Tuscan Grill, Revisit the 5-hour Duck and Recipe Culling

The temperatures soared on Saturday to 70 and suddenly all of the windows in the house were open, we cleaned and scrubbed and sat in the garden, we took my mickey mouse cook-in-the-fireplace setup out and finally installed the Tuscan grill husband bought for me at Christmas.  It had been decorating the living room rug and believe me, that is no light sucker to move when you have to vacuum!  I've wanted one of these for years and I think husband finally got sick of seeing my jerry-rigged fireplace set up.  The bricks went back to the garden where I noticed my chives pocking up a single leaf blooming on my thyme plants and a bare hint of horseradish leaf sprouting up.  There is hope!

This new setup leaves me spoiled for choice.  I can now choose the quick grill option for after work using the gas grill on the right, or I can go slow and smoky with wood on the left, strictly a weekend proposition.

I haven't broken it in yet, we had quail on the quick side last night and today I am slow roasting my 5-hour duck.  The house smells amazing.

The cleaning frenzy on Saturday also extended to the library where my desk is piled high with cookbooks that won't fit on my shelves.  Short of buying more Billy bookcases and shoving them in the room somewhere that would cause an HGTV stager to have a heart attack, I decided that the 35 magazine boxes hogging the bottom shelves would have to go.  If you haven't flicked open the magazines once in the 3 years they have been on the shelf then you don't need to have them around. Currently I'm parked on the couch ripping out recipes, adding them to my recipe box on epicurious, and beginning to plan some of the 11 weeks of summer classes. 

The fun part was each magazine had a little history of my life.  I always write in my book and magazines, when I cook the dish, if I made any substitutions, who was over for dinner, etc.  I found the first recipe I made when I returned from our wedding, the recipe I made when he finally arrived here to stay in August 98, guest lists for dinner parties over the years. After making a dish once or twice I didn't need the recipe any more, but I still wanted the record of when we had it.  I've graduated on to an excel spreadsheet that is just a list of the ingredients I need for the 75 or 80 recipes we rotate the most and I enter the date each time we make it again. Crazy I know, but I'm a list maker.

What did you get done this weekend?

PS...
  Here is the method for those who might want to make it.  I cut it out of the mag because it wasn't on Epicurious.  I found that with a few of my fave recipes.  I'll type it in later for those who can't read it.

Comments

[Janet]

I LOVE that you write down when you make things, etc. That is just fantastic!

[Julia]

That shrimp dish was obviously a good one! And I'm exceedingly jealous of your fireplace set up!!!

[Terri]

Hi Jo --

That Shrimp with Creole Sauce sounds wonderful -- I have all the ingredients to make the dish. Do you have the rest of the instructions? I searched on Epicurious.com for that particular recipe, but I couldn't find it.

Thanks so much!

Terri

[Terri]

Thanks Jo! Can't wait to make it.

[Blue Witch]

You're the only other person (than me) I've ever heard of who writes dates next to recipes you make! I'm glad I'm not alone. People think I am mad.

I too have the magazine problem. I have loads from the 1980s and 1990s I now cannot bear to throw away, but I need the space...