A Jeanne in the Kitchen

Steak is always a favorite in our house. We eat quite a bit, though I have to make mine into smaller and smaller portions because my tummy just can’t handle it the way it used to. Because steak is a staple in our house, I am always looking for new and creative ways to cook and serve it.

Right now our weather is all over the place. We are still having warm days mixed in with cooler days, which makes menu planning a bit challenging. It was one of our warmer days, and steak was in our weekly meat rotation. I wanted a steak dish that was a bit lighter to go better with the warmer weather. I found a delicious steak recipe that was just perfect. I seared my steak to a delicious rare-medium rare and served it over cannellini beans and spinach, then topped it with tomatoes. I topped it all with a toasted spice vinaigrette.

Steak with Toasted Spice Vinaigrette

I generously coated my steak with salt, fresh ground black pepper and olive oil and let it set for about an hour covered and at room temperature before searing it.

Next I made the vinaigrette.

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp fennel

1 tsp coriander

1/3 cup olive oil

2-3 TBSP white wine vinegar or Prosecco vinegar

1 tsp Dijon mustard

t-2 tsp Worcestershire Sauce

fresh ground black pepper and salt

Toast the spices in a small skillet for about 2-3 minutes, or until they become fragrant, then mix in with the oil, vinegar, Worcestershire Sauce and mustard and whisk everything together and let it set until ready to use.

My steak still needed something else, so I sauteed spinach with onions and garlic, salt, pepper and olive oil. Once the spinach was cooked, I tossed in a can of drained and rinsed cannellini beans. I used this as my base and built it all up from there.

Once everything was cooked and prepared, I just layered it all up, starting with the spinach and beans, then the steak, with the sliced tomatoes next. The final step was to drizzle the vinaigrette on top of everything while the steak and spinach were still hot. I had some leftover mashed potatoes that I added just to finish them off. You all know how I love to use up my leftovers. 🙂 A nice glass or two of Cabernet Sauvignon was a perfect addition to complete the meal.

You can also serve this steak, with the tomatoes and dressing over a bed of greens to make a nice steak salad too if you prefer. However you choose to serve it, it is definitely a very tasty choice. I think you will like it a lot. 🙂

Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

There were a lot of birthdays that needed to to be celebrated while we were gallivanting around Canada, which means we celebrated once we got back. I bought presents back from our travels for all the celebrants. I told you about Lauren’s birthday dinner, that I cooked. Lauren’s Birthday Celebration. Janet’s birthday was a few days later. She wanted us all to go out to an Italian restaurant in Cherry Creek, called North Italia.

North Italia is an upscale Italian Restaurant that opened 20 years ago. North Italia was founded on two essential principles: exceptional Italian cuisine and great hospitality. It specializes in combining traditional Italian flavors with innovation. Everything is always evolving at North Italia. It’s a place where details matter and every guest is welcomed and treated as guest in their house. This is how every successful restaurant stands head and shoulders above the rest. (This is also how my staff and I always treated everyone who entered our establishments too). Treating every guest like they are a guest in your house is what transforms the ordinary into the extraordinary. At North Italia, their motto is “From the ingredients we source to the wine we pour, every bite and sip you take was made with excellence in mind”.

While we were waiting for our wine and starters, Janet opened her presents. This beautiful scarf, a big bottle of pure Canadian maple syrup, and a maple chocolate bar were her presents from us. The scarf matched her sweater perfectly. 🙂

We started off with a bottle of some delicious wine and grilled ciabatta bread for the table.

Larry and I split a salad before our entrees and Janet and Bob split a bowl of lentil soup.

We all ordered something different for our main entrees. Janet ordered the tortellini.

Bob ordered the salmon.

Larry decided on lasagna. He likes to order lasagna when we go to Italian restaurants because I rarely cook it. It is far too cheesy for me, so I don’t eat it. But Larry loves it. 🙂

I ordered a chicken and pepper dish.

Everything was very good and we thoroughly enjoyed our dinners. Because it was a birthday, we actually did save room for dessert too.

The birthday girl ordered the tiramisu.

Normally, we just get one dessert to share, but Larry is not a tiramisu fan. He doesn’t like anything coffee flavored. So we ordered a hazelnut cake that we shared. I tried the tiramisu though, and it was divine. Once again, everything was delicious!

Janet, Bob and I all ordered a latte or cappuccino afterwards too.

It was yet another fabulously fun evening shared with great friends who are really more like family. Happy Birthday Janet, with many more to come.

North Italia is a chain of restaurants with locations across the United States, mostly in California. We went to the only location (so far) in Colorado, located at 190 Clayton Lane, Denver, CO 80206. Reservations are required, and everything fills up fast. So call (720) 941-7700 or go online. This is a North Italian dining experience you won’t want to miss.

Have a great day and make everyday great. And everything you do will always be better when celebrated with great friends and great food. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

Foods travel and cross paths into many different cultures and countries, all claiming those recipes to be their own. The precursor to the modern spinach salad was likely a “wilted” or “kilt” salad using dandelion greens, dressed with hot bacon fat, vinegar, and sometimes sugar. It was originally rooted in both Dutch and German traditions, but quickly became an American salad. It was specifically a Pennsylvania Dutch recipe from the Lancaster County region of Pennsylvania. The original version of the salad was popular in the 19th century as these greens were among the first available after winter. Once the use of spinach took over, spinach quickly replaced dandelion greens and the salad’s popularity really started to take off. The classic spinach salad with hot bacon dressing reached peak popularity in the United States during the 1970s and into the 1980s. During this time, variations often included common additions like hard-boiled eggs, sliced red onions, and occasionally canned mandarin oranges or blue cheese. The use of pancetta, an Italian cured pork belly, is a more recent culinary adaptation, often seen as a way to update the classic dish. Pancetta offers a different flavor profile than traditional American bacon, and recipes using it, such as one by Chef Michael Chiarello, began appearing in the early 2000s and onward. The pancetta fat, like bacon grease, is used as the base for the warm dressing, often a vinaigrette.

And yet again, I added my own personal touches to this classic salad, making it my own recipe. Or as some would say, I “Jeannefied it”. 🙂

Spinach Salad with Warm Prosciutto Dressing

I did not have Pancetta but I did have Prosciutto. Pancetta and prosciutto are similar and are both Italian cured pork products, but pancetta comes from the pork belly while prosciutto comes from the hind leg, resulting in some key differences. Pancetta is typically diced and cooked before eating, with a more savory, fatty flavor, while prosciutto is thinly sliced and served uncooked, with a more complex, slightly sweet flavor. While pancetta is cured pork belly that’s typically cooked, prosciutto is air-dried ham, often eaten raw, and has a more delicate, less fatty texture. To substitute, cook the prosciutto until crisp or add it at the end of cooking, and be cautious with adding extra salt. Prosciutto is healthier than pancetta because it is made from a leaner cut of pork (the hind leg) while pancetta comes from the fattier pork belly. This results in prosciutto having a lower fat content and being less processed than pancetta. Of course I made a few other changes as well. 🙂

10-16 oz fresh baby spinach, rinsed and stems removed

8 sliced Prosciutto

2 TBSP olive oil

2-3 cloves garlic, sliced very thin

1 shallot, sliced very thin

1/4 cup red wine vinegar

1 tsp Dijon mustard

salt & fresh ground black pepper to taste

5-6 radishes, rinsed and sliced very thin

Saute the Prosciutto in a little olive oil until it is crispy, then remove from the pan and drain on a paper towel.

Add the garlic and shallot to the olive oil and saute for 1-2 minutes.

Pour the vinegar, mustard and salt & pepper into the garlic mixture and mix well. Pour the hot dressing over the spinach and add the Prosciutto on top of the salad. Add the radish slices all around the salad. Serve immediately while the dressing is still hot.

Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

I just came across this old picture of me and one of my chefs, or “Jeffe”, as we called him; that was our nickname for him. His name was Miguel, but I had 2 Miguels, and Jeffe was my #2 man, behind me. We had just catered a big corporate event for Chevron. This was many, many moons ago. This must have been close to 30 years ago now.

Still working on Lauren’s birthday dinner. Now it is the side dishes I served with the Crying Lamb. Crying Lamb One of the dishes I served was green beans with marinated mushrooms. I love both green beans and mushrooms, so this was a win/win, at least for me. 🙂

Green Beans with Marinated Mushrooms

You can use either baby portabella, button or cremini mushrooms. I tend to use the baby portabellas most of the time, since they are my favorites, though I love all mushrooms.

I made some lemon zest with the lemons, lemon juice and Kosher salt first, and let it set until the rinds were softened.

1 TBSP garlic, sliced very thin

1 tsp lemon peel, chopped fine

1/3 cup lemon juice

1/2 cup olive oil

1/4 cup lemon olive oil, optional

1 TBSP fresh parsley, chopped fine

1 TBSP fresh basil, chiffonade fine

1-2 sprigs fresh rosemary, chopped fine

1-2 TBSP Peruvian peppers

salt & fresh ground black pepper to taste

2 cups mushrooms, quartered

1 TBSP green onions, sliced thin

1/2-3/4 lb cooked green beans

Cook the green beans until they are al dente in boiling water, then drain.

Combine all the rest of the ingredients together and mix well.

Add the mushroom and herb mixture over the cooked green beans and enjoy. Or you can serve it all over a bed of greens, lettuce of your choice, or spinach and make into a salad if you prefer. No matter how you serve it, I promise you are going to love it. 🙂 We did.

Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

We typically do not get any trick or treaters in our neighborhood. We don’t have a lot of kids that live in our neighborhood, and more and more kids are doing the Trunk or Treats instead. We only have only little boy, Luke, who lives on our street. Luke is a sweetheart, and I always get him some special treats. This year, I went to Yonutz Donuts Yonutz vs. Donuts, Yonutz! Is Official and got him a special Halloween donut.

I took a picture of the “donut chef” who made it too. She had the mouse from Ratatouille on her shoulder. She was ready for Halloween.

Other than Luke, no one came to our door, though it probably didn’t help that Larry and I did not have our lights on either. Halloween is not really our thing, especially since we do not have kids of our own. If you like Halloween though, I hope you had a spooktacular one. 🙂

Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

The fall colors we saw on the east coasts of both Canada and the US were magnificent! They were so colorful, full and lush. But our colors here in Colorado are pretty spectacular too. We have different trees, a different climate and altitude, and obviously we do not have the amount of beautiful trees that eastern coasts have, but we are still beautiful in our own ways. This fall has been a very colorful fall here at home too.

Beauty is all around us, everywhere we go. We just have to open our eyes and our hearts to see it. Have a great day, and take in all the beauty around you.

Crying lamb is a very old dish with its roots in many different countries and cultures, though today it is considered to be a classic French recipe, named agneau qui pleure or gigot d’agneau pleureur. It is also known as seven hours lamb or agneau de sept heures because some people like to cook it nice and slow for seven hours. It is believed it was a dish shared by many people who cooked in community ovens. Some food historians also suggest it may have been a simple, early “grandmother’s recipe,” perhaps originating from an oversight where a piece of meat was left to cook for an extended period in the embers of a fireplace.

The unique cooking method involves placing the meat on a rack above a bed of vegetables (often potatoes or a gratin) in a sealed pot or casserole dish (a luted casserole, sealed with a paste of flour and water). The “tears” or “crying” in the name refers to the meat’s juices and fat slowly dripping down onto the vegetables below during the long, slow cooking process, flavoring them and keeping the meat moist.

Crying Lamb

I did not cook my lamb for seven hours, but I did marinate it overnight, which made it very tender and full of flavor.

4-5 lb lamb leg or roast

8-10 garlic cloves, sliced very thin

salt & fresh ground pepper to taste

2/3 cup olive oil

1/3 cup lemon olive oil, optional

1/3 cup lemon juice

2-3 sprigs fresh rosemary, cut into small pieces

2-3 sprigs fresh tarragon, chopped

2 lbs new or yellow potatoes, sliced thin

1-1 1/2 sticks butter, sliced into pats

1 onion, sliced very thin

1 cup water or broth – You can use either chicken or beef broth

Pat the lamb roast dry with paper towels. Remove the excess fat, while still leaving a little fat around the lamb roast. With a sharp serrated knife, cut deep slats or pockets all over the lamb. Generously season the lamb with the salt & pepper and pat it down. Insert the garlic slices and the rosemary sprig cuts into the slats.

Combine the olive oil(s), tarragon, lemon juice and more salt & pepper and whisk together. Pour it over the lamb, cover and refrigerate overnight.

When ready to cook the lamb, remove it from the refrigerator about an hour before cooking it, then get a large skillet VERY hot. Add enough olive oil and butter into the skillet to sear the lamb on all sides, without it burning or sticking. Cook each side of the lamb for about 4-5 minutes per side, or until a nice crust has formed all around.

Preheat the oven to about 400*F or 200*C.

Line a deep baking pan with aluminum foil (for easier cleaning purposes) and either spray the foil with cooking spray and/or add dollops of butter to the bottom.

Slice the potatoes into thin slices and place in a single layer on the bottom of the prepared pan. Add dollops of butter onto the potatoes and repeat once again. Season with salt & pepper and drizzle olive oil on top.

Add more butter pats and the sliced onion. Add the of water or broth.

Place a rack directly over the potatoes, then place the lamb on top of the rack, cover tightly with aluminum foil and place in the center of the oven.

Roast until the lamb reaches an internal temperature of about 135-140* F or 58-60*C., or about 2 hours. Remove the foil after about 1 1/2 hours to let the roast brown some more and crisp up. Allow the lamb to rest for about 10 minutes before slicing it.

The lamb comes out so tender and juicy and the potatoes are crispy on the outside and velvety on the inside. In a word – PERFECT!.

This was a definite favorite. Lauren absolutely loved the lamb cooked this way. You will too. 🙂

Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

From time to time, I write some freelance articles on various topics for different companies. They always get first right of refusal before I can publish and share them with you. One of the other projects I was working on right after returning home from Canada was an article featuring fun, festive fall libations. I called the piece “Spirits Of The Fall“. Now I can share it with you as well.

Spirits Of The Fall

Spirits of the fall.  That phrase has a lot of different meanings and connotations, depending on where you are and who you are talking to. 

1.  Does it mean the Halloween spirits coming around since Halloween is just around the corner?  Maybe.  We were touring all around Eastern Canada and New England and the whole area is ready for the spirits of the fall to come, in more ways than one.  

2. Does it mean all the beautiful fall colors and the good spirits the beautiful season brings?  Maybe.

3. Does it mean all the delicious fall spices and flavorings, like pumpkins and pumpkin spice?  Maybe.

4. Or does the phrase “spirits of the fall” mean something completely different? 

Today I am focusing my attentions on the spirited beverages people are drinking all over Eastern Canada and New England at this time of year, as the “spirits of the fall”.  I was on a mission.  I set out to try as many different and tasty ”spirited”  fall beverages as I could while on my vacation.  I could only try so many, but I have a ton of great ideas to offer that you might want to experience this fall season too.

First, I am going to share the spirited beverages I did try.  They were all very good and all very different.  Every region we went to offered something different, which made this a very fun and tasty research project.  I put the local bartenders to the test, and they all came up with some fabulous creations.

In Boston, I had a fall sangria, at the Union Oyster House, the oldest continuous restaurant in North America, operating since 1742.  This delicious fall sangria was made with spiced rum, apple cider, Sprite and a dash of cinnamon and nutmeg to spice things up a bit.  It was a delicious start to the fall season.

Another delicious spirited beverage I tried was a Frangelico coffee while in Montreal, at La Buche.  We got soaked in a cold, heavy rain and needed something to warm us up from the inside out.  This delicious Frangelico coffee  hit the spot.  It was a combination of Frangelico, which is a hazelnut liqueur, coffee, and whipped cream, with some chocolate covered espresso beans on top as a bonus.  Spirited coffees of any kind are always a good cold weather favorite.

While in Lunenberg, dining at the seashore, I tried a Lunenberg blueberry lemonade.  It was made with Ironworks rum, Limoncello, vodka, blueberry liqueur and topped with locally grown fresh blueberries.  The sun was shining brightly, it was a beautiful sunny day, and this was a perfect way to relax by the boardwalk, watching life and all the people go by.

Another scrumptious fall creation from Halifax, Nova Scotia, was a cranberry mule, made with ginger beer, vodka, cranberry juice, and lime juice.  It was yet another great adult beverage to enjoy by the seashore on a bright, sunny day.

And one more adult fall lemonade to share from Sussex, Canada – a mango lemonade.  It was made with vodka, Limoncello, mango juice and Sprite, with fresh sprigs of mint on the side.  We enjoyed this lovely libation at Eastside Marco’s.  It was very tasty and very refreshing.

These were just the “spirits of the fall” I tasted and enjoyed, but there were many other options available too.  My dilemma – there were too many spirited libations from which to choose and far too little time to try them all.  Here are some other fall drink options I might just have to sample, the next time I am summoning up some fall spirits.

All of these libations sound luscious and delicious, and are only slightly decadent.  All are perfect to highlight all the fun flavors and colors of the fall season too.  So when hosting your Halloween parties or fall fiestas, you might want to summon up some or all of these “spirits of the fall” to add to your menu.  I’m sure your guests will all be wowed by your choice or choices of the “spirits of the season”.  These are many more reasons to enjoy the beauty of the fall season.  Cheers!

We had to celebrate Lauren’s birthday after the fact because we were still gone for her actual birthday. But I made something very special for her when we got home.

Lauren is Italian, and I was inspired to make her a traditional Italian dinner for her birthday, in part by our trip to the North End, or Little Italy, in Boston. I even bought her a North End Italian cookbook as her birthday present. Her whole dinner was from recipes out of her birthday present, although she didn’t know that at the time. 🙂

Lauren said she wanted lamb. OK. No problem. I made her some Crying Lamb as the main entree. I served it with some green beans and marinated mushrooms, olive bread, a spinach salad with a prosciutto vinaigrette, and rice pudding with chocolate covered pistachios for dessert. She was completely WOWED!! She said this was better than going to any restaurant, and it was her choice for me to cook her birthday dinner rather than go out. So I cooked her a delicious, authentic Italian dinner. 🙂

I’ve been telling you all along I have been busy cooking ever since we got back. I am always cooking up something. I am Jeanne, from “A Jeanne in the Kitchen” after all. 🙂

All the delicious recipes will be coming to you in good time, have no fears or doubts about that. 🙂 In the mean time, just sit back, relax, and let the good vibes come your way.

Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.