Friday, February 11, 2011

Friday's are sauce days?

I think I need some structure to help me post things in a blog. I feel a certain responsibility to this here blog, and sometimes I feel guilty for neglecting it. Which is ridiculous. If there is anything in my life I don't need it is internet guilt.
Regardless, I have been thinking about blog structure, and by that I mean a set schedule of some kind, which would make the refracted bits of me that are blog entries a bit more manageable. I have no intentions of developing a blog that will make me money or become my day job or anything like that, but I would like it to serve some purpose other being my own pretend world. I will continue to give this thought.

I read the wonderful postings at Nourished Kitchen. Today she posted this recipe for preserved lemon and mint allioli. What the what? This sounds amazing, never mind that I have no idea what an allioli is, let alone a preserved lemon. Turns out it is a sauce. Of some kind. Probably. (See the lovely photo from her website?)

I can't tell you how many times in the last couple of years I have bemoaned my inability to make sauces. It usually sounds something like, "Man, I wish I was French!", and usually has something to do with the fact that it is my turn to make dinner again and all I have is rice/lentils/quinoa and I can't think of anything to go with them and then I panic just make soup. So. One of my goals for my future life is to learn how to make sauces from scratch. Drew likes sauces to a kind of ridiculous degree. It has spawned fights. Really, I should make him learn how to make sauces. That will be the next step.
So! I need your help! I have a list of three or maybe four sauces that I think I can tackle right off the bat, but would love, love some slightly more exotic ones. I'm not certain about that allioli just yet. We'll tackle the issue with preserved lemons first and then maybe we will see.
List:
Mayo
Peanut sauce
Salsa varieties
yellow curry

What else?

3 comments:

Kelsey said...

stumbled on to your blog a few weeks back and am enjoying your posts! I feel as though my own blog life is so scattered about and also requires structure- thanks for the inspiration. :) btw, make Julia Child's mayo- she waxes poetic about it in her My Life in France book!

Donnell said...

I've always equated the word aioli to the word mayonnaise.

Hollandaise sauce is a good one. Especially if you like eggs. I have a few recipes but mostly I use Martha Stewarts.

Chris has an excellent spaghetti sauce recipe. And there is an awesome tomato sauce for pizza, etc in the Jamie Oliver book with the soup recipes.

Anonymous said...

Dear one,
I, too, am afraid of sauces. But, last night I had a breakthrough. I wanted to make a sauce like the one they put over the Stuffed Tilapia at El Siete Mares. Craving it, you know. So...drumroll, I made one up. It was scary and exciting. I am a recipe follower not a recipe creator. But Eleanor, it was scrumptious. I posted the recipe on Feast! (http://ourfeast.wordpress.com/2011/02/12/fish-fridays-volume-1-baked-tilapia-with-spicy-cilantro-cream-sauce/) It might make you cry it's so good. And Tilapia is super cheap, especially if you buy it frozen. I miss you and cooking together.