I was looking forward for our last weekend visit to Killen because I was really planning on eating a turkey club at Shoneys. A few years back, Shoney’s was everywhere but sadly, there is no Shoney’s that is close to where we live.
Anyway, here’s my turkey club…
Who could resist this turkey club? It is made of toasted bread with bacon, turkey, lettuce, tomato and cheese? Of course this is big for me but hey what is the use of those to go boxes?
It is almost back to school for students. We all know how expensive it is to buy everything that a student needs for the school. The fact that we are in economic recession makes it even harder to find financial means to provide our kids with everything that they need.
Charter understands our predicament that is why for two months (starting July 15 - September 15), they are giving away a new laptop everyday! This Laptop-a-Day Sweepstakes is perfect for parents who are burdened with the back to school expenses. In addition to the laptop, Charter is also giving away gift cards.
The winners of this cool promotion will receive an HP 550 Notebook 15-inch with Windows Vista and a NeoTec Compu Backpack. The Gift Cards are from major retailers in clothing, home and accessories, restaurants and more!
Charter Communications is always committed to its customers and they always create a buzz around its online contests. When it comes to prizes on their contests, Charter have already given away laptops and Xbox 360 game systems and one customer drove away a 2009 Honda Civic Hybrid.
Visit charter.com today and register on their back2school laptop-a-day sweepstakes. You can also get updated with Charter by following Charter on Facebook or learn more about Charter’s newest buzz by following Charter on Twitter.
Ingredients: 1 (1.25kg) chicken For rubbing on cooked chicken: For garnishing: For rice: For soup: For chilli sauce: Method: Cooking rice: Cooking soup: Cooking chilli sauce: To serve:
2-3 fragrant screwpine leaves, tie into knot
1 pc (size of walnut) ginger, bruise
1 tsp salt
sufficient water to cover chicken
2 cloves garlic, grind fine
1 pc (size of walnut) ginger, grind fine
Add 1 tsp turmeric powder to above paste
salt to taste
1½ tsp honey
lettuce leaves
slices of cucumber and tomato
fried shallot
500g rice, wash and drain
2 shallots, chop fine
2 cloves garlic, chop fine
1½ tbsp sesame oil
2 fragrant screwpine leaves, tie into knot
chicken stock
chicken feet and gizzard
1 stalk Chinese celery, chop
2 stalks spring onion, chop
salt to taste
pepper
fried shallots, for garnishing
15 dried chillies, soak
10 red chillies
2 cloves garlic
½ cup water
Put the above chillies, garlic and water in liquidiser and grind fine
½ cup water
2 tbsp brown sugar
salt to taste
juice of 3 limesCooking chicken:
Put water, salt, screwpine leaves and ginger in a deep pot and bring to the boil. When boiling, add chicken and boil for 10 minutes. Remove chicken and put on dish.
Keep stock aside for cooking rice and for soup.
Rub ginger-garlic paste and salt over chicken while still hot.
Next, rub honey over it.
Heat oil for deep frying in wok. Add chicken and reduce heat to medium. Fry till brown.
Heat oil, add chopped shallots and garlic. When fragrant, add rice. Fry for 5 minutes, coating the rice grains with oil. Put rice into pot, add 2½ cups chicken stock and cook.
Re-boil left over chicken stock with chicken feet and gizzard. When boiling, add celery and spring onion. Add seasoning. Before serving, remove chicken feet and gizzard and garnish with chopped shallots.
Put ground ingredients in saucepan, add water, brown sugar and salt. Cook till thick. Remove from heat and add lime juice.
Chop chicken into pieces. Arrange on a bed of lettuce. Garnish with cucumber and tomato slices.
Sprinkle fried shallot over rice. Serve individual bowls of soup.
I grew up in a place where fish are plentiful. Fish is always a part of our daily meal. There are different kinds of fish that is available in our locality and we cooked it in different ways, that is why, we never get tired of eating fish.
When I got here in the USA, I was disappointed that the choices of fish is very limited. The only good thing that came out of the little choice that I have is, I learned to enjoy cooking different recipe using salmon.
One of my secrets for healthy cooking is using NAKANO All Natural Seasoned Vinegar. This vinegar has subtle and distinctive taste. It is made from real rice thus it is all natural, fat free, low calorie, gluten free, and has 50% less sodium. This vinegar is really great for Salmon Salad. NAKANO All Natural Seasoned Rice Vinegar can also be used as healthy alternative to salad dressing, butter or sour cream. I encourage you to join NAKANO Splash Recipe Club and find out how you can Save $1 on Nakano Rice Vinegar.
Anyway, here’s the recipe of Salmon Salad with Tomatoes, Capers and Dill Vinaigrette
Ingredients:
2/3 cup NAKANO Seasoned Rice Vinegar Roasted Garlic or Original
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons dried dill weed, divided
4 salmon fillets, about 5 ounces each
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
16 asparagus spears
2 medium tomatoes, diced
1 tablespoon capers Hearts of Romaine lettuce
Directions:
Combine rice vinegar, garlic, salt and 1 teaspoon dill weed to make dill vinaigrette; stir well. Place salmon fillets in a shallow non metallic container. Add 4 tablespoons dill vinaigrette; marinate 30 to 60 minutes. Drain salmon and discard marinade. Grill or saute salmon, starting with the skin side down, until cooked as desired. Cover and set aside.
Add olive oil to remaining vinaigrette. Blanch asparagus and place in shallow, rimmed dish. Drizzle 3 tablespoons vinaigrette over asparagus. Combine tomatoes, capers, 2 tablespoons vinaigrette and remaining 1/2 teaspoon dill weed.
To serve, arrange lettuce leaves and 4 asparagus spears on each serving plate. Remove skin from salmon and place one fillet on each plate. Spoon a generous ribbon of tomato mixture over salmon, lettuce and asparagus. Serve with remaining dill vinaigrette, as desired.
Serves 4
Salmon may be served hot or at room temperature.
Buying prepackage fish is hard to determine whether it is really fresh or not. Unlike in the Philippine markets where fish are sold, a customer can hold, smell, touch and checked the fish gills. It is really difficult to smell the fish here because they are placed in a container with plastic covering it.
So how to determine if the fish is fresh:
(Note: I found this tips here)
Fresh salmon fillet should have:
Fresh cod fillet should have:
Ingredients: 3 tbsp oil Method:
1 tbsp sesame oil
2 big onions, cut into wedges
2 cloves garlic, chop
2 red chillies, slice diagonally
200g cauliflower, cut into florets
1 medium carrot, slice diagonally
5g black fungus, soak 10 minutes
salt to taste
2 medium sized sotong, clean, cut body in half then into pieces - slash edges of each piece
1 green capsicum, cut into half then slice
10 pcs minicorn, cut in half
200g medium prawns, peel, remove head, devein
100g snow peas, cut in 2 if too large
1 tbsp light soya sauce
4 stalks spring greens, separate stalks from leaves, cut or break into 4cm lengths
4 red chillies split in two lengthwise
pepper
½ cup water
2 tbsp cornflour combine with ¼ cup water
If you visited my main blog, I have an entry there about spending our weekend at Dad’s in Killen, Alabama. He served us a good pork roast last night and I decided to post it here. He told me how he did it and I got pictures of it too. His pork roast was very very good. I know I can cook a good pork roast, but his is different.
Ingredients:
Boston Butt Pork Roast
Butt Rub
Barbeque Sauce
Directions:
Proper waste management can help reduce the stress we give to our planet. Everyday, more businesses and individuals realize the importance of waste management. It is because of this that the companies that are providing small businesses and individuals with waste management are growing all the time.
Wastedge.com is the new Waste Management Software that aims to provide solution to the problems experienced in small - medium sized waste collection and recycling businesses. This latest technology is simple but has a lot of included features that will be useful for the users.
For more information about this cutting edge web-based system for the waste industry, email them at info@wastedge.com for a free information kit.
July 21, Independence Day. Mid afternoon. A car stops in front of my house. Out step a couple and five kids. They’ve been to the Science Park. The kids are running in all directions, a little one is so exhausted, that he’s screaming. The parents fall back in deck chairs and don’t move.
Out come a few solutions: a beer for dad, water, slices of melon, and -not without trepidation- home-made white chocolate ice cream. Eight glass ramequins each take one scoop.
Two kids taste and don’t like it, one kid is screaming so can’t eat, one kid is too tired to eat. Daddy is drinking a beer so refuses politely, mommy is eating it, but too tired to speak. Lastly, one kid likes it. He asks for 3 ramequins, but, as he has to mind his diet, he only gets two.
Morale: don’t even think that ice-cream light on sugar but big on chunks of white chocolate, wins over just any audience. But it sure makes for a wonderful dessert finished in solitude when dust has settled.
White Chocolate & Cranberry Ice Cream
From Chocolat bio. Saines tentations by Laurence Salomon
200 g white chocolate
2 whole-milk joghurts [I used a little less than 500 g)
150 ml Terschelling unsweetened cranberry juice (best tartness in the world)
Melt the chocolate au bain marie, add the cranberry juice and the joghurt, and whip the mixture by hand.
Transfer to ice cream machine and finish.
Note: A manual ice cream maker can’t do much hocus pocus, so the chocolate returns to its hard texture in chunks. Fine taste, but how more subjective can I get?
Week three in July is the week of this red beet appetizer: slices of cooked red beet, feta cheese crumbled over it, olive oil sprinkled over that, and decorated with some greens.
Courtesy of aunt M., who put rucola dell’ orto on top. I repeated the gesture with thyme flowers and chives.
Serves 4: 4 cooked read beets, sliced finely and draped elegantly on smaller plates, 1 pack of feta of which you will only need half, 4 small handfuls of rucola, 4 drizzles of olive oil.
Red beets are chock full of goodies for your hemoglobin. The feta may be too salty, but the portion is small. In that case, substitute with a bit of skimmed cottage cheese seasoned with herbs instead of salt.
I submit this to Heart of the Matter #28 for July: Budget-Friendly Foods. Because anything made with fresh vegetables that are in season is per se a budget-friendly dish.
Six Talents You Wished You Possessed…
Do you want to know what other participants wished they possessed? Check the entries of Saturday’s Small Talk Six at MomDot.com
Owning a car means being ready when the car gives you headache. It means you have to have funds set aside for car maintenance. Having a car is a necessity while living in the USA because not all places has the means for public transportation.
If while driving and you noticed certain stiffness in your steering and you feel a bit of resistance, it is better to check your power steering rack. This problem may come and go but you couldn’t risk driving a car with this kind of problem because this problem poses risk and can be deadly. You need to replace the steering rack before serious problem sets in.
I suggest you better check Power Steering Pros because they have high quality power steering racks, power steering box and other car products that are sold in low price with warranty. They even offer free shipping on all orders. Power Steering Pros is your best solution to your car steering problems.
1/2 cup butter Method:Ingredients:
1 cup flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
3 to 4 oz. cream cheese
Small jar of strawberry jam
1 egg, beaten
It is Food Trippers Day again. Check the entries today at Food Trip Friday. For my entry, I am posting here Buttered Shrimp with Shells-On. Actually most Americans don’t like eating shrimps with shells-on… Perhaps they are too lazy to remove the shells. I only cook shrimps with shells for me and my filipino friends as hubby always prefers a shrimp dish that doesn’t have shells on it.
BUTTERED SHRIMP
Serves 6-8 Ingredients: 1 (2kg) chicken, cleaned & halved Ground: Method:
2 tbsp light soya sauce
3 tbsp juice of lime
2 tsp turmeric
salt to taste
2 dsp butter
4 red chillies
4 chilli padi
1 clove garlic
1 tsp white peppercorns
1 tsp sugar
As I was browsing the internet for sweet and sour shrimp recipe, most of them are somewhat complicated and needs a lot of ingredients. I don’t have time to buy all those ingredients as I wanted to cook a sweet and sour shrimp right away. Anyway, I decided to be resourceful and used what I have in my kitchen.
Ingredients:
Shrimp
onion
garlic powder
cooking oil
red and green bell pepper
carrots
pepper
sweet chili sauce
vinegar
sugar
Directions:
Being a full time mom, and wife is a tough job. It seems like all the chores at home is never ending. As hard as it is, I could not complain as I enjoy being with my daughter everyday. By being a stay at home mom, I have the privilege to watch my daughter grows up. I experienced watching her going to all her “firsts”, the milestone of her life.
Stay at Home Moms need day-off too. I recommend that you should pamper yourself with visiting a spa. The warm water therapy in hot tub provides physical health benefits. It will help you relax, and rejuvenate because it helps loosen your muscles and ease your stress. If you are concern about the cleanliness of a hot tub, don’t worry as owners of spa always have hot tub spa covers and use filters and other hot tub accessories to maintain its cleanliness.
Why not make an appointment for a spa visit today? I know you deserve it!
What’s the use posting for the umpteenth time someone else’s recipe, really, what’s the use?
Well, this isn’t a blog about creation, about original recipes. If you’re looking for that, look elsewhere. Don’t pry into the kitchen cabinet of someone with amnesia when it comes to recipes. In a professional kitchen I’d be doing dishes, glancing furtively at the food stations.
But if you’re looking for food that’s good, if you care for a moment’s pause to reflect on what we are putting into our mouths, and if you’re willing not to take anything at face value -least of all sugar, then you’re sitting pretty. Occasionally, straying off the beaten path yields a beautiful surprize.
This is a blog about what I care to put into my body: the good things, some bad (See: The Sugar Rant Stuffed For Once). But mostly the excellent.
Michael Van Straten’s Super Salads book continues to delight me. Here is a hot and smoky salad with yellow bell pepper. Yep, food that I can get all hot and smoky about.
Yellow bell pepper salad (hot and smoky)
1 yellow pepper, deseeded, chopped
1/2 cucumber
150 g pine nuts
4 tablespoons of mayonaise (*)
1 tablespoon of horse-radish
4 smoked fillets of macquerel
Combine all ingredients in a bowl except the fish. Place fish and salad on a plate. Sprinkle with some chives or any fresh herb, and some curry powder.
Notes:
I used smoked sea trout, and less pine nuts. I quickly prepared Budwig mayo: whole-milk cottage cheese whipped with line seed oil. Decoration is fresh mint.
Serves 6-8 Ingredients: 375g long beans, stringed & sliced diagonally; parboiled in salted water Sauce: Method:
250g potatoes, boiled, peeled & sliced
250g beansprouts, tailed, blanched & rinsed well
1 small cabbage, sliced & parboiled in salted water
1 large cucumber, scored & sliced
3 eggs, hard-boiled, shelled & quartered
1 cake beancurd, cubed & fried
5 shallots, sliced & crisply fried
1¾ cup (450ml) thick coconut milk
2 tbsp cooking oil
310g shelled peanuts, roasted, peeled & crushed
¼ tsp dried shrimp paste
3 red chillies, seeded & chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 tsp palm sugar
1 tbsp lemon juice
salt to taste
I admit, I miss going to the market and buying fresh fish. Fish of different kinds and different sizes. Fresh fish in the market always reminds of me the simplicity of life back home in the Philippines.
What I miss with the fish in the Philippines:
Recently a potluck summer table picture with report at Joanna’s Food has been an inspiration. Not only have I made her cold beef strips marinated in lemon thyme to great succes for a summer buffet on 10 July (alas, no food pics here), tonight my eye fell on one of the dishes she credited with the most success: onion bahji. Perfect as an evening snack, with a beer. Served with mint raita.
Before I could figure out the pronunciation of Bahji, Videojug came to the rescue. See video for their ingredients for a batch serving 4-6. Here are my own ingredients, serving 1.
Mint raita:
50 g joghurt (2-3 tablespoons)
handful of fresh mint
salt
Mix the ingredients until the joghurt is very liquid.
Onion Bahji:
1/2 red onion,
50 g chickpea flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon rice flour
A mixture of chilli flakes, koriander and cumin seeds and turmeric
salt
25 ml water
Combine these ingredients, and form spoonfuls (”quenelles”).
Heat vegetable oil, lower the spoonfuls of onion batter in it, and fry.
Drain. Let cool a little.
Dinner for one in no time, but more fun to share as an appetizer, during a picnic or a brunch.
Serves 4 Ingredients: vegetable oil for deep-frying, plus 1 tbsp Method:
105g cellophane noodles or rice vermicelli
4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tbsp peeled and grated fresh ginger
1 small red chilli pepper, seeded and chopped
375g lean ground beef
¼ cup (30g) chopped scallions
2 tsp Asian sesame oil
150g firm tofu, finely chopped
12 butter lettuce leaves, trimmed
12 scallions, blanched (optional)
Thai sweet chilli sauce for serving
Housesitting one summer off Greenville, leafy neighborhood in a Southern American city. Honey-suckle rose in bloom, a house that breathes a pleasant atmosphere through golden scrims and colorful deco. The lady of the house was always beaming. A magical object sat on the kitchen counter: a manual ice cream maker.
Two gadgets made their entrance here in July: a freezer, and a manual ice cream maker. Made in Canada, this Donvier, but swiftly coming from Holland. Ice cream would be ! on the menu this month. My sister confirmed this when she brought me the Peter Bauwens Ice Cream book I’d been ogling [Ice Cream and and Sorbet from your Own Garden ISBN 9789044716399). Here’s his blueberry ice cream.
1 portion of blueberries
1 portion of blackberries
1 tablespoon of cream
2 tablespoons of natural fruit syrup (apple)
Choose ripe fruit, wash it well. Put everything in the blender, and mix.
Put mixture in cooled ice cream maker. Manually turn until the ice has thickened. Eat at once, freeze the rest.
My variations:
I didn’t use blackberries, but jostaberries (”yostaberry”). I put them through a sieve (or it is possible to use the extractor tro catch the juice)
1 tablespoon of syrup is enough.
This yielded about 1/2 of the ice cream maker’s content, 4-5 scoops is my guess.
Incredibly fresh fruit taste! Perfect to surprize someone special.
First week of July. Dog days. My cooking follows the weather: northerners like chilled stuff then. I followed suit with the actions of another blogger and made Michael Van Straeten’s Greek soup.
I have Michael Van Straeten’s Salad book, and each recipe is a delight. Because I can’t immediately lay hands on the soup book firsthand, here’s a second hand culinary action.
The ingredients are easy, yet there is a bit of preparation to do. Having cold vegetable stock ready, that’s the grand secret. And making fresh tomato sauce (by juicing them with the extractor). If you can do that in the morning, blending everything on a hot day is all you want to do in the afternoon.
Greek Soup for Dog Days (Cucumber)
750 ml cold vegetable stock (from scratch, please)
25o ml tomato juice (from sun-clogged, very ripe tomatoes)
400 ml joghurt
1 cucumber, peeled, deseeded
1 clove of garlic
a lot of fresh mint (+ some for garnish)
1 tablespoon Worcester sauce
Combine everything. Blend.
Put this into the fridge till late dinner time. Until then, pass out.
Serves 4-6 Ingredients: ½ chicken Pounded: To serve: Method:
5 tbsp cooking oil
1 onion, sliced
5 cups water
1 stalk lemon grass
2.5cm piece galangal
3 dried bay leaves
salt to taste
8 shallots
4 cloves garlic
2cm piece turmeric
¾ tsp pepper
¾ tsp white cummin
¾ tsp cummin
¾ tbsp coriander seeds
625g precooked rice (compressed & cubed) or 375g precooked rice noodles
250g bean sprouts, tailed & parboiled
3 stalks spring onions, shredded
3 stalks Chinese celery, shredded
3 tbsp deep-fried sliced shallots
2 red chillies, seeded & sliced
I admit this is one of the best dish that I ever discovered. Sometimes, I just wanna experiment on dishes. I have known that beef and oyster sauce are really a perfect match. So, I tried to spice it up so I ended up this dish. It was really surprising how good it was. This is very easy so perhaps you would try this dish.
Ingredients:
Beef (cut thinly in bite size)
green bell pepper
carrots
mushroom
cooking wine
garlic powder
onion
pepper
oyster sauce
cooking oil
Directions:
Tip: Be sure not to overcook the vegetables. Veggies are sweeter when it is not well cooked.
Blame it on the Northern evening light, but that’s what I snapped a hearty dinner with in July’s week 2. After a week of heat, cool weather with showers. Pointed cabbage is such a fine hearty vegetable. So why not eat it now?
No further ado here, except the cooking method for the cabbage: no water, only a little bit of olive oil. Shred the cabbage, season it with curry. Braise in its own juices in a cast iron pan over medium heat (no coloring) until it is very soft.
I had this with cooked potatoes and lamb.
Serves 4 Ingredients: 2 cups (300g) rice, washed, drained & cooked Method:
3 tbsp oil
10 shallots, sliced
180g chicken, sliced thinly
60g ham, sliced in strips
125g green peas
Mix:
- 1 tsp chilli sauce
- 5 dsp light soya sauce
- 1 tbsp tomato sauce
salt & pepper to taste
60g spring onions, sliced
2 eggs, made into omelette, rolled & shredded
I was happy to have eaten as much empanada as I can (take note: with take home) when one of my friends cook this. This empanada was baked and not fried so at least it was healthier.
———–
From Wikipedia:
Filipino empanadas usually contain ground beef or chicken meat, potato, chopped onion, and raisins (somewhat similar to the Cuban “picadillo”) in a sweetish wheat flour dough. Some Filipinos are not partial to the sweetish flavour notes and prefer empanadas that are closer to the Hispanic versions. There are doughy baked versions, as well as flaky fried versions. Often, to lower costs, potatoes are added as a filler, and olives– relatively expensive in the Philippines—are omitted.
———–
Check more Food Trip Friday entries.
