Posts Tagged ‘fancy dinner’

Linguine alle Vongole

I’ve said it before on this blog, but I’ll say it again: yes, you can eat pasta during the hot and humid days of summer! I realize the thought of a thick, heavy dish doesn’t necessarily appeal when the weather is breaking 100º, but there are ways to lighten up your pasta dishes to make them appropriate and appealing. The big thing is cutting back on the sauce – rather than something heavy or creamy, summer is the time when I turn to “barely there” sauces that are more like a drizzle and explosion of fresh ingredients. Your tastebuds and your A/C will thank you!

This simple dish of linguine and clams will whisk you away to Italy (where I’m sure they eat pasta all year round, regardless of soaring temperatures), all from the comfort of your own home. For inspiration, I combined two recipes, one from Rasa Malaysia, and one from Mario Batalli, courtesy of Epicurious. Some of you may be a bit leery of cooking shellfish at home, but I assure you nothing could be simpler than this dish. Best of all, this dish only has about 15 minutes of active cook time, so you won’t spend your time slaving in front of a hot stove. Elegant and simple, this is summer dining at its best!

Ingredients (for two)

• 1.5 lbs of fresh littleneck clams, cleaned and scrubbed (see below for info on cleaning clams)
• 8 oz linguine… use the best you can afford
• 4 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tbsp butter
• 4 cloves of garlic, minced
• ¼ tsp of crush red pepper flakes (add more if you like your dishes spicier)
• ½ cup white wine (we used Riesling, which I’m sure is a sin, but it worked for us… use whatever you like to drink)
• 6 tbsp of parsley, finely chopped (+ 2 extra tbsp for garnish)
• juice from ½ a lemon
• salt to taste

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steak tacos with a beet & apple slaw and blue cheese

Growing up, I was not a picky eater (still am not), and certainly wasn’t one of those kids who hated vegetables. My brother went through a phase where he hated carrots and hated peppers, but veggies never bothered me. That said, one vegetable I didn’t get much exposure to when young was the ruby red beet. I suspect my father doesn’t care for them and that’s why they never graced the dinner table, but I decided recently I was at a point in my life where I wanted to explore the less conventional vegetables in order to spruce up meals. After whipping up a beet & pear salad last week (with some kohlrabi tossed in just for kicks), I realized that raw beets are: a) really delicious, and b) actually quite sweet! I’d had pickled/jarred/canned varieties of beets before, and they are nowhere in the same league as fresh, raw beets.

With that in mind, I decided to use up our last beet in another slaw fashion, and suddenly this dish popped into mind. What could be better than steak tacos with beets & apple and some blue cheese? It sounded like a divine combination to me… and it was! Plus, it was a breeze to whip up! These will definitely be on the roster again soon…

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Mushroom & Pea Risotto with Pan-Seared Halibut

A few weeks ago, Tony and I took our dear friend Trisha out to dinner to celebrate her birthday.  We went to a restaurant called, Marché, that specializes in simple – but delicious – French dishes.  That evening, Trisha ordered the halibut and risotto combo, which really captured my imagination.  I decided I wanted to try to recreate it (with my own twists, naturally) at home.

Ingredients (serves 4, generously)

For the Risotto

• 3 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 2 cups of diced mushrooms
• ½ onion, finely minced
• 4 cloves of garlic, finely minced
• 1 cup Arborio rice
• 1 cup dry white wine (we used a Bogle sauvignon blanc that was wonderful)
• 2 – 3 cups of chicken broth
• 1 cup of frozen peas, thawed
• zest from ½ a lemon
• salt & pepper

For the Halibut

• 4 4-ounce pieces of halibut (or another firm, white fish)
• 2 tbsp butter
• salt, pepper, cayenne pepper
• 1 tbsp fresh thyme
• juice from ½ lemon

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Last night Tony and I celebrated our three-year anniversary!  We’re both pretty on the ball when it comes to remembering dates (except when I maybe, accidentally told someone the wrong date when they asked us when we got married… but in my defense, I’d had maybe three too many drinks that night), but the anniversary of our first date is also Tax Day here in the U.S., and really, what says romance better than the IRS, am I right?

But really, after a few weeks of sending emails back and forth on Match.com, and one phone conversation, Tony and I first laid eyes on one another in real life on April 15, 2007, around 5 pm.  And the rest, as they say, is history.  Sparks flew, and they only burn brighter three years later.

To celebrate this year we decided to try out a new restaurant (well, new to us), and went to one of Nashville’s fancier restaurants, F. Scott’s (leave it to us to go to a literary-inspired eatery!). Hey, I’ll take any excuse to wear a pretty dress!   After much research on my part, I settled on this place because it had the adventurous kind of menu that I love.  When we eat out, I like to try out stuff that I’d never have the stones (or the skill) to cook in my own kitchen, and F. Scott’s definitely didn’t disappoint!

Click through the gallery below if you’d like detailed descriptions of what we ate:

This meal was SO good.  Definitely our new favourite splurge restaurant, I think.  Everything we ate was divine, and even things we had eaten before at other places were finessed in really interesting and updated ways.  One of the things I love best about Tony (of course there’s so much to love), is just how adventurous he is as a diner.  He never shirks away when I say things like “let’s order chicken livers” (in fact, he kept most of it to himself…) or “oooh, fried marrow”! I figure there are plenty of ways to measure compatibility, but a couple that can happily dine together and guess what the other person wants to order off of the menu are bound for greatness, right? It’s little wonder Match.com ranked us as 100% perfect matches!

Three years in, I still marvel at how lucky I was to find Tony and how fortunate I am to spend my life with my best friend, a man who cherishes and challenges me every day.

A poem by Neruda, and then one more tidbit:

‘Perhaps not to be is to be without your being.’

Perhaps not to be is to be without your being,
without your going, that cuts noon light
like a blue flower, without your passing
later through fog and stones,
without the torch you lift in your hand
that others may not see as golden,
that perhaps no one believed blossomed
the glowing origin of the rose,
without, in the end, your being, your coming
suddenly, inspiringly, to know my life,
blaze of the rose-tree, wheat of the breeze:
and it follows that I am, because you are:
it follows from ‘you are’, that I am, and we:
and, because of love, you will, I will,
We will, come to be.

In three months’ time we celebrate our one-year wedding anniversary, which we promise to do in style!  After much discussion of possible getaways, the tickets have been bought, and from July 3 – July 12, 2010 Tony and I will find ourselves vacationing in…. PUERTO RICO! Soooo excited! Anyone who has ever been, recommendations/suggestions are greatly appreciated!