My Funny Valentines

It was a rare treat to have Valentine's Day on a Saturday this year.  It gave us plenty of time to be together and spend some time in the kitchen as a family.

Since there are three of us in my little family, we each chose a cookbook from the collection and picked a recipe to make.

Each one of us had varying results!

The kiddo chose something from this book:

The husband chose something from this book:

And I chose something from this book:

That makes 19, 20, and 21 of 99 cookbooks down.

The best part is that they are all keepers!

I could start in order with salad, then entree, then dessert....but I'm going with dessert first!

The chef is super cute!

He chose something more complicated than I had expected, so I gave him a hand. I would say he did about 75% of the work on this one.

This particular book is fantastic for kids, because it gives very specific instructions and encourages the chef to be sure they have all of their materials ready before they begin. There are explanations as to why they need to prep things a certain way, and helpful suggestions for substitutions or corrections.

I picked this one up at a Scholastic Warehouse sale last year, and I am SO glad that I did. It's a beautiful book and all of the recipes look fantastic. It isn't a dumbed-down kids' cookbook at all. We've got one of those...I'm sure it will make an appearance sooner or later!

Instead of transcribing the recipe, I am going to post photos of it.

 

Here is Mr. Big Hands swirling the batter together:

And the finished product:

 It was pretty damn delicious! Very rich though, even though I subbed reduced-fat cream cheese for the regular. If you make this, I suggest a tiny slice or you may regret it!

To erase the dessert calories, we can move on to the salad...

This is a Winter Green Salad with Sugared Walnuts, Crispy Pears and Pomegranate. 

My darling husband chose this from his new cookbook that he got for the holidays. He nailed the Pomegranate Vinaigrette that goes on the salad.

Winter Green Salad with Sugared Walnuts, Crispy Pears and Pomegranate

Serves 6.

6 cups chopped or torn bitter greens (arugula, romaine lettuce, frisee, dandelion greens or watercress)
2 D'Anjou pears (red or green), thinly sliced
Seeds from 1/2 pomegranate

For the sugared walnuts:
1 tablespoon maple syrup
1 tablespoon walnut oil
1 tablespoon maple sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 cups walnuts

For the pomegranate vinaigrette:
1 garlic clove, minced
1 shallot, minced
1/2 cup pomegranate juice
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon zesty honey mustard
sea salt

Prepare the vinaigrette: in a medium bowl, whisk together all ingredients by hand or with handheld blender. Season to taste with salt. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Prepare the walnuts: Preheat oven to 350°F. In medium bowl, combine syrup, walnut oil, maple sugar and cinnamon. Add walnuts, toss to coat and spread on parchment-lined cookie sheet. Bake until lightly browned (about 20 minutes). Remove from oven and set aside.

Assemble the salad: Place greens in salad bowl, combine with most (but not all) of the sliced pears, drizzle with pomegranate vinaigrette and toss to coat. Arrange remaining pears and sugared walnuts over salad greens, top with pomegranate seeds and serve.

Unfortunately, we had some issues with the nuts.

When you've been primarily out of the kitchen for the last 17 years, and you have multiple distractions, mistakes are bound to happen. Rather than measuring the nuts out into a dry measuring cup, he just went by the weight on the bag. Bzzzt. Not the same thing.

So, our nuts were not as candied as one would want. Then when we tried to fix them, we just ended up burning them.

Fortunately, I had a stash of candied pecans from Target in the cabinet left over from Thanksgiving. Success! (You've got to picture Kristin Wiig's Target Lady saying that one!)

The salad was saved and it was delicious.

Onto the main event....

Blue Ginger is a restaurant in Wellesly, MA. When my husband and I lived outside of Boston in Newton Centre back in 1998 & 1999 Ming Tsai opened a restaurant nearby and we had to check it out. Ming was the MAN back then. A big, handsome guy who had a cooking show on Food Network.

We had a delicious meal at Blue Ginger, and were fortunate enough to meet Ming himself that night. We purchased his new cookbook, and he was gracious enough to sign it for us:

I chose to make Teriyaki Salmon, since that seems to be the only protein source that we all can agree on these days. Living with a vegetarian, a dieter and an 11 year old can get complicated. 

So, we settled on Teriyaki Salmon with Mirin Cucumber Salad

Vinaigrette

1 ½ teaspoons wasabi powder1 tablespoon mirin (Japanese sweet sake)
1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
½ cup Grapeseed oil
Salt and Freshly ground black pepper

Marinade

1 cup soy sauce
Juice and zest of 2 oranges
2 tablespoons brown sugar
4 garlic cloves, peeled and left whole
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh ginger
4 skinless salmon fillets (about 6 ounces each), preferably center cut
2 large English cucumbers julienned*

To make the vinaigrette, combine the wasabi powder and mirin in a medium bowl and mix to make a paste.  Whisk in the vinegar and sugar.  Whisk in the oil and season with the salt and pepper.  Taste and correct the seasonings, if necessary.  

1. To make the salmon, combine the soy sauce, orange juice and zest, brown sugar, garlic and ginger in a medium saucepan.  Bring to a boil over high heat and simmer slowly until reduced by half or syrupy, about 15 minutes.  Remove from the heat, stir in the sesame seeds and cool.   Transfer to a baking dish, at the salmon, turn to coat and marinate for 1 hour. 
   
2. Prepare an outdoor grill or preheat the broiler.  If cooking outdoors, spray the grill with nonstick cooking spray.  Grill the salmon over high heat, or broil, turning once until the flesh is slightly charred, about 4 minutes per side.  Brush the fish with the remaining marinade as it cooks.   The fish will be medium-rare to medium.
   
3. About 10 minutes before serving, toss the cucumbers with enough of the vinaigrette to coat them completely.  Correct the seasonings and set aside.   Divide the salmon among 4 plates.  Place a salmon fillet on top of each portion and serve.

And there you have it. A pretty successful Valentine's Day dinner that we all helped make. I couldn't think of a lovelier way to spend a snowy Saturday night!