blue_dolphin

Aside from using it as a shortcut to related green sauces from multiple cuisines, I might: Toss with pasta and cooked veg and top with crumbled queso, feta or Parmesan Mix into eggs before scrambling or use in an omelet filling Smear on bread for a grilled cheese sandwich Mix into mayo for a sandwich spread Whisk into a vinaigrette or creamy salad dressing Drizzle over roasted sweet potatoes or any roasted vegetables Spoon into a baked potato Mix into potato salad or egg salad or deviled eggs Add a swirl on top of a bowl of soup, polenta, cooked rice or bean dips Mix with sashimi-grade fish and lime juice for a ceviche or pickled shrimp Blend into meatloaf or meat balls before cooking Dollop on any grilled meats or seafood Spread on pizza dough instead of a pizza sauce Edited to add that I should have mentioned the recipes where Bayless uses it in the book. He uses it as a sauce for shrimp, beef or pork in his recipe for skillet tacos, tosses it with roasted chayote, and uses it in a risotto-like green rice and beans dish. What uses do you have in mind for the green chilli paste that you are requesting a recipe for?

Sounds like @Alex absolutely nailed your request! You can make it as smooth as you like and determine the heat level by your choice of chile peppers. My go to green chile stuff is the green chile adobo from More Mexican Everyday by Rick Bayless. I find it neutral enough that I easily scoop some out and tweak it into a zhoug or green chile chutney. I wouldn't call it chilli paste though because it contains so much cilantro and parsley. More chili herb paste.

In case you wondered….A Visit to the Peeps Factory (gift link to NYT article with some great photos)

Those pita breads in last week's lunch look great....well, everything else does, too 😋 Sorry about this week's food, though I'm sure the company was excellent!

Not Margaret, but I have always used the whole thing.

Roasted asparagus with marinated mushrooms and crispy fried buckwheat from Grist, topped with a boiled egg.

Yes. The recipe says the raw cauliflower is to be, "shaved into thin vertical cross pieces, leaving the core intact," whatever the heck that means 🤣 At first, I thought it would have been better to slice the cauliflower similarly but roast it instead of raw. Turns out the texture of the thin, raw slices works quite nicely here. Though roasted, crispy bits have their own charm!

Late reply here. I know what you mean about the icky silicone. I ordered one of the Mastrad spatulas and I see what you mean about it being sturdy. I really liked the iSi slim spatulas (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) but they have disappeared from the market. RIP. I've had one of these Tovolo spatulas with a stainless steel handle (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) for about 3 years and it's been OK. Like the iSi, the blade is very thin but it has a bit of curve. They also have an all silicone one (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) that is cheaper but looks otherwise similar and wooden-handle versions. The downside of those very thin blades is that they get nicks in them easily if someone (aka cat sitter) uses them to scoop stuff out of pull-top cans of the sort that leave a sharp inside edge.

Barley salad with cauliflower, smoked whitefish, marinated mushrooms and arugula from Grist. Kind of a strange combo of ingredients that I only tried because this recipe is in the "Week's Worth of Barley Without Any Boredom" section of Grist and I decided to work my way through these "weeks" as a way to get more familiar with the book and these grains. I wasn't prepared to love it but it grew on me and I ended up enjoying it. I used smoked trout instead of whitefish and baby kale instead of arugula. The dressing is just pickle liquid (I used spicy dills) mixed with mayo and seasoned with S&P. I added some crisped barley from one of the other recipes for a bit of crunch. The marinated mushrooms are first pan-roasted, then tossed with garlic, thyme, rosemary, garlic, chili flakes, olive oil and red wine vinegar. They're quite good - more umami than pickle-y.

Per the instructions in the book, you separate the leaves from the lettuce and toss everything together so any lettuce would work. Seems to me the point of little gems is how cute they look when halved or quartered so that’s what I did even though the dressing doesn’t coat every leaf evenly.

A riff on the barley cakes underneath lamb chops with roasted carrots and ras el hanout apricot almond rig from Grist: No lamb chops at my farmers market vendor. The recipe just seasons them with S&P and grills or pan fries them so I subbed a couple of meaty baby back ribs that I cooked in a hot oven per Eric Kim's Salt & Pepper Ribs recipe. The barley cakes are a little bland but not bad. The given quantities would have made a thin batter, not a thick one as the recipe describes so I added more barley and less water. I think they'd be better if I'd seasoned the batter with some of the ras el hanout spice mix that went into the apricot almond relish. I used baby kale instead of spinach for the green and added more lemon juice and olive oil to dress it. A fine lunch, even if I barely followed the recipe!

Little Gems with Lemon Cream, Spring Onion, Radish and Mint p 101 The Lemon Cream p 41 is an interesting dressing, with garlic-infused heavy cream whipped into a light, airy sauce flavored with lemon. This is the only recipe in the book that calls for it and I rarely have little gem lettuces but figured I should take advantage of the opportunity and mark this one off my list. I used the torn croutons instead of breadcrumbs and forgot to add the mint. Ooops. This one is light, bright and spring-like.

Eric Kim's Gochujang Buttered Noodles from the NYT. Dead easy and quite tasty. If you try it, I recommend reducing the honey from 1 Tbsp to 1 tsp/serving. Eric does have a sweet tooth. I added sugar snap peas and red bell pepper.

Buckwheat with asparagus and radishes in a citrus vinaigrette

When I'm in Ibericaland, I always start off with a classic Pan con Tomate y Jamón

I love plain whipped cream with gingery baked stuff, maybe garnished with a few wisps of candied lemon rind or a grating of fresh lemon zest.

Pizza Beans

Either a stovetop, ridged grill pan or broiler would work but I used my handy dandy countertop Philips Avance Grill, which has its own topic here.

Charred radicchio with farro and burrata alongside orange and mustard marinated asparagus, both from Snacks for Dinner. I thought bitter radicchio + rich, creamy burrata was a curious combo but it works well with the farro and vinaigrette. Speaking of which, I was a little wary of putting two vinaigrettes on a plate together but clearly, some color was needed on the plate and it turns out they complement each other nicely. The orange, mustard and thyme marinade for the asparagus is delicious and the asparagus reportedly keeps in the fridge for 4 days, though I may eat it all today. Great do-ahead side if you've got nice, tender spring asparagus.

It works really well. You can either bake them right away or freeze some on a tray, bag them up and bake directly from frozen at a later time.

I can confirm @KennethT's Wild Fork grouper recommendation. I like that the portions are individually vacuum packed so if I want to take out just one piece for a grilled grouper sandwich, I don’t have to repackage everything else. I agree on the so-so salmon. I go to a physical Wild Fork location so I can fish 😉 through the packages but the salmon filets still tend towards tail end cuts

I just re-read it also and would really like some waffles now!

One of the items in the Sweets/Desserts section of Lukas Volger's Snacks for Dinner is titled "Dates Four Ways." I decided to test them out to find my favorite before committing a bunch of dates to the effort. At the top, we have a broiled date with olive oil drizzle, lime zest and Aleppo pepper flakes. In the second row, from left to right, we have a date stuffed with maple goat cheese (Silver Goat chèvre mixed with a little maple syrup) and topped with cacao nibs, a date stuffed with sharp Cheddar and drizzled with honey and a date stuffed with almond butter and topped with Fly By Jing chili crisp. These dates are pretty small so this looks rather silly but they're the last of the ones I bought at the farmers market. All are good enough for further exploration. The broiled one was supposed to be broiled until the skin blistered, turned and done on the other side. I wasn't seeing any obvious blistering so it got left in too long. Still, the inside was nicely chewy and the lime and pepper were a nice contrast. The maple goat cheese tasted delicious on its own. I'd happily smear it on a waffle or bagel or muffin. The tang of the goat cheese contrasts with the sweet date and the cacao nibs add a nice crunch. This wins the dessert category. If you made these with larger dates, cut in half and piped the goat cheese on with a pretty tip, these could look quite fancy. The sharp Cheddar was good with the date but the honey just blended in. I'd be tempted to skip the honey and use a few drops of aged sherry vinegar or balsamic. The nut butter and chili crisp wins the savory category. Very more-ish. Edited to add these were accompanied by a small glass of Pineau des Charentes....a small glass that I refilled once...or twice 🙃

My recommendation is to let your pantry grow according to what you want to cook rather than just trying to build a collection. What are you missing in the recipes and cookbooks you are working from? If you have a friend who cooks one of the cuisines you are interested in, ask them if you can tag along on a shopping trip. The 99 Ranch in Monterey Park is indeed overwhelming but even there, if you are looking for a specific Chinese ingredient, you should be able to get some help from either the staff or fellow shoppers, particular on a non-weekend day. And while 99 Ranch has a variety of Asian ingredients, it's probably not the best place to ask for advice on Japanese, Vietnamese, Cambodian or Thai recipes. Mitsuwa Marketplace will be great for Japanese, LAX-C in Thai Town is the place for that cuisine. This is not to say the ingredients are not available but your chances of good advice rise when you're at the mother ship. I agree with @BeeZee on Andrea Nguyen for Vietnamese food and would add Leela Punyaratabandhu's blog for Thai ingredients. She's the author of Simple Thai Food and Bangkok and while the blog is no longer active it can still be searched. Older, but still reliable brand recommendations can be found in Bruce Cost's Asian Ingredients and Lucky Peach 101 Easy Asian Recipes. Finally, most grocery stores in So Cal can sell alcohol so you should able to find Shaoxing wine that's not salted. It's usually shelved with the alcoholic beverages rather than with cooking ingredients.

One way to ease the prep part is to make an Instant Pot risotto. I've made this asparagus risotto and the mushroom variation of this basic risotto, both from @pazzaglia on hippressurecooking.com. They're really pretty good.