halibut, carne asada, cucumber salad, and more!

This is supposed to be My Dude Ranching Adventure, which leads you to believe I might be telling you about things going on at, well, at the Dude Ranch!  But the thing is, I've been sooooooooo busy there, that by the time I'm done, I just want to go to sleep!

Actually, it doesn't help that I'm out of shape, it's 2000 feet higher than Dow's house, or that there was a foot of wet snow to tromp through, but this will probably be another post, assuming I get to it!

Since it is my "day off", I will spend the day cooking for the Food Guy and tutoring.   

So let's talk about food!  (One of my favorite subjects, by the way...something I never would have believed if you'd told me 10 years ago.)

As I mentioned in previous posts, I have to think about how the food will keep or reheat.  Let me show you how I send him stuff.


Pineapple Chicken Salad Pitas
This chicken salad is my favorite!  It's so quick, especially if you use canned chicken or a roasted chicken from the store, and so good.  But, it only lasts for about 3 days before the almonds and carrots lose their crunch.

So, I made the mayonnaise mixture separately from the dry ingredients and left the pineapple in a can.  I write him a sheet of instructions that tells him to drain the pineapple, dump it into the chicken, add the mayo, mix and stuff in a pita with some lettuce.

Steamed Halibut with Sesame-Lime Sauce and Coconut Rice and Mom's Cucumber Salad
I generally don't cook the fish for Food Guy, because when he re-heats it, it becomes rubbery.  On a separate note, I think steamed meat is gross.  I mean, would you steam a steak?  Didn't think so.  As such, my instructions tell him he can steam it, however, I suggested he put it in a pan with a little oil.  That's what we did last night and it had a really nice brown crust to it.

As you might have guessed, Mom's Cucumber Salad isn't on the Cooking Light website.  So here goes:

Ingredients:  Cucumbers, salt, rice vinegar, and sugar (for 2 people, I used 1.5 cucumbers, some salt (?), 1/4 cup rice vinegar and 1/4 cup sugar)

Directions:  Peel cucumbers, slice length-wise, spoon out the seeds.  Use a mandolin to shave the cukes or slice as thinly as possible. Sprinkle salt on the heap o' cukes and let set for a few minutes.  Massage cucumbers and pour out the excess water that comes from massaging.  Combine equal parts rice vinegar and sugar, stirring to dissolve.  Pour vinegar over cucumbers.  Eat within a day or so!  (Or it loses its crunch.) 

Chef Salad with breadsticks (yeah, I cheated...Pillsbury!)
Nothing Special here...Cold cuts, tomatoes, hard-boiled eggs, and cucumbers.  It's not exactly vegetarian, but Food Guy isn't exactly vegetarian and he loves salads, so why make my life difficult?  And like he said, while it sounds ridiculous, he just really likes having the stuff all chopped so all he has to do is throw it together.

Peasant Soup with breadsticks (uh-huh...Pillsbury again.)
I had made a huge ham a couple of months ago, so I'm using up the leftovers now.

This soup smelled DELICIOUS while I was making it and tasted great!  Not a quick recipe, but definitely an easy one.  And even better if you have leftovers to throw in. And all Food Guy has to do is reheat!

This is just a gratuitous picture to show you my beautiful red pot (I LOVE RED!) that Dow gave me for Christmas.

Carne Asada Taco with Avocado Pico de Gallo
They always tell you to read through your recipes first.  And I suppose I did, a while ago.  But this was one of my last recipes to make when I saw that the meat had marinate for 3 hours!  I guess I'll go relax for a while as it basks in the lime juice and cumin.  This one isn't much work for Food Guy either...he has to dice the avocado and toss it with the Pico de Gallo - I didn't add it so it wouldn't discolor or get mooshy.

And there you have it!  Another week's worth of meals...with pictures to boot!