Catching Up on Missed Opportunities
Since last Thursday I’ve been running in full foodie mode. I could have been blogging, tweeting, and facebooking all of my preparations for Easter dinner. But I didn’t. I get so wrapped up in my “doing” that I don’t have much time to write about it. I truly admire foodie bloggers that can do both simultaneously. I’ll try to make up for it now in hindsight.
As of last Thursday, the only framework I had for my Easter dinner was that we would have a pasta course, mandatory in this Italian household if any holiday falls on a Sunday, and a fresh ham. That’s why on Thursday I had to get serious about my menu planning. For starters, I attempted to find a recipe for fresh ham since I had never roasted one before, and was concerned that I would blow it and the ham would be undercooked. I had no luck with that, so I consulted with the butcher at Whole Foods who gave me general cooking guidelines. On the advice of my mom who has cooked many fresh hams, I created a bed of celery, onions, carrots, and a green pepper (to substitute for the green pepper bread stuffing she usually makes). I rubbed the ham with a paste of garlic, olive oil, kosher salt, and fresh thyme the night before. It tasted very good, especially the gravy made from the vegetables and drippings, but I had the opposite cooking problem, it was overcooked instead of undercooked because I got wrapped up in the girls’ Easter egg hunt and didn’t check it on time.
As for the rest of the menu, I decided to turn to Giada’s “Family Dinners” for inspiration. I prepared the marinated vegetable salad you see here as one of the appetizers:
I also made these fresh herb goat cheese balls with home made crostini:
The next course you’ll have to take my word on because I missed the opportunity to photograph it. I was too busy digging into our locally made cheese ravioli, and the fettuccine noodles that Louisa and I made together the previous night. I actually found good tips on making the fettuccine earlier that day on a Lidia Bastianich program I had caught on PBS. Serendipity. So while watching the wonderful “Ten Commandments” we made sheets of pasta dough until Annie became too tired. I cut the strips after she went to bed.
For the main course, you can see we had the fresh ham accompanied by roasted asparagus and pine nuts, and couscous with raisins and almonds, both recipes from “Food Network” magazine. Asparagus always seem like a perfect Easter vegetable to me. We also had a little salad, home grown by my dad.
Dessert was another missed photo opportunity. I made a small New York cheesecake (the recipe I was having such a good time with back in January), fresh strawberries, and nutella ravioli, another recipe found in Giada’s cookbook. The nutella ravioli were really pretty simple to make. The day before I filled wonton wrappers with nutella and deep fried them very quickly. Unfortunately, while reheating them on Easter, I lost track of the time and they were a bit toastier than I wanted. But everybody still agreed that they were basically pretty good – just could have been better!
Today is Candy Monday, and I’m doing my best to celebrate in the spirit of the day. Plus, we’ll be eating leftovers for the next two nights, a great bonus for a pretty good Easter dinner.
Comments
5 Responses to “Catching Up on Missed Opportunities”
Got something to say?
Call me weird but I find that part of the charm of a home cooked meal are the slight mistakes in cooking that are more made up for by the good family times.
I can only hope my family is as “weird” as you are.
It was a memorable Easter Feast!
I’d bet big money that your family was ‘weird’ enought to enjoy every morsal of that perfect dinner and the wonderful company that went with it!
[...] For starters, I attempted to find a recipe for fresh ham since I had never roasted one before, and was concerned that I would blow it and the ham would be undercooked. I had no luck with that, so I consulted with the butcher at Whole Foods who gave … Today is Candy Monday, and I’m doing my best to celebrate in the spirit of the day. Plus, we’ll be eating leftovers for the next two nights, a great bonus for a pretty good Easter dinner. Bookmark and Share. April 5, 2010 | …This Post [...]