I'm a Cookerer

I love to cook. It's one of the few things I do well all the time. I'm not a "Top Chef" by any stretch of the imagination, but I do a damn good job of putting together great meals when called upon to do so. Check out some of my recent feasts:

I recently moved back to Maine, as you know from reading this blog. One of the things I wanted to do was have my Mom and Dad down for dinner at my house. (My house used to be the house my Dad grew up in...I bought it from the family this year) So, for Mom and Dad, I had this great meal of roasted chicken (carrots and celery were roasted with the bird), mashed cauliflower(served like mashed potatoes), corn-off-the-cob, green salad, individual ramekins with the great chicken gravy I made, and for desert, we cut up the melon in the background. Yummy, eh?

Yes, I know...the silverware is totally in the wrong order.

A friend of friends of mine is a single Mom with two great kids. So, I thought I'd help her out one night and made a kick-ass lasagne. The sauce is homemade, cuz I'm good like that. It's a ground-turkey and fresh spinach lasagne, fresh brocolli steamed, fresh garlic bread, and though it's not pictured, I also made a green salad. This was, without a doubt, the bestest lasagne I ever made.

This is in it's pre-cooked state.

For a party I was invited to I made a tortellini salad. This is something that I learned in Philadelphia as it was easy to find this kind of salad in lots of places. It's not hard to make,and whenever I would bring it to pot-lucks or for a dinner, it would go fast. I would never bring any of it home with me. However, up here in Maine, I brought it to the party, and hardly anybody touched it. Wacky how regional foods can be. So worse-case-scenario was that I had tort salad for a week. Sheesshhh......no complaining could be heard from me, that's for sure.

This past weekend I put together a great Sunday meal for friends of mine who I've known for a long time. They've been really helpful to me as I've made the re-settlement to Orono after having been gone for 24 years. They've gotten me in touch with contractors, had me out for drinks and dinner, have me over for lobster and Red Sox games. It's been great seeing them, so I thought I'd do something cool for them and their two kids: I made Sunday dinner! This time I made chicken cordon bleu (I use prosciutto and provolone instead of regular ham and Swiss cheese) and also roll fresh spinach into the chicken. I also served fresh steamed brocolli, mashed cauliflower, and homemade chicken/garlic rice, all served with a homemade gravy for the chicken. It was truely an awesome meal.

So, if you're ever in the area and want something good to eat, let me know. I'm sure I'll have something around the house I can whip up in no time. If not, we'll just head uptown and get a pizza at Pat's.