Reasonably So

My dears, I have a few things to report on. Food related things! I love food.

1) I just finished reading Heat by Bill Buford.

It was a graduation gift, and a great one, at that. It is an excellent book, and I highly recommend it if you like to cook, even a little bit. It reminded me that I can do whatever I want in the world as long as I have a good reason, forced me to realize that restaurant cooking is NOT my dream job, and inspired me to reach for more in my own kitchen–I can be an even better cook than I already am. This last point leads me to item 2…

2) I finished reading Heat on the morning of Father’s Day. Last year for Father’s Day, my sister and I cooked/grilled up a feast for my dad, and especially after being inspired to be a better cook, I was so ready to take that on again. This time my stepmom helped me. One of the things I’m trying to focus on lately is more seasonally-geared eating. I found a few recipes that seemed mid-June friendly and seemed like they would work well together. I didn’t take pictures (sorry), but I found some on the net so you can drool as you think about how good they probably tasted.

I made grilled swordfish with lemon, mint and basil:

With creamy mushroom risotto:

and grilled asparagus:

MMMMM!!!!! Is that what you’re thinking? That’s what it was. MMMMMMMMM DELICIOUS. I tweaked recipes, as I always do. For the swordfish sauce, I doubled the amounts of both mint and basil… next time I try this, I plan to use a food processor or blender to make a sort of pesto-like sauce rather than having the big chunks of basil and mint and garlic (if you try that, let me know how it goes). I used fresh mushrooms for the risotto, just about doubled the amount of them, but still poured a cup of boiling water over them to extract some juices to help flavor the risotto. I totally improvised with the asparagus, drizzling them in balsamic vinegar and olive oil and then sprinkling with salt, pepper, and garlic powder (did this first and let it sit, marinating, while I made the risotto, heated up the grill, etc.).

I took some risks with this meal since I have grilled only as many times as I have fingers on my right hand (if that), have never before cooked fish (except shrimp), and had a limited amount of time to pull it all off. I am thrilled to report that everything went well, my kitchen-instincts guided me truly, and Dad seemed pleased and full at the end of the meal.

Success!