Denver Life with Carl and Mark: April 2025

Wednesday, April 30, 2025

New recipe, April 30, 2025

Cauliflower Alfredo Pasta from NYT Cooking. The textural contrast of the pasta and the cauliflower is wonderful. And this is the way Alfredo sauce should be—subtle and delicious in spite of the rich ingredients. We give this a 5.

New recipe, April 29, 2025

Slow Cooker Mushroom and Wild Mushroom Soup from NYT Cooking. Very easy, of course, and with lots of umami. This is a comforting dish and tastes great. We give it a 4.

Tuesday, April 29, 2025

New recipe, April 28, 2025

Herby Asparagus Salad with Beets and Prosciutto from NYT Cooking. This is simply delightful. Every component adds something and you can taste each component. This gets a 5!

New recipe, April 27, 2025

Lemony Shrimp Scampi with Herbed Orzo from Food and Wine. This is not a complicated dish, but the elements work really nicely together, from toasting the orzo, through the lemon and butter and the finishing tarragon. We give it a 4.

New recipe, April 26, 2025

Mie Goreng from NYT Cooking. This is an Indonesian stir fried noodle dish, which has tons of different flavors in it. We enjoyed it thoroughly—it gets a 4.

New recipe, April 25, 2025

Roasted Butternut Squash and Red Onions from NYT Cooking. Those two items are delicious as it is, but this is jazzed up with pistachios, mint, and a tahini sauce. Yum! This gets a 5!

Thursday, April 24, 2025

New recipe, April 24, 2025

Sheet Pan Quesadillas from NYT Cooking. These have the convenience of going in the oven, but also get jazzed up with chile added to the cheese with some corn kernels. We would do this again—it gets a 4.

New recipe, April 23, 2025

Spiced Chickpea Stew with Coconut and Turmeric from NYT Cooking. Great combination of flavors from lots of elements. This gets a 4.

Wednesday, April 23, 2025

New recipe, April 22, 2025

Stir Fried Soba Noodles with Long Beans Eggs and Cherry Tomatoes from NYT Cooking. I blanched the long beans for 3 minutes before adding them to the stir fry (we have learned this makes them a bit more tender than just stir frying. The sauce with soy, sesame oil, rice vinegar, sugar, ginger, garlic and hot peppers makes this spectacular. It gets a 5.

New recipe, April 21, 2025

Sea Scallops with Cider Glaze and Cauliflower Two Ways from NYT Cooking. This has 4 separate, though not very complicated, steps. The combination is really fantastic—a cauliflower puree, roasted cauliflower and romanesco with onions, and a delicious apple glaze drizzled over seared scallop. Really nice—it gets a 5.

New recipes, April 20, 2025

I completely forgot to take photos of our contributions to the Groshek Easter Dinner. We brought veggies with Muhammara (Red Pepper and Walnut Spread), Strawberry Shortcake, and Chocolate Easter Egg Nests, all from NYT Cooking. The muhammara is a delicious spread with toasted walnuts, roasted red pepper, scallions, pomegranate molasses, olive oil and breadcrumbs, and gets a 4. The shortcakes were spectacular, and get a 5. The nests are apparently an English tradition and are fun and quite sweet. They get a 3.

New recipe, April 19, 2025

Narjissiya with Asparagus Halloumi and Sumac from NYT Cooking. This is a fun dish, with eggs served over sautéed asparagus ands halloumi and drizzled with sumac oil and lightly salted yogurt. We like the flavors, but found it a bit salty—this may have come from the halloumi, which I might use a little less of next time. Overall, we give this a 3, would easily be a 4 with a bit less salt.

New recipe, April 18, 2025

Greek Salad Rice Bowl from Food and Wine. The flavors of Greek salad are classic and delicious (there is a reason you can get them everywhere in Greece), and it turns out they work really well in a rice bowl as well. We give this a 4.

New recipe, April 17, 2025

French Onion White Bean Soup from NYT Cooking. There is a reason French Onion Soup is a classic, and here it is blended with white beans to make a delicious meal. We give this a 5.

New recipe, April 16, 2025

One Pot Coconut Curried Lentil Soup from Food and Wine. Yum! The combination of flavors is familiar in southeast Asian cooking, but they really shine in this dish. It gets a 5!

New recipe, April 15, 2025

Huevos Enfrijolados (Eggs in Spicy Black Beans) from NYT Cooking. From the photo, it is hard to tell there are eggs in there, but there are. The beans are spiced with chipotles in adobo, and it is all topped with queso cotija, avocado and cilantro. A new dish with the familiar Mexican flavors. We give this a 4.

New recipe, April 14, 2025

Vignarola from Food and Wine. This is an Italian spring vegetable stew which we enjoyed a lot. We give this a 4.

New recipe, April 13, 2025

Cambodian Chicken Stir Fry from Food and Wine. I was inspired to try this after we saw the excellent exhibit about Angkor at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. It uses a large amount of a lemongrass paste called Kroeung that I ended up having to order, but it was well worth the wait! It is a unique flavor and is delicious. We give this a 5.

New recipe, April 12, 2025

This is Sloppy Jacks, from The How Not to Die cookbook. It uses jackfruit instead of meat in a sloppy joe. You can use canned jackfruit or fresh. We found out the hard way how hard it is to separate the edible parts from a jackfruit—if you try this, use canned! It calls for date sugar, which I did not have, so I used brown sugar. Overall, this was too sweet for us. We give it a 3.

New recipe, April 11, 2025

Chicken Piccata Pasta from Food and Wine. I missed the photo, but this is a happy marriage of chicken piccata and pasta. We like it a lot, and give it a 4.

New recipe, April 10, 2025

Mongolian Beef from NYT Cooking. This is not a complicated dish, but the sauce gives it a great flavor. We give this a 5.

New recipe, April 9, 2025

Spinach and Feta Lentil Bowls from NYT Cooking. This features both spinach and bitter greens, which gives it a nice depth of flavor, mixed with lentils, feta, oregano and lemon. We enjoyed this dish, and give it a 4.

New recipe, April 8, 2025

Lemongrass Tofu and Broccoli from, NYT Cooking. The lemongrass vinaigrette is wonderful and makes this dish. We give it a 4.

New recipe, April 7, 2025

Vinegar Glazed Butternut Squash Pasta Salad from Food and Wine. The sweetness and tartness of the squash blends nicely with the bitterness of radicchio and the saltiness of the romano cheese. We give this a 5.

New recipe, April 6, 2025

Chopped Salad with Chickpeas Feta and Avocado from NYT Cooking. This has a lot of the elements of a Greek Salad, notably without tomatoes, but has a lovely creamy element with avocados. We like this a lot, it gets a 5.

New recipe, April 5, 2025

PB&J Overnight Oats from Fit Foodie Finds. This is a fun variant on overnight oats—it called for strawberry jelly, but I couldn't resist using fresh strawberries. This gets a 3.

New recipe, April 4, 2025

Overnight Oats from NYT Cooking. Has chia and oats, with pops of flavor from dried apricot and almonds. This gets a 3.

New recipe, April 3, 2025

Overnight Oats Blueberry Smoothie Bowl from AllRecipes.com. We really haven't had very many smoothies, but this is delicious! It gets a 4.

New recipe, April 2, 2025

Celery Victor Salad from NYT Cooking. This is a complicated dish, but it is restaurant-worthy! It takes quite a bit of time, but we loved it. It gets a 5.

New recipe, April 1, 2025

Roasted Golden Beet and Winter Squash Salad from NYT Cooking. This also has roasted radishes, arugula, pecorino and mint, with a citrus dressing. This is a real winner-it gets a 5.

New recipe, March 31, 2025

Coconut Caramel Braised Tofu from NYT Cooking. The tofu and vegetables are braised in coconut milk with soy sauce, miso and sugar with spices. It is a warm and soothing dish—it gets a 5.

New recipe, March 30, 2025

Crispy Black Bean Cakes with Sour Cream and Avocado from Food and Wine. Another simple dish with great flavors, including the garnishes of sour cream, avocado and lime wedges. We give this a 4.

New recipe, March 29, 2025

Laotian Style Pork Patties from Food and Wine. Bright with oyster sauce, sambal oelek, lime, ginger and garlic, these are great! We give them a 5.

New recipe, March 28, 2025

Asparagus Caesar with Pecorino from Food and Wine. This is a fun variant on the Caesar Salad—we give it a 4.

New recipe, March 27, 2027

Kind of a cheat, but this is a packaged freeze dried Thai curry that we had camping out at Jackson Lake State Park. All we had to do was boil the water and mix it, but we have never made it before! It gets a 3.

New recipe, March 26, 2025

Chocolate Overnight Oats from NYT Cooking. We are experimenting with different overnight oats recipes, and this is really tasty! It gets a 4.

New recipe, March 25, 2025

Quick Shrimp and Asparagus Stir Fry from NYT Cooking. This is a simple dish, but a fun way to enjoy spring asparagus. Finishes with a little butter that is a nice touch. This gets a 4.

New recipe, March 24, 2025

The fifth Chat GPT trail mixes recipe, salty and crunchy. This also gets a 3.

New recipe, March 23, 2025

The fourth Chat GPT trail mixes recipe, sweet and chewy. This also gets a 3.

New recipe, March 22, 2025

The third Chat GPT trail mixes recipe, salty and chewy. This also gets a 3.

Tuesday, April 15, 2025

New recipe, March 21, 2025

The second Chat GPT trail mixes recipe, sweet and crunchy. This also gets a 3.

New recipe, March 20, 2025

We asked Chat GPT for suggestions of trail mixes for the Colorado Trail. It came up with several combinations of sweet, salty, chewy and crunchy. We had one on each day of a road trip. Let's say that Chat GPT got the characteristics down well, but the flavors of the individual ingredients did not always make sense. These tended to have a lot of space in them since some of the ingredients were in fairly large pieces, which can be an issue on a long hike as you need to reduce things to the smallest volume possible to fit in to a pack. Today's was the bog combo, sweet salty chewy and crunchy. It gets a 3.

Mew recipe, March 19, 2025

One Pot Tortellini with Prosciutto and Peas from NYT Cooking. This is simple and has classic flavors. We give this a 4.

New recipe, March 18, 2025

The Tipperary Cocktail from Food and Wine. Whiskey, chartreuse and sweet vermouth, but somehow manages not to be over-ruled by the chartreuse. We enjoyed this and give it a 4.

New recipes, March 17, 2025

To celebrate St Patrick's Day, we have Buttery Irish Cabbage , and Guinness Marinated Bison Sandwiches, both from Food and Wine. The cabbage is incredibly simple and still very flavorful. The sandwich has nicely marinated bison with sautéed mushrooms and onions on rye, and is even better than is sounds. We give the cabbage a 4, and the sandwich a 5!

New recipe, March 16, 2025

Spice Rubbed Pork Tenderloin with a Mediterranean Grain Salad from Epicurious. This offered 3 options in terms of flavor variety, and of course we went for the "next level". The meat was nicely flavored with its spices, and the salad is reminiscent of tabouli, though with quinoa. Very enjoyable meal, we give it a 4.