What's Your Most Creative Menu

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:ohmy: You mean I have to try to remember? The thing is - I don't know how creative any of my dishes would be. If I pull something together out of what I have on hand it's usually something like a pasta dish - with roasted red peppers, kalamata olives, water-packed mozzarella, spinach with some sort of wine/butter sauce.

I did create (again, how original it is I don't know but I certainly had never seen a recipe for it) a pasta dish and I roasted every fresh vegetable I had on hand - it included beets, turnips, broccoli, cauliflower, shallots, mushrooms, grape tomatoes, Brussels sprouts, and carrots. Drizzled everything with evoo and a sprinkle of kosher salt. Once done I tossed in some penne with more olive oil, salt, pepper, and I think that's all.

Or.....I have poached chicken pieces in white wine, thyme, rosemary, onions, mushrooms - homemade slick noodles, topped with Parm shavings, but it's not like it's a creation of my own really.

It's a harder question that it seems! I guess I am seeing the word "creative" and I think more of a menu that has creatively been put together via planning. I don't think of scrounging in cupboards to find something to eat. Maybe a glass of wine will clear my thought process :mrgreen:
 
Don't know if this "out of the ordinary" Miss StirBlue, but with so many Etouffee, Stewfee, Creole, Courtboullion, and Sauce Piquant recipes plus the plethora of sauces over dozens of baked/broiled/steamed etc fish dishes I do the following. Make a simple Creole sauce recipe. Fry a small (3-5 oz) Catfish fillet. Cook some rice. Lay the fried fillet on a bed of rice and cover with the Creole sauce. Serve with Louisiana Hot Sauce/Tabasco. I doubt this is original. Is anything anymore? However it is good!

Enjoy!
 
I've been creating dishes out of what I have in the pantry and the freezer for years. I guess my family's favorite has been the sausage and noodle casserole.

http://www.discusscooking.com/forum...513-2.html?highlight=sausage+noodle+casserole

If you like, add peas or broccoli florets and pimentoes.

Another one I really like is to start with a box of Rice-a-Roni or other rice blend, and add meat and vegetables of your choice for a skillet meal. For instance: leftover chicken, R&R chicken flavor, and frozen oriental vegies. You can go in all kinds of direction with this one.
 
ALL my menus are creative. Most of the recipes I use are my own, developed with hours of trial and error.
 
StirBlue said:
What have you brought together out of the ordinary to make a meal?

Hmmm, creative menu, meal or dish? I am pretty traditional in planning a menu in so far as what type of cuisine I want to prepare, decide on a main dish & start building the menu/sides around that cuisine - flavors that will not over power the main attraction. i.e. if it's Greek, Italian, etc - I keep within that theme. The individual dish is where I get creative - looking through my recipes for some faves & tweaking them, prior to putting it 'on the menu' or experimenting with a new dish first.

For an everyday meal, sometime I use some ready made/prepared foods as either an accompaniment or incorporating them into the recipe -- semi-homemade.

Examples:

Bagged salad - add mandarin oranges, or fresh fruit, veggies, dressing of choice.

Lasagna, pasta, pasta salad - almost anything goes - from sauce, fillings & type of noodle. I like Stouffer's spinach souffle, and have mixed in ricotta etc and used as a filling for stuffed shells or lasagna - manicotti would be another choice.

If I make fried rice or won tons, I may add a few ready made sides like egg rolls, won ton soup, etc.

I also like Mrs. T's perogies - I turn that into a cold salad, side dish or an appy.

Semi-homemade desserts - prepared cheesecake or poundcake and adding fresh fruit - strawberries, blueberries etc - posted a recipe for cheesecake in a martini glass on this site.

Some of the creativity also comes into play in changing out the serving dishes, i.e. guacamole or shrimp cocktail served in a margarita glass. Or, preparing mini dishes i.e. souffles etc. in individual servings like ramekins, rather than one large dish. The tricck for me, is turning something ordinary into something extra-ordinary. Hope I understood the question correctly. :chef:
 
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I put together a sort of "chicken cordon bleu" dish last week that my fiancee went nuts over. I didn't really think it was anything special but it was basically just your average chicken cordon bleu recipe with bacon and chorizo stuffed inside with a cheese blend, instead of the traditional swiss and ham. I did saute the bacon with some shitake butter, just because I was curious about the flavor it would have, and I like it a lot, but I think it might stand out better on it own without the chorizo, and then an easy mushroom cream sauce would make a great sauce for it.
 
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