Porky Roast with Scalloped Potatoes

Tonight, a pork roast, cooked in a dish with olive oil, garlic and onions, in the oven with scalloped potatoes from a box (sale on Betty Crocker’s at Lucky this week (4 for $2!)) at 325°F for about an hour, accompanied by garlic steamed fresh green beans / haricôts verts, and grilled portabella mushrooms (marinated first with olive oil, salt and black pepper).

Fried Chicken

It’s Friday night, so G&T and L joined us for dinner and Wii… For a change of pace, J fried up chicken, Southern-style in the skillet, one of our favorite meals. We boiled some potatoes up and mashed them up with a little rosemary and garlic and lots of butter, of course. In addition, we reheated the red beans and rice, cornbread and green beans from a couple nights ago, and I sautéed some asparagus in lemon and butter and steamed a broccoflower. A what? A broccoflower- the genetic mutant bastard child of broccoli and cauliflower. Steamed, and served with a little sesame oil and fresh crushed garlic, it’s quite good. G&T brought some red wine, an ’06 pinot noir from Sonoma Creek.

Southern Ham and Beans

A treat tonight- one of J’s Southern family-style meals! Pan-fried ham steak with red-eye gravy, red beans and rice (a mix from a package, but they are damned good), and a pot of J’s family heirloom Virginia half-runner beans that have been passed down for at least four generations by now. They’re a little tougher than your typical haricôts verts, so J puts them in the old-school pressure cooker with some bacon (we’re out of salt pork) to tenderize and flavor them. They’re delicious and grew so well in the garden last year, we’ll be planting more soon.

J baked a skillet cornbread from scratch with onions and Sriracha in it. We started off with a California-syle green salad (lettuce, tomato, avocado, cucumber, carrots and green onions) with the vinaigrette dressing I made the other night. (Did I mention there’s a tutorial on making a vinaigrette salad dressing coming up?)

And to finish off, PIE! Blueberries, cherries and peaches mixed together, with Ben & Jerry’s cinnamon bun ice cream to top it off. Sometimes it really is better to be cooked for than it is to cook!

Mothy’s Open Dinner Thread

As she suggested, here’s a thread where you all can list what YOU had for dinner on March 18, 2008. I’ll post my dinner later (as it’s not even noon yet, here…). I’ll update the tags regularly, so it will get indexed properly with the other posts.