Zucchini Fettuccine

Now this takes a bit more patience then I'm usually willing to afford to cooking, but I think it's totally worth it. It's simple, but time consuming.

Take a veggie peeler, and go nuts with your zucchini. You're going to end up with a big pile of what looks like fettuccine. (You do not want to know how many times I had to look up "fettuccine" to spell it correctly. Noodles. You end up with noodles).

Saute in butter and herbs, and voila! Done.

I made them as a side dish to broiled tillapia. I also cooked up brown rice, because I'm a carb-junkie and veggie noodles weren't going to cut it, but its probably not necessary.

This would be a pretty awesome light Summer meal.

Balsamic Chicken

After much gentle persuasion (definitely not screaming "just tell me what you want to eat") Dan picked out a recipe for dinner.


Chicken Breasts with Balsamic Vinegar and Garlic


I looove balsamic vinegar, so I was happy to oblige. This was super easy, and really farken good! Yay!

As listed, the recipe is as follows:

4 skinless, boneless chicken breasts
salt and pepper to taste
3/4 pound fresh mushrooms, sliced
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons olive oil
6 cloves garlic
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
3/4 cup chicken broth
1 bay leaf
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1 tablespoon butter


Directions
1. Season the chicken with salt and pepper. Rinse the mushrooms and pat dry. Season the flour with salt and pepper and dredge the chicken breasts in the flour mixture. Heat oil in a skillet over medium high heat and saute the chicken until it is nicely browned on one side (about 3 minutes).
2. Add the garlic. Turn the chicken breasts and scatter the mushrooms over them. Continue frying, shaking the skillet and stirring the mushrooms. Cook for about 3 minutes, then add the vinegar, broth, bay leaf and thyme. Cover tightly and simmer over medium low heat for 10 minutes, turning occasionally.
3. Transfer the chicken to a warm serving platter and cover with foil. Set aside. Continue simmering the sauce, uncovered, over medium high heat for about 7 minutes. Swirl in the butter or margarine and discard the bay leaf. Pour this mushroom sauce mixture over the chicken and serve.


I of course left out the vile fungus, but followed the recipe otherwise. Once the chicken was cooked was removed, I added leftover cooked pasta and heated it through in the balsamic sauce.

And now for something completely different.

Patiently waiting for my guest blogger....

Crappy photos of awesome grub.

Dan and I used to have the perfect hang-out bar. It was casual, had an awesome beer selection, free popcorn, was close to Port Authority, and, this one is very important, had a single stall bathroom. So of course it closed down, leaving us to navigate the overpriced bars, the trendy bars, and, the god help me Greys Anatomy crowd bars.

So, imagine our surprise to learn that Shorty's is an AWESOME bar, basically steps from Port Authority! And, they serve Cheesesteaks!

CheeseFries

Chicken Cheesesteak with Broccoli Rabe

Please excuse my crappy cell pics. The downside to Shortys is that it is a Philly bar, and I didn't want to call any more attention to myself (beyond the Reyes jersey), by risking a flash.

Carino's Italian Restaurant

I have some not the best memories of eating at Carino's (back when it was Johnny Carino's), mainly overcooked, bland pasta. But, Dan and I gave it a second chance one evening when we were looking for a quick dinner.

Any basic Italian restaurant probably could have done better, but it didn't suck. And prices were reasonable.

Dan's dish was cheese, and bacon-ey, so of course it tasted good. I ordered the Primavera, which was surprisingly spicy, which is always a plus, but a bit too garlicky.

Finally, because it's what everyone says about Carino's, the bread was awesome! In fact, the bread was like scrapbooking.

Grilled Chicken Bowtie Festival

Chicken Primavera

NYC Food Cart Extravaganza

Poor, poor me. Having to work on the weekend. Dan is helping plan a big company event, with a "Foods of New York" theme. So he brought his ever-helpful, ever-hungry wife to help him sample the goods. We started out at the Brooklyn Flea Market to find Pizza Moto, A Mobile Brick Oven Pizzeria.

This was, excuse me, the shit. Margarita pizza with anchovies. Fresh, salty, cheesy, and not too doughy. This is what pizza should taste like. If I could I would hitch this thing to my Golf and take it with me everywhere I went.

Next stop was Ice Cream from Brooklyn's Van Leeuwen Ice Cream

Ginger (yum!) Red Currant.

Now, I may not be big on sweets, but I do love me some ice cream. The ginger beat out the currant; both ice creams were rich and creamy, but the currants were frozen solid, and gave it a freezer burn feel.

Our third stop was Bian Dang. Bian Dang is located in a Korean Food Court called Food Gallery 32 at 11 West 32nd St (bet 5th & 6th Ave). And I definitely want to go back and try the other shops.

Vegetarian Zongzi (glutinous rice, peanuts, green beans, radish, mushroom, Szechuan veggies steamed inside bamboo leaves.

Pork Dumplings. The dumplings were very good, but I wouldn't go back for the Zongzi, I found it way too bland and sticky.

After this much food, there's really only one true way to end a meal. Hamburgers. I have a strong suspicion that we will be returning to GO Burger.

GO Burger's Classic with Gruyere.

The Kobe Dog. (If I can't decide whether or not to add a rape joke, I should leave it our, right?) Gourmet frankfurter crafted from 100% American Kobe beef, smoked using authentic hardwoods combined with signature blends of spices, topped with Apple cole slaw, spicy German mustard, and pickled jalapeños. So this is what a hotdog is supposed to taste like, like meat, and not preservatives? Wow.

Turkey Burger with Vermont Cheddar. Hands Down the best turkey burger I have ever eaten.

And lastly, a grown-up milkshake with Coffee Liquor and Tequila.

After all this, I passed into the predictable food coma for approximately two hours before I was ready for dinner.

D&D

Thankfully this isn't a post about Dungens and Dragons, it's about the other D&D...Dunkin Donuts.

I know it's crap. But it's really good crap. The kind of crap you want to eat it's 11:00 am on Sunday and you realize you should eat breakfast. Thus I give you:


The Big and Toasty!

I opted for the much less impressive Turkey Sausage Flat Bread.



I'll admit, the Big and Toasty was damn good. But I can't bring myself to order any of the "man choices" at fast food places, anything described as Big, Jumbo, Grande, Bottomless, you know, cause I'm a real classy lady.