#even when a recipe calls for others...except I do like pickled red onions | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

chamerionwrites · 8 months ago

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Apropos of nothing except me making a grocery list whilst dreaming about favorite salads (and deliberately albeit sort of arbitrarily excluding many excellent vegetable dishes which I don’t really consider salads):

Cobb salad wherein you replace some or all of the lettuce with fresh basil

Yum kai dao (Thai fried egg salad; make sure you fry the egg fast in hot oil, so it’s very crispy but the yolk isn’t fully set)

Standard Arabic/shirazi/choban/shopska Mediterranean kinda thing with tomatoes/cucumbers/onions/herbs/citrus/olive oil, optionally also other stuff like peppers, radishes, olives, cheese, pomegranates, etc. Add some toasted pitas and you’ve got fattoush. Add a dollop of Greek yogurt and you’ve got a very homey, comforting version with a bit more body, that’s still refreshing enough for summer dinners when you cannot bear to turn on the oven or even the stove.

This super fresh herb & nut & cucumber & lemon number from Sami Tamimi’s Falastin (the version in the book also calls for toasted pumpkin seeds)

Very crunchy thinly sliced cabbage and carrots (you can use one of those bagged cole slaw mixes if you’re in a hurry) mixed up with a whole bunch of fresh cilantro, green onions, lime juice, chopped peanuts, and a drizzle of spicy peanut dressing (I recommend letting some or all of the cabbage chill in the lime juice all day/overnight, maybe with a dash of fish sauce if you’re into that)

Similarly, thinly sliced cabbage and carrots mixed with mango, lime, cilantro, and green onions (again I recommend throwing everything but the cilantro/scallions in a bowl to let the flavors meld). You can add mango to the previous salad too if you have it, but in that one I prefer the mangoes just slightly underripe whereas here without the peanut dressing I want them ripe and serving as the star of the show, you feel me?

Grapefruit & avocado & quick pickled red onions & watercress (this is also incredible with a bit of spicy grilled salmon if you’re eating meat that day)

Honeydew melon, prosciutto, dried figs, goat cheese, walnuts (or something else crunchy), good olive oil and a lemon-balsamic reduction over arugula

Warm goat cheese (are we sensing a decadent theme here), caramelized onions, dried figs, toasted pistachios or pecans, good olive oil and lemon balsamic reduction over arugula.

Put a slight spin on a standard panzanella by grilling the cherry tomatoes, adding chunks of grilled eggplant instead of/in addition to the cucumbers, subbing lemon juice for vinegar, and subbing out the basil for mint. Make sure you zest the lemon too before juicing it. Toss a dollop of yogurt on top if you want.

Winter panzanella loosely inspired by this recipe - personally I use clementine segments instead of oranges because it’s easier and often (unless you have really fresh oranges) better, goat cheese instead of ricotta salata, often add radishes or small fresh turnips (don’t recommend using the big woody ones you often find at the supermarket) for crunch, and while I recognize that it preserves the pretty colors better I cannot be arsed to do the whole bake-in-foil-and-scrub-off-the-skin thing when roasted beets are like fifteen times tastier.

Various other riffs on panzanella. If you find yourself roasting a whole chicken I especially HIGHLY recommend making up some schmaltzy homemade croutons and some schmaltzy black pepper brussels sprouts and tossing all that with some lemon and any other suitable vegetables you have on hand (most decadent version: pomegranates and thinly sliced red onions, with a lemon/pomegranate molasses vinaigrette)

Roasted maple-chile squash (I prefer delicata squash for ease of use/added skin texture/nice shape, tossed in olive oil/sambal oelek/maple syrup/black pepper then roasted), dried cranberries or cherries, toasted squash seeds, maybe some tart apples and/or pecans if you’re feeling fancy, toss it all with some kale and olive oil and balsamic vinegar (you can also do crispy roasted brussels sprouts instead of kale here if you like)

You know how fried chicken and pickles is a thing? Get ahold of some fried chicken, up to and including those premade chicken tenders you find in the freezer section (just please bake them long enough that they’re crispy). Get some pickled banana peppers. Get some sort(s) of sweetish and/or sharpish crunchy root vegetables sliced nice and thin (carrots, radishes, chioggia beets, etc). Whisk up a honey mustard vinaigrette with olive oil and a dash of the banana pickle juice. Put all of that on top of some kind of leafy greens (I like those mixed greens that typically come in bags or cartons for this one, or sometimes baby spinach). Profit.

A lifehack imo is that you simply do not have to eat lettuce in your salads. Spinach, kale, arugula/rocket (my beloved), nasturtiums, mâche, watercress, radicchio, and cabbage all exist. Using A Metric Fuckton Of Herbs is also both viable (and affordable if you have a garden or a sunny windowsill) and 10/10 delicious. Or you can just make a shirazi salad and call it a day. Sometimes the problem is not actually that you don’t like salad, it’s that lettuce is insanely boring unless it’s just-picked fresh or on the rare occasion when you want a caesar salad with some really crunchy romaine

#anyway. share ur salad dreams with me #culinary adventures #my posts

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wondersofdreaming · 4 years ago

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Edible Love

Characters: Captain Syverson x female reader

Word count: 1.206

Warnings: Fluff, sexual innuendos, filthy thoughts, sarcasm.

Author’s note: A request from @littlefreya after I showed her the vagina/breast look-a-like dessert I made in culinary school. I hope you like it <3

I do not own any characters in this short story, except the reader who is a figment of my imagination.

Thank you so much to my muse, my inspiration, my sanity, you give me motivation to continue writing when I’m lost - @radaofrivia, a thousand thanks to you, love <3 Go read her stories from her masterlist!

MASTERLIST

Feedback is appreciated.

You were rarely allowed in the kitchen. Every time you would try to cook, Sy’s 6th sense alerted him of your sneaking around. He would storm into the room, throw you over his shoulder and manhandle you towards the bedroom.

He had tried to teach you once how to make a baked pasta dish, and when you had tried to make it by yourself to surprise him, you had forgotten the dish in the oven, and it had been burned to a crisp, definitely un-edible. Sy had a strong stomach, so he at least tried the food, but as you watched his face forcing to swallow the nasty pasta, you threw the rest out and ordered a large pizza. You had since that time been determined to at least make him something tasty, and you were going to succeed one day.

On your wedding day, he had written in his wedding vows that he would cook for you until death do you part, and then he had whispered in your ear that the only way you were allowed in his kitchen was naked and willing for him to taste your peach and cherry on the counter.

You bargained with Sy for over an hour the day before your 1st anniversary. He still wouldn’t let you use the oven, the stove, and even the microwave had become forbidden to use. But you argued for your case, promising him that you would only make a dessert that would use minimal use of the oven or the stove.

Sy had relented in the end and had helped you go grocery shopping. You had put all kinds of things in the basket to trick him, like radishes, pickled red onions, olives, and black garlic.

“You’re not trying to kill me, are you, buttercup?” Sy asked nervously.

“If I were going to kill you, my love, then you would have already been dead by my cooking years ago.”

Your dear husband roared with laughter, gaining attention from a few other customers in the supermarket around you.

At home, Sy went to work in the backyard, while you started the prep in the kitchen. The captain was standing just outside the back door that led to the kitchen. He was close by in case you needed him or if you were injured. You read the recipe that you had received from your mother-in-law, who had been secretly teaching you the dessert you were making, just so you could surprise your big handsome husband.

You grabbed the peaches from the mountain of fruits you had brought. Peach was your husband’s favourite fruit, so it was the obvious choice. You peeled the peaches and took out the pits before cutting them into bite-size cubes. You looked through the door, watching your big burly man cutting the grass. Almost forgetting your task at hand, seeing his muscular arms pushing the lawn-mower. Your mind turned to mush as you watched sweat dripping from his concentrated forehead.

You went back to the dessert before you did something you were going to regret, as you really wanted to make something for your husband to eat for once. You put a pot of cream on the stove, waiting for it to come to a boil. You added the gelatine, that you fished out from a bowl of cold water, into the cream and poured the warm mixture over some egg yolks and honey you had whipped together earlier. Pouring the cream-mix in small ramekins you set them aside to cool down, while then concentrating on the peaches.

After a while of blending the peaches, it had become a coulis that you wanted to pour over the set panna cottas. You peeled some mandarins to decorate the dessert with.

You hadn’t noticed the time had gone by quicker than expected. In no time, Sy called you to the backyard for dinner. He had set the table there with a white and blue table cloth and had served your dinner on the plates.

Dinner was eaten hurriedly because Syverson always made tasty food. Everything had been made on the grill, the spareribs smeared in homemade barbecue sauce, the corn dripping with butter, and the big baked potatoes covered in tinfoil and smothered with crispy bacon bits, chopped chives and sour cream. You couldn’t wait to bring him the dessert that you had made with love. The panna cotta had set, you thanked your lucky stars for that. You poured the peach coulis on top and set the mandarin slices into somewhat of a circle.

“Dessert is served, captain,” you teased and set the ramekin down in front of him with a spoon next to it.

Sy looked down. The first thought that crossed him was that the mandarins were arranged in a fashion that it looked like… a vagina.

His jeans suddenly grew snug around his hips. His boner growing steadily harder and painful. He looked at his innocent wife, so eager to please him, not even knowing that her efforts alone made his heart soar to the skies.

He had to make a plan on how to make you as lustful as he was. He watched as your eyes grew sad that he wasn’t digging into your dessert right away.

“This looks amazing, love,” he smiled. He grabbed the spoon and dug a large chunk of the panna cotta with the peach coulis out. He opened his mouth and closed his lips around the spoon, moaning as the sweet custard with the peach touched his tongue. Sy slowly moved the spoon out, languidly carving out another bite of the sinful dessert.

All he could think of, as he ate the dish his wife had created for him, was to have your spread out right before him. Legs wrapped around his hips, while he pounded into you with such vigour, you would break the table, and perhaps even break the deck too. He wanted to hear your moans and screams, hear his name falling from those lovely lips of yours, hear you tell him that he was the only one who could make take you into oblivion.

“So… do you like it?” you asked, arousal slowly pooling between your closed thighs. You watched as the big guy ate another bite, groaning, the rumble coming from deep within his chest. His eyes were looking at you with such intensity that you had to look away before you threw the dishes from the table and assaulted him.

“It tastes great, babygirl,” he told you in a low voice, lust filling his deep sound. “But I do want a second dessert.”

“Oh?” you looked at him perplexed, but you knew exactly what was on your husband’s mind. The smirk on his bearded jaw was imminent, while he slowly moved up from his chair.

Sy watched as his angel-wife stood up and watched him through hooded eyes, if you looked up innocence in the dictionary, a picture of you would be front and centre. But in the bedroom, you were a sexual goddess, a vixen of lust, and you left your virtues on the threshold.

“Then you must follow me to the bedroom, where I will serve you, your favourite dessert.”

#Henry Cavill #This man #I need a drink #Henry Cavill x reader #Henry Cavill x female reader #Henry x reader #Henry x female reader #Captain Syverson #Edible Love #Short story #My story #Fanfiction

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nagdabbit · 5 years ago

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lamp-bright rind Food Masterlist

Hello! I am Daggs! I write things and stuff!

Currently, I write a fic over on Ao3 called lamp-bright rind where everything is soft and I work out my feelings on an unsuspecting Billy Hargrove, because that’s just what’s happening while I’m stuck at home.

I thought it might be fun (and because I reeeeeaaallllllyy need something else to take up time, I’m going bonkers here) to like make a master list of all the recipe/food references in the fic? Because it’s a lot. My roommates can’t get out to get ingredients to feed me and I’m going through withdrawal. And, also, I really fucking love food. I can’t cook for shit, but I can eat like a mother fucker.

So with each chapter I’m gonna update this with where I got the recipes and link to them if they’re online or if my roommates let me give out their recipes that I have stolen (with permission, of course!). I’ll put a link at the top of each chapter, too. So. Here we go!

Chapter 1

This is a recipe from one of my roommates--henceforth known as Roommate Senior--and it is the most comfort food ass shit, y’all. I DO NOT have permission to give out the entire recipe for the sauce, only the ingredients that are included in the chapter. There are a few bits that I had to leave out, but not including them won’t actually ruin the dish, or so she says. Senior also does something else to her trofie because she’s just Like That. But, homemade trofie is my favourite pasta, y’all.

Here is a recipe from Italian Food Forever if you wanna give it a go. If you don’t feel like making your own pasta, because that shit takes time, The Chef recommends getting gnocchi. Something soft and starchy, basically. She also recommends: Delallo Roasted Red Peppers in Olive Oil. It’s a pretty common brand, apparently.

Chapter 2

1. This is my grandma’s Chicken Noodle Soup. So this is what we always had at Christmas time because it makes A Whole Ass Lot. And looking back, I think I definitely underestimated the amount of water/broth needed. This is one of three (3) things I can actually, competently cook IRL. Which explains why I work out as much as I do, because Reames noodles, y’all.

2. Jasmine Tea Panna Cotta from Madeline Effect. Never had it but, 1) Shiiiit is it pretty; 2) I love jasmine tea; and, 3) I fucking love plums, y’all.

3. Popcorn Ice Cream with Caramelized Popcorn and Black Pepper from page 263-5 of the NOPI cookbook by Yotam Ottolenghi and Ramael Scully. My other roommate--henceforth known as Roommate Junior--made this once and I just. I don’t even like popcorn, and I still think about that. The recipe itself isn’t online anywhere that I can find in full, but here is an Eat You Books link for the basic ingredients.

4. Raspberry Tart. This is a lesson in bookmarks. I SWEAR TO GOD, this came from Felicity Spector’s instagram, probably very far back. You’re gonna see her name pop up a lot on this list because I just love her instagram. So anyway. I have a very vivid memory of seeing a small little raspberry tart with pillowy clouds of whipped lemon verbena ganache. I know I saw it SOMEWHERE, but now I cannot find it. Learn from me. Bookmark your shit when you find it.

Chapter 3

A lot of the food I’m gonna mention is in reference to my favourite restaurant. It’s called Bourbon & Baker and my aunt takes me every time I visit. I don’t even care how long the drive there is, I’m there for the foooooooood (and her puppy, but that’s not the point). Funnily enough, the used to have a sister location in Chicago! Anyway, this is kind of what I’m basing Billy & Robin’s restaurant off of.

Currently, because of the You Know What, the menu on their site is pared down for To Go orders only, but I’m gonna use an old one I still have on my phone to give you an idea of the kind of food they serve, but also because I’m going through withdrawal.

1. Brussel sprouts. This, for the reason mentioned in the fic (blight), was removed from their menu before the last time I went, so this is gonna be mostly from memory: Roasted brussel sprouts (they were chopped p small and roasted til crispy), with toasted pecans, with a maple, brown sugar and balsamic vinegar glaze, and topped with shaved parm. Christ I miss those. Senior does a pretty good remix, but I think about those all the time.

2. Lamb Belly Tacos. So fucking goooooood. For size reference, it’s two street-style sized tacos. From the menu: Poblano chimichurri, crispy lamb belly, flour tortillas, Cojita cheese, pickled red onion, sunflower shoots, lime-mint tzatziki, cashew crumble.

3. Duck Tacos. This is a go-to for me. Like, if they take it off the menu, I will riot. From the menu: Citrus chile marinade, chargrilled, flour tortillas, Manchego cheese, spicy green-onion hoisin sauce, arugula, heirloom tomato relish.

4. Smoked Salmon. Here’s the trick. Get the salmon, keep 1-2 of the toasted breadsticks and use them to sop up the last of the Duck Taco juice. That’s the money. From the menu: Dill cream cheese, fried avocado, caper-red onion relish, lemon balsamic, arugula, toasted baguette.

5. The Waffle Thing. Okay. This is another thing they took off the menu before my last visit and I nearly DID riot. It sounds like there wasn’t nearly enough demand for it, which is a shame because it’s hecking incredible. From memory: a stack of orange zest waffles (1/4 wedges, so it was just one small/medium waffle divided and stacked) with sweet mascarpone, crispy prosciutto, maple syrup and a gooey ball of dates and pistachios.

6. “shrimp--” This was gonna be Shrimp & Grits. From the menu: Andouille grits, spinach collard greens, gulf chrimp, Cajun BBQ cashew cream.

ALSO on the menu this chapter, GRILLED CHEESES.

1. THE SOUP. I based it on this Smoky Tomato Soup from two peas & their pod.

2. Red Rock Cheddar & Gruyere. This is kinda based on the grilled cheese from B&B, except I just really like sourdough more than brioche. But that’s me. Red Rock Cheddar is a very specific kind of cheddar. It’s SUPER orange and also a blue cheese? It’s great. Creamy cheddar-like taste, but a hint of blue. Here’s a little thing about it if you’re curious.

3. Pumpernickel, ham, cheese. It’s basically this recipe from Finlandia Cheese, only Junior made it with pumpernickel once and it fucked me up. So good.

4. Onion, Mayo, Gouda. This is a Senior recipe. The closest IRL I can find is this from redbook mag. She, because she is just Like That, does something extra to her onions, but she confirmed that this recipe would be close enough to taste p good. Just switch in gouda for the cheese and put mayo INSIDE the sammich. I saw that some people put in on the outside instead of butter, and y’all need jesus. *shudder*

5. Toad in the hole. A midwest staple, but here is a recipe from Taste of Home if your family isn’t into dying early from a heart attack. In my head, Billy cooked the egg over hard, or at least NOT gooey, but that’s just for the mess. Obv it would be over easy/sunny in the restaurant. Obvs.

And there we have it! All the food from the first three chapters. Join me next time for more Daggs Loves Food and Really Misses Fresh Veggies, JFC.

Now, how should I tag this.

#stranger things fanfiction #billy/steve #fic: lamp-bright rind #lamp-bright rind #lamp bright rind

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365-money-diary · 4 years ago

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Days 1-7

DAY ONE [JAN 1 2021]

8:00 AM - I’m back! It’s been a few years since I’ve done this and I thought it would be cool to try again. There are a lot of differences with COVID in my life – I mostly don’t leave the house and we [K and I - same boyfriend] are waiting for the vaccine before integrating back.

10:00 AM - Grab a handful of chex mix, make a chemex, and zone out on the couch for a bit. It’s been a really slow week all around, but good. I’ve gotten a lot of cleaning stuff done and I’m hoping to wrap up my to-do list this weekend.

11:45 AM - Clean the kitchen and shoot black bean burgers for my recipe blog. I started this sometime in 2018 but really picked things up in 2019 and even more so with being home in 2020. I have a goal to turn this into a lucrative side gig by the time I have kids which won’t be for a few more years.

2:30 PM - Burgs turn out great and photograph well too. K and I eat them with a side of chips and salsa and a seltzer.

4:30 PM - K, KP (dog), and I take a 1-mile walk. I do a Pure Barre livestream after. I’m doing the platinum challenge this year (15 classes x 12 months), so my first class of 180 is done! Hah. Decide I want to buy some stickers for the chart I made to track my classes so I buy a pack on Amazon. $7.44

6:30 PM - Make cauliflower rice for dinner with tofu. Put Mamafuku crunchy chili sauce on it that friends gifted us for Christamas.

10:30 - Get a nasty text from my mom about refinancing my house. I want to put K on the title, but it turns out I will get taxed a gift since we are not married (yet!). Kind of annoying, but K and I decide to just wait until that happens. Also my parents suck with anything non-traditional and it is becoming a huge problem in our relationship.

DAY ONE TOTAL: $7.44

DAY TWO

9:30 AM - Make a chemex. Feeling a little off from last night and the way my mom seems to think she can step all over me. Watch Youtube [Dessert Person] and start to edit photos from yesterday.

12:00 PM - Make soyrizo tofu (for me) / egg (for K) scramble tacos for brunch.

1:00 PM - Can’t decide on which color background is better for these burgers and after polling my friends one of them suggests and A/B test. The nerd in me is so down and I build the campaign in Facebook. Open a seltzer. $10

3:30 PM - Ride the Peloton for 10 minutes (Trying to integrate this more into my workouts - I love it, but I love barre more!) and then do a barre stream. I email the studio about the new warmup since I seem to have hurt my lower back from yesterday’s workout.

5:00 PM - K is tired of finding my hair literally everywhere so we decide it’s time to cut it - I haven’t had a cut since December 2019. He chops off a good 6-8 inches. It looks ok!

6:30 PM - Heat up leftover lasagna rolls and air fry some green beans for dinner. Eat a piece of peppermint bark while everything heats.

9:30 AM - Make a chemex. Feeling a little off from last night and the way my mom seems to think she can step all over me. Watch Youtube [Dessert Person] and start to edit photos from yesterday.

12:00 PM - Make soyrizo tofu (for me) / egg (for K) scramble tacos for brunch.

5:00 PM - K is tired of finding my hair literally everywhere so we decide it’s time to cut it - I haven’t had a cut since December 2019. He chops off a good 6-8 inches. It looks ok!

6:30 PM - Heat up leftover lasagna rolls and air fry some green beans for dinner. Eat a piece of peppermint bark while everything heats.

8:00 PM - Pour myself a glass of rosé and rummage for snacks - eat a small handful of chex mix and some gf pretzel sticks.

9:00 PM - Looks like yellow is winning the A/B test by about 2%! I build out the rest of the assets for the post so it’s ready to go first thing tomorrow.

DAY TWO TOTAL: $10

DAY THREE

9:30 AM - Chemex and a handful of chex mix. Turn on Raptors / Pelicans game from yesterday. Wrap up my black bean burger post and get it up into the interspace.

1:00 PM - Wow that took 100 years. I’m really trying to amp up my posting signal, and what normally takes 30 minutes took an hour. Blah. Need to get away from screens.

2:00 PM - Eat leftover black bean burgs for lunch with chips & salsa with a Polar seltzer. Set chairs up in the backyard. NY Friend is in town and he and Q are stopping by. Q paid me back the last of the ~$2k he owed me sometime last summer. We’ve remained very close and I don’t feel like our friendship has been affected by this transaction in a negative way!

5:15 PM - NYF & Q head out. Jump on a zoom with K’s family for a bit and then hop over to another one with some of my girlfriends. Pour a glass of rosé.

8:00 PM - Watch the last two minutes of the Suns game (they lost). Need to eat. Heat up a Big Sur Breakfast Burrito for dinner with tortilla chips and truffle hot sauce. Check analytics on black bean burg it’s doing REALLY well. Yay!

9:30 PM - Make brine for ham seitan and check my fantasy teams (I’m in two NBA leagues). Both are on track to win this week!

DAY THREE TOTAL: $0

DAY FOUR

7:00 AM - Pure Barre weekly charge. $15

8:30 AM - Cue that They Might Be Giants Song, I Don’t Want to Go to Work. Pull on a pair of fitted sweats with an Everlane tee. Make a chemex and seitan ham dough. Open my computer and discover that Slack is down. Do some misc reddit things before returning to emails.

9:30 AM - KP barfs on the carpet. Gross. K helps me clean it up. Wash hands and toss seitan ham in the oven.

10:00 AM - Eat siggi’s plant-based yogurt for breakfast. This is by far the best vegan yogurt out there. 10/10 - vanilla is the best.

11:45 AM - My seitan exploded. Damn. It’ll still taste good but I hate when that happens! Eat a piece of rye toast.

12:45 PM - Eat a leftover lasagna rollup for lunch along with the last of the chex mix. Open a Polar seltzer.

4:30 PM - Here’s the part where you stop reading already because of generational wealth - Dad calls and says there was enough money in the family trust this year for every grandchild to get $5k and that he transferred the money into my account. This was a total surprise - we thought last year was supposed to be it. Always eternally grateful for all of the gifts my grandparents have given me over the years and 2021 is no exception. Check my account and see my stimulus also hit today. What a day to be alive.

5:30 PM - Do a Pure Barre live stream, take a birdbath, and get ready for the grocery order. We order Instacart every 2.5 weeks and it’s always a production to wash and put everything away. In this order, we get frozen burritos, tofu, tortilla chips, riced broccoli, real cheese, vegan cheese, frozen corn, plant-based yogurt, cloves, low carb tortillas, bread, onions, scallions, bell peppers sauerkraut, pickles, relish, vegan butter, sprouts, bananas, basil, green beans, vegetable bouillon, chickpeas, oranges, romaine, grapes, clementines, black beans, vegan mayo, broccoli, potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, thyme, rosemary, cauliflower, garlic, lemon, celery, cucumbers, limes, jalapenos, apples, horseradish, leeks, cilantro, marinara sauce, dark chocolate, frozen peas, olives, BBQ sauce, salsa, pepperoncinis, mustard, lasagna noodles, & lemon juice. $324.11

8:15 PM - Finish up seitan ham and roast potatoes to go with veggie sandwiches. We eat these at the start of every grocery run and they have Dave’s Killer Bread, Vegenaise, vegan cheese, seitan ham, cucumber, onions, red bell pepper, sprouts, romaine, and red wine vinegar. So delicious. Pour a rosé after dinner.

DAY FOUR TOTAL: $339.11

DAY FIVE

8:15 AM - Lay in bed thinking about the generosity of my grandparents. Decide to put $3k of the money into my investment account, $1k into HYSA, and put the last $1k off to the side for wardrobe improvements – I lost some weight last year and NONE of my clothes fit. I have 4 dresses that are work-appropriate and the rest - I gifted to friends and others in need. For the most part, I’m waiting until COVID winds down and I have to be in public again before buying much just in case my size changes again.

9:00 AM - Chemex, banana and a clementine for breakfast. KP seems to be feeling better today.

12:30 PM - Make K and I salads for lunch with romaine, cucumber, bell pepper, tomato, chickpeas, red onion, and cashew ranch. Open a Polar seltzer.

2:00 PM - Yard guy texts me and says he never got December’s payment. He says it’s totally chill but it’s absolutely not because he did a crap ton of work on our side yard. Pay him plus an extra $20 immediately and schedule something for the weekend so he can get the rest of the leaves out front. $180

3:00 PM - Last night I found the DDR subreddit and honestly couldn’t be more happy. I LOVED the game and still have my gear from middle school. I drop in the shed to find my mat and dust it off to use for later. Also eat a handful of gf pretzels. Venmo my old coworker for a joint bday present for another old coworker. $25.30

4:00 PM - Work is finally slow so I change into my exercise clothes early and do pure barre livestream. I make it through the entire workout uninterrupted and try DDR for the first time in a hot minute.

5:45 PM - That was SO fun. I played for 30 minutes. Did mostly songs on standard but had way better stamina than other times I’ve tried to pick it back up again when I’ve been extremely out of shape and couldn’t really keep up + light songs are boring so this was just a treat.

7:30 PM - Make leftover bean, rice and cheeze burritos for dinner with chips and homemade chile de arbol salsa. Drink a glass of wine after.

DAY FIVE TOTAL: $205.30

DAY SIX

8:50 AM - I slept through my alarm? Or turned it off. Weird. My butt is so sore today from yesterday’s workout. Make a chemex. Eat a banana.

10:00 AM - Have a call with a mortgage loan officer and give him the official green light to proceed with refinancing my house. Interest rates are so good right now. Shortening my loan by 4 years and mortgage will only go up by $20! Give the guy my card number to pay for the appraisal and credit check. Goodbye stimulus. $658.66

12:30 PM - K turns on the news to watch the Trumpers protest. I make a salad for myself for lunch and toss one for him in the fridge. Attend virtual therapy. Got some good things to think about and am energized after. Therapist doesn’t take insurance so this is OOP. $90

2:15 PM - Tune into the news. What a giant cluster. I don’t have much to add to the conversation. I’m disgusted but not surprised. Eat 2 clementines and a handful of gf pretzels.

5:30 PM - Do a barre livestream. Start to catch myself feeling a little wonky halfway through and make a nuun. Perk up after 5 minutes and finish strong.

7:00 PM - Make veggie sandwiches for dinner with miso butter broccoli. Watch the news for a while, finish a book about abusive partners (I grew up with a lot of abuse and still deal with it from family members who suck), pour a glass of rosé and eat a couple chocolate squares and a few sweedish fish.

12:30 AM - Fall asleep on the couch. At some point I wake up and sleepily eat a few mini pretzels on my way to the bedroom.

DAY SIX TOTAL - $748.66

DAY SEVEN

8:50 AM - Sleep in again but this time on purpose. Make a chemex and eat a banana and two clementines for breakfast. Make an effort to drink water too.

10:00 AM - My back has been feeling really bumpy lately and I think I need to get that layer of bacteria off since my regular cleanser isn’t cutting it. Buy a bar of zinc soap from Amazon. $14.04

1:30 PM - Eat K’s salad from yesterday so it doesn’t go bad with a Polar seltzer.

4:00 PM - Work has been wild today. Lots of calls. Good progress, but not so much for a major report I have due soon. Hopefully I’ll be able to finalize it tomorrow so it’s off my desk. Eat some grapes.

5:30 PM - Ride the Peloton for 10 minutes and do a barre live stream.

7:00 PM - Rinse off, do the dishes, roast potatoes in the oven, make the last of the black bean burgers for dinner. Spend the rest of the evening working on the header and footer templates for this project, reading Remain in Love, and watching NBA.

DAY SEVEN TOTAL: $14.04

0 notes

sensespike3-blog · 6 years ago

Text

Cowboy Pasta Salad with the BEST Dressing!

This Cowboy Pasta Salad is purely addicting loaded with juicy ground beef, bacon, sweet corn, black beans, tomatoes and cheese smothered in tangy, creamy southwest barbecue sauce!

This Cowboy Pasta salad is a TexMex Pasta Salad at it’s most tantalizing. It is fully loaded with everything delicious and makes not only a crowd pleasing potluck side but is a stand-alone dinner as well. You can make the entire salad ahead of time and just add the bacon before serving for easy entertaining or meal prep. This Cowboy Pasta Salad is delicious slightly chilled but equally delicious served warm. No matter how you serve it, this Cowboy Pasta Salad is one for the “favorite recipe file!”

Pasta Salad

This summer has been the year of pasta salads at Carlsbad Cravings from Italian Pasta Salad with Tortellini to Po Boy Shrimp Pasta Salad to Cubano Pasta Salad with Mojo Dressing and many more listed below. But none of these pasta salad recipes boast juicy, ground beef – until today. Think taco salad – but even dreamier.

And not just dreamy for cowboys. I guarantee that every cowboy and cowgirl alike will be singing your praises for this Cowboy Pasta Salad Recipe. It’s creamy, tangy, smoky, boasts layers of textures and flavors of TexMex glory and did I say bacon already?

If you consume this Cowboy Pasta Salad the “proper way,” serve it alongside some cowboy favorites of Nashville Hot Chicken, Oven “Fried” Chicken, Slow Cooker Barbecue Ribs, or Slow Cooker Beef Brisket but I was so enamored by this Cowboy Pasta Salad I couldn’t stop sneaking it from the refrigerator – when I wasn’t even hungry. I would eat it cold and I would eat it warmed in the microwave. Both arguably delicious. Make it, try it both ways, and you’ll know exactly what I mean.

How to Make Cowboy Pasta Salad

Cook pasta just until al dente according to package directions. Rinse with cold water and drain. Add to a large serving bowl and toss with half of the dressing.

Brown meat with onions in a large skillet over medium heat. Drain off excess grease. Stir in green chiles and all spices. Set aside to cool while you chop your veggies.

Add beef and all remaining salad ingredients to pasta except bacon. Stir in desired amount of dressing. Add bacon if serving immediately or cover and chill in the refrigerator until ready to serve then add bacon.

Cowboy Pasta Salad can be served cold, at room temperature or warmed through.

Dressing for Cowboy Pasta Salad

A pasta salad is only as good as its dressing and this Cowboy Pasta Salad has the best dressing AKA Creamy Southwest Barbecue Sauce! It’s punchy, tangy, creamy and as spicy-as-you-like- it depending on if you use mild, medium or hot salsa and if you want to amp up the heat with hot sauce.

You can choose to get even more flirty with you Cowboy Pasta Salad Dressing by adding some chipotle or cilantro to the dressing – it’s entirely up to you! Just know that as written, the ingredient list may seem long, but it takes minutes to whisk up and you will be salivating that you did.

I first made the dressing for the Cowboy Pasta Salad as written (and loved it) but I was worried it seemed a little lengthy and I didn’t want anyone to get intimidated or turned off by the long yet easy-dump-and-run ingredients, and be cheated out of its deliciousness – so I made it again – with 2 different dressings.

My first dressing is what made it into the recipe:

1/3 cup ketchup

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1/3 cup sour cream

1/4 cup salsa

1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 tsp EACH smoked paprika, salt, pepper

Hot sauce to taste

(Just as promised – easy, pantry staple, dump-and-run ingredients!)

My second dressing was a simplified version swapping the barbecue sauce for the ketchup, mustard, etc. And although it was good – it was not dynamite good like my original Cowboy Pasta Dressings, And you deserve dynamite good. Get ready to taste dynamite good. And get ready for the inevitable insatiable Cowboy Pasta Salad cravings that follow.

HELPFUL TIPS TO MAKE Pasta Salad:

Turkey Substitute. You can substitute the lean ground beef with turkey in this Cowboy Pasta Salad. If you do this, I like to brown my turkey with a little olive oil and 2 teaspoons beef bouillon. If you add beef bouillon, omit the salt called for in the recipe.

Pasta Substitute. I like to use mini farfalle in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe but any medium or small pasta will work great. Rigatoni as well as macaroni would work great.

Don’t overcook pasta. No one wants a mushy Cowboy Pasta Salad! It is important to not overcook your pasta – you want it al dente so it still has a little bite otherwise the pasta salad will be soggy.

Stop Pasta from Cooking. To stop your pasta from cooking after it’s removed from the heat, rinse and drain it in cold water then stir in some of the dressing to keep it from sticking together.

Thick-Cut Bacon. It is essential to use thick-cut bacon in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe so it retains its meaty texture when covered in the creamy dressing.

Cool Pasta. Unlike vinaigrette dressings, you will want to make sure the pasta is completely cool before mixing in the creamy dressing to ensure the dressing doesn’t separate.

Customize Veggies. Feel free to add/substitute any other veggies your heart desires like avocado!

Canned Jalapenos. I highly recommend canned jalapenos as opposed to fresh because they are pickled which adds a fabulous tang that compliments the richness of the dressing.

Customize Dressing. You can also choose to make your dressing tangier by additional apple cider vinegar or sweeter by the addition of brown sugar. Make it spicier by adding hot sauce to taste, keeping in mind the salad will also have chopped canned jalapeno peppers.

Prep Dressing Ahead. You can make the dressing ahead of time and store in an airtight container in the refrigerator until ready to use.

Make Salad Ahead. This Cowboy Pasta Salad keeps fabulously with the exception of the bacon. If you know you are going to have leftovers and want the bacon to stay crispy, then hold the bacon and add to individual servings or just part of the salad you’re serving.

Looking for more Pasta Salad Recipes?

Want to try this Cowboy Pasta Salad Recipe?

Pin it to your SIDES, SALADS or PASTA Board to SAVE for later!

Find me on Pinterest for more great recipes! I am always pinning :)!

©Carlsbad Cravings by CarlsbadCravings.com

Print Recipe

Cowboy Pasta Salad with the BEST Dressing!

This Cowboy Pasta Salad is purely addicting loaded with juicy ground beef, bacon, sweet corn, black beans, tomatoes and cheese smothered in tangy, creamy southwest barbecue sauce! Perfect for potlucks or make ahead dinners!

Votes: 0 Rating: 0

Rate this recipe!

Ingredients

Pasta Salad

1 pound mini farfalle or other small pasta such as rigatoni or shells

1 pound lean ground beef or turkey see note

1 4 oz. can mild diced green chiles

1 tsp EACH chili powder, ground cumin

3/4 tsp EACH garlic powder, salt (omit salt if using ground turkey and bouillon)

4-6 tablespoons diced canned jalapeno peppers (from 4 oz. can)

1 green bell pepper chopped

1 15 oz. can black beans rinsed and drained

corn from 1 ear sweet corn

1 pint cherry tomatoes halved

1 cup cubed sharp cheddar cheese

1/4 small red onion chopped

2 tablespoons chopped cilantro

1/2 pound thick center cut bacon cooked and chopped

Dressing

1/3 cup ketchup

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1/3 cup sour cream may sub plain Greek yogurt

1/4 cup salsa medium if you like a kick

1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 tsp EACH smoked paprika, salt, pepper

Hot sauce to taste

Ingredients

Pasta Salad

1 pound mini farfalle or other small pasta such as rigatoni or shells

1 pound lean ground beef or turkey see note

1 4 oz. can mild diced green chiles

1 tsp EACH chili powder, ground cumin

3/4 tsp EACH garlic powder, salt (omit salt if using ground turkey and bouillon)

4-6 tablespoons diced canned jalapeno peppers (from 4 oz. can)

1 green bell pepper chopped

1 15 oz. can black beans rinsed and drained

corn from 1 ear sweet corn

1 pint cherry tomatoes halved

1 cup cubed sharp cheddar cheese

1/4 small red onion chopped

2 tablespoons chopped cilantro

1/2 pound thick center cut bacon cooked and chopped

Dressing

1/3 cup ketchup

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1/3 cup sour cream may sub plain Greek yogurt

1/4 cup salsa medium if you like a kick

1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 tsp EACH smoked paprika, salt, pepper

Hot sauce to taste

Votes: 0 Rating: 0

Rate this recipe!

Instructions

Whisk together all of the Dressing ingredients in a medium bowl. Set aside.

Cook pasta just until al dente according to package directions. Rinse with cold water and drain. Add to a large serving bowl and toss with half of the dressing.

Brown meat with onions in a large skillet over medium heat. Drain off excess grease. Stir in green chiles and all spices. Set aside to cool while you chop your veggies.

Add beef and all remaining salad ingredients to pasta except bacon.

If serving immediately, add bacon and stir in desired amount of dressing. If not serving immediately, hold bacon and dressing and add when ready to serve. Add hot sauce for spicier, apple cider vinegar for tangier, brown sugar for less tangy if desired.

Cowboy Pasta Salad can be served slightly chilled, at room temperature, or heated through. Leftovers are equally delicious heated in the microwave.

Recipe Notes

HELPFUL TIPS TO MAKE COWBOY Pasta Salad Recipe:

*Turkey Substitute. You can substitute the lean ground beef with turkey in this Cowboy Pasta Salad. If you do this, I like to brown my turkey with a little olive oil and 2 teaspoons beef bouillon. If you add beef bouillon, omit the salt called for in the recipe.

Pasta Substitute. I like to use mini farfalle in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe but any medium or small pasta will work great. Rigatoni as well as macaroni would work great.

Stop Pasta from Cooking. To stop your pasta from cooking after it’s removed from the heat, rinse and drain it in cold water then stir in some of the dressing to keep it from sticking together.

Thick-Cut Bacon. It is essential to use thick-cut bacon in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe so it retains its meaty texture when covered in the creamy dressing.

Cool Pasta. Unlike vinaigrette dressings, you will want to make sure the pasta is completely cool before mixing in the creamy dressing to ensure the dressing doesn’t separate.

Customize Veggies. Feel free to add/substitute any other veggies your heart desires like avocado!

Canned Jalapenos. I highly recommend canned jalapenos as opposed to fresh because they are pickled which adds a fabulous tang that compliments the richness of the dressing.

Prep Dressing Ahead. You can make the dressing ahead of time and store in an airtight container in the refrigerator until ready to use.

©Carlsbad Cravings Original

Never miss a Carlsbad Cravings Creation:

Facebook / Google+ / Instagram / Pinterest / Twitter

Looking for More Salad Recipes?

Perfect Fruit Salad with Honey Citrus Dressing

Cilantro Lime Chicken Taco Salad

Broccoli Salad with Strawberries and Avocado

Asian Salad with Sriracha Peanut Dressing

Strawberry Salad with Strawberry Balsamic Vinaigrette

Southwest Pepper Jack Salad

Source: http://carlsbadcravings.com/cowboy-pasta-salad/

0 notes

northsyria04-blog · 6 years ago

Text

Cowboy Pasta Salad with the BEST Dressing!

This Cowboy Pasta Salad is purely addicting loaded with juicy ground beef, bacon, sweet corn, black beans, tomatoes and cheese smothered in tangy, creamy southwest barbecue sauce!

Pasta Salad

How to Make Cowboy Pasta Salad

Cook pasta just until al dente according to package directions. Rinse with cold water and drain. Add to a large serving bowl and toss with half of the dressing.

Brown meat with onions in a large skillet over medium heat. Drain off excess grease. Stir in green chiles and all spices. Set aside to cool while you chop your veggies.

Cowboy Pasta Salad can be served cold, at room temperature or warmed through.

Dressing for Cowboy Pasta Salad

My first dressing is what made it into the recipe:

1/3 cup ketchup

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1/3 cup sour cream

1/4 cup salsa

1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 tsp EACH smoked paprika, salt, pepper

Hot sauce to taste

(Just as promised – easy, pantry staple, dump-and-run ingredients!)

HELPFUL TIPS TO MAKE Pasta Salad:

Pasta Substitute. I like to use mini farfalle in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe but any medium or small pasta will work great. Rigatoni as well as macaroni would work great.

Stop Pasta from Cooking. To stop your pasta from cooking after it’s removed from the heat, rinse and drain it in cold water then stir in some of the dressing to keep it from sticking together.

Thick-Cut Bacon. It is essential to use thick-cut bacon in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe so it retains its meaty texture when covered in the creamy dressing.

Cool Pasta. Unlike vinaigrette dressings, you will want to make sure the pasta is completely cool before mixing in the creamy dressing to ensure the dressing doesn’t separate.

Customize Veggies. Feel free to add/substitute any other veggies your heart desires like avocado!

Canned Jalapenos. I highly recommend canned jalapenos as opposed to fresh because they are pickled which adds a fabulous tang that compliments the richness of the dressing.

Prep Dressing Ahead. You can make the dressing ahead of time and store in an airtight container in the refrigerator until ready to use.

Looking for more Pasta Salad Recipes?

Want to try this Cowboy Pasta Salad Recipe?

Pin it to your SIDES, SALADS or PASTA Board to SAVE for later!

Find me on Pinterest for more great recipes! I am always pinning :)!

©Carlsbad Cravings by CarlsbadCravings.com

Print Recipe

Cowboy Pasta Salad with the BEST Dressing!

Votes: 0 Rating: 0

Rate this recipe!

Ingredients

Pasta Salad

1 pound mini farfalle or other small pasta such as rigatoni or shells

1 pound lean ground beef or turkey see note

1 4 oz. can mild diced green chiles

1 tsp EACH chili powder, ground cumin

3/4 tsp EACH garlic powder, salt (omit salt if using ground turkey and bouillon)

4-6 tablespoons diced canned jalapeno peppers (from 4 oz. can)

1 green bell pepper chopped

1 15 oz. can black beans rinsed and drained

corn from 1 ear sweet corn

1 pint cherry tomatoes halved

1 cup cubed sharp cheddar cheese

1/4 small red onion chopped

2 tablespoons chopped cilantro

1/2 pound thick center cut bacon cooked and chopped

Dressing

1/3 cup ketchup

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1/3 cup sour cream may sub plain Greek yogurt

1/4 cup salsa medium if you like a kick

1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 tsp EACH smoked paprika, salt, pepper

Hot sauce to taste

Ingredients

Pasta Salad

1 pound mini farfalle or other small pasta such as rigatoni or shells

1 pound lean ground beef or turkey see note

1 4 oz. can mild diced green chiles

1 tsp EACH chili powder, ground cumin

3/4 tsp EACH garlic powder, salt (omit salt if using ground turkey and bouillon)

4-6 tablespoons diced canned jalapeno peppers (from 4 oz. can)

1 green bell pepper chopped

1 15 oz. can black beans rinsed and drained

corn from 1 ear sweet corn

1 pint cherry tomatoes halved

1 cup cubed sharp cheddar cheese

1/4 small red onion chopped

2 tablespoons chopped cilantro

1/2 pound thick center cut bacon cooked and chopped

Dressing

1/3 cup ketchup

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1/3 cup sour cream may sub plain Greek yogurt

1/4 cup salsa medium if you like a kick

1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 tsp EACH smoked paprika, salt, pepper

Hot sauce to taste

Votes: 0 Rating: 0

Rate this recipe!

Instructions

Whisk together all of the Dressing ingredients in a medium bowl. Set aside.

Cook pasta just until al dente according to package directions. Rinse with cold water and drain. Add to a large serving bowl and toss with half of the dressing.

Brown meat with onions in a large skillet over medium heat. Drain off excess grease. Stir in green chiles and all spices. Set aside to cool while you chop your veggies.

Add beef and all remaining salad ingredients to pasta except bacon.

Cowboy Pasta Salad can be served slightly chilled, at room temperature, or heated through. Leftovers are equally delicious heated in the microwave.

Recipe Notes

HELPFUL TIPS TO MAKE COWBOY Pasta Salad Recipe:

Pasta Substitute. I like to use mini farfalle in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe but any medium or small pasta will work great. Rigatoni as well as macaroni would work great.

Stop Pasta from Cooking. To stop your pasta from cooking after it’s removed from the heat, rinse and drain it in cold water then stir in some of the dressing to keep it from sticking together.

Thick-Cut Bacon. It is essential to use thick-cut bacon in this Cowboy Pasta Salad recipe so it retains its meaty texture when covered in the creamy dressing.

Cool Pasta. Unlike vinaigrette dressings, you will want to make sure the pasta is completely cool before mixing in the creamy dressing to ensure the dressing doesn’t separate.

Customize Veggies. Feel free to add/substitute any other veggies your heart desires like avocado!

Canned Jalapenos. I highly recommend canned jalapenos as opposed to fresh because they are pickled which adds a fabulous tang that compliments the richness of the dressing.

Prep Dressing Ahead. You can make the dressing ahead of time and store in an airtight container in the refrigerator until ready to use.

©Carlsbad Cravings Original

Never miss a Carlsbad Cravings Creation:

Facebook / Google+ / Instagram / Pinterest / Twitter

Looking for More Salad Recipes?

Perfect Fruit Salad with Honey Citrus Dressing

Cilantro Lime Chicken Taco Salad

Broccoli Salad with Strawberries and Avocado

Asian Salad with Sriracha Peanut Dressing

Strawberry Salad with Strawberry Balsamic Vinaigrette

Southwest Pepper Jack Salad

Source: http://carlsbadcravings.com/cowboy-pasta-salad/

0 notes

news-mashable-yahoopartner-blog · 6 years ago

Text

Lessons from 'Chopped' with Ted Allen: The 15 most rage-inducing mistakes in the TV kitchen

Food Network's Chopped invokes a certain kind of screaming-at-your-TV-screen carnal energy — the baskets! the knife injuries! the leaving an ingredient off the plate when it's sitting RIGHT THERE!

After 10 years and 40 seasons on the air, Chopped still delivers some of the most whiplash-inducing twists on television. Like say when host Ted Allen reads out a seemingly cohesive basket, only to have the last ingredient be something like pickle-flavored cupcakes.

SEE ALSO: Why the '15-minute recipe' sets you up to fail

me yelling at the tv when i watch chopped pic.twitter.com/pW37XlkEej

— nicole ♡ (@suckernasa) March 1, 2018

In Chopped's world of televised culinary surprises, there are still a number of things that always go predictably wrong. As the host of Chopped, Ted Allen has stood front and center for just about every kitchen disaster you can imagine, so we asked him to dish on the most common mistakes made by chefs tackling the unforgiving beast that is a Chopped basket.

"It’s a whole bunch of traps." Allen says. "It's nothing but traps."

1. Whenever anyone attempts to make risotto in under 20 minutes.

me whenever a Chopped contestant assures the viewer that they can and will make risotto in 30 minutes pic.twitter.com/pUYOTrS1QK

— elexus jionde. (@Lexual__) January 24, 2019

"Planning comes into play," Allen says. "Let’s say you’re in the appetizer round. It takes about 20 minutes to cook arborio rice. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but that’s probably not the best choice in round one."

Not only does the chef have to constantly stir the arborio rice to cook it to the right consistency, but then they have zero time to do anything else creative. Risotto is a labor of love — ask any Italian nona!

Lesson: The judges won't be happy with your undercooked rice.

2. Trying to save face when the plates come out looking less than desirable.

*watching chopped* "My plating is sloppy but I know my flavors are there" Me: pic.twitter.com/kJyl9XNvhv

— jojo (@BROCKSQUADD) August 2, 2017

Don't say it. Please don't say it. We know you're going to, and no one wants this, and yet here we are. You used the dreaded 'D' work. There it is...deconstructed.

There are absolutely other words to describe the way the a dish looks. Maybe it's Rushed. Sloppy. Mismatched. But the word you're looking for is not the 'D' one, and it's certainly not the 'R' word either (Rustic).

Time management is key here, or as Allen calls it, rational innovation. "We want you to do something creative, but you have to recognize the incredible limitations you’re up against."

Lesson: Take the time when plating (it's one-third of the judging criteria, after all) and be honest when the presentation isn't its best.

3. Forgetting a basket ingredient.

Okay, so...you know that feeling during the Big Game when the quarterback throws a perfect spiral, and the receiver is wide open, but he drops the ball anyway? Doesn't that make you tear your hair out?

No? You know when a chef forgets a basket ingredient? The camera zooms in, and it's sitting right there on the table? Same range of emotion.

"We’ve almost never had a chef that didn’t get 4 plates made that are reasonably plausible," Allen says. "But we did have one guy who did plenty of cooking, but he just judged his time so poorly that he got nothing at all on except for three edamame on one plate. Yeah, that was a rough one."

Lesson: It's not the end of the world. Someone else's dish could have literal raw bones and trash in it.

4. Trying to make ice cream during the dessert round.

When the Chopped contestant goes to the ice cream machine pic.twitter.com/pVVJRoHoEb

— Lindsey Adler (@lindseyadler) June 1, 2018

Why would this go wrong? Everyone loves ice cream, right? But the other chef is inevitably going to be making an ice cream too — it's the easiest way to hide a funky ingredient, or showcase an ingredient with a milder flavor profile. But you can't ALL use the ice cream machine, people, it's just not possible.

It's also a documented fact that there is purposefully only one ice cream machine, just for the chaos of it all. That's very Cutthroat Kitchen of you, Ted.

Lesson: Make cookies or something. NOT ice cream.

5. Leaving bones, seeds, or otherwise hazardous material in the dish.

One of the first rules new chefs learn is to taste their food as they go along.

The hustle of the Chopped kitchen can cause even the most experienced of chefs to forget this tried and true rule.

If the judges have to spend their precious time picking fish bones or seeds out of the dish, they will not be happy campers. For chefs that are unfamiliar with an ingredient, it's even more paramount to check and check again. Because something inedible might be left over. Or something possibly deadly (Fugu fish, anyone?)

Lesson: Taste it now. Taste it again. When in doubt, taste it.

6. Trying to make bread pudding during the dessert round.

me when the chopped contestant makes it all the way to the dessert round and then starts making a bread pudding pic.twitter.com/E7c9e6X99D

— generation loss (@shoegays) May 12, 2017

Bread pudding is such a popular dish during the dessert round, it might as well be made a requirement to win (please, no).

The dish became so popular, Allen reveals that "we did have a ban on bread pudding for a while. But it seems to have been allowed to creep back in. It’s just that you don’t want a show where everybody always goes to that, so we kinda had to push people to be more creative and think of other approaches to things."

The Chopped kitchen god himself has spoken.

Lesson: Get creative, even if you're not a pastry chef. Make something no-bake! Elbow your opponent for the ice cream machine! Make some candy, anything!

7. Not cleaning off the counter space.

My feelings exactly.

Image: GIPHY

One thing Allen says that viewers rarely consider when thinking about the difficulty of the kitchen is the small counter space. Most of which, he says, is taken up by the 7 knives chefs are allowed to bring.

"One pitfall that is often a giveaway [of who will be chopped] is people that don’t clean off their stations after they’ve done something, because of that lack of space. It’s always a good sign if somebody chops the onion, they put the chopped onion in a bowl, and then they clear off everything, and move on the next [task]."

Lesson: A clean station denotes an organized chef. And if you don't believe Allen, Ratatouille makes a pretty great point.

8. Calling anything with chocolate and chili a "mole."

Every time a Chopped chef introduces a "mole," the judging table reacts with grace, but you can see it in their eyes: Your mole sits on a throne of lies.

There's a wide variety of traditional mole sauces from different parts of Mexico, but the most ubiquitous kind typically includes roasted red chilis, nuts, spices such as coriander, cloves, and anise, and of course, chocolate. But very little chocolate is actually used, and it's added more like a spice.

Lesson: Of course no one's going to be judging on complete culinary purity when the basket ingredients are a wild mix. But if you melt a Hershey's bar and put some cayenne in it, don't call it a mole. You will be in the wrong.

9. Not planning out a dish before jumping into the cooking.

This one is hard. According to Allen, chefs get, at most, a minute or two to think after they open the basket, and they certainly don't know what's in the basket beforehand. The four ingredients are often so wildly different (such as Korean short ribs, canned spaghetti, purple artichokes, and baby pineapple) that there's no obvious connection.

"What often indicates that someone might do well is, instead of just jumping right in, taking a moment to plan. If you pointed to an 8-pound Peruvian leg of lamb, I mean I’ve literally seen people salt it and pepper it, then throw it in the oven whole before it occurred to them that, wait a minute, that’s never gonna work."

Lesson: It's all about taking a second to think about what is doable before it's 5 minutes left and you have an inedible raw lamb.

10. The goddamn siphon (aka the whipped cream canister).

Why does this one piece of kitchen equipment never seem to work? It might just be that chefs don't typically come into contact with a siphon on a daily basis, now that we've moved beyond non-dessert 'foams' and 'whips' that dominated the trend of molecular gastronomy. Or it could just be cursed.

Lesson: Shake it like a polaroid picture, or prepare to just see a spittle of sad sauce drip out.

11. Throwing any of the basket ingredients on the plate at the last minute, or as a garnish.

http://crayola-colored-skeletons.tumblr.com/post/161837244904/if-you-use-a-basket-ingredient-as-a-garnish-on

Part of the beauty (and the challenge) of Chopped is to take four disparate ingredients and transform them into one cohesive unit. But the keyword here is transform.

The chefs are under immense pressure, so it's easy to get all knees weak, arms spaghetti and forget a basket ingredient. But sometimes chefs will knowingly leave an ingredient to use at the last minute as a garnish.

Where's the showmanship? The pizzaz? You are not dripping in any culinary finesse if you don't figure out a way to incorporate all the ingredients.

Lesson: "Have the judgement to fit those mismatched pieces into a puzzle without masking them with too [sic] much with items from the pantry," Allen says.

12. Relying too heavily on the pantry ingredients.

Leaning heavily into the basket ingredients tends to score bigger points with the judges, however strange they might seem at first glance. You might not want to touch that black chicken, but at this point, what choice do you have?

Depending on what's given to the chefs, though, they might actually do worse the "better" the basket might seem.

"When you’ve been given a basic basket — with a T-bone steak, and a sweet potato, and butter, and a carton of heavy cream — it seems like such a layup, but it almost seems like [the chefs] do the worst job when they don’t have enough of a challenge."

Allen says that while something like pickled giblets might not be "the first thing you'd ask for," it might force chefs to get more creative.

Lesson: You don't always get what you want, but you might just get what you need.

13. Using rookie culinary techniques, such as adding truffle oil or a mint leaf.

Why do we dislike truffle oil on #Chopped? Most is synthetic & contains no truffle. It’s strong, & tends to overwhelm a dish. It was trendy (a long time ago), & we don’t like trendiness. It feels pretentious, now—a cheap way to try to make a dish seem fancy.

— Ted Allen (@TheTedAllen) June 5, 2018

If a Chopped judge utters the words "why are they going to the pantry, oh god, there's only 30 seconds left," you know this isn't going to be good.

Most of the time these last-minute additions are at best, superfluous, and at worse, ruin the integrity of the dish as a whole. The perfectionist anxiety to add ingredient upon ingredient in search of making your dish stand out is understandable.

"I mean this in a positive way, a chef is generally a control freak," says Allen. "Someone who has a strong point of view, something that they want to say with food. On Chopped, we take away all of that control, all of it."

Lesson: At a certain point, the dish is going to be what it is. And tossing something like truffle oil or saffron on top with five seconds left won't make your dish any fancier.

14. Trying to hide your basket ingredient through the magic of blending.

http://luvkurai.tumblr.com/post/165382319715/i-didnt-used-to-understand-why-people-got-so

Blending is the one technique that shows you're either the smartest person in the Chopped kitchen, or you have no idea what the hell is going on.

Okay, sometimes there's really nothing left to do when there's a basket that's mostly normal, but has one giant curveball. In that case, feel free to hit the judges with some foot-long oversized gummy worm gastrique.

Lesson: If the Chopped judges have to ask where you a put an ingredient, and the answer is "...it's in the sauce", perhaps the blender was not your best friend.

15. Starting to cook ANYTHING, or plating, with less than a minute left.

http://projectcatzo.tumblr.com/post/159772284409/ted-allen-one-minute-left-chopped-contestant

Hmm, I think my dish is missing something. Let me just whip up a little salad dressing real quick...oh, I should probably get my stuff on the plate too. How much time do I have left? 45 seconds? I got time!

Then, shockingly, they did not have time. And there is never really enough time. But as we've established, the secret ingredient to winning Chopped isn't necessarily killer cooking skills, it's killer time management.

Listen to Ted Allen on this one, kids: "If it’s going to take 20 minutes to make something, I might be able to pull off a ham sandwich. 20 minutes is nothing. It’s just nothing. Take a second to plan and realize that you’re gonna have to slice something smaller or make something that’s doable."

Lesson: Don't do the culinary crime if you can't manage your kitchen time.

me, with no professional experience, yelling @ chopped competitors when they burn anything or forget an ingredient pic.twitter.com/zMKbBk4gJT

— meg 🐉 (@n_agem) April 25, 2017

Sure, we'd love to think we know everything about goes down during Chopped's intense 20-30 minute rounds, but we're just Average Joes yelling about coulis and beurre blanc to a screen. The Chopped competition turns us all into pseudo-culinary experts, while perched on the sofa eating half-frozen chicken nuggets.

Allen says that if you ever find yourself getting frustrated at the chefs, "set the clock to 20 minutes, and ask your wife or husband to take out four weird ingredients, and see how you do. 'Cause it could be an eye-opener for you."

But that's the fun part! Chopped manages to show us a life lesson best expressed in Ratatouille: Anyone can cook. And, just as important, anyone can think they can whip up a risotto in 20 minutes and fail miserably.

"In this business, you’re only as good as the last plate you cooked. So the stakes are pretty high."

Ted Allen is right — the chopping block is a great, delicious equalizer.

WATCH: A study of 'ultraprocessed foods' had some bleak results

#_category:yct:001000002 #_author:Sage Anderson #_uuid:6fcc73ec-ec6f-306a-9799-d7331ff7345f #_lmsid:a0Vd000000DTrEpEAL #_revsp:news.mashable

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exmoor4all · 5 years ago

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La Petite Bouchée in Witheridge is again taking part in the Exmoor Food Fest! Below is a guest post by Anita-Clare Field, telling you a bit more about what’s on the menu for the next four weeks:

With a week to go before we launch our Exmoor Food Fest menu, we’re busy sourcing the finest ingredients and continuing to prep all the little extras that go on the plate at La Petite Bouchée like handmade pickles, Ice creams sorbets and confit tomatoes.

For those of you not familiar with the way La Petite Bouchée works here’s a little snapshot. We have a zero waste policy which means we only ever buy what we need in the restaurant. If there are any leftovers they are neatly packaged in a box for you if you wish to take them away.

This means that we ask diners to let us know in advance what they wish to order so when you arrive all you need to do is sit back, relax and enjoy your evening without the stress of deciding what you’re eating. Another thing to mention is that we can cater for everyone. Please don’t worry if you have allergies or intolerances, just let us know and we’ll recreate a dish which meets your needs.

You can read all about our Environmental and Social Policies on the website.

Back the menu now and for this years festival we’ve gone for a traditional brasserie style menu. You will see a lot of dishes you are familiar with and a couple you’ll be eager to try. Here is a whistle stop tour of what to expect in terms of flavours and produce.

Entrée

Our French onion soup is my Grandmother’s recipe which I have developed over the years it’s rich, warming and packed with the flavours of sweet onions and bone broth. Have no fear, we’ll be making a vegetarian and vegan friendly version too which is equally as rich in flavour using our secret ingredient to recreate that legendary “beefy” flavour.

Our Chicken Liver Parfait is light, almost mousse like in texture but bold in with its cognac and thyme overtones, served with french toast and handmade pickles.

Love them or hate them, Escargot will be making an appearance this month. Delivered fresh from Somerset Escargot , these locally ( Wellington) farmed snails arrive ready to be steamed then turned into delicious Escargot Bourgogne dripping with garlic butter ready to be mopped up with a hunk of crispy baguette.

Our Ham Hock Terrine is gelatine free, we slow cook our ham hocks for 12 hours with herbs, cider and aromatics and allow to cool, pull and pack tightly into large terrines and chilled, You’ll be served up a generous slice with baguette and handmade pickles.

Our Vegetable Pâté is made using seasonal vegetables, fresh herbs and stock, we use the vegetables themselves to thicken the pâté which is served with toasted bread. This delightfully rich pâté is suitable for vegans, coeliacs and dairy intolerant guests.

Amuse

The amuse this month is refreshing Champagne Sorbet, made in-house with our house fizz with a hint of citrus, guaranteed to cleanse your palette . If alcohol is not your thing then simply let us know because we usually have an equally delicious fruit sorbet available too.

Plats

Two stalwarts of the menu this month are Steak Frites, 10oz hand -cut Bavette Steaks cooked from fresh, to order and served with our legendary French fries, homemade Béarnaise or Green Peppercorn sauce. Moules Frites are also on the menu, we usually serve Moules Marinières because that is the preference of most of our guests but this month we’ll be offering a special Moules Frites option so if mussels are your thing keep your eyes peeled.

Our seasonal fish this month is Pollack, caught in the west country and sent directly up fresh from the boat. We’ll be serving it in a delicious shellfish broth with a seafood garnish, pickled samphire and powdered smoked dulce all from the Devon shoreline.

Our other meat option is a very traditional Côtelette de Porc, a local pork cutlet, served on the bone, breadcrumbed and shallow fried then served with smoked lardons and peas. This reminds me so much of eating in Les Routiers restaurants on holiday with my family. It’s a classic.

Our vegetarian and vegan options this month are a delicious Winter Coulibiac, brimming with seasonal vegetables, grains and pulses and wrapped in a lattice pastry case. We’ve also been very busy making lots of confit tomatoes recently for our amuse this month and for our Galettes for the Festival. Tomatoes slowly cooked in olive oil, fresh herbs and garlic. Each tomato is like a flavour bomb going off in the mouth. The pastry is vegan and gluten friendly.

Desserts

Our menu always contains a traditional French tart and this one is no exception, we’re looking forward to serving up a delicious Prune and Armagnac Tart during festival month together with a Tarte Flambée with Apples caramelised apples on top of a pizza style crispy base. As ever all of these will be served with one of our handmade ice creams.

Cheese

The cheeses this month to compliment will be Sharpham Crement, Curworthy Haytor, North Devon Gruyére style hard cheese and delicious Beenleigh Blue from Ticklemore Cheeses. Accompanied as ever by one of our handmade chutneys and fruit cheeses.

Suppliers

Our suppliers are family run independent companies based within a 12 mile* radius of our restaurant.

Meat & Poultry

Shapland and Searle in South Molton. All the beef, pork and chicken is locally sourced and butchered on site.

Cheese

All of our cheese is expertly sourced for us by the team at The Cheese Larder

Fruit & Vegetables

All of our fruit and vegetables for the festival month will be supplied locally at our farm shop just outside Witheridge or homegrown by our Front of House team Linzi and Nigel Walker. We’ll also be using foraging company Bello Wild Food, so expect some new and exciting things to try across the month.

Fish & Shellfish

Our Fish and shellfish is supplied by Celtic Fish and Game, who use their own boats and fish along the Devon and Cornish coasts.

We really look forward to welcoming you to La Petite Bouchée across the festival month, but be quick, we’re filling up, if you have a specific question and you can’t find it on our How it Works page then do call us, we’d be delighted to answer any questions.

Current Availability

7th & 8th – Good Availability

14th ( Valentines Menu applies ) – 4 covers

15th – 4 covers

21st – FULLY BOOKED

22nd – 6 covers

28th FULLY BOOKED

29th 8 covers

Bookings – Telephone 01884 860 654 or on our online reservations page HERE

Read more about La Petite Bouchée here.

RECIPE

FRENCH ONION SOUP

(Serves 6)

Ingredients

2Kg of onions

6 Shallots

A generous knob of butter

1 tbsp of caster sugar

1 litre of beef stock ( if you are vegetarian or vegan, a vegetable bouillon is great)

1 large glass of dry sherry, Fino is great.

A splash of brandy

Half a bottle of red wine

A handful of fresh thyme

Salt and pepper to taste

1 baguette, sliced into croutons

A handful of grated gruyere cheese

Directions

In a heavy based pan melt the butter and and add the sugar. Once the sugar has started to melt add the onions in batches and sauté until completely softened and caramelised. Add the thyme, the stock, sherry, wine and brandy and then bring to the boil. Reduce after a minute to a simmer, place a lid on and cook for 45minutes and if you are using the slow cooker then let it bubble away for 3-4 hours.

Remove the lid after the cooking time and stir through, removing any thyme stalks, season to taste. Ladle into bowls, cut a some thin slices of baguette and lightly toast. Just before serving, float the toasted crouton on top of the soup and add a small handful of grated cheese. Then place under a very hot grill until the cheese is melting. Serve piping hot with an extra few slices of baguette. Absolute bliss !

Bienvenue and Welcome to La Petite Bouchée in Witheridge La Petite Bouchée in Witheridge is again taking part in the Exmoor Food Fest! Below is a guest post by Anita-Clare Field, telling you a bit more about what's on the menu for the next four weeks:

#Exff20 #La Petite Bouchée #Witheridge

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jennifertple · 5 years ago

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Realizing the word that one is using refers to an entirely different object in another region is a situation many can relate to. The last time this happened to me, it almost cost me a bowl of Hanoi’s bánh đa trộn.

It’s impossible to explain why certain dishes have the names they do given the sometimes arbitrary, untraceable nature of language. This impossibility doesn’t mean that wondering about them is a pointless activity. Indeed, one shouldn’t resist the head-scratching nature of different dish names that the written language fails to distinguish, including food names that takes on different lives, taste and appearance when they cross regions. These questions always result in more traces, possibilities and questions about the past, and if one is lucky, unexpected discoveries along the way.

Chả and Nem

Chả is made from a mixture of fish flakes, vegetables, herbs and spices that are pulverized together and then quết (pressed and folded into a paste) until the final product is elastic and gummy. The paste is then put in boiling oil, which allows fat to infiltrate the meat and enhance its flavor while browning the skin. Just like the alluring smoke wafting off grilled cơm tấm meat, it’s hard to ignore the pleasing fragrance of shallots, herbs and fish that emanates from a bánh mì stall frying chả cá.

While someone from the southern and central parts of the country might be familiar with this version of chả cá, it refers to a completely different dish in Hanoi, though still with fish as the main ingredient. Making chả cá in a Hanoi eatery involves no grounding or quết. Instead, fresh fish is cut into cubes and marinated in a mixture of ground riềng (galangal), mẻ (fermented rice), pepper, turmeric, shallots and shrimp paste and then cooked on a charcoal grill before being pan-fried with a generous amount of dill and spring onions.

This is not to say that the ground fish form of chả cá doesn’t exist in northern locales such as Hanoi. Chả cốm, for example, consists of a mixture of cốm (flatten young rice kernel), mọc (pulverized pork meat quết into a paste) and lean pork, shaped into a round disc and fried. Ha Long also has chả mực, made using a similar method as the southern chả cá but with squid as the main protein.

Hanoian’s chả cá, also known as chả cá Lã Vọng.

How to quết your chả.

The world of chả can be roughly divided into four domains: grilled or fried fresh meat, such as in the cases of bún chả or Hanoi’s chả cá, which is more commonly seen in northern provinces. This linguistic use is rare in southern and central cuisines. Meat mixed with spices and aromatics in a well-kneaded paste and sometimes fried seems to be the most ubiquitous use of the word in these regions. Examples include chả cá thác lác (southern-style fish cake with thác lác fish), chả lụa (a pulverized meat mixture made with the quết technique), and central Vietnamese chả bò (an identical dish to chả lụa but made with beef). The third grouping includes fried spring rolls like chả giò, common in southern and central cuisines. Meat or fish patties such as chả cá mòi (fish patties made with sardines) and chả rươi (patties made with mealworm and eggs) are more common in the north.

Examining Han-Nom characters provides a possible explanation for why chả has so many different linguistic uses. Anthony Tran Van Kiem’s Nom and Sino-Vietnamese dictionary and the dictionary published by the Nom Preservation Foundation list six Han-Nom characters that translate to chả.

The first character, 鮓 in its traditional form and 鲊 in its standard form, is romanized as zhǎ. The word refers to salted, preserved fish, or a dish made with ground vegetables, flour and other condiments. Interestingly, in Chinese provinces like Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, Hunan, Hubei and Jiangxi, 鮓 (zhǎ) refers to a method of pickling vegetables and meat with rice flour or flour.

These dictionaries provide no information regarding two terms. 鮺 and 𫆢 don’t have Mandarin equivalents because they are pure Nom words that were introduced during the later stages of Nom language development, when the writing system broke away from Han traditions.

Another character that piques interest is 炙 (zhì), which, according to Nguyen Quang Hong’s Nôm Characters with Quotations and Annotations, has three Vietnamese readings, including chá, chảand chạ. Chá refers to grilled or fried seasoned meat or fish. Chả however, is a term of negation (i.e. don’t) in Vietnamese. Another exclusively Nom word with an identical meaning to 炙 (zhì), a definition of the frying and grilling method, is 𤌄, pronounced as chả.

A little more digging reveals a fascinating link between zhì and the common Vietnamese phrase khoái chá, which describes the feeling of really liking something. The term, according to Vietnamese scholar An Chi, is rooted in the phrase quái chá, an abbreviated Vietnamese reading of an old Chinese metaphor 脍炙人口 (pinyin: kuài zhì rén kǒu; Vietnamese: khoái chá nhân khẩu). In Mandarin usage, 脍 (kuài) refers to thinly raw sliced meat, while 炙 (zhì) refers to grilled meat and 人口 (rén kǒu) is a person’s mouth. When put together, the phrase refers to the ecstatic joy of consuming a kuài or zhì dish, but it is often used as a metaphor to describe something popular, especially a poem or a work of literature that pleases people they way these meat dishes do.

A look inside Technique du People Annam provides insight about another character. The book, published in 1909, is a collection of drawings and text describing the activities and culture of Hanoi, written in both pure Nom and Han characters. Its Vietnamese translation for bún chảcorresponds to two exclusively Nom characters. The first one, placed on top, is the written word for bún, and the bottom for chả. While the first character is recorded in the dictionary, the second is nowhere to be found. One can see its resemblance to 詐 (zhà), which means to cheat or pretend in Mandarin.

Bún chả in Technique du People Annam.

Overall, the Han and Nom characters associated with chả sometimes refer to a piece of meat itself, or the grilling, frying or grounding methods involved in its preparation. Chả, when used in modern Vietnamese, seems to fit under one of these two broad, flexible umbrellas.

This leads us to another common word, nem, which is often paired with chả in various idioms, including the famous saying “nem công chả phượng,” which describes a Hue royal dish commonly served to kings and elites in feudal times. The saying is sometimes used as a metaphor for a fancy feast, or fanciness in general. Công translates to peacock and phượng translates to phoenix, but the dish’s precise historic ingredients are unknown. The majority of modern interpretations rely on different definitions of nem and chả and rely on visual representations of the phoenix and the peacock.

Ton Nu Thi Ha, a descendant of mandarin wives in the Nguyen royal court, suggests that the nempart of the dish is made with peafowl meat, spices and sugar and left to ferment for three days, while the chả is made with pheasant meat, ground with herbs and spices, quết and wrapped in banana leaves and steamed. Whatever the original dish, nem công chả phượng will look different depending on which meaning of nem and chả one uses. One can find spring rolls, sour nem and different types of sausage on a tray of nem công chả phượng in someone’s home or an online recipe.

Nem is most ubiquitously understood as a type of fermented sausage that uses lean pork, spices and rice wrapped in either guava or gooseberry leaves with garlic and chili and then further wrapped in banana leaves. This tight wrap produces an anaerobic environment that enhance the growth of lactic acid bacteria, which feed on the rice, contributing to the dish’s iconic sour taste and helping to prevent salmonella.. While people in the south and central regions simply use the word nem for this dish, northerners opt for the term nem chua.

This fermented sausage is popular in neighboring countries too. One can recognize it and its Vietnamese name in Thai (naem or nham), Laotian (naem moo or som moo) and Cambodian (nam) cuisines.

Nem enjoys another meaning in northern provinces. There, it describes fried spring rolls, which southerners often call chả giò and central regions, with the exception of Thanh Hoa Province, call ram. Although similar in essence, not all chả giò or nem within the same region are the same, with versions varying in their types of fillings and wrappers. Rice flour wrappers are more common in the north and central regions, while southerners are more familiar with wheat flour based wrap or rế, net wrappers. Interestingly, the fresh version of spring rolls are called nem cuốn (rolled nem) in Hanoi, while southerners are more familiar with gỏi cuốn.

When placed before other words, nem invites even more meanings. For example, nem chạo or nem thính is a dish that uses pork ear mixed with ground, roasted rice, similar to bì in Saigon.

The chả and nem pair also exist in the common saying ông ăn chả bà ăn nem (the husband eats chả, the wife eats nem), in which they are used as metaphors for an illicit female mistress and an illicit male lover, respectively. The metaphorical connotation of chả and nem here suggests there is some sort of commonality between the two, despite them often being placed in oppositional spaces.

Chè and Bánh

Food used

Bánh Trôi Nước (The Floating Cake)

Thân em vừa trắng lại vừa tròn (My body is both white and round)

Bảy nổi ba chìm với nước non (In water I now swim, now sink)

Rắn nát mặc dầu tay kẻ nặn (The hand that kneads me may be rough)

Mà em vẫn giữ tấm lòng son (I still shall keep my true-red heart)

English translation by Huynh Sanh Thong.

Once again, different names for the dish and the different regional variations emerge. Bánh trôi nước doesn’t exist in Saigon. Rather, the dessert that the poem seems to be describing resembles chè trôi nước, a dish consisting of glutinous rice balls with mung bean filling, coconut milk and sugar syrup simmered in ginger.

Chè trôi nước. Photo via YouTube account Vanh Khuyen Le.

Bánh might be the most all-encompassing word used in Vietnamese food. It can refer to savory or sweet treats of different sizes and shapes. Bánh phở is a rice noodle, bánh cuốn is a flat rice noodle sheet with fillings, bánh bao is a bun, bánh giò and bánh ú are triangle-shaped rice dumpling, bánh mì is a baguette, bánh đa can either be a noodle or a rice cracker depending on regional dialect, bánh tráng is the catch-all term for wrappers and crackers, bánh ngọt is an umbrella term for sweets made from wheat flour, bánh tôm is shrimp fried in batter, bánh xèo is a thin crepe, bánh đậu xanh is made from mung bean paste, bánh gan and bánh flan are made with an egg custard base and don’t even have flour as the main ingredient.

Bánh is fascinatingly flexible and often combined with a word that describes a cooking method, an ingredient, an appearance or a sound. The word originates from 餅 (bǐng) in Mandarin, which is a common term for many Chinese flatbreads, pancakes and objects that have a round, flat appearance. This association with shape extends to Vietnamese, as tires and steering wheels are called bánh xe and bánh lái, respectively.

Bánh in Vietnamese is even more all-encompassing, as it also includes foods that are mainly made from flour, powders and legume-based pastes in various shapes. The term also has a similar pronunciation in different languages, such as Lao’s pǣng, which means flour or powder, and Thai’s bpɛ̂ɛng, which also refers to flour or starch, with the addition of ground meat. Khmer’s bañ has two meanings; one shares the same proto-Mon-Khmer root with Vietnamese’s bắn, which is to shoot; the second means cake or pastry. In countries with a language tradition closer to Chinese, like South Korea and Japanese, byeong and mochi are the readings for the hangul and kanji version of the character.

Similar to bánh, chè is also a common term used for some beloved soupy desserts. In northern provinces, chè standing on its own also refers to tea, which is more typically called trà in the south. While it is common knowledge that tea etymologies are similar across countries, how Vietnamese chè took on another cluster of meanings is a mystery. Perhaps it’s because both the dessert and beverage are liquids. Or, perhaps it has roots in an entirely different language, such as Khmer.

As if the matter isn’t already complicated enough, two Hanoian snacks defy common associations for chè:chè lam and chè kho. Chè lam is made with sticky rice flour and molasses with peanuts, while chè kho is made of ground mung beans that are steamed, sautéed and shaped into a round loaf. A similar version of chè kho in central and southern regions is called bánh đậu xanh tươi.

Chè lam. Photo via Eva.

Chè kho. Photo via Lao Dong Thu Do.

Ho Xuan Huong’s poem provides a different overlapping of categories. In it, she describes herself, and women in general, as sharing the fate of the sweet sticky rice dumpling. It floats and sinks within nước non, which refers both to water and country, and is at the mercy of the hands of those who shape it, yet still keeps a lòng son, (literally, red heart; figuratively, loyal heart).

When people in the south read the poem, many assume that Ho Xuan Huong is referring to the sticky rice ball floating in syrup in a bowl of chè trôi nước. Imagining she is actually describing a different, northern dish allows for an interpretation that reveals an even greater brilliance.

It is more likely that the poet is referring to bánh trôi, a slightly different dessert. In the 1914 woodcut version of the poem, the Nom title is translated to bánh trôi, without the nước. This dish involves several small sticky rice dumpling eaten with sesame seeds without sugar syrup. The filling doesn’t contain mung beans like chè trôi nước, but instead a cube of đường phên (a type of reddish-brown rock sugar made of sugar cane molasses). Some sources suggest that lòng son is a play on words because the dumpling fillings share a color with an actual heart.

Bánh trôi dumplings are boiled, and thus the floating and sinking that Ho Xuan Huong mentions could refer to the up-and-down movement of them during the cooking process. In the 1914 version, she uses the character 㵢 for trôi, which means gliding and drifting, or sôi (boiling).

Another version of the poem published in Que Son Thi Tap gives the poem the name Lưu Thủy Bính, a synonym for bánh trôi. In Technique du People Annam the entry for bánh trôi also uses this name for the dish: 流水餅 (pinyin: liú shuǐ bǐng; Vietnamese: lưu thủy bính). Lưu means flow, stream, and together lưu thủy means flowing water.

Bánh trôi entry in the book. Note that the first and last characters are different because they are Nom writing variations liú and bǐng.

If one considers this definition involving flowing water, one can see a parallel in terms of movement with a practice performed during the Den Hat Mon festival, which commemorates the Trung sisters in Phu Tho, Hanoi. It was here that the sisters jumped to into a river, committing suicide after being defeated. Because the sisters were reported to have ordered rounds of bánh trôi before going into battle, it is prepared on the occasion and placed in 49 lotus flowers, which are released into the river. Is the poem also referencing the sisters?

Perhaps the metaphorical use of bánh trôi in Ho Xuan Huong’s poem also applies to the slippery relationship between language and food. It’s constantly renewing, changing, slipping, taking on new lives and colors with and against the currents of culture and history.

----- Sưu tầm------

Sunday reading

#chuyện nọ chuyện kia #readinglist

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foodtrails25-blog · 6 years ago

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Missi Roti an Indian flatbread made with whole wheat flour and chickpea flour(besan) and flavored with herbs and spices with added veggies like fenugreek or spinach. Usually, fresh fenugreek leaves are commonly added. My dad is a fan of Missi Roti and usually orders Missi roti along with other breads like naan or tandoori roti, whenever he dines out. Missi Roti made with besan or chickpea flour is also known as besani roti (my dad calls it with this name only). Missi Roti is very popular in Northern parts of India in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan. This flatbread is usually made on chullha or a small earthen stove in villages or in tandoor (like naan and tandoori roti) on roadside dhabas and has a rustic appeal to it. Oh, I miss so much the roadside Dhabas of Punjab and Rajasthan where you can enjoy the fresh tandoor baked rotis, naan breads with your dhaba dals and curries. Missi roti can be enjoyed with any of the dals, curries or vegetables. I love missi roti with my baigan ka bharta, sarson saag, palak paneer and simple aloo matar ki subzi(curried vegetable of potatoes and peas). It can be enjoyed as a breakfast item along with some pickle/chutney and hot cup of ginger tea(Adrakwali Chai). Check out my Aam aur Sirke ki Chutney(Raw Mango and Cranberry Chutney in Vinegar)

This flatbread is made with whole wheat flour and chickpea flour. The ratio of the two depends on the one’s choice. I usually take more of chickpea flour and less of wheat. My ratio of besan to whole wheat flour is 2:1. Finely chopped Fresh Fenugreek leaves added on to the flavor aroma, nutrition and of course to the color of the bread. Spices such as caraway seeds(ajwain), cumin seeds(jeera) add-on to the flavor and digestive properties of the rotis.

As per the nutritional value, these can be called healthy rotis/breads. Chickpea flour is good for people with high sugar levels. Fenugreek(Methi) leaves tough bitter in taste, are rich in iron and other minerals and vitamins. These are widely used for its medicinal benefits in diabetes, constipation and even kidney ailments and menstrual problems in females. These are also known to purify the blood. Check out the recipe of Methi Parantha(Fenugreek flatbread) here.

Let’s see how I make this easy simple and so full of flavors.. the Missi Roti!!

Missi Roti

Servings: 8

Time: 15 minutes

Indian Flatbread made with Chickpea and Whole Wheat flour, flavored with Indian herbs and spices.Learn how to make Missi Roti

Ingredients

Chickpea Flour(Besan)- 1 Cup

Whole Wheat Flour-1/2 Cup

Finely Chopped Fresh Methi Leaves- 1 Cup

Chopped green Chillies-1-2 (optional)

Caraway Seeds(Ajwain)- 1/2 Tsp

Cumin Seeds(Jeera)- 1/2 Tsp

Red Chilli Powder- 1/2 Tsp

Turmeric Powder-1/4 Tsp

Salt- 1 Tsp or as per taste

Oil/Ghee – 1 Tsp

Directions

Clean and wash Methi leaves. Chop the leaves and keep aside.

In a bowl take chickpea flour, whole wheat flour and all the other ingredients except oil.

Start kneading it with water. Keep it to rest for 2-3 minutes.

Add a tsp of oil and again knead it again to a soft dough. Keep covered for 5 minutes. The dough is little sticky due to chickpea flour in it.

Divide the dough into medium equal sized portions.

Heat griddle or tawa.

Roll out the dough portions like we roll chapatis. Refer the pics below. Don’t roll into very thin rotis or discs.

Cook on the warm tawa from both sides. I have ceramic top electric range so I cook rotis on this mesh shown in the pic below. If you have gas-tops then you can also cook on the inverted pans, to give it the tandoori effect. Please refer to my Whole Wheat Naan recipe to check how to make flatbread on inverted pan.

Once the roti is cooked from both sides put a dollop of butter😋 or ghee on it and enjoy hot with your favorite side dish.

These rotis taste best when hot and fresh. But you can make these ahead, wrap in a foil when cooled and reheat these in an oven for 2-3 minutes whenever required. Don’t re-heat these in microwave these can become too hard or soggy. So enjoy these with your loved ones. Kids too love these Missi rotis. You can serve these to them with their favorite ketchup, jam or yogurt/curd. Many add finely chopped onions also, but I usually skip these. In case fresh fenugreek leaves are not available then you can add dry fenugreek leaves(kasuri methi) or spinach leaves or even fresh coriander leaves. Both fresh and dry fenugreek leaves are available at Indian grocery stores. Also, black chickpea flour(Kale Chane ka aata) can also be used in place of chickpea flour(besan) a sit is much more nutritious and very good for people with high cholesterol and high sugar values.

We enjoyed my Missi roti with baigan ka bharta( roasted eggplant made in onion-tomato masala with Indian spices) and some chass. So what are you waiting for. next time whenever you want to enjoy some rustic meal or need a change from the usual chappatis or naan do try out these Missi Roti. Delicious and super healthy!!

Do give feedback in comments and whenever you make these do share the pics on my FB page or tag me on Instagram. You can also Pin the recipe for later use.

Join me in my food trails by following the blog and on my social media accounts. Click on the icons on the sidebar for joining in. If you like my work do share my blog with your loved ones.

Thanks for stopping by. Keep coming back for more such yummy recipes 😋!!

Missi Roti(Chickpea Flour and Fenugreek Flatbread) Missi Roti an Indian flatbread made with whole wheat flour and chickpea flour(besan) and flavored with herbs and spices with added veggies like fenugreek or spinach.

#Besani Roti #chickpea flour #diabetic friendly recipe #how to make missi roti #low fat and oil #Missi Roti #North Indian Cusine #U.P ka khaana #weight loss recipe

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party-hard-or-die · 7 years ago

Text

Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter

Don’t call it junk food.

It’s academic research, at least for a University of Winnipeg historian, Janis Thiessen. Or just call it a snack, based on the title of Professor Thiessen’s latest book. While traveling on assignment recently, I picked up a copy of “Snacks: A Canadian Food History,” which was published last year. I became intrigued and decided this newsletter deserved some snack time.

Canada once had a wide array of Canadian brands of potato chips, other salty snacks and candies. But as in most of the rest of the world, the number of nationally owned or nation-specific brands has dwindled.

Professor Thiessen’s book also punctured some accepted wisdom about just how Canadian some famous snacks really are.

Probably the most Canadian of non-candy snacks are Hawkins Cheezies, made by W.T. Hawkins and the pride of Belleville, Ontario. For the benefit of non-Canadians, Cheezies share the saltiness and nowhere-in-nature orange of Cheetos, the puffed-up offering of the multinational PepsiCo, but little else. Hawkins Cheezies are hard like a crunchy nut and come in an assortment of irregular shapes and sizes.

The Hawkins Cheezie came about when someone at the company saw a newly developed machine that extruded pellets of corn meal for feeding cattle.

“They thought: ‘If we deep fry them and add cheese, it will be delicious,’” said Professor Thiessen, whose snack passion is potato chips. “That could be a life motto.”

W.T. Hawkins is now “a Canadian company,” as it says on its packages beneath a red maple leaf. But it was originally the Canadian subsidiary of a large snack maker based in Chicago that made a variety of treats. The company’s Canadianization, detailed in Professor Thiessen’s book, is a convoluted story involving a bitterly contested divorce, a bankruptcy and suggestions of Mafia influence through the Teamsters.

Abnormally for the snack food world, Hawkins, which is still owned by W.T.’s descendants, does not advertise. There isn’t even a sign on the factory where it moved in 1956 after a fire destroyed the original Canadian plant in nearby Tweed, Ontario. Professor Thiessen, who was granted a rare tour, said she found the employees, some of whom have been around for more than four decades, a dedicated bunch. As for the general organization of the plant: “I don’t imagine it’s a model that would be promoted at business schools.”

In Western Canada, Hawkins Cheezies are distributed by Old Dutch Foods, a Winnipeg-based company that defines potato chips in that part of the country. Many Canadians, even many Winnipegers, believe that Old Dutch is an all-Canadian company, Professor Thiessen said. But its nationality is more complex.

It is actually a subsidiary of an American company of the same name, which is headquartered in Roseville, Minn., where it makes chips for the United States market. But unusually for an American company, the Canadian operations dominate, providing about 70 percent of its business. Old Dutch Canada mainly uses Canadian potatoes that are fried in Canadian canola oil in Canadian plants.

Professor Thiessen said that Old Dutch’s Canadian and American arms diverge when it comes to chip flavors. Canadians prefer anything involving vinegar as well as less conventional seasonings like dill pickle (one of her favorites). Sour cream and onion is more of a hit in the United States. Theories abound to explain the taste differences and include the Canadian habit of squirting vinegar on French fries and the differences in ethic backgrounds between immigrants to Canada’s West (Eastern Europe) and Minnesota (Scandinavia).

And what of the Canadian snacks that have vanished, including the Cuban Lunch chocolate bar that was made in Winnipeg? While Professor Thiessen devoted much time to researching its history, mystery surrounds the Cuban Lunch, starting with the origins of its name and when it was introduced. The Cuban Lunch eventually disappeared after its maker, Paulins, was sold and its Winnipeg factory closed in 1991. (At the time Paulins was owned by the same corporate parents as McCormick’s, another defunct maker of candy, and sometimes Cuban Lunch, in London, Ontario.)

The Cuban Lunch had nothing obviously Caribbean about it except, maybe, that it contained sugar. And there remains considerable debate about its recipe, including discussion on a Facebook group devoted to the revival of this chocolate and peanut delight.

“That’s one of the mysteries that remains unsolved,” said Professor Thiessen, who was unable to obtain the definitive recipe even from the last Paulins plant manager.

Can Canada Letter readers crack this case? Do you know the one and true Cuban Lunch recipe? Do you know how it got its name? Is there a Canadian snack food that’s disappeared but that you still pine for? And is there a uniquely Canadian, commercially made snack where you live that the rest of the country should know about? (Let’s exclude baked goods like the Joe Louis.) Please send your answers along to [email protected].

Professor Thiessen’s book is highly informative, filled with nostalgia and amusement. But it’s an academic history, so you may find yourself skipping over some abstruse sections to get to the sweet and salty bits.

Centre Ice

The distance between the arena in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario and the hotel where Givani Smith of the Kitchener Rangers is easily walked. But racist threats meant that he had to travel in a police cruiser.

Trans Canada

—Dan Bilefsky has traced how Alexandre Bissonnette went from being “a mousy and soft-spoken chess-obsessed student from a middle class family” to someone obsessed by “far-right, mass killers, Donald Trump and Muslims” who ultimately a killed six people in a Quebec City mosque last year.

—Team names and mascots based on stereotypes of Indigenous people have pretty much vanished in Canada. But the offensive practice thrives in Europe. In England, fans of the Exeter Chiefs, a rugby team, call themselves the Tribe in an online group, communicate on a message board called the Pow-Wow, drink in stadium bars called Wigwam, Cheyenne, Apache, Mohawk and Tomahawk and are led in “tomahawk chops” by a mascot named Big Chief.

—Ninalee Allen Craig, who was the subject of an iconic photo taken in Florence in 1951 by Ruth Orkin, died in Toronto, her longtime home, last week.

—Charlie Russell, a self-taught naturalist from Pincher Creek, Alberta, who studied grizzly bears by living with them, died in Calgary on Monday because of complications from surgery. Mr. Russell long urged people to seek coexistence with bears rather than dealing with them in fear.

—In Opinion, Bari Weiss analyzes the Intellectual Dark Web, a collection of thinkers including Jordan Peterson of the University of Toronto, whose ideas “have met with outrage and derision.”

A native of Windsor, Ontario, Ian Austen was educated in Toronto, lives in Ottawa and has reported about Canada for The New York Times for the past 15 years. Follow him on Twitter at @ianrausten.

We’d love your feedback on this newsletter. Please email your thoughts and suggestions to [email protected]. And if you haven’t do so, please subscribe to the email newsletter version.

The post Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter appeared first on World The News.

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#News Headlines #News Update #Sports Update #Business Update #World The News

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dragnews · 7 years ago

Text

Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter

Don’t call it junk food.

Professor Thiessen’s book also punctured some accepted wisdom about just how Canadian some famous snacks really are.

The Hawkins Cheezie came about when someone at the company saw a newly developed machine that extruded pellets of corn meal for feeding cattle.

“They thought: ‘If we deep fry them and add cheese, it will be delicious,’” said Professor Thiessen, whose snack passion is potato chips. “That could be a life motto.”

“That’s one of the mysteries that remains unsolved,” said Professor Thiessen, who was unable to obtain the definitive recipe even from the last Paulins plant manager.

Centre Ice

Trans Canada

—Ninalee Allen Craig, who was the subject of an iconic photo taken in Florence in 1951 by Ruth Orkin, died in Toronto, her longtime home, last week.

—In Opinion, Bari Weiss analyzes the Intellectual Dark Web, a collection of thinkers including Jordan Peterson of the University of Toronto, whose ideas “have met with outrage and derision.”

A native of Windsor, Ontario, Ian Austen was educated in Toronto, lives in Ottawa and has reported about Canada for The New York Times for the past 15 years. Follow him on Twitter at @ianrausten.

We’d love your feedback on this newsletter. Please email your thoughts and suggestions to [email protected]. And if you haven’t do so, please subscribe to the email newsletter version.

The post Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter appeared first on World The News.

from World The News https://ift.tt/2rENIAO via Today News

#Daily News #Daily World News #Daily Business News #Daily Sports News #World The News

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cleopatrarps · 7 years ago

Text

Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter

Don’t call it junk food.

Professor Thiessen’s book also punctured some accepted wisdom about just how Canadian some famous snacks really are.

The Hawkins Cheezie came about when someone at the company saw a newly developed machine that extruded pellets of corn meal for feeding cattle.

“They thought: ‘If we deep fry them and add cheese, it will be delicious,’” said Professor Thiessen, whose snack passion is potato chips. “That could be a life motto.”

“That’s one of the mysteries that remains unsolved,” said Professor Thiessen, who was unable to obtain the definitive recipe even from the last Paulins plant manager.

Centre Ice

Trans Canada

—Ninalee Allen Craig, who was the subject of an iconic photo taken in Florence in 1951 by Ruth Orkin, died in Toronto, her longtime home, last week.

—In Opinion, Bari Weiss analyzes the Intellectual Dark Web, a collection of thinkers including Jordan Peterson of the University of Toronto, whose ideas “have met with outrage and derision.”

A native of Windsor, Ontario, Ian Austen was educated in Toronto, lives in Ottawa and has reported about Canada for The New York Times for the past 15 years. Follow him on Twitter at @ianrausten.

We’d love your feedback on this newsletter. Please email your thoughts and suggestions to [email protected]. And if you haven’t do so, please subscribe to the email newsletter version.

The post Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter appeared first on World The News.

from World The News https://ift.tt/2rENIAO via News of World

#Daily World News #Daily Entertainment #Daily Sports #Today News #World The News

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newestbalance · 7 years ago

Text

Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter

Don’t call it junk food.

Professor Thiessen’s book also punctured some accepted wisdom about just how Canadian some famous snacks really are.

The Hawkins Cheezie came about when someone at the company saw a newly developed machine that extruded pellets of corn meal for feeding cattle.

“They thought: ‘If we deep fry them and add cheese, it will be delicious,’” said Professor Thiessen, whose snack passion is potato chips. “That could be a life motto.”

“That’s one of the mysteries that remains unsolved,” said Professor Thiessen, who was unable to obtain the definitive recipe even from the last Paulins plant manager.

Centre Ice

Trans Canada

—Ninalee Allen Craig, who was the subject of an iconic photo taken in Florence in 1951 by Ruth Orkin, died in Toronto, her longtime home, last week.

—In Opinion, Bari Weiss analyzes the Intellectual Dark Web, a collection of thinkers including Jordan Peterson of the University of Toronto, whose ideas “have met with outrage and derision.”

A native of Windsor, Ontario, Ian Austen was educated in Toronto, lives in Ottawa and has reported about Canada for The New York Times for the past 15 years. Follow him on Twitter at @ianrausten.

We’d love your feedback on this newsletter. Please email your thoughts and suggestions to [email protected]. And if you haven’t do so, please subscribe to the email newsletter version.

The post Cheezies, Dill Pickle Chips and Cuban Lunches: The Canada Letter appeared first on World The News.

from World The News https://ift.tt/2rENIAO via Everyday News

#News #Online News #World News #Today news #health News #Social News #Forex News #World The News

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anoopkam · 7 years ago

Text

This is something that was overdue for quite a long time as I have been wanting to visit the Slice of Spice restaurant ever since they opened and I heard about it… The restaurant is located at the same location inside Anna’s Arcade near Spencer Junction where Pizza Corner used to be… Finally after a long wait I got the chance to visit the place for lunch… The exterior looks pretty much the same as how the place looked back when Pizza Corner used to be except for of course the signs… Clearly they are proud of their Al-Ashrouf grills… On the inside however, I was quite surprised to be greeting by a lot of post-it notes everywhere on the walls and even on the false ceiling… If you can zoom into those pics, you can see that many of them are quite funny to be completely honest 🙂

Slice of Spice – Exterior

Slice of Spice

A couple of weeks ago, one of the owners of this restaurant, contacted me and invited me for a private tasting event organised to test out some new items that they were planning to introduce… Unfortunately, being engaged elsewhere, I couldn’t attend the same… Hence, I contacted that owner before going there first of all to confirm the location and also to know if any of the new items are available and which they are… So, he basically informed me about a new series of grilled items in their menu, which they call as Rottsy… Apparently it has only been a week since they started serving it… From the brief conversation with the owner and. the manager at the restaurant (whom to my surprise is somebody I have met before as manager of another restaurant which was one of my favourites when it existed), I came to understand that Slice of Spice prides itself on the special spice mixes that they have come up with… The one they call Al-Ashrouf apparently was a hit and now the Rottsy is a new one they came up with which they hope will also be a hit… The owner also recommended that I try the leg piece option unless I am a die-hard breast fan… Its not secret that the dark leg and thigh meat in a chicken tastes better than the white breast meat… He also recommended that among the beverages, I try their new Expresso Milk Shake as well…

Hence, I decided to try a piece of the Rottsy Grilled Chicken as the appetiser, while leaving the Al-Ashrouf for next time and along with it I had the Smoked Chicken Balls Soup and for mains their Malabar Dum Biriyani and for dessert, tried their Rabri Falooda… I first didn’t plan on getting the dessert and so ended up ordering an Expresso Shake as recommended by the owner at first… The decision to order dessert was made in the last minute… However, to my surprise, they made the Expresso Shake as complementary and let me express my thanks to the owner and manager for doing that…

Smoked Chicken Balls Soup

Rottsy Grilled Chickenl Leg

Malabar Dum Biriyani

Rabri Falooda

Expresso Shake

Now, coming to the food, the first to arrive as expected was the soup they call their Smoked Chicken Balls Soup… It came as shown in the pic… From the outside, it pretty much looks like any other non-cream Chicken soup, but on the inside are two chicken meat balls, that appear to have been grilled because of the grill marks as can be seen in the pic below…

Other than the meatballs, the soup is a thickened chicken broth with eggs and green onions and cilantro… My only problem with the soup was that the broth was made too thick with starch, which I believe is completely an unnecessary thing to do… Leaving that aside, its definitely one of the best tasting chicken broths I have ever had… The meatballs made up of smoked chicken was also incredibly flavourful… The soup was also perfectly seasoned with salt and pepper… Great tasting soup that I’ll recommend to try at least once… 🙂

As I was almost done with the soup, the starter that I order, namely the leg piece of the Rottsy Chicken had arrived… They served an entire leg of the chicken that was grilled in their charcoal grill as the manager informed me and it came with some spicy mayonnaise dip and some salad… I must say that this turned out to be one of the rarest of rare instances when you get grilled chicken thats not dry at all throughout the piece… Usually if a restaurant doesn’t make it completely dry, only the parts at the centre and nearby are somewhat moist… Here on the other not only was the entire piece moist, but it was really juicy with the meat simply falling off the bone very easily…

Regarding its taste, I found it to be an incredibly complex taste thanks to their top secret marinade on the meat… But from what I could understand, which could be completely wrong, it kind of felt like the Chermoula spice mix combined with smoked paprika and black pepper and then cooked with butter if I am not mistaken… I am not 100% sure, but I think I felt a slight hint of cardamom in it as well… Anyways, its their secret… The mayo dip appears to have been spiced with smoked paprika as well and the salad appears to have been seasoned with salt and red chilly powder and it was exactly like the salad we get with tandoori items usually in most places… However, one thing I can confirm is that this Rottsy Grilled Chicken is the best grilled chicken that I have ever had so far… I’ll definitely will be getting it again in my future visits… I almost ordered some more to be taken as takeaway, but since I was not going back home directly, I left it for my next visit… 🙂

Next came the Malabar Dum Biriyani… The waiter had informed that its a Thalassery Style Biriyani, which being a Thalassery guy who has had whats called “Thalassery Biriyani” from some of the other restaurants, made me a bit skeptical but since I was really hungry, went for it anyway… So, the biriyani came in a bowl that sort of looks like a spoon as can be seen in the thumbnail pic :), served with what I consider an unfairly tiny cup of raita (I can never understand the idea behind such severe rationing of the raita in most restaurants) and dates pickle… The biriyani came with two pieces of chicken with one of them being a drumstick piece 🙂

Unfortunately, the only part about this that I liked was the dates pickle which was awesome… Great flavour of dates and spices in it that I wish they would actually sell bottles of it as its way better that the ones we already get in the supermarket… 🙂 The raita, well, is as good as it can be… However, the actual biriyani was not as good as I had hoped… I guess it was a bad day for the chef who made it… On the positive side, the pieces of chicken was cooked perfectly and by themselves tasted good enough… However on the downside, the rice felt to be overcooked and I am not sure that actual Jeerakasala rice was used or not as I couldn’t detect the fragrance of that rice in it… The rice and the masala felt like it needed more seasoning and more spices in it… Also, one of the most important thing is the presence of the fragrance and flavour of ghee which I felt was completely missing from this biriyani… However, what amazed me is that the dates pickle that was given ended up compensating for the pitfalls of the biriyani… I say this because, when I mixed in the pickle with. the rice and the masala, the whole thing tasted quite nice… So, if you are having this and find yourselves having the same experience as myself, just make sure to ask for extra pickle and it will be fine… 🙂

By this time the expresso shake had also arrived and I really liked that one… Good taste of the coffee in there…

Having skipped breakfast, I felt like having a dessert as well and so in their menu, the Rabri falooda caught my eye… Because that reminded me of the faloodas I had in Mumbai and got it hoping to get something similar… It came as can be seen in the pics below… It had vanilla ice cream, fresh fruits, the rabri, vermicelli, cashewnuts and some blobs of butterscotch, which I think are attempts at making the English Toffee and topped with caramel and some cashew nuts…

Rabri Falooda

I had mixed feelings about this one… Let me tell you why… As you go from top to bottom, first you get the scoop of vanilla ice cream with roasted cashew nuts and caramel, which is great… Then as you dig further, you get the first wave of the English Toffee attempts, which are ok but I felt that they could be better… Then when you hit the fruits, then also its great… However, what all comes after the fruits in the problem… The vermicelli definitely needed some more time being cooked and since this is a falooda, I expected a lot more of the rose flavour in it… Then below the vermicelli were the 2nd wave of the English Toffee attempts and then there was the Rabri and some more ice cream at the bottom… Honestly, I felt that the flavours of the butterscotch blobs (English Toffe attempts) and the caramel didn’t quite work with the Rabri and the vermicelli and that was the problem… I mean I think if the vermicelli was properly cooked and the butterscotch and caramel was replaced with Kulfi, this would have been an excellent Falooda… I say this because I liked the taste of the Rabri used… Overall, I believe that this recipe needs to be redesigned…

After leaving the restaurant, I contacted the owner and discussed about the negative aspects of my experience… After apologising for it all, he informed me that he’ll talk to the chefs and fix them very quickly… Apparently they are in the process of completely revamping their menu… That is, more new items to be added plus, recipes of existing dishes revised and corrected if needed… Once everything gets implemented and ready, I hope that this place flourishes and truly be one of the best eating spots in Trivandrum… I for one will be eagerly waiting for it…

Slice of Spice – First Visit – New Rottsy Grill This is something that was overdue for quite a long time as I have been wanting to visit the Slice of Spice restaurant ever since they opened and I heard about it...

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