Well, it's not like my dad's

I never really had meatloaf until high school. I suppose that's when my dad decided he should learn how to cook (So Ben and I weren't exclusive raised on chicken fingers and mac and cheese. Hi Dad! Just joking...mostly.) and he made a delicious meatloaf. I called him up to ask him his recipe but he couldn't find it/couldn't remember it. So not helpful. Getting forgetful in retirement dad. Tsk tsk. This one was okay (although it had rave reviews). I used a pre-packaged mix of beef, pork and veal (on sale!). Between the milk and the bread it was just a tad too soft for me plus there was a lot of extra liquid bubbling up. I poured it off when the time was up but luckily Mr. Lawyer wasn't home yet so I let it sit in the oven after I turned it off. This decreased the soupiness. I would decrease the milk and use some bread crumbs the next go around. For me the key is to use Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce in place of the ketchup. It's what dad always did so it tastes like my childhood and I love it. Half the loaf is gone so I guess it wasn't that bad! Also, meatloaf is a gross name.

Savory Meat Loaf

(Adapted from Betty Crocker)

Ingredients:
1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef

1 cup milk

1tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1teaspoon chopped fresh sage leaves or 1/4 teaspoon dried sage leaves (omitted)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon ground mustard

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1 garlic clove, finely chopped or 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder

1 egg

3 slices bread, torn into small pieces

1small onion, chopped (1/4 cup)

1/2 cup ketchup, chili sauce or barbecue sauce
Directions:
1. Heat oven to 350°F.
2. Mix all ingredients except ketchup. Spread mixture in ungreased loaf pan, 8 1/2x4 1/2x2 1/2 or 9x5x3 inches, or shape into 9x5-inch loaf in ungreased rectangular pan, 13x9x2 inches. Spread ketchup over top.
3. Insert meat thermometer so tip is in center of loaf. Bake uncovered 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes or until thermometer reads 160°F.

Stupid Sad Smelly Fish

Mr. Lawyer bet me that I wouldn't name this post "Stupid Sad Smelly Fish"....well who wins this one!? It is an apt name anyway because I was randomly in a sad mood even though my day was good, the fish was super smelly and therefore stupid. I've done a few things with frozen tilapia but over all I do not have a lot of experience with cooking fish. Especially fresh fish from the market. Evidently fresh fish is suppose to smell like the sea and not too fishy but it smelled like fish! So obviously I was worried about killing us all with food poisoning or at the very least having to fight for the bathroom. It also made my apartment smell like fishy fish. Gross.

I substituted collard greens for the mustard greens and it was delicious. However I was not impressed with the fish. I thought it was too fishy and didn't pick up any of the other flavors of the dish. Mr. Lawyer gobbled down two fillets and declared it was good. Obviously flounder is not my fish....unless it's fried.

Quick Steamed Flounder with Ginger Garlic Mustard Greens

(adapted from the NY Times)

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon vegetable or peanut oil
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil, more for drizzling
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 1-inch-thick slice peeled fresh ginger root, minced
2 small bunches mustard greens, cleaned, stemmed and torn into pieces
1 tablespoon soy sauce, more for drizzling
2 flounder fillets, 12 ounces each
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper.
Directions:
1. Heat oils in a very large skillet. Add garlic and ginger and sauté until fragrant and translucent, about 2 minutes. Add mustard greens, soy sauce and 3 tablespoons water, and sauté until greens start to wilt, 2 minutes longer.
2. Spread greens out in pan. Season flounder with salt and pepper, and place on top of greens. Cover pan, reduce heat to medium, and let fish steam until just cooked through, about 6 minutes. If pan dries out before fish is cooked through, add a little more water, a teaspoon at a time.
3. Uncover pan and transfer fish to serving plates. If greens seem wet, turn heat to high to cook off excess moisture. Serve greens on top of fish, drizzled with a little more sesame oil and soy sauce, if desired.

So to make myself feel better about the stupid sad smelly fish I made some cookies for our maintenance crew and door people who once again fixed a new problem (bathroom light switch) within four hours. Danny, the head maintenance guy (who lived across from us for a year before moving to a different floor) made a point of coming over to me in the lobby to inform me that he took care of everything and replaced the whole switch. It was really sweet that he wanted to let me know. It's also really nice to not have to worry that the light will go off in the middle of your shower. Unfortunately I am currently out of flour and had to cheat a little bit.

One should always have some Betty Crocker in the cupboards for emergencies. 

They are not as delicious as the homemade gingersnaps I made and they don't have the pretty crackly top but they still taste pretty good. 

Breakfast of Champions!

Regional differences: In Upstate NY I would have said that "my kids were squirrelly this week" but here in Philly my students tell me that the proper slang is "my kids are hyped". I have one class that teaches me one slang word a day. This serves a duel purpose: I understand what they are talking about and it gets me major street cred which is useful when it comes to classroom management. I have also learned a handshake. The end of this week was insane, my students were all hyped. As a result Mr. Lawyer made me his famous chocolate chip peanut butter cookies....for breakfast.

Breakfast of Champions!

These cookies were highly sought after in the realm of Syracuse. In fact, there was a backhanded girl fight over them before we started dating. I won. Obviously. Mr. Lawyer would also try to bribe me with them. His method of flirting went like this "Star Wars in on tv. Want to come over? I made cookies." Clearly this worked. 

I interviewed Mr. Lawyer about the origins of these Upstate famous, fight inducing, girl swooning cookies. This is what I learned: it was the first year of law school and he had just started really cooking on his own. He was really craving cookies so he bought the Betty Crocker Peanut Butter Cookie mix. He just happened to have peanut butter and chocolate chips chilling in his cabinet. So he mixed them in and these amazing peanut butter cookies were born. 

However he left me with this mess:

Not my cookie plate, coffee mug, mixing bowl or measuring spoons. Ah well, at least he knows to soak everything.

Prep it up!

This past week we had a dinner party with the Prep gang (or 4Pod as Jackie calls us). We decided on a tapas theme. Jackie and Maggie took care of the main dishes and I was in charge of dessert. The dishes included delicious quesadillas, cocktail wieners, meatballs, a yummy crostini, deviled eggs, stuffed mushrooms and other things I am probably forgetting. I had a difficult time deciding what to bring and then it hit me: since it's a high school group of friends why not bring my high school signature dish?! Lemon bars! Whenever we had a class party I was always asked to bring in my lemon bars. But I couldn't limit myself to just one thing. Plus I wanted to keep with the bite-size tapas theme so enter teeny tiny Vanilla Pudding Cookies, Mini Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes, and Lemon Bar Circles.

Jenni's Famous Lemon Bars

(which Jenni originally got from an old Betty Crocker recipe book)

Ingredients:
1 cup flour
1/2 butter, softened
1/4 powdered sugar (plus more for dusting)
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice (plus an extra dash!)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Mix flour, butter and powdered sugar. Press into an ungreased 8x8 pan. Make 1/2 inch edges.
3. Bake crust for 20 minutes.
4. Beat sugar, lemon juice, baking powder, salt and eggs with mixer for 3 minutes until light and fluffy.. Pour over hot crust.
5. Bake for 25-30 minutes.
6. Cool, dust with powdered sugar.

I would also like to restate my love for my cupcake corer and pancake pen (which was used for both batter and ganache). Amazing creations. 

Coring the mini-cupcakes

Other possible titles for this entry include: Jenni doesn't know how to halve recipes, Dessert Explosion, 4.5 hours of baking hell when it's 101 degrees out, the Night of 75 cookies, 50 cupcakes, and 20 lemon bars, or just plain old gluttony. But really, what's the fun in halving a dessert recipe?!