… and these Thy gifts …

Need to use up these things before we leave. I’ll be crossing out as I use them up.

“oriental noodles” (from mommy)
5 century eggs
acorn starch (K)
agar sticks 3
agar strands
baby corn
bean curd sheets
belacan
besan flour
bihon 1/2
black corn
bonito flakes
Botan rice
chee hou sauce
chili powder (K)
chinese green tea 2
coconut shreds (dried, Indian)
dried anchovies
dried kamias
dried lily flowers 2
dried mushrooms 2
dried shrimp (K)
fermented black beans
glutinous rice
glutinous rice flour 3 1/2
green bean starch (K)
idli rava
instant dashi (1/4 packet)
jackfruit
kare-kare mix
konbu 2
large instant tapioca 2
malt powder (K)
mi chay dac biet
mini tapioca 2
misua
mochiko 1/2
palm sugar (T)
panko
pho noodles
pinipig 2
rice flakes large
rice wrappers (V)
sinigang mix
straw mushrooms
sweetened bean paste
tamarind concentrate (T)
tapioca sticks
tofu mix
urad dal 2
wakame
wheat starch
wild rice mix (K)

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Kids, here you go. In a few short months. (Argh, do you see rice?)

Ipercoop: Better practice at Aldi’s now.

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the VP debate!!

Yea!! (Go Bears )

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Heat canola oil in skillet, over high heat. Add minced garlic, minced ginger, sliced onions, and crushed red pepper flakes (or broken up dried Chinese hot pepper). Stir-fry 10 seconds. Add broccoli florets and 1/4 cup water. Cover for 3-5 minutes and cook over medium-high heat, just until broccoli is almost done. Add fish sauce (or soy sauce) and 2 pinches sugar. Stir to combine flavors and remove from heat. Serve immediately.

This is also delicious made with broccoli rabe.

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I can’t remember what cut of beef this was. I just told the farmer I wanted a roast cut and would take whatever he had, and he handed me this — maybe a bottom tip roast, or something. Suffice it to say, any slow-cooking roast will do here. The one I used was wrapped in one of those elastic net thingies that hold the meat in nicely and helps it keep its shape.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees. In a oven-proof pot (I like using enameled cast-iron here), bring meat — and water to cover — to a boil. Immediately transfer to oven, covered, and let simmer all night.

In the morning, turn oven off, remove pot and let cool. When meat is cool enough to handle, lift up from liquid, and transfer to a cutting board. Cut crosswise into 1/2 inch slices. Set aside, tented with foil.

Meanwhile, bring cooking liquid to a boil, along with cut up potatoes (I used small Yukons) and carrots and herbs and aromatics and seasonings you like. I sometimes use thyme, bay leaves, aromatics like celery, onions, plus Worcestershire sauce, etc. Today I just used salt and pepper and a bit of soy sauce, oh and yeah, two dashes Tabasco. Cook ~10 minutes or until potatoes and carrots are just cooked through. Remove with slotted spoon and set aside.

Tomatoes (canned or fresh) and/or some full-bodied red wine are nice additions here, if you like. Continue boiling liquid until reduced a bit, and thicken with a cornstarch-water paste to desired consistency. Return meat and potatoes carefully to gravy to heat through, lowering heat, 5-10 minutes. Transfer to serving platter and garnish with a sprinkling of freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley.

You can also adapt this recipe to a crock-pot/slow-cooker.

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Small Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled, quartered and tossed with extra virgin olive oil and salt and pepper, herbs if you like
Several slices prosciutto di Parma, heated briefly in dry skillet and chopped into pieces
Frico
Romaine lettuce, torn into bite-sized pieces, rinsed and spun dry

Drain potatoes from the olive oil and cook in a pre-heated cast iron pan, covered, 15-20 minutes, turning every 5 minutes or so, until cooked through and nicely browned in places. Set aside.

Make the dressing: whisk together extra virgin olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, herbes de Provence, salt and pepper to taste

Toss everything together and serve.

I wasn’t very happy with how the frico turned out — I had put the baking sheet on the lowest rack because I was cooking a roast on top, and so the sheet was resting on my baking stones. My hips were achy or I would have taken out the roast just to bake the frico, but hey… sometimes you just don’t have what it takes to do what it takes to make everything perfect . They were a bit too overdone on the underside and hence had a bitter taste. Bleh. There’s always a next time. The prosciutto was soooo good though…

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After a quick review of what we’ve been eating the past couple of weeks since Aisa’s party, I decided that we need to add more ORANGES and YELLOWS to our diet. So I bought ~10 pounds of garnet yams to make into SOMETHING.

Somehow, this really wasn’t what I had in mind when I decided we were going to eat healthier around here… but heh… I couldn’t resist.

Spiced Sweet Potato Cake with Brown Sugar Icing recipe at Epicurious

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from an Epicurious recipe (sorry, too tired to look for the link again)

Toast pecans and almonds in 375 degree oven for 10 minutes or so. Let cool and chop.

Meanwhile make Elizabeth Foss’ Favorite Family Granola (I’ve tailored this to our own taste with a few adjustments, but the original is just as wonderful)

While granola is baking/drying/toasting, chop up dates.

Toss granola with pecans, almonds, dates, and dried blueberries. Yum yum!

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This is a nice dinner entree when you forget to take stuff out of the freezer in time, like I did today. [blush]

Put 2 frozen chicken breast halves (leave skin and bone intact)
into a skillet. Pour extra virgin olive oil on top and the juice of 1/2 lemon. Sprinkle with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. Poach over low heat for 30-45 minutes or until just cooked through. Remove from skillet, set aside 5 minutes, then cut into slices down to bone but not all the way through. Believe it or not, this served a family of 5 (dd was in KY practicing with choir), with side dishes!

I was planning to add some white wine or vermouth halfway through cooking, and sprinkle with some freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley before serving, but by then my energy level was down to ZERO, so I served as is, simply topped by the cooking juices. But if you want it fancier looking that’s what I would do.

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Sorry about the fuzzy recipe.

1 scoop dried baby lima beans (I mean the scoop at Whole Foods, which probably came to about 1 1/2 cups)
vegan buttery spread (I used Earth Balance)
soy milk to thin mash to desired consistency
pinch garlic powder or 1 large clove garlic crushed to a paste
salt and pepper to taste

Pick over lima beans to discard ickies. Boil lima beans in water for ~1 1/2 hours, or until tender. Drain and put into food processor bowl along with the rest of the ingredients. Process until smooth to your liking (we like ours with a bit of roughness left). Great side dish!

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1 medium head romaine lettuce, torn into bite-sized pieces, rinsed and spun dry
1/2 English cucumber or any waxless cucumber, deseeded if necessary
4 ribs celery hearts, leaves discarded if you like, sliced thinly (leave unpeeled)

the dressing, whisk all in a bowl:

~1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
juice of 1/2 lemon
4 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
salt and pepper if you like (I didn’t use any)

Toss together and enjoy!

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Boil together in a pot large enough to accommodate a large salmon fillet (this was enough for 6 people):

water (enough to cover salmon when you put it in)
2 bay leaves
a teaspoon or so allspice
a tablespoon or so whole black peppercorns
a tablespoon or so sea salt

When boiling, gently add salmon, cover pot, and turn off heat. Let poach 15-20 minutes.

Drain salmon and set aside on cutting board until cool enough to handle, loosely tented with a piece of foil. Cut/Pull off skin gently.

In a small bowl, mix together

mayonnaise (or Vegenaise if you’re allergic to eggs like my dh is)
Dijon mustard
dried or fresh tarragon
dried or fresh dill
freshly squeezed lemon juice

Serve salmon topped with mayo-mustard sauce.

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It’s not picture perfect, and I wish I could say I grew the basil that went into the pesto, and the tomatoes… but no. It was still perfectly yummy, and what’s important, it’s all mine — well, except for a couple of bites Paco took. My little ones don’t like this particular salad, dad’s allergic to cheese, and Aisa’s sensitive to cheese and didn’t want to try.

The fresh buffalo mozzarella is from EuroPomella Italy, imported by Mozzarella Fresca in California, and locally available at Jungle Jim’s.

I made a batch of pesto, so I’ll be having the rest of that maybe with some penne, chopped up tomato and chopped up rest-of-the-mozzarella tonight. Yum. The baby should like it

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We got the remnants of Hurricane Ike 2 weekends ago — strong winds (strong enough to break in half our basketball pole, luckily no one was hurt) but no rain. We didn’t have power for 24 hours. Luckily we just had Aisa’s grad party that Saturday, and on Sunday when we lost power we had gas (fortunately we had the foresight to switch the stove to gas when we moved here — it’s good to have two sources of fuel) and the grills. And 10+ bags of premade pizza dough from the party (we made almost ALL the dough recipes from Peter Reinhart’s American Pie).

These were Neapolitan dough, I believe, but I grilled them on the gas Weber outside. Topped with my favorite toppings (sopressata — just the smell of this brings me back to Italy, mix of mozzarella-asiago-provolone, crushed tomato sauce, and sliced onions)… you know it’s good when your 9-yo proclaims it “better than Pizza Hut!” You bet.

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Cut eggplant into strips (about 3 1/2 inches x 1/2 inch).

Heat canola oil in a wok over high heat. Add minced garlic and onions (sliced lengthwise) and stir-fry 30 seconds. Add eggplant slices and let sit 4 minutes or so, turning after 2 minutes, until blistered and brown in spots.

Add coconut milk, chili paste, fish sauce to taste and palm sugar (or brown sugar if you don’t have palm). Cover and braise over medium heat until eggplant is tender. Return to high heat, add scallions cut into 1-inch pieces, stir-fry 30 seconds, and serve hot.

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