quarter rack + portabello shrooms in white wine reduction

So I splurged a few weeks ago on truffle salt which was the best luxury investment I've ever made to my spice rack. Grilled up some lamb and shrooms and am kicking back before surgery orientation starts tomorrow. Made extra for lunch... for the next two days. Happiness abound. The colors suck, unfortunately, but use your imagination.

Recipe: salt + peppa, sear rack on both sides; bake at 380 for 8 minutes each side for medium rare. toss a few sliced shrooms, basil, white wine, & 1-2 tbsp water together in a high heat pan (separate from the seared lamb so it doesn't taste burnt). It's maybe 10 minutes of work, with ~20 minutes of waiting around and ordering books from amazon.

lime meringue tarts with repurposed gingersnap cookie crust

so i decided since the gingersnaps i made were a semi-fail due to their too-delicate texture, i would use them instead as a shells for mini lime meringue tartlets to bring to a bbq. basically i threw them in a food processor with some extra whole wheat flour and beat it into crumbs and pressed the crumbs into a cupcake pan and baked for 10 min at 375F. i followed david leibovitz's recipe for the lime filling component, which involved lots of manual labor since i didn't have a juicer. since i also don't own a candy thermometer, i decided to go with good old fashioned meringue topping instead of his marshmallow topping and used the broiler to brown it. the gingersnap crusts were a bit soggy/oily because the cookie crumbs weren't dry enough, but i felt the flavors went well together, so all in all i was pretty satisfied with the results.

photo provided by the most excellent jeff chang.

gingersnaps!

im getting too lazy to post up the recipes. but i made gingersnaps out of the "good to the grain" cookbook. its dedicated to baking recipes with whole grain flours. this recipe used a mix of whole wheat flour and all purpose, but i was forced to sub whole grain pastry flour in for the all purpose as it was all i had. came out extremely thin and delicate as a result, but incredibly tasty.

i do believe gingersnaps are my favorite cookie.

yes, that is my foot.