Jujubee
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We had a change of plans this weekend: we decided to hop in the car and go to Chicago to visit some family for a couple of days. But when we got in tonight we decided to mine through our fridge for an impromptu dinner instead of eating out, which is what we would usually do upon getting back from a trip. My husband had the rest of the chili (it had been frozen), my daughter had some chicken nuggets from the freezer, along with some grapes and carrot sticks from the road trip (I suppose I cheated by getting road trip snacks, but I much prefer to buy fruits and vegetable snacks for road trips rather than dehydrate on salty snacks and fast food), and I cooked up a package of ramen with napa cabbage. Add that to five meals from last week, I can definitely get one more meal out of what we have.
Looking back, though we definitely had a much more boring menu than a lot of others participating in this challenge, I am actually pretty happy with the change in attitude that has happened even in these few days. That chili that I made last Monday made an appearance 3 times (Mon for the family, Thur/today for my husband) which I would normally deem too monotonous. But why not? The reality is that we are a three person family and a pot of chili will last a few meals. Otherwise it would have remained in my freezer forever. My husband loves it and didn't complain. In fact, he made a comment after I made the pot roast last week (which he loved) that I rarely repeat the things that he tells me he really likes because I am always trying something new. I also came to the realization that sometimes I eat more than I am actually hungry for because it's new and tasty; when I'm nibbling at leftovers to use them up or making do with odds and ends in the fridge I tend to only scavenge until I'm not hungry anymore. Even when I go back to regular grocery shopping I think I'll only plan to shop for three new dinners a week; with leftovers, pantry, and whatnot, it's more than enough food and variety for our family.
I think I will participate for another week but my grocery shopping rules will be modified a bit:
1) No limit on milk. My daughter is 3 and it's a major source of nutrition she will actually eat.
2) No limit on fruit. Again for my daughter. It's one thing to make my husband deal with beet surprise as the vegetable of the day; I don't want my daughter to avoid produce for another week because it's too unfamiliar. It is all eaten plain by her and not incorporated into my cooking, so it doesn't really affect me trying to pull together dinner from pantry/freezer. Also, fruit is what she usually snacks on. This past week I found myself giving her a lot more crackers/chips/cookies/etc from the pantry as we ran out of fresh fruit. Good for using up stores, not so good for setting up healthy eating habits.
3) I don't know how much we spend on groceries a week, so I'll just stick to the $15 used in the example. But that won't be until Tuesday since I still have to make one more dinner to finish out my original "week."
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I haven't bothered to mention breakfast so far because we've had plenty of cereal, oatmeal, and milk, so nothing has really changed on that front. However, this morning I decided to make sort of a faux tortilla espanol. I had leftover potatoes from the other night that had been very thinly sliced and cooked under some roasting chicken, thus they were pretty rich from all that chicken fat. I figured that was a close enough substitute for sliced potatoes cooked in copious amounts of olive oil. I heated those up in a pan and then poured in enough egg substitute to surround. (I am down to 4 eggs so I sort of felt like I needed to hoard them.) It was actually very good and was the first time egg substitute didn't taste like an obvious diet food to me. Apparently the secret to making diet food more palatable is chicken fat.
Dinner was various leftovers from the week, plus some frozen veggies.
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I'm not sure about copyrights or whatnot, but roughly speaking:
Sauteed up a bit of celery and scallions with a pinch of curry powder and salt. Let it cool and then mash that up with the egg yolks along with a very generous amount of mayo and a bit of parsley. Drain and flake/chop up a can of high quality tuna in olive oil (this is KEY - they recommend Ortiz, but I couldn't find it so I used Zoe, another brand from Spain) and mix that in. S&P to taste. Fill as usual for deviled eggs.
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For dinner today I used up a whole chicken from the freezer. I cut it up into parts (throwing the back and wing tips into the chicken scraps bag in the freezer) and baked it in a marinade of olive oil, the juice and zest of a lemon, the last of a bottle of mustard (I just shake it up in the bottle, saving myself the aggravation of trying to get every last bit out), garlic, fresh oregano (leftover from another recipe last week), and a squirt of honey to encourage browning. The parts that were close to the surface were pretty tasty, but this particular bird had proportionally enormous breasts so most of the interior meat was kind of bland. I peeled and thinly sliced a little pile of annoyingly small potatoes and stuck those under the chicken. On the side I braised half a head of savoy cabbage and some sauteed onion in vegetable stock. Not a bad meal, but color-wise it was pretty boring on the plate.
I'm currently cooking a pot roast in the oven for tomorrow night's dinner. The recipe (Balsamic Braised Pot Roast with Tomatoes, Lemons, Raisins, and Black Olive-Pine Nut Relish) is one from How to Cook Meat that I've been meaning to try for a while. I'll need to substitute a few things, but nothing major: canned tomatoes for fresh, yellow onions for red, some other nuts for pine nuts. Maybe walnuts, since I have the most of those to use up.
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I recently had a dinner party and tried a bunch of stuff from CI. Usually I like to test out recipes beforehand on my family, but I had been pretty busy leading up to it so instead I went with new-to-me stuff from CI because I could be fairly confident that there wouldn't be any major disasters. Results ranged from acceptable to positively addictive.
Mediterranean-Style Deviled Eggs (Restaurant Favorites at Home) - These were AWESOME. Quite a few people wanted to know what I put in them. One guy told me he ate about 8 of them, and I probably would have done the same except I was busy doing hostess stuff so they were pretty much gone by the time I was able to try them. Because of all the additions, there is a lot more filling than egg whites, so I cooked up some extra hard boiled eggs just for more egg whites to stuff.
Marinated Goat Cheese (It's been printed in a few different publications. I was using Italian Classics, but I know I've seen it elsewhere.) - Also awesome and couldn't be simpler. Quite a few people also wanted to know how to make this one, though you barely need a recipe. More than the sum of its parts.
Caponata (Italian Classics. I noticed they re-did this in the magazine more recently, but I used the older recipe from the aforementioned cookbook.) Solid and tasty, but not addictive.
No-Knead Bread (Jan 2008) - Excellent. I think the addition of a splash of beer and a spoonful of vinegar really does boost the flavor compared to standard no-knead bread. I was worried the vinegar would make it too sour, but it is definitely not a sourdough.
Roasted Corn Bisque (Restaurant Favorite at Home) - Eh. Maybe I was setting myself up for failure since it is definitely not corn season, but with the new supersweet varieties they have in the off season I've had some decent ears. Plus, the recipe said adjusting with sugar at the end would compensate for off season corn. It wasn't bad, but it was too starchy. The consistency was also a far cry from the smooth and elegant texture they promised in the description. It also looked kind of unappealing. I considered not serving this one, but then decided I was among friends. I did like the fried leek garnish though; I might try that one on something else.
Arugula and Roasted Pear Salad with Walnuts and Parmesan Cheese (Nov 2000) - Good combination, but way too much "stuff" for the amount of greens.
Lamb Shanks Braised in Red Wine (Italian Classics) - I thought this was just okay, though my guests really seemed to love it. Maybe it's because I did 1.5 times the recipe, but the resulting liquid didn't really reduce down and was kind of watery. I ended up taking the shanks and vegetables out and further reducing the juices, which definitely improved the flavor and body of the liquid. I still found it kind of boring though. Maybe other folks would consider it classic.
Make-Ahead Mashed Potatoes (on their website - don't know the issue) - Excellent. This recipe was developed to specifically address the issue of heavy, gluey re-heated mashed potatoes. Their method of partially microwaving, then baking, beating until smooth, then adding dairy first, and melted butter second really works. I also liked the roast-y flavor from baking the potatoes.
Roasted Asparagus (various publications) - Easy and good, but you don't really need a recipe. Have made it a million times.
Lemon Layer Cake (March 2007) - This one wasn't bad really, but I wouldn't make it again. Because I had such high hopes, I was actually pretty disappointed. The main probably is that there is way too much lemon curd for the amount of cake, and I really like lemon! The white layer cake is their standard (good, reliable base for other cakes), the revised method for the seven-minute icing works well, and then lemon curd itself is nicely stabilized for cake-layering purposes. It also looks beautiful, but the flavor is just way off balanced. I was actually a little embarrassed by this one.
Sables (Nov 2008) - A last minute addition to serve with coffee (I also did Korova Cookies, but that's not CI and everyone already knows about those), mostly to use up some extra egg yolks from the deviled eggs. They were okay. I don't know what authentic sables are suppose to taste like, but these didn't seem special to me. Solid and tasty though. I didn't find the texture particularly sandy, as per the description.
The best part of this menu was that it was almost all make ahead, which is a big consideration of mine when throwing a dinner party. I find it makes a huge difference in how much I am actually able to enjoy myself. So that was definitely a success.
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I'm on board. Very timely too, as we are moving in May. Since I stock up during sales I have a very bountiful pantry/freezer, and even though I keep telling myself it's time to stop buying and start plowing through it, habits are hard to break. I think I may even want to challenge myself to do this every other week until we move.
I'm not quite sure when my week starts though, as I don't really do a big weekly trip, so I guess I'll just start it today. I didn't see this thread until this evening so I did pick up milk at the store earlier today, but before that my last trip was on Thursday. We had people over for dinner on Friday so we've been grazing on the leftovers all weekend. Now that the fridge is looking spacious I had been planning on making up a meal plan for the week tonight and doing some more comprehensive grocery shopping tomorrow, but obviously not anymore.
So, for dinner tonight (2 adults, 1 3-year-old) we had leftover braised lamb shanks (about 1/2 portion of meat, plenty of braising liquid), leftover mashed potatoes (about 2 servings), and 1/2 a bag of frozen mixed vegetables sauteed in some olive oil (also about 2 servings), plus standard beverages (milk for the kid, water for me, beer for my husband). This made for extremely modest portions, but no one minded because that meant that my husband got to munch on chips and salsa, which he loves, my daughter got a handful of teddy grahams, which she carefully pressed into her mashed potatoes and ate together, and I had a slice of leftover cake, which I was able to fully enjoy because I wasn't too full. Besides eating up perishable leftovers, I realized I rather liked that they made a dent in the many partially eaten bags of snack food we have in the pantry.
I also cooked up a big pot of chili for dinner tomorrow night. It used up some ground beef in the freezer, which I apparently hadn't done a very good job of wrapping because there were lots of ice crystals in the bag. Surprisingly though, the ice crystals were somehow completely separate from the meat itself, so once defrosted it was fine. No freezer burn. I also threw in a red bell pepper that I probably would have thrown out otherwise (no signs of rot or mold, but very limp and sad), an onion from the pantry plus half an onion from the fridge, all the little teeny annoying cloves of garlic from the middle of two heads, 2 cans of black beans (I still have about 10 cans of assorted beans left), a few cans of tomatoes (lots of those left as well), and a healthy dose of spices (including the last of the chili powder). Tomorrow it will get served with some sour cream that has been waiting for a purpose for a few weeks now and a red onion that I think may be starting to sprout. Oh well, I'll just cut that part out.
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Chris, your recommendation for Carbonnade a la Flamande reminded me that I have had that recipe in my beef recipes file for a while now. This rainy weather combined with the fact that we found a bottle of Chimay Ale when we were cleaning out the pantry last weekend (How did that happen?) seems to call out for that recipe Do you use the blade steaks that the recipe calls for or do you use another cut of meat? Has anyone else made that recipe with another cut of beef?
Thanks!
I can't say for certain if I've made that specific dish, but I know in a lot of beef braises they say you can successfully use other cuts from the chuck, though they often have a specific chuck steak or roast (like the blade steak above) that they particularly like.
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Has anyone tried the Chicken Kiev from the Mar/Apr 2006 issue? I was thinking of making it for a dinner party, but I'm going out of town so I won't have a chance to test it out on my family beforehand. It appeals to me because 1) it can be mostly made ahead, and 2) it's chicken. I am also open to other suggestions of main dishes that would fit those criteria. (Between religious restrictions, pregnancy, and just plain dislikes, I can't serve the following: beef, pork, lamb, shellfish, mercury-containing fish, soft cheeses, and undercooked food. So I figure that leaves me with chicken.)
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On the other hand, my veal stock cooled on the deck in about 5 minutes today.
That's such a great idea, and so simple too. Thanks!
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It seems plausible to me that it is just fat and juices from the pork. I took apart a hunk of pork shoulder today and rendered the fat low and slow in the oven and there was definitely several cups of fat at the end. If the crock pot was very snug around the pork, it really wouldn't take much liquid to submerge it.
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Cucumbers were 4 for a $1 (about 1 lb each): 1 cucumber was made into a spicy szechwan pickle today (salted first, then vinegar, sugar, sesame oil, garlic, and spicy bean paste); 1 cucumber is going into a cantonese style pickle with daikon, carrots, and ginger (salted, then vinegar and sugar only); 1 cucumber is going into a salad with celery, bell peppers, and red onion with a cumin and mint vinaigrette; the last cucumber will be stir-fried with a little garlic and maybe chile paste. The other idea I had was to cut them into 2 inch rounds, hollow out the center and stuff with a ground pork mixture, and then steam them.
A timely post indeed! I have a large pile of cucumbers sitting on my counter as I type. I was thinking that I had to pickle them, but was feeling very uninspired. Now, for the szechwan pickle you speak of, what spicy paste are you using? Can you post pictures of these pickles, or tell me how you cut up the vegetables?
I think quick-pickling is an over-looked area when it comes to dealing with bulk vegetables. And nothing picks up a meal like a small plate of pickles.
The spicy bean paste I use is the Chinese version; it is a mixture of chiles and fermented broad beans, more or less. The package may say hot bean paste, chili bean paste, bean paste with chili, etc. You get the idea. It is a deep reddish brown and a bit chunky looking. I've also seen Japanese versions, but they tend to look a little redder and have a smoother texture. Most of the time it is used as a cooking condiment in beef noodle soup or a meat sauce for noodles and rice, but I came across a Wei-Chuan recipe that used it in a quick pickle and decided to try it.
I don't have a picture; by the time I posted before we had already eaten them. This is the way I prep the cucumber: peel (opt depending on whether wax was used), slice lengthwise, scoop out the seeds, then cut each half lengthwise into 4 long spears, then cut into approx 2 in lengths. You end up with little "fingers" of cucumber (say, the width of a pinky).
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What's made the biggest difference for my grocery budget is inventory and planning. I keep a detailed inventory of everything in my fridge, freezer, and pantry. This allows me to plan menus around what I have and it also keeps me from forgetting what I've already bought. Since I've started doing it almost nothing gets thrown out, which of course wastes less money. I also end up going to the grocery store fewer times, and that cuts down on impulse purchases. And, I noticed that sometimes even when my fridge looked pretty bare, I still had a pretty long inventory list, so I was able to pull together some meals when previously I probably would have thought there was nothing and just gone out to eat.
I think this is key. I found everything a lot less overwhelming when I had a record of what I already have available.
How do you keep inventory? What system do you use?
I just keep it all in an excel worksheet. There are four tabs: Refrigerator, Freezer, Pantry, and Wine (I use this more as a way to track wines we've tried and take notes on what we like, very useful for finding modestly priced wines that taste fine). Each tab is further divided into subcategories, e.g. Refrigerator has Dairy, Protein, Vegetable, Fruit, Condiments, Beverages, Ready-to-Eat. Each item has three columns: description, unit size, quantity. So if I buy chicken thighs at Costco and freeze 3 of the individual packs, that line would read "chicken thighs, whole" then "4 each" then "3 (for quantity of packages)."
The initial inventory was the most time-consuming part. Now every time I go to the store I just take a couple minutes after putting away the groceries to update my spreadsheet using the receipt, and then at the end of each day I update the sheet taking into account what we cooked/used up that day. I also apply a reasonableness test, e.g. it is useful to keep track of exactly how many random packages of chicken I have in the freezer, but I'm not going to keep track of how much cereal is left in the box at the end of every day.
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What's made the biggest difference for my grocery budget is inventory and planning. I keep a detailed inventory of everything in my fridge, freezer, and pantry. This allows me to plan menus around what I have and it also keeps me from forgetting what I've already bought. Since I've started doing it almost nothing gets thrown out, which of course wastes less money. I also end up going to the grocery store fewer times, and that cuts down on impulse purchases. And, I noticed that sometimes even when my fridge looked pretty bare, I still had a pretty long inventory list, so I was able to pull together some meals when previously I probably would have thought there was nothing and just gone out to eat.
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I've been doing some menu planning today, based on vegetables I bought at the super-cheap, warehouse-y produce market and on loss leader proteins at the supermarket this week.
Some examples:
Cucumbers were 4 for a $1 (about 1 lb each): 1 cucumber was made into a spicy szechwan pickle today (salted first, then vinegar, sugar, sesame oil, garlic, and spicy bean paste); 1 cucumber is going into a cantonese style pickle with daikon, carrots, and ginger (salted, then vinegar and sugar only); 1 cucumber is going into a salad with celery, bell peppers, and red onion with a cumin and mint vinaigrette; the last cucumber will be stir-fried with a little garlic and maybe chile paste. The other idea I had was to cut them into 2 inch rounds, hollow out the center and stuff with a ground pork mixture, and then steam them.
Daikon Radish was $0.54/lb. I picked up two small ones for .79 cents. One is going into an asian style beef stew with some carrots; about a third of the other one is going into the aforementioned cantonese style pickle; and the remaining two-thirds is going into a pork-y miso vegetable soup.
Savoy Cabbage was $0.29/lb. I picked up a big 3-lb head for .90 cents. Half of it will going into a side dish of smothered cabbage with pancetta (braised until completely, meltingly tender); the other half will going into soup (sort of french onion soup style, meaning with cheesy, crisp toasts on top)
Escarole was $0.99 for an enormous head. This thing is seriously threatening to take over a shelf of my refrigerator. Half of it is going into a pot of beans and greens (in this case chickpeas, braised with some onions, garlic, raisins, and such); the other half will become a salad with some of the cheap red navel oranges I picked up and a green olive vinaigrette.
Rutabaga and turnips were both about $0.50/lb. A huge rutabaga and a few turnips was less than $2. Half will be mashed with bacon, apple, and sage; the other half will be roasted.
In addition, I got a 3 lb bag of carrots for $1, a 10-lb bag of potatoes for $2.89, a head of celery for a $1... They'll last a while and end up going here and there, but I'm also thinking roasted under some chicken ($0.59/lb for leg quarters), and braised with some hoisin sauce.
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Braised celery is pretty good and makes it easier to eat in quantity as a vegetable side dish, instead of as a stalk or two in another dish. Chop up an entire bunch into longish pieces, simmer in some water/wine/butter/s&p until tender and the liquid has evaporated into a glaze. You can dress it up a bit by sprinkling it with Parmesan and running it under the broiler.
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I made the Old Fashioned Chocolate Layer Cake (March/April 2006) for a birthday party last week and it got rave reviews. The cake itself is nicely moist with a good chocolate flavor and bakes up into nice tall layers, but what people really loved was the frosting. It was billowy and fluffy and so light it almost melted on your tongue, but it was still very chocolate-y.
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I just got a call from the supervisor. She wanted to let me know how a cook at another program cooks her roast. She buys an Outside round roast and cooks it from frozen. She puts it in a pan with a bit of water. She covers the pan with saran wrap and then foil( I didnt know you can cook saran wrap). She cooks it at 325f for 1/2 per pound. Does this sound right? Do you cook beef from frozen?
I made a recipe once that instructed me to do this and I ended up throwing it out. While it didn't melt into the food, it sort of shrink-wrapped itself around the food and imparted a bit of a plastic wrap taste. Safe? I don't know, but I wasn't willing to risk giving my family cancer over it. For a more scientific answer, I'm sure you could look on the web site of whatever brand of plastic wrap is in your kitchen or call their customer service number.
Of course, they're seniors. They're going to die soon anyway. Maybe they don't care about cancer causing chemicals. (I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I know that's evil, I take it back.)
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BTW - has anyone heard about this little brouhaha? I like the magazine a lot, but, golly they take themselves seriously!
I agree that the magazine takes themselves too seriously, but in this situation, after reading the original exchange, I have to say the blogger comes off as rather immature.
I think the point at which she lost my sympathy was when she wrote: "I appreciate that you are trying to play the bigger person and be all kind and patient and whatnot. That's my typical M.O., as I consider myself a spiritual and loving individual. But..." It's like saying "I'm not trying to be a ass hole here, as I'm usually a really nice person, but [insert ass-hole-ish thing to say here]." Saying you're usually not like that doesn't excuse your current rude behavior.
Like I said, the magazine does take themselves ridiculously seriously, but personal behavior counts for a lot. Even if I may agree with the blogger's position generally, in this case the blogger just rubs me the wrong way.
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I echo the above opinions about what to keep on hand, and I'll add one more: bread crumbs, preferably made from fresh bread (I keep them in the freezer). There are a lot of vegetables improved by a smattering of crunchy, garlicky/herby, and/or salty bread crumbs.
We just started getting CSA deliveries and here's what I've found works for me. I also make up a list of everything in the box and cross stuff off as I use it. It gives me a bit of visual motivation to have everything used up before I pick up the next box. On my pick up day (Thursday for me), I have a easy protein ready to go in the fridge (fish fillets or whatever) that just needs to be sauteed. Then I pick out two of the vegetables in the box and cook them simply: stir-fried, roasted, etc. I think it gives me a bit of a kick start if I get through two of the items on the first night. Then I do my regular menu planning, incorporating what I get in the box, and then I go to the grocery store over the weekend to buy stuff for more interesting preparations.
One thing we really like is to make salsas. Good with chips, toasted bread, or on some fish. I just try to have something pungent (onions, green garlic, etc) + something bulky (fruit of veg) + something herby + something acidic (citrus, vinegar) in every batch.
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The other night I made the Golden Northern Cornbread from the September 1995 issue, and I was quite disappointed with how it turned out. From the article:
In my opinion, there was very little flavor, it was a bit dry, and it was not very "Northern-like" at all to my tastes (that is, it was not soft, moist and sweet). What gives? I could swear I have made a successful CI-recipe cornbread before, it must not have been this one! I was left wondering if it was the cornmeal itself: I used a stone-ground organic that had lots of germ in it, so I was hoping for a lot of great flavor, as the article promised me! Is there another Northern-style cornbread recipe in a more recent issue that I could be thinking of? (I feel like it might have actually had corn kernels in it, anyone remember that one?)This cornbread is moist and light, with the rich taste of corn. Use stone-ground or water-ground cornmeal for the best taste and texture. Either yellow or white cornmeal bakes into a handsome, delicious cornbread.Oh wait, I just looked online. The Corn Muffins don't have corn kernels in them. I think you were looking for their All-Purpose Cornbread from January 2005:
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The other night I made the Golden Northern Cornbread from the September 1995 issue, and I was quite disappointed with how it turned out. From the article:
In my opinion, there was very little flavor, it was a bit dry, and it was not very "Northern-like" at all to my tastes (that is, it was not soft, moist and sweet). What gives? I could swear I have made a successful CI-recipe cornbread before, it must not have been this one! I was left wondering if it was the cornmeal itself: I used a stone-ground organic that had lots of germ in it, so I was hoping for a lot of great flavor, as the article promised me! Is there another Northern-style cornbread recipe in a more recent issue that I could be thinking of? (I feel like it might have actually had corn kernels in it, anyone remember that one?)This cornbread is moist and light, with the rich taste of corn. Use stone-ground or water-ground cornmeal for the best taste and texture. Either yellow or white cornmeal bakes into a handsome, delicious cornbread.I'm not a big fan of their Golden Northern Cornbread either. It's still firmly in the savory camp, and I think that type should be sweet. (Please, if you're a southerner, don't shoot me). Were you maybe thinking of their corn muffins? I tried those a while ago, and while they are not cake-sweet, they do have a nice sweetness to them and a softer, moister crumb. They offered a few variations on the muffins; I can't remember if one included corn kernals or not.
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I tried the Roasted Asparagus with Panko Breadcrumbs and it was DELICIOUS. We couldn't stop eating it. However, technically the recipe is sort of a failure. The crumbs didn't really adhere to the asparagus spears (I used fat spears, just as the recipe directed) so it looked sort of messy and unappetizing. Since it was just a family meal, it didn't matter - we just scooped up some coating with every bite of aspargus - but I would like to make it more presentable, since the flavors are awesome.
Can anyone suggest a way to make the coating stick? (For anyone without the book, fat asparagus spears are rolled in a mayo/mustard/lemon juice mixture and then rolled in panko bread crumbs, put on a greased baking sheet, drizzled with a bit more oil, and then baked.)
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But, alas, recipes like their Beef Tacos from May 2002 are so good that I find it impossible to consider canceling my magazine subscription! Has anyone else tried these? As jsmeeker mentioned in my foodblog, one of the things they recommend is buying soft corn tortillas and frying them yourself. Total pain in the butt, but also makes the best taco shells I've ever had at home, hands down, no question.
I tried this recipe a few times, and I completely agree that frying your own taco shells makes a huge difference. I also agree that it is a huge pain, since you have to stand there holding each shell in a bent shape while frying, making it impossible to get anything else done. So my solution to this problem is to make tostadas instead! Same filling, toppings, etc. I just drop each tortilla into the oil and let if fry flat, flipping halfway through. It takes half the time (since you don't have to fry the two halves seperately) and because you don't have to hold the tortilla while frying, you can get other work done at the same time. The way I do it is to do all the chopping and measuring first, and then cook the beef filling at the same time I fry the tortillas.
I also find that making tostadas instead of tacos allows you more leeway to play with the ratio of fillings. I really like the freshness from the lettuce and cilantro, so this allows me to pile it on.
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Thanks for all the replies! We just moved in a couple of days ago and I went to check out Pike Place Market this morning. My first observation is you must all be really fit! I've been exploring the neighborhood by foot and even the relatively flat streets would be considered hills in other places. I've had to climb up the waterfront-to-downtown steps in our apartment complex twice now (Harbor Steps) in as many days, and all I have to say is I'm going to have legs of steel by the end of the summer.
My parents helped us move in and stocked the fridge with some fresh meat and produce so my trip today was more to explore, but I'm excited for what's to come. Our furnished apartment came with the crappiest knives I've ever used, and after almost impaling myself while hacking away at a watermelon I decided the first order of business was to pick up a cheap but decent knife for the summer. For the very fair price of $30 at Seattle Cutlery, I got a Forschner Chef's Knife. The sales people were quite friendly, too. Actually, everyone around here is friendly. It sort of weirds me out. I'm going to have to get used to chatting with random folks.
Oh actually, I forget. I suppose my very first order of business was to pick up donuts at Daily Dozen Donuts. Those cinnamon sugar donuts fresh out of the fryer were sublime. The other donuts were fine, but freshness does make a huge difference in this case. Next time I'm just going to get whatever is coming out of the fryer immediately, instead of a variety.
Our next stop was World Spice. In a word: Wow. Incredible selection and super fresh. The whole spices are ground (if requested) when you buy them. When I opened my backpack at home, the smell practically bowled me over. And it was cheap.
They didn't have saffron, however, so I wandered over to the Spanish Table. Very interesting selection of things that can be hard to find.
Then we spent some time wandering in the lower levels. Around lunchtime, we came back up and ordered from the counter at Jack's Fish Spot. I liked the cod in my fish and chips, but found the fries to be too soggy. There was some good looking cioppino floating around that I'll have to try some other time though. And the counter guy likes to flirt with the ladies too, which adds to the experience. No fishy smell from the counter, always a good sign, and reasonable prices. I was actually really surprised about this. I thought for sure the seafood would be marked up like crazy.
Picked up some tasty cheese for later at Beecher's. And apparently there's a cheese festival this weekend to look forward to.
Overall, the prices at the market seemed pretty fair, given their location and the fact that they have so many tourists. Well, some items I checked out did make me raise my eyebrows quite a bit, but I also saw plenty of stuff within "everyday" range. Pleasant surprise.
Klatsch: a week without shopping
in Kitchen Consumer
Posted
Anyone have any ideas for wheatberries? I realized I only ever use them for salads but that doesn't sound very appealing for this weather and we'll be moving before the weather really warms up again. Any suggestions?