Dinner's On The Table – The Personal Chef & Home Cooking Resource

     I’ve had many inquiries about cooking for a Vegetarian.  It’s not as difficult as it sounds.  Most of us eat at least one Vegetarian meal a week. 

     When’s the last time you had Eggplant Parmigan?  Yup, it’s a Vegetarian meal.  Bean Burritos, Fettuccini Alfredo, Veggie Omelets or Quiche are all Vegetarian meals that don’t require any special ingredients.  Now there are plenty of ingredients that you either need to purchase or make yourself for other dishes, but many Vegetarian meals can be prepared easily by anyone with just a few kitchen skills.  The really hard part is making sure the meal is balanced.  Many Vegetarians don’t get enough protein, and alternately have too much fat or carbs in their diets. 

     I’ve seen the Vegetarian offerings at restaurants.  Some get it right and offer delicious, nutritionally complete meals.  While most just offer a veggie burger or a veggie plate.  Broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, and rice.  Now THAT’S going to make me want to give up meat?!

     What makes matters worse for many Vegetarians is having to prepare meals for themselves and the meat eaters in the house.  It’s just too much work!  Nobody wins.  How does someone who doesn’t eat meat prepare a chicken dish?  I know I taste everything I make.  There are a few foods that can substitute easily for meat.  Seitan and tofu are good sources of protein.  When prepared properly, they’re both delicious!  I know what you’re thinking… TOFU????? YUK!  It has no flavor, and I don’t like the texture.  Not so if you do it right!  If you want your tofu to taste good, you need to infuse it with flavor. 

     Place a skillet over medium heat.  Add your choice of flavors.  Soy sauce and toasted sesame oil are really nice for Oriental dishes.  Heat the sauce then add cubed, dried tofu to the skillet.  Allow the tofu to cook for a few minutes, until at least half the sauce is absorbed and the tofu starts to brown.  Flip the pieces over and continue to cook until all the sauce is absorbed and the tofu is browned on the bottom.  Remove from skillet and prepare the rest of your dinner.  Toss tofu cubes in at the end to avoid breaking the tofu.  (If you don’t use all of the tofu, you can top a tossed salad with it for lunch the next day)

     You can use any marinade you like to get similar results.  Think pesto, a nice vinaigrette, any Indian spice mix with a bit of oil.  The options are endless and delicious!

     Call us to set up a cook date!  We can whip up healthy meals for homes with both Vegetarians and meat eaters.

     For more information on adding green to your diet, check out www.greenyourdiet.org  

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     Recipe testing is one of the most important – and really fun – things we do as Personal Chefs. You could say we’re food explorers. We scan through many different food magazines (Gourmet, Fine Cooking, Bon Appetit, Cooking Light, Cook’s Illustrated, Cook’s Country), cookbooks, and Web sites (The Food Network, Recipezaar, Epicurious) always looking out for recipes that will expand our palate and what we can offer you.     

     When we find a recipe to offer you, or you make a specific request, we make absolutely certain that it meets our standards and your expectations. In addition to testing the dish to see how it tastes the same day we cook it, we also test recipes for the 2-4 days they may sit in your fridge and whether they freeze well for the week or so they may stay in your freezer.

     Of course you don’t have to eat your meals the same week we prepare them. Most dishes will survive quite well for 4-6 weeks in your freezer. Any longer and they may acquire freezer burn which will affect the flavors. They can still be eaten, however. This is why we date everything we make with its "born on date," to borrow the term from Budweiser, so you know exactly when the dish was prepared. 

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That time of year is here football fans. The playoffs are almost finished and the Superbowl is right around the corner.

What are you eating for your Football Party or Superbowl Party?

Do you like traditional Football Party snacks (Buffalo Wings, chips, dips, hot dogs, burgers, pizza) or crave something a little different that you can’t find at your local eatery, take out joint or grocery store? No matter which, Dinner’s On The Table can whip up some fresh to order goodies for your superbowl party – right in the comfort of your own home!

• No worries about buying ingredients!
• No worries about picking up the food!
• No worries about finding the time to make the food!
• And best of all, no cleanup afterwards!

Just sit back, enjoy the game and a spend a stress-free, fun evening with family and friends.

Give us a call @ 845-773-9013 to book your Superbowl or Football Party today. Limited bookings, don’t miss out!

Let Dinner’s On The Table cater your event and we’ll cover all 9 yards and maybe even 10.

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     So why do  millions of folks throughout the world turn to commercial diet systems to prepare and package their food? There is very little science to what NutriSystem, Jenny Craig, The Zone Diet and Weight Watchers do. They measure quantities and package it up. Yes, some measure the glycemic index, calorie levels, etc., etc. If you sit there and measure all these variables you may as well be an accountant as a profession. My grandmother, who was a very wise woman, said "everything in moderation." Now, of course, she said this to encompass everything, not just eating. But she had the right idea. If you eat too much of anything it will cause problems. Yep, you could probably eat too much salad too. (When you’re running to the restroom late at night you’ll know why )

     And besides, commercial diet food has proven to be OK, to barely edible, to ugh, I wouldn’t feed that to me neighbors dog much less my own! So why do we torture ourselves with nasty to blah food when we can make it ourselves?

     Oh, weight (pun intended), it’s the convenience factor.

     Well, believe it or not, with a little bit of planning and a few hours time you can be your own Personal Chef and prepare your own meals and snacks so you can succeed on your own diet plan (no, lifestyle change!). Seriously, you could do this yourself. You have plastic containers like Rubbermaid and Tupperware. You probably also have Pyrex containers too. Ziplock and Glad have disposable containers and plastic bags. You have all the tools needed. This is in effect meal planning. A topic most people shy away from because they feel it is too time consuming. And meal planning is what we do as Personal Chefs.

     One Sunday every other week (or whichever day off you have) put aside 4-6 hours to prepare meals and snacks for yourself. It takes just as much discipline to do this as it does to endure the food you’d buy from the diet systems and you’ll know they taste that much better- and what’s in them! Besides, I’m only talking about making meals, not necessarily snacks. There are plenty of options out there for snacking. They even have specific 100 calorie packages too. Not to mention nature’s prepackaged items like fruit and nuts which are healthy and tasty.

     Now we say 4-6 hours when you’re cooking for one. We put aside 6-8 and sometimes up to 10 hours for a cookdate for a family of 4. In the long run it is time well spent for you. Because during the busy week all you have to do is re-heat and eat. Then pop the dishes into the dishwasher.

     When you have your meals planned, mapped out for you throughout the week, you’re more likely to stick with it, especially if you enjoy what you’ll be eating instead of dreading it.

     Ultimately, if you’re looking to lose weight you’re better off adjusting your activity levels and watching what and how much you eat instead of counting calories. Because counting calories is an inexact science anyway. And do what my Grandmother used to say – eat everything in moderation.

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     This post we look at what Jenny Craig has to offer the folks who want to lose weight using a commercial diet system.

     Compared to NutriSystem, the biggest difference between programs is that Jenny Craig comes with different levels of counseling and support which you get to choose depending on how much money you want to spend to lose weight.  From what folks have said in reviews the food is much more expensive as well. You also have to become a "member" which allows you to order the food and includes a fee, of course.

     One reviewer described the counselors as not having any connection to their clients because they had "been thin all their lives" and couldn’t possibly understand what it is to fight with weight issues. Other reviews described the counselors as being "so large they couldn’t possibly have used Jenny Crag themselves. So how do you know it works?"

     Other reviewers describe high-pressured selling tactics to drag them into the highest level program as fast as possible. Is this a diet program or a used car lot?

     As for the food, it was also a mixed bag. Many reviews describe the food as being terrible. Others loved it. Everyone has their own tastes. On a positive note, some dieters have responded that they lost weight more gradually and had an easier time adjusting their eating habits to what was expected of them for the diet to succeed.

     But you’re still spending $150-175 or more on food for one person. And from what we’ve heard this doesn’t include the shipping costs. So, if you have a family of 4 on this program it would be close to $800 per week!

     Sticking with a diet or lifestyle change needs to be a positive move otherwise it will more than likely fail. If you dread the food you won’t stick with the program and you’ll hit the cookie aisle for a bag of Oreos! (By the way, there is nothing wrong with a little indulgence!)

     Do a search on Yahoo! or Google for Jenny Craig reviews and you’ll find dozens of Web sites that offer a huge variety of reviews from customers and, believe it or not, former employees with opinions on the program from the inside and out. You need to decide how important the Jenny Craig system will be to you reaching your goals. Because it seems there is much to sacrifice here to succeed.

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     The reality is commercial diet systems like NutriSystem, Jenny Craig and The Zone Diet want you to become dependent upon their food. This is how they make money. So, you decide to make the leap thinking that 12-18 dollars per day for food isn’t that bad. This sounds inexpensive until you add in the fact this doesn’t include your spouse or the rest of your family if you have children. So you still have more work to do to prepare meals for everyone. And you thought your food worries were eliminated?

     Jill and I have searched through various review Web sites and spoken to a number of folks who have been on these diet systems and we get very mixed responses. From the quality of the food to poor customer service to menu availability.

     We found these responses for NutriSystem:

• "A few of my friends swear by it, but it seems expensive, especially if you still have to cook separately for your family."
• "After losing 15 pounds on NutriSystem, I have gained all plus five back. The diet was OK, food ranged from decent to inedible. The pictures on the website and TV are inaccurate."
• "They are very small portions and require salad and other side dishes to complement to get full enough."
• "I dealt with almost constant problems just with getting the food I ordered. They were constantly out of things and would just send substitutions."
• "Even though I took their survey on what I can or can’t eat they still got it wrong. I said I don’t eat beef and they sent beef as a substitute and I’m allergic to nuts and they completely ignored that."
• "The food is flat out disgusting, and thats IF you get any of the entrées that actually HAVE taste."
• "I have to say I don’t think the food is so bad but I am starving from mid-afternoon to the time I finally fall asleep. I’m totally following the diet which is supposed to keep you "full and satisfied" Really the sodium is so high it should keep you so bloated you won’t want to eat anything but, no, I’m HUNGRY."

     Of course there are plenty of positive responses as well. Consider, if you are satisfied with store bought frozen dinners then you will most likely find NutriSystem’s meals fine. But if the quality of your food extends from beyond weight loss to nutrition and taste, you will most likely not feel satisfied. And if have to prepare regular style meals for the rest of your family you’ll be torturing yourself because you won’t be able to eat what they’re having for dinner.

     A Personal Chef offers you and your family a more livable option for changing the way you eat as part of a new lifestyle. We sit down with your entire family and learn about likes and dislikes, allergies, and special diets. We work one-on-one with you to create a weekly menu (usually for dinners only, but we can add lunch and breakfast too) based on what you wish to eat. You will always have the correct menu prepared unless extreme circumstances make a particular ingredient unavailable in our region. In which case we find an acceptable substitution that fits your expectations. From experience we’ve found that on rare occasions some species of fish, fruits and vegetables may not be available due to season.

     Would you prefer to conform to what a diet system offers you to eat or would rather have custom made meals that fit your dietary (lifestyle!) needs? With a Personal Chef preparing healthy, delicious meals for you, even if you do decide to have store bought, "healthy" frozen dinners for lunch, you’ll have a fantastic dinner to look forward to 5 nights each week.

     Please explore NutriSystem and other diet programs for yourself and find other folks who have enrolled in these programs so you can make an informed decision for yourself.

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     Terrible words, The Diet. Yet, its the most popular New Year’s Eve Resolution – and the one most likely not to succeed. We try and we fail. Why, most likely because we need to plan better. Meal planning is one of the more challenging things to do when you’re living a hectic life. When you don’t have the time to put together a healthy meal, you grab fast food, hit the diner or hope the TV dinner you just bought will be worth eating.

     Then there is the concept of The Diet. It has such a negative feeling tied to it now that the thought is an immediate turn off. Unpleasant to say the least. And we all know how well we react to doing unpleasant things – we avoid it at all costs! Plain salad for lunch – yum. Where’s that Snickers bar!

     If you’re looking to lose a few pounds so you’ll look good in your wedding dress, tuxedo or swimsuit then a diet will possibly work for you. You’ll most likely gain most, if not all, of the weight back anyway. But for long term success it has been proven that diets don’t work for the masses.

     What if we were to ditch the diet concept and look at it as part of an overall lifestyle change?    

     Lifestyle changes are the most important aspects to maintaining a healthy weight or keeping diabetes and heart disease in check. And lifestyle changes means long term changes, not short term spurts of action. These changes have to be positive. They have to leave a positive mark on your psyche, how you feel about yourself, and need to be easily repeated. And of course, this means positive choices for food and activities that will allow you to retain the lifestyle you envision for yourself.

     You could be like all those celebrities out there and choose a "diet plan" like Jenny Craig, NutriSystem or The Zone Diet. Then again, if you were being paid to lose weight it would be a great incentive to do so. Got to love those endorsements! In the next few posts I will be examining what these 3 diet plans are while looking at objective reviews and comparing them to how a personal chef can help make the difference for you in making positive changes to your lifestyle.

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     Salt. You can’t escape it. It’s in almost everything we eat. And it’s also a necessary part of our body’s chemical processes, particularly hydration. You could say we have a love/hate relationship with the mighty salt crystal. On the whole, we need a minimum of 500 mg per day to be healthy. 2300 mg per day is the recommended maximum intake which is the equivalent of 1 teaspoon of table salt.

But the average American consumes 2-3 times more salt than needed on a daily basis.

     So how can you reasonably keep track of how much salt you’re consuming? If you eat at restaurants regularly there is no way to accurately estimate the salt content in your diet aside from keeping the rest of your meals low to salt free.

     Restaurants over salt your food for a number of reasons. First, they know we crave salt. It’s part of our physiological make-up. Second, because it makes food "taste" better, we are more likely to eat out at restaurants that hit our taste buds in the right spots. Third, restaurants that serve alcohol know that you are more likely to order more drinks if you feel thirsty. And alcoholic drinks are a very big money maker for restaurants.

     The inspiration for this post was the new Food Network program called, "Secrets of a Restaurant Chef" with Anne Burrell. In the episode in particular, Burrell was making Spaghetti Bolognese, a very popular Italian dish. We sat there in utter amazement as she grabbed handful after handful of salt and flamboyantly splashed it into the dish during the cooking process in Emeril Lagasse fashion. The only thing missing was the "Bam!"  

     She then went on to explain that it may seem like a lot of salt, but in "restaurants we properly season our food." Whatever that’s supposed to mean.

     Too much salt, is too much salt. And salt intake can be addicting just as with sugar. Our bodies and taste buds become used to a certain level of salt. And just as some foods require salt to bring out their flavors, too much salt can also mask flavors so you can’t taste them.

     Personally, we use a modest amount of salt in our food at home. I grew up with parents who needed to reduce their salt intake due to blood pressure and other reasons. Because we use salt moderately, we’re better able to judge the taste of dishes. Preparing foods with a minimum amount of salt, enough to make dishes taste great without being overwhelming, is very important to our clients who require a lower salt diet – and to us.

     So, back to accurately estimating the salt in your diet, the best way to do this is to cook your own meals and watch the amount of salt you use. If you must buy prepared foods, watch the sodium content. This, along with eating correct portions, will allow you to reduce your salt intake. The other option is to hire a personal chef who will work with you to build the right meal plan for you and who will adjust the seasonings in your food to help you build a healthier lifestyle. Actually, we’ve learned that herbs and spices offer a variety of flavors that, along with a modest amount of salt, create a flavor panorama that is more satisfying than just salt alone.

     And stay away from frozen TV dinners! Many frozen dinners can pack 2-3 days worth of salt and fat into one meal. Now you would need to eat plain fruit and veggies for the next 2 days to make up for it (if it were that easy!). Check out the 20 Saltiest Foods in America.

     Tip: Taste your food throughout the cooking process. With raw meat, wait until the meat has cooked through. Remember, you can always add salt to a dish, but you can’t take it out!

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          We use our kitchen counters for holding everything. And that goes well beyond the food we eat. From tools to work gloves, to mail to the latest novel we’re reading. And we don’t clean those counters often enough – do we? Nope. I’ll bet big money on that too.

          The problem is we also tend to place our food directly on those counters without thinking about it - and sometimes without cleaning the counters first. And many illnesses from germs (bacteria and viruses) can be transferred in this way.

          If you don’t like using store bought chemicals, you can simply dilute white vinegar in water, 1 part vinegar to 2 parts water, in a spray bottle and give your counters a good bath a couple of times each day and especially before you plan on preparing any kind of food.

          As Personal Chefs we take cooking surface cleanliness seriously. The second thing we do when entering a home to complete a cookdate or catering party is wipe down the counters thoroughly. The first is making sure all perishable foods are placed in the refrigerator.

          Food safety should be your number one priority in the kitchen.

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It’s 2 weeks to Christmas and 3 weeks to the New Year. There’s still time to book a Personal Chef to prepare your holiday dinners or holiday party.

You owe it to yourself to actually enjoy the holidays this year. Instead of slaving over a hot stove, you can spend time with your family and friends. At Dinner’s On The Table, our goal is to make your life easier – and tastier. You can enjoy our fresh made delights in the comfort of your own home which leaves you more time to schmooze and, dare we say it, booze too!

Call us today to book your holiday dinner or party. We’ll create a menu that will entice even the most finicky eaters.

Dinner’s On The Table Personal Chef Service serves the Greater Mid-Hudson Valley (Westchester, Putnam, Orange, Ulster, Dutchess, Columbia Counties) and Eastern Connecticut.   

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Gobble gobble gobble

First we stuffed the bird, then we stuffed ourselves.  It’s inevitable that we’ll be eating turkey sandwiches for the next week.  I don’t know about you, but I actually like a nice fresh turkey sandwich the day after Thanksgiving.  

If that sounds like a fate worse than death, here are a few ideas.  If you aren’t feeling creative, or you just don’t like to cook, the easiest option is to package meal-sized servings of turkey, stuffing or potatoes and gravy in Tupperware, then stick it in the freezer.  Pull it out the day before you’re planning on eating it, and just nuke it.  Instant easy meal after a long day of holiday shopping.  I like some of the other options a little better.  Turkey Pot Pie, Turkey Chili, Turkey Soup, Turkey Salad, Turkey Stir Fry, Turkey Tacos, Turkey Fajitas, Turkey Croquettes, Turkey Hash, or just have the old stand by…Hot Turkey Sandwiches.  You could even use it for breakfast by adding it to the filling for you Sunday morning omlet. 

Keep in mind that the turkey isn’t the only thing you can get creative with.  You can use the potatoes or the stuffing as a topping for your pot pie.  The veggies can go into a pot of soup.  Even the cranberries can be transformed.  Mix them into a container of cool whip, spoon them into a dessert dish and top with crushed graham crackers or chopped walnuts.  Top some non-fat vanilla yogurt with a spoonful of cranberries and sprinkle with granola for a healthy breakfast or snack. 

(If you have any pie left, your best bet is to eat it or freeze it.)

If you like some of these ideas, but don’t want to spend another day cooking until next Thanksgiving, give me a call.  We can schedule a cook date and whip up something delicious with your leftovers. 

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The holiday season is just around the corner. And we’re all stuck trying to figure out the best gift to give to our loved ones or very good friends for Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanzaa. Socks or fruit cake? Mail order cheese or a restaurant gift certificate?

Here’s a gift idea? Why not a week’s worth of delicious meals?

It’s definitely different, even thoughtful and yummy. And not only are you giving delicious food, your giving the gift of time, as all your friends and family would have to do that week is reheat and enjoy! Besides, we all know time is something we all have a hard time finding these days.

Personal Chef gift certificates start at only $200 (Pricing). So give the gift of a Personal Chef this year. And you never know, you could be re-gifted a delicious meal if they invite you over for dinner one night!

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We all eat frozen veggies. Sometimes it’s because the vegetable we want is out of season and sometimes it’s to save time. (Hey, we Personal Chefs eat frozen veggies too!)

Steamed, baked, stir-fried, microwaved- no matter how we reheat them – we’re always looking for ways to make them seem not quite so, well, frozen. Especially when the vegetable is most often the last thought of "Oh, Yeah!" Some of us grab for the butter or liquid cheese-food stuff to liven up the dish.

Here’s a quick easy tip to perk up your side dish.

If you have the time to make your own pesto, by all means go for it. A handful of fresh basil, a couple of cloves of garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper, a handful of nuts (pine, hazel, pistachio all work well) and a sprinkling of hard cheese like Romano or Parmesan (optional). Place the basil, garlic and nuts in the blender or food processor and give it a whirl to start the chopping process. Now, with the pouring lid open, drizzle in olive oil until it forms a paste. Keep adding oil until you are happy with the consistency. Now add in a pinch of salt, a few grinds of pepper and some cheese. Taste it. Add more salt, pepper or cheese to fit your taste buds.

You can use your pesto right away, or you can grab an ice cube tray and freeze individual portions to use when you need it. Just pop them out when they are frozen and store in a freezer bag in the freezer.

Back to the veggies! Stir in some fresh or frozen pesto toward the end of the cooking cycle and you have a cool twist that is much healthier than using butter or margarine. Mangia!

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Oh, how we love Thanksgiving Dinner – delicious oven-baked turkey smothered in fresh giblet gravy, mashed potatoes, home-made stuffing, sweet potato casserole with marshmallows on top, crisp and savory green bean casserole, home-made apple and pumpkin pies – the list goes on. Everyone has their favorite foods for the Thanksgiving Day holiday, but do you have the time to prepare them?

One way to do it is to start now. Yes, this weekend. Spend a few hours on Saturday and Sunday creating the favorites your friends and family have grown to expect every year. And make sure there’s enough room in the freezer to hold everything until Turkey Day arrives. It’s a challenge but it can be done.

Another option is to let Dinner’s On The Table prepare your Thanksgiving Dinner a few days before Turkey Day. We’ll make your family favorites according to your recipes - exactly as you would prepare them –  or help you add some new favorites – so you can enjoy Thanksgiving without all the fuss and mess. And you can spend more time with your friends and family instead of toiling in the kitchen.

And if you don’t have the time to personal chef yourself, you don’t need to settle for a mass produced Thanksgiving Day Dinner with who-knows-what side dishes coming from who-knows-where by ordering out or eating at a restaurant. You can enjoy fresh prepared foods to order in the comfort of your home surrounded by your friends and family on that special day.

We don’t have any pre-made menus – We customize a menu to your exact specifications. Typical pricing for meals serving 8-10 people starts @ $300 including groceries.

Call Chef Jill or Ira at 845-773-9013 to book your Thanksgiving Day Dinner cook date – bookings are limited!

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My husband and I are on a hummus kick.  It's one of the healthiest dips out there.  What could be bad about chick peas, olive oil, lemon juice, garlic and tahini?  Add some roasted garlic, olives, roasted red peppers or pine nuts and it's even better.  There are so many things you can do with hummus. 

Making it is easy.  If you have a blender or a Magic Bullet, now is the time to break them in if you haven’t used them lately.  The easiest way to make a batch is to drain and rinse a can of chick peas.  Put the chick peas into the blender with a few teaspoons of tahini, the juice of half a lemon, a few teaspoons of olive oil, a few cloves of garlic, a bit of cumin and add enough water to almost cover the chick peas.  Then blend them until you have a nice smooth paste.  Taste it to see if you have enough tahini, lemon juice, olive oil and to see if you need salt.  You can add just about anything to the blender for additional flavor.  Once you like the flavor, pour it onto a plate and stir it with the back of a spoon to make a groove.  Sprinkle your toppings, additional chick peas, pine nuts, roasted red peppers, carmelized onions, sun dried tomatoes, spices, you get the idea, then drizzle with really good olive oil.  It’s now ready to devour.  (If you don’t have the 5 minutes it takes to make a basic batch of hummus, Cedars is good, Sabra is great, but yours will be the best ever!)

The possibilities are endless as to how to eat hummus.  You can scoop it up with fresh pita, baked pita chips, tortilla chips, baby carrots, sliced veggies, a spoon,  your fingers.  Just don’t double dip!  You can make a sandwich by placing lettuce, tomato, cucumber and whatever other veggies you have on hand into a pita pocket.  Spoon some hummus in and enjoy.  If you have any leftover, spread it on bread instead of mayo for a roast beef or turkey sandwich.  I haven’t tried it for breakfast yet, but that veggie hummus sandwich sure sounds good.

We haven’t tried brushing our teeth with it, but the Zohan seems to like it.  (If you haven’t seen Don’t Mess With The Zohan with Adam Sandler, check it out.  He does some really strange things with hummus.) 

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Wow! Adams Fairacre Farms in Kingston, NY has expanded their smoked fish offerings. And we’re happy campers because of it.

Aside from additional options of salmon, cod, eel, mackerel and other fin fish, Adams now has smoked scallops, smoked shrimp, smoked mussels and a mix of all three. These are all sold in vacuum packages that can be popped into the freezer for later…or taken home and greedily consumed as dinner that night.

Jill and I immediately knew what we were making. A local restaurant called Kaycey’s, that went out of business a few years ago, had offered a smoked seafood alfredo over fettuccine as an entrée. We missed this dish and have made it at home using canned smoked scallops and shrimp. It tasted good, but a fresher fish option would have been better.

So, we planned the meal as a smoked shrimp and scallop alfredo with mushrooms accompanied by a spicy grilled catfish and green beans (from our garden) with caramelized onions. Absolutely awesome. We also made the alfredo much healthier by using a combination of skim milk and evaporated milk.

Many of the dishes we make for ourselves don’t include a recipe. We’ll post it as soon as we write one down! In the meantime, don’t forget to ask for any of these three dishes as part of your next cookdate. We promise you won’t have any leftovers.

Adams Fairacre Farms is one of the many local Ulster County Grocery Stores where we shop for ingredients for our clients’ meals. Their fish is so fresh we watched the fish manager preparing fresh halibut steaks out of a whole halibut.

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Many foods that we place in the freezer need 24-36 hours to completely thaw so we can place them into the microwave or oven to reheat and eat. These foods can be soups, stews, casseroles and other edibles that have been cooked in preparation for eating later (Like we do at Dinner’s On The Table) or leftovers.

These foods may have been placed in a microwave container with the sole purpose of being reheated in the nuker, an aluminum pan for baking in the oven, or Corningware, Pyrex or similar container that can be used in the microwave or oven. 

If you stored your freezer meal in a Corningware or Pyrex container you’re in luck! Because if you ultimately wanted to bake your meal or reheat it in the oven, you can give it a head start in the microwave. And there is a strategy and a little science behind it. Microwaves create heat by making water molecules jump around really fast, and if you’ve noticed, microwaves heat food from the inside out. Your oven heats food from the outside in.

Now put the two methods together and your meal is reheated faster.

So, start the meal in the microwave and finish it in the oven until bubbly and delicious. Always keep in mind that the internal temperature of all cooked, reheated food should reach 165 degrees, so always keep your trusty food thermometer handy.

(Dinner’s On The Table provides complete reheating instructions and we’re always available to answer any questions. This way, no matter what level of cook you are, your food will come out just right)

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ABC News reported recently that higher food prices are causing some restaurants to become "creative" when it comes to the food they’re serving on your plate by swapping out one food item for a less expensive one, or reducing portion size without editing the menu to reflect the change . When you order a main course of Grouper you have every right to expect to be served Grouper, not Catfish or some cheaper fish in its place.

This isn’t cutting costs, it’s robbery on the high seas. If a certain food is too expensive, don’t offer it or do raise the price, but don’t steal from customers. You might say it’s the equivalent of buying a knock-off piece of clothing. The brand name is there, but it was manufactured by someone else, with reduced quality of craftsmanship and materials.

Dinner’s On The Table Personal Chef Service will never use bait and switch tactics. We’re food lovers as much as we are providers. We respect ourselves and our food as much as we respect the clients we cook for. We hand-pick every ingredient we buy for your cookdate or dinner party  and strive to acquire exactly what you order. If for some reason we can’t find a specific ingredient due to seasonal or supply issues, we’ll inform you and ask what you would like in its place.

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I was talking with a friend the other day and the topic of leftovers came up. They flat out said they hate leftovers and reheated food. That statement had me scratching my head in wonderment. Modern prepared foods are entirely based on the concept of leftovers and reheated food. Only if my friend bought only raw ingredients and prepared everything from scratch would they avoid eating leftovers and reheated food.

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Keeping Kosher is a very important part of life for many Jewish Families in the Mid-Hudson Valley. At Dinner’s On The Table, we understand this importance and realize many Jewish families don’t have the time to prepare fresh, healthy meals every night and being Kosher in the Mid-Hudson Valley doesn’t leave many options. That’s where our Personal Chef service can make your life easier and healthier.

We prepare both Kosher and Kosher-style meals.

Kosher-style meals are prepared using our regular pots, pans and utensils in your home. We purchase only Kosher foods and prepare meals as you want them.

Kosher meals are prepared using separate pots, pans and utensils marked specifically (and stored separately) for meat or dairy, also using freshly purchased Kosher foods, prepared just for you. All dishes for meat and dairy are washed separately according to Kosher law.

However, to ensure the integrity of every Kosher Kitchen that we cook for, we can use our client’s kitchen tools – pots, pans, utensils, and other small appliances – that we usually supply ourselves.

This way we meet the Kosher requirements and culinary needs for our clients in Dutchess County , Ulster County and Columbia County.

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