Fresh-caught blue fish baked with red potatoes, eaten with spinach-walnut pesto. Sautéed kale.

My mother’s neighbor went fishing yesterday and, upon his return, gave her a giant fillet of striped bass, which we ate yesterday, and a rather large fillet of blue fish, which she gave me and I cooked tonight.

“Tuscan Steak with Rosemary White Bean Mash” from French Revolution Food. “Sautéed Greens with Pine Nuts and Raisins” from Simply Recipes.

Dinner tonight was one of those monumentally good meals that I think about later and the next day (and the next). It was the holy trinity of weeknight dinners: quick, easy, satisfying. And while I’m no nutritionist, I think it was relatively healthy. But mostly, it tasted super good. There was something utterly perfect-tasting about the filet mignon but adding a smear of white beans to every bite was like icing on cake. The greens were good — I’d certainly make them again — but they were upstaged by the meat and beans. Those beans: I’m already thinking of the next time I’ll make them.

Homemade gnocchi with kale and mozzarella.

Stuff that gets covered in cheese and baked usually isn’t much to look at but is often really comforting and satisfying to eat; dinner tonight is no exception to that.

The gnocchi was made from scratch, which was an interesting experience considering that my experiences with it span the grocery store aisle and not the lovingly-made-by-Italian-grandmother spectrum. How these would compare to Real Gnocchi, I couldn’t tell you. But for what it’s worth, they weren’t particularly gummy nor were they very heavy. They were maybe a little bloated-looking and a few of them fell apart in the last batch that got boiled. And they tasted pretty good.

Ribollita soup with grilled cheese.

I had completely different plans for dinner tonight, although I did too have plans to make this soup today and freeze it. But when I ran out of containers to put soup in (and I didn’t really feel like making dinner), it soon became apparent that it would be a soup and sandwich night.