During the “decision-making” time about what to make for our graduation class last week, I had several suggestions to choose from for one of the main courses, among them, tacos or Greek salad.  Both are good ideas and both work well on a buffet, but we already had decided on another salad, and “Plain Jane” tacos seemed a bit tame for the rest of the menu.  So we combined the two and made Greek Tacos… they were a huge hit with students and guests alike.  If your family is the more adventurous type, go with the ground lamb, otherwise, either ground beef or ground turkey work perfectly well.

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When my kids were young, I loved to trick them with food on April Fool’s Day. The year Marissa was in fourth grade and Connor was in first grade was a stellar year! 

I started the day off with a non-food trick on my husband, Dave.  The day before, I took a new bar of soap and coated it on all sides with clear nail polish.  After it was dry, I replaced the soap in our shower with this new bar. I stood outside the bathroom and listened to him cursing as he continually dropped the bar of soap, trying to get a lather going.  He was so frustrated, that I actually began to feel sorry for him, and went in to replace the bar for him.

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I’ve posted the recipes for regular chicken stock and for rich duck stock here before, but I just realized that I’ve not put up recipes for beef stock or brown chicken stock yet.  This recipe is for brown chicken stock, but the recipe for the beef stock is exactly the same, just sub in beef bones for the chicken pieces. Having these two stocks in your freezer, ready when you need them, will make you feel very rich indeed, as there is nothing better than homemade stock!  I’m including nearly a dozen pictures to make it as easy as possible to follow along.

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Today we come to the end of our “Cook Once – Eat All Week” use of the Prime Rib.  I call this salad “bicicleta” because the way you arrange it on a platter is made to resemble the spokes of a bicycle wheel.  It’s a pretty salad when it’s laid out that way and even after it’s tossed, so bright and colorful.

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Here is meal #3 from our original prime rib of three days ago. You may not know this, but I am a French Dip aficionado, I know my French Dips, and this is a keeper, trust me!

Use a very sharp knife to slice the beef as thinly as possible.  Since the meat is cold from being refrigerated for the last couple of days, it’s not as hard as you may think.

The little “dips” pictured here are a bit smaller than usual because I made them appetizer size for a little happy hour birthday celebration for my BFF, Peggy.   Make these and thank me later!

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This is the second installment of my “Cook Once – Eat All Week” segments. Last time we used a whole roasted chicken, this time… a prime rib beef roast, also known as, beef rib-eye.  These recipes were used last night in the first week of my 3-week series of classes at Les Gourmettes Cooking School.  Today’s recipe begins with a bone-in prime rib beef roast. This and the recipes to follow are designed for “cooking for two” – but every recipe can be easily doubled to feed a family of four.

In fact, Costco sells gorgeous whole boneless beef rib-eye roasts that weigh about 12 pounds.  Although this recipe calls for a bone-in roast (you will need those bones for the soup that will be coming up tomorrow), you can use other beef bones for the soup if you choose to use a boneless roast.  Many grocery stores will sell you beef bones if you just ask.

So, to recap; Prime Rib today, which you use only two servings of. Prime Rib Soup to follow tomorrow, French Dip Sandwiches the next day, and a beautifully composed Mexican Beef Salad the day after. Which will give you 4 meals from one cut of beef.

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You may recall that I adore Beef Stroganoff, I’ve previously posted THE best recipe for it HERE. But browning each little cube of beef can be time-consuming and trying. I had a huge piece of tri-tip leftover and decided to try and make Stroganoff with already cooked meat. Honestly, it wasn’t as wonderful as the original recipe, but it certainly satisfied the craving, used up leftover meat, and was still darn tasty!

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On Sunday I taught a demonstration cooking class as part of a bridal shower. It was a lovely afternoon with 21 delightful ladies and a beautiful bride-to-be. This was our main course. P.S. Thanks to my own lovely daughter, Marissa, for assisting me! xoxo

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For Christmas dinner I made everyone’s favorite cut of beef – tenderloin. Although filet mignons are always a treat, preparing a whole tenderloin feels wonderfully decadent. And when you throw in a creamy brandy sauce, well that puts it above and beyond. Unfortunately, while in the rush to make all the plates perfect and get them to the table hot on Christmas night, I didn’t get a picture snapped before all the sauce was gone… so the picture above is with the remaining beef, sans sauce. Be sure you run out today to buy your tenderloin if you want to serve this on New Year’s Eve. I picked up mine at Costco, of course!

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About a week ago, when I was making an appetizer for a cooking class, I told you about the convenience of purchasing fully cooked beef short ribs. Back when I was testing that recipe for the class, I’d purchased several packages of beef.  Two of them were still sitting in my freezer, and I need that space for Christmas, so this recipe was born from that. And, did we love it! Everyone joined the clean plate club and I won’t tell you how many of the four of us had seconds, it’s embarrassing.

Now you’ll never find me calling any lasagna recipe “easy-breezy”.  There is way too much layering and trying to keep all the amounts of each of the components straight – for me to consider that.  For example: “Spoon 1/3 of the sauce over the bottom of the dish. Sprinkle 1/4 of the Parmesan cheese over. Arrange 1/3 of the lasagna noodles on top. Drizzle 1/2 of the cheese mixture over noodles; sprinkle 1/4 cup  Parmesan cheese over. Repeat. Cover with remaining noodles. Spread cheese mixture over noodles. Sprinkle remaining Parmesan over…” Oh my goodness!  I am too dyslexic to follow along and ever call that easy!  But it’s the nature of the beast, if you want to make lasagna, it’s just the way it is!

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