calamari chain restaraunt style

Last week I was out of town for work. We were in the Bloomington/Normal Illinois area, and based on nothing but a hotel magazine advertisement, we chose a place called Biaggi's for dinner. It's a small chain Italian place, but I had never heard of it, as there are none located anywhere near the STL. I was quite pleasantly surprised by how good the food was! For an appetizer we had the Calamari Alla Griglia, "Tender marinated calamari, lightly grilled and served over arugula with extra virgin olive oil, tomatoes and balsamic vinegar" and it was probably the best calamari I've had anywhere. It was grilled, which was a first for me, and I loved the slight smokiness.

So I had a bag of frozen calamari waiting for me in the freezer, and decided to pull it out to try and replicate Biaggi's for a quick and easy Monday night meal. Well, it wasn't quite so easy because I was apparently being far from smart that night...I ended up ruining the seasoning on our cast iron skillet that Jack had worked for about a year to get to where it was. Yeah Balsamic vinegar AND frozen seafood liquid are big no-nos...I just wasn't thinking. Oh well, I salvaged the meal using another pan, and now I get to learn how to season cast iron!



The calamari was pretty good. I cooked some garlic in olive oil, then added balsamic vinegar, liquid smoke (to try and get that grilled flavor...our grill is out of gas) and salt and pepper and then the calamari. I cooked it probably about7 minutes? Somehow I managed to NOT overcook it. Yay! Then I served it over a bed of Arugula. I'm beginning to love arugula more and more. Its peppery bitterness compliments so many things. In this case the sweetness of the calamari and vinegar. It was good, although next time I'll thaw the calamari fully first, and rinse it and dry it. I had to pour a lot of liquid out during cooking, and there was absolutely no carmelization. Also, the calamari was a little fishy tasting...I think rinsing might have helped that...or marinating it for an hour or so...



My favorite part of the meal, and something I'll probably be making a lot, was the improvised side dish of cannellini beans and roasted red pepper. I sautéed some garlic in olive oil, added a can of the beans, salt and pepper and a roasted red pepper from a jar, which I chopped up. I'm always looking for new, easy side dishes.




The next day I had the leftovers for lunch...I added the beans to leftover calamari and arugula and ate it cold, like a salad. Like a really good salad.

random foodness

-Tiny tiny sculptures of people interacting with food as the landscape. Fantastical!

-Today Slashfood had a post about the ”popener”, a name and product that made me giggle. I sent it to a couple of friends, and Kelly went the extra mile and clicked on the Spartacus link on the site where the popener is sold. The only Roman Gladiator to cook! Apparently it’s a show/going to be a show? What the?!

-Last night I made a simple, cheap, healthy-like dinner (those are my specialty). I cooked some cous-sous, added a can of butter beans, a can of diced tomatoes (drained) and a can of Glory mixed greens along with some garlic and onion powder, cumin, salt, pepper and crushed red pepper. Mixed it all up, put a blob of it on my plate, sprinkled low-fat Mexican cheeses on top and nuked it to melt the cheese. I served it with salsa. It was yummy. The greens really add a nice smoky-sweet flavor. I know it sounds strange. A “fusion” of Moroccan, Southern US, and Mexican. Hey, my kitchen is a melting pot, what can I say?

-I am currently drinking Old Speckled Hen Ale. It’s quite delish. Rich, but not in that dark-beer way. Kind of nutty, but still refreshing. I think it’s a bit on the expensive side, but heck, Jack bought it, and it’s really yummy. If you’re up for a beer splurge, I’d recommend it.

more time for food

So I am just starting to settle in after moving. We are way way way closer to work, now, saving around and hour and a half a day of our lives that used to be spent in the car. Woo.

Tonight I'm flying solo. I decided against working out, because I have worked out 3 days in a row, and don't feel bad taking a break. So after work I went to the library. Having so much time, I perused the "New Books" shelf. I came across Read it and Eat, by Sarah Gardener. It basically lists 4 books for every month, each month within a theme (i.e. September is "Celebrate Banned Book month" and October is "Fright Night," so all the books have a common theme). It has discussion questions for each book, then, and this is the neat part, recipes inspired by the book to serve at the book club gathering! What a great idea! There's a catfish recipe for Huckleberry Finn, "Inconcievable! Fritattas" for Princess Bride,and Irish Farm Bread for Angela's Ashes. I really like this idea. Check out the excerpt from Amazon.

After the library I made myself a healthy dinner. I cooked a sweet potato in the microwave, then cut it in half and dumped some curried chickpeas on it. It was a simple meal...I added my curry powder and a few other spices and seasonings to the canned chickpeas, and a bit of water, and nuked them for a couple minutes. It's a very filling and comforting meal. Healthy, too, it would seem.

While I was eating, I flipped to Isaac Mizrahi's show on the Style Network. He's so fun. He had a guy on named Josh Perilo who had the 10 best wines for under $10. Being a big fan of wines under $10, I enjoyed the segment. Unfortunately, the link to Perilo's site doesn't work, and I couldn't find anything much on him with a web search. For now, there are tons of "Under $10" lists out there for us to check out.

Okay, back to my book, now.

Ruby Reuben

Last night I got a little creative with dinner. I had some German dark wheat bread...that's what the package said...it's pumpernickle, basically. I got some turkey pastrami from the deli as well as some Lorraine swiss. So I have to make a Reuben, right? Only I don't really like Thousand Island dressing...so I used spicy mustard intead. The "creative" part was, I also didn't feel like sauerkraut.I remembered Aunt Nellies sweet & sour cabbage. It's milder than sauerkraut, and prettier, and really really cheap.

I put my pastrami on one slice of bread, my swiss on the other, stuck them under the broiler for a few minutes, added the cabbabge and voila! A yummy modified Reuben! I'll call it a Runy Reuben, because Aunt Nellie's is red, and with the pink pastrami and dark brown pumpernickle the colors of tha sammich were lovely. It was quite healthy too.

making it up as i go along

Exibit A:

Last week I had the following: can of garbonzo beans, small leftover nub of feta cheese, Ajvar and some past-thier-prime pitas.

So I mixed up the beans, cheese and some avjar with a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper and garlic powder. I cut the pitas into 4 wedges and toasted them in the oven. And had me a delish dinner of garbonzo gunk on crunchy warm pitas!

Exibit B

Over the weekend I had low-fat cinnamon ghraham crackers, honey spread* and some plums. I merely spread honey on a cracker and topped with a plum wedge. It was suprisingly wonderful.

*Honey spread is new to me. There are no ingredients listed, so I guess it's just kind of honey that's been put through some kind of crystallizing process.