Weekend Hospitality

For one of my readers who requested this recipe.  I left the zucchini in the marinade overnight and it developed a strong flavor.  It was unusual, but my guests at it up. Zucchini Salad (AKA Marinated Vegetable Noodles) 3-4 zucchini, trimmed 1/2 cup white vinegar 1 tbsp kosher salt 2 cups hot salsa Slice the zucchini (I used a mandolin) into thin pieces and then cut the pieces into strands the size of thick noodles.  Put the strands in a container with the vinegar and salt.  Let sit for up to 24 hours.  Strain and rinse.   Put the now soft strands in a bowl and mix in the salsa. Serve cold.

I'm tired of cooking boring food with no flavor.  Or more exactly, I'm tired of the flavors that I have been using.  This weekend presented an opportunity to experiment.  We are having a friend from off the community with 3 of their daughters, the youngest of which is 16.  In addition, a number of community friends are dropping by for meals.  Its all adults, so I can try out less usual flavor combinations. The cookbooks that I used are in the side panel.  They are old friends and are usually good for ideas or techniques.  My menu approach is like a game show.  I take a look at what my wife has provided for us in the freezer and refrigerator.  Then I make up a menu using more or less what's available.  Sometimes, I skip an item, but that's life. So, today, I started with two whole chickens, two packages of beef medallions, a package of stew meat and a package of deboned chicken breasts.  My first thought was to make Goulash. ...

Israel launched a surveillance satellite into space last night.  It was reported by all the Israeli newspapers.   Haaretz , Yediot Achronot , and the Jerusalem Post .  What I think is most interesting is the lack of concern by foreign governments. A launch to space by Israel from an Israeli military base implies that: Israel has home-grown launch and delivery technology. Israel has proven launch facilities Israel has long range ballistic capabilities. Israel has intercontinental ballistic capabilities Israel has its own surveillance capabilities unencumbered by foreign governmental control I'm not upset about this.  It is part of Israel's deterrent capabilities.  Each launch enhances Israel's reputation as a serious partner and dangerous enemy. What is interesting is how no-one outside of Israel cares, or at least cares enough to report about it.  When Iran launched a low earth orbit satellite in february 2010 , every news story carries the milit...

Its summer.Did I mention that I have a strong dislike for this season in Israel.  The temperature is hot, the humidity is low, the skies are clear all day and the sun gives me migraines.   Schools are over and the foreign students have gone home.  Its going to be a long hot summer. This weekend, we were invited our for dinner.  Yeah!  We are a hard family to host, with lots of large boys and larger appetites. Thankfully, we have great friends who put up with us. For lunch, we have invited over my son's Ram.  A Ram is a Rebbi Muvhack, a rabbi who is his permanent teacher.  For my son, this person is like a parent and we are cool with that.  Sometimes, our children need special help that we cannot provide and it is nice to know that there are special people who can step in. Shabbat Parshat Chukat Lunch - 16 Corned Beef Creole Jumbalaya Prepare Shnitzel Roast Potatoes Zucchini Salad from  Zucchini: You Can Never Have Enough (Bountif...

Just when we thought the end of the school year meant the end of our big shabbat meals, comes this shabbat with a full house.  First, we have a friend of our youngest staying with us while his parents are away on a trip.  Then, my sister is visiting with three of her children!  They too will be staying at our house for the weekend.   One of my sons is away, so our base number is six.  Thus, dinner will be a modest 10. Lunch is another story.  Start with these 10.  Add my married son and his wife.  Add a friend and his son who are coming over because the electricity was turned off in their house.  Add two families that we invited, one with three kids and one with two.  Total 23! In case you havn't gotten the message yet, we love company on weekends.  Hence the name of the blog!  I can only hope that we have the honor of company for many years to come. On the food side, lots of dishes because of the quantities.  No biggie...

This is the last weekend for most seminaries catering to foreign students in Israel.  The kids need to go back home to work at summer camps that start in mid-june.  We had a nice year, but not a particularly busy one with respect to american students.  Ok, so were were busy with a bar-mitzva and an wedding that put a serious cramp in our ability to host guests.  May next year be easier with more new friends. This weekend, we attempted to invite a family over for lunch, only to be invited to their house instead.  They are readers of this blog and have told me that the restaurant wings recipe is one of their favorites.  They would not even let me bring anything!  Oh well, I'm sure it will be a wonderful meals with friends. We have two young ladies staying with us this shabbat.  One of them visited our house for shabbat three years ago as a high school student.  Now she is back in seminary and has decided to spend one of her last weekends o...

Holy readers, its been two weeks since my last post.    During that time, I visited and starved in Pisa, Italy.  My wife and family made the meals last week and did a very good job (if you like milk meals on shabbat). This week was smoother and now I'm back to a normal schedule. I attended a conference in Pisa for one of the projects that funds my graduate school experience.   This was our final general meeting as the project failed to get follow-on funding for next year.  The usual suspects were all in attendance and surprisingly positive about the projects results and its future.  For those who have not yet heard me rant about the Leaning Tower of Pisa, I have to say that its just plain wrong.   There are few things in this world that evoke a visual sense of wrongness.  The leaning tower makes me ill.  It is an embarrassment to engineers everywhere.  The one other event that I can recall is the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse.  I...