Thursday, March 25, 2010

Day 42 - Value Eating on 03/24/2010

Today was a day of some kitchen experiments. Well, rather a couple of hours in the evening. But it was so much fun! I love playing around with ingredients.

But before I arrived in front of my stove, I had half a Ciabatta bread roll (from Cook au vin, great artisan baker who sells around the Chicago Farmer’s Markets!) w. butter & honey & a glas milk for breakfast = 50c+15c+15c+40 c = 1.20$
And for lunch an organic banana and the other half of the bread with some of my imported Camembert (39c, 50c, 50c) = 1.39$

For dinner I used the leftover of the polenta seasoned with chilli peppers & oregano. I was thinking in the lines of a polenta based veggie lasagne. So I lined the baking pan with 1 Tbsp of Roberta’s intensely sunny tasting sun-dried tomato spread, and then layered polenta (in which I had mixes on egg) – grilled eggplant – polenta – grilled eggplant (the eggplant I had briefly grilled on the griddle pan on the stove). After 20 min in the oven at 450 F, I turned the whole things upside down on a plate and hade two slices of it with a side of salad, the remaining organic romaine lettuce. Very yummy!

As a perfect condiment I used some of the green garlic pesto I had prepared earlier: Vera from Videnovic Farms had brought this green baby garlic to last Saturday’s Farmer’s Market – I passed four bunches through the food processor with ¼ cup of Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil and seasoned it with a tsp of Roberta’s Roasting & Grilling Salt. To die for! So yummy! I can totally see me using that as a spread on my sandwiches… I am also thinking a savory crepe with a thin layer of this “garlic pesto” and then filled with minced beef & sautéed chard… sooo many ideas. I love products like that, a food that you smell or taste and then a firework of ideas goes off in your head! So, be prepared – I will be babbling about green garlic pesto for a while!!

Polenta 40c, ½ organic eggplant 64c, 1/2 tbsp Sun Dried Tomato Spread 60c, 1/2 egg 33c romaine lettuce: 35c = 2.22$
Green garlic pesto: 4$ garlic, 1.2$ EVOO, 0.1$ salt = 5.30$ for ca 20 teaspoons. = 27c

TOTAL FOOD COSTS FOR TODAY: 5.18$

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