I have the best sister
May 12, 2020 8:00 AM
Seriously. She cooks and bakes several dishes in a single day, and they're all delicious. She made sourdough bread, and then made grilled cheese using that bread.
Yeah, there's a lot of stuff in this grilled cheese. You can barely tell there's cheese.
But whatever. It was amazing. You know what else she made with her sourdough? Avocado toast. I didn't really understand the appeal of avocado toast before (or even the appeal of avocados at all), but my sister converted me and now I love avocados.
My sister has been making me these wonderful, aesthetic lunches which give me a nice moment of happiness during my stressful workday.
She even made me poutine! My family went to Canada for vacation and we never got poutine, and I was so annoyed, and ever since then I have been wanting poutine. I don't know how poutine normally tastes, but this poutine was delicious.
And finally, I needed to show off these hot dog buns. For some crazy reason, none of the Asian bakeries in town (okay, there's only one) sell hot dog buns. My sister has made this recipe a few times, and I think this her best batch yet! It was sooooo good.
Social Distancing: Days 39 - 41
May 4, 2020 8:00 AM
Day 39 (Sunday): So my sister really wanted to make Korean pizza. I don't even know what makes this pizza Korean except for the fact that we put some marinated beef on it.
But whatever. This was delicious. She even stuffed the crust with sweet potato!
Day 40 (Monday): The start of a busy workweek. So busy that I had my sister pretty much make all the dinners for the week. Starting with a Mediterranean-ish meal with some meat, roasted veggies, and a chickpea salad! I did prepare the dressing, so I contributed something! At first I was going to get some ground beef for this, but we decided to be way fancier.
Yup, look at how good that piece of lamb looks. It was a bit fatty but we like it that way.
Maybe not the most aesthetic dish when it's all put together, but it was delicious.
Day 41 (Tuesday): Before all of this coronavirus craziness, my sister, mom, and I were planning a trip to Ireland. Of course, that had to be cancelled. We were feeling a little sad about it, so we decided that we should make something Irish: Shepherd's Pie.
I didn't even know this was an Irish dish, but it's filled with meat and potatoes (and little bits of vegetables, even though I know you can't tell from the picture), so it makes sense. We may have had it under the broiler for a tad too long, but I think it tasted great.
Social Distancing: Days 33 - 35
April 28, 2020 8:00 AM
Day 33 (Monday): Every once in a while I feel the need to make a fried chicken sandwich. Because who doesn't love fried chicken sandwiches? I actually found a recipe on Budget Bytes for a baked chicken sandwich, but it looked like it was fried.
This meal was way bigger than I meant for it to be. We marinated the chicken in pickle juice overnight, which meant we had a jar of pickles with no juice, so we made fried pickles as well. My sister even made the buns from scratch.
But it was worth it. These sandwiches were really good, though I don't think they're quite as good as actual fried chicken sandwiches. I would definitely make them again.
Day 34 (Tuesday): So we actually were going to include sweet potato fries in Monday's meal, but we realized that was way too many things to cook. We moved it to Tuesday and paired it with a pork tenderloin. And...various leftover veggies because veggies are important.
I never actually posted this dish on my blog, but back when my sister was living with me last year, we baked pork and it was the best pork I've ever tasted in my life. We were hoping to replicate that here, but last year we used a pork shoulder and this time we used pork tenderloin. It was kind of dry. Lesson learned, never buy tenderloin. Always go for the butt. The pork butt, I mean.
Now those sweet potato fries were delicious. I'm definitely making them again.
Day 35(Wednesday): I was scrolling through food blogs and I saw a picture of some Bibimbap, and I don't know, but those fried eggs on top always get to me. So we decided to make some Bibimbap.
Bowl meals are great. Just get whatever ingredients you have on hand and chop them up and put them into little bowls and have a bowl party.
Delicious.
Social Distancing: Days 27 - 29
April 26, 2020 8:00 AM
Day 27 (Tuesday): Finally! Grocery shopping time! We go to Target since we need some non-food items, and then Trader Joes because Target is seriously lacking on actual food items. We made it to Trader Joes literally two minutes before the store closed. And I am pooped. My sister takes control of dinner because I am too exhausted to do anything else. Shopping is stressful during these times.
She made some Kimchi fried rice which was already on our list of things to make, but the lack of eggs made that harder. And you just need that egg on top. Look at how good that looks. It tasted great too.
Day 28 (Wednesday): We have eggs! And fruit! And other foods! It's amazing! Anyway, I had Mac n Cheese on my list of things to make, and we finally had the ingredients to make it.
What a classic American meal. This was pretty good, but I don't think I'll use shells if I make mac n cheese again. I guess I should have called this shells n cheese. They have a tendency to get inside each other.
Day 29 (Thursday): We still had leftover Indian food, but we were all out of naan, so my sister made some paratha, which is an Indian flatbread. She was so so so excited about it, and even more excited when she tasted it. It was deeelicious.
For dinner that night, we made burgers. I saw a picture of a burger a few weeks ago and since then it's been on my list of things to make.
You can never go wrong with a homemade burger. Burgers are always better when they're homemade.
I wanted a picture of one of us holding up the burger but it was way too messy. I guess that's a good thing though.
Stuff I cooked before Thanksgiving
January 12, 2020 8:14 AM
Happy New Year! This time I really haven't posted in a while. But I still took pictures of the food I've been making, and we're going to see how good my memory is. All of these things were made before Thanksgiving.
Bulgogi Tacos
In the previous post I made some bulgogi. Any time I make a new meat dish I have to see if it'll work well in a taco. It always works well in a taco.
Udon Noodle Soup with Chicken & Mushrooms - The Woks of Life
I've been on a no-instant-noodle diet since July (and until this coming July), because at the time I ate some really spicy instant noodles and totally regretted it, and I figured I was eating way too much instant noodle already that year. The problem is sometimes I just really want some noodle soup. This isn't a dish I'm completely comfortable with yet, so I looked for a super easy noodle soup recipe I could try. This was very good and very easy to make.
Ravioli with Sage Brown Butter Sauce - Budget Bytes
I actually make this dish all the time (in fact I'm eating it right now!) so at this point I don't even take a picture every time I make it. Sometimes when I'm at Aldi I look at all the interesting raviolis they have and I buy it just to make this recipe.
Quesadillas
What kind of quesadillas?! I don't even know! My guess is that it's barbecue chicken, because I think I had chicken left over from those noodles, and that looks like bbq sauce reside on the side of the plate. Oh by the way, that guac is homemade too. But not the pico de gallo. I bought that from Aldi. Aldi's pico is really bad. I don't recommend. But my quesadilla and guac? I'm sure it was delicious.
Carne Asada - Damn Delicious
I don't know how to cook steak. I don't really know why I have so much trouble with it, but this was such an ordeal to cook. The recipe said to put it in the broiler and cook for 5 minutes on each side, and I did that and it was still way below medium-rare temperature. I just kept cooking it longer, but it wasn't helping so I moved it to the stovetop. Maybe there's something wrong with my broiler. Maybe I'm not using the broiler correctly. Anyway, at the end of it, it was still delicious, and I made some great burrito bowls (plates?).
Taco Party
And for this last section, I had a lot of guests over, and you know what that means. Tacos! Tacos are delicious. What else can I say.
