What We Ate For Supper

Homemade Sausage and Mushroom Pizza

2010-08-19T18:51:00.000-07:00

Now that we're living up in Putnam Valley, we found that we don't eat out much. I was really craving pizza tonight but most of the recipes for pizza dough require it to sit overnight. I found a recipe on epicurious.com that only requires an hour to sit before baking.

I used some leftover chicken & apple sausage and mushrooms for the topping. For the sauce, I used a 28oz can of whole plum tomatoes and I winged it with the ingredients...we had some fresh basil from our CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) and it smelled so incredibly good.

We still have a ton of basil so we may have to make some pesto soon.

A Catch Up Post (Sunday, August, 2010)

2010-08-08T15:00:00.000-07:00

After going on vacation in June and moving an hour north of New York City while renovating our apartment, we've been a bit distracted lately. Here's a little catch up post of food we've been cooking for the past month.

Great Pickles

Ground beef with Turkish seasonings on skewers

Kimchi hotdogs

Endive with fig, goat cheese and pecans with a reduced balsamic sauce

Vietnamese summer rolls

Lamb Chops from our CSA

Thomas Keller's Fried Chicken

Swiss chard

Tamales: pork and mushroom

Homemade chocolate cake with homemade mint chocolate chip ice cream for Ethan's birthday

Jasper White's Lobster Corn Chowder

Returning Home to NYC (June 17, 2010)

2010-07-17T21:17:00.000-07:00

Leaving for our flight back to NYC. Eating at the airport in Munich:

Pisa and back to Florence (June 16, 2010)

2010-07-17T21:12:00.000-07:00

In Pisa...this tomato was amazing!

Out last meal in Florence we ate at Trattoria Enzo e Piero. It was a lucky choice... we just had a few hours to spend between train rides and Ethan spotted this place not too far from the train station. It was on a less-travelled street and he thought the menu looked promising (not too many choices, focused on Florentine specialities). The restaurant was booked up and we didn't have a reservation, but they seated us with our promise that we could be done by 9pm.

I had this lovely ravioli

We shared green beans

and very tasty potatoes

and Ethan had a classic Florentine tripe dish:

For dessert we had tiramisu:

The food & restaurant was wonderful. Ethan also was able to help a waitress explain what squab was (finally resorting to saying, "You know... the birds that are in the piazza," to the waitress's horror) to a very pleasant Norwegian couple.

Cinque Terre, Day 2 (June 15, 2010)

2010-07-17T20:58:00.000-07:00

We were using Rick Steves's travel books throughout Italy. One of the recommendations was to go to the Cannoli Brother's for breakfast. The pasties were so good we made dinner reservations for that evening. It was our last night in Cinque Terre.

Eating in Corniglia after a hike from Vernazza.

Cinque Terre, Day 1 (June 14, 2010)

2010-07-17T20:34:00.000-07:00

Cinque Terre - Vernazza
Our first lunch in Vernazza...the pizza was just okay. I ordered the pizza with pesto, because apparently, pesto was invented here. It wasn't so great.

I was very excited about this gelato!

Tuscany, Day 3 (June 13, 2010)

2010-07-17T20:23:00.000-07:00

Lunch of Salami, fruit, tomatoes and bread

We ate at this restaurant every night while we were in Tuscany. It was in Turbone the next town from our B&B.

Tuscany, Day 2 (Saturday June 12, 2010)

2010-07-11T17:19:00.000-07:00

We loved the Osteria we ate at the night before, that we went back for seconds tonight.

We had melon, prosciutto, and sundried tomatoes as antipasti.

The waiter suggested a beef dish... we opted not to get it, but then he brought it anyway. It was great!

And Janet and I decided that the boar pasta I had the night before was a winner, so we both ordered it again.

Tuscany (Friday, June 11, 2010)

2010-07-10T18:07:00.000-07:00

We decided to cut our time in Florence a little short so we could spend a few extra nights in Tuscany. The apartment we rented in Florence was a bit of a disappointment and between Venice and Florence, I still haven't been had much of an escape from city life so I'm so glad we escaped to Tuscany. I was finally able to unwind. Our friends Briana and Dhruv, who are living in London right now, met up with us in Tuscany.

By the time we got to the countryside it was their "siesta" time and all the restaurants were closed. We drove for almost an hour in circles trying to follow signs for the grocery store but never found it. Luckily, I'm a food hoarder and we has some decent snacks.

We stayed at the B&B called I Melograni. The owners were so friendly and really helpful with directions and suggestions of things to do in the area. Briana and her family rented the connecting villa a couple years ago and they remembered a B&B on the opposite end of the villa. Maybe next time we can rent the villa.

Dhruv and Janet - what a beautiful view behind us! I was particularly impressed with our choice of color.

Since Dhruv and Briana stayed here a couple years ago, Dhruv wanted to go back to a restaurant he remembered. I think it was called "Grandpa's" in Turbone. The food was so good we ate there the three nights we stayed in Tuscany. The waiter was a lot of fun and didn't speak a word of English. These photos are a bit blurred since I took them after a bit of wine.

I believe this is the name of the restuarant

Pasta with boar meat

Gnocchi with butter and basil

Osso Buco with the best tasting peas ever!

Pork

Cannellini Beans

Panna Cotta with berries

Third day in Florence (Thursday June 10, 2010)

2010-06-30T19:23:00.000-07:00

We continued our gelato taste-tour with a couple of cones for Gelateria de Neri, which was around the corner from our apartment. It was excellent! The gelateria is run by the same folks who own Vivoli--the place I used to go to when I lived in Florence.

We had doner kebabs for a late lunch.

For dinner we met up with my Florentine friends Ilaria and Maurizio at a nice little restaurant in their neighborhood. We started the meal with prosecco. Janet and I shared a fungi pasta.

Followed by beef that was slowly simmered in wine & black peppercorns.

For dessert we split a slice of millefoglie cake. Yum!

Second Day in Florence (Wednesday, June 9, 2010)

2010-06-25T19:21:00.000-07:00

On our second day in Florence we visited the wonderful Mercato Centrale. It's full of little stalls selling veggies, fruits, meats, cheeses, etc.

dried mushrooms

veggies

We picked up the ingredients so that we could have spaghetti alla carbonara for lunch.

slicing pancetta

Our apartment's kitchen

Tomatoes with lunch

We had one of the bottles of wine we purchased the day before at La Buca del Vino. It was great!

For dinner we went to a little trattoria around the corner.

We started with chicken liver crostini

We shared a pasta (perhaps alla bolognese?)

Janet ordered chicken hoping it would be a good as the one I got in Munich (it wasn't)

I had some roast beef

The dinner was certainly solidly acceptable, but not amazing. As we left the restaurant at the end of dinner we realized that we had been segregated into a back room for Americans... The front room was all Italians.

First Day in Florence (Tuesday, June 8, 2010)

2010-06-25T18:05:00.000-07:00

Breakfast at the hotel in Venice:

We're taking the afternoon train from Venice to Florence today. Until then, we wandered the streets of Venice until it was time to go. We walked to the Rialto Bridge, then the outdoor produce and fish market.

We arrived in Florence with enough time to check into our apartment and wander across the Ponte Vecchio and over to a restaurant Ethan used to go to (La Mangiatoia) when he lived in Florence. While we were waiting for the restaurant to open we ran into a tiny little wine shop (La Buca Del Vino) that served wine bulk. You can bring your own bottle (or buy a bottle there) and they'll fill it up. It was the coolest place ever. The woman working there let us try every type of wine she had and we bought two bottles for 6 euros - what a deal.

Here's our dinner:

Gnocchi with pesto

The Discovery of Spaghetti with Clams (Monday, June 7, 2010)

2010-06-25T16:15:00.000-07:00

Breakfast at the hotel. We stayed at the Ai Du Principi hotel and I was really happy with it. The rooms were nice and the hotel, was perfectly located just far enough away from the crowds. If we go to Venice again, I'd probably stay here again.

We decided to go to Murano (glass) and Burano (lace) instead of spending another day in Venice. Yesterday was a bit too crowded, hot and humid, so taking a day trip to Murano and Burano was a good decision. For lunch, we ate at one of Rick Steve's recommendations and is where I ate the most amazing spaghetti with clams. I never order this in the states b/c I never know if I'm getting canned clams or not, but this was truly amazing! We shared the first dish of different types of seafood and for the second course, Ethan ordered a pasta with tomato sauce.

After lunch, we went to a glass making factory to watch them blow glass into vases.

We walked around a bit then caught the vaporetto to Burano. Burano really stood out from Venice and Murano because of all colorful buildings.

In Burano, we stopped to enjoy some wine and an appetizer.

This photo looks pretty gross, but it cracks me up.

My lunch was so good Ethan and I ordered it again for dinner in Venice. It tasted better in Murano, but still really good. Dinner was at Al Giardinetto da Severino.

Tiramisu

First night in Venice (Sunday June 6, 2010)

2010-06-25T15:36:00.000-07:00

We arrived in Venice pretty early in the morning on a Sunday so there wasn't much open yet, but it was great walking around before the rush of tourists flocked the city.

Cafe Latte and Crescent

Pizza with mushrooms and Pizza with anchovy, olives and capers.

Here are just a few photos of Venice:

In St. Mark's Cathedral

Peggy Guggenheim Museum

Here's my first of many, many gelatos to come. My favorite flavor was Stracciatella (vanilla with chocolate chips):

For Dinner I ordered pasta with a spicy tomato sauce and Ethan order the pasta with black squid ink. For our second course we both ordered the Venetian specialty of dried cod with polenta.

Espresso and Cafe Latte

I was told drinking coffee with milk after breakfast was a big no-no in Italy, unless you're American. So I ordered my cafe latte with pride.

Gelato, Gelato, Gelato! This was was vanilla with cherry I think

Munich's English Garden (Saturday June 5, 2010)

2010-06-25T14:48:00.000-07:00

We had lunch in the English Garden at the Chinese Tower.

Ethan and Pyul ate the roasted chicken - the BEST Roasted Chicken EVER!

I ordered the fried pork cutlet with fries and a giant pretzel. Pyul and Ethan chose the right thing. Oliver ate a couple different types of sausages.

The craziest thing happened while we were eating lunch. I just happened to look up and saw my cousin Dave who I haven't seen in nearly 10 years! He's working in Austria and happened to come into Munich for the day to run some errands - what a small world!

In the afternoon, we relaxed at an outdoor bar and enjoyed the most amazing drink - rhubarb beer. My favorite in Munich was Radler (lemonade and beer), but the rhubarb beer was so good. We'll have to see if we can replicate this at home. Pyul's been raving about this dessert that we just had to try and it was really good. It's like chunks of pancake with apples and and raisins - delicious! I couldn't stop eating it! I can't remember what it's called.

Later this evening we took an overnight train from Munich to Venice. We had a first class sleeper car and it was surprisingly comfy. It was nice that we had our own toilet and shower and it worked out perfectly.

Before we caught the train we picked up some snacks at the grocery store - cheese, prosciutto, bread and wine.

It was pretty late, but I was craving a little snack so we ordered curry wurst (it was so good yesterday), sausage with ketchup and curry powder, and a salad.

Next stop, Venice!

Dinner at Broeding in Munich (Friday June 4, 2010)

2010-06-19T04:59:00.000-07:00

Janet and I have lot's of catching up on our meals during our trip to Europe! For our second breakfast in Munich, our friend Pyul took us to Victorian House where we had scones, jam, and clotted cream. Yum!

A bit later in the day we stopped at a lovely beer garden for a pick-me-up beer. The pretzels were fine, but not nearly as good as the ones we had the night before.

After fortifying us with beer, Pyul took us to get currywurst. Her favorite currywurst place wasn't open, but this restaurant's offerings were fine by me! The dish consists of chopped up frankfurters, fries, curry ketchup, a sprinkling of curry powder. We ordered another plate of it after finishing this one.

We stopped for a coffee and a sweet. I had some marzipan cookies and we each had a little white chocolate confection topped with candied rose petals.

And for dinner we had an amazing meal at Broeding. There's a nice write-up about the restaurant in the New York Times. There is a single choice each night, so whatever the chef is serving is what one orders (with an option of adding a cheese course).

Couscous salad with fish

Scallops with wonderfully buttery kohlrabi and an arugula salad

Soup with sliced speck

Janet liked the tuna, even though she usually isn't a fan.

Super-tasty lamb with white asparagus.

It was asparagus season in Bavaria and we saw huge mounds of it being sold on the street:

Back to the meal at Broeding:

Can't remember what this was, but it was sweet and came with melon. On the melon was strands of what looked like saffron, but I think it must've been something else because there wasn't a saffron taste.

Mascarpone mousse

I also had the cheese course... Whereas the preceding meal was amazing, the cheese was unremarkable. It was a slice of reasonably decent brie--I had been hoping for the cheese to be a revelation rather than something I can get at most American supermarkets.

Hallo Munich! (Thursday, June 3, 2010)

2010-06-06T15:09:00.000-07:00

Our first day in Munich and we couldn’t have been more welcomed here by our friends Pyul and Oliver. They moved here last July from New York and it was a great chance to see them and spend time in their new city. If you think I like to eat, oh man, you haven’t met my friend Pyul. This girl is about a tiny as my pinky and she can eat like two grown football players. It brings me such joy to eat with her. If I did this every day, I think my stomach would explode.

Here’s how the day looked: We arrived in Munich and Pyul picked us up when we landed at 8am and we went straight to a restaurant for breakfast. This place supposedly has amazing Mississippi Mud pie, but they didn’t have it ready for breakfast…darn! Ethan and I ordered the two eggs, potatoes and bacon. Pyul ordered french toast. Pyul, if you’re reading this, I’ll need your help on the restaurant names.

We had dinner at a traditional Bavarian restaurant and had enormous amounts of food. It’s white asparagus season right now so we had to order a side of this. Not only is it gorgeous, it was so great with the hollandaise sauce and butter.

The pretzel was NOT just an average little pretzel. It was so beautifully perfect - it was what you would hope a pretzel would taste like…THEN add this completely addictive mustard to each bite of your pretzel…what a great way to get you ready for the rest of your meal. We had a total feast – take a look:

Sweet Mustard

White Asparagus

Roasted Pork belly, and another part of the pork with bread dumplings

Gigantic Pork Ribs, uncooked pickled cabbage (tasted a lot like sauerkraut)

This is Pyul's dish of more roasted pork - different from my dish but I can't remember what cut of the meat she ordered.

En Route to Munich (Wednesday, June 2, 2010)

2010-06-06T14:55:00.000-07:00

It was a good thing I took the day off today since we spent a good part of this morning moving the rest of our kitchen items into our bedroom in preparation for the demolition. Our friend’s Nami and Jonathan had their second baby, Yuto, on Tuesday so we finished up as quickly as possible to get a glimpse of this bundle of joy before flying out. What a gorgeous baby!

We flew on Luftansa and had a pretty easy and unadventurous flight to Munich – that’s always a good sign. My pasta wasn't so bad for airplane food. I ate the pasta and Ethan ate the chicken and mashed potatoes.

Spam and Ban Chan (Tuesday, June 1, 2010)

2010-06-06T14:51:00.000-07:00

Today is the day before our two week vacation to Munich and Italy, and we had to clear out our kitchen since we’re having a wall taken out while we’re gone. Notice we are using paper plates and plastic utensils. Without getting more groceries, we ate kimchi, Korean style spinach, spam, and rice.

Leftovers (Monday, May 31, 2010)

2010-06-06T14:50:00.000-07:00

I had leftovers and Ethan dropped off our cat Nelly with a friend who is watching her while we're on vacation.

Bi Bim Naengmyeon (Sunday, May 30, 2010)

2010-06-06T14:47:00.000-07:00

I made Bi Bim Naengmyeon for dinner tonight. It's using soba noodles, and a gochujang sauce. I also used cucumbers, Korean pear and 2 hard boiled eggs. Ethan made this last month.

Applewood (Saturday, May 29, 2010)

2010-06-06T14:36:00.000-07:00

We ate out at a restaurant called Applewood in Brooklyn. Check out my posting on the Out to Eat Blog.

Soon Dubu Jjigae (Friday May 28, 2010)

2010-05-28T18:40:00.000-07:00

I'm feeling a bit sick... so I made spicy tofu & seafood soup.

It was a much better batch than my last one. I think I've figured out how to make this one!

Spam & Kimchi (Thursday May 27, 2010)

2010-05-28T18:37:00.000-07:00

We had leftover rice salad with kimchi and spam. Yum!

Rice Salad (Wednesday, May 26, 2010)

2010-05-26T18:20:00.000-07:00

Great for a very hot and humid day. Ethan used basmati rice and added feta cheese and capers in case you can't see from the photos.

This was a great wine with a cost of around $13

Shin Ramen and Leftover Spaghetti (Tuesday, May 25, 2010)

2010-05-25T20:25:00.000-07:00

I went for a run after work today so I didn't get home until after 8pm and Ethan spent the day at a conference called Games for Change. Dinner was a bit of an afterthought tonight.

I made shin ramen for dinner and Ethan had leftover spaghetti and meatballs.

Piper's Kilt (Monday, May 24, 2010)

2010-05-25T20:20:00.000-07:00

We ate bacon cheeseburger's for dinner tonight. For dessert we picked up ice cream from the neighborhood bodega. I picked up my favorite Ben & Jerry's AmeriCone Dream and Ethan tried a new Haagan Daz flavor, Bananas Foster.

Spaghetti and Meatballs (Sunday, May 23, 2010)

2010-05-25T20:16:00.000-07:00

Luckily we didn't hit too much traffic heading back home so we had a little time to stop at the Whole Foods in Edge Water, NJ. We picked up some ingredients to make dinner at home.

The sausage meatballs were baked in the oven

Broccoli with garlic

Sea Scallop Salad (Saturday, May 22, 2010)

2010-05-25T20:07:00.000-07:00

We started off the evening with appetizers of cheese, bread, hummus, tzatziki, cherries, and olives - what a beautiful variety of food. The bread was from Atwater's in Belvedere Square near Mary Lou's (Ethan's mom and my mother-in-law).

For dinner we had a seared sea scallop salad with bacon, avocado, cherry tomatoes and a mustard vinaigrette.

For dessert we had fresh coconut. I saw some fresh coconut in the grocery store months ago and we thought it would be fun to drink the juice au naturel. Little did I know that it's a complete pain to break the coconut apart without making a complete mess. This time, Ethan bought a green coconut, thinking it would be easier to drink, but it was just as difficult. The coconut milk was really good and sweet but who actually wants to go through all the trouble for a few sips of juice? If it takes, a hammer, screw driver, AND a knife to eat dessert, it's just not worth it...for me.

For more dessert, Mary Lou picked up some mini cupcakes that were so good and pretty too! The flavors included coconut and lemon.

Roy Rogers along the New Jersey Turnpike (Friday, May 21, 2010)

2010-05-25T19:16:00.000-07:00

Yuck! We were driving down to Baltimore for the weekend and we left NYC after work, around 6pm. Surprisingly we didn't hit any traffic!

There is nothing along the way between NYC and Baltimore other than the nasty service stations along the NJ Turnpike. If you know of a good place to stop for food along this route, please let me know!

We ate burgers at Roy Rogers. When we saw the sign, Ethan thought that they might have good burgers so we pulled in. As soon as he saw the Roy Rogers counter, he realized he was thinking of Carl's Jr....not Roy Rogers. Oh well, now we know...

Han Bat (Thursday, May 20, 2010)

2010-05-25T18:53:00.000-07:00

We met Yumi for dinner at Han Bat. I ordered my usual, Gop Dol Bi Bim Bap and Ethan tried a new dish here called Soon Du Bu Jigae. He's had this dish many times, but it was the first time trying it at Han Bat. He thought this was just okay and probably wouldn't order again next time he eats here. We also ordered Pajun.

I LOVE this place!!!

No Meal (Wednesday, May 19, 2010)

2010-05-25T18:39:00.000-07:00

Ethan had some art friends over for an art group to discuss grants. They meet once every few months and they rotate to different apartments.

Ethan served cheese and crackers, grapes, nuts, rugelach, and steamed some veggie dumplings.

Panzanella Salad (Tuesday, May 18, 2010)

2010-05-18T18:36:00.000-07:00

Ethan made my favorite salad with the french bread I picked up the other day. What a great way to use stale bread.

Spaghetti Carbonara (Sunday, May 17, 2010)

2010-05-18T18:27:00.000-07:00

Ethan made Spaghetti Carbonara tonight with a salad. I took the leftovers to work the next day.

Pork Tenderloin & Banana Pudding (Saturday May 16, 2010)

2010-05-16T07:08:00.000-07:00

We had a few friends over for dinner and Janet made a feast!

She made some crab mushroom appetizers. They were good, but not exactly what she had in mind. Janet wanted to recreate a mushroom dish that Maro, our sister-in-law, made--but it turns out we had the wrong recipe.

We have decided to try to buy all our meats from local farmers. This is the first dish we've made using meat from Lewis-Waite Farm (which we get through our Community Supported Agriculture group).

Janet marinated a pork tenderloin using Ina Garten's recipe. It was so good!

I made some mashed potatoes and asparagus (which Janet picked up at our farmers' market) to go along with the pork.

Janet also made the most amazing banana pudding using the recipe from the Magnolia Bakery. She reduced the cream from 3 cups to 2, but I couldn't tell the difference from the original. It is so delicious!

Korean and Indian Leftovers (Friday, May 14, 2010)

2010-05-14T19:10:00.000-07:00

We had a combination of Indian and Korean leftovers plus a new tofu dish. I reheated the curried cauliflower, the vegetables from the Indian chicken dish (I ate all the chicken), chickpeas, and we also had Ethan's homemade kimchi, dried seaweed, salad.

Here's my plate with food piled on.

Piper's Kilt (Thursday, May 13, 2010)

2010-05-14T18:46:00.000-07:00

We ate burgers at Piper's Kilt in the neighborhood tonight. Always a good standby, local burger joint in the hood.

Chickpeas with spinach (Wednesday May 12, 2010)

2010-05-12T18:35:00.000-07:00

Tonight we had beer with orange slices:

With chickpeas, spinach, and sun dried tomatoes

And leftover pumpkin jook.

Pumpkin jook and homemade kimchi (Tuesday May 11, 2010)

2010-05-12T18:15:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we made pak chok kimchi. The recipe said that it is meant to be eaten right away, but it was a bit too bitter, so we decided to stick it in a jar and let it ferment a bit.

I added a bit of Thai fish sauce and let it sit out overnight before sticking it in the fridge.

That was enough to get rid of the bitterness and soften it. It tastes like kimchi! This the first batch I've made (aside from an unfortunate oi [cucumber] kimchi).

The recipe for the kimchi called for much more grated pumpkin than could be possibly correct. So I saved the extra pumpkin and made some pumpkin jook (porridge).

We had it with some gochujong potatoes, leftover skate salad, and fried rice.

And strawberry rhubarb cobbler for dessert.

Skate Salad and Fresh Pak Choi Kimchi

2010-05-10T18:44:00.000-07:00

We went shopping at the Korean supermarket the other day, and I picked up a couple of bunches of pak choi to make a fresh kimchi from The Complete Book of Korean Cooking.

While Janet washed the cabbage, I minced kabocha pumpkin...

... ground sunflower seeds (a substitute for pine nuts), and chopped scallions (a substitution for leeks).

The pumpkin, seeds, & scallions are mixed with ground red pepper, ginger, garlic, salt, soy sauce, and sesame seed oil.

The pak choi is stuffed with the mixture.

Along with the kimchi we had fried rice, skate salad (the skate is from the farmers' market), and ojingo (dried squid in gochujong).

It's supposed to be eaten fresh, but the uncooked baby pak choi is a bit bitter for my taste. We stuck it in a jar and will see how it tastes after it ferments a bit.

Han Bat (Friday May 7, 2010)

2010-05-09T20:18:00.000-07:00

Don't miss Janet's posting on Out To Eat about her trip to Han Bat!

Chicken and Lentils (Sunday, May 9, 2010)

2010-05-09T19:42:00.000-07:00

I tried a new recipe from my Indian cookbook. The recipe looked easy and the photo looked really good....it wasn't that easy and my dish didn't look anything like the photo. It turned out pretty good, but I don't know if I have the patience to do it again, plus I would have to modify several steps. The recipe called for 2 cups of lentils but it really only needs 1 cup at the most. I would probably add the fresh spinach in the last few minutes so that it keeps it's fresh green color. The recipe called for 1 lb frozen spinach. I would probably use a 28 oz can of whole tomatoes instead of peeling 4 fresh ones. I also used pre-cut chicken thighs instead of cutting up a whole 3 lb chicken since I liked the idea of using dark meat.

I also made Indian Spiced Cauliflower and Potatoes

The garlic naan is from Trader Joe's.

Gochujong Bluefish (Saturday May 9, 2010)

2010-05-09T07:08:00.001-07:00

We picked up some bluefish & skate from Seatuck at our farmers' market today. This was the first time Janet has had bluefish... she was a little unsure of it (based on me describing it as a strong-flavored fish), but since she likes sardines, herring, and salmon, I was pretty confident she'd like it (and she did!).

I briefly marinated (for maybe 10 minutes) it in a mixture of gochujong, sesame seed oil, mool yut (barley malt syrup), soy sauce, ginger, garlic, and hot pepper. I baked/roasted it at around 400 degree for about 20 minutes.

We had it with leftover rice & broccoli.

Ethan's dinner (Friday May 7, 2010)

2010-05-09T07:08:00.000-07:00

While Janet was eating out at Han Bat with a friend, I had some homemade Korean food. I made fried tofu, broccoli sautéed in sesame oil with garlic and hot pepper, shredded daikon (with salt & mirin), and gaji namul.

Soup for the Sick (Wednesday & Thursday, May 5 & 6, 2010)

2010-05-09T07:06:00.000-07:00

Ethan had oral surgery Tuesday afternoon, the same day I went to the Carnegie Hall Performance. For dinner he ate tofu with soy sauce, yogurt, and ice cream - a lot of ice cream. I wasn't being a very good wife leaving him alone after surgery...

On Wednesday, I made more kimchi jigae, modified with added carrots, celery and spinach. I think the soup helped him recover faster.

Ramen: Mei Kui Tei (Tuesday, May 4, 2010)

2010-05-07T21:19:00.000-07:00

I went out to dinner with Yumi before going to a performance at Carnegie Hall (Orpheus and Ryu Goto) Tuesday night. We didn't have a specific place in mind for dinner, but found a Japanese ramen restaurant close enough to Carnegie Hall. The ramen was good, but nothing great. I wouldn't go out of my way to come here again, but it was pretty good especially if you're looking for convenience before a show. It's also near Joe's Shanghai.

Shoyu Ramen (soy sauce flavored noodle soup - 2 pieces roast pork, bean sprout, bamboo shoot, and scallion)

Tonkutsu Ramen (rich pork bone broth noodle soup - 2 pieces of roast pork, bean sprout bamboo shoot, and scallion)

Gyoza

By the way, the performance that night was amazing! The music by Ryu Goto was beautiful and it might have been the first time music brought me to tears. It was amazing to find out that Ryu is a college student at Harvard studying quantum physics. What a memorable evening.

Mei Kui Tei (map)

60 West 56th Street (between 5th & 6th Ave)

New York, NY 10019

Leftovers (Monday, May 3, 2010)

2010-05-03T18:43:00.000-07:00

Leftover kimchi jigae tonight.

Kimchi Jigae (Sunday, May 2, 2010)

2010-05-03T18:40:00.000-07:00

We had kimchi that was perfectly ready for kimchi jigae. As usual, I threw in some duk and mandoo into the pot. It's amazing how so few ingredients makes such a flavorful soup.

Dinner at The Martin's (Saturday, May 1, 2010)

2010-05-03T18:29:00.000-07:00

We had spaghetti and meatballs at Jonathan and Nami's house for dinner. Jonathan even made the pasta from scratch! Dinner was fabulous as it always is at The Martin's.

Baby Spaghetti

Nami made the perfect dessert, tiramisu:

Sautéed Blackfish (Saturday Lunch, 1 May 2010)

2010-05-02T16:34:00.000-07:00

We stopped by our farmers' market and picked up some blackfish and asparagus to have for lunch (along with some leftover rice).

I sautéed the fish in butter and olive oil with some lemon--and it was amazing! Last week we had skate from the market and we're going to try to make this a regular Saturday tradition.

The people who run the fish booth are very nice... They gave us a little reusable cooler bag for the fish--so we'll bring it back with us every week. And it's great to know the folks who are producing your food.

Rob Williams, owner & operator of Seatuck Fish

Soon Dubu Jjigae (Friday April 30)

2010-05-02T15:44:00.000-07:00

I made soon dubu jjigae (spicy seafood & tofu stew) for the second time--so I took a more free hand with the recipe. It was okay, but I'm going to go back to more closely following the recipe in Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee's Eating Korean--but with some anchovy stock and doenjang (soy bean paste) added.

We had ban chan with it, of course...

Janet picked up some more Banana Pudding from Magnolia Bakery (they recently added a location in Grand Central Terminal). It's wonderfully addictive. We're definitely going to try making it ourselves (here's someone who blogged about making it) soon!

Sloppy Joes (Thursday, April 29, 2010)

2010-04-29T18:27:00.000-07:00

Ethan made Sloppy Joes on Martin's potato rolls tonight.

Piper's Kilt (Wednesday, April 28, 2010)

2010-04-29T18:08:00.000-07:00

We had dinner at Piper's Kilt tonight. It's a pub in our neighborhood, and apparently, they have "The Best Burgers in Inwood". At least, that's what the sign says as you enter the restaurant. We've only had burgers here, but they do have a variety of other dishes on their menu. Maybe one day I'll try something else.

Spaghetti Carbonara (Tuesday, April 27, 2010)

2010-04-27T19:06:00.000-07:00

Ethan made my favorite dish, spaghetti carbonara! We ate almost a pound of pasta - there was only a tiny bit leftover...I could've easily kept eating but had to just stop myself before Ethan thought I turned into a pig ; )

Arugula

For dessert, I picked up some Magnolia's Bakery banana pudding. My cousin Brandon mentioned that he's not a fan of bananas or pudding, but he LOVED this particular dessert at Magnolia's. This was enough to intrigue me. I had to try it and it was so incredibly good. This is now my favorite dessert at Magnolia's - who knew I would like it as much as I do.

Short Ribs Provençale (Monday April 27, 2010)

2010-04-27T18:50:00.000-07:00

Tonight we had some grass-fed beef ribs we bought from New York Beef at our farmers' market. It was braised for 2 1/2 hours in a Provençale-style along with potatoes. For dessert we had leftover strawberry-rhubarb cobbler.

Zucchini Rice Gratin (Sunday, April 25, 2010)

2010-04-25T17:09:00.000-07:00

I haven't left the house all day - this is very rare for me and I wasn't even that productive at home either. It's been a very cold and rainy gray day. One thing I did do was make dinner. I wanted to make Ina Garten's pork loin recipe but strangely, none of the grocery stores within walking distance had it in stock yesterday.

We just watched the documentary, Food Inc, and I'm a little grossed out by meat right now (this won't last, I'm sure), but I will tell you that this is changing the way Ethan and I think about food and what we purchase in the future. Another food show we've been watching is Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution.

Anyway, I made Zucchini Rice Gratin and a Shrimp Salad. They didn't really go so great together, but were pretty good each on their own.

Zucchini Rice Gratin up close

For the Shrimp Salad, I made quite a few modifications. I added some chili garlic paste as well as Sriracha sauce, I didn't add dill b/c I didn't have any, and I used one scallion instead of the red onion.

Shrimp Salad

Ethan made a delicious strawberry rhubarb cobbler for dessert - my favorite. The strawberries were so good and fresh on their own. I love that strawberries are in season right now. The rhurbarb came from our farmers' market.

Skate & Wheatberries (Saturday April 24, 2010)

2010-04-25T16:53:00.000-07:00

This morning we picked up (among other things) some skate, ramps, and asparagus at the nearby farmers' market.

I fried the skate wings and made up a Provençal-style sauce out of the ramps (wild leeks), tomatoes, parsley, and capers. To go along with the fish, Janet made a wheatberry & sour cherry salad and I simmered some asparagus.

Flor de Mayo (Thursday, April 22, 2010)

2010-04-24T10:34:00.000-07:00

This restaurant is a little gem in the Upper West Side. It's inexpensive and their rotisserie chicken and Lomo Saltado are the BEST! I forgot my camera tonight, but Ethan took some of these photos on his iphone.

We tried a new dish tonight, the Pork Adobo which was their daily special. It was pretty good, although I don't know if I'd order it again. The Lomo Saltado is a beef stir fry with french fries on top. We ordered it with yellow rice and a side of sweet plantains.

Lomo Saltado

Pork Adobo

Sweet Plantains

Yellow Rice

Spaghetti (Wednesday April 21, 2010)

2010-04-21T20:15:00.000-07:00

Ethan made a delicious spaghetti with garlic bruschetta and melon wrapped in prosciutto. The pasta was whole wheat thin spaghetti. I think the thin pasta made it harder to distinguish the grainier texture typical of most whole wheat pasta. I'm excited to have leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

Side of sauteed beet greens

Panzanella Salad with Melon wrapped with Prosciutto (Tuesday April 20, 2010)

2010-04-21T20:00:00.000-07:00

This is one of my favorite salads, especially when Ethan bakes the bread from scratch. It's filling and extra fresh with all the great veggies tossed together.

Melon wrapped in Prosciutto

Guchujong pork (Monday 4/19/10)

2010-04-21T19:58:00.000-07:00

We had pork that was marinated in guchujong, miso, malt syrup, garlic, ginger, sesame seed oil, and soy sauce. Our ban chan included oi (cucumber) kimchi and radish kimchi made by Janet's mom, jicima, napa cabbage kimchi, and gim (seaweed).

I also made the dough for a batch of almost-no-knead bread... The dough has to sit for at least 12 hours, so it'll be baked tomorrow night.

Quinoa with Spring Vegetables and Strawberry Rhubarb Cobbler (Sunday April 18 2010)

2010-04-21T19:36:00.000-07:00

I modified the Spring Vegetable and Quinoa Pilaf recipe I found on epicurious.com. I used red beets instead of the golden beets - you can tell right away by the photo. I also threw in some shrimp to the dish as well.

I wanted to cook quinoa since we bought a gigantic bag of it at Costco the last time we were there, so you'll be seeing many more recipes using this seed (I guess it's technically a seed, not a grain).

Strawberry Rhubarb Cobbler

Frankies 457 (Saturday April 17, 2010)

2010-04-20T19:39:00.000-07:00

We ate at Frankies 457 in Brooklyn... Read Janet's post about it on her Out To Eat blog!

Lunch (Saturday April 17, 2010)

2010-04-19T19:44:00.000-07:00

For lunch we had Bi Bim Naengmyeon noodles--which is a cold noodle in guchujang sauce. I pretty much love any dish that features guchujang (Korean spicy/sweet paste). The noodles were topped with asian pear, pickled radish, & sunflower sprouts.

We also had sigumchi namaul (spinach), kimchi, and some refrigerator radish pickles that I had made the day before.

The spinach & sunflower sprouts came from our local farmers' market.

Cachapas y Mas (Friday April 16, 2010)

2010-04-19T19:28:00.000-07:00

We went to a local Venezuelan sandwich shop for dinner. Read Janet's posting about it on her Out To Eat blog!

Leftovers and Banchan (Thursday April 15, 2010)

2010-04-19T10:05:00.000-07:00

We had a combination of leftovers with rice with a variety of kimchi.

Magnolia's Bakery: Chocolate Cheesecake Swirl

Leftovers (Wednesday April 14, 2010)

2010-04-19T09:56:00.000-07:00

We ate leftovers today.

Chickpea & Chicken Tagine (Tuesday April 13, 2010)

2010-04-16T19:37:00.000-07:00

We had a pseudo-tagine based on a recent Mark Bittman recipe. We didn't have dried apricots on hand, so I substituted dried sour cherries and dried prunes.

Ippudo & ice cream (Sunday April 11, 2010)

2010-04-16T19:22:00.000-07:00

We went to Ippudo with my sister cecilia and had bowls of ramen, pork buns, and tofu hot pot.

For dessert, ice cream:

Leftovers & okra & green beans (Saturday April 10, 2010)

2010-04-16T19:16:00.000-07:00

We had leftover mac & cheese from yesterday along with steamed green beans

and okra roasted with Indian spices

For dessert we had strawberries

Macaroni and Cheese (Friday, April 9, 2010)

2010-04-12T17:53:00.000-07:00

I was craving mac & cheese....Cecilia's (Ethan's sister) mac & cheese she made once while I was visiting Baltimore. She used Ina Garten's recipe found on foodnetwork.com. The interesting part of the recipe is that it calls for fresh tomato slices on top - make you feel like it's extra healthy ; )

I work near Grand Central, so on my way home, I thought I could just stop in the Grand Central Market and pick up the cheese but when I got there I realized they only had Murray's Cheese shop and the 12 ounces of Gruyere cheese the recipe called for would've cost over $30. I already picked up 4 tomatoes at the market for $9, and thought that this was going to be a very expensive mac & cheese. So instead, I picked up some cheese at our local market and we used cheddar & swiss. It was still pretty good, but I still dream of the one Cecilia made.

Jamie Oliver's Smashed Chicken recipe (Thursday, April 8, 2010)

2010-04-12T07:03:00.000-07:00

This recipe has become a staple go-to recipe for us and as simple as it is (ingredient-wise), it's so tasty and wonderful!

Roasted Artichoke with Thyme

Trader Joe's Apple Tart Tatin (I wouldn't buy this again. It wasn't bad, but after having Ethan's homemade Apple Tart Tatin, I'd rather have his again. Maybe he'll make this again soon - yay!)

Soon dubu Jigae (Wednesday, April 7, 2010)

2010-04-09T19:40:00.000-07:00

Ethan's still not feeling well so he made some Soon dubu jigae from Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee's Eating Korean cookbook - I guess he really liked what he ordered at Seoul Garden on Saturday night.

Spaghetti (Tuesday, April 6, 2010)

2010-04-09T19:32:00.000-07:00

Ethan made Spaghetti with a side of Brocoli tonight.

Lentil Soup (Monday, April 5, 2010)

2010-04-09T19:24:00.000-07:00

Ethan's been feeling a bit under the weather so he made lentil soup. He used the leftover bulgogi we had from making kimbap and he used sundried tomatoes instead of a canned tomatoes. It was really good and perfectly comforting.

For dessert, my mom gave us some sweet sticky rice with pine nuts and dates. I'm not sure exactly what it's called - but I know I like it ; )

Food my Grandmother gave us (Sunday, April 4, 2010)

2010-04-09T18:59:00.000-07:00

My mother and Grandmother gave us some food to take back with us. I was very excited about this. It was great, since we got home at around 8pm, all we had to do was cook rice really quick and heat up the food.

Seoul Garden - Mom's 60th Birthday (Saturday, April 3, 2010)

2010-04-08T18:50:00.000-07:00

Ethan and I drove to Ann Arbor for the weekend to celebrate my mother's 60th birthday - an eleven hour drive from Manhattan. My brother Jason, flew in from Denver on Friday night and stayed until Tuesday morning.

We went out to dinner at a restaurant called Seoul Garden. It was a big crowd between my parents, grandparents, aunt & uncle, my cousin Beth and her two kids who flew in from San Francisco. We've been here many times for family events and it's always pretty good...not NYC Korea-town good, but Ann Arbor good. I ordered the Yook ge Jang (spicy beef broth, with shredded beef and mixed vegetables). Ethan ordered the Soon du bu Jigae (soft tofu, and assorted seafood served in spicy broth).

A sample of the ban chan

Hae Mool Pa Jun (seafood and scallion pancake)

After dinner, Jason, Ethan and I stopped in a pub to watch the end of the MSU vs. Butler basketball game where I ordered some breadsticks...I guess I got hungry again.

Right across the street there is a place called Cafe Luwak, that serves the Superman ice cream - my childhood favorite. I only discovered this place because seriouseats.com did an article on this and was amazed that this is so close to my parents house and I had never been here before.

Superman Ice Cream

Heavenly good!

Roadtrip to Michigan (Friday, April 2, 2010)

2010-04-06T20:02:00.000-07:00

We had originally planned to hit the Road at 6am, then 7am, then just before going to bed, we decided to leave at 10am. For road trips, it's a family tradition to make kimbap, but the problem is that you have to make it the same day since you can't put it in the refrigerator or the rice will harden. The ingredients in kimbap are rice, spinach, carrots, bulgogi (beef), yellow radish, and egg.

Kimbap roller - a required tool

Layering the ingredients

Rolling this is much harder than you would think

On Ethan's trip to the Korean market the day before, he picked up some duk (sweet rice cake) for dessert.

The road trip to Ann Arbor was 11 hours. When we ran out of the kimbap, we stopped at Panera Bread for dinner - not so bad for service station fast food. We listened to the book, "Devil in the White City" on disk and somehow we timed it just perfectly. We finished it as soon as we crossed the George Washington Bridge on our return trip. It was a really good book and would highly recommend it - very creepy and historically interesting.

Some of you might know that I've been on a mission to find a McDonald's Shamrock Shake for the past several years living in NYC - come to find out it's been a decade(s) since they sold this out here. We had to pull over to a McDonald's about an hour outside of the City b/c I was getting a little car sick (I should've eaten breakfast). Low and behold this McDonald's, in the middle of nowhere, is serving Shamrock Shakes even though it was April 2nd! I was so giddy and couldn't wait to take a big slurp...but it just wasn't as good as I remembered. Or maybe my stomach being a bit off didn't help, regardless, I think it cured my obsession for a shamrock shake.

Shamrock Shake

I found this on YouTube and had to share:

Bar Breton (Thursday, April 1, 2010)

2010-04-06T18:22:00.000-07:00

What great company for an evening out to dinner at Bar Breton. Ethan's friends just flew in from Thailand, and Ethan just got back that afternoon from Baltimore/Philly. The next morning we were driving 11 hours to Ann Arbor, MI. I hope we'll be seeing John and Ann again...maybe a trip to Thailand?

Check out my post on Bar Breton.

Bertucci's (Wednesday, 3/31/10)

2010-03-31T19:36:00.000-07:00

My nephews, my sisters, my mom, and I went to Bertucci's tonight. It's the first time I've been there and it's not bad for a chain restaurant. I got the meatballs & spaghetti in pomodoro sauce and a caesar salad (with anchovies).

Cheese & crackers (Tuesday 3/3/10)

2010-03-31T19:32:00.000-07:00

At my mom's house we had crackers, cheese, salami, pistachios, Cadbury chocolate mini eggs, & wine.

Fondue (Monday 3/29/10)

2010-03-31T19:31:00.000-07:00

I'm on a quick Spring Break visit to family. At my sister's house we had fondue, bread, vegetables, and wine.

For dessert we had ice cream mochi:

Spaghetti Carbonara (Saturday, March 27, 2010)

2010-03-28T20:01:00.000-07:00

I asked Ethan to make my favorite, Spaghetti Carbonara. He actually made it with rotini pasta and pancetta. When I eat this dish, I really don't know when to stop eating...you just have to tell me that I'm full, otherwise, I'll keep eating until it's all gone! I'll suffer the consequences later - it's totally worth it!

Ippudo (Friday, March 26, 2010)

2010-03-28T18:57:00.000-07:00

Tonight we ate at Ippudo. Check out my blog posting on my other Blog, Out to Eat.

Guchujong pork (Thursday 3/25/10)

2010-03-28T07:22:00.000-07:00

I defrosted some pork roast (we get a big pork roast from Costco and divide it up to make 4 different dishes) and made a guchujong pork dish. I based it a bit on what I remembered putting into guchujong chicken a couple of weeks ago, but no potatoes and more of a braise than a stew.

The main flavors in the dish are guchujong (Korean chili paste), tahini (sesame paste), sesame seed oil, and ginger. A bit more subtle are soy, Korean chili pepper, and garlic.

One of my regular banchan is grated daikon with a little salt and mirin. For some reason, tonight I unthinkingly put in soy sauce (instead of salt) and experimented with using Korean malt syrup instead of mirin. Both are mistakes... the daikon needs light flavors that bring out its taste, not heavier flavors that mask it. Plus the soy gave it an unappetizing brown color.

The daikon is at "9 o'clock" below. Going clockwise are radish kimchi (one of my favorites), geem, Korean zucchini, and ojingo (dried squid in guchujong).

Janet's coworker Julie sent her home with a huge slice of chocolate cake. It was great! The recipe comes from Ina Garten (aka the Barefoot Contessa) and Janet has sworn to try making it herself.

Leftover sujube (Wednesday 3/24/10)

2010-03-28T06:59:00.000-07:00

We had leftover sujube (torn noodle soup). I picked out the leftover noodles (which went from mediocre to soggy flakes of lead) and made a new batch of noodles.

To go along with the leftover soup, I tried out a new banchan: Soy-Sweetened Lotus Root. We had a dish like this at a friends-of-friends house around Christmas, and I had tried a couple of times to recreate it (with mixed success). There is a recipe for the dish in our most recent Korean cookbook acquisition, The Complete Book of Korean Cooking (reviewed by me here), so I decided to give it a shot.

The recipe is to slice a lotus root into 1/4" slices. I used pre-sliced packaged root, but if it is fresh the slices should be dipped into acidulated water to keep them from browning.
The root slices are then put in a pot and covered with water. Soy sauce is added (about 1/4 c. per 3/4 lb of root) and boiled for 20 minutes.

2 tablespoons of granulated sugar and 3 tablespoons of maple syrup are added and the boil is lowered to a simmer for another 30 minutes. I suspect the maple syrup is a substitution for Korean malt syrup (which we have), but we actually have more maple syrup on hand then we know what to do with, so I kept the substitution. I like the resulting taste, so we'll keep maple syrup in our version of the recipe.
The root is drained, coated with 2 teaspoons of toasted sesame seed oil, and sprinkled with toasted sesame seeds.

We loved how the recipe turned out, so it is definitely a keeper!

Janet sliced jicima to which we added a little rice wine vinegar, mirin, and Korean chili pepper. Janet had a bite and accidentally had a piece go down the wrong pipe. It may have been having a piece stuck in her throat, but it felt a little like she was having an allergic reaction to the jicima (and people do have reactions to it--the plant is in the nightshade family) so Janet steered clear of the dish for the rest of the night.

I steamed some asian eggplant for gaji namul.

We added some leftover mixed grain rice, geem (seaweed sheets), and kimchi and had a meal.

Pasta with sausage (Tuesday March 23, 2010)

2010-03-25T20:03:00.000-07:00

Everyone's heard of chocolate covered strawberries? For dessert we decided to experiment with strawberry covered (Easter) chocolate:

It turns out there's a reason this hadn't been invented.

Kimchi Sujube (Monday March 22, 2010)

2010-03-25T19:42:00.000-07:00

The great thing about having roast chicken on Sunday night is that I have a good excuse to use the leftovers to make Kimchi Sujube on Monday night.

I fried a couple of eggs to have on top of our bowls of soup.

The noodle dough wasn't a stretchy as the last time I made this, but I'm not sure what I did differently. Perhaps it was a bit dry?

Roasted Chicken (Sunday, March 21, 2010)

2010-03-25T19:40:00.000-07:00

Roast Chicken is something I've been trying to "master" for several attempts now and I have to say that tonight was my favorite so far. I finally got crispy skin and a golden color. On all of my previous attempts, I've used fresh herbs inside and out and used olive oil. I never quite got much flavor from the fresh herbs, but this time I used Montreal Steak Seasoning and melted butter. I separated the skin from the meat like I read in other recipes, and rubbed the butter on top of the skin and underneath. Since I used up the last of the butter (I think it was only a couple tablespoons), I rubbed a little bit of olive oil on the chicken as well.

This was a bigger chicken than my previous ones so I wasn't entirely sure about the timing. I think it roasted for about 2 hours, maybe less.

Yay, montreal steak seasoning. This was a spice my friend Sarah suggested we use on roasted potatoes - it's so good!

Kale with garlic

We also had wild rice, but I forgot to add that to my plate for this photo

It's Easter time and the season for chocolate eggs. We bought a bag of Cadbury chocolate mini eggs last weekend and went through them in abou a day. When we went to Target this morning we didn't see the Cadbury eggs so we bought Hersey's milk chocolate eggs instead. Knowing that the chocolate eggs only come out once a year, we thought we'd stock up...

Sandwiched and Seven's Turkish Grill (Saturday, March 20, 2010)

2010-03-23T20:15:00.000-07:00

I started the beautiful sunny day with Yoga, brunch at the Whitney Museum and a facial at Mario Badescu with Yumi. A little belated birthday celebration.

Danny Meyer opened up a temporary cafe at the Whitney called Sandwiched. It's been getting a lot of press from the time they opened and since we were only a couple blocks away, Yumi and I just had to check this out. I ordered the "Applewood-Smoked Turkey & Gouda" and Yumi ordered the "Line-Caught Albacore Tuna". My sandwich was definitely good and hearty - no complaints, but didn't wow me. Yumi seemed a bit more excited about her sandwich. She said there was a hint of lemon in her tuna which she liked.

Ethan and I met up in the Upper West Side to watch Avatar so we grabbed an impromptu dinner at a Turkish restaurant called Seven's Turkish Grill. It was a surprisingly good meal. I probably wouldn't go out of my way to come back here, but it was definitely satisfying and tasty. Ethan and I ended up ordering the same thing...I've been on a bit of a sandwich kick. We ordered the "Special Beyti Kebab" which was ground lamb with garlic, hot pepper, parsley kebab wrapped in lavash bread, served with their special sauce.

Leftovers Reinvented (Friday, March 19, 2010)

2010-03-23T18:49:00.000-07:00

Since our friends Nami and Jonathan have been renovating their kitchen, we were lucky enough to have them over for dinner a couple nights this week. What a treat for us! What a joy to have a two year old at the dinner table. Have you ever watched a 2 year old eat? I couldn't keep my eyes off of her, especially while two fisting the dried seaweed.

Ethan was very creative in combining some leftovers into entirely new dishes.

Banchan with fried tofu and leftover chicken

Fried Mixed-Grain Rice with Steak, Asparagus, Scallions, and Gingko Nuts

The Fridge...So Much Food!

2010-03-22T19:12:00.000-07:00

I was just amazed at how full our refrigerator was. I do like a full fridge...full of options! Perhaps it's intriguing to peer into someone else's fridge or just plain disgusting.

Regardless, here's a peek!

Chicken and Potatoes (Thursday, March 18, 2010)

2010-03-22T18:50:00.000-07:00

We had our friend Nami and her 2 year old daughter Mio over for dinner. I forgot to take photos of the finished dish, but here are some as Ethan was preparing the meal. He modified Jamie Oliver's Crispy and Sticky Chicken Thighs with Squashed New Potatoes and Tomatoes. This is a great dish!

Along with the chicken we had skillet asparagus from Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking For Everyone.

We started off with some fresh mozzarella and tomatoes:

Preparing the chicken:

More Magnolia's cupcakes

Steak (Wednesday, March 17, 2010)

2010-03-21T20:57:00.000-07:00

For dinner, Ethan picked up some food at Stew Leonards. An interesting grocery store, that's not your typical market. It takes you on one path that winds through the entire store. You basically follow this path from beginning to end. The produce here always looks so amazingly vibrant in color, it just makes you want to buy everything! It was a treat to eat strawberries that not only smelled as strawberries should, but the flavor was heaven! I'm definitely looking forward to the summer full of fresh fruit!

Very yummy grapes and strawberries...the strawberries were amazing!

Salad with grapefruit

Tomatoes and fresh mozzarella

Ciabatta Bread

Dry-Aged T-Bone Steak

For dessert, I picked up Magnolia's cupcakes at Grand Central...yes, they just opened up there and how convenient. We can now have magnolia's cupcakes every night for dessert ; ) I bought chocolate with chocolate frosting and red velvet.

Deliciousness

Ramen noodles (Tuesday March 16, 2010)

2010-03-17T05:37:00.000-07:00

I was working late helping a friend tear out his kitchen floor, so we didn't have a real meal. Janet had a package of ramen noodles with an egg on top for dinner and when I got home I had the same... plus lots of kimchi!

Stir-fried Pork Belly & Kimchi (Monday Mar 15, 2010)

2010-03-17T05:35:00.000-07:00

After our trip the to the H&Y Korean supermarket, we were all stocked up for making more Korean food.

I've been wanting to try making gingko nuts, so I made a simple ban chan of them:

I had read that they should be sauteed in a bit of oil until their shells crack. Crack is an understatement--I'd say, "explode like giant popcorn kernels." I'll have to figure out another method of making these. Or at least use a lid on the skillet.

Our other ban chan were napa cabbage kimchi, gim (seaweed sheets), and radish kimchi (which is my favorite kimchi):

The baby bok choy at H&Y were on sale ($0.99/lb) so I made a dish of them that is more Chinese than Korean. (In college I was a line cook in a Chinese restaurant):

Our main dish was stir-fried pork belly with onions and kimchi. I made a mixed-grain rice to go along with it. The rice included brown rice, white rice, wild rice, lentils, and a few other assorted grains. Bags of mixed-grain rice can be purchased at the Korean supermarket, but I just make my own. I'm pretty impressed with Korean cuisine that it maintains a whole grain tradition (even though white rice is much more commonly eaten).

As usual, we ate it all!

Leftovers (March 14, 2010)

2010-03-14T17:57:00.000-07:00

We had quite a variety of leftovers: pork with bacon, chicken burrito, yellow rice, black beans, baked rigatoni, spinach with parmesan...and carrot cake for dessert.

Before...

...After

Korean Grocery Store - H&Y Market (March 14, 2010)

2010-03-14T17:46:00.000-07:00

Daylight Savings...Daylight Savings...I kept trying to remind myself, but of course I forgot until I woke up at 10:30 this morning. Once we got moving, we took a trip to H&Y Mart (Korean grocery store) in New Jersey - just over the George Washington Bridge. I love these trips, since we stock up on so much Korean food and fresh produce.

Ginormous Fuji Apples

My favorite ramen noodles (Shin Ramyun)

Gochujang...lots and lots of gochujang...and soybean paste

H&Y Mart (map)

1 Remsen Place

Ridgefield, NJ 07657

Bake Rigatoni (Saturday Mar 14, 2010)

2010-03-14T09:26:00.000-07:00

Tonight we had a few friends over for dinner. I was in the mood for Italian so I made baked rigatoni from Marcella Hazan from Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking.

The rigatoni called for bolognese and béchamel sauces. This was the first time I've made a classic bolognese sauce--turns out it takes 3-4 hours of simmering and is not at all saucy.

None of the vegetables looked good in our local supermarkets (see my complaints on a local neighborhood forum), so I ended up using frozen spinach. I used it to make my version of a very venerable Italian dish which involved baking the spinach with vinegar, parmesan, currants, and a bit of sugar. I topped it with a mixture of panko bread crumbs, more parmesan, and olive oil.

Pine nuts are common in this dish, but we had just tossed out a huge bag of them due to a rumors of Costco selling tainted Chinese pine nuts. In their place I used some leftover chick peas, which worked great--in fact, I think chick peas will become a permanent part of this recipe for me. They're cheaper and healthier (especially in light of Cosco problem) than pine nuts.

I picked up a bottle of St. Michael-Eppan 2008 Alto Adige Pinot Grigio for the bolognese sauce. Wow, it was good and very flavorful (which isn't how I typically think of pinot grigio). I looked it up and it turns out the wine received a 90 rating from wine spectator. We're going to get more bottles of it.

For dessert Janet made carrot cake. I'm not a big carrot cake fan, but this one is great--I had two slices.

Homemade Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
From Land o Lakes

Classic carrot cake is filled with coconut and pecans and frosted with cream cheese frosting.

Preparation time: 25 min Baking time: 40 min Cooling time: 1 hrs
Yield: 15 servings

1 cup butter, melted
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 (11-ounce) can mandarin oranges, undrained
2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2 teaspoons freshly grated orange zest
2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup sweetened flaked coconut
1/2 cup chopped pecans
4 medium (2 cups) carrots, grated

Frosting:

3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened
2 tablespoons butter, softened
2 teaspoons vanilla
chopped pecans, if desired

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Combine 1 cup butter, brown sugar, sugar and eggs in large bowl. Beat at medium speed, scraping bowl often, until creamy. Add mandarin oranges, 2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla and orange zest. Continue beating until well mixed.

2. Reduce speed to low; add flour, cinnamon, baking soda and salt. Beat, scraping bowl often, until well mixed. Stir in coconut, 1/2 cup pecans and carrots.

3. Pour into greased and floured 13x9-inch baking pan. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely.

4. Meanwhile, combine all frosting ingredients except chopped pecans in small bowl. Beat at medium speed, scraping bowl often, until smooth. Frost cooled cake. Sprinkle with pecans, if desired.

Chicken Burritos (March 12, 2010)

2010-03-12T20:00:00.000-08:00

I made chicken burritos tonight...Ethan happily (luckily) made the black beans. I looked online for a basic chicken burrito recipe, but didn't like any of them. Ethan suggested a few spices I could use to flavor the chicken and veggies (cumin, chili powder, coriander, garlic powder, and oregano). I added some chipotles in adobo sauce, orange & green peppers, onion, and a jalapeno pepper. It turned out pretty tasty even though I had no idea what I was mixing together.

Here's the result: