For Saint Patrick's Day breakfast we had Lucky Charms, of course. A venerable Irish tradition if there ever was one.
And let's be honest, the dinner I'm cooking now is just barely more Irish than that. But we're barely more Irish than this dinner anyway, if I remember right, so this seems about right:
roasted potatoes with garlic, rosemary, and oregano
Glynne's cabbage salad recipe, minus the daikon because I forgot to buy it
southwest-y falafel with Irish cheddar on top
So that's my tribute to St. Pat.
May the road rise up to meet you and the wind be always at your back. :)
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
New Foods! Yay! At Long Last!
Okay, most of these new foods are from Target, but I can't help it if they make interesting food.
1. Basil noodles (I think it was linguine) from Target--these were pretty fun. They definitely taste basil-y, and they're also a nice green. I think we had them with a mediterranean stew, which was nice. I think they'd be good with all sorts of Italian sauces.
2. Chili noodles from Target--I used these with a peanut sauce, which was probably not ideal but it went fine. These have some heat but not a ton of flavor. They're interesting but I'm not sure what to really use them with.
3. Archer Farms Roasted Tomato and Chipotle salsa--I like this a lot. It might be my new favorite salsa, sweet and not-too-spicy with a nice roasted flavor. And I'm partial to smaller salsa chunks rather than big, so these are a good size for me.
4. Archer Farms Traditional Picante Style salsa--also a good one, mild with a good flavor. Who'd have thought that out of all the fancy brands I've tried I'd settle on plain old Target salsa?
5. Denmark's Finest havarti (finally something not from Target)--our store has plain (nice and rich), caraway, and jalapeno. Plus I think they make the dill flavor I tried a while back, which was nice but a little too dill-y for me. I was worried the caraway would be overpowering but it was really nice, and a totally new flavor with cheese for me. The jalapeno is Denmark's answer to pepper jack, I guess, and I think I actually prefer it to pepper jack. It's got a nice kick to it which blends nicely with the richness of the havarti. I highly recommend both the jalapeno and the caraway.
1. Basil noodles (I think it was linguine) from Target--these were pretty fun. They definitely taste basil-y, and they're also a nice green. I think we had them with a mediterranean stew, which was nice. I think they'd be good with all sorts of Italian sauces.
2. Chili noodles from Target--I used these with a peanut sauce, which was probably not ideal but it went fine. These have some heat but not a ton of flavor. They're interesting but I'm not sure what to really use them with.
3. Archer Farms Roasted Tomato and Chipotle salsa--I like this a lot. It might be my new favorite salsa, sweet and not-too-spicy with a nice roasted flavor. And I'm partial to smaller salsa chunks rather than big, so these are a good size for me.
4. Archer Farms Traditional Picante Style salsa--also a good one, mild with a good flavor. Who'd have thought that out of all the fancy brands I've tried I'd settle on plain old Target salsa?
5. Denmark's Finest havarti (finally something not from Target)--our store has plain (nice and rich), caraway, and jalapeno. Plus I think they make the dill flavor I tried a while back, which was nice but a little too dill-y for me. I was worried the caraway would be overpowering but it was really nice, and a totally new flavor with cheese for me. The jalapeno is Denmark's answer to pepper jack, I guess, and I think I actually prefer it to pepper jack. It's got a nice kick to it which blends nicely with the richness of the havarti. I highly recommend both the jalapeno and the caraway.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
East Meets West, Rice Style
So we tried Glynne's omuraisu a while back and despite my sub-standard omelette skills it turned out pretty well and we all really liked it.
Fast forward a couple weeks and I'm getting ready to make barbecue rice, which is pretty much southwest-style fried rice. It's got corn, kidney beans, onions, bell peppers, and (of course) barbecue sauce.
And I realize I could totally combine these two recipes, so I did. So I made barbecue rice without the kidney beans and shredded some colby-jack onto it, then I topped it with omelettes. I'm still a fairly crappy omeletteer, but it turned out pretty tasty anyway.
Fast forward a couple weeks and I'm getting ready to make barbecue rice, which is pretty much southwest-style fried rice. It's got corn, kidney beans, onions, bell peppers, and (of course) barbecue sauce.
And I realize I could totally combine these two recipes, so I did. So I made barbecue rice without the kidney beans and shredded some colby-jack onto it, then I topped it with omelettes. I'm still a fairly crappy omeletteer, but it turned out pretty tasty anyway.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Avocado-blueberry-grapefruit salad
We had some people over tonight, and I wanted something to serve with the taco soup, so I kind of made up this recipe based on what I felt like eating. I surfed some recipe sites for ideas, and that's where I got the grapefruit, but the rest was me. I'm kind of proud of it: people had seconds and thirds.
Ingredients:
2 pink grapefruit
2 large avocados
1/2 large red onion, or 1 small red onion
4 red radishes
1 cup or so fresh blueberries
vinaigrette dressing
1. Chop the onion fairly fine.
2. Slice the radishes paper-thin with a mandolin.
3. Cut open the grapefruit and cut out the insides. Dice.
4. Cut open the avocados, scoop out the insides. Dice.
5. Mix onion, radish, grapefruit, avocado, and blueberries in a bowl.
6. Drizzle vinaigrette over, mix.
7. Chill for an hour or so.
The vinaigrette I used was Brianna's Champagne Caper Vinaigrette, which is kind of creamy with a hint of grapey sweetness and a touch of salty-sour caper. It was perfect, but I'd be curious to know if a regular vinaigrette would work too.
This made enough for five adults, with some left over for tomorrow. Obviously, you could halve this recipe for a smaller group.
Ingredients:
2 pink grapefruit
2 large avocados
1/2 large red onion, or 1 small red onion
4 red radishes
1 cup or so fresh blueberries
vinaigrette dressing
1. Chop the onion fairly fine.
2. Slice the radishes paper-thin with a mandolin.
3. Cut open the grapefruit and cut out the insides. Dice.
4. Cut open the avocados, scoop out the insides. Dice.
5. Mix onion, radish, grapefruit, avocado, and blueberries in a bowl.
6. Drizzle vinaigrette over, mix.
7. Chill for an hour or so.
The vinaigrette I used was Brianna's Champagne Caper Vinaigrette, which is kind of creamy with a hint of grapey sweetness and a touch of salty-sour caper. It was perfect, but I'd be curious to know if a regular vinaigrette would work too.
This made enough for five adults, with some left over for tomorrow. Obviously, you could halve this recipe for a smaller group.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Lemon Rice
This is probably my favorite recipe that I make. It also has a nice little story to it:
The story-
In our ward in India, there was a family names the Katukas. They were from Andhra Pradesh, in the south, and sister Katuka made fantastically delicious south Indian food. The best was her lemon rice. It was bright yellow, just spicy enough, flavorful, fragrant, and AWESOME. I drooled over it for years and my last summer in India, I finally learned how to make it. The Katukas had us over for dinner and sister Katuka ushered me into her tiny kitchen and taught me the magic of lemon rice as I frantically took notes. So here it is!
Lemon Rice
what you need:
-3 or 4 cups of cooked Basmati/Jasmine rice. It's especially good if it is a day old. You can use other types of rice but it is best when the rice isn't sticky.
-1 tbs black mustard seeds
-1/2 tbs cumin seeds
-2 green chilies, slit in half or chopped. If they are halves, they are pretty easy to take out if that's what ya want (2 chilies or to taste. This can totally be omitted and spice lovers can add cayenne or chile flakes to their portion)
-4 or 5 sprigs of curry leaves, stems removed
-1 lemon, halved and with as many seeds as you can get at removed
-1/2 cup raw peanuts
-2" chunk of ginger, grated. (use a box grater, it's super fast and easy. Just don't grate your fingies)
-3 tbs cooking oil
Optional but encourages for added yumminess and effect:
-1/4 cup masoor dal (if you put this in a mug and then pour REALLY hot water over it and let it sit for about 5 min it will be the perfect tenderness for this. Just drain the water out)
-a generous pinch of ground turmeric
What to do:
1. Heat the oil over medium heat in a large enough frying pan to accomodate everything.
2. Add your cumin and mustard seeds and leave them alone until they start "sputtering," they will pop a little and start smelling delicious.
3. Add your peanuts, curry leaves, chilies, and ginger and cook until the peanuts start getting a little translucent. Mush them a little to break some of them in half. Keep a close eye on your chilies and your curry leaves to make sure they aren't burning. You can turn the heat down as needed. ***frying chilies can hurt your nose, lungs, eyes etc. this recipe has gotten me a few times.
4. Add the rice and masoor dal and mix all the ingrdients thoroughly over low heat. Add the turmeric at this point if you are going to. Turn of the heat and squeeze the lemon juice over the rice, mixing it thoroughly. Serve!
The story-
In our ward in India, there was a family names the Katukas. They were from Andhra Pradesh, in the south, and sister Katuka made fantastically delicious south Indian food. The best was her lemon rice. It was bright yellow, just spicy enough, flavorful, fragrant, and AWESOME. I drooled over it for years and my last summer in India, I finally learned how to make it. The Katukas had us over for dinner and sister Katuka ushered me into her tiny kitchen and taught me the magic of lemon rice as I frantically took notes. So here it is!
Lemon Rice
what you need:
-3 or 4 cups of cooked Basmati/Jasmine rice. It's especially good if it is a day old. You can use other types of rice but it is best when the rice isn't sticky.
-1 tbs black mustard seeds
-1/2 tbs cumin seeds
-2 green chilies, slit in half or chopped. If they are halves, they are pretty easy to take out if that's what ya want (2 chilies or to taste. This can totally be omitted and spice lovers can add cayenne or chile flakes to their portion)
-4 or 5 sprigs of curry leaves, stems removed
-1 lemon, halved and with as many seeds as you can get at removed
-1/2 cup raw peanuts
-2" chunk of ginger, grated. (use a box grater, it's super fast and easy. Just don't grate your fingies)
-3 tbs cooking oil
Optional but encourages for added yumminess and effect:
-1/4 cup masoor dal (if you put this in a mug and then pour REALLY hot water over it and let it sit for about 5 min it will be the perfect tenderness for this. Just drain the water out)
-a generous pinch of ground turmeric
What to do:
1. Heat the oil over medium heat in a large enough frying pan to accomodate everything.
2. Add your cumin and mustard seeds and leave them alone until they start "sputtering," they will pop a little and start smelling delicious.
3. Add your peanuts, curry leaves, chilies, and ginger and cook until the peanuts start getting a little translucent. Mush them a little to break some of them in half. Keep a close eye on your chilies and your curry leaves to make sure they aren't burning. You can turn the heat down as needed. ***frying chilies can hurt your nose, lungs, eyes etc. this recipe has gotten me a few times.
4. Add the rice and masoor dal and mix all the ingrdients thoroughly over low heat. Add the turmeric at this point if you are going to. Turn of the heat and squeeze the lemon juice over the rice, mixing it thoroughly. Serve!
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Cry for Help: Curry Leaves
So I was reorganizing my spice cupboard, which had become woefully un-alphabetic, and was reminded that I bought curry leaves (dried, obviously) before Christmas and haven't used them. I remember Taryn once gave me a recipe for scrambled eggs with curry leaves, I think, so this question is mostly for her probably, but if anyone has favorite ideas for them I'd love to hear them before I use my expensive curry leaves. Thanks, yay!!
Omuraisu
I feel like we may have posted something about this before, but I can't find it, so sorry if it's a repeat.
This is something we like to do when we have rice left over in the rice cooker from the night before. If your rice cooker has a keep-warm feature, and you leave rice in it overnight or longer, it gets a little dry, and that's the perfect time to make fried rice dishes.
Ingredients:
cooked white rice, a couple of cups or so worth
6 eggs
grated parmesan cheese
shredded mozzarella cheese
ketchup
pepper
vegetable oil
milk
1. Heat some oil in a wok. Toss in the rice and stir fry it. Season it with a couple of squirts of ketchup and some ground pepper. Sprinkle some parm over it while you're stir-frying.
2. When the whole thing is a nice pink color and smelling good, transfer to dishes. This recipe makes enough to two people. Make a nice mound of rice in the middle of each plate. Sprinkle shredded mozzarella over the top. It should have almost entirely melted by the time you're done with the next steps; you can cover the dish with a plate to make sure it melts, if you want.
3. Mix the eggs together in a bowl with a little milk.
4. Heat more oil in a frying pan and pour the eggs in. The idea here is to make a really light fluffy omelette (omuraisu=omelette over rice). While the eggs are frying, keep whipping them in the pan with a pair of chopsticks or something to keep them frothy. When the omelette has solidified enough on the bottom, roll it up in the pan with a spatula.
5. Cut the omelette in half with the spatula and place each half on top of a mound of rice.
6. Here's the cool part. If the omelette has come out right, you can now take a sharp knife and cut it lengthwise and unfold it so that it covers the mound of rice, and the inside should still be runny/fluffy enough to turn into a steamy mess on top of the rice. Top with ketchup. Voila: you're done.
You don't normally associate ketchup with Japanese cooking, but this is a standard recipe in Japan. It even comes up in one of my favorite Japanese movies, Tampopo. Enjoy the scene here.
This is something we like to do when we have rice left over in the rice cooker from the night before. If your rice cooker has a keep-warm feature, and you leave rice in it overnight or longer, it gets a little dry, and that's the perfect time to make fried rice dishes.
Ingredients:
cooked white rice, a couple of cups or so worth
6 eggs
grated parmesan cheese
shredded mozzarella cheese
ketchup
pepper
vegetable oil
milk
1. Heat some oil in a wok. Toss in the rice and stir fry it. Season it with a couple of squirts of ketchup and some ground pepper. Sprinkle some parm over it while you're stir-frying.
2. When the whole thing is a nice pink color and smelling good, transfer to dishes. This recipe makes enough to two people. Make a nice mound of rice in the middle of each plate. Sprinkle shredded mozzarella over the top. It should have almost entirely melted by the time you're done with the next steps; you can cover the dish with a plate to make sure it melts, if you want.
3. Mix the eggs together in a bowl with a little milk.
4. Heat more oil in a frying pan and pour the eggs in. The idea here is to make a really light fluffy omelette (omuraisu=omelette over rice). While the eggs are frying, keep whipping them in the pan with a pair of chopsticks or something to keep them frothy. When the omelette has solidified enough on the bottom, roll it up in the pan with a spatula.
5. Cut the omelette in half with the spatula and place each half on top of a mound of rice.
6. Here's the cool part. If the omelette has come out right, you can now take a sharp knife and cut it lengthwise and unfold it so that it covers the mound of rice, and the inside should still be runny/fluffy enough to turn into a steamy mess on top of the rice. Top with ketchup. Voila: you're done.
You don't normally associate ketchup with Japanese cooking, but this is a standard recipe in Japan. It even comes up in one of my favorite Japanese movies, Tampopo. Enjoy the scene here.
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