flickr photo by Arlo Bates

My wife and I had some friends over for dinner tonight, as a non-seder Passover celebration, just to hang out and enjoy some good food and company. Inspired by reading Dr. Sue’s Open That Bottle Night blog post, I decided to open a dusty birthday present from years ago to go along with the lamb chops I was making. It ended up being delicious, a dry red wine, as it said on the bottle, with a beautiful dark burgundy color. I made lamb chops with a pan sauce (referring to the Joy of Cooking a bit to get the general idea). My wife made soup, sides and dessert and our friends brought another bottle of wine and a fancy salad. I’m so glad we were inspired to open the wine, it was awesome to share a good meal and good wine.

Here’s the full menu:

1999 Barone Cornacchia Montepulciano d’Abruzzo

Vegetarian matzoh ball soup

Mixed greens with dried cranberries, candied walnuts and goat cheese

Green beans with almonds

Curried apples with sweet potatoes

Lamb chops with red wine reduction

Chocolate-covered matzoh and candied fruit slices

Quick tip - my parents have a Meyer Lemon tree in their backyard. I got a big bag of lemons from the tree to make a delicious sorbet, but it turned out I only needed eight lemons, not a giant bag-full. So I juiced all of the lemons, then put the juice into an ice cube tray. Perfect for cocktails or just with some club soda.

Success! After a do-over due to failed yeast, I made a tasty loaf of Classic Sandwich Bread from the King Arthur Flour website. I used nonfat milk and 2 cups of white bread flour and one cup of whole wheat. It turned out delicious!

My first try, which failed, was because my yeast was dead. I followed the directions (I thought), and it smelled yeasty, but once I mixed it all together and kneaded it in the mixer, with the dough hook, it never got past the sticky stage. I let it sit overnight but it never got to the ‘fingerprint doesn’t bounce back’ stage of the first rising. I googled a lot for ‘failed dough’ and tried some of the dough to make breadsticks but they didn’t quite taste right.

This time, I made sure the water was nice and hot (110 degrees F) and stuck the measuring cup with the water and yeast into our turned-off oven (since the rest of the apartment is so cold). You can see from the pictures that it is much more bubbly and frothy when the yeast is actually working. After that, I just followed the recipe and used both the thump and temperature test at the end. Result: tasty home-made bread!

Bad yeast

Good yeast

Today’s project was some delicious belgian waffles. mmm! I made them a little healthier than the recipe called for, but didn’t do any super low-fat, apple-sauce substitutions. I used the Joy of Cooking recipe, which is:

Preheat the waffle iron. Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl:

• 1 3/4 cups flour (I used whole wheat)
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Blend well in another bowl:

• 3 eggs (I used 2 eggs and 2 whites)
• 1/2 to 2 sticks butter (I used a half stick, melted in the microwave)
• 1 1/2 cup milk (I used nonfat)

Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the wet ingredients. Combine with a few swift strokes of the whisk.

They came out amazingly well, thanks to a good waffle iron and some home-made maple syrup from a friend in upstate New York. Delish!