Month: September 2017

Sep 29: Bahn Mi; Smoked Salmon Cobb Salad

Lunch

During a shopping trip, bahn mi were purchased for enjoyment at lunch. An excellent bahn mi, although a little pricy at $8.50 each with tax and tip. In fairness, it’s a big serving.

Dinner

We’ve eaten very well during September and one of the meals from earlier in the month was worth repeating: smoked salmon cobb salad.

This was still an excellent salad.

  • Smoked salmon $5.99 for the 4oz pack or $3.00 a serve
  • A pastured egg is 50c (only on special)
  • Bacon end pieces were $3.99 and we used less than 1/4 or 50c per serve
  • The cherry tomatoes were $3.49 and we used about half, or 75c per serve
  • Add 20c for shredded arugula.
  • The avocado was $1.49 or 75c per serve
  • The feta in brine was $6.50 and 1/4 went into dinner, or 41c per serve.

This is a great variation on a Cobb, and the feta was the right choice. A great mixture of salty, fresh, creamy and egg for $6.11 per serve.

Sep 28: Apple & Cheddar, Corned Beef and Labné; Rib Eye with Endive and Rocomoule

Lunch

Today’s sandwiches were a mix of village bread (corned beef) and toasted rye for the cheddar and apple. We melted the cheddar and it mixed with the apple much better.  The sandwiches were split and shared.

  • The bread is $2.99 for the loaf of 12 slices, or 25c per serve
  • The rye is 20c per serve
  • The corned beef was $14.99 for 1.2 lb, and we used about 2 oz in this sandwich, or 79c per serve
  • The cheddar is $3.99 a block and we used 1/3 or 67c per serve
  • The apple was 96c and we used 1/2, or 48c per serve
  • Add 25c for spicy labné and mustard aioli.

Today’s sandwiches were returning favorites for a good reason: they’re great and just $2.44 per serve.

Dinner

Thursday night is traditionally our steak (or other meat focus) night and tonight we grilled a rib eye. Greg was inspired by the blue cheese and endive we had at Dos, but used Nigella Lawson’s rocomoule recipe: avocado and blue cheese. Tonight we went with a creamy blue castello and two ripe avocados.

It was very good. The rocomoule is amazing and the bitter endive is a perfect balance.

  • The dry aged rib eye was $20.24 or $10.12 per serve
  • The cheese was $4.10 or $2.05 per serve
  • Endive was $2.49 or $1.25 per serve
  • Four avocados were $5.49 and we used two, or $1.37 per serve
  • The pomegranate adds 20c per serve.

Definitely not a cheap meal at $14.99 (possibly our most expensive at home meal since we started this blog) but a very tasty one. The steak was fully flavored and cooked blue (as we like it) and the rocomoule and endive as a perfectly balanced accompaniment.

Sep 26: Apple & Cheddar/Corned Beef and Spicy Labné Sandwiches; Thai

Lunch

More sandwich combinations on village bread (a dense grain bread we enjoyed a lot in Amsterdam). Today apple and caramelized onion cheddar, and a repeat of the corned beef and spicy labné sandwiches. The sandwiches were split and shared.

  • The bread is $2.99 for the loaf of 12 slices, or 50c per serve
  • The corned beef was $14.99 for 1.2 lb, and we used about 2 oz in this sandwich, or 79c per serve
  • The cheddar is $3.99 a block and we used 1/3 or 67c per serve
  • The apple was 96c and we used 2/3, or 32c per serve
  • Add 25c for spicy labné and mustard aioli.

Today’s sandwiches were returning favorites for a good reason: they’re great and just $2.53 per serve.

Dinner

A friend invited us out for Thai food  at Krua Thai and paid for the meal. We enjoyed Tom Ka Gai, eggplant with ground pork, stuffed chicken wings, and duck on rice. All were great.

Sep 24: Corned Beef Sandwich; Perfect Pot Roast

Lunch

Now that we’re home from traveling, it’s back to making our own lunch. Today we went simple and did corned beef and spicy labné on village (dense) bread.

  • Two slices of bread are 39c
  • The corned beef was $4.99 for 8 oz, and we used about 2 oz in each sandwich, or $1.25 per serve
  • Add 25c for spicy labné.

Lunch today was $1.89 per sandwich.

Dinner

As we had a chuck roast, the obvious meal is a pot roast. Slow cooked until tender, the perfect pot roast recipe has a lot of flavor, particularly when you ramp up the amount of mushroom in the recipe.

Unlike Pioneer Woman, we cook the potatoes in the flavorsome liquid.

  • The roast was $21.41 or $5.35 per serve
  • Onions are 20c per serve
  • The carrots were 69c or 18c per serve
  • One cup of red wine is around $1.33 or 33c a serve
  • Two cups of broth is half a $1.99 carton or 50c per serve
  • The mushrooms were $1.99 or 50c a serve
  • The Rosemary came from our own plant
  • Add another 15c for oil, seasoning and Thyme
  • Add 25c for potatoes.

Dinner tonight cost $7.06 for a hearty, warming meal.

Sep 23: Airport and Airline Food; Thai Shrimp Gyoza in Organic Chicken Broth

Lunch

Before heading to the aircraft for our trip home from Amsterdam, we stopped for a ham and cheese croissant. Approximately $7.15 per serve! Well, it was an airport.

We had two “other lunches” on board the flight home. Some decent chicken stew with rice, coleslaw and the world’s sweetest profiteroles, and our other meal was the most boring piece of “pizza” ever served. Fortunately we didn’t pay directly for these meals.

Dinner

We were back home for dinner and not wanting anything too heavy, so Foodie Greg picked up some Thai Shrimp Gyoza and organic chicken broth from Trader Joe’s.

Heat the gyoza in the chicken broth with some bok choy and a nutritious and tasty meal was on the table quite quickly. The gyoza were quite lightly flavored but tasty and with good texture.

  • The gyoza were $4.99 and we will get three meals, or $1.67 per serve
  • The chicken broth was $1.99 but we used half, or 33c per serve
  • The bok choy was $1.99 or 33c per serve.

Dinner tonight was quick, tasty and nutritious for $2.33 per serve.

Sep 22: Filet Américaine; Tapas

Lunch

We took an early train the Haarlem, and sadly experienced Haarlem in the rain again. After exploring the city for a couple of hours, we headed back to Amsterdam and Rembrandtplein for another Filet Américaine at van Dobben. Aproximately $5.40 per serve.

21.5Dinner

Our final dinner in Amsterdam and an opportunity to return to a restaurant, or find something new. As there were unexplored entries on the Dos menu, it was close by and we liked the local ambience we went back.

Tonight it was a little later and the light was not good for photos, but we enjoyed three different dishes.

The roasted garlic mushrooms was good with plenty of garlic flavor, but we decided that Greg’s version with butter is better.

We finally had an opportunity to try the ropa vieja – a beef and vegetable beef stew with origins in Indonesia, as it was out at Jottum last night. It was exactly what a warming beef stew should be like.

And for a fish dish, we had fried calamari, which was also as perfectly floured and fried with just the right bite and tenderness.

All up, the food cost about $13.45 per serve. Worth every penny.

Sep 21: Steak and Fries; Tapas

Lunch

As we were out walking, we did the total tourist thing and stop in for rib eye at an Argentinian steakhouse, just off Dam Square. It was competent all round, although the sauces lacked a lot of flavor.

Lunch cost approximately $27.85.

Dinner

We returned tonhave a full meal at Jottum, as we enjoyed our last minute, on the way home, meal there last year.

We chose four dishes, which seems to be enough for us. First out were the padron peppers. Although there are random hot ones, we had only mild on this plate.

Next out was the lamb sausage with yoghurt dressing and a little tabouli. They had good flavour, and the texture was perfect.

We couldn’t have Tapas without tortilla, the Spanish kind made from potato. This was a particularly good example.

We also had a scallop each, but there’s no photo!

All in the meal cost approx $16.67 per serve.  Although Jottum was good, we think Dos takes the lead for local tapas.

Sep 20: Pannekoeken; Tapas

Lunch

Out for a walk around Centrum, we stopped for pannekoeken: Dutch pancakes. Greg had a bacon, onion and cheese, while Philip got a huge surprise with his schwarma pancake!

A full schwarma wrapped in a pancake.

Lunch today was approximately $11.90 per serve.

Dinner

For dinner we decided to revisit a neighborhood tapas place – Dos – where we had enjoyed a great meal last year. They did not disappoint.

Starting with the tomato bread with anchovy featured in the cover photo, through three more great dishes.

The rib eye was perfectly cooked and full of flavor, largely because there was fat on the meat.

The cherizo sausage was simply fried off, but was delicious and proper sausage  not the loose version common in Mexican food.

The hit of the meal was definitely the endive and blue cheese. Yum. The bitterness and wetness of the endive is a perfect balance totblue cheese dressing.

With a bottle of wine the total was 50 Euro, or without wine, about $17.00 per person.