Meal No. 3197: Sous Vide Bacon-Onion-Swiss Egg Bites

As the long-awaited visit of Karissa Piper was wrapping up the weekend before last, we enjoyed a Sunday morning light breakfast of bacon-onion-Swiss sous vide egg bites together with sliced bananas and whole strawberries. Washed down with ample coffee and extended by the relaxing but animated conversation we were enjoying, it was a most suitable coda for our time together.

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Based on "How to Sous Vide Egg Bites at Home," from Jenna Passaro of SipBiteGo.com. [Published 08 July 2021 / Modified 31 August 2021]

Meal No. 3196: Boogaloo Wonderland Sandwiches

Once suppertime rolled around on September 17th, I made a last-minute shift in my plans. Adding to the joy of a weekend out-of-town visitor was the happy circumstance of another friend and colleague coming by with her awesome twin senior-in-high school sons, to catch up with all of us. In eager hopes of channeling my mother's uncanny ability to be a host-at-the-ready in nearly any social situation, I opted for a back-up mealplan that might serve six instead of three, and Boogaloo Wonderland Sandwiches fit that bill. A variation (dare I say upgrade?) on sloppy joes, that would more properly be served on hoagie rolls instead of brioche buns, these work well as open-faced piles of savory and slightly sweet goodness.

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"Boogaloo Wonderland Sandwiches," by Bryan Roof. In Cook's Country, April/May 2018, p. 4-5.

Meal No. 3195: Carrot Cake Oatmeal

While the delightful Karissa was here the weekend before last, our Saturday morning day-starter snack was a long overdue return to carrot cake oatmeal, a slightly healthier spin on what's already an awesome breakfast choice. It's not so much more trouble to make than regular oatmeal but it can feel like you've really notched things up. Our portions remained moderate that morning while we enjoyed our bowls outside on a wonderfully moderate sunny morning.

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Based on "Carrot Cake Oatmeal," from Molly Watson of TheSpruceEats.com. [Updated 02 July 2019]

Ray's the Bar Sign

When architect Sam Binkley designed the kitchen addition in 2008, he did so with excellent vision and foresight. It has been a marvelous expansion of and improvement to the life of the Roediger House. The west gable added to the roof back then would, he predicted, make an excellent space for a pool table, if and when I decided to finish out the attic. Sam was spot-on yet again in 2014 when he designed that attic renovation into a massive man cave, perfect for the pool table, plenty of seating for large gatherings for movies and games, and smart uses for the smaller north and south gables.

That south gable is outfitted with a sink and cabinets and a double undercounter beer cooler, all under a unique bar top made from salvaged old wood from a theatre demolition in the North Carolina Sandhills region. Aptly and cleverly named “Ray’s the Bar,” all it has needed to be complete is a couple of key signs. I’ve got a spot above the window where someday I hope to have a Foothills Brewery beer sign. And Sam envisioned a woodcut sign on the exposed chimney beside the bar area, and we even positioned a dedicated spot light on it. Finally, over seven years later, I finally got that sign, and it’s a beauty, if I my say so myself.

Ice Cream Sandwiches

In early September I was once again an ice cream-making fiend. Among the good frozen batches of fun that I'd put away was sweet vanilla ice milk. As long as it was already churned and ready, I figured I'd finally try my hand at ice cream sandwiches so, back on September 15th, I made the chocolate cookies for top and bottom and, as bedtime approached, I spread that sweet vanilla ice milk on a bottom crust and topped it with the top cookie. I wrapped it back up to refreeze overnight so that the individual sandwiches could be cut the following day. Back into the freezer the then individually-wrapped ice cream sandwiches went until I could break them out for dessert after dinner. Our verdict? They were pretty tasty.

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Based on "Chocolate Ice Cream Sandwiches," from I Scream Sandwich! by Jennie Schacht. Posted online in a blog post by PJ Hamel of King Arthur Baking.[Published 29 July 2013]

"Classic Vanilla Ice Milk," by Stella Parks, Pastry Wizard of SeriousEats.com. [Published 22 August 2018 / Updated 15 April 2020]

Meal No. 3194: Sheet Pan Beef Nachos

Oh my gosh: can it have been nine years since dear wonderful friend, colleague, and former neighbor and former teacher education student Karissa Piper visited the Roediger House? She is such an awesome person and someone I've truly missed ever since she moved to Ohio. I'm very glad she decided to come back for her Wake Forest University class reunion so that I might claim some time with her back on the September 15th weekend. When she came in on Friday afternoon, I figured I'd have a simple dinner for us: sheet pan beef nachos with lime crema. There was also a special new dessert treat already put aside and waiting...that'll be the subject of tomorrow's blog post.

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Taco-Style Meat Based on "Crispy Beef Tacos," by Hilah Johnson. From HilahCooking.com.

"Homemade Chili and Taco Seasoning," from Jamie of MyBakingAddiction.com. [Published 03 February 2011]

"Easy Lime Crema," from Lisa Bryan of DownShiftology.com. [Published 22 April 2020]

Meal No. 3193: Bacon Cheeseburgers

As we were approaching the middle of September, we were blessed with picture-perfect weather of sunny days, moderate temperatures, nearly cloudless skies. Seemed to me on Thursday a week ago that grilling was called for, and it'd been a couple of months since I'd made burgers. I upped the ante a bit with a batch of bacon, some of which went immediately onto the hot cheesed burgers. I also brought out my special spin on burger sauce to go on the top and bottom brioche buns. These bacon cheeseburgers were just what the doctor ordered that day.

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Adapted from "Juicy Burgers," originally from Pillsbury Classic Cookbooks recipe magazine, July 2003, p. 52-53. After Pillsbury was purchased in 2001 by General Mills, home of Betty Crocker (founded in 1921, mind you!), it basically ceased to exist as a company and lives on just as a brand. I guess that's why a Pillsbury cookbook recipe from 2003 is now only found on the Betty Crocker website.

Meal No. 3192: Garlic-Honey-Mustard Chicken Thighs

As of just after 9 pm last night, we reached the official change of the seasons. My beloved summer has come to an end; autumn is upon us. And the weather cooperated with a semi-dramatic change to coincide with this march toward year's end, giving us a couple of near-90s days and then a shower burst and strong cooler breezes that whispered and then screamed "Fall!" By bedtime last night, it felt like October, and September seemed no where to be found.

Ah, but I've got a meal from a while back to make note of here. I was faced with the last of a Costco bulk package of fresh chicken thighs that had to be frozen or utilized by Tuesday a week ago, and I decided there's no such thing as too much chicken at suppertime. So I made a simple olive oil, honey, garlic, and mustard glaze and nestled the salt-and-peppered thighs onto some dressed Brussels sprouts, which were already oiled and topped with slivers of bacon. This one-pan wonder went into the oven for about 45 minutes and out came a pretty scrumptious weeknight meal.

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"Oven Baked Chicken Thighs," from Joanna Cismaru of JoCooks.com.

"Maple Bacon Brussels Sprouts," from Christine Gallary of TheKitchn.com. [Published 09 August 2022]

Peach Buttermilk Ice Cream

Perhaps not long after I'd bought the Roediger House, and knowing it would require culinary equipment like a gas grill or a bread machine, I happened upon yet another necessary item on a Sam's Club run, if memory serves: a classic wood bucket-style ice cream freezer with an electric motor and a hand-crank. (I never used the hand-crank.) I made quite a few tall cannisters of various ice creams with it over the years but it finally rusted out. I'd bought a replacement through Amazon in August 2017 but never put it to use before I undertook my big weight-loss effort the following year. (Oh, I make a lot of ice creams, but just in the smaller batches thanks to my Cuisinart countertop machine.)

When I came across a compelling recipe for peach buttermilk ice cream recently, but also found that it made about double the base needed for my countertop model, I decided to break out the big boy and break it in. I'm so glad I did, because this new ice-and-rock-salt maker churned the ice cream most excellently. And the ice cream itself was excellent and worthy of recommendation!

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Adapted from "Musings on Peach-Nectarine Buttermilk Ice Cream," from Carolyn Jung of the FoodGal.com blog. [Published 24 July 2013] Her recipe was adapted from The Animal Farm Buttermilk Cookbook by Diane St. Clair. A print-friendly pdf of the recipe is available.

Meal No. 3191: Murgh Makhani (Butter Chicken)

While I did not feel it scaled up well when I tried to double it for a crowd of six on Monday a week ago, it was still a pretty decent supper of murgh makhani for that weeknight gathering of the most regular Roediger House crew. It was another good time, not only around the dinner table but also for the casual laugh-filled hanging out up on the third floor.

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"Murgh Makhani (Butter Chicken)," from Sam Sifton of NYT Cooking.

Meal No. 3190: Jollof Rice and Chicken

It's been a nice run of new recipe experiments, with a decidedly international bent of late. Back on Saturday, September 10th, it was a highly successful trial of African jollof rice and chicken thighs. A sensational combination of spices, a touch of heat, tons of flavor...it all came together terrifically for a fine dinner feast.

I'd made another dessert to serve up at the meal's conclusion: hot chocolate pudding. Let me clarify: the pudding is chilled but its flavor is akin to that of hot chocolate. My single serving of it was insufficient but I remained strong in the face of temptation...until Sunday night when I was not so well restrained.

That dreary and all-day-rainy Saturday began with a quick trip out with Sumner once we got up, and I spied upon passing the window at the kitchen sink a hungry adorable visitor atop the platform bird feeder. While I'd like his cuteness and coloring to persuade me he is just a mouse, the large feet and hairless tail—and overall larger size—would suggest he's probably a roof rat. Not as yucky as the greasy other rats that we've also seen around here...but at that moment he was simply harmless enough.

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"Jollof Rice and Chicken," from Imma Adamu of Immaculate Bites, a blog found at AfricanBites.com. [Published 02 November 2020 / Updated 20 April 2021]

"Hot Chocolate Pudding," from the Food Network Kitchens.

Tasty Tangy Lime Sherbet

Sherbet is not a regular frozen dairy treat here, having appeared hardly at all on the dessert menu, so Friday a week ago it was a nice suprise when I was able to serve a delightful lime sherbet to go along with an impromptu evening visit from Kristen and Mookie. This was my second time making this recipe although it's good enough to be in a more regular rotation.

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"Lime Sherbet," from Kathy Berget of Beyond the Chicken Coop. [Published 09 June 2018 / Modified 20 April 2020]

Meal No. 3189: Pork Tenderloin Stirfry

Friday a week ago was a chance to try out another new recipe, and it was yet another winner: a Korean-inspired pork tenderloin stir fry. And it was not alone on the plate, because multiple piles of add-ons surrounded it, including Korean spinach salad, roasted broccoli florets, and the last of the leftover butter chicken basmati rice. A bigger supper than the day called for, but there was no limit to the enjoyment of it.

The meal itself was a delight, but its sheer size led to some feelings of guilt. Fortunately, all those calories were fuel for my best ever walking/running workout that evening, that took me from the Holly Avenue Neighborhood through the West End and up through Buena Vista, over to Ardmore, across through West Salem, up the main drag of Old Salem, and through downtown back home again. Grand total: 9.4 miles, at an average pace of 13'23" per mile.

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"Best Pork Tenderloin Stir Fry," by Rika Agustini of Posh Journal. [Published 02 June 2019 / Modified 16 May 2020]

"Siguemchi Namul (Korean Spinach Salad)," by Rika Agustini of Posh Journal. [Published 20 June 2016]

Meal No. 3188: Hamburger Supreme

When I realized I had grabbed but tucked away a package of fresh ground beef, back on Tuesday a week ago, I was in a bind for getting it cooked into something before it was too late to use it. I've got several go-to quick beef recipes that might have sufficed but I could not think of anything better that night than a comforting casserole of hamburger supreme, a long-time family favorite, a dish I've been making consistently for friends ever since the late 1980s...and a joyful supper for four of us that more recent evening.

Here's another milestone worth noting from that day: I've managed to keep up with my commitment on walking or biking, always exceeding the minimum of 30 minutes of exercise per day, and closing all three rings on my Apple Watch for 200 consecutive days.

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"Hamburger Supreme," from the late Mrs. John T. (Glynn) Johnson of Buies Creek, North Carolina, via Janice Jones Bodenhamer.

Meal No. 3187: Ultimate Cream of Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

Labor Day Monday this year was rainy and grey and dreary. But the house was warmed with the arrival of Mookie and Kristen for an evening hang, including some dinner. The weather called for soup, and I went with cream of tomato for our bowls. I also made a fun little loaf of peasant bread to turn into grilled cheese sandwiches, which were pretty awesome in their own right. While I either over-proofed the dough or simply had it too wet, it deflated some without becoming unpleasantly dense while baking. (These small successes in from-scratch bread-making are likely to render my previously much-used bread machine permanently stored away on the top shelf of the butler's pantry.)

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"Ultimate Cream of Tomato Soup," from Cook's Illustrated, November 1999. Recipe can also be found online at Cookography.com.

"Easy Same-Day Peasant Bread," from Jenny Rosenstrach of the CupofJo.com blog. [Published 02 February 2022] Adapted from Alexandra Stafford of AlexandraCooks.com. [07 November 2012 / Updated 06 January 2022]

Meal No. 3186: French Toast

A meal that could come together in under a half hour was the necessary call back on Labor Day Sunday, and French toast was perfect for the moment. It's another of the simple favorites here, with the distinct advantage of allowing breakfast for dinner from time to time.

Confession: it was so good, easy, and fast, I turned around and made it again three days later:

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"French Toast," from King Arthur Flour online.

Meal No. 3185: Roasted Salmon & Broccoli

I could not help myself! On September's first Saturday evening, when it was just a meal for me, I could not be dissuaded from running out for a fresh slab of salmon to spice and roast, along with more roasted broccoli florets.

Batches of Ice Creams

As August was coming to an end, I had an oversupply of heavy cream nearing its expiration date. While there are several different favorite uses for said ingredient, what could be better than ice creams, as in plural? So I made four different batches, three of which were successful and one which was a bit of a bust. I started with brown sugar cinnamon, putting aside a portion of it in a to-go container because I'd long ago promised to share a sample with neighbors across the street. Then, I went with a traditional authentic vanilla bean ice cream, shown above adorned with some of the hot fudge sauce (that was first made for the death by chocolate cake).

There was also butterscotch pecan, with the extra step of delicious roasted buttered pecans (that I could not also stop snacking on before I churned the base). It was pretty freakin' delicious. Ah, but the unsuccessful batch was eggnog ice cream, where I think the issue was my churn urn had not had enough recovery time in the freezer before being pressed into service...so it did not properly freeze the base. (I still ate the deflated result after letting it sit overnight in the freezer.)

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"Brown Sugar Cinnamon Ice Cream," from Heather Tullos of SugarDishMe.com. [Published 11 September 2015]

"Vanilla Ice Cream" (p. 35-36), from Bi-Rite Creamery's Sweet Cream and Sugar Cones, by Kris Hoogerhyde, Anne Walker, and Dabney Gough. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press (2012).

"Eggnog Ice Cream" (p. 58), "Butterscotch Pecan Ice Cream" (p. 44), and "Buttered Pecans" (p. 195), by David Lebovitz. In The Perfect Scoop, Berkeley/Toronto: Ten Speed Press (2007).

Meal No. 3184: Salmon Croquettes

The Friday evening at the front end of Labor Day Weekend involved a simple and somewhat skimpy meal, using up some leftover salmon from earlier that week: salmon croquettes, with the incredible and dependable chili-garlic-lime aïoli that originally came to me as a wise partner to crab cakes. Roasted asparagus cuts were on the side, all on a most fantastic downtown day.

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Adapted from "Salmon Burgers" (p. 396) and "Herb Sauce" (p. 395), from Denise Austin, Shrink Your Female Fat Zones, Rodale Books (2003).

"Chili-Lime Aïoli," from David Wald of Princeton, NJ, May 2009.

Meal No. 3183: Murgh Makhani (Butter Chicken)

September came on the scene in a clear-skied blue glory of breezes and gracious temps so that outside time required maximizing. But I retreated to the kitchen late that month-starting Thursday afternoon for a grander dinner undertaking, dicing onions and mincing garlic cloves and cutting up a couple of tomatoes. I'd put bone-in chicken thighs into a marinade of Greek yogurt and various spices that morning, and I portioned out additional spices (including a bonus dose of kashmiri chili powder) and various complementary other ingredients...all toward a grand skillet of incredible murgh makhani, also known as butter chicken. If the blog is to be believed, this is Butter Chicken No. 4, and by far the best yet. (No. 1: Meal No. 442; No. 2: Meal No. 1001; No. 3: Meal No. 1998.) Served over fresh basmati rice and with enough sauce to be utterly decadent, this counts as one of the awesome meals of the Roediger House kitchen.

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"Murgh Makhani (Butter Chicken)," from Sam Sifton of NYT Cooking.

Meal No. 3182: Sweet and Sour Chicken

When I made some tasty fried chicken strips near the end of August to go atop a salad, I had enough leftover for another meal on the final day of that month: sweet and sour chicken. With some fresh-steamed rice, some stir-fried vegetables, and that tasty special sweet and sour sauce, it was a filling mid-day meal on a gorgeous Wednesday in Winston-Salem.

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"Sweet-and-Sour Chicken," by Diane Unger. In Cook's Country, June/July 2016, p. 19.

Meal No. 3181: Roasted Salmon over Caesar-Topped Greens

The final Tuesday of August called for harvesting some tasty microgreens, a very thoughtful gift when neighbors Jessica and Mike came over not long before...and these fresh-clipped nutritious powerhouses were the crowning touch to a roasted salmon Caesar salad. On the strength of that meal intake, I managed a six-mile power walk of the West End neighborhood and across downtown and back, including a fair stretch of the Long Branch Trail. Later that evening, before bedtime, I added another two miles to my walking total that day.

Meal No. 3180: Spicy Fried Chicken Bites Salad with Buttermilk Ranch Dressing

Fried foods are few and far between at the Roediger House but on the final Monday afternoon of August, it's what I was drawn to: spicy fried chicken bites served on greens with a fresh-made buttermilk ranch dressing. Piled suitably high as a tribute to its rarity, it made for a pretty involved production for lunch, or dinner, or whatever: no other meal was needed that day.

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"Spicy Fried Chicken Bites with Buttermilk Ranch Dressing," by Will Coleman from TheKitchn.com. [Published 26 August 2022]

Death by Chocolate Cake

Back on August 27th, once we'd wrestled our Filipino chicken adobo into dinnerbell submission, we took a brief break upstairs to steel our courage for the grandiose dessert selection that evening: death by chocolate layer cake, a towering monstrosity with three deeply-velvety fudgy layers, rich chocolate buttercream frosting, and drizzles of homemade hot fudge sauce with every layer.

This was the deadly real deal, for sure, that robbed us briefly of our abilities to communicate coherently. Its lethal legacy propelled me to make immediate offers to neighbors to share slices so that the evil temptation would not long endure in easy reach.

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"Death by Chocolate Cake," by Ashley Manila of BakerByNature.com. [Published 15 September 2016]

"Hot Fudge Sauce," a recipe shared with me by former neighbor Jessica Atkinson.

Meal No. 3179: Filipino Chicken Adobo

On the final Saturday night of August, my full day in the kitchen drew to a wonderfully weary end as I wrangled into submission the enormous pile of dishes and pots and such, a testament to another great evening with friends here. At dinner time, I brought out a dish we'd all enjoyed a number of times before: Filipino chicken adobo. But for some reason, in spite of its winning appeal since I first made it in early 2012, it's been absent from the rotation since 2019 (701 meals ago!!). Good lord, I loved it that recent Saturday night! With a small sampling of roasted broccoli florets to add a touch of green goodness to our plates, it was a flavor-filled fun time with fantastic folks.

It was a super enough evening that my late-night discovery of a misbehaving candle in the foyer did not break my stride. All that spilled wax was relatively easy to scrape up, including the splatter pile on the floor that deceptively appears on first glance to merely be a reflection. Nope: it was more wax!

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"Introducing Chicken Adobo," by Bryan Roof. In Cook's Illustrated, March & April 2012, p. 6-7.

Lemon Burst Buttermilk Cake

Among the joys of life on Spring Street are the friends and acquaintances made just because there's a wonderful curious Roediger House pup who loves his outside time and who loves people...so he is a constant watcher on the wall. Over the years, various neighbors and neighborhood dog-walkers have come and gone but a few have become consistent and steady features of Holly Avenue Neighborhood life. At the end of August, it was a Saturday morning treat to get to show the house to Casey, one of those delightful neighbors, and also to offer her a sweet slice of lemon burst buttermilk cake (with tangy sugary lemon glaze!). It was a new recipe, and was a bit of a chore to pry out of the inadequately-prepared loaf pans, but we still enjoyed it!

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"Lemon Burst Buttermilk Cake," from Melissa Sperka of Melissa's Southern Style Kitchen blog. [Published 24 January 2016]

Meal No. 3178: Korean Beef Bowls

Times remain good here at the Roediger House, I must say, in these late days of summer as the new school year commences. This is still breaktime for me, while principals and teachers undertake classroom set-up and back-to-school nights and long drawn-out faculty meetings and mandated trainings on new programs. The week before last, I spent several concerted days with that extra time sorting a ridiculously enormous stack of printed and ripped out recipes I'd set aside, getting them filed away in my equally-ridiculous set of recipe notebooks in the butler's pantry. It worked well that the August 26th evening meal could be simple: Korean beef bowls, with a spicy-sweet rich flavor (a fresh bucket of gochujang paste was a winning ingredient). Alongside was a smashing small spinach salad, also of a Korean culinary bent. I was still spooning up beefy morsels from the dregs of the skillet on the stovetop after putting the spent dishes into the sink for washing up.

Speaking of that recipe collection meticulously filed away into notebooks, the above photo is from 2017 when I first got them set up; the photo below is from Sunday a week ago. I'd say things have expanded, wouldn't you?

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"Korean Ground Beef Stir Fry with Gochujang," by Rika Agustini of Posh Journal. [Published 27 June 2019]

"Siguemchi Namul (Korean Spinach Salad)," by Rika Agustini of Posh Journal. [Published 20 June 2016]