This is the last (cheese) straw!

Let me start this post with the appropriate tone.  This was my mood last night:

This was Kini's:

And this was Grisgris'.  Shelby was her usual reclusive self.

Last night was the fifth night in a row that I've cooked this week.  Usually by Wednesday I manage to convince Nick that we really want to go out for dinner, and he usually obliges.  This week, no such luck.  It was mostly seafood, so he wanted to "get it out of the way" as quickly as possible.  Harumph.  Last night we had the fish soup.  I thought it was delish.  I also like fish.  I understand that's an acquired taste (thanks, Mom and Dad!), so this may not be for everyone...that said, Nick said, "As far as fish soups go, this one was good.  But it was still fish soup."

Cooking up the rice, onions, and garlic.

I don't think these are mung beans, but they're green and they were in the Asian food section, so I used them anyway.

Cod and shrimp, ready to go.

Boiling everything.

YUM!  I had about two bowls of it.  Nick had about 2 bites. 

Shelby got the rest.  She SCARFED this down.  I take that as a compliment.

After dinner, there was a little dancing. You can tell Kini enjoys this by the way she recoils when you pick her up. 

Then, down to business.  First, play with the camera a bit.

This is the shredder I used to shred that entire lb of cheese.

Did you know dogs LOVE cheese?  Kini does.  Every time I looked up, she'd inched closer.  Then she'd be on my foot.  Then I'd stomp and kick her out and she'd go to her mat and the process would start over.  In the end, I gave her a small piece, but made her work for it.  Silly dog.

It took a while, but eventually this is how it looked according to my mom's recipe. 

I tried to use an icing bag, but this is all that came out.  Two tiny cheese turds. 

I added more water (about a cup actually) and it eventually moistened up a bit, but by that time it was too late...I broke the icing bag.  So I mashed it all out on a pan and cut it with a pizza cutter. 

Not exactly my gramma's cheese straws, but they worked, more or less. They're definitely squishier than hers. 

Nick wanted to prove that he could make popcorn all by himself, and this was the result.  He called it "Still Life Popcorn Maker".  It tasted just fine.

This morning, Nick woke up a few minutes before I did and had these cooking, cruelly, while I was on the treadmill.  Talk about motivation, huh?  He's all mine, ladies, sorry.  :-D

When You Say "Grill" You Really Mean "Broil", Right?

...because it is just too d@mn cold out to be firing up the grill, I'm sorry.  Add to that the fact that firing up the broiler makes the house warmer inside, well...sorry grill, but it's a losing battle. 

Instead of grilling the eggplant and scallops like last night's recipe requested, I broiled them.  Less smokey taste, more feeling in my fingers and toes.  It wasn't bad.  It's funny, everything this week has been combinations of thing that aren't foreign (excepting maybe the fish sauce), they're just combined in new ways.  For example, I never would have thought to marinade scallops in soy sauce and garlic.  Yum! 

Broiled veggies.  The eggplant was better than expected, but still...eggplanty.

Sauteed green onions.

Fried up some leftover rice from the night before, added a little soy sauce and fish sauce for flavor.

Broiled scallops and onions.  Yum.

The presentation.  Overall, it was good.  Not a favorite, but we didn't need to order pizza either.  :-)  I'm sure Nick will be glad when this week is over...one more fish recipe for tonight, then it's his turn to provide food!  :-)

Something Fishy

When I was 3, I'm told we went on a camping trip someplace with some dear friends and fishing was involved.  At some point, my parents (who'd thus far not caught anything) thought it would be a cute photo op to have my dad cast a line, then have me hold his fishing pole and smile.  Then I caught a fish.  Quite by accident, I caught the first, and I think the only, fish of the day.  It fed the kids (all 4 of us) that night.  Go me.

I bring this up because the fish I caught was a trout.  The fish I cooked last night was trout too.  See the connection?  Aren't I clever?  :-) 

Mmmm scaly.

All sliced up.

And now...our first video!  Nearly 5 minutes of watching sugar water boil!  Oh yeah, baby!  In the background, you'll hear some conversation, a little video game playing, and the ticking of the clock telling me when the carrots would be done.  I think.  I didn't actually watch the thing again...it really isn't that exciting.  I mostly wanted to record HOW sugar would brown using this method...was it suddenly?  Slowly?  How long would it take?  It took about 4.5 minutes, and it all happened in the last 30 or so seconds.  But hey, I made the video so I'm going to embed it.  Maybe later I'll add some really epic music to it so it's more interesting. 

The rest of the recipe was pretty easy...throw everything in the pot and let it cook.  The fish was plenty cooked (I didn't remove the skin, FYI), but I think I'd leave it in just a little longer next time...it had some of the flavor of the sauce but not as much as it probably could have been.  I didn't want to overcook the fish (can you do that?) so I erred on the side of "it's falling apart, that's tender enough, let's eat".  It was still pretty good though.

Kini shamelessly helped me clean up the carrot peels that "fell" on the ground.  Later, she went trash surfing and licked up some raw fish.  Yum.  Dogs are gross.

Shopping, Fried Rice, and Bodily Harm

Last night, I went into battle, steel raised and rebel yell...yelling.  (To this day, I always think of John Travolta in Michael, about to head-butt a raging bull when I think the word "battle".) 

First battle, the grocery store.  My foe:

Vanquished. 

Utterly slaughtered.  Did all that in under an hour AND less than $175.  That's groceries for a whole week, including a party on Saturday. 

Next battle: making dinner.  I think this one might've been a mild defeat, at least with the utensils.  I tried to be lazy and use the nifty new mandolin my mom had gotten me last year sometime, and found it had a french fry setting.  I needed to chop an onion so I figured what's the worst that could happen?  Thank God I'm lazy.  If I had just decided to do slices instead of fries, the whole side of my hand would be missing right now.  Yikes. 

I was so wrapped up in battling the rest of the meal that I forgot to take pictures until it was nearly done.  This was REALLY good.  Very simple, not a lot of spices or anything, but a lot of flavor.  It made a LOT, which is great for leftovers.  I picked out the shrimp as best I could in an act that was only mildly altruistic, since I love shrimp just about as much as Nick hates it.  Yum. He missed out on this one...it was delish.

And the final battle of the night...the puppy.  Not really a battle, but there was some wrestling that happened.  She's so special.

In Which We Attempt to Take Better Pictures

I'm sure in previous posts it's been painfully obvious that I've been using my phone's camera for pictures.  It's not bad for a phone, but it's not great either.  As a joint Christmas gift, Nick and I got us a new camera...the Canon s95, to be exact.  It's powerful beyond my comprehension, but it's still (thank God) a point and shoot.  Still, it's better than my phone's camera...but now I have no excuse for the sheer lack of photographic talent I have running through my veins, given my stock.  Oh well.  On with the food. 

Last night, I made Pork Brochettes with Shredded Coconut (Saik Chrouk Ch'ranouitk).  YUM. 

Mixing the lemongrass paste.

Chopped the pork.

Unearthed my zest scraper/finger skin remover.  Yikes.  I used lime zest instead of lime leaves.  I thought it tasted great.

The paste.  Let me pause here a second and talk about tasting food along the way.  I know you're supposed to do that...I know it makes sense in some recipes.  This one, the raw ingredients at this stage just hurt.  All I got was a stinging tongue and an apprehension that the recipe was going to be spicy, in spite of the lack of anything even remotely spicy in the mix.  Garlic is a beast.

Mixed with sugar, coconut, and salt.  I actually meant to avoid the sugar because I used sweetened coconut (couldn't find unsweetened in any obvious places, and I was hungry).  It turned out fine, in my opinion.

Waiting for the broiler to warm up.

Oh, friendly reminder kids...just because there's no visible fire present...doesn't mean wood won't burn.  Yes, the sticks caught on fire.  No, I didn't get a picture...I was busy making sure the house didn't burn down (and the pork didn't burn).  Soak the sticks ahead of time, for everyone's sake. 

These cooked surprisingly quickly, once prepared.  I didn't marinade them at all, and they were still VERY flavorful.

Carrots!  I tossed them with olive oil and thyme, then baked them at 400* for 30 minutes covered, then 10 uncovered.  Gives them a little crunch and seals the sweetness in.  OMG good.  Thanks, Mom!

Dinner!  I made the rice with olive oil and a little lemon juice.

Classy dinner at our house. 

Kini wanted part of the action, but people food is strictly verboten. 

The way I timed this one worked out well.  I started the carrots first, letting them bake while I prepared the pork.  When I uncovered the carrots, I started the rice.  When the carrots were done, I removed them and upped the temp to broil, and moved the rack up to the top.  I broiled the pork on one side, put out a couple small fires, flipped the pork, broiled on the other side, and by the time the second side was done, the rice was done and dinner was ready!  The carrots were a teensy bit cold by then though, so I could have thrown them back in the oven for a couple minutes while I was setting up plates maybe, I don't know.  In any case, that was the best-timed meal I've managed to make yet, so...there you go!

Week #8: Cambodia

For some reason, I think I thought Cambodia bordered China.  Shows what I know, at least about southeast Asian geography, huh?  :-)

Rice, as in other Southeast Asian countries, is the staple grain, while fish from the Mekong and Tonle Sap also form an important part of the diet. The Cambodian per capita supply of fish and fish products for food and trade in 2000 was 20 kilograms of fish per year or 2 ounces per day per person.^[72] Some of the fish can be made into prahok for longer storage. The cuisine of Cambodia contains tropical fruits, soups and noodles. Key ingredients in Cambodian cuisine are kaffir lime, lemon grass, garlic, fish sauce, soy sauce, curry, tamarind, ginger, oyster sauce, coconut milk and black pepper.
Some delicacies of Cambodian cuisine are នំបញ្ចុក (Num Bunhjok), អាមុក​ (Ah mok), អាពីង (Ah Ping).
An example of French influence on Cambodian cuisine, is Cambodian red curry with toasted baguette bread. The toasted baguette pieces are dipped in the curry and eaten. Cambodian red curry is also eaten with rice and rice vermicelli noodles. Probably the most popular dine out dish, kuy teoh, is a pork broth rice noodle soup with fried garlic, scallions, green onions that may also contain various toppings such as beef balls, shrimp, pork liver or lettuce. The cuisine is relatively unknown to the world compared to that of its neighbours Thailand and Vietnam.

I also didn't realize Cambodian cuisine is so little known.  If you Google "Cambodian Restaurant"  though, it looks like there are only three in the Boston area:

Vietnamese is MUCH more represented:

Did not know that.  It's a shame too, because if last night's dinner (post pending) is any indication, Cambodian food is YUMMY! 

So without further ado, here are this week's recipes:

http://asiarecipe.com/cammain.html#Brochettes - I made this last night.  SO GOOD.  Post pending.
Trey Kho Manor Caramelized Fish With Pineapple
Bai lieng nung poat. ( Corn fried rice.)
Bor bo pakon trey . (Seafood rice soup.)
Trop ang chia mui trey. ( Grilled eggplant and scallop). - Nick probably won't like this one, but it's got scallops AND eggplant.  OMG yum. 

This weekend is also the Christmas party, so at some point I'll be devising/posting a list of foods I'll be making for that.  I got a book called Gourmet Game Night as a wedding gift, and there are a ton of little appetizer-ish finger foods in there, that are all designed to keep your hands clean so you can keep playing your game.  I'll definitely be drawing from that! 

More Monday Menu Plans here.