Mushroom Ragout With Pasta pg. 314

5 Toasts

Even without meat this pasta was a wonderful dinner. Spatula hates mushrooms and still give this a 5.

We chose a nice bottle of red wine vinegar at the grocery market only to forget to add it in step three. Not much to write tonight. We will make this again with the vinegar and re-rate it.

Anyone have any tips for cooking ragout? How can the sauce thicken in step 3 when a tight fitting lid is added to the pan? Also how can all the mushroom juices evaporate when one follows the instruction "add the mushrooms;cover"? The condensation just gets trapped inside the pan keeping eveything liquid.

This dish is really quick, filling, tasty and a great meal to make with minimal chopping.

Lemon-Parsley Pork Chops pg.299 & Buttermilk Mashed Potatoes pg.247

3 Toasts & A Crust

We tried the flavorful chops with the potatoes this evening. Anyone try mincing lemon zest by hand before? Really difficult even if you follow the tips in the book. Maybe our knife needed to be sharpened. As you can see in the pic, the mince was more of a chop.

The chops did not brown so the end result was lighter than expected and next time we make this I may pour the pan juices over top of the lemon-parsley mixture to cook it a bit.

I had two frying pans on the go for this, why are chops so big? Yes I was using a big pan! All in all this was a nice change from the usual pork chop with apple sauce.

The mashed potatoes tasted great (5 toasts) but so do potatoes with regular milk. Why butter milk? Pretty simple to make and serve.

Lots of leftovers from all these recipes for lunch, and it's pretty easy to cook a new one every day. I think we will beat the clock on this challenge.

Beef and Orange Stir-Fry pg. 212

4 Toasts

Sweet and squishy oranges and garlicky beef. This is hands down the best stir-fy made in this home yet. Normally when we have stir-fry I dump all the frozen veggies from our freezer together and cook to make - voila! - a bland textured pile, but not this time.

The beef was just done (nice and soft) and had a sweet sticky taste. If you make this, make sure you have an orange juicer or extra orange juice on hand. I ran out of juice and had to make due with lemon, which really put a bitter taste into it.

Yes the green onions are delicious at 1 inch lengths once everything is cooked together. Try using a good quality white rice, or maybe long grain instead of just Uncle Ben's which I found was too small for my liking.

This dish looks beautiful and even work well for leftovers!

Salmon Nicoise Salad pg. 66

No we did not try this salad in Nice. I wish we did because this receipe was great and the real thing could only have been better. Since it's not a traditional hot dinner we don't want to give it a 5 out of 5 rating, but I will go so far to say it is 4 1/2 toasts.

Where to begin? The Dijon vinaigrette went well with all parts of the dish. Try doubling the receipe and saving some on the side because we were wishing there was more while eating. We couldn't find any anchovy fillets at No Frills but wanted to try them - anyone out there use them?

The simmered salmon had an addictive bouncy texture that even Spatula liked. An easy was to flake the fish is to press the back of the slotted spoon down on the fillet after you have remived it from the skillet. The salmon breaks into bit sized chunks - yum!

Really surprised by this one!

Lentil Soup pg. 263 and Lemon-Parmesan Vinaigrette pg. 347

3 Toast Rating

It looked and smelled great but the taste didn't live up to expectations. Maybe we added too much red wine vinegar (who needs measuring spoons) and the bacon probably would have crisped up better if we had cut it into 1/2 inch pieces.

Our neighbour asked us if the great smell was coming from our house. While it was thickening I went to the gym and when I got back our whole floor smelled delicious. You may want to use canned lentils or soak the dried lentils a bit.

We paired it with the green salad topped with the lemon-parmesan vinaigrette (which Spatula said tasted kind of "red") which was a light side. I would try some flat bread or maybe nachos with it next time.

We probably won't make this again, but it was fun to try.

Top Chef II Kingston Rd Pics

And so it begins . . . Asparagus Gruyere Tart pg. 69

On a scale out of 1-5 Toasts (a crust counting as half) this tart is gets a 5 toast rating.

Although it takes just minutes to put together, this savory tart does make an impressive main course. It won Top Chef II Kingston Road last week. One of the judges described the taste as "angels dancing on his tongue" and wanted more.

This was my first time using puff pastry and I it was so simple to use, yielding such great results that I am on the look out for chance to use it again. For the next time I need to try scoring the inside of the rectangle, not the 1 inch edge, as this made the crust hard and flat.

If you are trying the recipe for the first time I recommend using more cheese, try 8-10 ounces of Gruyere. We bought it Saturday morning from St.Lawrence Market, and the taste was very snappy and delicious.

If you are cooking along with us, how did it go? What are your suggestions?

The beginning

After being inspired by the fearless cooking in Julie & Julia we decided to start cooking our way through this book of recipes from the kitchens of martha stewart living.

The book is divided into Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter. We may start in winter, maybe not, let's see how this goes.

Both of us know the very basics of cooking so this will be a delicious learning experience. Follow along for the next 365 days. Will we make it through the book? Probably. Will there be any kitchen fires? Probably. Will we keep you posted on our progress? Yes!

On your mark . . . get set . . . start cooking Monday January 18, 2010.