Summer dinner party

We had a couple friends over for dinner on the day our CSA basket arrived. Let's see what I concocted...

Left to right:

• Cold salad of tomatoes, cucumbers,  mozzarella, and basil tossed with sesame seed oil, lemon juice and white balsamic vinegar. 
• Roasted Italian Trombolino Squash sautéed with collard greens, beet tops, and toasted pecans, topped with sour cream and peach salsa. 
• Pan fried chicken breasts drizzled with a reduced port sauce. 
• (not pictured) Corn with butter and grains of paradise or long pepper. 
• (not pictured) Watermelon. 

Overall, I was pretty happy with the meal. In particular, the squash and greens was a nice experiment. I like the pale yellow color with the deep greens. Our guests seemed to have fun experimenting with grains of paradise and long pepper in grinders at the table. 

Rolled turkey breast

Take a 3-pound turkey breast, butterfly it, slather with 6-oz of sliced prosciutto and 6-oz sliced, boiled ham, a Tbs of rosemary leaves, three cloves crushed garlic, some sage, salt, pepper.

Roll it up like a jelly roll.
Tie it up.
Place it on aluminum foil. sprinkle with 2 tsb more rosemary, salt, and pepper.

Bake at 400º for 45-55 minutes.
Take out and let rest for 20 minutes before unwrapping and slicing.

Next time: I baked it 45 minutes then took the internal temp and it was only 100º.
So I put it back in until I got an internal temp of 150º, but that was too long.
After the overshoot it got up to 175º.
So, probably taking it out when it gets to 135º would be good.

In any case, it was very tasty.

Christmas feast

We had some folks over for a Christmas feast -- a good day for cooking. In advance we made pumpkin pie and cookies: lemon cloud, chocolate crinkles, and oatmeal chocolate chip.

Experimented making orange jello from scratch for a spiced peach mold (recipe from Betty Crocker).

Probably rosemary oven roasted red potatoes.
On the day we baked Fresh yams baked in orange sauce which were well received, roasted red potatoes with garlic and rosemary, sourdough rolls, and a peach pie.