Mea'ai

Best dinner: Pa'i 'ai and smoke meat

2011-10-01T15:50:00.000-07:00

Top right: pa'i 'ai made with a variety of green taro (kalo) corm;

top left: Hawaii-style smoke meat; bottom: homegrown Japanese eggplant sautéed with garlic.

I'm very lucky to come from a family where both the males and females are great cooks. My older brother is an excellent cook and a gardener and he always feeds his family well.

Visiting him and his family in September, he loaded our bags with goodies including green pa'i 'ai. Pa'i 'ai is "hard poi," kalo pounded (pa'i) with no water added, as it is for poi. He grows a wide variety of kalo and though the corms are usually purple, this one's green.

Pa'i 'ai* and poi match well with salty meats like kalua pig and smoke meat. My brother also gave us a big bag of homemade smoke meat — one of the best batches I've ever had. Usually the flavor of smoke meat is enhanced by frying after smoking, but this one stood on its own.

(* We added a few drops of water to the formerly frozen pa'i 'ai and warmed it in the microwave for a minute. The pa'i comes out nice and chewy, similar to mochi, but it tastes like delicious kalo!)

Cone sushi picnic

2011-08-06T18:24:00.000-07:00

I'm really picky about my cone sushi. A few times, I've ordered it, taken one bite and then rejected the rest. Usual problems are that they're too dry, too vinegary or too sweet.

These have to be juicy and full of balanced flavor. In the recipe I used, from the best cooking show on YouTube, Cooking With Dog (the dog is the cook's gray poodle who watches from a stool), every element is flavored — the aburage, the rice and the vegetables that go into the rice.

This is one of my favorite foods and this was the first time I made this from scratch. The perfect picnic food. My version doesn't look very pretty, but it tasted pretty good!

Into this: Mexican lollipops

2011-07-19T21:11:00.000-07:00

Picked up some Mexican lollipops at American Falls, Idaho, a while back. They were covered in chili powder and came in flavors I hadn't tried before — corn and tamarind. Also picked up a mango one.

I've never been into hard candy, but the chili is more appropriate than I would have ever thought. The ones I've tried so far haven't had hot chili in them, but I think I might like a little heat.

Maybe I'll have to try making my own.

My favorite one so far is the tamarind. It seems like there's actual tamarind pulp in these.

I've only eaten these in the car so far on long drives. It's nice.

Never-going-to-give-it-up flan

2011-07-07T22:30:00.000-07:00

I recently declared that I'll never give up flan. It has my favorite things: eggs and milk (plus sugar). I made my first batch ever from scratch. It was pretty good and I love it when you get the custard out of the mold, all the caramel spreads out over the top.

This is the way to prepare garlic scapes

2011-07-03T15:27:00.000-07:00

I'm sure there are markets that sell garlic scapes, garlic's firm flowering stalk, but mostly it seems a specialty item, and so the gardener's treat while the bulbs continue to develop.

It's my second year growing garlic and I've found that the best way to prepare the scapes is to roast them. Coat them in olive oil and a little salt. Toss them and then cook in the oven on high heat until they wilt and brown.

Raw, the scapes are firm on the outside and gel-like inside. Without roasting, the mouthfeel is a little too unctuous and the garlic flavor is subdued. Roasting concentrates the flavor, improves the texture and makes them easier to chew. Because of the tough, long fibers in the skin, cut the scapes into bite-size pieces.

This high-heat roasting method is one I often use for green beans and asparagus. Usually, the beans or asparagus are cooked at 500 degrees for just a few minutes. At 500 degrees, burning dinner is too easy, so for these scapes (which I only have so much of), I set the oven to 400 degrees instead.

ROASTED GARLIC SCAPES

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and toss two-inch garlic scape pieces with olive oil and salt in a bowl.

2. With your fingers or tongs or chopsticks, transfer pieces onto a baking sheet with raised edges. Don't pour them out from the bowl because you don't want excess oil on the sheet. Space the pieces out and try to put the thicker sections at the edges of the group.

3. Put the baking sheet in the oven (middle rack is fine) and stay in the kitchen. After about 5 minutes, check the pieces. If they are lightly browning and starting to smell aromatic, mix them around a little bit and roast more, checking after about 3 minutes or so. If they aren't browning, just give it more time, checking every two to three minutes or so.

4. Take out when a majority of the pieces are browned and wilted, 10 minutes maximum (though every oven is different). Use as a garnish or in pasta, frittata, in tacos, on pizza (put it on last minute) or rice dishes.

(If you want to try roasting green beans, asparagus or garlic scapes at 500 degrees, you'll get crazy dark marks which translates into flavor. One step too far, though, and your food is burned. To do the scapes at 500 degrees, consider parboiling first. Pat dry and then continue on as above. Cooking times are a lot quicker though. Check after a minute and a half. Definitely don't leave the kitchen!)

What's your favorite way to prepare garlic scapes?

Lucky Peach is a brand new food mag!

2011-06-07T20:40:00.000-07:00

Usually I don't buy on impulse. I'll wait days, weeks, months before making a purchase. The exception is usually food.

There's a brand new food magazine coming out this month: Lucky Peach. I just found out about it yesterday and I'm a subscriber. Issue 1, with a focus on ramen, will be here soon.

Design-conscious McSweeney's is publishing this magazine quarterly with a different food focus each time. I love the cover and I love ramen. Harold McGee, author of On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of Cooking, the indispensable, no-nonsense guide to food science, is weighing in, along with other experts and artists.

Though I love food, I'm not interested in Home and Garden-type food magazines at all and Lucky Peach doesn't seem like one of those. I received a gift subscription during Christmas to another food magazine, Diner Journal, which I love and would recommend for its design and obvious reverence for food. The writing in Diner is interesting, but pretty casual. In Lucky Peach, I'm hoping for a similar enthusiasm but more rigor with the articles.

Also, in 2011, with people on the Internet all the time (me included), I appreciate print. Back in the mid-2000s, a new food mag, Chow, debuted and stopped publication after a few issues. I regretted not subscribing back then. They are now online only, at http://www.chow.com/.

I'm nostalgic for print work, so I'm subscribing.

UPDATE: I just received the first issue of Lucky Peach Wednesday, June 29. So far, I love it.

Emergency Hekka

2011-05-21T15:15:00.000-07:00

We know a secret spot where watercress grows wild, looking like a weed to most, but like the first step on the road to hekka to us.

According to the cookbook, "What Hawaii Likes to Eat," hekka is based on sukiyaki, a dish with a sauce made of shoyu, sugar and mirin. The cookbook author says the dish was created by sugar plantation workers who used the sauce and whatever else they had on hand.

For me, hekka always had to have watercress and aburage, some kind of meat, usually chicken or pork, and it was served over rice. This is one of my favorite dishes. The watercress adds a flavor you can't recreate with anything else.

I think my love for watercress comes from my mom who loves it raw as much as she likes it cooked.

Mmm.

Surprisingly, watercress on a simple cheese pizza is wonderful.

Hekka

1. Stir fry thin-sliced meat in some hot oil for a minute of two. Add a chopped onion and cook for a few minutes. Carrots can be added here. Small pieces. Mushrooms (like shiitake) too.

2. Mix up a 1/3 cup each of brown sugar, shoyu and mirin. Instead of mirin, I used rice vinegar.

3. Lower the heat and simmer for five minutes or so.

4. Add ingredients that just need to be warmed through like aburage and bamboo shoots. Lastly, add a big bunch of watercress. I cut the lengths into three pieces. I add the bottom third first, then the middle section and then the top goes in.

5. Serve over rice. Chopped raw sweet onion or green onion tastes good for a garnish.

* I like the texture-variety mushrooms give in a dish like this. Shiitake would be the usual choice for me, but we used snowbank morels (see one of the mushrooms in the upper left corner of the dish). The mushrooms were fresh, so we cooked them separately with no oil or liquid. The fresh mushrooms give off a lot of liquid in the pan. After the liquid is cooked off, the mushroom flavor is concentrated and the meat is not soggy and retains a bite. We added them on top of the dish before serving.

How do you like your hekka?

Best breakfast: kalo and ulu

2011-04-07T18:44:00.000-07:00

Ulu and kalo with a little brown sugar and whipping cream.

Note the somewhat gelatinous upper layer and the more starchy looking inner section.

This makes a great dessert too. But, a scoop of Roselani haupia ice cream

on some warmed kalo is even better.

Don't the most simple foods taste the best?

hello kitty!

2011-04-05T20:58:00.000-07:00

my first strawberry hello kitty cake. next one will be easter themed. :)

suggestion.

2009-11-25T18:05:00.000-08:00

thinks eden should make pumpkin ice cream pie. gooo meeeek um.

Almond Biscotti

2008-01-06T01:41:00.000-08:00

You start with a pretty dry dough.

After the dough is not really cooked, but for the most part, set, you let the loaf cool and then slice into 3/4 inch pieces.

They are put back into the oven to dry out. The drier they get, the longer they'll keep.

They'll dry even more on a cooling rack.

What pretty little dunkers for my milk!

Ciabatta time

2007-12-16T13:52:00.000-08:00

Two of four loaves cooling on a rack.

What a lovely dough to work with.

Ciabatta, according to Carol Field's The Italian Baker, starts with biga, or a starter. Honestly, I've never worked with a starter. I've used sponges, but the point of the starter, I think, is to lend deep flavor. It was easy, and I consider it magical. When I added it in the dough the next day, it made the mixture immediately alive...and so, the dough was very responsive.

This is fun!

Pop pop pop

2007-12-02T14:19:00.000-08:00

Popcorn is cheap, easy and quick to make, and is scumptious. I like it popped in olive oil and covered in a little butter with some kosher salt and brown sugar.

Another good recipe: toss in sesame oil and shake furikake over it.

Any other suggestions?

yummy yummy, rub my tummy.

2007-11-29T22:45:00.000-08:00

I just had me some ahi steaks and poi! Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmie.
Can't wait for left overs!

Homemade Pappardelle

2007-11-25T21:14:00.000-08:00

Do you ever get down on yourself for not being productive? Eventhough it's stupid, sometimes I do. But for me, one thing that counterbalances all of those "I-never-do-anything" feelings is making noodles.

This batch came together with more ease than any other batch. The difference? I didn't use a recipe. I just made it by feel like Helen Keller.

I tossed them with a whole bulb of roasted garlic and fed it to myself and a living room full of hungry boys (2). I licked my lips and called it a night.

creme crackers

2007-11-24T17:52:00.000-08:00

I just got back from a long day in town. I fought the rush of people running around like christmas is tomorrow. But it's not people, so ease it. Anywho, I did some good eating today. I got the breakfast special from freddys for only $2.75. It's filling. Scrambled eggs, two scoop rice and your choice of meat. It gave enough energy to last the rest of the day to finish up my shopping.
I got a good strawberry smoothie from this lady named rosa. She sells pateles abd stuff down in Pahoa town. I'm sure she didn't make the smoothies but she made them nice and frozen and it was perfect to drink while we walked around the farmers market. It was hotter than hot today, more humid than humid. All I wanted to do after everything was go home and sleep. But of couse by the time I got home, I wanted to eat. So I got me some royal creme crackers. The best snack. It's good with hot cocoa too, but not today.

Pear Sauced!

2007-11-15T00:06:00.001-08:00

1. Get ye some pears.

2. Peel and core pears and cut into small chunks. Throw into a slow cooker with 1/4 cup of water per 15 pears and some lemon juice.

3. Slow cook on low for a day or until texture is to your liking.

4. Using an immersion blender in the bowl of the slow cooker, puree until very smooth.

To can Pear Butter...

1. Fill a water bath canner (basically a huge stock pot) with water and boil glass jars. When boiled, lift out with jar lifter one by one and let excess water drain from jar.

2. Putting a wide mouth funnel over the jar, fill the jars with a ladle leaving 1/2 inch space.

3. Cover with the lid and screw top ring.

4. Place in the water bath canner on the rack and boil for 20 minutes covered.

5. Pear butter is sealed when you hear the "plink" and when you see that the lid is sucked in. Let sit on the counter for 24 hours.

6. Spread on toast.

Lentil Shiitake Afternoon Soup

2007-11-15T00:05:00.001-08:00

for two

2 small handfuls lentils
water to cover
1 teaspoon dehydrated onions
1 bay leaf
1 each sweet potato and carrot, peeled and cut into chunks of similar sizes
olive oil
3 shiitake mushrooms
1-2 teaspoon cumin seeds
a small handful of pasta like corkscrew, orzo or similar

1. Fill a stockpot with the lentils, bay leaf and the dehydrated onions. Cover with a few inches of water. Bring to a boil and then lower to simmer. Simmer for 1 1/2 to 2 hours until lentils are past tender but not mushy. Don’t mix it up, stir gently ocassionally. Add more water when most of it is evaporated. I added water two more times.

2. Pre-heat the oven to 425. Toss sweet potato and carrot with olive oil. Lightly salt and place in oven until edges are browned and crisp and the raw carrot smell and taste is gone.

3. While the vegetables roast, rehydrate the shiitake mushrooms in boiling hot water. Cover and let sit.

4. Puree potato and sweet potato until big chunks are gone, but it does not have to be smooth. Add to soup.

5. Cut mushrooms up ( I like chunky slices) and add to soup. Add shiitake broth. Continue to simmer.

7. Heat a small amount of olive oil in pan to medium high. Again, I use my cast iron skillet. Fry cumin seeds in oil, watching carefully. It might be best to fry at the perimeter of the pan to regulate heat. They are done when they start to pop and release a smoky but not burnt smell. They will be dark. Transfer to a small plate to cool and taste to make sure there is no burnt taste. Add to soup.

8. While the soup continues to simmer, boil a small amount of pasta in salted boiling water if desired. Cook just under al dente as the pasta will continue to cook in the warm soup. If everyone is hungry and ready to whack up the soup, add the drained pasta in the soup. Otherwise, stir in to each serving.

9. Ladle soup into bowls and top with a small amount of olive oil.

Le Cafe De Paris Boise, Idaho

2007-11-08T22:57:00.000-08:00

We started with mixed olives from different countries. The Spanish ones, which were green and had a tender orange pepper in it were my favorites. I love olives!

Filet mignon, morelle mushrooms demiglace, sweet potato mashed potatoes, mixed veggies. Usually, my favorite part of meals at restraunts are the extras, the appetizers, the desserts, the side salads. This time, though, the main course, which actually consisted mostly of meat, was thoroughly enjoyed. The meat was tender and flavorful — the taste reminded me of hot potatoes. The edges were extra good. The mushrooms, rare to find and expensive, were savored. I wish there were more of them. The taters were very yummy. Good mashed potatoes made even better with a little sweet potato.

Lemon meringue torte was presented in a clean and neat way. Our first thought though, without consulting each other, was blood. It kind of tasted like blood. I think the torte should have been room temp., but I'm not French so what do I know. It was accompanied by dots of grainy chocolate sauce, same chocolate, I think that went into my hot cocoa. Interesting combo.

The waitress was consistently nice, which always adds to a better restraunt experience. The other desserts in the glass case looked enticing. We passed up many chocolatey desserts.

Real French, French-speaking patrons were there next to us. Their table was covered in a sea of glasses. The food wasn't bad, in fact it was good, but it portrays itself as being authentic, while It's somewhat faux fancy.

I would return.

Sushi Etiquette

2007-11-03T16:15:00.001-07:00

The Japanese Tradition: Sushi

here.

Interesting. Funny. Strange. Entertaining. How food should be.

Funny Food Marketing

2007-10-22T18:35:00.000-07:00

Vegetable mascots!

Cookies From Scratch

2007-10-14T22:55:00.000-07:00

An overcast day in Flora.

Lu and I took a pioneer skills class, Cookies the Pioneer Way. We churned butter, grinded flour, steeped vanilla beans to make vanilla, learned how to dry raisins, sifted baking powder together and grated turbinado sugar to sweeten the cookies. We cooked the cookies on a griddle on a wood fire stove.

The class was held in a town that is considered a ghost town in Wallowa County, Flora — population 8. Nine in the summer time. Nearby is Flora School. The owners are trying to restore it and are doing so by teaching these classes.

Flora School was built in 1915 in the Craftsman style. The school closed down in 1975.

Churning heavy cream in an old-fashioned glass jar butter churn to make butter. It took 1 and a half hours for 2 quarts of cream to turn into butter.

You must separate the buttermilk from the butter.

Then, you must wash the excess buttermilk from the butter in a wooden bowl with a steady stream of cold water. The butter is shaped together with wooden paddles that have grooves or channels in them. Washing the buttermilk helps the butter keep longer. Once the water runs clear, the butter is lightly salted and then tasted.

Then, the butter is molded to set.

Grinding hard white wheat kernels into flour. After the grinding is done, the flour is sifted. The bigger pieces that don't grind still provide fiber in a diet, so it can be added to granola or oatmeal.

The dough came together after we made baking powder and vanilla.

The cookies on the griddle on the wood stove. You flip them like pancakes.

They were delicious. I'm going to eat one right now.

A Pok Pok dinner on SE Division in Portland

2007-10-02T21:01:00.000-07:00

We went to Pok Pok last Saturday night. We had the house peanuts to start. It was toasted with Thai chili peppers and kaffir lime leaves and tossed with sea salt.

Drinks: Naam Oi (sugar cane juice drink) and Cha Yen (Thai Tea with condensed milk)

Dinner is served family style. Portions are smaller — the point being that the diners get to taste a small amount of lots of dishes, not just one or two. I picked Muu Sateh, basically very tender pork kebabs "larded" with a tiny piece of fat. It's served on skewers with a simple cucumber and onion relish, a peanut sauce, fresh Chinese parsley and little squares of toast. Lu picked a Northern Thailand curry dish that was served in a clay pot. The meal looked deceptively simple — just big pieces of pork belly and pieces of pork shoulder, some snake beans, picked garlic and a dark brothy sauce. It reminded me of hekka.

Each bite was full of flavor. Layers of flavor. In the menu, there was a description of what was in the dishes and we tried to taste each. The unified flavor of the dishes were not muddled. Every aspect of the meal seemed very intentional. We were provided with hand wipes for after the meal because some of the food was to be eaten by hand. Usually I hate the strong smell of wipes, but these smelled lemony and nice.

Even the water was great. It had a slight taste of coconut to it. Maybe coconut water, not milk, had been added. The water was served in these cool metal cups that look just like plastic disposable cups and the water was not overy iced. It was just perfect. Also, since we're getting into fall and it's getting cold, outdoor heaters were set up to keep all the diners warm while they ate outside.

I liked our seating. We were outside on a landing at the top of steps leading to the "Living Room" which is indoor seating for large parties of 5 or more. We were kind of scrunched together, but that definitely added to the ambiance.

I liked the chairs too. They seemed salvaged.

Dessert was black sticky rice with a coconut custard, maybe the best part of the meal. I loved the contrast between the dark rice and the light color of the custard and the coconut milk. And also the contrast between the occassional crisp bite of rice and the delicate texture of the custard.

Being a sucker of Thai food and cleverness, I'd have to say that Pok Pok is my new favorite restaurant in Portland.

Bento Art

2007-09-13T20:13:00.000-07:00

yummy!

What a delightful way to spend your lunch break!

Click on the months up above to see all the different bentos.

(via)

Ensemada Buns

2007-09-12T20:10:00.000-07:00

Sans the butter. Ooh la la. In snails and in knots.

grapes.

2007-09-08T22:07:00.000-07:00

i love my grapes.
but i don't like raisins.
and i don't like wine.

i just like grapes.
so today, when i went into the fridge to get my grapes out (that i had just purchased two days ago), i thought it was odd that it was half empty and smelt all wine-ie. i didn't think anything of it cause i had my mind set oneating grapes. anywho, i tried to pick out all the gross ones and then i noticed that these grapes had huge seeds in them. long story short, these grapes where from the begining of august. grossed me out. i dumped them out, cleaned the bowl, washed my hands a million-ka-billion times and then i found the GOOD GRAPES. in the end i got my grapes. but this whole experience reinforced my dislike for raisins and wine.
the end.

Cookie Monster

2007-09-08T15:44:00.000-07:00

Chocolate chocolate cookies

Hand-chopped Pesto with Toasted Cashew

2007-09-05T22:30:00.000-07:00

Basil and garlic from the farmers market, oven toasted cashews, parmesan cheese, olive oil.

Thanks, Lu!

Ensemada You?!

2007-09-02T13:40:00.000-07:00

HO, bra. There are certain foods I want to make but I inject myself with trepidation over making them because when food fails it doesn't taste good but also, I hate wasting so I always make an effort to consume the monstrosities and the winners.

I always felt I couldn't recreate the fluffy goodness of ensemadas, but I came close last night and it was one of the easiest breads I'd ever made. It accompanied our dinner of pork teriyaki kebabs, Hawaiian style, rice and fresh grilled corn on the cob from the Farmers Market. Lucas was impressed with the amount of butter I let us have.

This morning, we had more ensemadas for breakfast on our front steps while we discussed the future.

Pau Hana Snack

2007-08-30T17:19:00.000-07:00

Diamond Head Coconut Cream Crackers and 'Ohelo Berry Jam (berries, sugar, lemon juice) from Hirano Store on Hwy. 11 on the Big Island.

i'm back....

2007-08-29T19:42:00.000-07:00

soooo. i've been M.I.A. for ages. and i know all you faithful readers have missed me. a.k.a e and luke. right? right. HAHA!

ok now to the food.

as a family, we decided to cut down on our meat in-take. which is a huge step for the parentals. i have no complaints at all. i love not having to see bloody, fatty slabs of cow meat lying on my plate.

my newest meat love is an 'ahi steak. well it's probably called something other than a steak, but it's real good. mom prepares it just like she would an actual moo-cow steak, but it tastes ONE HUNDRED times better. i don't even need to eat rice with it! amazing.

so, to sum it up. go out, buy a slab of fish and eat it.

Comfort Food

2007-08-26T18:09:00.000-07:00

Maruchen saimin with Kohala brand Kim Chee. The best.

Alexis

2007-08-23T12:01:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite restaurants ever is Alexis in Portland on Burnside.

The food is great, there is always a nice friendly host that seats you, I think maybe he is usually the owner. The waiters and waitresses don't act like they're better than you and the curtains are made out of strung wine corks. The restaurant is nice and cozy with old looking wooden floors, low lighting and unpretentious tables and general restaurant decoration. There is an enlarged photo of an older Greek couple on one of the main walls, maybe the owners or the parents of the owners.

My favorite thing on the menu is marinated octopus. It is so tender and delicious. The lamb is wonderful too. Tender and lamby.

I highly recommend Alexis.

Uwajimaya Hawaiian Plate: Lau lau, kalua pig, rice, lomi lomi salmon

2007-08-22T22:11:00.000-07:00

I got my wish and had the first lau lau I've eaten since for a long time. Too long. It was not the best I've had but at least it wasn't dry and it wasn't tiny. Lots of meat, though. Couldn't really taste the butterfish and no sweet potato or yam.

I had to tell Luke not to eat the ti leaf.

The lomi salmon was very delicious, but different than I'm used to. The salmon was cut in huge unruly chunks unlike the orderly cubes I'm used to. I think they used smoked salmon instead of salted salmon, but it was still very good.

All it was missing was POI!!!!
Yum.

Red things from the garden

2007-08-15T20:14:00.000-07:00

I guess we're still in a mood for pasta. Very strange and un-American right?

This recipe is from the Splendid Table. It's a very basic idea, but so different from what I know of multi-ingredient sauces, luscious and savory. This one was a raw sauce. Extrememly simple to make. Cut up a few tomatoes, we used romas that were given to us and romas (see below) from our very own garden. Let the tomatoes sit with some olive oil, salt, and chili flakes for a while. When the pasta is almost cooked, you drain them and add the juices from the tomatoes to the noodles and they soak up the flavor. Then you toss the noodles with the rest of the tomatoes and simplicity is transformed into an edible tribute to tomatoes.

Yum.

The Noodle Itself

2007-08-11T20:57:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while, I try to plan a really nice meal. I had been wanting to make pappardalle with mushrooom wine sauce for a while.

We used an Italian wine from Bella Market in Baker City. It's called Barbera. The color is a gorgeous deep plum-red. The taste is multi-layered in a very clever and subtle way. Hard to explain because I don't have lots of experience tasting wine. Why the rubber corks though? Poor Portugal.

The recipe for the actual noodles was a new one. Unlike other recipes I've tried, this one had only eggs and no olive oil. It was hard to work with so Lucas stepped in and helped with his brute strength. Making handmade pasta is hard, but I think something worth it to try to perfect. I think it didn't help that the eggs were very cold and not room temp. I didn't realize how important that was until a while ago.

The recipe I referenced called for porcini mushrooms but we couldn't find them so we used dried shiitake mushrooms plus crimini mushrooms.

It was yummy. In pasta dishes with fresh handmade noodles, I always think that the noodle itself is the star of the meal. The texture, the chewiness is so grand.

All the dish lacked was a little fresh parmesan and the onions would have been a little better carmelized.

We gobbled this up.

My Tomatoes Are Gorgeous

2007-07-29T11:50:00.000-07:00

I'm growing two roma tomato plants and one "Sun Gold" cherry tomato plant. Lots of flowers on all of them. We ate that red one last night and it was so good. Sweet unlike the hit and miss tomatoes you can get at grossery stores.

The Pizza Which Grills at Midnight

2007-07-24T22:17:00.001-07:00

I thought figuring out baked pizza was a great accomplishment of mine, but now that I have made midnight grilled pizza, I think of regular baked-in-the-oven pizza as boring and cumbersome to prepare.

My dad once "cooked" a frozen pizza on the grill. I thought that was magical enough.

But this one is made from scratch!

Griled pizza requires you to simplify. Isn't it true that when most people think about their favorite pizza, they think about the toppings they like or the extremely complicated combination of toppings places like Dominos and Pizza Hut promotes with close-up photography and crazy commercials?

My version of grilled pizza, has a pretty thin crust to ensure quick cooking. If the crust were piled heavy with handfuls and handfuls of cheese and toppings like Canadian bacon, onions, sausage, pepperoni, peppers, etc., the thick thing would take a long time to meld together evenly, and one might even end up with a gooey doughy center in the crust. The aim is to melt and meld the flavors of the topping, not to steam the crust. This means less sauce too.

So midnight grilled pizza goes like this: add 1/4 teaspoon yeast and 1/2 teaspoon salt to 2 1/2 cups flour. Slowly add 1 cup of hot water (110 to 125 degrees or so) to the mixture. Start with a wooden spoon or a spatula then start kneading with floured hands. Knead still smooth and elastic.

Let rise in an oiled bowl until doubled in size, 1 to 1 1/2 hours depending on the ambient temperature of your kitchen. Cover with several thicknesses of thin cloth like a flour sack towel, a plastic bag like a clean produce bag or a big plastic lid much bigger than bowl. When doubled in size, knead again. After about 30 or 45 minutes of rising, divide the dough in half.

Meanwhile, preheat your grill. A wood fire is best. Start to roll dough into a flat round about 12 inches in diameter, and about 1/4 inch thick. Grease dough with olive oil or spray grill grate with oil spray.

Place the dough onto the hot grill and let it cook for about 30 seconds. Flip with a metal spatula. Lu uses his hands because they are natural ove gloves.

When flipped, work fast. Spread dough with toppings. I like to put down a layer of olive oil first, then the sauce, then the cheese. For this batch, we did one with mozzarella and mushrooms and one with mozzarella, sheep's milk feta and freshly ground pepper.

If you've caught the grill at a good time (a mystery to me that I'll let Lu figure out), the cheese will melt nicely and you'll have a crispy, smoky pizza to share with good root beer in front of the tv while some life-changing movie plays.

ENJOY!

It's hot hot hot

2007-07-05T22:10:00.000-07:00

Today was a very hot day. It is also my five-year anniversary with Lu. We planned on having salmon and Lu's famous (to my belly) garlic mashed potatoes, but as my post title says, It was hot today. Extremely so. Almost too much to bear, so we did not want the oven on.

So instead, we took a stroll after the sun went down and then ate a small dinner. Vinta crackers, white cheddar cheese and homemade chocolate shakes.

Homemade key lime pie for dessert. We made it yesterday.

Maybe tomorrow we'll have salmon, but tonight's little snack dinner was delicious. We listened to Elvis Costello's Trust on vinyl. Lu gave me a painting he did of us and everything was a-ok.

Stout Muffins

2007-07-04T14:19:00.000-07:00

This morningish, we made these muffins that contain dates, brown sugar, and Guinness stout beer. They are so delicious.

We promise to gobble them up.

Won Ton Ravioli

2007-06-29T22:30:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, Lu made me won ton ravioli. He stuffed won ton wrappers with sweet potato, ricotta, parmesan and basil. He made so much filling, we had the ravioli three ways for three different meals. For the first dinner, the ravioli were boiled and topped with a cream, basil and parmesan sauce with extra basil and cheese for garnish.

The next day, he fried the ravioli, and for yet another meal, the ravioli were baked. I didn't get tired of it.

P.S. I have to get better at food photography if that is possible.

Bacon Fat

2007-06-22T18:59:00.000-07:00

My sister thinks its strange that she prefers to eat papaya for dinner. Papaya and probably 7-up, right a-bean? Well, it's strange, but not for her. Okay, not for us.

I love raw vegetable or fruit meals. It's uplifting, is it not?

I love to eat half of an avocado, right from it with a silver spoon. After you take out the enormous seed, you're left with a small bowl to add maybe a little, pequeno, li'i li'i olive oil, salt and pepper. Or maybe some white sugar or honey (spread on a sweet roll to make your own ensemada!).

For my 19th birthday, my dad and I drove two hours to get to this small grove of old avocado trees. We left early in the morning. My dad made a long fruit picker for the ocassion. The net was made out of an old canvas bank deposit bag threaded on to a thick wire hoop. We picked so many avocados! Maybe six or seven bags full.

We ate them forever! Last summer, he made an avocado pie, kinda like a sweet potato pie, and I never tasted it because I was in Oregon. I hope it was green.

A-bean, at least you're not eating bacon fat every night!

i told you i don't know how to write.

2007-06-05T16:49:00.000-07:00

i like papayas. i don't know why. i never use to like them as much as i do now. but they're really good. if you there is a local farmers market in your area, go buy some. we can six to seven papayas for $1. yes one dollar. that can feed me dinner for a week. oh yah, i only like to eat papaya for dinner. super duper odd. i know. i believe they sell papaya by the pound if you buy it from a grocery store, which means you'll only be able to afford eating papaya cause they'll charge you like two dollars for one. what a rip. so support your local farmers, they actually work hard for a living.

Cat Food

2007-06-02T08:40:00.000-07:00

Warning: this post isn't going to make you salivate unless you like to eat birds, feathers and all.

Everyone eats. Some whales siphon the sea for tiny plants called plankton. Apparently, monkeys eat bananas and rabbits eat carrots almost exclusively (my attempt to poke a length of fun at popular culture stereotypes at 8:43 in the morning).

What does the homeless cat who meows at my screen door eat? Well, sometimes he gets a scrap of food from me, but how does he stay strong and healthy? Two nights ago, I saw Chia, as we call him, catch a bug and eat it up. I thought that was cute. Yesterday wasn't so adorable though.

Chia was lazing about under the neighbor's porch. He had been absent all day where usually he will greet us, lie at our feet, and try to force his way into our house. I squatted to peek into his shady lair and I saw a gray bird standing there with its back to me. Chia is such a bundle of kittyness, that for a second, I figured that Chia and this bird had been telling each other campfire stories all day. This was their fort.

Then, Chia tackled the bird. And the bird made a sound and it wasn't "tweet tweet."

I love birds and I love life. I considered rescuing the bird as if I could. But, I walked away, and I'm glad that Chia can feed himself because no one else is (he was abandoned by our former neighbors!).

It's a strange and wondrous world.

Spam Musubi Variations

2007-05-30T23:35:00.000-07:00

Spam musubi is popular in Hawai'i. Apparently 7 million cans of spam are sold in Hawai'i per year. Oh, the things that ail us. Seven million tourists come to Hawai'i a year too.

Spam musubi is a handheld tasty package of fried spam and rice wrapped in dark, iridescent green nori (seaweed paper).

When I was younger, I liked to eat the musubi without the wrapper, and now, because I have joined the crowd in being suspicious of spam, and because I'm not much of a meat eater anyway, I haven't eaten the spam part of spam musubi for about 6 years. The last one was yummy though; I had it in Tacoma late at night.

But I will never fret because like sandwiches, pasta, and fried rice, musubi is the kind of food that is open to experimentation. The whole deliciousness of spam musubi is that the juices from the fried spam is absorbed into the plain white, room temperature rice. Other food items can soak into rice too.

I've marinated and fried tofu making shoyu-tofu musubi. I've made veggie hot dog musubi. Okay, I know this doesn't sound good to anybody (not to Lucas and my other meat-coveting buddies). You could make bacon musubi. But what really sounds good is some kind of fritter musubi. Some kind of mushroom, bean sprout, and potato fritter or maybe a mini omlette musubi.

In the meantime, just remember children, you can sell spam musubi to your classmates for a dollar each as long as you don't get caught. And if the manapua man has been driving around all day with his saran-wrapped musubis displayed in the window, you better watch out.

Finally some rice

2007-05-29T22:13:00.000-07:00

I want to celebrate for a day last week that I had good Korean food at Toeshi's Teriyaki and Korean Restaurant in Kennewick, Washington. Finally something palatable!

First of all, they played Beck, Elliott Smith, and I think a Sade song too.

I chose the usual. Mandoo and vegetable tempura with a side of kim chee. One thing about this restaurant, it didn't just serve Korean food. It also served Japanese food because I think Japanese food is just a tad bit more accessible in the minds and palates of Kenniwickians (But, ai-yah, tempura is Portuguese!). But, I do believe that the owners or at least the people who served us and greeted us were Korean. Which matters to me. Call me on it if you want. Let's talk about it.

It wasn't the best Korean and Korean-style Japanese food I had ever had, but I hadn't had Korean food in months, so of course, I really appreciated it.

We also had ginger tea served in pretty tea cups with matching saucers. At first I thought there were three lemon seeds floating in the tea, probably because lemon is a common tea add-in, and I did think that the tea tasted lemony. The beverage was warm, and at once sweet and spicy. Upon closer observation, I found that the "lemon seeds" were actually pine nuts. The nuts were such a great and subtle complement to the tea. The taste of the pine nuts stayed with me while I chose fabric and while we drove home.

so yah...

2007-05-29T17:50:00.000-07:00

i'm not not the cook of the family. those genes were all given to eden. my specialty is rice. oooooo and i make some goooooood teriyaki spam musubis. and yes, i am a picky eater. most of the time i'm not up for trying funky dishes. but if i like something and i can't stop eating it, then it must be good. or odd. or something.
***oh and i'm not the writer of the family either. those genes were also all giver to eden. so don't mind my mess.

McDonald's Ketchup

2007-05-25T12:28:00.000-07:00

Food is much more than a necessity for me and I try not to treat eating as a habit that I must fit into my day.

I am critical of what I eat and of what restrauants and I admit, people serve me, but I don't want to be a typical food snob.

I appreciate that people have fond taste memories connected to food like canned corned beef hash or McDonald's french fries. I mean, the food went in their mouths, and travelled throughout their bodies.

But, I want to rail against corporate and careless food too. I want to think about why I am enjoying what I am eating; I don't want an advertisement campaign to guide me. Yet. I know I'll be tricked into eating at the Olive Garden at least once this year. I'll try to like it. We'll see.

My food foil is my little sister, Ashley. She doesn't cook like I do, and I once embarrassed her by reading out loud the ingredient list of a packet of McDonald's ketcup. She doesn't want to analyze like I do. Where I gulp drinks, shovel food, and gain weight, she will patiently assemble her plate with proper dainty portions and will pick at her food, leaving me the leftovers. And so, when Ashley raves about food, I know she's being serious.