KennethT

Malaysian chicken kapitan curry with homemade roti canai.

I don't think you even need to order the potted plant (unless you don't already have potting soil and pot) since it roots so easily. Take practically any branch, pick the leaves off (except for the top two or so) and plunk it in a glass of water. You'll see roots probably by the next day!

I bought a start from a nursery a couple years ago.... I don't think you can root a thin branch - maybe one of the larger branches but I don't know if they'd have them in the market.

Vietnamese grilled (baked/broiled) chicken on a bed of rau ram. I swear, if I had a restaurant, I'd made rau ram soaked in chicken juices either an appetizer or a side dish!

Interesting... it's like an Indian version of Tom Kha. BTW, I think your photo is a LOT better than theirs!

I used to make it all the time but it fell out of rotation after I had problems with my lemongrass plant. Recently I bought some from my local Hmart (a primarily Korean but some other Asian type store) for a barbeque that I keep meaning to post about but haven't yet.... but had some extra, hence.... Usually the stalks I can get here are mostly desiccated husks (I really need to grow a new plant) but these weren't terrible, just not great.

Vietnamese lemongrass chicken, ga xao sa ot.

My curry leaf tree is sprouting a new tree! I'm debating whether to prune it.... Here's the whole garden (minus the 6 kencur plants which are in a different area): The curry leaf tree is doing really well - so bushy now.

Pineapple som tum?

@liamsauntthanks for taking us along and glad you made it out ok!

I know you said no grilled, and I have no idea if it would go along with the sides, but I'm quite partial to grilled pineapple with a sour/sweet/salty tamarind drizzle.

Yes, but it's uncommon there so it is a specialty item. I'm sure if you were to drive a couple hours to Vietnam, it would be 1/10th the price but also every vendor sells tons of it every day. Plus, since it's not used often in that area, I wonder if the lemongrass was imported rather than grown locally.

Out of curiosity, how much does the lemongrass cost?

We don't have crocodile here, but we have alligator. I've had it in restaurants - quite tasty - kind of like chicken, but I'd say more like a large steak of frogs legs. Very mildly flavored. I can even get alligator steaks (which come from the tail) from one of the online supermarkets I use.

How does one eat a sausage like that (at breakfast) with chopsticks? Is there a knife around to cut it into small pieces?

How do you extract the meat out of the conch? What is the flavor/texture like? I've only had conch in the Caribbean, where it's a large conch that's typically chopped up and made into fritters since it's pretty tough and chewy on its own.

After all the rain we've had recently, it'll be so nice to see pictures of your gorgeous (hopefully) weather!

Barramundi with sambal bawang from Bali. Simple but really tasty. Lots of shallots (bawang in Indonesian), garlic, chillies and shrimp paste. That's it.

I think that line was hyperbole. Personally, I do like their marinara sauce but I've never tried their (or any) frozen lasagne.

Is that graffiti on the shooting house? I imagine there's no one around to do it, so it Ronnie and company did it. The darker marks almost look like antlers or is that my imagination/rorschach ink blot?

It's the United Nations of Snacks!

Wow! That's expensive!

Thanks! I haven't really kept up with any advances or new products they came out with.

The Coravin uses disposable argon canisters - they look like the CO2 charges used in a whipping siphon. I forget how many glasses each canister is good for - I think 6-8 but they're not super expensive unless you plan to drink most of the bottle at once, which is not what it's really designed for. We only use the device when we want to have a glass or so of a relatively expensive wine, so the cost of the argon is little compared to teh cost of the wine consumed. I wouldn't use it with a $20 bottle. Also, it doesn't work with screw caps or with the aggregate corks. Only real cork. It does, however, work really well on older wines - although REALLY old wines need a special super-thin needle to deal with a delicate cork.

For wine, the best device for having a little bit at a time is the Coravin. The device is small and portable - it attaches to the top of a bottle and a needle is inserted through the cork. Argon is used rather than CO2 so it does't carbonate the wine - adding argon pushes wine out the needle into your glass. You can take 2 sips or several glasses, then remove the device keep the bottle standing up for maybe 10 minutes for the cork to heal then it can go back in your wine fridge. I've had some bottles that we've removed a glass from once a year and the bottle is still the same except for the normal aging that it would have had in that time.