Re: Cooking for my girlfriend
I'm an amatuer chef (that means I've taken cooking courses but I've never worked in the food industry).
With limited equipment, pasta is definitely the way to go. There's a really easy white wine sauce with capers that's tasty, google for that. And never, ever use "cooking" wine. If it's not good enough to drink, you don't want it in your food.
A few nice touches would be fresh parm cheese (not the powdered stuff in the plastic jar), fresh basil leaves, fresh garlic, and a salad with homemade dressing.
The dressing is easy too. Just get some decent olive oil and some balsamic vinegar. Start with the oil and slowly add some vinegar, maybe a tablespoon at a time. Taste the dressing by dipping a lettuce leaf and eating it. Keep adding vinegar until it's the right balance for you. If you add too much, just add more oil. Then add some fresh garlic (pressed) and salt and pepper to taste. And use romaine lettuce, not iceberg. Some cherry tomatos, sliced bell pepper, cucumber (always peel the cucs), a little red onion, some green salad olives (just the cheap jarred are fine), and some sweet or hot salad peppers if you want. And sprinkle some crumbled gorganzola or bleu cheese on the top...
I would avoid soup unless you're making it yourself. Don't serve canned or dry soup.
Go with a good bread (baguette) and you're set. For drinks, you should be able to get a non-alchs sparkling grape juice or something like that. If you're worried about wine in the pasta sauce, don't. The alcohol boils off leaving only the flavor behind.
I don't think you need to do anything special for dessert. Try to get some fruit sorbet, preferably lemon, or some good ol' vanilla ice cream. That would finish it off nice.
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12-19-2006, 02:07 PM
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