Kevin's Watch

To honor and celebrate Mexican culture today, SD made a lovely albódingas for dinner. It was light, refreshing, and warming, perfect for today’s wet, windy, dreary, and cool weather here in the Pacific Northwet. And a nice break from the typical tacos, burritos, and enchiladas.

Menolly brought home Hatch peppers and an ear of corn from Hopelink. I had a few roasted chicken drums left from a previous night's dinner, so I whipped up a Chili Relleno casserole that fed the three of us for two nights.

As always, I took multiple liberties, but this is the base recipe: Chili Relleno Casserole

Savor Dam wrote: ↑ Menolly brought home Hatch peppers and an ear of corn from Hopelink. I had a few roasted chicken drums left from a previous night's dinner, so I whipped up a Chili Relleno casserole that fed the three of us for two nights.

As always, I took multiple liberties, but this is the base recipe: Chili Relleno Casserole

This was really good! I’ve had sensory issues with peppers lately, but this went down nicely. SD took the time to first oven roast the peppers before layering the casserole, which I think helped immensely.

Thanks for sharing that. It looks and sounds delicious! One of the things I miss from living in NM is the prevalence of hatch chilies.

For as long as I lived here, @Savor Dam has served bratwurst on this day, saying it is “traditional.” I have no idea when or how the tradition started, but I do know his humorous reason as to why.

This year SD came across a recipe for Nam Sod, Thai pork salad and offered it as an alternative to the bratwurst, saying it met the traditional requirements. While I always love beer braised brats, Dam-sel and I were both happy to try something new.

The dish was served with lettuce leaves to make lettuce cups and steamed white rice.


It is certainly a colorful dish! The dressing is a bit potent, but I found it to be tasty.

Tori Avey’s Mushroom Barley Soup made with half Instant Pot poultry bone broth and half Instant Pot vegetable broth was for dinner tonight.



https://toriavey.com/mushroom-barley-soup/

Making beef fajitas, rice, refried beans tonight.

The Luck o’ The Irish Americans to Ye!

Dinner last night was my traditional corned beef and cabbage to acknowledge and enjoy St. Patrick’s Day.


Sliced corned beef.
I used a flat cut, rather than a point cut, even though I prefer the extra fat of the point cut. But the past few years the point cuts have shredded rather than sliced nicely.

However, I also added an extra step of resting the brisket for half an hour after the 12 hour cook in the crockpot. It definitely firmed up the meat a little; in fact the taste was a little too dense for my liking. Not dry, but dense.

I think I’ll try the same method next year, but I’ll go back to the point cut and see if the extra step works.


Carrot, parsnip (was supposed to be turnip, but @Savor Dam picked up the ingredients and apparently misheard me), onion, potato, and cabbage


Fresh out of the oven Irish Soda Bread


The top buttered and sprinkled with cinnamon sugar


Removed from the Pullman loaf pan and cooling before slicing.


An interior view of the soda bread.

I used dried cranberries instead of raisins or currents. I asked SD to reconstitute the dried cranberries by simmering in whiskey for 20 minutes and allowing them to cool for me as I was working and was already pushing timing by making a quick bread after work for dinner the same night. I find dried fruit mixed straight into the dough remain too chewy for me. This was perfect.


My dinner plate.

I did corned beef in the crock pot.

With onions, carrots, red potatoes, parsnips.
Added a Guinness beer.

Cooked at low for 7 hours. Added cabbage for last hour.