Week 9 - Clam Linguini & I'm blowin it!!!

So week 7 has far passed, I still have yet to type week 6's recipe and I truly should be on week 9 now I think... Thank God for pre-dating and free-will - I can post whenever I want and unless you check daily (stalker!) you'll never notice how much of a slacker I am... I'm fudging here and posting 9 prior to 7 and 8 - sue me!

Week 9 - Clam Linguine - this recipe comes straight from my Dad's new wife, (my 2nd step mom, damn Cancer!!! She's very cool!) I have tasted many seafood pasta recipes in my life, I love seafood and while not a full pescetarian, I'd say it overwhelms my red meat consumption by over 75%. Bottom Line, this recipe was BAR NON the BEST clam linguine I've ever tasted - I'd pay top dollar for it in a upscale coastal restaurant and not even bat an eyelash... It's not creamy, not fatty and doesn't leave that traditional film in your mouth and throat I'd typically experience after a hearty seafood pasta dish like this - the trick here is there are no creams, very little fat and lots of flavor that comes from the clams themselves.

I find posting the recipe on AR (All Recipes) first then posting a link or copying the format here is far easier - so that said, I'll detail the Mediterranean Dish and this one there and re-post here by mid next week - I also have yet another Shrimp dish I might use as a filler to catch up that I've already posted there...

Hope you all enjoy your Halloween and were able to get creative on a few "Spooktacular" dishes!

Happy Cooking!

~Jeff

Week 6: Mediterranean Dinner

So as I look in the stores for something that pops, from time to time I find myself flipping a frozen meal over that looks good only to find it's packed full of stuff that probably didnt even exist when I was born. I hate to say it but I am now begining to realize how much "chemistry" is going into our food to make it last longer, colors brighter or save some flavor that would be lost in the processing - today I took on an entire meal - made fresh with only the ingredients I needed - this is the first week I can honestly say there were no processed foods involved - even the herbs were fresh, my sore wrist can prove how much mincing, dicing and slicing went on today. This is not a quick dinner you can throw together on a week night after work - I created approximately 4 servings and spent about 5 hours doing so, but, boy was it worth it!!!

Tonights dinner was "Mediterranean Inspired" from marinated Lamb and Beef Kabobs to Curried Beef Couscous finished off with a phenominal salad dressing with crumbled feta and kalamata olives, dinner started at about 10:00am this morning...

My inspiration, a vaccum sealed referated package of beef and lamb kabobs that had so many ingredients it was close to two paragraphs - the kicker said "May contain tree nuts" What?!?!? I quickly pulled out the Blackberry and began to review the similar dishes google presented me - not one really sang loud but some if the ingredients sounded good and so I began my 1.5 hour stay in the market. A few spice lables later I found even they are being processed - there should only be "Oregano" in my "Oregano", but there were like 4 ingredients, except for the curry powder, it simply said "Curry powder" so I went over to the produce aisle - there stood before me fresh, single ingredient herbs - I knew it would be a lot more work but I grabbed my oregano, parsley, mint, garlic, green onions and lemons as well as a fresh lettuce box that only had the lettuce I wanted in it, to the butcher and got angus beef cubes ($3.50 for 3/4 lb) and fresh lamb cubes ($4.75 for 3/4 lb) - found an extra virgin olive oil with only olive oil in it and stumbled upon a boxed couscous with only ingredients I recognized in it - even some bamboo skewers that said, Ingredients: Bamboo

So the recipes are coming soon, I am still hashing them and I am really running behind on this project - this for sure could have been served in a fine dining establishment, was much healthier and was a lot of fun to create... I promise to get the recipe up soon!

Happy Eating!

~Jeff