Food and Drink

How Alaska eats: Ideas to put a springtime shine on weeknight dinner

Newsletter #35: Nugg life

Valentine’s Day is officially when I start to feel a little bit of spring optimism coming on. The pace of things for the kids starts to pick up just a little. There are sports practices and birthday parties and reports on the life cycles of penguins due. I’m ready to wear regular shoes instead of boots and mix up my weeknight dinner routine.

Let me suggest you put these lemon-Parm chicken cutlets in next week’s rotation. They are just enough like big chicken nuggets to keep the kids happy, while also still feeling like a grown-up dinner. Other recipes that might mix up your weeknight mojo: Kim Sunée’s coconut curry chicken and Maya Wilson’s quick tortellini soup.

If you are feeling ambitious (actually, this recipe is pretty dang easy), you might get a kick out of making a key lime pie. You can find key limes in grocery stores now. I will say, though, that I bought a bag last weekend, squeezed almost every one and only ended up with 1/4 cup of juice, so you might take advice from online test kitchen cooks and buy Nellie and Joe’s Key West Lime juice instead. That will make pie assembly a breeze. Just give yourself enough time to let it chill. (My last-weekend pie below.)

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In other food news: Did you hear that Alaska chef and “Top Chef” veteran Laura Cole is heading to Muse at the Anchorage Museum? I can’t wait to see that menu.

[Read previous newsletters here. Find more Alaska recipes here.]

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Finally, I just got done eating a halibut sandwich at The White Spot Cafe and it was like a perfect soaring aria, if an aria could be deep-fried and slathered in tartar sauce. Is there a better halibut sandwich out there? (Email me, I want to know.) And, if you don’t already, support local cooking and local news and subscribe to the paper.

Here’s hoping you halibut is crispy and your pie sets up just right.

RECIPE: LEMON PARMESAN CHICKEN CUTLETS

Julia O'Malley

Anchorage-based Julia O'Malley is a former ADN reporter, columnist and editor. She received a James Beard national food writing award in 2018, and a collection of her work, "The Whale and the Cupcake: Stories of Subsistence, Longing, and Community in Alaska," was published in 2019. She's currently writer in residence at the Anchorage Museum.

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