Cooking School (part 1?)

Another response we’ve made to the uncertain economic status these days is to reduce dining out. This really bums me out on one hand because I’m a minor foodie. I love to have a great meal from someone else’s kitchen. On the other hand it has been fun to remember how much I love to cook. Now that HJ is home from school it has been nice to have someone to cook with since He is up north. We all love gyros so dinner tonight was gyro inspired: Lamb meatballs with Couscous and Tzatziki and homemade lemonade. It was really fun to cut our own fresh mint, rosemary and flat leaf parsley for each component of the meal; it was too bad that I didn’t have any fresh garlic to pick. I really enjoy watching her learn to cook. It is nice to see her confidence and skill build. Now I just have to teach her how to clean up after herself but cleaning up the kitchen was a welcome chore in this case!

I don’t often use a recipe when cooking, although always when baking!, but here’s generally what we did:

Equal portions of ground lamb to leanest available ground beef

1 or 2 eggs

2 cloves garlic crushed and minced

Good handful of chopped fresh mint

Good handful of chopped flat leaf parsley

½ to 1 t of chopped fresh rosemary

Probably a ¼ to a 1/3 cup plain bread crumbs

Mix well with your clean hands and form into meatballs. We cooked our batch at 350 for 40 mins. In the past I have gone 375 for 30 mins. They just need to cook. You’ll know when they are done.

Couscous – so easy!

Equal parts boiling water to couscous, cover and let stand a couple of mins. or follow directions

Juice of 1 lemon

1 tomato diced

Small handful of fresh mint and parsley chopped

Drizzle with good olive oil to taste and sight

Tzatziki

16 oz plain yogurt – you can drain in a sieve overnight if you can plan ahead, I can’t.

1 cucumber peeled and seeded then dice
Good handful of chopped mint with some parsley thrown in
A splash of rice wine vinegar

1 clove of garlic crushed and minced or as much as you like to your tastes

Dinner in under an hour - Yum!