It's all about the sherry.

Hi! Long time no post! Today I am going to extol the tremendous virtues of Sherry. Dry. Which I actually like to drink as well. (what don’t I like to drink?) (I mean seriously, I enjoy vermouth!)


But it is Sherry that has made my mountain dishes have that depth of flavor that, let’s face it, is sometimes hard to achieve without chicken broth.

OK

Beet soup.

A carrot, a celery stalk, 1/2 and onion dice/slice sauté in a little olive oil, when soft toss some sherry in there and let it cook off then

A qt of veg stock, 2 small bay leaves and three cloves and three diced previously roasted and skinned beets and some salt and pepper

Let it simmer a while

I left it in the fridge overnight and then the next day I added some chopped orange peel and the juice of one orange, fished out the bay and cloves (which really make a difference) put it in the blender and added some brown rice I had lying about.

MMMMMM.

Frozen Perch Fillets with brown rice

Make some brown rice. Or whatever whole grain you’ve got around. Sautee a1/2 an onion and a diced carrot in olive oil, again sherry it when they’re soft, cook off and let carmelize a bit

Meanwhile

Dice up some tomatoes and some marinated artichokes, lightly grease a baking apparatus, put in your THAWED perch fillets* cover with chopped tomatoes and artichokes, a squeeze of lemon, a little s and p and bake at whatever the bag says – 400 or so, until fish flakes easily with a fork.

Ok, while your fishes they are baking,

Toss an appropriate amount of rice in with the carrots and onions, and add say, an also appropriate amount of chick peas and toss it around over high heat, until you know, it’s hot and some of the rice is a little crispy.

Plop your fillets on top of your rice and delicious!
* I bought Wholey’s frozen perch fillets because they were wild caught, and all the “fresh” fish at the counter was farmed and frankly looked like shit. I know that the politics of eating fish are very complicated right now, what with the over fishing and the ickyness of farming – but whatever. I always take supposedly wild over farmed, even if it’s been frozen. This much thought about the politics of fish production and health concerns from a woman who eats wendy’s.

And perhaps the most successful stir fry I’ve ever made:

1/2 an onion, a carrot, a stalk of celery, a clove of garlic, and some fresh ginger if you have it. I didn’t.

heat up a pan real hot, swirl in some oil (peanut or canola) add garlic sauté for just a little bit, to flavor the oil and remove garlic (if you were doing the spicy dried chili thing you would do that here now in the same way)


add onion, carrot and celery, sliced fine, to the oil, stir it up! When starting to soften add some, wait for it, Sherry!* And cook it off, add a little water. I had cooked off some kale, so add that, or whatever greens you like.

Add a little water and soy sauce boil off the water

Add brown rice and cubed tofu and sesame seeds, hot it all up and add soy sauce and toasted sesame oil to taste.

MMMMMMMMMM.


*dry sherry is very integral to asian home cooking in the states. I don’t know why. Maybe because rice wine was difficult to get for a long time – I don’t know – but I suppose that you could use Mirin instead of Sherry in this one.

And as a side note – it is snowing big flakes and the sun is sort of diffused and glowing everything and I feel like I’m in the little house in the snow globe. The little house on the mountain with the bare trees and rolling fields and whirl pool bathtub…!

Lots of loving!