Food food food!

Well, loyal readers, it's like this: only one of you responded to my comments about food porn in a previous post, and s/he was very positive about the extensive food porn I've been posting. So here you go, L!

This is all from our trip to New England over the xmas holidays. My in-laws responded to my taking pictures of food the whole trip with varying degrees of bemusement, though K seemed to totally get it, and the kids just giggled. (I did and said a lot of things which caused the kids to giggle, so this was well within form.)

Zucchini, onions, tofu, and garlic for:

Hot salad!

I think this might have been the prep for the hot salad, but honestly, I'm not really sure. I did a lot of cooking in the week and a half.

All the fixings for a hearty vegetable stew.
Unfortunately, the finished product was too shy to pose for a picture.

J baked fresh bread in less than two hours beginning to end with the ingredients on hand. It's more impressive than it sounds, when you know what ingredients are usually on hand.

Frying polenta rounds, in two stages, with crispy fresh thyme from the fall garden in the back of the pan for flavoring.

BRUSSELS SPROUTS!

My sister in law had a lot of brussels sprouts. Six bags, to be precise. So we did a little Iron Chef style routine: I flash-fried mine with olive oil and salt, while she roasted hers with olive oil and salt. Not to be too immodest, but: I won. Hers were very good, but everyone at the christmas table preferred mine.

Then again, my prep took about ten times as long, with cleaning, halving, and then cutting a little divot to get the harder part of the stem out on each side, and maintaining the frying.

Happy, clean brussels sprouts.

And three stages of frying, out of order, with the end product in the middle bowl.

And not a man, woman, or child alive doesn't love fresh guacamole, right? (Reference: SH. Hope you're well, wherever you are.)

Asparagus, onions, and zucchini for stir fry, with carmelized onions making a cameo in the back.

If it seems that certain ingredients are making appearances over and over, well, in small town Vermont in the winter, you gotta work with what you have.