Red curry with chicken
January 27, 2022 9:12 PM
Along with the cream of mushroom, my aunt also left me large container of curry (to eat) and a tiny container of red curry paste (to cook). I wanted something simple, so I searched Budget Bytes for a curry recipe and I decided to make Braised Thai Coconut Curry Chicken Thighs.
Budget Bytes isn't really the place I turn to for Asian recipes, but I still like her take on them. They aren't as flavorful as I want, so whenever her recipes call for soy sauce or fish sauce, I know I need to quadruple that amount.
The other thing I did to increase flavorful-ness was add salt to the chicken. Another tip I got from Salt Fat Acid Heat is to season your chicken with salt well in advance. I seasoned these chicken thighs with salt about 8 hours before cooking. I also added peas because I didn't think the dish had enough veggies in it as is.
I'm really happy with how this turned out! I thought the curry had a good amount of flavor with just the right amount of kick for me. And tossing green onions and cilantro on top right before serving adds a nice crunch to the dish.
Kung Pao Chicken
March 9, 2019 11:30 AM
I actually have no idea what Kung Pao Chicken even is, but I saw this recipe on Jessica Gavin's site and I basically had everything I needed to make it, so I figured why not.
We first had to make candied walnuts, and I took no part in this process since my sister knows how to do this, and if I were making this on my own, I would skip the walnuts altogether. I think it probably tastes better without the walnuts, anyway.
It did make the dish look nice though. Overall, the dish was very sweet and probably could have used something like fish sauce to give it a better flavor. But hey, this was certainly way cheaper and probably healthier than takeout.
Stir Fried Veggies and Chicken
February 23, 2019 6:26 AM
Somehow in all our cooking, I feel like we have too much food and not enough food at the same time. We're just always running out of vegetables! I am very adamant about having vegetables in every meal I cook. I can leave out meat, or I can leave out a starchy element, but I need vegetables. And I found myself going to the grocery store almost every day just because I needed more veggies.
So I decided to subscribe to a service that delivers produce on a regular basis. I kept seeing ads for Misfits Market on Facebook, and I wanted to give it a try. My first box contained the above produce and at full price, it's $23.50. This is what their site says:
We ship fresh, imperfect produce for up to 50% less than what you pay in stores.
I'll say this. The produce is probably better looking than what I get at Aldi, but definitely not cheaper. But then again, the Misfits Market produce is organic, and I never look at the organic section in Aldi.
But, on to the meal I cooked!
Since I had an eggplant, I needed an eggplant recipe. The first idea that came to my mind was to stir fry it, so I checked The Woks of Life and I saw Stir-fried Eggplant, Potatoes, and Peppers. I had some potatoes in my box of produce and some bell peppers in the fridge so that was perfect.
I always think of stir fry as a really easy method of cooking, but this was kind of complicated, with the putting things in the wok and taking them out, and putting them back in later.
And just because it is nice to have meat in my meals, I also made Thai Peanut Chicken from Budget Bytes. Chicken drumsticks are still on sale at Aldi! We added more fish sauce to the marinade and also upped the amount of soy sauce.
It was a lot more effort than I wanted to put in for a weeknight meal, but it was delicious.
Leftovers and Chicken
January 28, 2019 4:31 PM
I had a lot of rice in the fridge with no protein to go with it, and I also had chicken in the freezer.
I made Sweet and Spicy Glazed Chicken Thighs from Budget Bytes. It was super easy to make, and it tasted pretty good, but I thought it was missing something: fish sauce. That would have made it so much better.
