What's for Dinner?

It is a challenge having dinner with someone that doesn't eat vegetables. How do I add them in? Well his soup just didn't have any bok choy in there. But don't tell him. There is Chinese cabbage and bunching onions in those wontons. I pureed them with the seasonings and shrimp in the food processor. Then mixed in the ground pork. I found them much lighter than the ones we get at the Chinese restaurants. And much easier to cut through with my fork.

I had some left over mix of Chinese cabbage and some other veggies. Probably from making the wontons. I needed to use them up. So I tossed them inside some pot sticker skins and fried them up. Technically you aren't supposed to fry two sides of a pot sticker but I did anyway as the bottom was starting to get too dark. They were so good but anything is tasty with the sauce that goes with them. These were just for me. Sometimes it is nice not to have to share.

And speaking of pot stickers. Here in Boston we have always called them Peking Raviolis. Supposedly the name is unique to our area. Though it is rare to see a vegetable one. They are always pork. I've always wondered whether the name is just used here or it is an internet fable. Has anyone else heard them called that in other parts of the country?

Ah mac and cheese (or in this case ziti and cheese). It is such a comfort food. The recipe I use is healthier than normal. Though I use whole wheat pasts to increase that. I love the taste as it is a bit like Welsh Rarebit - a cheese sauce I've loved since I was a child. I of course added veggies to mine (fava beans, snap peas, and garlic scapes). I put ham in my husband's.

Yesterday we had terriyaki chicken on a homemade whole wheat bun. The sides are Boston baked beans (with beans and mustard from the garden) and some grilled sweet potatoes and garlic scapes. I thought those two veggies would meld better. Sometimes contrast is good. But nope. I ended up picking them apart. They were both good, just not together like that.

I had leftover chicken from last night that I wanted to use up, so I made a fried rice. I put in two normal things, snap peas and bunching onions. But the third was kind of a weird thing for a Chinese dish. I put in about a quarter cup of chopped parsley. It made it taste not Chinese at all. But it was very good and it brightened it up a lot.

I was surprised that I took photographs of all five dinners I made this week. Joel and I love going out also and typical go out twice a week for dinner. So those would be the missing two dinners. We have a new restaurant opening up just two blocks from our house. We can't wait to try it. Finally a new restaurant that isn't Italian. It isn't that I don't like Italian, but our neighborhood is historically filled with a lot of Italians and Greeks. The problem with that is we had five Italian restaurants (Maria's - best thick bread pizza, Franchescha's - best cannoli, Olympia, Olivio, and Sabatino's - best thin crust pizza) in the neighborhood already when we were getting our last new restaurant. And of course it was another Italian one (Comella). I kept thinking we didn't need six of them in our little area. Oh and I wasn't even counting Za which is a gourmet pizza restaurant which weirdly I give the title of best interesting salad and they use local farms to source their ingredients too.

We even got a new deli this spring that ended up being Italian. Joel and I were so sad to find out it was Italian. When we think deli, we think Jewish deli. Ah for knishes and matzo ball soup.

But I digress. I always thought we could use a good Irish pub. What we got was the Menotomy Grill and Tavern. Menotomy is the name for the town before it was changed to Arlington, so it is an American bar and grill with a historic theme. We are now both praying that it is good since it was one kind of food really lacking in our neighborhood. That and the bagel bakery. Yes we will be all set except for our bagels. Right now we pay for our bagels in sweat as it is a three mile round trip walk.