Stuff I cooked a while ago

June 16, 2019 12:27 PM

I meant to write this blog post over two weeks ago. Then I got really busy, and I went on vacation, and now I don't really remember what I wanted to write about. But I have all these pictures so I should at least show them to you, and maybe looking through them will help jog my memory.

Remember how I subscribed to Misfits Market to get veggies delivered regularly? Well, I canceled it a while ago, but they did send me an email asking me to use their service again AND they gave me a complimentary box. I kind of feel bad because half of this box went to waste. It wasn't my fault though. The produce was sitting in transit for way too long and by the time it was delivered, the ice packs were completely melted, and the spring mix looked really sad. So, yeah, this free box didn't convince me to sign up again.

But, I did get an eggplant that I could use. I really like stir fried eggplant so I made Chinese Eggplant with Garlic Sauce. I know I didn't have any spicy bean paste or ground pork at the time, but it still tasted good without those ingredients.

And to go along with the Asian theme, I made some Sesame Chicken. This is a pretty old Budget Bytes recipe, and it was recently updated to double the sauce. I don't think it needs nearly that much sauce, so I would actually cut it in half now. So easy to make though, and very delicious.

It's really hard to tell from the picture of produce, but I did get some zucchini in a bag (why some things get put in bags, and others don't, I have no idea). Zucchini is not my favorite vegetable, as it reminds me too much of college cafeteria food, but turning it into Zucchini Fritters makes them a little better.

While I'm not a huge fan of zucchini, I really don't like butternut squash. It just tastes like a cross between a sweet potato and a pumpkin, but somehow much worse than either of those. I also don't know what I'm supposed to do with it except roast it or turn it into soup. They also take forever to cut up, which makes them not worth it to cook at all. But hey, this was free and I didn't want to waste it.

I do love salmon, though! This recipe came from a book, so I can't exactly provide a link. I still haven't quite mastered the art of baking salmon. I think I may have put it in the oven at 350 or 400 degrees for 10 minutes, and then broiled it for 5. This was waaay overcooked, but at least the rub was really tasty.

Also mango salsa to go on top of the fish! Because I had mangoes in the box!

For some reason I thought the mango salsa would go with the sesame chicken. I don't think I'd pair the two again.

Oh yeah, I also made collard greens (because it was in the box!), but I neglected to take a picture of the collard greens by itself.

Not box related at all, but I also cooked Shrimp Scampi Florentine, with some pasta added. This dish is always delicious.

I had a dinner with friends where we all made pizza. Anytime I get to choose my own pizza toppings, I will always choose BBQ chicken. For some reason every time my family orders pizza, they ask me what pizza topping I want, I tell them barbecue chicken, and they give me a look and proceed to not get any barbecue chicken. It's okay. I can just make my own.

And finally, here's one last picture of that chicken rice skillet. Because I must have had leftovers from the week before and this picture looks nice.

And that concludes this long, not-very-cohesive post. Honestly, it'll probably be a while until my next post because my schedule is crazy and I'm not going to have too much time to cook. Maybe once the summer is over!

Bánh Xèo

March 3, 2019 10:20 AM

My friend came over and we tried to make Bánh Xèo. We used this recipe from Hungry Huy. Here is a progression of how things went as we tried to make yellow pancakes.

Attempt #1

We poured too much batter in this.

Attempt #2

I don't know, we probably still used too much batter again. And the heat may have been too high.

Attempt #3 & #4

Heeey, look the third one didn't totally fall apart. And I think we finally figured out that the meat and onions needed to be on only one side of the pan, so it was easier to fold the pancake in half.

Many attempts later...

Yeah! We finally made it look nice! I'll have to make this again in the future, but I'll probably see if I can find a different recipe. Or at least cook the meat separately from the pancake.

Oh yeah, we had extra batter so we cooked the rest of the pancakes the next day.

Happy New Year!

February 5, 2019 4:52 PM

I know we had fish tacos yesterday, but our official new year's celebration happened on Sunday, making and cooking dumplings.

Our dumpling filling consisted of ground pork, onions, and chives. We actually had to look in three different grocery stores just to find ground pork. Giant Eagle only had a pound left and Whole Foods sells pork for $5.99/lb! It's a good thing I have a lot of grocery store options.

My friend also made a filling with ground turkey and carrot. It kind of reminded me of shumai.

We pan fried the pork dumplings and boiled the turkey dumplings. Everything was delicious. Next time I think I'll up the ratio of chive to pork. I love chives.

All in all, it was a successful dumpling party. I definitely want to have more of these in the future.

Dumpling Party

January 26, 2019 10:45 PM

I know they call them "pot stickers" but you really don't want them to stick to the pot. Because then you can't take them out of the pot, and you end up with dumplings that are missing bottoms.

We switched to a non-stick pan for the second batch. I guess you can't really tell from the picture though, since the bottoms are hidden.

One of my friends made a pretty salad to go with the dumplings. Apparently he was supposed to use green onions, but Aldi was out of them so he used red ones instead. Red onion is not a good substitute for green onion.