Curry

Wow, somehow I managed to delete this post within seconds of posting it. So here goes take two.

This is a dish that Ethan introduced me to shortly after we got married. He bought the stuff and made it one day when I was at a night class, so I came home to dinner already made. It looked kinda weird  and it smelled even more weird. I'd never eaten anything like it before. I was pretty skeptical, but I have to say I ended up really liking it, and it's something we've had fairly often since then. I love it because it's quick, easy, and you can just kinda throw in whatever you've got laying around. It's pretty hard to mess up.

What You Need:

1 box (or bottle) curry seasoning (you can use whatever brand you want, but after some experimenting, we've decided to stick with this one)

S&B Golden Curry. It comes in a whole range of spiciness levels, so you can pick what works for you. I never had any trouble finding it in Thatcher or Rexburg, but only one of the three stores here carries it.

1lb cubed meat ( use the pork roast chunks I keep on hand, but you could also use raw pork, beef, chicken, shrimp, lamb, or anything else you have handy, although I'm not sure what else one WOULD have handy)
1 onion, diced
2 cups water, unless you're using a pre-made sauce in which case you don't need water (start with a little less than this and add more if you decide you want it)
A little oil or butter for stir-frying
Veggies, we use carrots and bell peppers, but you could also but celery or anything else you've got laying around.
Rice (start this cooking when you start your curry and they should be done around the same time)
If you're doing this with already cooked meat it's pretty simple, here's What to Do:

Stir fry your veggies until they are crisp/tender (meaning they're mostly soft, but still have some crispness left in them, you don't want mush). Add the meat and water (or sauce if using a bottled variety, if you are than you are done now) and bring to boil.

Waiting for my water to boil. 

Now turn your pan down so it will simmer, break your bar of curry seasoning into pieces, and stir in your curry seasoning. Stir until it dissolves and then simmer for a few minutes to let it thicken. Start with about half the bar and then taste it to see what you think. I don't normally put in the whole bar, it's just a little too strong. I think I leave out one of the pieces.
Serve over warm rice or noodles and you're ready to go.

For cooking this with raw meat:
Stir fry your meat and veggies until your onions are just starting to brown. Add the water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer until meat is done. Break apart your curry seasoning and add to skillet. Simmer a few minutes to thicken and then serve over rice.

Bitter Gourd, a Cautionary Tale....

Our neighbors have turned out to be pretty good at container gardening, which has been fun for us since they are from Sri Lanka and grow some things that we haven't seen before. Among them you will find bitter gourd. About the same size and roughly the same shape as a cucumber, except a little bit different. 

 They were kind enough to give us one or two specimens, so we googled how to cook them and gave it a try, although Gaji did warn us that we probably wouldn't like them as much as he does. We started by giving them a good washing, and then sliced them up. I'd read that you can remove some of the bitterness by heavily coating them in salt and leaving them to sit for a little while. So we did this, rinsing the salt off before we were ready to cook them.

 We didn't do anything else to prep these babies, just dropped them in a pot of hot oil and gave them a good fry until they were golden brown.

I think I salted them after we took them out of the oil, but I'm not sure really.
The texture was about what you'd expect of any fried food. Crispy and crunchy and perfect.
Then the taste hits.
The first thought that pops into your head is "wow, we WAY over-salted these puppies".
Very shortly after that you realize that maybe it's not just the salt you're tasting.
Then you think "ummm, this is kinda gross, but I guess I can finishing chewing and swallow it".
This progresses to "If I can't find somewhere to spit this thing I'm going to DIE!!!!!!!!!".
Next comes "OH MY GOSH! I already spit it out, why is the flavor still intensifying on the back of my mouth?"
All this is ended by spending the next couple of minutes frantically eating and drinking ANYTHING you can get your hands on, because at this point you'd probably eat poop if it would get that ever increasing foul taste out of your mouth.
Moral of the story, don't EVER eat bitter gourd unless you wish to die a slow and incredibly nasty death while the worst taste imaginable builds on your palate until it takes over and squeezes the life out of you.

Gaji was not surprised to find out we didn't much care for his favorite snack, but he's probably glad. There are now two less people in the world he has to compete with for a supply of bitter gourd.

Kung Pao Pork and Noodles

I found this recipe in one of my cook books and decided to try it out. I used some of my Pork Roast meat from my freezer, but you could use whatever.

What you need:

1 TBS vegetable oil

1 bag (1 lb) broccoli slaw mix (you can use regular cole slaw if you want but you miss out on the great texture the broccoli gives)

1 lb pork boneless loin, cut into 1/2 inch pieces

1 med. red bell pepper, cut into 1/2 inch pieces

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup spicy Szechuan stir fry sauce (I didn't want spicy so I went with regular stir fry sauce)

1 TBS honey

1 pkg (6-7oz) rice stick noodles

2 tsps sesame or vegetable oil

2 TBS salted peanuts

What to do:

1.Heat a large skillet over medium high heat. Add vegetable oil; rotate skillet to coat bottom. Add slaw mix; stir-fry 2-3 minutes or until crispy/tender. Remove broccoli slaw from skillet; keep warm.

2. Start a pot of water boiling for the noodles. Add pork to same skillet you cooked the slaw in; stir-fry over medium high heat 5-6 minutes or until brown. Stir in bell pepper and water. Cover and cook 3-4 minutes, stirring occasionally, until pork is tender. Stir in stir-fry sauce and honey; reduce heat. Simmer uncovered 1-2 minutes.

3. Add noodles to the boiling water. Boil 3 minutes; drain. In large bowl, toss noodles and sesame oil. Divide noodles among 4 individual serving bowls. Top with broccoli slaw and pork mixture. Sprinkle with peanuts.

Sukiyaki

Sukiyaki -by Cameron

Here's a few different pronunciations:

(tskee-ah-kee)-That's roughly how they pronounce it in Japan

(soo-kee-ah-kee)- How American's often pronounce it

Ingredients (for 2-3, maybe 4, people):

3 carrots

1 bundle of green onions

1/2 of a small onion

1/4 head cabbage

2 stalks of celery

1 large crown of broccoli

1-1 1/2 lbs steak (we just used steak because we had a ton of it in the fridge-love those albertson's deals!-but you can use regular stir-fry meat, or chicken, or whatever)

2 TBS of oil

Sukiyaki sauce

Rice

Optional Ingredients:

2 eggs

Soy Sauce

How to make Sukiyaki:

1. Get your rice cooking. We use a Rice Cooker, but you use whatever method you have.

2. Cut up the vegetables:

Slice the celery into about 1/2 to 1 inch slices

Cut the carrots into small strips about match stick size

Cut the end of the green onions off (you'll only use those

Cut the broccoli crowns into bite sizes

Shred the cabbage

Slice the onion

Slice the meat as thinly as possible, so you'll probably want to leave you meat slightly frozen to facilitate this.

3. After you slice the meat, you should let it thaw.

4. Heat up the oil (on high) in the pan and put your meat in the heated oil.

5. Put about a 1/4 cup of Sukiyaki sauce in with the meat.

6. Cook the meat. You don't want to cook the meat all the way, but just enough to brown the

outside of the meat.

7. Turn the heat down to low-medium and arrange your vegetables inside the pan.

8. Add between 1/2 -1 cup of Sukiyaki sauce to the vegetables/meat.

9. Cover the pan, and cook for another 10-15 minutes (just until your meat is done and until

your vegetables are cooked to your liking-we like ours a little bit more on the slightly crunchy side and not the mushy side).

10. You're supposed to leave the pan on the heat, but we weren't able to do that with the set up of our kitchen/house (well, we could have stood around the stove, but we didn't want to do that). You eat the meat/veggies right out of the pan.

11. Beat the eggs with a little bit of soy sauce.

As you pull your meat and vegetables out of the hot pan, dip it in the raw egg and eat it.

LET ME EXPLAIN BEFORE YOU GROSS OUT:

You are supposed to take the vegetables/meat out of the pan hot enough so that when you dip them in the raw egg and pull it out, the egg is cooked onto the veggies/meat. A heat transfer is supposed to occur from the veggies to the egg, cooking the egg and cooling the veggies off enough so you can eat them.

12. Eat with your rice.

Lettuce Wraps

PF Chang Lettuce Wraps

This is a dish that my cousin Diana made when we visited.

Here is where she got the recipe.

This is so yummy!

What You Need:

* 5 T. oil

* 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts, diced small

* 1 c. water chestnuts, minced

* 2/3 c. mushrooms, minced

* 2 green onion, minced

* 2 cloves garlic, minced

* 1 t. fresh ginger, minced

* 1 t. cornstarch

* 2 t. dry sherry

* 2 t. water

* 1 T. soy sauce

* salt and pepper

* lettuce leaves

* COOKING SAUCE:

* 1 T. Hoisin sauce

* 1 T. soy sauce

* 1 T. dry sherry

* 2 T. oyster sauce

* 2 T. water

* 1 t. sesame oil

* 1 t. sugar

* 2 t. cornstarch

What You Do:

-Mix all ingredients for cooking sauce together and set aside.

-In bowl combine cornstarch, sherry, water, soy sauce, 1 T. oil,salt and pepper and chicken. Stir to coat and set aside for 15 minutes.

-Heat wok or large skillet over high heat. Add 2 T. oil to pan. Add chicken and stir fry until done, about 3 to 4 minutes. Set chicken aside. Add 2 T. oil to wok and add rest of ingredients. Stir fry 2 minutes. Add chicken back then add cooking sauce. Cook until thickened.

-Serve with lettuce leaves to wrap.

enjoy!

Sweet N' Sour Pork

Sweet N' Sour Pork

Nate loves this. It's really fast and easy and tastes so good!

What you need:
1lb Pork cut in l inch cubes
2 bell peppers
1 carrot
1/2 an onion
Any other veggies you want
1 cup chicken broth
1/2 sugar
1/3 cut cider vinegar
2 tsp soy sauce
2 TBS corn starch
Rice

What to do:
cook pork over medium heat in a skillet seasoned with salt and pepper

In a separate saucepan, combine broth, sugar, cider vinegar, and soy sauce while heating it up to a simmer. In a separate small bowl, stir the corn starch with some cold water and add last. Stir and let simmer until corn starch turns clear and the sauce thickens up.

Serve hot over rice.

ENJOY!!