LTH Small Household Food Exchange - Season Two - March 8th

Location: Tre Kronor
http://www.trekronorrestaurant.com
3258 West Foster Avenue
Chicago, IL 60625-4828
(773) 267-9888

Attendees (9 for exchange; 11 for dinner):
GAF: White bean chicken chili
nr706: Steak roulade
Aimee: Poblano Corn Chowder with Shrimp
Boudreaulicious: Empanadas
The GP (+1 for dinner): Roasted Poblano Crema with Mexican Greens
Leek (+1 for dinner): Seco de Pollo (Ecuadorian chicken stew)
Cathy2: Smokin' Meatloaf
moetchandon: Apfel Kuchen
lemoneater: Vegetable curry

Date: Monday March 8, 2010 at 7 pm

Time to plan our next exchange! Below are the details--let me know if you can join us. I have selected Tre Kronor, a restaurant that receives a lot of respect, but primarily for brunch and for their Christmas (St. Lucia) buffet. It is time to see what they can do for dinner:

Number in the group: We will cap attendance at each gathering at 14 and food exchange participants at 12 so that participants are never making more than 12 servings of anything. Couples will be counted as one serving.

The food: The food exchange started so that those of us in 1-2 person households who love to cook aren't stuck eating that big pot of chili we made for a whole week. Instead, we make 8-12 servings of one dish, and bring back 8-12 different dishes. Participants bring one pre-portioned serving of their food for everyone who has RSVP’d to come that month. A serving is whatever you think it is for your food item. For soup, it may be two cups say; for pastrami, 4 oz. (or more if you make more generous sandwiches). The priority will be for entrees, meats, soups, salad, stews, pastas, grains, etc. One dessert is OK each month, we just didn’t want 6-7 dessert offerings as everyone was mostly interested in main meals (and there is a fabulous LTH dessert exchange the first Monday of each month). There will be no restrictions on the food – we’re an omnivorous bunch. WE DO HAVE ONE MUSHROOM ALLERGY IN THE GROUP SO IF YOU MAKE SOMETHING WITH MUSHROOMS, PLEASE INFORM THE GROUP WHEN YOU POST WHAT YOU ARE BRINGING. IF ANYONE ELSE HAS ANY ALLERGIES, PLEASE LET US KNOW. Again, that doesn’t mean that the ingredient is off limits, it just means to let everyone know if you are using it that month. We decided we don’t want to start running any list of off-limit foods or ingredients.

The containers/delivery system: Everyone in the group should use the Gladware 3 1/8 cup plastic containers (it’s the approximately 7” x 7” square). You’ll portion your food into those containers to bring and hand out at the gathering. You can freeze them or not depending on your schedule and when you make your food. There is no need to fill the container, just put in whatever is a serving to you. If you use something else to deliver your food that month (Ziploc bags, plastic wrap, etc.) you should also return the empty containers from the last round so that everyone always has a stash of these containers for the exchange and doesn’t have to run out and buy more.

The process: Each of us will take turns being the organizer each month. Each time we meet, someone will offer to organize the next month’s gathering.

Several weeks before the next gathering, the organizer will post a new thread to the events page announcing the date and the location for that month and asking for RSVP’s.

Participants will need to RSVP their attendance by one week before the monthly gathering. They will then need to post what they are bringing by three days before the gathering. This is to help make sure we get some balance in the food so that we’re not all bringing something that has to be eaten in the next 2-3 days; that there’s a balance of stuff that can be frozen for later, or eaten sooner.

The organizer will monitor the thread to see what people are bringing. The organizer will also make reservations for the group at the restaurant where we will be gathering. People can choose to stay for dinner or just come and exchange food and leave. Just let the organizer know so they can get an accurate count for the reservation. Other LTHers are welcome to join us for dinner, even if they are not bringing food to exchange.

We’re all pretty relaxed and flexible with the exchange as there will likely be some bumps here and there and questions we will continue to come up. Remember that the core purpose of the exchange is for a group of LTHers to exchange good food they’ve made with minimal hassle and restrictions.

See you on the 8th!

I'm in - 1 for the exchange, +1 for dinner.

-Mary

I'm in for the exchange, as is Aimee (I REALLY need her to sign up for her own account!!)

I'm in. Should note that Tre Kronor is BYOB.

Hi

Please put me down for 1 exchange and 2 to eat dinner

Lee

Hi,

I'm in for everything.

Thanks!

Regards,
Cathy

I can't attend the March event, but I wanted to take the opportunity to thank you all for the wonderful food. Good eats all the way around. Yes, I tried everything already (should I be embarrassed?)

I'm in for exchange and dinner.

Sharon

I'm in for exchange and dinner

I've decided that I will bring Apfel Kuchen.

Sharon

I'm making Seco de Pollo
http://laylita.com/recipes/2008/02/01/s ... uatoriano/

Paul Prudhomme's Steak Roulade

I'm thinking empanadas--doing some for the Pie for Pi day and you can never have too many pastry filled goodies, right? Chorizo shrimp and chimichurri beef perhaps? Maybe a sweet one too to form a "complete" meal

Hi Friends,

Please label your food. At the very minimum, put your screen name or what's it called. At this moment, I am defrosting a dish where I am doing a process of elimination to figure out what it is. If you want to go whole hog, a label with name, dish and ingredients.

Can't wait for next week!

Regards,

Cathy2 wrote:Hi Friends,

Please label your food. At the very minimum, put your screen name or what's it called. At this moment, I am defrosting a dish where I am doing a process of elimination to figure out what it is. If you want to go whole hog, a label with name, dish and ingredients.

Can't wait for next week!

Regards,

I think I might have been one of the only ones not to include a label of any kind either month, so good chance that it's one of mine Certainly a reasonable request!!

Hi,

It wasn't you. There were several unidentified containers, which look very similar to each other when frozen.

Regards,

I have no idea what I'm making yet. I suspect it will be a soup or stew. I'll try to have a definitive answer tomorrow.

Aimee is making Poblano Corn Chowder with Shrimp.

I'm looking at a vegetable curry.

Hi,

I have had several ideas dancing in my head on what to make. I decided rather than do something tried-and-true, to try something I never did before: smoked meatloaf. I rarely make meatloaf and never smoked one ever, so this will be an interesting effort for me.

See you all on Monday!

Regards,

Sorry for the late entry. I'm going to try a black bean soup.

After reading the black bean soup recipe, I realized it didn't call for stock. I have a bunch of stock defrosted in the fridge, so I am switching to Roasted Poblano Crema with Mexican Greens.

-Mary

The GP wrote:After reading the black bean soup recipe, I realized it didn't call for stock. I have a bunch of stock defrosted in the fridge, so I am switching to Roasted Poblano Crema with Mexican Greens.

-Mary

An excellent shift in recipes, I look forward to it.

Regards,

Just to confirm - if there are 9 in the exchange, then we bring 8 containers of our food?

Mine will also come with yellow rice.

thanks,

leek wrote:Just to confirm - if there are 9 in the exchange, then we bring 8 containers of our food?

Mine will also come with yellow rice.

thanks,

that is correct Also, per Cathy2's suggestion, don't forget to label (although, personally, I've enjoyed a couple of "I wonder what I'm going to be eating once this is de-frosted" meals )

See you tomorrow!

Official entry for tomorrow: 2 different empanadas: Chorizo shrimp with green olive and green onion; and chimichurri beef (cilantro, onion, jalapeno garlic, cumin and adobo amongst other things!). I made fillings for a few sweet treats as well in preparation for Pie for Pi day so I may bring everyone a taste of those as well if my dough holds out--spiced chocolate banana (cinnamon, chili powder, allspice and ginger) and honey apricot almond with a touch of honey grappa. No way that all this will fit on the container so thought I'd give a heads up here in case anyone wanted a full(ish) ingredient rundown.

I'm still in for the exchange, but DH and I won't be able to stay for dinner

If we can exchange at the beginning, I'll be there for 7 pm.

Thanks for understanding!

Hi,

I just put my meatloaf on the smoker to finish around 1 PM. The provenance of the meat reflects how I move around:

Beef: Sunset foods and Peoria Packing House
Italian sausage: Peoria Packing House
Veal: Bobak's

Breadcrumbs: from Thanksgiving
BBQ sauce in the meat: Many, many BBQ joints

If someone demanded I make this meatloaf again, I could never do it.

Regards,

boudreaulicious wrote:Official entry for tomorrow: 2 different empanadas: Chorizo shrimp with green olive and green onion; and chimichurri beef (cilantro, onion, jalapeno garlic, cumin and adobo amongst other things!). I made fillings for a few sweet treats as well in preparation for Pie for Pi day so I may bring everyone a taste of those as well if my dough holds out--spiced chocolate banana (cinnamon, chili powder, allspice and ginger) and honey apricot almond with a touch of honey grappa. No way that all this will fit on the container so thought I'd give a heads up here in case anyone wanted a full(ish) ingredient rundown.

Just in case you were curious what these looked like:



These were shared for dinner this evening. Wonderful!

Thanks, boudreaulicious!

Regards,

Cathy2 wrote:

boudreaulicious wrote:Official entry for tomorrow: 2 different empanadas: Chorizo shrimp with green olive and green onion; and chimichurri beef (cilantro, onion, jalapeno garlic, cumin and adobo amongst other things!). I made fillings for a few sweet treats as well in preparation for Pie for Pi day so I may bring everyone a taste of those as well if my dough holds out--spiced chocolate banana (cinnamon, chili powder, allspice and ginger) and honey apricot almond with a touch of honey grappa. No way that all this will fit on the container so thought I'd give a heads up here in case anyone wanted a full(ish) ingredient rundown.

Just in case you were curious what these looked like:



These were shared for dinner this evening. Wonderful!

Thanks, boudreaulicious!

Regards,

thanks Cathy--glad you enjoyed! guess i'll have to follow through now