Martha Stewart Dinners week 3

February 11th, 2010

This was a super-simple really quick dinner.  The kids liked it particularly since it had dipping sauce.  I don’t think it matters what the sauce is particularly, it’s the dipping action my kids like.

It was also white fish, which is another of Fuss & Bug’s favourite dinners.  The recipe calls for red snapper, but there wasn’t any available, so I substituted a white fish which I can’t remember at the moment.  I just asked the fish seller to wrap up whatever would cook in a similar fashion.  I’ve always found fish to be one that’s really easy to switch around.  And white fish particularly since it is so mild and tends to take on the flavour of what’s cooking with it.

The yams were baked in the oven and were the intended recipient of the sauce, but every diner put the fish in the sauce as well.  The spinach was simply steamed (I used baby spinach so I didn’t have to remove the stems or chop the leaves) and toasted sesame seeds were added.  I shaped them into the logs you see.  Fantastic way to get the kids to eat spinach.  There was some flavour from rice vinegar and a couple of other ingredients in a dressing the spinach was tossed in before shaping and the kids also appreciated the crunch from the seeds.

The dessert was candied kumquats over rice pudding.  I am horrible at making rice pudding which is a bit of a shame since it’s one of my favourite things to eat.  However, I made the recipe in the book using sushi rice and it turned out totally perfectly.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve attempted rice pudding just to throw out a gloopy mess.   This was delightful.   We could have (should have?) left it alone.

However, it called for candied kumquats.  They were a bit of a time consuming little fruit.  First I had to find them, then I had to remove the seeds, which were surprisingly large for such a tiny fruit.  Then I thinly sliced them. 

I then put them in a pan with some sugar and water and let them simmer away for some time.  Easy.  But, they ended up being a taste that is either acquired and we failed to do so, or I just put too many atop each dessert.  The resulting syrup was tasty, but one or two kumquats would have sufficed.  I think the next time I might actually make the candied kumquats but strain them out using just the syrup for a titch of flavour for the pudding.

The dish was a gorgeous colour though!

Enjoying the journey,  Amanda

Entry Filed under: Cooking