Negligence...

Oh, what a bad blogger I've been. I have actually been up to a fair amount of mischief in the kitchen lately, I just haven't had any time to write about it, let alone take pictures and post them. Things I've made lately, in no particular order:

- Pesto pizza with fresh mozzarella, sauteed red onions, pine nuts, and grilled chicken
- Homegrown blackberry and raspberry galette with limoncello-mascarpone cream
- Spicy pork and sausage ragu (later turned into baked pasta)
- Deconstructed pesto pasta
- Applesauce spice bread
- Lemon bread (recipe still missing, I know...)
- Pitas stuffed with cucumber, tomato, mixed greens, and marinated/grilled chicken
- Chipotle-lime grilled chicken (this is dinner tonight--hopefully it will be good...)

People have asked me about pesto, and about what recipe I use, but the truth is that I don't use--a recipe, that is. I just get some fresh basil, toasted pine nuts, sea salt and freshly ground pepper, some really yummy extra virgin olive oil, and a massive amount of parmigiano (or pecorino, but I prefer the former), and maybe a squeeze of lemon juice, and add things by turns until I decide that I like what I taste. In the end, I have no idea how many cups or tablespoons of anything I've put in there, as I do it all by trial and error. And to be honest, it's really hard to go wrong. As long as you have enough of everything on hand, you can add bits of everthing until it comes out right.

Meanwhile, tonight's dinner will (hopefully) be the chipotle-lime grilled chicken. This is a recipe I got from the June (or May?) Gourmet and modified a bit to have one part lime juice, one part orange juice, two parts olive oil instead of one part lime juice, one part olive oil. The chicken is in the fridge right now, marinating away. At some point I'll roast the corn and red pepper for the chopped salad, which will also have tomato and black beans and chopped cilantro, as well as some sort of vinaigrette. We'll see how it goes.