January 20, 1012. Dinner – Lamb Meatballs in Green Tomato Chutney Cream sauce on Pasta. A Christmas Redux with three PPI’s

January 20, 1012. Dinner – Lamb Meatballs in Green Tomato Chutney Cream sauce on Pasta.  A Christmas Redux with three PPI’s

I worked from 5:30 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. so I was a babbling idiot and of no assistance in the kitchen, so Suzette took over.  We discussed going out until Suzette re-discovered a container with about a dozen of the wonderful lamb meatballs made by Michele Varner for the Christmas Eve buffet and asked me if I would like pasta and the meatballs.  Being unable to move or think, I must have mumbled, “Yes”; so she proceeded to boil water for pasta while I finished my work.

When I went into the kitchen I saw she was heating the meatballs and their spicy tomato seasonings in a large skillet with about twenty thin spears of asparagus chopped into about 1 ½ inch lengths and little brown mushrooms from Ta Lin.  After those ingredients were heated, Suzette added the last ½ cup of the Green Tomato Chutney and Cream Cheese dip she had made for Christmas to the meatball skillet.  Then I handed her some Mexican crema (sour cream) and she added some of it to make the sauce thinner and creamier until it achieved a consistency similar to Beef Stroganoff (which it very nearly was). I uncorked the three open bottles of wine (Canoe Ridge Merlot, Josefina Syrah Rose and Cutler Creek Cabernet Sauvignon) that were each about 1/3 full and put them on the table with glasses.

The pasta was interesting; a bag of Christmas tree shaped Abetini di Socchieve in six colors, that Suzette had bought at T.J. Maxx (500 grams for $5.99 produced in Italy by Sapori an Antichi from Durum Wheat Semolina) to decorate the house at Christmas. 

After about ten minutes at a rolling boil the pasta was cooked to soft.  So we drained it and we each ladled some into pasta bowls and spooned the lamb meatball in green tomato cream sauce over it.  An exceedingly simple and quick dinner to prepare.  The delicious hardy flavor of the tomatoey meatball cream sauce and wine revived me and we enjoyed watching a four hour German movie called “Pope Joan” about a smart German woman who disguised her identity as a woman and became Pope around 850 A.D. set in the period during which the sons of Charlemagne fought between themselves to succeed him in re-unifying his Holy Roman Empire. It was a convincing period piece beautifully filmed with good acting, beautiful costumes and compelling period sets.  Whether it was historically accurate or not; it absorbed my attention so completely that I forgot I had been tired and bleary headed.  Or perhaps the terrific dinner that Suzette created that did that.

So Suzette has twice in the span of one week re-confirmed her title of Queen of Leftovers or QPPI by creating another delicious meal with three excellent PPIs from Christmas that, when combined, created a new, interesting dish.

I guess creativity makes the difference between nothing and something, gastronomically speaking.  I enjoyed our dinner creatively combining three PPIs much more than the alternative of going out to Little Anita’s for its predictable Mexican fare

Bon Appètit