What are you cooking the week of May 13, 2018

[Mike Nolan]

I'm making stuffed bell peppers for supper tonight.

[RiversideLen]

I'm going to saute a handful of shrimp, boil some angel hair pasta, and have it with left over Chinese food (3 kinds of mushrooms in a nice brown sauce) tonight.

[chocomouse]

No cooking here tonight -- lost our power! The marinara sauce was hot and fresh, but I had no way to cook the pasta. So I had leftover cold asparagus, and DH had the last of the egg salad for a sandwich. Apparently, a tree fell on our power line, it caused some very loud explosions (which we heard, sitting on our deck), and then started a fire at the base of the electric pole, in our woods. It took the fire department about 45 minutes to put out the fire, and another 3 hours for the power company to come inspect and reset the power. All winter long, with some big storms, we never lost power, and then something freaky like this happens!

[RiversideLen]

Chocomouse, I used to lose power often. So I bought a butane fueled camping stove. Now if the power goes, I have at least a burner that I can cook something on.

[navlys]

Baker Aunt, I copied your chicken and potatoes in oven idea! Great!!

[Joan Simpson]

We had taco salad last night and tonight it was salmon patties,cheese grits and left over butter beans.

[BakerAunt]

Navlys--I'm glad the sheet pan dinner worked well for you.

For dinner tonight, I made my adaptation of my Mom's hamburger stroganoff, which we had over mixed rice, with a salad on the side.

[Mike Nolan]

I found 3 small lobster tails in the freezer the other day so I defrosted them and butter poached them for supper. They had been in the freezer for a while and I think they weren't quite as big as the ones we had on Sunday, but they still tasted like lobster.

The broccoli was too far gone.

[navlys]

Mike

When you say you "butter poach" your lobster tails what do you mean exactly? I've purchased the 4 oz. tails ( not fresh water) and tried boiling and broiling ,removing part of the meat out of the shell etc. but wasn't always successful. What do you do and what size lobster tails are we talking about?

[Mike Nolan]

Butter poaching is a very common cooking technique for fish and shellfish.

These were fairly small lobster tails, probably 4 ounce. First take the tails out of the shell. There are lots of videos on YouTube on this, some better than others. Using kitchen shears, cut down the middle of the shell, pull it apart, and pull the lobster meat off the membrane. I also took out the intestine string and rinsed them off. (Not all the instructions have you do these steps.)

You can save the shells to make lobster stock. (Throw them back in the freezer until you have enough of them to make a couple quarts of stock.)

For the poaching liquid, use 1 1/2 to 2 sticks of butter for 4 tails, depending on the size of your pan. Put 2-3 tablespoons of water in your pan and heat it to boiling. Whisk in 2 tablespoons of butter, then start adding the rest of the butter a few tablespoons at a time. You should get a milky yellow-white poaching liquid. Heat it to a simmer but not to a full boil.

The poaching liquid should cover the lobster tails about half way. More than that uses too much butter, IMHO.

Some people throw a little lemon juice in the poaching liquid. (When I poach orange roughy, I use a lemon-butter poaching liquid,, but I don't use it for lobster.)

Add your lobster tails. Spoon the poaching liquid over the tails as they cook, turning them once or twice. It will take 7-8 minutes to cook them. (Larger tails take a bit longer.)

Serve with some drawn unsalted butter.

I've never found anything useful to do with the poaching liquid afterwards.

[navlys]

Thanks. When they are on sale again I will try your technique.

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