Quick, Mama, I'm Hungry. What's For Dinner?

When you have children with busy lives, who flit in and out of the house at all different hours, it becomes a tad challenging to be able to prepare a meal on their very important time schedule, so you can accommodate them and their agenda.

Yeah ... What's wrong with this picture?
I am nothing if not trainable.

So, back to the diner and my life as a short order cook.
Youngest Hawthorne appears, with a friend, of course, both seriously hungry.
They need to eat. Now.

So, let's see what Rosie can whup up in 10 minutes or less.


Earlier, Rosie had seen a recipe for a cheese dipping sauce in the local paper and was already preparing that. With certain tweaks and adjustments, of course.

The recipe called for:

2 cups Cheddar cheese, grated
2 cups pepper Jack cheese, grated
1 packet Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing
2 TB butter
2 tsp garlic
2 tomatoes, peeled, cored, seeded, and diced

2/3 cup heavy cream

Dixie's nose was working overtime what with the cheese on the counter.

I halved the recipe. First, I grated cheddar and mozzarella cheeses (I had no pepper Jack) and added 1/2 a packet of the Ranch dressing mix. Whoot! A seasoning packet. And if I really wanted to semi-Ho this arrussuppee, I could've used the pre-grated cheese packages.

Mince your garlic. Of course you could use jarlic.
Peel your tomato.

I cored, seeded, and diced my tomato.

Saute the garlic and tomato in a bit of butter for about a minute.

Add in the cheese.

Pour in the cream.

I had gone outside earlier and found these lovely asparaguses (asparagi) ready to be picked.

So here are my dippables.
Asparagus, broccoli, and carrots.
But really, you could use anything you have.
Smelly gym socks, oily rags.
Really, anything in your pantry.

M. Hawthorne and I test tasted the dip and found it to be somewhat lacking.

So, we added some Golden Velvet Cheese.

Ok. Ok. Velveeta.



I don't know what it was doing in my pantry.
Someone must have put it there.

Then, I added a bit of cream cheese, some cumin, chili powder, cayenne, salt and pepper, heated it all through.
And it is palatable.

It was at this point that Youngest Hawthorne came in with an appetite.

I quickly fried a tortilla shell.

I nuked my leftover chili and beans.
Poured it over the tortillas with the cheese sauce and some sour cream.

Then topped with shredded lettuce.

Total time from whining to dining?
Maybe 5 minutes.
And they cleaned their plates.

Now, on to the adult meal.
Good neighbor Bob had kindly brought over some flounder fillets for us the night before.
Mr. Hawthorne seasoned them with salt and pepper, drizzled a bit of olive oil over top, and added a few veggies.


A quick bake in the oven.


And top with the cheese sauce.

Not bad at all.

Shrimp Bisque For Dinner Tonight.

I developed this recipe while I was in Danville and wanted to make a Mussel Chowder,
but was unable to do so because of the lack of certain key ingredients, namely mussels.
So I substituted shrimp, since that was readily available.


First, I peeled my shrimp and dumped them in a pan of boiling water just until the first bubble of boil came to the surface, maybe two minutes. Then I drained and set them aside.

After that, I dropped the shells into the shrimp water

to simmer for an hour or two.

Here's my cooked shrimp.

And here are the shells simmering and imparting their shrimpy flavor to the stock.

I took a little trip through the garden and came back with
(from top left and clockwise) bay leaves, parsley,
oregano, sage, and rosemary.

I added the fresh herbs to the shrimp stock.

Then I added some celery, carrots, and onions with the peel, and some salt and pepper.

Keep on simmering.

Now here are the ingredients going into my bisque.

I chopped the onions, carrots,
mushrooms, celery, pepper, and garlic.

First, I sauteed the mushrooms.

Then, I added the chopped carrots,
celery, peppers, onion, and garlic.

Give it a good stir.

Next, I added about a cup of wine.

Then I poured in the shrimp stock through a strainer.

Add in the diced potatoes and
simmer until taters are tender.

I made a roux - just melted 2 TB butter
and added 2 TB flour and cooked it to get rid
of the raw taste of the flour.

Add the roux to the mix and cook a bit to thicken.

After the mixture has thickened,
add in heavy cream and stir.

Finally, add in the cooked shrimp
and heat through.

Now, here are my toppings:
from top left I have a jar of Paprika Oil,
then some chopped parsley, some chopped red onions,
chopped green onions, and a jar of saffron.

For the Paprika Oil, just heat paprika in a skillet, being careful not to burn it,
then remove from heat and add oil.
Keep refrigerated.

Ladle shrimp bisque into a bowl.
Garnish with toppings.

I couldn't decide which picture I liked best.

So I used all three.

And this was some kind of good.

A Sad, Sad Day for Rosie.

Remember Daughter Hawthorne, about whom I've bragged and of whom I've been so proud? You know she just got accepted into grad school. Well, she just called me on the phone, in tears. Apparently, she went in to work today high. They could smell the smoke on her and her eyes were all bloodshot. They told her to leave and not to ever come back. "But, Mama, you're not gonna tell Daddy are you?" Then she hung up. I spent the next 15 minutes crying my eyes out, then she called back. I refused to answer the phone, so Daddy Hawthorne did. "April Fool's Day!" You little bitch. And to think I gave up drugs and alcohol for 3 whole months while I carried you.

Mr. and Mrs. Hawthorne Have a Delicious Lunch.

I was hoping to find something bloggable when I was in Danville over the weekend, but unfortunately Danville doesn't lend itself particularly well to blog activity or any other type of activity for that matter.

I decided to cook seafood for my dear friend Maxine and my mother.
I had a plan in mind, but when I went to the local supermarkets, my plan, unfortunately, completely unraveled and substitutions abounded.
It was beginning to look like Dinner Impossible.
Danville has no Mahi Mahi.
But it does have Wahoo.
Danville has no mussels.
But it does have shrimp.
And it has frozen tuna medallions.
I am nothing if not flexible.
So, in the end, dinner was quite good.

And remind me to show you my recipe for the shrimp bisque
I made that was supposed to be Mussel Chowder.

I did however, come away with a new recipe from Maxine which I will share with you.

Ramen Noodle Slaw

First, I put Mr. Hawthorne

to work shredding cabbage.

Then, I had him chop a couple stalks of celery,

some green onion, and some red onion.

I started on the dressing.
1 cup oil
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 white vinegar

Mix oil, sugar, and vinegar, then add
one SEASONING PACKET
from

Ramen chicken flavored noodles.

I love it when I can Semi-Ho something.

Mr. Hawthorne tossed the
onions in with the slaw.

Next, I crushed up the
Ramen noodles.

And I added a handful or two each
of almonds and sunflower seeds.

Crumble wormy noodles over slaw.

Mr. Hawthorne adds the dressing and tosses.

And Wallah!
A new, tasty twist on slaw.
Thanks Maxine.

Now, on to the rest of today's lunch.

Mr. Hawthorne and I shucked a few oysters and I made a breading mixture out of corn starch, flour, a little corn meal, salt and pepper, and Adobo seasoning.

The oil temperature is hot enough when you can stick the end of a wooden spoon in it and air bubbles vigorously bubble up.

Drain on newspapers.

Next, on to the tuna.
Simply salt and pepper.

Heat up some olive oil and butter in a skillet and add the steaks.

After about 2 - 2 1/2 minutes,
flip over.

Heat up some butter, lemon juice and capers.

Plate the tuna and oysters and spoon some of the

butter/lemon/caper sauce over the tuna.

The tuna was nice and rare and the oysters were perfectly fried.
Add a bit of remoulade sauce and tartar sauce.

Oh, goodness me. This was really good.