In which I (finally) get my groove back

Miraculously, we got the gas turned on in our apartment on Monday as promised. We had grocery shopped banking on this being the case, but like most things we've banked on with this apartment, it could have easily gone to shit. It's a relief to be able to cook on my stove. Grilling is something that I like as an alternative, but my little kettle grill can't handle actually cooking on its top. So we have to be judicious. And cook in side. GLEE!!!!!

Monday night we kept it pretty simple. We have a salad of endive and blue cheese, with a basic vinaigrette, and pasta. Angelhair, with a "sauce" that was only a sauce in that it got poured over the pasta. Olive oil and butter, two smashed garlic cloves, and a pinch or two of red pepper flakes. Let it sizzle until the garlic starts to smell really nice, then fish out the cloves and pour over pasta. The garlic flavored the oil just enough, but neither of us were eating a whole garlic clove.

Tuesday night, while watching the All-Star Game (GO AL!!! GO RED SOX!!!), we had Honey-Lime Glazed Salmon, with Warm Black-Bean etc Salsa.
I can't find a link to this recipe, anywhere, so I'm going to give the basics from memory. It can be found in Rachael Ray 365:No Repeats. You start by chopping up a red onion (I used a shallot) and two cloves of garlic, and starting them cooking in 2 tbs of olive oil, with some cumin, crushed red pepper flake, salt and pepper. While that's happening, you combine the juice of a lime with 3 "tablespoons" (glugs) of honey, and some chili powder. Roll your salmon filets around in that to get them all coated, and then put them in a medium-sized skillet with 2 more tbs of olive oil in it. I like fish not cooked all the way through to "well done", so I would say about 3 minutes/side. While that's getting happy, chop up a bell pepper, add it to the shallot and garlic, and add about half a package of frozen corn. Toss that around, and add about a quarter to half a cup of chicken stock. Let that cook for a few more minutes, while you mind your salmon and open and drain/rinse a can of black beans.

Add the black beans, take the salmon off, and when you've got the salmon on the plates, put some chopped up cilantro and some baby spinach in the veggies. Toss it around until the spinach wilts, and serve it up alongside. I suppose you could also wait a little longer to start the salmon, and then serve the salmon on top of the veggies. If you're feeling fancy.

It was pretty darn nommy. I'm really happy that we went for this.

Tonight, we're having the Parmesan-crusted chicken with salad.

Then, we'll make another menu for the rest of the week, because shopping on Monday was as bad as we feared, so we have to go shopping again on Thursday to start the new routine.
I will, of course, keep you posted!!