Fettucine con Vongole

Good Morning, everyone!  Just wanted to share my attempt at the boyfriend's favorite dish - Spaghetti con Vongole.  (aka pasta with clams in wine sauce.)  Switched up the spaghetti for fettucine, but overall a fantastic dish...

Do the pasta while you're making the clams, trust me, this is a fast one.  1/4c EVOO, saute up 4 cloves of garlic and a pinch of red pepper flakes for a couple minutes.  Add the clams, 3/4c white wine (I used pinot grigio) and juice of 1 lemon.  Cover with a lid and cook about 7 minutes until the clams open up.  I then removed the clams to a bowl, added some sliced cherry tomatoes, and let the sauce cook until the cherry tomatoes got soft and the pasta was done.  Add the pasta to the sauce, let cook for a few minutes to soak up the sauce, and then plate.  To the plate, top with the clams and some sprinkled parsley.  Voila!

Lasagna

Is there anything more comforting and classic than homemade lasagna?  Here's the recipe and the pictures of a fabulous homemade lasagna I made for my boyfriend the other night:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Worlds-Best-Lasagna/Detail.aspx

Nom nom nom!  Okay, let's break this down a little!  First and foremost - would have totally looked cooler if I did an extra layer, but whatever.  The sauce - do it in the Crock Pot.  Let it simmer all day and your house will smell like heaven.  I used deli sliced mozzarella on the inside and fresh mozzarella on top.  I also used fresh parsley and basil instead of dried.  Delicious!  And its even better if you make the day beforehand, let it sit in the fridge, and then bake it the next day!  Perfect weekend cooking for the work week ahead!

Pork Fried Rice Leftovers

Okay, so last week, we made a chile rubbed pork tenderloin with a rich sauce a la Bobby Flay.  It was a great recipe, but what do you do with the pork leftovers???  Easy!  Some garlic, some scallions, leftover veggies, some ginger, a little soy, leftover rice - pork fried rice!

Fish and Chips Leftovers

Good Morning, All!  So last Sunday, we made a traditional fish and chips meal using cod.  We ended up with a couple of leftover pieces, so decided to Round 2 the recipe into something complete different.  Here's what we ended up with:

Doesn't that look great?  Okay, so we simply reheated the onion and bacon tart from Sunday night.  Then Jennifer made a great red cabbage slaw for some bite and acidity.  We peeled the breading of the fish, then sauteed it up quickly with lemon juice, white wine, capers, cherry tomatoes, and green onions.  The piece de la resistance was adding a little of that Land o' Lakes garlic&herb butter things to it.  This was delicious!  You never would have known it was a next day recipe!  

Tuna Steak Leftovers

Why, hello there!  Fancy meeting you here.

 

So the problem with buying 3 large tuna steaks for only 3 people is that you end up with about 1.5 lbs of leftover tuna.  Soooooo....  I was invited over for "the heck with it" leftover night.  Here is a great way for you all to use up pretty much ANY fish!  We did "build your own spring rolls."  Keep in mind - you can buy spring roll wrappers from most grocery stores, or Asian markets, for super cheap.  And you can keep them in a cupboard and they won't go bad!

 

Here's our beautiful leftover tuna:

 

 

 

The first plate was from our meal on Sunday.  The second plate was the leftover tuna steak.  We drizzled with soy, coated in sesame seeds and then quickly sautéed up for approximately 1.5 minutes per side in EVOO with a splash of sesame oil!

 

 

Final Spring Roll Product:

 

 

We used yesterday's avocado and mango, and combined it with some leftover chopped romaine from lunches earlier in the week.  Also added some sliced cucumber (always in Jennifer's fridge) and bottled wasabi.  Fantastic!

 

 

And Jennifer even used up the last of the nori sheets from a dinner a few weeks back and tried her hand at some fresh sushi:

 

 

 

Yup.  That was our Monday night leftover-inspired meal.  See you soon!

Random Saturday Night Salad

I had big plans Saturday night.  With my dog, a bottle of wine, a good book and a plan of doing a self-pedicure, taking a long bath, and enjoying total relaxation for a change.  So I figured I'd make a great salad and then have some leftovers for lunch on Monday to bring to work.  I came across the recipe below and quickly emailed it off to Jenn saying "going to try this out tonight, doesn't it look awesome?"  I got a quick response "oh my god, yes, we need to try that for the blog!"  Then I wrote back "have any dinner plans tonight?" and my evening of staying home alone and relaxing quickly changed course to a last minute fabulous night with my partners in crime!  (And I left Ozzy at home!  But before you judge, I sliced up a nice steak for him before I left!)

 

Grilled Peppercorn Steak and Caramelized Pecan Salad with Cabernet-Cherry Vinaigrette

 

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Grilled-Peppercorn-Steak-and-Caramelized-Pecan-Salad-with-Cabernet-Cherry-Vinaigrette/Detail.aspx

 

 

We added some freshly made garlic bread, and then boiled some cut up potatoes and sautéed them in that new Land O'Lakes Cooking Spread "stuff" that they sell near the butter.  (FYI - those things are amazing... can't wait to play around with them!!!)

 

The salad was insane.  I am personally a die-hard fan of "petite sirloin" steaks.  Mostly because you can get them really cheap when they are on sale, and they are basically perfect individual portions!  The marinade is fabulous, although I used Dijon, and I used a mortar and pestle to crack whole peppercorns.  There wasn't as much of a pepper-ish taste as I was expecting - maybe I should have crushed them more.  We also used a box of "herb salad mix" from Stew's, and that was perfection. 

 

Side note - Port.  I picked up a "Bogle Petit Sirah Port" because their normal Petite Sirah is quite possibly my favorite "everyday" wine on the planet.  (For under $12/bottle, folks!)  The port was just ok.  It was more of a dessert wine than a port - very sweet.  But for the price, a great cooking port!

 

So anywho... that was Saturday night.  And there's leftover steak for me to bring to work on Monday!  (Except I'll substitute a bottle of Raspberry Pecan Vinaigrette for the Cabernet Vinaigrette... it is a workday, after all!)

What Is This New Blog?

Hello, Culinary Sundays followers!!!

 

Soooooo...  we've decided to create another "Culinary Sundays" blog dedicated mostly to leftovers, but also random weekday meals, décor and design tips, and anything else we deem of some interest.  (For example, possible homemade dog biscuits and stuff of that nature.)  This will be a rather informal blog, it won't be updated on a specific basis, but updated as we see fit or feel inspired.  It's rather selfish on my part, actually.  I came up with the idea as a way to force me to make myself lunch for the work week.  I always say I'm going to make lunch, then I get lazy and end up ordering food at the office, spending money and eating sub-par greasy food.  If I know I'm going to blog about what I hope will be some fun and lovely work-place lunches, then I'll probably hold myself more accountable to my goal.  (And let's be honest... anyone who works in an office understands what I'm talking about... you say you're going to bring something from home - and then you get in on that pizza, or order that crappy salad from a local restaurant.)  On the flip side, John and Jenn are huge leftovers people.  While I tend to let leftovers sit in my fridge until the next quarter when I see a Tupperware in the back collecting dust, they recreate insane meals that you would never know were made from "cleaning out the fridge."  So therefore, we're combining our forces and going to share our silly day-to-day culinary antics with you all.  Give us some time and be a little patient while we figure this out, but I promise we'll have some fun with it!