Double Grill Pan Dinner

Driving home from work I was dreaming up ways to use my new grill pan and came up with this doubled grilled dinner. First I rubbed the pan with a bit of olive oil and laid in some trimmed asparagus sprinkled with coarse salt. I let the spears color in the very hot pan. They weren't quite as tender as I wanted so when the color was right I splashed the pan with a bit of water and the resulting steam finished the asparagus perfectly.

Next I prepped some sandwiches. The rosemary bread was thinly spread with butter and Dijon mustard. I topped the bread with 1 slice of prosciutto, several spears of grilled asparagus, a sprinkle of nutmeg, and slices of gruyere cheese. I buttered the outside of the sandwiches just a bit and laid them in the grill pan with the Le Creuset panini press (a weighted ridged lid with a handle) on top. Five minutes on a side and we had creamy melted cheese and beautiful Martha Stewart eat your heart out grill marks.

Panini Press Plus

Along with my fabulous new grill pan James picked out a panini press that was backordered. It just arrived so I have to give my new pan a full workout. Bacon, Gruyère, and red onion sandwiches dipped in an egg batter (egg, cream, salt and cayenne pepper) and "grilled" (pan fried is more like it) along the non-stick ridges -- pressed with the top weight to toasty, crispy, perfection. "I could live on these," James said as he munched happily.

Sandwich Night

James came home late from work and wondering if we had something for a "snack" in the house. I went through the usual list . . . pizza, spaghetti, toasties (that's open-faced toasted bread -- usually with cheese -- around here), grilled cheese. "Oooh," James said. So I started on a couple grilled cheese sandwiches. I always try to do something a little different so today I layered prosciutto, butter, arugula, mozzarella and parmesan cheeses, and a thin spread of Italian mostarda -- a sweet and tangy fruit flavored mustard -- on rustic peasant bread. I heated some butter and olive oil in a skillet, laid the sandwiches in the hot pan and pressed down with a heavy lid, flipped and cooked until each side was golden brown and crispy.

We always love Thursday sandwich night at Campanile, but tonight was grilled cheese night at home.

Our First Apples

Three years ago we planted a baby apple tree -- Pettingill apples native to Southern California (yes there are some), "discovered" in Long Beach in 1949. We waited and waited and waited and finally this year our baby tree was ready to fruit. Four lonely apples I have been hovering over and watching, waiting for them to ripen.

It seems I got a little too excited, even though they were green and flushed with red as the literature described, they were, as James described " a bit tart". His face puckered up with one bite.

I couldn't let our beautiful apples go to waste. We didn't have quite enough for even a tart. So I took the three we hadn't bitten into and but them in a brown paper bag with a couple of bananas to see if I could force them to ripen. That one, super tart, sample apple I sliced thin and sautéed with butter, brown sugar, and a hint of chili. I layered that quick apple jam with roast pork, fresh arugula, and Gruyère cheese between slices of crusty Italian bread for grilled sandwiches.

Along with the sandwiches, because my diet called or it and we had it in the fridge, a quick broccoli soup. I put fresh broccoli florets into a pot of salted boiling water and chicken stock and allowed them to cook for about 4 minutes until just tender. I puréed the mixture in the blender and served the hot soup (tasted again for seasoning) over a mound of fresh ricotta cheese (cheese for James, yogurt for me).

I suppose it's a long way to go to save an apple, but for my homegrown it might just be worth it.

Pastrami Reuben

That New York trip just keeps on giving. Today with some of the pastrami from Katz's deli I made James a quick toasted reuben, pan fried in a bit of oil and butter. I layered slices of rosemary bread with butter (James doesn't like Russian dressing), mustard, pastrami, sauerkraut, and nutty, fragrant, delicious Scharfe Maxx (kind of like an extra sharp Gruyere)-- a delicious cheese from Switzerland I "discovered" at Murray Cheese in NY and brought home for James.

When Eric Ate James' Dinner

James had a meeting out of the house and we had to re-schedule dinner with a friend so I needed some back up eaters. I invited our friend Eric to come and eat James' dinner. Eric is a good audience who appreciates my cooking so he is always a welcome guest, and his wife is out of town so we try to make him a regular at our dinner table.

We started off with a roasted corn and avocado salad from a recipe by Elizabeth Falkner of Citizen Cake fame. She instructed to coat the ears of corn with olive oil and roast them in the oven (500)) until tender and lightly browned. After cutting the kernels form the ears some (1/2 cup) went into the blender along with 3 TB fresh lime juice, 2 TB sherry vinegar, a dash of hot sauce and a pinch of cinnamon. As those ingredients mixed I drizzled in 1/2 cup of olive oil to make a vinaigrette. The rest of the corn mixed with cubes of avocado, tomatoes (I had some roasted ones so I used those along with some fresh tomatoes), cucumbers and the finished dressing. I served spoons of the mixed salad on arugula leaves topped with toasted pumpkin seeds and feta cheese.

We don't do sandwiches for dinner too often but I thought I had a good combo and layered bread warm from the oven with butter, thinly sliced london broil (Eric was sort of invited for leftovers after all), parmesan cheese, spinach leaves, sliced mushrooms, and a thick coating of my green pepper romesco sauce. Sandwich and salad dinner for a good friend and a good guest.