Summer Patty Melts

By Andrew Hunter
For The Family Table, a blog for busy families

Food and baseball are two of our favorite things. Last night, Marilyn and Nick were at a birthday party, which left Ben and me to our own devices. The first-place Dodgers were playing the Reds at 6 p.m. So Ben and I joined forces to prepare dinner in 30 minutes. After all, we needed to be watching in time to see the lineup!

We decided on patty melts and grapes. Ben spread mustard on the bread, grated the cheese, washed the grapes, and stirred the onions while they were caramelizing in the cast iron skillet. I sliced the onions, made the artichoke mayo, and formed and seasoned the patties. There was no need to set the table because we would be eating on the patio in time to hear the words, “It’s time for Dodger Baseball.”

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Chinese Noodles

By Andrew Hunter

There’s a Chinese noodle house east of L.A. called Din Tai Fung. Their specialty is dumplings and boy, are they special – glutinous rice shaomai, green melon and shrimp bundles, and tiny soup dumplings bobbing in clear chicken broth, to name a few of our favorites. Din Tai, as we call it, is a regular and possibly favorite stop on our weekend rotation of dim sum houses.

The place is sleek, clean and crowded with a large tinted kitchen window that gives a shady peek at cooks working shoulder to shoulder rolling noodles, stuffing discs of dough and crimping them into round, crescent and purse-shaped dumplings.

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