This Week's Ingredients

Happy Monday everyone! Hopefully this day finds you enjoying an extra day off - preferably in some nice, sunny weather. Alas, around the greater Des Moines area - that is not the case. Yet again, we are dreary and wet - essentially washing away a long 'summer' weekend. That's alright though - today is Monday, which means one thing...grocery day! Today it took a few trips to acquire everything we were looking for. However, after three stores (20 some miles) and a lot of searching, we've acquired all of this week's ingredients. 

1 Bag Carrots 

2 X Medium Onions 

1 Sweet Potato 

Vegetable Broth 

1 Red Chile * 

1 Lb Russet Potatoes 

3 X Lemons 

2 X Salmon Fillets (6 oz. each) 

7 Oz. Chorizo ** 

2 X Shallots 

1 Box Arborio Rice 

Mascarpone Cheese 

1 Lb Baby Potatoes 

Fresh Mint 

* The first ingredient we had issues tracking down was a red chile. Our local Hy-Vee hasn't stocked red chiles for about a month now. We've managed to work around and use substitutes, but we really need a red chile for one of the recipes this week. After finishing up at Hy-Vee, we journeyed to one of our favorite metro Des Moines locations - Gateway Market. This little market carries all sorts of things that normal grocery stores do not (imports - out of season veggies, spices etc.) surely, they would have a red chile! Nope. Go fish. We ended up having to go to a Super Target to track down the elusive little thing. Is there a shortage on red chiles at the moment? I may have to do some research... 

** Another ingredient that we had to search for. Luckily, Gateway Market did have chorizo in stock. Chorizo is a dried, spicy, sausage. The chorizo that Gateway had was imported from Spain...and was packaged entirely in Spanish. Luckily, I remember some key phrases and words from my four years of Spanish...mainly "Picante" (HOT). The chorizo came in two forms - picante and plain old chorizo. Knowing that chorizo is ALREADY a spicy sausage - the wrong grab could have destroyed our mouths! 

There you have it. There are a lot of new and interesting ingredients on this week's list. Shallots, mint, arborio rice, mascarpone cheese, chorizo - all things that we have never used before. It's going to be an interesting week! Tune in tomorrow as I take over the kitchen for a soup that I've been very eager to try. (So eager that I cannot wait until winter when it is 'okay' to make a soup.) Until then, 

~Cheers