what's cooking? part 5: 2017-2027

holy hell, the sichuan cookbook is like $90 on amazon! i've seen some recipes for dan dan noodles that call for broad bean chile paste and some that don't. do any of you with dan dan experience have feelings about this one way or the other? i think i wanted to make this dish abt a year ago but never found that paste @ my local asian food store, then i just forgot about it.

oh wait I don't have the sichuan book, just Every Grain of Rice

I just made what has become the unofficial main dish of Paris: bo bun.

I can check out the Dunlap dan dan noodles. I can get fresh noodles pretty easily in my neighborhood.

The restaurant I go to puts in bok choy, I guess instead of mustard greens

I had to look up what bo bun is and the first article that came up from eater "what's the deal with all the bo bun in Paris."

A salmon dhansak is scheduled for tonight. Not sure how this will go.

Bo bun is rice noodles with a lemon & fish sauce sauce topped with peanuts and a meat or tofu. Beef is the mainstay topping here but I prefer pork because of the legendary pork salad at the Thai Café at St@nf0rd, RIP

Do you have a favorite bo bun in Paris that has tofu?

At any place that doesn’t just sell premade ones (those are common now), you can request tofu or a meat as you like. When I eat them outside the home it’s usually around the Sorbonne; I had a decent one on the rue Saint Jacques recently. But normally you’re better off in the 13th for Vietnamienne cuisine.

I feel like we have a hard time finding asian restaurants that have tofu in France. I think we have a couple of days in Paris in July, so I want to remember the sparkling water fountains and to try the bo bun

Damn I had no idea that Land of Plenty is out of print and going for $134 US on Amazon now; I've had it for years. It's good but not THAT good.

I live in a town now with a shockingly good asian grocery store for its size - I lived in a small place without one for over a decade so I still have to remind myself not to buy tons of everything when I go because I won't be back for six months. It's amazing to be able to get all kinds of fresh noodles, dozens of stir-fryable greens, thai basil, etc easily whenever I want to.

I lived in Oahu for half a year and one of the things I most miss is prevalent asian groceries in every supermarket. YUM.

Hmm, you may be right, but I don’t know, I don’t usually take tofu here. But often on menus it’ll be called soja.

Yeah, I eat everything but my partner doesn't. This is why we usually just go to Mme Shawn for tofu for him.

Tonight’s 101 Easy Asian Recipes pick was chicken adobo, which I hadn’t done before. I don’t have any proper points of comparison I don’t think but it tastes good!

I don’t think I’ve ever properly reduced a sauce though. Unless there’s actually no reason to boil down your sauce until it’s the consistency of pancake syrup. Is that even possible? Sauce is a complete mystery to me.

i also find sauce mysterious but the guideline i would start with is reducing takes way way longer than you expect

i love adobo, i was planning to try that recipe next too

fuck it, this has been on my wishlist forever and i just bought it: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/0470194960/?coliid=I3L0KGYII342ZT&colid=1P6XT5QYBLVO9&psc=0&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it

same, have not bought yet but thanks for the reminder

I have peterson's splendid soups. I texted the gumbo recipe to my friend in new orleans for a quick check, and he talked to me for the next two hours about how it was a recipe that could only have been conceived by the antichrist. Yet, I've always liked the other soups I've made from that book.

and the gumbo recipe is probably tasty, too. it's just hard to please everyone with such a broad sweep of a topic.

The black bean soup in that book is good.

I made ricotta using the recipe from Kenji's book and...I guess I did it wrong. Curds stuck together almost immediately and the end result was kind of chewy :(

Made oven-braised pork chops with red onion and pears, zucchini with anchovies and capers, plus my wife chipped in some delicious sauteed radishes. Good times!

I wouldn’t be surprised if I posted about this dish in the past but it was 90-something degrees today so for dinner I rinsed a can of cannellini beans, added a can of tuna in olive oil, sliced red onion, red wine vinegar, and flat leaf parsley and ate it with some bread and rose. Ten minutes of prep time and nothing to heat up

that sounds awesome, i'm saving it

I've been adding a crap ton of tumeric to everything because I went to the doctor and my uric acid levels were a little too high (so also cutting out wine for now). This weekend I made DUMPLINGS! again but they were tofu, tumeric, scallion, kale. Also did a salmon dhansak which came out well but the salmon had a lot of the properties as if we just used canned tuna.

I've got this new turmeric that is brighter yellow and makes longer lasting stains on everything it touches. but I love it. Night+Market fried peanuts with lime leaves, red pepper, lemon grass, etc. have changed my pad thai game. Long, complicated recipes are never too enjoyable for the person that eats them. So the key to enjoying my own cooking is putting all of the effort into toppings or additives that are delicious and can be added very simply to the recipe in the moment before eating. Or I guess just making stuff that reheats well.

ugh what great summer dishes should i make, help i'm going grocery shopping tonight someone hold my hand!!!!

Hot dogs n potato salad

pffft

Cmon that’s the most summery meal there is

i need to make a side dish for work picnic. no hot dogs, possible potato salad.

How about a cold asparagus rice salad.

I make this Lebanese Lemon-Parsley Bean Salad. vegan and gluten-free!

green papaya salad.

i had to do dinner for 7 tonight with about one day's notice so i busted out this absolutely classic two-hour pork ribs joint:

http://www.laweekly.com/restaurants/a-recipe-from-the-chefs-vinny-dotolo-and-jon-shooks-balsamic-barbecued-baby-backs-2378837

y'all this was SO GOOD and SO EASY i just can't believe it, i just used ground pork from the store

https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/ba-breakfast-sausage

oh, i like the look of that Lebanese salad up there. gotta remember that. xxpost

on holiday from school and moving in a couple weeks to my transfer school area ( i found an apt. this weekend, YAY!) so am making use of some ingredients on hand. even though it's supposed to be scorching tomorrow, i made a big batch of curried lentil soup, that i think is gonna rule. that's for tomorrow/rest of the week. tonight making eggplant pizza. my housemate has a thing for eggplant.

i made the lebanese salad for guests and have been munching on the remains for like a week. it's very tasty.

I pan cooked a thin-cut porkchop and put it on a King's Hawaiian hamburger bun with mayo and hoisin, A+

I order halal lamb and chicken over rice and cut up tomatoes and cukes for an extra side salad with lemon dressing. One order will make at least two meals for me so it's a good way to prepare lunch the day before.

That's the extent of my cooking in past months.

haha! i regularly do the same thing
although today i made (vegan!) spinach pies (in easy to use country-style phyllo) with onions, berbere, ginger, turmeric

it's my antidote for enduring food poisoning sunday-monday

(food poisoning was NOT from the place i usually get my meat/rice/tabouli/hummus fix)

I'm doing my first and hopefully last kitchen reno.

What are things you'd change about your kitchen layout and why?

Are you happy with your appliances?

Should I get a bright orange wall oven?

Yes to the last.

yes to orange oven
most annoying thing is that the trash can is too far from the cutting area. if i had my way they would be closer together.

Bright orange oven yes. If I could redo my kitchen, I would seal seal seal the spaces between all the appliances and counters and the floors. I hate food particles falling in between. Definitely a bigger double sink (I rarely use the dishwasher), built in wine cellar, prep space for two people, and integrated seating/hangout for when I am waiting for stuff to cook. I'm not really into spending a lot on appliances, as long as I have a gas burner and an inoffensive fridge, I'm good.

Although I do covet Smeg and Big Chill fridges.

most annoying thing is that the trash can is too far from the cutting area. if i had my way they would be closer together.

― weird woman in a bar (La Lechera), Tuesday, June 12, 2018 5:05 PM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is a good one.