The Taste Buds

Cooking our way thru the Dallas Dish

Just left the February meeting of The Taste Buds.  I ate so much I can hardly breathe.  Another great meal. So far the Dallas Dish is a great cookbook.  This month Martha hosted Taste Buds.  We got about 4 inches of snow last night so the day started with worries of not being able to get up Martha's driveway, but never fear we all like to drink, cook, eat, and share so much that we found a way--all but one and she lives in the country and had some icy bridges to cross.  We missed you Beth and we sure missed the appetizer that we would have enjoyed.  Let us know how it turned out.

Our menu:

Specialty Drink:  Bloody Mary
Appetizer:           Snowed in, in the country.
Soup:                   Carrot Bisque
Salad:                   Arugula and Parmesan Salad
Main Course:       Basil-Stuffed Chicken with Caper Sauce
Side:                     Corn Souffle
Dessert:                Chocolate Souffles with Creme Anglaise
Wine - White:       Kendall Jackson Grand Reserve Chardonnay
             Red:         Root, 1 Cabernet Sauvignon

Now for a few pics:

Martha's gorgeous table.  Perfect since Valentine's Day is in 4 days.

 Peggy preparing the Bloody Marys

Posing for this pic--Martha, Peggy, Me and Patricia

Me and Jennifer enjoying our Bloody Marys by the fire

Peggy, Patricia, Lynn and Jennifer

Meet Anne(left) sitting with Lynn.  Anne could not be with us last month but she makes the 8th member of the Taste Buds

 Me pouring wine and the only picture of our delicious Carrot Bisque

 Me getting the wine and Jennifer, Peggy & Martha

Once again Me pouring wine and Patricia, Anne and Sarah Virden.  Since Beth could not be with us Martha's daughter, Sarah Virden, joined us.  Thank goodness--she saved my cork on one of the bottles of wine, since I absolutely did not know how to use their wine opener.  I am much better at pouring as you can see.  We sure enjoyed Sarah Virden!!!!

 Jennifer and Martha preparing to plate our food

Lynn, Patricia and Anne.  (Wish I knew what they were talking about.)

Basil-Stuffed Chicken with Caper Sauce, Arugula and Parmesan Salad, and Corn Souffle.

All delicious!!!

Chocolate Souffle with Creme Anglaise.  Delicious!!

Not a great photo, but a great dessert.

To accompany the souffles, Lynn also brought these darling cookies.  They were made by Diane, a local baker.  Also delicious.

Now take a look at these cute boxes of toffee.  Martha made the toffee and prepared these little boxes for each of us.  OMG, another delicious treat!! I'm not eating again until Friday.(haha)

Before we depart, we critique the recipes. We all agreed, they were all delicious.

Sorry, I did not take enough photos of the food, but I get so wrapped up in the food and fellowship with this great group of women that I just forget.  I will try to do better.  Can't wait til March.  See you then.

patti

This Week in My Kitchen

Ok folks.  This is what I am cooking this week.  I have a new Barefoot Contessa cookbook,
 How Easy Is That, so all but one of the recipes come from this book.

 From top left:  

Mustard Chicken Salad:  This looked so good and I needed something to have for lunch this week.
Results:  Very Tasty and a new slant on chicken salad.  Love the tomatoes and broccoli in this salad.

Lemon Chicken Breasts:  I love chicken and this recipe looked easy and somewhat healthy.
Results:  Good.  Lot of trouble for just good.

Garlic Roasted Cauliflower:  I have been wanting to try my hand at roasting cauliflower so here goes.  I'll let you know how it turns out.
Results:  Fabulous!!! I loved this.  So much better than steaming.  

Roasted Tomatoes and Individual Meatloaves: This sounds like a great combo.  Can't wait to try. These two recipes came from Food Network.
Results:  Great!!  I loved both the tomatoes and the meatloaves.  Lots of flavor in both.

This Week in My Kitchen

Here's what's cooking in my kitchen this week

Pork Chops with Mustard Sauce

                                                           

Chicken Paillard with Creamy Parmesan Salad

Pecan Cheesecake Bars

Chicken Mushroom and Swiss Quiche:  (Not Pictured)  I found this recipe in the  2009 Southern Lady Simply Southern Magazine.  It looks so good.
Results:  Good.  The egg mixture needs more salt.  Not sure I would make again.  Just ordinary.  I would prefer to try another recipe.

Pecan Cheesecake Bars:  This recipe also comes from the 2009 Southern Lady Simply Southern Magazine.  I had some cream cheese that needed to be used so this looked like a great recipe.
Results:  So good. What's not to like about this combination of ingredients.

Chicken Paillard with Creamy Parmesan Salad:  This is a Food Network Recipe by Tyler Florence.  I love his recipes and have been eyeing this one for some time.
Results:  Very easy, very quick, and very good!!!!  I was apprehensive about the salad dressing.  I think I would cut the lemon just a bit next time.  Even so, it was still delicious.  I could not find arugula in my little town so I used a spring mix.  Will definitely make again.  Thanks Tyler, I love your recipes. 

Pork Chops with Mustard Sauce:  I found this recipe on Fine Cooking web site.  I had the pork chops in my freezer and this seemed like a great way to use them.
Results:  Very easy and quick meal.  I only used 4 pork chops; however the recipe calls for 8.  If using 8,  I would double the mustard sauce.  I served with steamed broccoli and spooned a little of the mustard sauce on my broccoli.  Mmmm! 

Guess I better get to cooking.  Check back and I will give you the results and links.

This Week in My Kitchen

This is what I am cooking in my kitchen this week



Green Beans with Meyer Lemon Vinaigrette & Parmesan Breadcrumbs





Baked Chicken with Herbs, Garlic & Shallots



Rainbow Chard with Pine Nuts, Parmesan, and Basil

Baked Eggs with Chives and Cream

You are probably wondering why this combination of foods. I found all the recipes on the Fine Cooking website.  The chicken just looked good and simple, plus I had all the ingredients on hand. I went to the Fine Cooking website again looking for a recipe that I could use meyer lemons since I have 2 meyer lemon trees that have several lemons on them and wha--laa I found the green beans, so now I have a side and I get to use my tasty little lemons.  I have included a photo of my lemons for you to see.  They are sooo pretty!!!  The egg dish just looked good and I thought it would be a nice change from the chicken, especially since the chicken recipe will last me several meals.  The Rainbow Chard recipe was not initially planned.  When I went to my local Kroger to pick up a few things, I found the chard.  It was so pretty I decided to buy. So that is this week's recipes.  Check back and I will let you know how they turned out.

My beautiful meyer lemons

Baked Chicken with Herbs, Garlic & Shallots:  Results:   Great.  I really enjoyed this version of baked chicken.  I was surprised it had so much flavor.  My only compaint--sure wish you could find chicken that was not the size of Texas.  I will be making this again. 

Green Beans with Meyer Lemon Vinaigrette & Parmesan Breadcrumbs:  Results:  Yummy!! The Meyer Lemon Vinaigrette was delicious.  It would be good on almost anything--well maybe not bananas.  Loved, Loved, loved the parmesan breadcrumbs.  This is a great and pretty side.

Baked Eggs with Chives and Cream: Results:  Fabulous!!  How could anything so simple be this good?  Maybe it is because I love breakfast foods.  I served with bacon and it was oh sooooo good.  Can't wait to make and eat again.

Rainbow Chard with Pine Nuts, Parmesan, and Basil:  Results:  Well, I probably would not make this again.  It was not bad, it just was not good enough to make again---or maybe I just don't like swiss chard.  Either way, it is not a favorite.


Thought I would include my own photos of these recipes:

 Great Meal--the shallots were tasty too.

I bought these tiny cast iron skillets at Williams Sonoma some time ago.  They were so cute I could not resist.  When I saw the egg recipe, I knew I had a use for them.  Perfect!!



The Taste Buds

I am so excited to tell you about my cookbook club, Taste Buds.  We are eight women that started this club 3 years ago.  We meet 8 months of each year, January thru May and September thru November. We choose one cookbook to use each year, we meet at lunch, we cook in eight categories, we love to eat,  and most of all we have fun!!  The categories are specialty drink, appetizer, salad, soup, entree, side, dessert and bread and wine.  We each hostess the club once a year.  The month we hostess, we select the entree.  We then rotate the categories so that we each cook one recipe from each of the eight categories per year.  The bread and wine category is reserved for the member who was the hostess the prior month.

I am the hostess for January and this year we are cooking from Dallas Dish.  It is a cookbook from the Junior League of Dallas (duh). Since I decided to make the chicken enchiladas, I also suggested that we make our entire menu a Mexican/Southwestern theme. This was a first and it produced some great results.  If these recipes are any indication of the other recipes in this book, it is going to be a delicious 2011.   Our Menu:

Specialty Drink:   Mexitini
Appetizer:           Tomatillo and Avocado Salsa
Soup:                  Authentic Texas Chili
Salad:                  Layered Avocado Salad
Entree:                Green and White Chicken Enchiladas and Tomatillo Chicken Enchiladas
Side:                   Southwestern Squash
Dessert:              Easy Mexican Flan
Wine:                 Red - Cline Carignane
                           White- Dry Reisling by Pacific Rim
Now for a few pics:

My table with Mexican theme--thank you Beth

Isn't it great

 Martha, Jennifer and Lynn gathering in the kitchen with their food.  We just get so excited to share our food and recipe stories.

Jennifer, Me, and another Lynn.  Lynn was my guest from Oxford.  One of our members was unable to come so I invited my good friend.  We missed you Anne.  Hope to see you next time.

 Beth preparing the Mexitini--OMG this drink is the Bomb!!! You have got to try this.

The Mexitini

 Jennifer and Lynn enjoying the fabulous Mexitini.  Did I mention these were delicious!!

I did not have a pic of our appetizer, but this is a photo of tomatillos and they were the main ingredient in the salsa.  This recipe, Tomatillo and Avocado Salsa, was the second hit of the day.  The real reason I did not have any photos of this appetizer---I was too busy eating.  This salsa is to die for.  It is definitely going to be my new go to appetizer.  Wow!!!

As you can see in this photo, we all enjoyed the Mexitini (empty glasses) and the Tomatillo and Avocado Salsa(empty dip bowl).   From left--Lynn, Peggy, Beth and Patricia.

Peggy, Beth, Patricia and Martha.

The three of us might have had too many Mexitinis.

Peggy pouring our wine.

 From left, Lynn, Jennifer, Patricia, Peggy, Me, Martha, and Beth.  Our other member Lynn is taking the photo. 

 Eating the Authentic Texas Chili-Mmmm Good

As I said earlier, besides liking to cook and eat, we sure do have a lot of fun.

Although this plate is a bit full, it was all delicious.  Green & White Chicken Enchiladas, Tomatillo Chicken Enchiladas,  Layered Avocado Salad and Southwestern Squash. I was in desperate need of a nap after this fine meal.  Eat your heart out, Anne.

And finally, dessert--Easy Mexican Flan

Each month after we finish eating, we waddle to comfortable sofas and chairs and critique the recipes.  I did not tell you in the beginning, but here it is now--we follow the recipes exactly as printed.  This way when we are in critique mode, we do not critique the cook--only the recipe.  I got to tell you--this was one fabulous meal.  I will be making all these recipes again.  Check back next month for the February meeting of the Taste Buds.  See you then!!!!

Chicken Salad

While snowed in these past few days,  I decided to make chicken salad.  I know that does not sound like a warm and fuzzy recipe for a cold winter weekend,  but I had been wanting to try this recipe.  I had all the ingredients without going to the Kroger so it seemed like a logical recipe to me.  This Chicken Salad recipe came from Dallas Dish, a cookbook from the Junior League of Dallas.  The recipe had 3 different variations and I made the Southwest version.  Very Good!!

I do not have any pics for this salad (sorry), I promise I made it--just forgot to photograph.  I was too busy enjoying the great flavor.  Instead I included these pics of the snow--who doesn't like photos of beautiful snow.

 Isn't it beautiful!!