/Kentucky trip has helped cover for the fact that it's been quiet times indeed.  Really not much to write about during the week.  Simple dinners, movies or television.  Morning walks.  Few people coming through the door at work.  A lull before the conference and in-laws travel at the end of this month.  In short, sorry.  Not much to blog about.

So here is what has become a rare-these-days cooking entry.  Van came over last night so that the three of us could hammer out our weekend plans (a friend's 60th birthday celebration in Newport Beach).  I took one of our dinner staples (pork tenderloin) and served it up a little differently than normal.  A corn and leek puree went into the bottom of the bowl.  Alongside the pork came a couple of roasted slices of sweet potato and a small mound of sauteed cabbage and onion. 

Summery flavours, perhaps?  Nothing too rich.  A nice little dinner.

I've been looking ahead for some time now to retirement down the road.  When I finally do, oh boy will I be getting into the kitchen a whole bunch.  Baking, cooking.  Just you watch out. 

a weekend was had

Yep, it was a weekend, and not at all a bad one.  There are remnants of my cold lingering even now, but for the most part, I'm doing alright and was that way through the past weekend.  And that meant, happily, some welcome and familiar things.

Such as dinner at Maestro on Friday night!  It was a nice, warm evening, so Conrad and I sat outside.  I've been having a mostly dry month, so I had a mocktail made with coconut, pineapple juice, and cafe de olla syrup. 

We shared guacamole and plantain chips, a roasted beet salad,

and the black bean and huitlacoche tetela. 

It was only toward the end of dinner that we realized that we'd had a vegetarian meal.  Great!  It was nice to be back.

Saturday morning we walked.  After a few days of inactivity, I was sluggish, I admit.  But we hauled ourselves around Old Pasadena for a couple of miles and landed at Amara for a light breakfast. 

On  the way home afterward, I stopped to get a shot or two of the "snow" of fallen tabebuia blooms on the sidewalk. 

From a distant, they looked like crumpled caution tape.  Really striking.

We got things done at home and at the bank (but ugh, I won't go into the whole story, just...grrrr), and eventually I got into the kitchen to make us a simple dinner of pork tenderloin and cabbage. 

And after the bank thing I thought, you know what?  I will join Conrad in a cocktail with dinner.  And so I did!

I have no photos from yesterday, alas.  A much lazier day, and I wish I had slept better the night before.  The time change over a week ago is still kicking my butt, and my sleeping hours have been wonkier than I would like.  We ultimately ended up at Van's in the afternoon for a handful of hours of watching the Oscars and then dinner together.  Nice time of it, but nothing that I captured with a lens.