Friday Night Dinner

Once again, as Friday rolled around, we weren't quite up to the task of making chicken. So instead we made the side dishes: rice (well, really orzo), salad, and roasted vegetables. Check back next week, we might actually be making chicken!

The rice was relatively easy to make. First, we toasted it for five minutes in a pan on the stove with a little bit of olive oil. Once the rice was brown, we transferred it into a pot filled with four cups of boiling water. After six minutes of cooking while partially covered, we turned off the flame and let it sit for another five minutes. Then we put it in a tin pan and reheated it before dinner. 

This week's salad was also not so Israeli - we put lettuce in it. Even though it is hard to find in the Shuk, we did find it and made a delicious salad. Our secret ingredient? Pears. The salad was accompanied by a new homemade salad dressing: Balsamic Vinaigrette. Thank you to Beth for this great tip: In order to emulsify (turn the oil and vinegar into one substance) your salad dressing, blend it together. Not only did our salad dressing look more like a Balsamic Vinaigrette, but it tasted better too. Thanks Beth!

The last dish we made was roasted vegetables. We were going to grill them, but then we remembered that we don't have a grill! We settled for roasting in the oven and they ended up tasting great. First we sliced the onions, red pepper, zucchini, and eggplant. Then we salted the eggplant to remove the bitterness, as mentioned in an earlier post. Once all of the vegetables were ready, we tossed them in a mixture of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and chopped fresh rosemary. Then we popped them in the oven and we were done. Very easy, very delicious.