POSTIFY

So... I think I've lost the camera temporarily. I know that it is either in my room or in the main room, in its bag. Therefore, no food photos. However, I just did a massive amount of baking for the Thanksgiving holiday and I'm about to do some more for Christmas. I think I did about 12 pies or so... pumpkin, apple, apple-cranberry, and pecan. They were quite tasty... at least the ones I had were. I also got good reviews from the people who ordered them. I currently have 6 or 7 pies to make for Christmas, so it'll be interesting to see how I can mesh that with work and school, considering that I don't have any long weekends to make the pies or prep at all. *sigh* I'll make it work.

^_^ Wheee I have a date with Captain Obvious coming up soon~~ It's going to be much fun! I think I'll make another batch of chocolates to take with us.

End of Semester is slowly creeping upon me... woohoo, halfway through the year!

Work is the incredible-- the only negative is that i have less time to spend with C. Obvious.

Hehehe

So... I didn't post... woops. Job has kept me quite busy. And school. But now I'm officially a college student! Yay! I start next September at Charlotte's JWU. Ye-ah!

The biggest expenditure (besides tuition) is going to be getting a bunch of "business casual" clothing for my classes. They don't let you in the building unless you're wearing it. Uwww.

I'm doing a massively awesome pastry goodness sale from now until New Year's... Pies, cookies, cakes, AND (this is the most important part)....

WHATNOT!

Woohoo.

Yay to anyone who actually reads this.

Pictures eventually, when i find the camera.

EDIT: I've made the school Culinary Team! Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!

Hisashiburi desu, ne....

Wow, it's been quite some time since my last post. I have no new pictures to post, as I've been very VERY busy. My new part-time job is quite fun, but it has very long hours, so I've been somewhat attempting to balance that, school, and my teaching job along with some down time, sleep, food, and homework. I'm lucky, I have a study hall in which I can get work done! Now, I just need to bring things to DO in it... my classes that are book- and homework- heavy are on the other days.

I have it very well at my job-- we all get 'family meal' at the end of the shift, which is usually a version of one of the specials or whatever we were serving that night, and it's always incredible! I haven't been able to work out in about a 3 weeks, though, so I think I'll just see if I can get veggies and/or meat and not the potatoes or rice. Whatever I don't eat, I usually box up and take to school with me the next day, so that works out nicely for me.

The biggest things I need to do are to remember to take a multivitamin in the mornings, cut back on coffee (I drink a cup in the morning as part of my Stewart routine, see earlier post), get better time-management, and find some way of making myself work out. I have mini-dumbbells at home, that shouldn't be so hard... I'm just exhausted when I get home, so the motivation isn't there. Ugh. Oh well, I need to get over that and just do it, ne?

Current goal(s): Make the school culinary team/ become Chapter Vice President of FCCLA.

POW BIFF WHAM!

Curry chicken!! YAY! Served over egg noodles with a roux with awesome spices. Simple salad-- spinach, radish, scallion, and a little lime juice. I made biscuit-scone things from a recipe I found that was really simple and used the flour I had dredged the chicken in as half of the biscuit flour. Garnished with slivered almonds. IT WAS INCREDIBLE!! It had great flavors, I'm going to try and introduce it at the school restaurant.

UPDATE!

Here are the promised pictures!














Mom went to a party up in NJ over the weekend, so Dad and I decided to throw her a "see ya later" dinner. Grilled flat-iron steak with steamed green beans and garlic-pepper mashed potatoes. I used a mix of Russet and New potatoes. I LOVE using red (New) potatoes, the skins are soooo pretty!















While mom is away, the chefs like to play!
Spring rolls, adapted from a nifty Johnson and Wales recipe book that was complementary with the Career Explorations program in Culinary Arts. I had NONE of the ingredients needed except for the rice wrappers, carrot, and rice vermicelli (aka Glass Noodles). Their version calls for shrimp... we used sautéed pork and apple. They called for lettuce... we used spinach! Curry powder made the whole thing just beyond-description excellent!

The sauce is a pomegranate reduction. I overdid the lime a bit, so it was more bitter than I would have liked. Next time, I'll juice the lime instead of putting in pieces.















Mmm, dinner rolls...

These dinner rolls were OUT OF THIS WORLD. My bread machine is awesome... set it to "dough" and in 1 h 30 you have any of a various list of doughs. These tasted like they came out of a restaurant.. oh wait, they did! My kitchen, that is! A little butter and jam and you had a perfect egg accompaniment for breakfast.
















Shrimp, version 1!

Bacon-wrapped shrimp on basil, mozzarella, and pork scallopine. This one was my dad's creation. It was Saturday's dinner, along with the biscuits and spring rolls.


The non-photographed dessert was a chocolate whip with cream puffs. I mentally thwack myself on the forehead for forgetting to photograph it, it was a work of incredible tastiness.


TONIGHT'S MEAL!














Shrimp version 2!

This time, we added a little bit of bleu cheese and served it over chicken! I took action and added a dash of chili powder as well, just to kick it up a bit. Served over spinach and a (sadly pre-made but WHAT A DEAL; my grandfather would be proud) pickled shrimp salad consisting of baby shrimp, peppers, and onion all pickled very nicely. Also came with a roll.

Now that we know how incredible THAT was, we're thinking of trying beef next time in a surf-and-turf idea. I have a feeling that that is going to take it to the next level entirely!

















Dessert: a trio of mousses.

I worked on this one for a while, but it was well worth the effort. Lemon and orange mousse and a chocolate "mousse". The chocolate is more of a whip, because it has no gelatin. I'm working on that... I think I'll just try a version of the dark chocolate mousse I made back in July next time. The lemon mousse idea was from a Johnson and Wales Open House back in May or June. I played around with it to make the orange one. It was all very good fun. And now I have breakfast! Woohoo!















AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK BLOOD!

I lie, that's the pomegranate reduction. I thought it had a nice arterial-blood shade though. I have some new Halloween tricks now! That and the glass noodles as some sort of squishy brain-mass or something... teehehehe.


And that is how I spent my weekend!

Glee!

I have a job now!!! One that pays!! Yeah, the catering business is great-- as long as you actually have jobs lined up.

This job is incredible: part-time, weekends, dinner shift garde-manger. I'm sloooooowly working my way up to become (assistant) pastry chef. I went for a go-see Wednesday and it went really well! I felt all official in my chef coat, red bandanna, and Seabee cap... and I actually got to bring my knife bag of awesome! I do so dearly love my knives... they are very nice. It's just too bad I (don't think) I'll be able to use them at J&W U. They give you a very nice knife set though, and it's included in the tuition cost.

We had some Roadrunners from J&W U come to our culinary class last week. What/ Who are Roadrunners, you say? They are students who take a term off (or employees) to talk about the university and its awesomeness. At any rate, one of the Roadrunners is a former student of my school and was on our culinary team for competitions in FCCLA. She's a Baking and Pastry major, so we all got a nice lesson in prettifying puff pastry and making cute little apple tarts. They were adorable AND tasty! A very enjoyable experience.

I have some lovely photographs of the food from the past two nights, which I will be updating tonight. I just have to finish tonight's!

Jyaa ne!

Labor Day FEAST

It's Labor Day weekend in the US, so I have NO SCHOOL TODAY!!!! Wheeee!! I got to spend my morning baking a cake that turned out to be pretty darn tasty:














Then I got to visit my most incredible boyfriend of 7 months, Captain Obvious, and give him some!

Here's a bit of what I gave him for his birthday:














The big thing in the middle is a mudcup (what happens when I leave eggs out of a torte, decide it's edible, and FREEZE IT). The things on the side are the actual tortes, which I turned into muffin-like things to make them bite-sized. I also made a version of the Milano cookies from my all-time favorite brand of cookies and made them from scratch out of an almond cookie and a mint-chocolate or raspberry chocolate ganache. The leftover raspberry ganache went into tart shells and made cute little choco-raspberry tartes.

I made some candies, but also forgot to photograph those. They were a variation on those found in the Hershey's chocolate recipe book from the 80's. They were a BIG hit, so now I'm going to play around with them even more and make more flavors.

Anyhow, back to today!

I decided I was going to try something new, since it was a holiday and I had the time. Lucky for me, the local grocery store had ground chicken on sale as well as some house-made sausages. One was blueberry cinnamon (not bad, I made them for breakfast). The other was sweet Italian (INCREDIBLE). I made chicken-burgers out of the chicken, with chopped scallions, Herbes de Provence, (gr, I DESPISE how hard it is to get proper French spelling in here without a long involved process), tarragon, an egg, and some breadcrumbs (probably about... 1/2- 3/4 cup for the whole pound and a half or so of chicken). They grilled beautifully!
Here are the results:














Chicken burgers, sausages, and ciabatta bread.
















POTATO POTATO POTATO!
















Kudos to Dad on his mad presentation skills of the vegetables! Tomato, lettuce, and fancy cucumber!
















The full burger.















The all-inclusive plate, now with carrots! (Oh yeah, we had salad too)

Overall, a mad-awesome labor day. Much feasting.

BONUS PIC!! AND WEEBL REFERENCE!!















PEACHES! (and cream... and chocolate shavings)

The Pictures, they are here!

Here are all of the photos that I've been meaning to put up but haven't. Truth is, I had lost the camera for about a week-- my mom had put them back in the "case" they're supposed to be in and I didn't know. I combed my room (a mess on a good day) for them (cleaning it in the process, yay!) and didn't find them. I looked in all the places around the house I had been recently. This morning, I tried again and decided to flip open the camera bag to see if the other camera was in there, and *shock* there were BOTH cameras! Yaaaay.

Without further adieu:














Great big bag-0-cookies. Yum! The combined efforts of the entire baking and pastry class bundled into one giant piece of plastic wrap.














Convenience! This is my class-issued apron that has now become a carrying case for the uber bag of cookies and some other tasty treats.. shown below!














Yaay! For Squished Pastry! This is what happens when you use an apron as a carrying case and the only method of carrying your goods is with a plate and some plastic wrap!

I hate wasting food, that's why I took 5 shortcakes. They were well-enjoyed by my family.














Ahhh, home again. And so is Dad.. whee! He brings BAGELS from NEW JERSEY! *happy dance*
It is IMPOSSIBLE to find bagels like the ones from "up north" here in the South. This one has sliced tomato, capers, and sauteed onions. If we had remembered to grab some smoked salmon at the grocery store, then there would've been that on there too. And cream cheese.














Shrimp! Joy! Shrimp cocktail, half plain, half with melon balls and cappacolla (Dad, fix my spelling please on the cold cuts) from Casa Del Sol, one of the best places in Hillsdale, NJ to get good Italian stuff. Especially cold cuts. And fresh mozzarella cheese. The cocktail sauce was made by my dad and contains ketchup, worcestershire sauce, and wasabi paste (we were out of horseradish!). It was AWESOME.














Course the second of that night of feasting: Parsley mashed new potatoes (new potatoes are those little red ones that taste so good with the skin on); blanched green beans with sauteed garlic, onion, and slivered almonds (yaay prepackaged snackfoods!); and a braised pork chop. The pork chop was floured before cooking with garlic, paprika, chili powder, salt, and pepper. YUM.














Now for something completely different!! This was a course in a 3-courser I made while it was just mom and I. This was course #2: Grilled eggplant with heirloom tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, and gorgonzola cheese topped with a basil leaf. I love summer only for the food-- the tomatoes come out with all sorts of tasty varieties!














This one was fun-and-a-half to make and eat! Fajitas turned into lettuce wraps due to a lack of tortillas! This is grilled steak, and sauteed veggies including bell peppers, mushrooms, onions, celery (odd sounding but was a nice subtle difference and filler), and garlic. The sauce was a brainchild of my dad's containing soy sauce, coffee, wasabi, and a few other things that currently have slipped my mind.














Here it is without the lettuce, and some crunchy noodles I picked up at the Bon Odori! Ta-da, instant culture change.














What do you do when papaya's on sale? You eat it! And make fun desserts out of it. This one was neat, involving a "bird's nest" idea. A ring of papaya with bananas Foster in the center topped with a mound of vanilla ice cream and some whipped cream with a plum sauce. WOW was it ever good. It was a tropical awesome-explosion.














Finally, the plate of doom. This was a way to use up a bunch of the cold cuts at once. It started out with an idea for an antipasto but turned into a platter of doom. Sopressata (sp?) hot and sweet, cappaccolla (hot and sweet), prosciutto, mozzarella (sadly it was the storebought not fresh), artichoke hearts, and tomatoes on top of a salad of lettuce, onion, cucumber, carrot, and sliced black olives. We had just re-located my dad's mandolin (slicer) from about 30 years ago or more and I had some FUN with it.

There are all of the photos I've been meaning to upload but haven't. Enjoy!

Whoops

Wow, it's been a while since I said I would post the pics, hasn't it? It's been quite a busy past two weeks. We had a huge yard sale yesterday, so getting ready for that was quite time-consuming. I have also applied for numerous jobs and have been prepping for the Bon Odori!

What is the Bon Odori, you ask? It is Charlotte's version of the Japanese "end-of-summer" festival that is usually held on the 8th of August. Quite fun. Pics tonight (hopefully)!

Let the celebration unofficially commence!

Great news... I got into Johnson and Wales University! It's all unofficial until October when I'll be receiving the big "yay-you're-in-here's-what-you-need-to-do" package in the mail, but for now I'll still be doing the happy dance. Glee!

It's been a while since I last posted, but that was because I was getting ready to go to J&W University for their Career Explorations summer program. One weekend, one class, one heck of a time. I applied for the Baking and Pastry program this year, as I had done Culinary Arts last year, and it is a complete understatement to say that it was AWESOME. The chefs/instructors are incredible and I learned more about the effects of butter on pastry than I ever had before! My inner geek was dancing for joy! In the labs, we got to test out what a class might be like. There were five culinary "teams" and three baking and pastry. This year, B&P made cookies and strawberry shortcake. The culinary students had a different palate, depending on their group. Some groups did Italian, some did Mediterranean, and some did Thai. After each group finished cooking, a baking and pastry class would bring up some of what they had made to a culinary group and we would eat the culinary group's food. Thumbs up to the group my group sampled! Your Italian was full of yum and awesome!

We had piles of food left on sheetpans after all was said and done. I absolutely HATE wasting food. I'm sure I got some weird looks, but I took my apron and turned into a carrying case for the food I took-- five strawberry shortcakes, all of my cookies that weren't eaten, and a few of my classmates' cookies. Boo yeah.

We then went to Carowinds as part of the weekend, where we all had these baseball shirts with egg-yolk yellow sleeves and detailing. I must've been really lucky, but I won four stuffed animals at the games! I also conveniently broke my non-existent nails trying to do one of the games. I thwacked my nail against the edge of the protective Plexiglas while rolling golfballs into these holes to make a pig go across a stage. I won, and got a stuffed husky dog doll and a gash in my nail as reward!! It was quite a pretty sight, breaking your nail when you keep your nails extraordinarily short for work... I hung out with my roommates during the Carowinds trek, since one of them was pretty familiar with where everything was, and we had a blast.

The next morning, when we had to leave, I found out after the slideshow of our collective escapades that I had gotten into the University! I have this piece of paper saying so, and I'm going to put it into this little "hehehe go me" book, once I make one. Pictures of everything will be uploaded later.

Gourmet on a budget!

Some of the dishes I've put on here (such as the sushi platter) are dishes that require a considerable amount of cash to do unless you get a very good deal. Most people (myself included) don't have $70 to make one dinner with for four or more people. These next few dishes you can do with .















Here is an awesome chicken dish that tastes like something out of a fancy restaurant, but can come out of anyone's kitchen!

Pomegranate-Ginger Chicken over Lime-Ginger Rice with a Plum and Strawberry Sauce

For this recipe, I used chicken tenders.

The chicken is dredged in flour that has ginger, garlic, paprika, salt, and pepper. Note: don't waste zip-top bags on this-- use plastic grocery bags! You can throw them out when you're done. The chicken is then seared in a skillet with about 1/4 inch of oil (any oil will do, just not peanut) with slices of ginger or powdered ginger to taste (at least 1 t). When the chicken is seared on both sides and you hear your pan making the "gah I need more oil heeeeelp!" popping noises, add 1 c of pomegranate juice. Yes, it will make lots of steam, but that's okay, you're not killing the pan. I like using Pom, it comes in pint-sized bottles and is usually a decent price. At this point, you can add even more ginger if you want, just be careful about it. Turn the heat down to the lowest setting and cover the pan, occasionally turning the chicken.

Rice: Any rice will do. Cook it as you normally would, just put 1/2 t powdered ginger per every cup of uncooked rice in the water before you start cooking. As it cooks, halve a lime and then quarter the halves. Note: if lemons are a better deal, use them instead. If the idea of big pieces of citrus fruit in your rice doesn't appeal to you, add 2 T lemon or lime juice instead. When the rice comes to a boil and you turn off the heat, add four pieces of lime per cup of uncooked rice. Cover it, and let it cook itself.















Plum-Strawberry Sauce: I got this recipe idea from http://madame.lefigaro.fr/cuisine/recettes/164-confiture-de-fraises-tuiles-aux-noix. The recipe is for a strawberry jam with walnut tuile. I switched out the half of the strawberries for two plums that we had in the house. The cost of the fruit shouldn't be too much of an issue because you will only need 1/2 c sliced strawberries and 2 sliced plums. Quick translation of the directions: For my version, you need 1/4 c water, 1/2 c sugar, and the fruits listed above. Add the sugar to the water and boil. When it boils, add the fruit and let it poach for 23 minutes (i turned the heat down to medium for this). Then turn off the heat.

To serve: Put 1/2c to 3/4 c cooked rice into a bowl per person, then place three pieces of chicken on each bowl. To the side of each bowl or in a family serving-thing, put the fruit sauce. You can either put the sauce directly on the chicken or dip the chicken into it. Your choice!!




















The drink is as follows: Divide up the unused pomegranate juice from the chicken recipe into glasses for everyone willing to try it, then add enough seltzer water or Sprite or club soda to go to the top of the glass. I didn't particularly like the Sprite flavor, but my mom thought it was pretty tasty. Garnish with a strawberry. I put some mint in there too for added awesomeness because I grow mint and had some on hand.

Now for something completely different!

Quick healthy food!















Yum! This one is about as simple as it can get, but it's great if you only have about 20-30 minutes to make something. Thinly slice enough carrot, celery, and potato for the people you are serving (I used one russet potato, one carrot, and one stick of celery for two people), and dice 1/4 onion for every 2 people you are serving. When steaks are on sale (in this case top round buy one get one free!), grab 1/2 lb per person. Grill the steaks to your preference and let it rest while you do the rest of the cooking. Sautee the carrot, celery, and onion in a pan with a small amount of oil (I used 1 T for the amount I made). Add garlic, salt, and pepper to taste. When the onions become translucent, put the veggies into a bowl for holding. Sautee the potatoes with paprika and garlic for about five minutes, then add 1 c water and simmer for five or until the potatoes are fork-tender. Slice the steak into 1/4 inch strips, and serve!

To serve: put 1/2 c potatoes into the bottom of a bowl, and put the steak and veggies on the table and let each person put what they want on their potatoes.
















Short Chef, signing out. Itadakimaaaaasu! (Translations at http://dict.regex.info/cgi-bin/j-e/dict ).

Well whadd'ya know...

It turns out that we had the stuff to make chocolate-coated mousses all along! I made some last night, and I plan on finishing the batch today. It was LATE when I got started, so I had to store stuff so I could get some sleep.

Here is the finished product:

Finer things in life

Here is a list of some of the little things that make life awesome:

• A big cup of tea
• A good book
• A good movie (such as Matilda!!)
• Homemade pastry/ confections
• Comfortable clothing
• Hugs
  
• A few special individuals (family-inclusive) who you can trust and go to for anything
• Your favorite noise level
  
• Good memories of anything
• Being able to step back and go "whoa, life is pretty neat"

I'm sure I left out a few things... and for good measure, here's a picture of some homemade dark chocolate mousse adapted from the Biltmore Estate's recipe for White Chocolate Mousse:
















The next time we make it, we're thinking of making it more candy-like and dipping it in chocolate coating. It will be even BETTER.

Breakfast and whatnot

Some people may criticize the French, but I find their food and people (the ones I know, at any rate) to be quite nice. I may be biased because I have French family members and because I speak French almost fluently, but nonetheless...

Breakfast this morning was crêpes. Dad woke me up nice and early at 5:20-ish so that I would be awake and civil enough to make them by 6:30. It worked, we had a nice large batch. Here's a picture of one:














Yum!! Chocolate crepe with fresh whipped cream (called Chantilly cream for those who want to be really fancy and put added stuff in there like brandy or extra powdered sugar) and fresh fruit. In this one we have cherries, but my brother was being picky and a standard Stewart morning-grouch and complained (although he has two volumes: loud and LOUDER, even when it's not even 7:00 a.m. which can be really annoying at times), so he had blueberries in his.

And even though it's about a week late, here are the photos of pie! Pie-nots were consumed before photos could be taken... sadly.














Mmmmm pie. Full of apple-y goodness. For wacky British humor on pies, just see www.weebls-stuff.com. The section labeled Weebl and Bob. The other toons are just as hilarious, although not pie-related.

A side note about Stewart morning grumpiness: This is just applicable to the Stewarts in my family, I know Stewart is a common surname, so don't call up an Inquisition. Here, we may be awake 10 minutes after we get out of bed, but we're not civil. We DO NOT talk unless to say that the coffee is done, that breakfast is ready (if it's being made for more than one person), the dog needs to be walked or given food and water, or the comics are good. An occasional "Good morning" or "Hey" can be heard, but that's about the limit of pleasantries. News goes on, lights go on, newspaper is divided up amongst those who are there, and if all is well with the universe and the morning routine is not disturbed, it only takes about 30-40 minutes to civilize. If morning routine gets disturbed, the person feeling the most out of it usually retreats to a dark spot in the house, i.e. the living room or their own room, and wakes up some other way by vegetating a bit in front of the TV or the computer, respectively. After that whole ordeal, most of us can be very nice people to work with! Good thing it only takes 30 minutes or 15 if on "gah, I need to get out of the door or I'm going to be late" mode. This is why you will always find eggs, coffee, and milk in our house. That and a good loud alarm clock.

COOL MOVIE!

Ok so this is the first post that is (mostly) unrelated to food. I just went and saw Ocean's 13 the other day and IT IS AWESOME! The cast alone (Joe Pesci, George Clooney, Bernie Mac et al.) was great, and the plot tied in elements from the previous two movies very well. The opening credits were reminiscent of the original Ocean's movie done in 1960. I had gotten the baking bug earlier that week, so a few hours before I left for the movie, I made cookies! It wasn't mom's recipe, so she was a bit miffed, but they were good cookies nonetheless. It was a great way of not having to spend too much on concessions! Cookies and Dark Chocolate aka (although i don't know why) Men's Pocky take care of the snacks, and then you can either bring some water or grab a coke. This is where being female has its advantages, no one bothers you when you have a big purse. Looking at it now, my purse isn't even half the size of some I've seen out and about now, and my everyday purse is even smaller! Guys, try man-purses. My grandpa has one, and it looks like a small version of a messenger bag. And my grandpa is no girly-man! He's 82 and has only stopped chopping logs for the fireplace because the doctor said no. If it makes you feel better, call it a messenger bag or briefcase. If they let you in with it, bring a backpack.

Back on subject!!

Ocean's 13 was a definite hit, and I recommend it to anyone who likes James Bond movies or heist movies. It would help if you have seen the other two movies in the series, but there is enough explanation and unrelated stuff there that it's not absolutely necessary. Go see it!

Debts

You know how most people have cash debts or credit debts? Apparently, I have pie debts. For the past few years, I have been the pie supplier for small parties at a bar my dad likes. Nice people... even when they're tipsy! I usually make only one or two pies, but from what I hear they are gone in 10 minutes. Wow. Because of this, people who have done favors for me now ask for pie instead of another form of payment. That and barbecue sushi. What is that, you ask? Eastern style pulled pork barbecue in sticky rice wrapped in a tortilla sushi-style, then sliced into 1 to 1.5 inch pieces. I once made a HUGE platter of it for a party there and for a Taekwondo awards ceremony after-party and they were a big hit.

Anyways, I'm now making two apple pies-- one for a person who says I owe her (and right now I do, because I got some cool shoes from her), and one for a person who more than deserves it and needs it. It's a great comfort food, right up there with my grandma's chicken soup (and it's Kosher, oy vey!), my mom's chocolate chip cookies (she won't give me the recipe darn it!!), and my dad's chicken cacciatore.

My dad says I am now the pie-master of the house so he won't help me. It's not my fault that I like making pie crusts from scratch and they come out better than commercial pie crusts... oh wait, yes it is. He could at least help with the pie innards.

I'll post some pics of the pies and the "pie-nots" later.

An image is worth a thousand words

Here are the promised pictures!














The flan; with sliced peaches, papaya, and lime and a caramel crunch. This is only half of the 9 x 9 version, and it served four. The recipe called for cinnamon in the custard, so it was a nice flavor along with the vanilla and normal custard- caramel flavors. Most custards, such as crême brulée or zabaglione, have strong flavors, but the flan is made even more powerful by the dark caramel coating. This is not for the faint of palate. It's fun to play around with the flavorings you add to the custard. Where the recipe calls for vanilla extract, try a fruit flavor or almond or even chocolate or rum. You want the things to be the same consistency and viscosity of the vanilla, though, so DO NOT use chocolate syrup if you want to mess around with chocolate. Try to find something thinner. If you want, you can also mess with the caramel and add food coloring to the water and not let it get so dark. Just think, purple flan! For the caramel crunch, just make a batch of caramel but don't let it get too dark and then take a forkful of it and fling it onto a greased or non-stick-sprayed plate à la Jackson Pollock (be careful it's messy). It's neat if you can get some ribbons going or some threads. You'll have to work quickly though or keep it on a hot plate to keep it malleable. Caramel coating becomes like GLASS once it cools. To put it on the flan, loosen it from the plate after it has cooled and then place it on top or on the individual servings as you like.














First and second courses combined here!

Appetizer: Tekka Maki (tuna roll) and a Tekka/Kappa Maki (tuna and cucumber). There was also a Spicy Kappa Maki and Spicy Tekka Maki but we ran out before I could take a picture. The S.T.M was made using some of the seared tuna (pictured here). It wasn't too bad. The S.K.M was made by putting some wasabi on the seaweed before adding rice and cucumber and rolling. The wasabi (green Japanese horseradish that is MUCH hotter than what you normally get at the supermarket) that I bought for it was more concentrated than it is normally, so it actually caused my dad, mom and I to turn red and grab the nearest piece of lettuce. My little brother is spicy-food-sensitive, so we didn't give him any. Pepperocinis have nothing on this. Nor do Jalapeño peppers.

Main Dish: Shrimp, asparagus, and sweet potato tempura; seared yellow fin tuna that had been crusted in cracked black peppercorns, a little bit of lemon juice, chili powder, and kosher salt; and bacon-wrapped broiled shrimp.

Garnishes: Pickled ginger, which is traditionally served with sushi as a palate-cleanser; wasabi; and soy sauce.

A good site for sushi recipes and terms is http://sushiday.com.

Okay, I lied, it's more like 533 words... that's about half of what I said it would be worth. I ran out of relevant material. If this were for an English essay, I'd beef it up (pun not intended) and make it at least 1000 words. Good thing it isn't.

Sugar

Sugar is SO MUCH FUN! I decided that I was going to make a flan for my mom's homecoming dinner. Dad and I decided that it would be a gourmet meal after all of the good finds from yesterday. So we're going to have bacon-wrapped shrimp, seared yellowfin tuna, tuna sashimi/sushi (if it's good enough fish), flan with papaya and lime slices, and probably some asparagus and sweet potato tempura. All I need to do is get my dad to take me to a nearby Asian mart to pick up the short grain rice and nori (seaweed sheets). And some pickled ginger because mom loves the stuff. Talk about international...

I had to give my little brother a cooking lesson today because he kept saying "I'm boooooooored" and I wanted him to be quiet. I taught him the wonders of custards (flan), how to make caramel (the topping for it), and colors (define amber, warm colors, and cool colors). Yay.. . The fun part, though, was then making another small batch of caramel and doing sugar work with it. We now have a plate-full of caramel ribbons/threads. I was going for Jacques Pepin's sugar nest, but it didn't quite work out that way. Now we have a crunchy flan topping!! My orthodontist will hate me. Hahahahahahaaaa... (I don't really like the orthodontist, but they're fixing my teeth so that's what matters). I'll post some photos later.

So here's a story... of a chef-like lady... ok you know the tune

For lack of a better picture I have put Gackt as the main picture on my blog, eating what looks to be takoyaki (octopus dumplings). Yum!

My first official job interview was today. I hope it went well. It's a big position for a newbie, so if I get it that will be BEYOND incredible.

A big hug goes out to all of my special people-- Captain Obvious, Nomu-kun, family members, and friends-- for the awesome support network you have been in these past few weeks and for as long as I have known you. You have no idea how awesome you are.

Anyway... by me there is this great place that gets leftovers and rejects from major foodservice establishments, and every once in a while they have a freezer sale. One word: WOW. Today was the first time I checked it out, and there was everything from yellow fin tuna (still frozen, so maybe sashimi-able) to hamburger patties to bacon (in big giant boxes on sheets.. my culinary teacher would be ecstatic) to kielbasa. This place also has nice syrups and cans-o-stuff, if you can find things without dents. Dents are bad; dents = botulism = ew. More than food, they also have the occasional great find in clothes. I was able to nab a $90 sweater for under $15. That's at least an 80% discount-- my grandpa would be proud.

So dinner for the next few days gets to be super-gourmet stuff. A combination of freezer sale goodness and a few nice (and nicely priced) Farmer's Market finds make for a lot of fun in the kitchen. Aren't good deals a wonderful thing?

New Blog

Well... I guess I have finally succumbed to the blog fever. Wheee!

Pocky and Flambee, two great things!! Although probably not together... the pocky would die. That would not be good.