Friday, 10/6/17

Tempura style tofu with a spicy soy dipping sauce (from Asian Tofu), plus a stir-fry with baby bok choy and the leftover sweet potato noodles. The tofu was terrific---nice and crunchy on the outside and soft inside. I would cut the pieces smaller next time, even though it would be more of a pain. The stir-fry was only meh, and too spicy for Carter. It was kind of watery. Homemade Snickers for dessert. The good and bad news is that they taste just like Snickers', albeit with a higher ratio of (excellent) nougat. The other good news is that I finally worked up the courage to temper chocolate and it went nearly perfectly. The recipe is from Bravetart; I have been happy with the things I have tried from there so far.

Thursday, 10/5/17

Jason was off giving a final, so Carter and I fended for ourselves with a tomato-mozzarella salad, plus a loaf of bread that Jason made earleir. I had a broccoli melt and JAson just had bread and butter. Odd combo, but not unpleasing.

Wednesday, 10/4/17

Made japchae for I think the third time? I knew if was time consuming so when I got home at 4:15 I immediately started chopping away. It's nothing tricky, though: a quick brown sugar/soy/sesame oil marinade for the beef, cook the noodles, and individually saute all the vegetables (onions, scallions, spinach, carrots, peppers, garlic) . Season with more soy, sesame seeds and sugar (plus I added sriracha cause we all like it).
Carter looked down at his bowl and said "I don't like this. I don't like these noodles". Well, I found that I had made this almost exactly a year ago and back then, he liked it, and especially the noodles. So he ate it and admitted that it was delicious. Reason enough to keep a blog.

Tuesday, 10/3/17

Just a leftover night. It made for some strange bedfellows: potstickers, pizza and some broccoli. Still, it is nice to be able to open the fridge without fear again.

Monday, 10/2/17

Pulled pork, pinto beans, coleslaw, pickles and hush puppies, courtesy of my mom. All predictably delicious. Carter even mentioned how good the coleslaw was on the ride home.
I brought nutterbutter style cookies, from the Bravetart cookbook. I thought the cookies were too crunchy, but then I remembered that actual Nutterbutters are pretty crunchy. They are fairly simple and quite nice (if you like peanut butter). I am looking forward to trying our something more complex from the book, as soon as I have time and ambition.

Sunday, 10/1/17

Jason made pizzas for us: one with jalapenos, pepperoni and provolone (this was so good that it was very difficult not to eat more and more of it), and a new variety with leftover pork, barbecue sauce, red onions and gouda (I didn't tell him that this is very similar to one at Bob & Timmy's in Providence. I wasted to boost his morale). The second pie was also great, but I will never get tired of pepperoni and provolone.

Saturday, 9/30/17

Jason wanted to make potstickers, so we did. We filled them with a mixture of pork, cabbage and mushrooms; the big surprise was how good Carter is at folding dumplings. Faster and better than his parents. We also had zucchini fritters (an odd accompaniment, but I like them) and some fried cheese curds from Aldi as an appetizer. I bought two boxes, knowing they would soon disappear from the shelves, and I wish I had bought more. They are remarkably tasty and who knows if Aldi will ever have them again?
I forgot that I made rice pudding on Friday. Followed the same recipe as last week, but added more rice and less cream. I may have also cooked it longer. The result was thicker and more set, as I was expecting, but a little too firm. Carter and I both like it a little softer and creamier. Next time I'll try to hit the middle somehow.