Outside the dugout: What's cooking?

Tomorrow night a friend from San Diego is coming to town and my wife and I are have two more friends over for dinner and an evening of bridge. It is just coincidence that both are happening the same evening.

So my wife asked me to make this shrimp and pasta dish that I make with sun dried tomatoes, roasted red peppers, and cream. My friend from California is gluten-free so I might cook up some bomba rice (the rice in authentic paella that my MIL scored for me on her trip to Portland after I made a paella-like recipe and complained that I didn't have the correct rice) for his serving instead of the penne pasta.

As a special treat for tomorrow night I made a dish that I saw on Anthony Bourdain's show when he went to Peru in Season 1. (I am binge watching his CNN show on Netflix right now.) It is a terrine with layers of avocado, some from of protein and I used crab meat because I like crab and that was used in the show, and mashed potatoes. The name for the dish is Causa Limena, but I don't think that they mentioned that in his show. Eggs might be in it, but are not required. I don't like eggs so I left them out.

The way I prepared it has cilantro, scallion, and lime juice in the crab meat; tumeric and cayenne in the mashed potatoes; and only lime juice in the avocado. The avocado layer is on top, the crab layer is in the middle, and the potato layer is on the bottom. It is setting up in the fridge right now. I did let the crab and lime juice play with each other for about one hour at room temperature before building the terrine. I like how the acid from the limes interacts with the uncooked crab.

 

Not as hard as it sounds and a lot less work than making a proper posole rojo or a chicken mole from scratch. Those take most of the day.

Getting ready to fire up the kitchen. Good thing I spent the time this morning to peel and devein two pounds of medium shrimp. That does take some time if you try to get all of the meat out of the tail flippers like I do.

 

Grouper is so wonderful.

Anybody that cooks it and it is bad should be banished from the kitchen.

 

On Saturday night I made a Moroccan spiced chicken dish that I had not tried before and it was a huge hit. On Sunday I was all cooked out and we had take out pizza from Big Lou's.

Tonight it is a Thai-style (but not a Thai dish) clam soup/stew over rice.

 

I like Big Lou's better, but not by a whole lot. They use a lot of oil like some of the places I loved in Chicago growing up. Chicago pizza is not just deep dish.

I miss Ruscitto's as well. They had a great red scungilli sauce. Also Manero's on Hawthorne Road, Vecchio's on 441 well south of town, and Casa Palermo in an old house a little south and west of downtown when going down the memory lane of Gainesville Italian restaurants that are long gone. I never was a fan of Tony and Pat's, though.

 

Tonight is carnitas served on corn tortillas with pico de gallo and a tomatillo/avocado guac. Everything homemade except the corn tortillas. I also have some queso fresco for those that would want that, but I prefer my carnitas without. And I use epazote in my carnitas and guac instead of Mexican oregano. Not too much to overpower the dish, but just enough to give a hint of its flavor.

I think that I have enough tequila and Cointreau to make a few before dinner margaritas.

 

I did do a drive-by post where somebody asked where the best bbq in Gainesville was and I said "My house" as a joke.

Ed's is long gone. They had really good goat.

 

La Familia is very good and have been for a LONG time. I also like Mi Apa, but they are more recent.

There used to be a place up in Thornbrook (sp?) that had some very good Cuban/Puerto Rican food, but I don't think they lasted very long.