Stacked Supper of Shrimp, Rice, Avocado and Cucumbers - Healthy !

Wife and I tag-teamed making a Stacked Supper tonight from http://www.skinnytaste.com/2015/10/spicy-california-shrimp-stack.html?m=1. Brown rice on the bottom, seasoned with rice wine vinegar; a layer of shrimp; a layer of avocado; then, diced cucumbers top the stack. A finish of  siracha mayo and furikake. Yum ! Delicious, easy and healthy !

Winter Bosc Pear and Roquefort Salad with Spiced Red Wine Figs

 Winter Bosc Pear and Roquefort Salad with Spiced Red Wine Figs

from the just-published book The Magic of Spice Blends by Aliza Green, p. 80

(picture from the book, below)

 

A trip to Whole Foods, along with a previously-purchased Pinot Noir, gave us a nice salad for about $4.50 a serving (PLENTY of left-overs !)

 

 From right to left in my final plating - A fanned-out Bosc Pear (with a bit of lemon juice and some of the vinaigrette); about 1 oz. of wonderful Roquefort; radicchio; endives; spiced red wine figs; and walnuts. 

 

 The book instructs how to make Quatre Epices (in case you're not familiar with it, it's a French blend of four ground spices, in a rough ratio of White Pepper:Nutmeg:Ginger:Allspice of 4:3:2:1). 

 

That blend is used, along with the red wine, to poach the dried figs. 

 

The straight-forward vinaigrette uses neutral oil and cider vinegar (2:1).

 

Gabriel Coulet Roquefort !

Aquavit

'Finally got back around to this Blog.  I JUST picked up a beautiful cookbook by Marcus Samuelsson (for $1 !!) about the NYC Scandinavian restaurant he helmed for a while.  I hope to try out some recipes soon ! (I just RETIRED, so I SHOULD have more time for recipe testing).

In case you're not familiar with the restaurant (I've not been there) ---  http://www.aquavit.org/.