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I made a lasagna a couple of days ago... It might look a bit weird, this is straight out of the oven while it's still bubbling and hissing. It looks like a greasy omelette because...
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...I didn't have any butter, so I used olive oil for the roux, never done that before but it seems like something you can do. Oil is obviously pure oil unlike butter so there's no water to cook out of it, it will be greasier than butter. It actually absorbed all that oil after it cooled down a bit and the browning on the top is the very cheesy bechamel. I poured almost an inch of bechamel on top before putting it into the oven, I wanted it to cook down and become really, really thick and cheesy. It doesn't look like much but that is a deep dish lasagna. Sort of.
There were no lasagna sheets in the pantry either, I was 100% sure there was, so those were replaced with layers of half-cooked penne pasta, it was the best I could do at that point.

All in all, this accidentally improvised lasagna came out good("I'm going to get a small second portion...") and was even better the next day and the day after that. After it sat for an hour or two it cut into neat, firm pizza-like slices and the cross cut looked interesting because of the penne. This is the closest I've come to making pastitsio.
 
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Made several quarts of spicy pickles. I underestimated what the pickling brine would be like with a powdered, crushed up Trinidad scorpion pepper. It was like a mustard gas attack and I coughed myself into a headache. That said, I look forward to the final result. Don't do this without proper ventilation. If you think just vinegar fumes are bad, they get exponentially worse with superhots.
 
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My prepper friends managed to implant this thought in my head again that I need to have non perishable food, so I made some beef jerky. No way this is gonna last until WW3 tho, already ate one third of it. I have mentioned before I have this secret BBQ recipe, that I marinated the beef in. Basically the secret is hickory wood smoke combined with brown sugar, soy sauce, garlic and pureed peaches. I wholeheartedly recommend beef jerky for everyone, its good, pretty much all protein and if you buy it from a shop its like 100 euros a kilo. Might just as well make it yourself.
 
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Not done cooking yet, but since it's Easter I'm going absolutely nuts in the kitchen.
10 pound honey glazed ham, a massive mound of extra buttery mashed potatoes with ham gravy, green bean casserole with extra french fried onions, roasted ginger glazed carrots, pasta salad, deviled eggs, dressing, buttermilk biscuits, a carrot cake from scratch, a gallon of iced tea, and another gallon of fresh lemonade.

Hopefully I'll have pictures of this feast soon. Should be done in a little over 3 hours.
 
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Happy Easter...I colored eggs and made a pair of roast chickens again.

I found a ten pound chicken! I have never seen one so big at the grocery store! The other one is around seven and a half.

I cannot seem to post images at the moment, so I will wait to upload a picture.
 
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AnOminous said:
If you think just vinegar fumes are bad, they get exponentially worse with superhots.
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Okay, the pickles are awesome. Even if the garlic turned a garish shade of blue-green. I looked it up and apparently you can stop this by blanching it but then you lose much of the flavor. So I'll just put up with the color.

Next time I do this, I seriously need to figure out some ventilation strategy. Anyone make pickles with superhots?
 
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Wednesday, I made ribeyes with roasted asparagus and stir-fried onions and bell peppers. Served it all with chimichurri.
Thursday, I made chicken thigh vindaloo with basmati rice.
Friday, I made a spinach lasagne.
Saturday, we went to my in-laws' and just grazed all day. My MIL makes a really good salsa so we had a bunch of that with vegetables and yellow corn chips, and there were a bunch of bowls with snacks and platters with cheese, meats, and vegetables.
Sunday, I had a greek salad with blackened shrimp for lunch and crawfish for dinner. There were potatoes, corn, and sausage in the boil too, but I always just fill up on the little beasts. Half was cajun style and the other half was viet-cajun, super good. One of the best days I've had in recent times as far as food goes and we eat very well. I also had 2 cheladas and 2 Voodoo Rangers and I don't drink a lot so I was really silly by the end of the day, lmaoooo.
Today, I had jalapeno cornbread for breakfast and promised the kids DQ if they went through their 2 week intensive swimming camp and it ended today, so we went there. I had a kids' chicken tender meal and a chocolate dipped cone, that was for lunch and I'm still full from that now so that'll be it for me today.
I peeled all the leftover crawfish tails bc my in-laws don't eat those and froze them after the meal, and I'm going to make crawfish pasta with a cream + lemon + garlic + parmesan sauce tomorrow.

AnOminous said:
Okay, the pickles are awesome. Even if the garlic turned a garish shade of blue-green. I looked it up and apparently you can stop this by blanching it but then you lose much of the flavor. So I'll just put up with the color.

Next time I do this, I seriously need to figure out some ventilation strategy. Anyone make pickles with superhots?
Click to expand...
I haven't yet and this is obviously a huge addition, but next time we're building a house, we're going to be adding a fry shack outside a bit further away from the house. I make hot sauces a few times a year, usually just with scotch bonnets, but I've been trying my hand at superhot sauces as well and ngl, even the scotch bonnet vaporizes to a really uncomfortable level to the point where I just wait until a day where all the kids are out of the house for a half day or longer. I also really hate it when we make smashburgers or steaks and the whole kitchen smells like meat for a day and a half, so I think it'd get a fair amount of use. Other than an insane vent hood or cooking the peppers directly in liquid to minimize the capsaicin cloud, I think it's probably something we're just going to have to deal with. :(
 
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The tops of my Easter loaves turned out nice. I forgot to brush egg on top before baking it like a dumbass, but it all tastes just fine.

This recipe is different from the ones I seem to find online. It doesn't have the orange or lemon zest, and takes about 2-3 days total to make due to rise times.

It was given to the family by my great uncle who was a monastic monk. The recipe makes 5 loaves, but that's a culled down version since they tend to make batches in the hundreds.
 
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