Part 2 (Bob Helps Get Dinner Continued)

How It Tasted

Halibut Steak

Fortunately any fishy smell dissipated by the time the steaks made it to the table, and they tasted good (not $36.98 good, but good).

Each steak had one large chunk of bone and a few smaller ones—I managed to steer clear of them but my husband and son were less successful and did some minor grumbling about “these bones—I think I swallowed one!”

New Potatoes in Cream Sauce

This dish of potatoes was far more successful than its predecessors, thanks I believe to several factors: choosing an appropriately-sized serving dish, sprinkling parsley over it as a garnish, and using hot rather than the sweet paprika. This not only gave the sauce a little more zip but also improved the color.

String Beans in Butter Sauce

Found the strings!

Tomato, Cucumber and Pimento Salad

A tasty salad but once again the lettuce leaves were viewed by my family as a decoration and carefully discarded. It was hard for me not to grumble when I saw those sad scraps of green piling up--don’t they realize there are starving rabbits in China?

French Dressing

Despite all the shaking this dressing didn’t thicken, and refrigerating for a few hours didn’t help either. The taste was fine, but I was surprised at how little there was in the jar. Bob speaks grandly of refrigerating leftover dressing for “next time”, but in our case there simply wasn’t any. This recipe designed for two served exactly that and there wasn’t a drop left over.

Sliced Pineapple

I wasn’t sure the tips I received about ripening green pineapple (tie up in a plastic bag and store upside down for a day or two) were any good, but I do have to admit it worked perfectly. The addition of sugar and lemon juice also helped hide any deficiencies in the fruit, and my family gobbled it up (“This is good!”).

Would I Make This Again?

In a word—yes. Probably, though, I’d find a substitute for that horrifically expensive halibut--I could almost see its price tag dancing before my eyes as we ate. I’ve heard that cod and haddock are similar, so next time I’ll probably give one or the other a try.

But the potatoes were adequate, the salad very good, and the pineapple excellent—realistically, who could ask for more?