traditional Greek Easter dinner

Adam decided we were going to be a bit more adventurous for Easter dinner this year, and found this article the other day on NPR with a number of recipes in it. Adam followed the recipes exactly, since these were all new cooking concepts.

chicken and rice soup - we had this with homemade sour-dough bread. It was the perfect complement to it! The lemon flavor was quite prominent in the soup, but it wasn't overpowering. If you try this, be careful with the eggs so they don't cook up wrong. This was our "first course" which we had for lunch between General Conference sessions, and we had the rest of the dinner after Conference ended.

roasted leg of lamb - this was expensive! 30 bucks for a not-very-large piece of meat! We wondered at first if we'd like it - if not, that was a pretty big waste ... but hey, at least then we'd know to not spend that kind of money again. But it was good! Lots of rosemary and garlic and other herbs in it. Adam is sold - we'll have this maybe once a year just because of the cost.

asparagus with dill and garlic - asparagus was something I never had as a kid, but have liked quite a bit as an adult. It also had melted parmesan cheese over it.

There is also a recipe for an Easter bread (the red eggs on it look kinda yucky, if you ask me). Adam planned to make it but we ran out of time and didn't really need it anyway because we had the sour-dough to go with the soup.

roasted new potatoes with feta cheese - this was not included in the article but Adam found it to be a side to the lamb.

home-cooked Chinese

One of the missionaries requested meatballs, sweet and sour meatballs. So Aaron took the suggestion and ran with it. He's got a handful of Chinese recipe books and was excited to use them. We made two dishes with lots of rice and some steamed asparagus on the side.

Lychee Pork
Company's Coming Chinese Cooking

• 1 1/3 cups flour
• 2 tsp salt
• 3 large eggs
• 1 1/2 lbs pork tenderloin cut into small cubes
• cooking oil for frying
• 20 oz can of lychee* fruit with syrup
• 1/4 cup white vinegar
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 2 tbsp dry sherry
• 2 tbsp ketchup
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 2 tbsp water
• 1 1/2 tbsp cornstarch

-Stir flour and salt in medium bowl.
-Beat eggs with fork in small bowl.
-Dip pork in flour and then egg until coated.
-It said to deep-fry, but we just did a simple pan-fry, just making sure pieces were cooked all the way through. It will be fairly light colored because of the flour. Remove to paper towels to drain.
-Combine next 6 ingredients (lychee - soy sauce) in medium saucepan. Bring to boil.
-Stir water into cornstarch in small cup. Stir into lychee mixture until thickened. Pour over pork. Stir lightly until combined.

*Lychee is an incredibly sweet berry found in China and southeast Asia. We got our can at an Asian supermarket here in Calgary.

Sweet and Sour Meatballs
Hawaiian Meatballs
Joy of Cooking

• 1 lb lean ground beef
• 1/2 cup soft bread crumbs moistened with milk (we used quick oats)
• 1 beaten egg
• 1 clove garlic, pressed
• 1/2 tsp dry mustard
• 1/4 tsp ginger
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp soy sauce

-Combine ingredients and form into 1-inch balls and saute in 2 tbsp vegetable oil until brown.
-We finished cooking in oven (about 15 minutes at 350) after pouring can of pineapple (chunks or tidbits) and sweet and sour sauce on top.

Sweet and Sour Sauce
Company's Coming Chinese Cooking

• 1/4 cup reserved pineapple juice (from can of tidbits)
• 2 tsp cornstarch
• 1/3 cup ketchup
• 3 tbsp white vinegar
• 2 tbsp dry sherry
• 1 tbsp water
• splash of soy sauce (says Aaron)

Stir pineapple juice into cornstarch in small bowl. Add next four ingredients and stir.

Over all impression - excellent. I'm not even a big fan of Chinese food and it was pretty good. I wouldn't suggest making both recipes at the same time though, simply because they are both rather sweet (with the lychee and pineapple). The missionaries went back for seconds (and thirds) and almost left us with no leftovers.

rice and peas

Number 10 of 50, and I actually made this in January. So in one month, I was already 20% done. Yay!

1 tbl olive oil
4 tbl butter
4 strips of bacon or pancetta, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
6 cups hot chicken broth - I used chicken bullion to make the broth
1 3/4 cups rice - the original recipe calls for risotto, I used regular medium grain
3 tbl parsley
2 cups frozen or canned peas
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
pepper

1. Heat the oil and half the butter in a (very) large pan on low heat. Cook the bacon and onion until the onion is translucent.

2. Add the broth to the pan and bring to a boil. Stir in the rice and season to taste with pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and cover. Simmer, stir occasionally, until rice is starting to get soft. Takes 20-30 min.

3. Add parsley and peas, continue cooking until peas are hot and liquid is mostly gone from the pan.

4. To finish, stir in 2nd half of butter and the Parm.