Mashed Potato Cakes

Tonight for dinner I used the leftover mashed potatoes from last night. I made really delicious mashed potato cakes and served them with a little sour cream and apple sauce. I also cooked some broccoli and seasoned it with a little salt and some butter - almost instant dinner. My daughter loved it and it was ready super fast!

Mashed Potato Cake

• 1 beaten egg
• 1/3 cup flour
• salt
• pepper
• 1-2 Tbs dried minced onion (or grate a fresh onion, or saute some chopped onion in olive oil and add)

Combine potato with egg, flour, salt, pepper and onion. Form into thick patties and dredge in a little extra flour

Heat 1 Tbs butter and 1 Tbs olive oil in a cast iron skillet, add cakes and let cook over medium heat for 2-3 mins without disturbing until a golden crust forms, flip and cook other side about 2 more mins. Serve with sour cream and applesauce.

Grape leaves, mashed potatoes and a Greek Almond Cake

Tonight for dinner I made a Greek inspired menu: Grape leaves, stuffed with rice and lamb seasoned with cinnamon, mashed potatoes to soak up the sauce from the grape leaves, simple buttered green beans and a wonderful cake called Amygdalopita with ground almonds and semolina soaked with a spiced simple syrup.

Grape Leaves

• 1/2 lb ground lamb
• 1/2 lb ground beef
• 1/2 cup rice
• 3/4 cup water
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• salt and pepper
• grape leaves
• 1 can tomato sauce
• juice from 1 lemon

Make rice - combine rice and water, bring to a boil reduce heat cover tightly and simmer 20 mins. Brown beef and lamb in a cast iron skillet, drain fat, add cinnamon and salt and pepper. Add rice. Set aside to cool. Blanch grape leaves (I separate the leaves and lay them in a large casserole pan and pour boiling water over to cover and let sit for 10 mins) Lay individual leaves on a work surface, place one tsp - 1 Tbs filling, depending on size of leaf, on base of leaf fold sides over filling and roll up tightly. Placed filled leaves seam side down in a large dutch oven. Pour 1 can tomato sauce over, pour 1 can water over pour in juice from one lemon, weigh down the top with a heavy dish and bring to a boil lower heat and simmer 45 mins

Make mashed potatoes, make green beans.

For cake see my youtube channel

Lamb Curry and Royal Rice

OK, already I didn't post last night - but here it is. I made a lamb curry and a quick royal rice to go with. The lamb curry used a simple yogurt marinade for the lamb, and the rice included rasins and cashews sauted in ghee - which my daughter loves!

For the curry I used part of a boneless leg of lamb, cut into 1" cubes.

Lamb and Spinach Curry

• 1 lb lamb, cut into cubes
• 1 cup plain yogurt
• 2 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 2 tsp coriander
• salt and pepper
• lemon juice from a lemon if you have it
• 1 cut up onion
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• 1 can diced tomatoes
• 2 Tbs tomato paste
• 1 lb peeled cubed potato
• 2 tsp yellow curry powder
• 1 lb spinach
• 2 Tbs oil or ghee

combine yogurt with spices, add lamb and let marinate for 2-8 hours

heat oil or ghee in cast iron skillet, saute onion and garlic

add lamb with marinade, tomatoes and tomato paste and potatoes, curry powder - bring to a boil, lower

heat to a simmer and cook for about 1 hour. Add spinach.

Serve hot with

Royal Rice

1 cup basmati rice

1.5 cups water

1 cinnamon stick

6 whole cloves

add rice to water with cinnamon and cloves, bring to a boil lower heat and cover tightly

let simmer for 25 mins.

Steep saffron in 2 Tbs boiling water for 10 mins while rice is cooking, add 1 tsp sugar and 1 tsp cardamon

saute 1/4 cup chopped cashews and 1/4 cup raisins in 1 Tbs hot ghee or oil

Add saffron water and nuts and raisins to rice, fluff and serve

Out to dinner

Tonight I made reservations...out to a local steakhouse, where I will most likely

order the bone in fillet Mignon - no cooking tonight!

This morning though I made crepes, with sugared bananas for filling - I love crepes because I wake up very early anyway, so I just blend up the batter and pop it in the fridge - then when everyone else is up the batter has sat long enough so that the bubbles have settled, which makes it easier to make the crepes. I use a medium saute pan, a little butter and about 1/4 cup of batter per crepe. I eat mine with just a little butter and sugar, but I usually toss some fresh fruit with a touch of sugar to fill my daughters:

Easy Crepe Recipe

• 3 Tbs melted butter
• 1/2 cup water
• 3/4 cup milk
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup flour
• 2 Tbs sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla

Blend in a blender and refrigerate for at least 1 hour and up to 24. Use about 1/4 cup of batter per crepe. Butter a medium saute pan and heat over medium heat, pour in batter and swirl around to coat bottom of pan, cook for about 30 sec per side. Take off and sprinkle with a little sugar and fold in 1/4s.

For banana filling:

cut up a reasonably ripe banana and sprinkle with 1 Tbs sugar and 2 tsp lemon juice, fill crepe

you can serve with whipped cream if you want

Pizza ....

Tonight I made pizza - easy dough, let mydaughter help. She rolled a personal pizza for herself, then we did some simple, classic toppings and a quick salad and some broccoli/cauliflower and almost instant dinner. She chose mushrooms and black olives to complement her sauce and mozzarella and I stuck to just the addition of mushrooms...

Pizza Dough

1 cup hot w

ater

1 pkg dry

yeast

1 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp olive oil

2-3 cups all purpose flour

proof the yeast in the water with the sugar to feed it, after it gets all foamy add the olive oil

salt, and flour (only add about 1.5 cups at first) if you have a standing mixer with a dough

hook, use this and stir the flour in at low speed and the rest of the flour and increase the speed and let

the mixer do its job adding more flour a little at a time if needed until a single ball of dough forms, then let the mixer knead it for few more minutes. Turn it out, knead by hand a bit for love and put it in an oiled bowl to let rise for about an hour. Punch it down and cut it in half and roll each half out into a circel. Heat a pizza stone in the oven at around 450, sprinkle

with cornmeal or polenta place crust on top and fold over edges to make a lip. Prick all over with a fork and bake for about 7 mins.

add sauce, cheese, oregano, mushrooms, a drizzel of of oil etc and pop back in the oven until cheese melts

Minestrone and Lingonberry Bread

Its cold outside, and I haven't posted here for ages, but I am going to try and see if I can stick with sharing what we have for dinner for the next 30 days...here goes with tonight - way too much to do today, with a late swimming lesson for my daughter starting on Thursdays - so I made a winter minestrone earlier, but didn't add the pasta or spinach until we got home - also made some lingonberry bread from a fancy mix I had gotten ages ago... the minestrone recipe is on my youtube site, but its really easy and I vary it according to what I have on hand -

Easy Winter Minestrone

dice up an onion, some carrots, celery and garlic, saute in a little olive oil

add about 6-8 cups of chicken broth (i always use low sodium if its not from scratch)

add a can of diced tomatoes

some dried basil, rosemary, thyme

salt and freshly ground pepper

2 zucchini diced

a yellow squash diced

bring to a boil and then lower heat

add a can of white kidney beans (cannellini) rinsed and drained

then about 20 mins before serving bring to a boil, add 1 cup of ditalini (or other small tube shaped pasta) and 1/2 lb fresh baby spinach lower heat and let cook until pasta is done

add a rind of parm if you have one in the beginning and serve with a little bit of freshly grated parmesan

you can leave out the spinach, add more or less tomatoes, add a diced potato or two, add some oregano, add some fresh parsley, a can of red kidney beans - or even chick peas, and you can always serve it with a big spoon of fresh pesto (either made with basil or parsley)

Crab Salad Stuffed Tomatoes

These fun and easy appetizers were inspired by my belief that if you present a
child with attractively plated food in a fun way you can get the child to eat just about anything -
I had no tuna, no eggs and wanted to make a quick lunch for my daughter - she eats tuna salad and egg salad - but crab salad? (Crab meat I had - coupled it with some mayo, chopped capers, diced celery and a little salt, pepper and old bay seasoning, instant crab salad)

All I did was cut the tops off some cherry tomatoes, scoop out the insides (which, as an added healthy bonus, she actually ate all the pulp calling it 'fresh tomato soup') and stuffed the tomato shells with the crab salad - she ate them all!! These look so pretty and you can do them ahead - and of course, you could stuff them with egg salad or tuna salad or whatever...