After a bit of a whirlwind week, we headed up to Vermont this past weekend for some relaxation and foliage exploring. The foliage was just getting started and it was a rainy weekend for the most part, but we were able to get out and hike (yes, Erin is still hiking despite her growing size and could probably match the best of them on the AT - oh yes, I'm hip enough to call it the AT despite only having ever hiked very small parts).
The food in Vermont was pretty good - nothing spectacular for dinner though. The Perfect Wife was good but didn't blow me away (it won Chef of the year for New England a few years back). Erin had an interesting rabbit and mushroom dish though that I may try to replicate one day. Breakfast was something to speak of however - made with love too which counts for something. We ate at the bed and breakfast - Bromley View Inn - they made pumpkin pancakes one day, pretty good eggs with sausage another and a pecan french toast another day.
Here's a couple of meals from home in the last week:
Spaghetti carbonara
- got some good bacon delivered this week which always helps; I think the best version of this I ever made was with fresh parmigiano in Italy... but it's usually good with local stuff too.
- cook the bacon with some garlic while pasta water boils (please don't add olive oil to pasta water!)
- beat two eggs
- grate about 1 cup of parmigiano
- after the pasta is done cooking and drained, I like to add the bacon with a little of the grease and garlic still in it to the pasta first so it doesn't stick together at all when you add the egg and quickly toss while quickly adding parmigiano
Scalloped potatoes with blue cheese, grilled steak and sesame broccoli
- Little Will is probably the main reason for this meal - Erin was craving steak and potatoes
- grilled the steak after just some time with salt and pepper and lime on it (about 1 hr)
- the scalloped potatoes are a la my dad... I'm sure there's a recipe out there but I just try to make it like he does:
- slice some potatoes fairly thin and make layers of potato, then cheese and onion (I used cheddar mainly), topped with flour and salt/pepper and occasional pats of butter before repeating beginning with potatoes and lots of cheese on top, pour milk in until you can see it just barely and then bake at 400 with foil on top for 3omins then with foil off for 30mins
- sesame broccoli is the art of getting oil so hot that water forms a nice bubble on top of the pan and then adding oil, broccoli after 2 mins and letting it cook on that hot heat for a couple of minutes before finishing with sesame seeds and soy sauce
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