Gourmet Food on a Budget
Rosemary Garlic Chicken Purses make a great lunch or appetizer. The chicken is infused with rosemary and mixed with cream cheese, all wrapped in eggroll wrappers and deep-fried. Of course, to lower calories, they can also be baked.
Veal Marsala Meatballs are light and flavorful with their Tomato Basil Cream sauce over pasta. Serve this with white wine and crusty bread to sop up all that lovely sauce.
Pasta a la Carbonara is a favorite in our family because it’s very simple and quick to make for dinner with salad and a glass of wine. I add shallots in oil to enhance the mushrooms.
This afternoon when I was at the local store, I had a taste for Mexican food. I already had frozen taquitos in my freezer (I’m too lazy to make them myself), so all I needed was avocado. Well, surprise, surprise my little store didn’t have any, so I decided to make the white sauce similar to the fish taco white sauce at Rubio’s.
I also had some cabbage in the refrigerator. I love cabbage and it’s very good with Mexican food. I picked up a can of black beans so I could make the same black bean dip I used for my Black Bean Tacos.
When I was in grammar school at Cheremoya Avenue Elementary School in Hollywood, California, about once every two weeks we had Hamburger Gravy and Mashed Potatoes. I really loved that dish, it was my favorite. All the other stuff was pretty bland, and actually kind of nasty, especially the paper thin cheeseburgers. For years and years, I have been trying to replicate the special taste of that gravy, and have been pretty much successful.
Years ago, when I first met Chef John Farion, he treated some friends and I to dinner at another chef’s restaurant on Melrose . I ordered the filet mignon with blue cheese sauce. It was truly fantastic, and I have been pairing blue cheese with beef ever since. I guess I’m not the only one, even Carl’s Jr. now has a steakhouse burger featuring blue cheese.
I get my blue cheese at the Armenian stores, for several reasons, 1) because the cheese is of a superior quality, 2) because it is much less expensive than the major chain supermarkets, and better quality. I just bought a half a pound brick a few days ago, and it was sitting in the cheese drawer waiting to be the star of some dish.
I had an epiphany! Why not make hamburger gravy and add blue cheese at the end? I tried it, and it was, well, fantastic! This was much, much better than the gravy I had had when I was a child. Now, just because Spane gave it a big thumbs up, I can’t guarantee that every child will like it as much as we did.
Make these fried shrimp stuffed wontons as part of a Chinese feast, or enjoy them as an after-school snack. You can even make them in the air fryer.
Feel like you are in a maze with mayonnaise? Musings about mayonnaise, its history, and variations. Bonus – How to make Kewpie Mayonnaise Popsicles!
This lasagna with ricotta, spinach, and sausage is rich and delicious. It’s time-consuming but a lot of it can be made ahead, so enjoy it with friends, a big salad, and a bottle of red wine.
Secret garlic sauce is not a secret. It’s my easy version of the famous Toum, a garlic sauce common to the Levant.
Pizza Fried Chicken is chicken strips with pizza seasoning made crispy in the air fryer. It’s easy to make and for kids of all ages.