Ok let's hear your menus for the special day!

Things I like about cookbook club:
- Try new books I might not have considered;
- I am not in charge, so I can just show up and have fun;
- The challenge to try new recipes and whenever possible not run to the store for ingredients.

Yesterday's book via hoopla was 'Home Made Winter,' by Yvette van Boven. I made three recipes: Irish Potato Soup, Irish Soda Bread and Beet blini.

The beet blini was interesting to make from a process point of view: chop a small beet in a food processor, add flour and run processor until flour and beets are blended. Add milk, yeast, eggs and some salt, then let it rise for an hour.

After making the first blini, I ended up adding more milk to thin it. My Dad prefers thin pancakes and these were thicker than I knew he would like. Instead of little bite blini, I made 6-inch crepe style blini.

The blini was the only component for this recipe I made. There was salmon marinated in star anise syrup and beet juice tinged pink marscapone.

Mom and I ate our blini with a thin coating of sour cream topped with potted salmon. My Dad ate his with butter and raspberry jam. We were all purring like kittens.

I thought some might welcome a new red-tinged component for their Valentine's dinner.

Interesting...I make German pancakes (essentially less-fussy crepes) frequently and never thought of mixing in colors or flavors from fruits or veg.

Last year I found a NIB heart-shaped large pierogi press at a thrift store, which led to heart-shaped ricotta-filled pizza puffs for V Day. Ahh, the good ol' days when one could fearlessly stop at interesting thrift stores.

This year it will likely be a heart-shaped Detroit pizza from the Cook's Country 2018 recipe. And possibly a heart-shaped Beatty's Chocolate Cake from the Ina Garten recipe. Surplus of Dutch cocoa here.

Or a heart-shaped cheesecake, haven't made cheesecake in a few years. That might be tricky as I have neither a heart-shaped springform nor a deep heart-shaped removable bottom pan. Parchment lining a deep pan on bottom and sides?

Good day of cooking:
Breakfast was Eggs Benedict O.G. (Canadian bacon, poached eggs, English muffin, hollandaise, bonus garden kale on mine).
Dinner was Sue's choice: lamb loin chops from Costco (window box rosemary, breadcrumbs and parmesan crust), seared brussels sprouts (seared in bacon fat, shallot, glazed with maple, dijon, soy, rice vinegar, chile powder), fried polenta.

Dessert from my lovely wife was a double chocolate pudding tart and fresh whipped cream.

Hi,

For Valentine's Day I made reservations at White Castle in Gurnee. Afterwards, we drove past the pyramid house an often requested destination by my Mother. It turns out my Dad and sister had never gone over there. We went home for dessert of my sister's homemade caramel cake and watched the youtube documentary on the pyramid house.

If my family balked about going out, I had ingredients for a Chinese meal. A component I made this morning: turnip cake. This finished steaming about 20 minutes before we left. Too hot for the fridge and not safe to leave of the counter due to Chinese sausage and reconstituted dried shrimps. I ended up taking outside to cool in a parked car in the driveway.

On Friday, I made spicy beef to be sliced and eaten as an appetizer or part of a dim sum platter. Still dickering about making pork or lamb dumplings, though certainly both at some point.

Ended the day watching Around the World in 80 Days and The Sound of Music. Now just waiting for more snow, because we have no more places to put it!

Regards,
Cathy2

I made Rick Bayless's recipe for the tuna tostada made famous at Contramar in Mexico City: tostada, chipotle mayo, raw tuna (marinated briefly in soy sauce and orange juice), topped with crispy fried leeks and a squeeze of lime.

It was an old standby, Beef Wellington, for Valentine’s Day here.
Some of the decorations browned too much. (Looks a little bit like a pig to me.)


But it wasn’t a pig. The meat was a beef tenderloin (not my favorite cut, but the shape was right; it was trimmed and tied well) from Homestead Meats. Duxelles were made from a combination of crimini, sulfur shelf and lion’s mane mushroooms, surrounded by prosciutto also from Homestead, and store-bought puff pastry.


Plated with candies red carrots (red for Valentine’s).

The meal ended with a Grand Marnier soufflé — except I cheated; I used Cointreau instead of Grand Marnier. (Sorry, no pic.)