Yes...pretty readily available. OP mentioned buying other ingredients at TJ which is why I said that. For some of us TJ is our regular staple store.

Duck? Anybody recently cook it? The most rural of the three outlet grocers I visit has frozen duck breasts at $2.99/each. This is the brand/product in question.
They had them on Friday and since they are the one most out of the way, I will assume that they will still have them tomorrow or Tuesday.

Also, I was on pizza dough balls and I wasn't going to pay nearly $3 for a ball at Publix, but one of these stores had a Pizza Hut frozen dough for $5/case and a case is 20 pounds and comen in 60 discs of dough. 2 to 3 discs make 16" pie.

wow that’s a great price! I pay $2-$2.3 for frozen balls of dough, depending on white vs multigrain. I did buy 00 flour and I’ve pdf’d the Roberta recipe, but I’m procrastinating on making my own dough.

Pizza Hut breadstick dough for the same price too. As I said, it is in discs and I ended up wrapping the at a time up in wax paper then foil to freeze and it was easier to place it in available places in the freezers. :)
I cooked the pizza on convection at 425 for 18 minutes, but the crust did not brown well.
Next Friday, I'll place it in the bottom rack for a few minutes before making it. I am wary of setting the oven past 450 because there are times my folk's GE Profile oven locks up at high temps and even after shutting the breaker, the door won't open.
But for pizza, I still need to find more Leprino pizza cheese on the cheap as I am down to my last 20 oz. of five pounds. Mixing smoked provolone with mozzarella doesn't have the stretch compared to that Leprino cheese blend.

Welp. After receiving a broken grill, it seems like the whole country is sold out of full-size Weber charcoal grills so I will have to wait at least a month for a replacement from Amazon.

I bought a small camping size one in the meantime so I'll be in limited steak searing mode soon enough.

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My first ever batch of cookies. I used a basic drop cookie recipe off the Internet with 2 cups of dark chocolate chips added. The brown sugar made them a little crispy around the edges. Made 2 dozen. Gone in 24 hours which equals one cookie per hour.

gorgeous and I’m so happy for you!!!!
we all have boosted our cooking and baking.

At my closeout grocer, whole briskets were $19.99 this weekend regardless of size, so I bought one which is at least 11 lbs. I know that as I went to Aldi after and saw a 3# brisket flat @ $4.99/lb and I have something three times as large.

I'll smoke this one before July 4 as my brother and his savage family will drop the kids off with their mutt on the Wednesday before.

Grocery Outlet? That’s a great price.

I’m unclear how hosting savage people (as you typed) is a good idea.

Can the kibblers and I come and visit that weekend? :D

Not a Grocery Outlet. Central Florida has a few grocers who sell discounted merchandise. I call my niece and nephew "Savages" because their parents are not very good at teaching them manners. "Yes" and "No" aren't said, just "Yea".
Plus, they seem not to eat chicken or pork when dining with others, just asking for beef. Savages.
PM two weeks from now if you make a run to the Tampa Bay area. I will hook you up.

Today my college kid was about to make another frozen meal for his lunch. So I suggested we whip up some Caesar dressing, make some quick croutons, and build a salad. He said “this is the best salad I’ve ever had”. The best part is that we had all the basics we needed.
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It’s really sweet of you to host them.
sometimes I’ll see discounted products at Safeway; I really only know grocery outlet for actual stores with discounted groceries although I’m sure that Big Lots and other dollar stores also have groceries. I’ve passed Big Lots often in car (they’re a mile from home) and foot (they’re near the Japanese curry place I loved and my local dispensary which I last visited in February) and I’ve yet to enter Big Lots.

Go to Big Lots..it's fun to find treasures and yes they have a lot of brand name food but I don't think it is considerably cheaper.

even pre/Covid I never entered Big Lots! It’s been there for decades. The past 2 years, I’ve literally walked past it when parking the saab convertible and walking to the Japanese curry, the sushi/ramen combo, the Mediterranean chicken, Pizza Hacker, and the dispensary. I love all of these places and now go to none of them during Covid although I’ll return to the dispensary at some point. I’ve even parked by parking meters literally next to Big Lots but of course they have a parking lot and their door entrance faces their parking lot and not the street.

Even my closest Safeway (where I went today at 8:45a and among other things, got 6 Haagen daaz 14-Ozers for $8.25!) is across the street and two doors down from Big Lots and I still haven’t ever entered. Now that I know that their groceries aren’t on sale, I’ll never have an excuse to enter. It is EV- to go into any public business unless I have a very specific purpose - other than groceries, post office, and bank, I’ve only entered or stood at the doorway for total of four pickups at a restaurant, 2 times to susiecakes, and one hardware store since Shelter on 3/17/2020!

:D It's only a 14 hour drive from me. :D

Scallops on scallops on scallops.
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And don’t forget, scallops!

Your thumb looks a little banged up.

oops I thought that the thumb was part of the meal! Ugh. So no cannibalism?

The thumb is taking the abuse of fishing every day.

'Fishing'? Seems like an euphemism for the most common crime on the recently withdrawn TV-series 'C¤ps'

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No, I meant fishing

Scallop daisy chains? Kinky scallops.

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Molasses cookies, seasoned with cloves, cinnamon & ginger.

Don't make any drive. I have to apologize to you. The brisket which I am thawing has already been "brined" for corned beef.
I am still thawing and rinsing most of the brine away to make pastrami with my smoker.

I'll post pictures anyway on my first attempt at that.

:D

It used to take an hour or more for me to make a Caesar salad using the New Best Recipe. Now I can do it within 15 minutes while cooking other things. That’s a huge improvement. I’m so pleased.

An hour? How is that possible?
If it took me an hour to make a salad I would never make it again. ;)

What is this New Best Recipe? We’ve been making lovely Caesars here with homemade dressing for about a week.

It's a cookbook from America's Test Kitchen. Unless you had to bake your own bread for croutons I can't imagine it can take an hour...it is a pretty straightforward basic recipe.

it’s very straight forward and I used to need an hour because I wasn’t accustomed to cooking. I made the caesar for 6-8 people as an appetizer to go with crab on Xmas eve, so I always needed time to read, reread, measure, reread, and also rinse and dry the lettuce, let alone cutting it. I just needed time and higher confidence in the kitchen. That’s why being able to make it in 15 minutes has improved my cooking.

from The Force (and I also used The Force last night):
dressing based on 4 people (2 heads of romaine)

1/2 cup olive oil
4 anchovies - minced or smushed
1 tsp Worcester sauce
Juice from 1/2 big lemon (technically about 1 tbsp plus 1 tsp)
2 egg yolks after eggs are boiled for 45 seconds
optional - salt/pepper to taste (I used neither)

mix the bottom items and whisk in the olive oil.

Other than with baking, you really don't need to be ultra precise with recipes. And you should always use salt...it doesn't make food taste salty...it brings out the flavor of all ingredients. Only use kosher salt...not table salt which has iodine. Ican't imagine a Caesar salad without pepper as that is part of the flavor profile but I guess if you don't like it....but never leave out salt. And don't skip salt when you do any baking. I buy anchovy paste in a tube...much easier and less gross than a can of them. Also, if you are serving to anyone with immune issues you should probably buy pasteurized eggs. Or you can skip the eggs and still get an emulsion by adding a tbs of mayo or tsp of dijon mustard. Do you put the parmesan on after you toss the salad? I like a little in the dressing too.

No garlic? :confused:

I also like to throw in a little Dijon mustard.

Oh yeah...didn't notice that. :confused:
The oil to lemon ratio seems a bit off but oh well...he likes it so that's what matters.

What is your recipe for caesar salad dressing?

Actually, I kind of wing it without using a recipe but I will try to piece it together. I use half olive oil and half grapeseed oil as I find the olive oil kind of takes over. And I like lots of lemon. I will have to come back with amounts. I do it in the blender.
Of course the salad is just romaine, croutons, parmesan.
I really good way to make it is to cut a head of romaine in half lengthwise and brush with oil and grill it...then put the dressing, shaved parm and croutons on the grilled romaine. Works best with the baby heads.

Yum! Never thought of grilling it. I’ll try it when you post the amounts. My favorite one at our local restaurant adds crispy capers. So good.

garlic is part of the recipe but my spouse is a vampire so no garlic. When solo, I would use garlic often. I do use “garlic” croutons by Semifreddi as opposed to making my own croutons.

i’m positive that new best recipe is 4 tsp lemon which works to a half lemon. I have that “half lemon” in my memory as opposed to the exact terms used by new best recipe.

i’ve heard of the grilled Caesar but just haven’t tried it.

I definitely add Parmesan with the Caesar but I mix everything so I am pretty sure that the cheese is within the dressing.

Yeah, I just sort of eyeball it. I'd be interested in how often other posters follow recipes v tasting as you cook. The person who really taught me how to cook was my Neapolitan uncle. There was never a recipe in sight, just a little bit of this a little bit of that. Most of his recipes were dead simple, but the flavours were astounding. You can look like a superstar with 3-4 ingredients. When I'm trying something new, I usually look at a few recipes just to see what the flavours are then adjust to my own taste.

How about everyone else?

This
It is rare that I follow a recipe and get out the measuring spoons etc. Recipes to me are more like suggestions and I always mess with them. You get a feel for what flavors work with others. You should be fearless when you cook....what's the worst that could happen? The worst is that you won't like it and have to throw it out. It is highly unlikely that you will kill anyone with your cooking.
You can't do this with baking which is why I don't bake...too many rules to follow and having to be precise.