eG Foodblog: Torakris in the Heartland - Fast Food to Fine Dining

[Pam R]

I have no idea where the purple cauliflower comes from or why it's purple. But it also comes in light green and orange. One of our grocery chains here has been selling them this year, but they never look good enough to try.

[chardgirl]

I have no idea where the purple cauliflower comes from or why it's purple.  But it also comes in light green and orange.  One of our grocery chains here has been selling them this year, but they never look good enough to try.

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A regular white cauliflower if exposed to the sun while growing will naturally get some purple and orange and look somewhat like a black eye: not appealing! For white cauliflowers growers sometimes tie the leaves off with a rubber band. They are blanched with the leaves.

Purple and Orange cauliflower varieties have been selected to be just orange and just purple and gardeners and farmers can purchase seeds for them. They are modern varieties: They are hybrids (not genetically modified, just hybrids). The purple variety that we grow is 'Grafitti' and the orange is 'Cheddar.' I think they both have a few more nutrients (the orange might have more carotene, I'm fuzzy on this but I think it's true).

I know this is Kristins blog, but I'll just put this one photo of some of our purple cauliflower: (ps about the stuff in the grocery store not looking good: it was likely weeks old. look for these varieties at your local farmers markets, and let your farmers know you're interested. Assure them that Johnnys Seeds has the seeds for them. ) -cg

[torakris]

chardgirl,

Thanks for the information on the cauliflower, and the beautiful picture!

I am off to lunch, A very popular Turkish place called Anantolia, not far from my house with fellow eGullet member NancyH. I noticed she is still online here so I guess I don't need to leave just yet.

pictures to come!

[Hiroyuki]

Back to the garden,

I asked my dad about the hours he spend there and he replied, "oh, not too many. About 3 or 4"

Sounds like a lot to me...

The planters he said are to give him more space, he doesn't want to dig into the rest of the backyard.

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Thanks for the reply. Your father is a great gardener!

[torakris]

Incredible lunch today!

NancyH and I had Turkish cuisine at Anatolia cafe in the Cedar Center shopping area.

It was the first time for both of us and we wanted a little bit of everything so we shared the appetizer platter, with 7 appetizers.

starting with the olive at the top and going clock wise:

Haydari (yogurt with walnuts, dill and garlic)

Kisir (cracked wheat salad)

Humus

Soslu Pathcan (eggplant, green peppers, tomatoes, garlic, onions, parsley)

Babagannush

Ezme salad (tomatoes, walnuts, onions, parslley & hot spices with lemon and olive oil)

and stuffed grape leaves

we also split a dish of falafel

these were the best falafel I have ever had! My close-up of the insides didn't come out very good though.

made on the premise pita bread that we had to get refilled.

Nancy had the yogurt drink called Ayran and I went for the Turkish coffee

then we shared some of the most incredible baklava

Sorry the pictures got worse as the meal progressed....

[Kouign Aman]

Yummy lunch.

Your dad's garden looks great (wonderful) and great (large).

[bavila]

Yummy lunch.

Your dad's garden looks great (wonderful) and great (large).

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Wow! I just checked the garden pics. Quite impressive. Your parents' food supply looks a lot like my parents -- plenty of processed stuff in the pantry, but plenty of homegrown produce. Good stuff. Is the household able to consume all the bounty or do they end up sharing with neighbors?

[torakris]

Is the household able to consume all the bounty or do they end up sharing with neighbors?

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With 8 kids and other relatives nearby there isn't much leftover for the neighbors. the problem we have is that he gets a lot of one thing at a time. The first week I was here we had swiss chard almost every night and there were almost 15 of us.

[torakris]

Went shopping with my kids this afternoon, Target and Old Navy. On the way back I stopped off at an Indian market (Lakshmi Plaza) and an Asian store (Star foods) both on Mayfield Rd.

Nancy and I were discussing at lunch how neither of us have tried to make falafel from scratch and after eating those ones today I will never go back to the boxed stuff again. So I picked up some dried chickpeas, I also needed some ginger for dinner today. The guy at the store just tossed it in for free though...

At the Asian store I pick up some of my favorite Korean noodles to take back to Japan and some sesame seeds for tonight.

[Hiroyuki]

Is the household able to consume all the bounty or do they end up sharing with neighbors?

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With 8 kids and other relatives nearby there isn't much leftover for the neighbors. the problem we have is that he gets a lot of one thing at a time. The first week I was here we had swiss chard almost every night and there were almost 15 of us.

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He is just like my father, making my mother complain.

Why not give him some square foot gardening ideas, like staggering the harvest?

[torakris]

Why not give him some square foot gardening ideas, like staggering the harvest?

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I have tried year after year, I guess by this age they are too set in their ways to change.

[helenjp]

Planting too much...reminds me of an elderly customer in my parents' pharmacy. He came in regularly for medication for his many ailments, walking very slowly on his two walking sticks...and further burdened by the cabbages, the potatoes, the tomatoes etc. that he used to bring in. I doubt if he cooked or ate much of it himself, but he got enormous pleasure out of his crop nevertheless!

Do your parents freeze or can garden produce much, or do they use everything in season?

Chapaghetti, hmmm...will have to check out *my* local Asian foods store when I'm in NZ briefly next month!

So what do all the nieces and nephews like you to cook for them?

[torakris]

Weds Dinner:

Now this was a dinner I would make in Japan!

Mapodofu, using hzrt8w's pictorial in the Chinese forum. If you have not tried this yet, you must cook it soon, It was a big hit tonight!

I also made one of my favorites, green beans for a sesame sauce (goma-ae), my recipe can be found in my eGCI class on Japanese food.

another favorite dish, Sweet Potatoes and Onions with cardamom, cinnamon and lime.

[MarketStEl]

Incredible lunch today!

[...]

Sorry the pictures got worse as the meal progressed....

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And what was in that Turkish coffee? Hmmmmmm?

Went shopping with my kids this afternoon, Target and Old Navy.   On the way back I stopped off at an Indian market (Lakshmi Plaza) and an Asian store (Star foods) both on Mayfield Rd.

Nancy and I were discussing at lunch how neither of us have tried to make falafel from scratch and after eating those ones today I will never go back to the boxed stuff again. So I picked up some dried chickpeas, I also needed some ginger for dinner today. The guy at the store just tossed it in for free though...

At the Asian store I pick up some of my favorite Korean noodles to take back to Japan and some sesame seeds for tonight.

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Question: Are the Korean noodles less expensive in the US than they are in Japan? Easier to find here than there?

From what I've read, I understand that many Japanese look down their noses at Koreans, but as the two countries are far closer to each other than either is to the US, I would think it wouldn't be much of a problem to find Korean products in Japan.

[edsel]

Nancy and I were discussing at lunch how neither of us have tried to make falafel from scratch and after eating those ones today I will never go back to the boxed stuff again.

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Falafel from scratch is easy, and so worth it! Though you will find yourself standing in front of a wok full of hot oil again.

That ma po dofu looks scrumptious.

[torakris]

Question:  Are the Korean noodles less expensive in the US than they are in Japan? Easier to find here than there?

From what I've read, I understand that many Japanese look down their noses at Koreans, but as the two countries are far closer to each other than either is to the US, I would think it wouldn't be much of a problem to find Korean products in Japan.

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There has been a recent boom in Japan of all things Korean for the past year or two. It started with the Korean dramas and movies and has moved into many people wanting to study the language and cook the food. The prices are a little cheaper here, I probably saved myself a dollar on that pack of noodles. But the more important thing is I will have something to feed myself and kids when we are awake with jet lag at 3:00am once we get back. To get these particular noodles I would have trek into Tokyo...

[torakris]

Nancy and I were discussing at lunch how neither of us have tried to make falafel from scratch and after eating those ones today I will never go back to the boxed stuff again.

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Falafel from scratch is easy, and so worth it! Though you will find yourself standing in front of a wok full of hot oil again.

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Hot oil, I didn't think of that...

Maybe it won't be as bad if it isn't for 25 people!

[torakris]

I just finished off a nice sized bowl of cookie dough ice cream, I haven't had that in years.

We used to eat ice cream (or some other dessert) almost every night and we always had about 5 kinds in the freezer at all times. Now we try not to keep it in the house to avoid tempting my diabetic father. He is very good with his diet, but he LOVES ice cream.

My sister Laura just flew in from Boston tonight, so we will have an extra person in the house until Sunday. Her husband, Jean, couldn't make it with her this time.

[racheld]

I am SO CRAVING this!!! I've been wanting some for several days, MADE myself not look at hzrt8w's thread, and HOPED no one would have it for dinner and put up that enticing picture, and now THIS! I just innocently wandered in here and you set off a midnight CRAVE!

We've had all the ingredients for a couple of days, and I can just smell all those good aromas as it cooks---last two times have been on Saturday mornings, as DD cooks it, and she put on a pot when she got home from work at 7 a.m. Now it's one of our favourite breakfasts. All that lovely spicy red sauce, with its gingery, sweet hot overtones.

I'd cook it myself, following the tutorial, but it's HER dish, and it would be wrong, somehow, to just jump in there and get going---like maybe writing a chapter of a book when she was away from her desk.

Anyway, yours looks terrific!!

[torakris]

I love mapodofu evers since a Japanese friend introduced me to it when I was about 20.

As I drink my cup of coffee (instant with 1/2 pack of sweet and low and a spalsh of 2% milk) and contemplate if I am actually hungry for breakfast or not let me tell you more about dinner last night. I was 4th in line for the computer so did't have much time to talk last night...

Last night was a good example of working with what you have. I don't want to go out and buy condiments that no one is going to use after I leave so I improvised a bit. I did buy the chili bean paste because I will use that for other dishes and my sister had Hoisin sauce. We had no brown bean paste, rice wine or chicken stock. I just used water for the stock, mirin (Japanese sweet rice wine) for the regular rice wine and then did not add the sugar that was called for. I also added a nice splash of soy sauce to add some depth that the bean paste would have. It was quite good and though I noticed a small difference no one else suspected a thing.

The sweet potato dish I was more disappointed in, it was a Sri Lankan dish from a Madhur Jaffrey cookbook but without the chiles and cardamom it wasn't as good. I also ended up using powdered cinnamon instead of a stick and some it basically tasted like cinnamon and lime juice flavored sweet potatoes. Everyone loved it but it wasn't the dish I wanted..

My goma-ae I made in the blender for the first time and it worked great! I usually mkae it in a suribachi (Japanese style mortar and pestle) and will continue to do that at home but it was nice to know it can be made just as well with a blender.

[rockandroller]

I just discovered this thread. It sounds like your trip is going great!

Chiming on on "Cleveland" food, I think it's a mix of ethnicities and that's what cleveland is, as it's really a melting pot of a lot of different types. I mean, there is a HUGE Irish population here, the kielbasa crowd and the whole Polish section of town and their influences, lots of Italians/the little Italy section, I could go on and on. I would be hard pressed to pick one single food as a representative of Cleveland cuisine. To be most accurate, I would say a European multicultural buffet would have to be the representative. Something with pierogi, kielbasi, sauerkraut balls (which are DIVINE by the way), Irish stew and soda bread with a hearty stout and a heaping dish of eggplant parm.

[Hiroyuki]

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Just curious... How firm is "medium firm" tofu? Is there an equivalent type in Japan? Is it more like kinu or momen?

I'm also curious what that Korean takuan tastes like...

[MomOfLittleFoodies]

Just curious... How firm is "medium firm" tofu?  Is there an equivalent type in Japan?  Is it more like kinu or momen?

I'm also curious what that Korean takuan tastes like...

I'm not Kris, but Ive found that there really isn't a huge difference between Japanese and Korean Takuan. The slight variation I noticed isn't any bigger than the difference between brands really. My mom uses Korean or Hawaiian brands of takuan when she can't get the Japanese brands.

[torakris]

This takuan was the only one available, I don't buy a lot of takuan in either country but I prefer the non-yellow I buy in Japan.

The tofu was quite good, and a great price at that. 15 years ago the only tofu I could get in Cleveland was awful. The medium firm was sort of like a soft momen, it worked well for the mapodofu.

[torakris]

I never did eat breakfast this morning...

I had an iced coffee though, my sister Laura can mkae really good iced coffee with instant. I really am going to have to pay attention next time...

We drank them in the car when we headed off to Gabriel Brothers (I am not sure if this store is found outside of Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia), I got some great deals on clothes but no good kitchen stuff.

I promised my sister Mary I would teach her how to make some sushi rolls. We spent two years at the same university and our favorite restaurant was this tiny hole in the wall Korean place. She always ate their Korean version on the sushi rolls.

some prep

the finished rolls

These were very simple ones with some seasoned pork, cucumbers, carrots and takuan. We didn't even season the rice because she forgot to bring over the rice vinegar. We tried one roll with kimchee inside as well, it was really good but next time I will squeeze all the liquid out as is loosened up the rice.