Lemony-sage chicken in milk

I did give in to the temptation (I tried so hard to resist!) to add fresh rosemary as well. I hope the rosemary doesn’t overpower the sage. :-/

Roasted potatoes, squash and mushrooms as the sides. So far all I’ve done is fry and season the chicken with herbs and the house already smells ridiculously good. Umm… do I *have* to wait for E to get home to dive into this meal??

I found the recipe on the food network site while searching for what to do with a bunch of linguica that we had on hand. Earl and I snagged about two pounds worth of the Portuguese sausage while on a ski trip coming back from Kirkwood at this amazing sausage shop in Lockeford, CA. We were so psyched we had a cooler full of ice (formerly housed our lunchtime ski brews) on hand to bring home a nice haul of meat.

Not only was this recipe super easy and delish, but it made enough to feed us for about the whole week!
Your primary materials: linguica sausage, 8 oz. of dungeness crab, some chopped scallions and wine for the chef.

First step: cook up some rice. I used a plain old box of rice pilaf we had sitting around. Throw the pot of rice in the fridge while you do everything else.
Next step: Fry up four eggs.

Then: add rice and sausage to the eggs, begin stirring.

Next step: make yourself a little appetizer of cheese and sausage while you let that cook!

Now add your crab, peas, and scallions. Keep stirring!

Final step: Nosh! Throw on some soy sauce or oyster sauce if you please. I added just a touch of soy, E kept his plain.

Any meal that’s this easy, delicious and yields enough bounty to sustain us for a week (let me tell you how jealous my partner was in the ambulance when I busted a leftover bowl of this for lunch… ) is certainly going into the “REPEAT” file to be made again and again!

We also had a helper on hand to assist with extra sausage consumption.
Hey… I like sausage, too! Down here! I’ll taste test some sausage for ya.

I was out running con woofer this am and must have ran by a house cooking breakfast because MAN did I get a whiff of something tantalizing and bacon-y. Right then and there I altered course and Linus and I jogged over to the store, bought English Muffins and eggs, and came home and made these:

Bacon egg and cheese sandwiches might be one of my favorite foods EVER. In college I dated a guy who made these on the grill whenever we were camping or tailgating and they would come out SOOO good. The key is to use the LARGE sandwich-sized english muffins, so that way you can fit on three fried eggs. Our little corner grocery store only had regular sized english muffins, so, rather sadly, I could only fit on two fried eggs.

Still used a pound of bacon, tho

We each had an extra 1/2 of an english muffin to mop up runny yolk. Runny yolk orbits in its own realm of awesomeness.


Linus even got in on some bacon action. He had to do “manners” to get it, however!

Lucy doesn’t care for bacon or eggs (lame!) but she did find a nice spot to curl up in the sunshine.

We, erm… also had some fruit to counteract the massive pile of bacon and make a tad more healthy.

I am going to go lie on my back now and let this post-bacon aura wash over me in waves of deliciousness.

I’m making these soy-sauce sesame crusted roasted radishes as a side. Not because they particularly sound like they’ll go with grilled bratwurst, but because we have radishes on hand and I’ve been wanting to try that recipe out now for a while. I’ve seen roasted radishes mentioned a LOT lately, and people are always talking about how surprisingly awesome they turn out. Radishes get such a bad rap in the vegetable world. We’ve been roasting lots of veggies lately (asparagus, mushrooms, tomatoes…) and it’s just failproof. They ALWAYS turn out awesome. No huge shocker there that roasted radishes are good, too! Well… I guess we’ll see about that

Oh- one amusing anecdote from my day. I realized we had no crusty rolls to serve the brats on tonight, so I decided to run to the bakery and get some. I had to get a run in anyways, and the bakery was 3 miles away, so it was perfect. I just couldn’t decide if running to the bakery to get a bunch of hard rolls on which to nosh beer and brats is counter-intuitive, awesome, or stupid. What do ya think? The cool part is, I left at about 5:30, and the bakery was closing at 6:00, so it ended up being a bit of speedwork, too! (anything below 10:00 min/mile is certainly speedwork for me at this point.) Anyways, I made it and the rolls look awesome. I also bought a bit of shortbread at the bakery which I noshed mid-run before heading back home Couldn’t resist. Anyways, I kinda like this “running to get your errands done” deal.

We always feel a little bit like we’re cheating when we cook a skirt steak. How can something be this cheap, this tasty and this quick to prepare? It’s like we’ve stumbled onto an ancient secret in the supermarket: How does everyone not know about this?!

They’re right! Skirt steak DOES feel like it’s cheating. I’m not even much of a “steak cooker” (back when we did have outdoor space, E managed the grill), and even I could pull these off. So if you’re in the mood for red meat and don’t have much cash or time (hello!), grab yourself some skirt steaks and whip these up. They’re easily schmanced up by the paprika butter (which was STUPENDOUS!). I’d venture these are good enough for guests or a dinner party- they’d never know how simple they were!

Since this was so fast and easy to prepare, I made the side first. Sautee some kale in EVOO and a little lemon juice:

Dry rub your steaks in salt and pepper (or whatever spice blend you like. I used some Emeril Essence of Creole that I had leftover in the cupboard). Cook 3 minutes on high on each side. Done before I got off a good picture! Here they are, as per recipe, “resting” for 5 minutes.

Now here’s the ace up your sleeve, the paprika butter. Basically, it’s melted butter, sauteed with garlic, smoked hot paprika and some lemon juice:

I made some Old Bay roast sweet potatoes, also from the Bitten Word, as another side. These also fall into the “so easy you think it’s cheating” category. You slice sweet potatoes, toss them with some olive oil and Old Bay seasoning, and roast.

When you’re ready to serve, brush the steak with the paprika butter. The paprika butter knocks this dish out of the park- brushing on the smoky heat really makes the steaks pop.

Earl shows us how it’s done.

Start to finish: 20 minutes… if that. Gotta love meals where the cleanup takes longer than the cooking and the prep! Especially when you’re not the one who does the cleanup

Also, just some random shots I took around the kitchen- check out the lovely Salmon Falls serving plate that my sister mailed me! Isn’t it gorgeous? I think this is a great spot for it.

Proudly displayed next to my other Salmon Falls pottery:

How cute was Earl when he was a little kid?!

Have a great weekend!
<3,
Ceej

Please watch it if you have the time!
Watching the kids unable to identify basic vegetables, around 11:00 in is just… jaw dropping.

There is a guy with a grill who sells it at the base of the mountain.  We all get an ear to munch while we walk to and unload our gear at the car.   It is STUPENDIOUS!  Almost (almost) takes the place of beer for first place “Best thing apres-ski.”  Even Linus has gotten in on the corn action before.

Man I am tired.  We had such a fun daytrip today!   We skied from bell to bell, after getting up to drive to Tahoe at 4:45am.  Then, after getting back to the city we headed straight to Emmy’s Spaghetti in the Mission to chow some ENORMOUS spaghetti and meatballs.  All four of us brought home to-go bags.  I think I’ve got lunch and dinner taken care of tomorrow.

According to our dog walker’s note, Linus had a fun day today, too.  She apparently took him on multiple walks and he hung around at her house all afternoon.  So funny.  She is such a nice woman.  Anyone who needs a dogwalker rec in SF, please ping me.

Sorry if this post is incoherrent I am pretty tired.  Off to snooze

-Ceej