NPR: What I Made for Dinner, 1/15/08

What I Made for Dinner, 1/15/08

Laura Conaway, this blog's esteemed editor, has been harassing me to start blogging what I make for my family for dinner every night. I have no idea why she would find this interesting. We McKinneys must represent the typical nuclear family or something. If so, I feel sorry for this nation.

Here's what we consumed chez McKinney this evening: beef stir fry with peppers. It was purchased pre-chopped at Stop and Shop with a sell-by date of today. I glopped way too much pre-made black bean sauce from a jar all over it. I served it with brown basmati rice. My daughter's portion was sauce-free.

Happy, Laura?

Tricia McKinney

8:24 PM ET | 01-14-2008 | permalink

Comments (Send a comment)

Yummy!

Sent by Steve Petersen | 9:43 PM ET | 01-14-2008

Bless you, Laura! Great idea. I cobbled together a dinner tonight consisting of a small helping of leftover chicken with soba noodles (homemade, at least) and some mini-carrots with red pepper hummus. And now I'm eyeing the box of Cheez-Its b/c I'm still hungry and all I've got left is junk.

Sent by akash | 10:25 PM ET | 01-14-2008

Tricia, man, you light up my life.

And Akash, your mama knows.

Sent by Laura, NPR | 6:15 AM ET | 01-15-2008

Well, I had a fried bologna sandwich! Top that for grossness

Sent by Nicole | 9:09 AM ET | 01-15-2008

My inner Texan came out: we had beans and cornbread. If I may be immodest for a moment, I have pretty much perfected my cornbread at this point.

Sent by Stewart | 11:14 AM ET | 01-15-2008

Mmmmm. Fried bologna sandwich. Mmmmm. Did you put mayonnaise on it?

Sent by Matt Martinez-NPR | 11:55 AM ET | 01-15-2008

OK Stewart -- what's your cornbread recipe?

Sent by Sharon Hoffman, NPR | 12:36 PM ET | 01-15-2008

It's basically the main recipe from the King Arthur Flour Whole Grains Cookbook with some tweaks.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix together two cups stoneground cornmeal, one cup each of whole wheat flour and AP flour, two teaspoons of baking powder, one teaspoon of salt, one teaspoon of baking soda. In a separate bowl, mix two cups buttermilk, two large eggs, 1/4 cup honey, 1/4 cup chopped hot red peppers in vinegar (what's known in New England sub shops as "hots," available on the pickle aisle of any decent supermarket) and a large handful of freeze-dried chopped red and green bell pepper from Penzey's. (You can substitute fresh chopped bell pepper, of course, but this is actually better because it doesn't add any extra liquid to the batter, which can throw off cooking time.)

In a 12-inch cast iron skillet over medium heat, melt one stick of butter, swirling to coat the entire interior of the pan as it melts. When the butter is melted and the pan is thoroughly hot, pour the melted butter on top of the dry ingredients. Working quickly, add the wet ingredients, stir just to combine (it's okay if there are some small lumps) and pour the batter into the hot cast-iron pan. Bake in the 400-degree oven for 35 minutes, cool for 5-10 minutes, then cut into wedges and serve.

Although this recipe goes against my upbringing by including a sweetener and containing equal portions of cornmeal and flour (Texas cornbread is unsweetened and the cornmeal to flour ratio is more like 3:1 or even 4:0), the toothsomeness of the whole wheat flour and stoneground cornmeal and the subtlety of the honey as opposed to white sugar keeps it from being the oversweetened cake that's most often passed off as cornbread up here. My main addition is the chopped pickled peppers (or the chopped fresh chiles I add in summer and fall when they come off the plants growing on our stoop) and freeze-dried bell peppers: between them, they make this cornbread a dead ringer for the jalapeno cornbread they used to serve at Furr's Cafeteria when I was a kid.

Sent by Stewart | 1:57 PM ET | 01-15-2008

I had the typical college student staple: Top ramen!?!?

Sent by Charlie | 2:01 PM ET | 01-15-2008

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