40s (2023)

Time for some challenges from the weeks in the 40s!

Week 44 - Halloween

I'm not big into "decorative" food (kind of lacking in artistic ability), so I wasn't sure what to make for this challenge. A lot of internet searching led me to a Food Network recipe for white ghost pizzas, and that seemed doable so I went with that. Of course, Trader Joe's didn't have any plain pizza dough that week, so we ended up with garlic and herb pizza dough (which we normally like, but this was for ghosts). I consider this a semi-fail not because of that, but because of my inability to truly shape them as ghosts. The pizzas were topped with an olive oil and garlic base, ricotta and mozzarella cheeses, and some black olives for eyes. They tasted good, but I don't need to make these misshapen ghosts again.

Week 45 - drying

Another theme I wasn't especially excited about, because I had no intention of dehydrating food, and most of the already-dried food I could think of was fruit, meaning I had to mix fruit with savory, not my favorite flavor profile. I eventually settled on a caramelized onion and fig pizza from Taste of Home, which sounded like a good combination using dried fruit. The pizza had a cream cheese-olive oil-thyme base (which was useful, because I had a block of cream cheese in the fridge that I needed to use), and it was topped with caramelized onions (one giant onion I got from TJ's), chopped sun-dried figs, prosciutto, pine nuts, and cheese (quattro formaggi from TJ's). The combination was good, but other than pineapples (and I guess banana curry pizza), I still prefer my pizza without fruit.

Week 46 - gourds

I chose a bit of an easier route for the gourds challenge, opting to use canned pumpkin, and make a pumpkin pasta bake from Skinnytaste. It was a recipe we had tried before, mixing in some greens and canned pumpkin, and topped with breadcrumbs and cheese. I don't know where my head was at that night, because for some reason I threw on the breadcrumbs before the cheese instead of the other way around, which just wasn't as good. Lesson learned for next time.

Week 48 - grains

The grains challenge came up right around the time we needed to use up some just-expired wild rice in our pantry, so this wild rice stuffing from Iowa Girl Eats was perfect. I had tried using some of the wild rice blend previously on its own, following the package directions, and it was too crunchy and seemed undercooked despite doing everything we were supposed to do. I was kind of dreading making more of it in case the same thing happened, but this recipe was just right. The rice texture was great, chewy but cooked enough, and with lots of flavor thanks to everything added in (bacon, shallots, mushrooms, celery, cranberries, walnuts, and cheese). I would absolutely make this again.

Week 49 - clear

When I think clear, I think soup (also jello and broth, it hasn't been that long since my colonoscopy diet), and one of my favorite soups of all time is Italian wedding soup. I thought trying a new recipe for that would be perfect here, especially with the colder weather setting in. There was a wedding soup recipe on Once Upon a Chef, a site I have found good luck with before, that sounded a little different since it combined ground beef (used Impossible) and sweet Italian sausage (we had one in the freezer already) with garlic, herbs, cheese, and breadcrumbs for the meatballs. It really did make for some flavorful meatballs that were excellent both on their own and in the soup. Looking forward to making this again soon.

Week 50 - root vegetables

Back in 2015, I made a loaded baked potato salad based on a FoodieCrush recipe for the picnic food challenge, but since I wasn't officially participating back then, this root vegetables challenge seemed like a great time for the recipe to make a return. It has been years now since I made it, but it was just as good as I remembered. It could have used a little bit more bacon (some of ours was too overdone) and maybe some more cheese too (I don't think I used the full amount), but it was excellent and made enough leftovers for multiple lunches. I could have used multiple recipes that week for the root vegetables challenge since we left BJ's with a 5-lb bag of Idaho potatoes and a 3-lb bag of sweet potatoes, but it was nice to make this again.

20s (2023)

Another group post! Some with great results, some stuff that we probably won't make again, but always good to try new things.

Week 21: hot sauce

Hot sauce was a tough challenge, trying to make something that would be palatable to a 4-year-old who doesn't really like spice yet. I didn't want to make my own hot sauce, didn't want to buy a new hot sauce that we weren't going to use much of, and didn't want to really make hot sauce the focus. After a lot of searching, I found a recipe for yuzu hot sauce pound cake on Ciao Bella Kitchen, and decided that would work. It used the yuzu hot sauce from Trader Joe's, which we already had and enjoy adding to various dishes, so at least it wouldn't be a purchase gone to waste. The cake was fine, but I learned I don't really prefer my cake with a little zing.

Week 23: boards

I'm not a huge fan of the "arranging" or "plating" type challenges, so A helped me choose what type of board to make that B might actually eat. We went with a chopped salad with red onions, tomatoes, olives, mozzarella cheese, pepperoni, cucumbers, and artichokes with a homemade vinaigrette consisting of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, maple syrup, and dijon mustard. Really good salad!

Week 24: most requested

This challenge choice was a little tough because what did it really mean? Who was doing the requesting? In the end, I consulted Food & Wine's list of the most popular recipes of 2022 and chose the first on the list, an Italian wedding risotto. I love risotto and have been making it more and more (got to use up all the rest of the arborio rice!). This turned out well, and we could see why it was so popular last year.

Week 27: alliteration

I was really ambitious for the alliteration challenge, at least with the name. I had started out with chicken corn chowder and carrot cake cookies, but then just kept adding to it until I ended up with cheesy chicken, carrot, celery, and corn chowder with crushed cheez-its covering + carrot cake cookies with cream cheese and confetti coating. The soup was based on a recipe from Lil Luna, and we really liked it. I would definitely make that again, although the cheez-its weren't really necessary. I just wanted more letter Cs.

The cookies came from Love and Lemons, and while tasty, I only have a mild like for carrot cake, so that one might not be repeated. We do still have some in our freezer though since it made a bigger batch than we could eat at one time, so we can still have more!

Week 29: candying

My original plan for this challenge was to make tanghulu, but I never got around to it and then made some candied lemons. I don't remember what recipe I followed, but I think most candied lemons are made the same way, so anything on Google would probably work. I think my expectations were completely off though, because I was expecting something like those sugary lemon slices that you could just eat as candy, and these were... not. The rind was a little too hard, and they were extremely sour, even with all the sugar that was added to them. I think maybe my brain and taste buds were expecting actual candy versus candied lemons, but once I realized how sour these were, I had no idea what to do with them. We tried eating some plain, but never figured it out before they were out too long and ended up tossing a bunch. I don't think I would do this again without a specific plan for them.

From Soup to Burgers

First group post for the 2023 cooking challenge!

Week 4: instant

I knew immediately I wanted to make something new in the Instant Pot, since our IP doesn't get enough use, and this potato corn chowder was delicious. It tasted very much like a spring soup since I also added some chopped asparagus into the mix, but that was not unwelcome, even in the depths of January. 

Week 5: mustard

I initially thought about making my own mustard, since during the pandemic I did a virtual class that taught you how to make mustard, but then I got a little scared off when I read someone's comment about needing proper ventilation (our kitchen has no windows). What I ended up making was probably even better though since these smoked salmon toasts with homemade mustard-dill compound butter (well, the combination was homemade, not the butter itself) I found on Food52 were amazing. Like cocktail hour hors d'oeuvres amazing in flavor, so now not only do I have a great toasts recipe, but also a recipe for compound butter that I can put on all sorts of things.

Week 7: dyed

I've been trying to avoid artificial food dyes, so I wasn't sure exactly what to do for this challenge. Then I found a recipe on The Healthy Family & Home for vegan and naturally-colored chocolate coconut eggs, and that seemed like the best option. I used turmeric, matcha, and ube powder for the colorings, although the ube one turned out a little more reddish-brown than purple, which was a little disappointing. They were pretty good though and kept well in the freezer for future snacks, which was another plus.

Week 8: celebrity chef

Years ago, I was an audience member at a few tapings of Beat Bobby Flay, so I decided to make some Bobby Flay recipes from his cookbook, Sundays with Sophie. So many recipes there sounded good, and I made some crunch burgers with BBQ mushrooms and quick pickled onions with a side of pan-fried asparagus with garlic-lemon bread crumbs. Two dishes, but four different recipes in the cookbook, so lots to do but very tasty results. I've already made the asparagus again, and would make the burgers again on a day when I had some extra time to cook.

Week 1 (2023) - Rainy Day

I haven't finished posting the 2022 challenge yet, so this might get confusing, but I've had most of this year's just sitting and waiting, so it seemed better to try to catch up a little bit here too.

First week of the new challenge! I tried to picture a day with gloomy pouring rain outside and what I would want to eat, and it was actually a fairly easy choice - grilled cheese and soup. I don't know if I ever actually eat that when it's rainy out, but I don't usually time our meal plan with the weather forecast (which changes anyway). But it's my top pick, for sure.

For the challenge, I decided to go with a Kappacasein-style cheese toastie (my favorite version of grilled cheese). I made this for a sandwiches challenge back in 2015 after we returned from London, and at that time, there was an official recipe on the Borough Market (where Kappacasein is) website. That recipe is no longer there, but thankfully I took good notes on it the first time, plus I found another similar version on Feast/SBS.

The biggest difference between this toastie and the last one I made was that I didn't have leeks. The frozen leeks we've had stored for years are getting a little too old and flavorless, so I sadly had to leave them out and just use red onions, because it was too late to go get fresh leeks. Luckily, Trader Joe's still carried the same cheddar-gruyere blended cheese blocks, which is the perfect cheese for this sandwich (if you can't get the local cheeses they use in the original). This toastie is really where I learned to make good grilled cheese sandwiches, so besides being delicious (which it was again this time), it really holds a special place in my heart.

For the soup, I decided to go with a squash, bean, and corn soup I found on the Borough Market website, because why not just go fully British? The basic ingredients were acorn squash, tomatoes, corn, black beans, kidney beans, onions, garlic, vegetable stock, cumin, smoked paprika, lime juice, cilantro, and salt, but I skipped the sour cream in favor of their listed alternative of adding cheese. I couldn't find the specific cheeses they mentioned (Wensleydale or Cheshire), but we went with a white cheddar which was a good match. It was a little more like stew than soup, but that fits my personal soup preference anyway. A lovely way to kick off the challenge, and a good meal for the England AtWCC!

Week 8 - Comfort Food

When I hear comfort food, one of the first things that comes to mind is soup. This challenge came up back in February, and I remember that we liked this vegan corn chowder. Unfortunately, I didn't write any notes, so I think I'm going to have to make this again to figure out what I did the first time. Definitely felt like comfort food though!

Week 42 - One Pot

There are many dishes that can be made in just one pot, but the easiest, in my opinion, are soups and chili, which are also perfect for the cold weather. I did this challenge back at the end of October, so I decided on chili, and then upgraded it to pumpkin chili since it was Halloween week. Also, I'm not Texan, so this chili had lots and lots of beans.

The final ingredient list for the chili was beefless beef (from Trader Joe's), onion, peppers, garlic, kidney beans, white beans, black beans, tomatoes, pumpkin puree, corn, vegetable broth, and taco seasoning. We ate it alongside a pumpkin bagel, and it was a great fall dinner!

Week 9 - Brazilian

I was excited when the week 9 challenge came up as Brazilian, because B had never had Brazilian food before! I wasn't sure what to make since one of my favorite Brazilian foods, pao de queijo, has eggs as a pretty central ingredient, but I was sure we could find something we would all love. I looked around for something that wouldn't be too meat-heavy, and came upon a recipe for a Bahia-style moqueca prawn stew on BBC Good Food. We'd been meaning to introduce B to shrimp for some time, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity. It sounded delicious and simple to make, so it was an easy choice.

Previous Brazilian challenge meal from 2016

A few days after I made our recipe choice for the challenge, I looked back at what we did for the last Brazilian challenge. I remembered that it had involved fish and a soup or stew of some sort, and that we had not really been fans of how the fish turned out. As I read over the post, it occurred to me that the ingredients and the steps sounded very similar to the moqueca that we were going to make this time. Well, it sounded similar because it was. It was almost the same thing but with fish instead of shrimp (and some other ingredient variations like cumin and the amount of lime juice), but I didn't realize it when picking this one because the recipe last time had just been called Brazilian fish stew and not moqueca. I decided to make it anyway, since this time it would have shrimp, and it would also be a chance to do it better.

The ingredients for our adapted version were:

- 1 package of frozen raw shrimp (about 450g) ($9.99)
- juice of 2 limes, divided ($0.58)
- 6 cloves of garlic, finely chopped ($0.33)
- a few tbsp coconut oil ($0.50)
- 1 onion, chopped ($0.50)
- 4 scallions, chopped, whites and greens separated ($0.65)
- 2 bell peppers, chopped ($2.67)
- a couple tsp paprika ($0.10)
- 1 can diced tomatoes with juice ($0.89)
- 1 can (about 400 ml) coconut milk ($1.50)
- salt and freshly ground black pepper ($0.05)
- rice ($2)

[Note: The original recipe also included a couple tbsp of chopped cilantro, but the grocery store was out of cilantro and we were a little too busy to go hunting for it. It would have been a nice addition to brighten it up even more.]

The total came out to approximately $19.76, more than recent challenge meals, but that's to be expected when almost $10 of that cost is the shrimp by itself. It was enough for the three of us for dinner, plus a little left over for lunch for me and B (chicken nuggets went really well with it).


The steps for our version were:

1. Marinate shrimp: Place in a bowl with about 2 tbsp of lime juice and 1 tbsp of chopped garlic. Chill for about an hour.

2. Heat coconut oil. Add onion and the whites of the scallions, and saute until soft. Add peppers, scallion greens, the rest of the garlic, and the paprika, and cook until the peppers begin to soften. Season with some freshly ground black pepper.


3. Add the can of tomatoes with juice, coconut milk, and a little salt. Bring to boil, and then simmer on low for 10 minutes. [Note: I added another 1/2 cup of water along with the coconut milk because it didn't look like enough liquid for the shrimp. It didn't need it. It was more than enough so it ended up being more like soup than stew, but it was some delicious broth!]

4. Add shrimp with the marinade and the rest of the lime juice, and cook for about 3 minutes (or enough time for shrimp to turn white and opaque).

5. Garnish with chopped cilantro (if you have it, unlike us) and serve over rice.


We really liked this recipe, much more than when we made it last time. Cilantro would have made it even better, but it was vibrant, bright, and full of tropical flavors, especially lime, transporting our minds and tastebuds to someplace warmer in the middle of winter. (We made this back in February.) The prep took a little bit of time, but it was a pretty straightforward recipe and easy to make. All three of us liked it a lot, and it seemed like B's first time having shrimp was a success! Would definitely make this again.

Week 2 - Miso

When I hear miso, my first thought is soup (which amuses me, since the majority of the miso mentions on this blog have nothing to do with soup), and since it's January and it's cold, soup sounded really appealing. I didn't want to make a plain miso soup, so I looked around online until I found a recipe for ginger chicken meatballs in miso broth on No Spoon Necessary. I've been wanting to make homemade meatballs for B ever since we found out about his egg allergy, so this seemed like the perfect time.

The ingredients for our adapted recipe were:

For the meatballs:
- 1 lb ground chicken ($4.99)
- 1 cup panko breadcrumbs ($0.40)
- 3 cloves of garlic, minced ($0.30)
- 1 tbsp soy sauce ($0.20)
- 2 tsp ginger paste ($0.40)
- 5 scallions, greens only (use the whites for the broth) ($0.50)
- 1 tbsp fish sauce ($0.10)
- 1 tsp lemongrass, minced ($1.29)
- 1/2 batch of cilantro, leaves finely chopped (several tbsp) ($0.50)
- 2 tbsp broth (from the broth below)
- olive oil to coat pan ($0.20)

For the broth:
- 6 cups water (although I added 2 more later because we had too many vegetables)
- 2 spoonfuls chicken bouillon ($1)
- 3 cloves of garlic, sliced ($0.30)
- 1 medium shallot, sliced ($0.33)
- 1 tbsp ginger paste ($0.20)
- 1 tbsp fish sauce ($0.10)
- 4 scallions, whites and greens sliced, plus the whites from the meatball scallions ($0.49)
- 2 tbsp white miso ($1)
- baby corn ($2.50)
- napa cabbage ($2.89)

That came out to about $17.69 ($8.88 for the meatballs and $8.81 for the broth) for soup for three for dinner with about a bowl left over for lunch. On the more expensive side for the home cooking/challenge meals we've done, but it made a lot of food and the meatballs had so many ingredients in them that they definitely didn't taste like ordinary meatballs.

The original recipe called for baby bok choy, but apparently in everyone's "it's the new year and it's time to eat healthy" madness, bok choy and baby bok choy were nowhere to be found. (Either that or there was a supply issue somewhere that we didn't know about when planning this.) We tried two different stores, and there was a single package of bok choy that we were planning to use for something else, so we went with napa cabbage here and some baby corn. I think there are a lot of vegetables that would be complementary here, so we went with what we could find. Tastewise, it was fine, but the giant napa cabbage was a little harder to manage than bok choy would have been, and I only ended up using a third of it, max (and that was with adding more to the broth after we all had our first bowls and had made some space in the pot).


Another ingredient note, this was my first time using actual lemongrass. I watched a few YouTube videos to prepare, and I thought I was ready. Remove the fibrous outside layers, mince the inner tender part finely, and you're good to go. But instead, it was like the bamboo root adventure all over again. I kept removing the outer layers because they felt fibrous, and ended up with very little lemongrass. I don't know if I tossed too much and should have used more, and I tried to follow one YouTuber's method of sticking your thumbnail in to see if there's an indentation, but very little of it seemed tender. Will need to investigate further. (Comments and advice welcome!)

The steps for the recipe were:

1. Prep. [Here I should note that the recipe total time was given as 40 minutes, with 20 minutes of cook time (not that inaccurate) and 20 minutes of prep time. Yes, I'm a little slow on prep on a good day, and yes, I'm a little rusty, but even when I wasn't, I don't think 20 minutes would have been nearly enough to do all of this. 20 minutes in, I had gotten through the garlic, the lemongrass, and the shallots, and that's it. The prep probably took at least an hour, and even if you subtract all the time I had to take to wash my burning eyes out (thanks, delicious scallions and shallots), it still wouldn't be anywhere close to 20 minutes. I feel like to do that you would need a giant counter with room to lay everything out for prep, very quick knife skills, and someone to wash all the vegetables for you. Washing vegetables thoroughly takes so long!]

Anyway, this first step of prep was for the garlic, shallots, scallions, cilantro, lemongrass, and the soup vegetables. It shouldn't have taken as long as it did, but time just vanished, and that was with using shortcut ginger!


2. Start the broth. I added the water and bouillon to the pot along with the garlic, shallot, ginger paste, fish sauce, and scallions.

3. Once the broth had come to a boil, I lowered the temperature and then made the miso mixture by combining the miso with 2 tbsp of the broth. After stirring to combine it into a nice paste, I added it to the pot and stirred it in. [Note that the original recipe removed the solids from the pot, but considering they were just vegetables we'd normally eat anyway and not the fibrous lemongrass or something like that, I just left them in.]

4. Add all the meatball ingredients to a large bowl and mix together. Form small meatballs and place on parchment paper-lined surface. [I can't tell you what size they were, because I have no idea. Maybe a tablespoon size or a little bigger. I tried to be consistent but didn't measure.]

5. Add the vegetables to the broth (as long as it's been simmering for at least 15 minutes) and simmer until vegetables are tender and while the meatballs cook.


6. Add olive oil to a pan over medium heat, and add the meatballs in batches to cook until golden brown. [I think they were mostly cooked by the time I was done with them, but they were going to finish in the soup anyway.]

7. Add finished meatballs to the broth and cook for another 5-10 minutes until done.

Thankfully, after A and I took turns working in the kitchen for almost 2 hours (he did some of the vegetable washing and chopping, which I really appreciated), the soup tasted really, really good. It would have been so disappointing to put in so much time and not love what we made, but the soup turned out really well, especially the meatballs. They also seemed to be a hit with baby B, and I'm glad we were able to introduce him to some new flavors we haven't given him at home before, like lemongrass and miso. I could eat a giant bowl full of those meatballs, I liked them so much.


What would I do differently next time? Start cooking earlier, and set my expectations accordingly for how much time prep will take. Watch more videos about lemongrass preparation. Choose another vegetable for the broth that wouldn't take as much time as the corn and cabbage to prepare. Figure out a way for A and I to both work in the kitchen at the same time, because having two extra hands would have made things go much more smoothly (and is how I'm still used to operating, since I haven't cooked a lot of prep-intensive things since B's arrival). Wear contacts so I don't have to keep running to the bathroom to wash out my eyes.

All that said, the recipe itself was delicious, and I would make this again. I think with better planning, quicker ingredients, and less rusty kitchen skills, things might go a little faster next time. (Hopefully!)

52W Challenge: Salt

This is the last post from the 2017 challenge for the 52 week cooking challenge. In my last post about why I quit, I mentioned I was starting to twist whatever I was making into a theme to check the boxes, and there is probably no better example than this challenge right here. I wrote this back in November when we made the soup, but had been waiting to post it until I finished all the challenges in between, which as you know never happened. This was from Week 41 since I was jumping around, but going forward I'll just note any posts with themes from the challenge with 52W Challenge in the title instead of the week number since I'm no longer following along, officially or unofficially.

The Week 41 challenge was all about salt. The challenge was supposed to be about using salt in cooking, which is something we do all the time but rarely with salt as the focus. They had a bunch of suggestions, like encasing food in salt or doing a brine or curing. I didn't really have any interest in those types of projects at the time I was going to do the challenge, and the only thing I could think of was seasoning some vegetables with onion salt, not exactly much of a "challenge." Since I'm not officially participating, I decided to switch it around. How could I get the flavor of salt without using any actual salt itself?

Around that time, my grandparents had split a giant winter melon that had grown in someone's backyard into three sections, and I had to figure out what to do with a third of a winter melon. (Yes, the winter melon in the photo below is about a third of a single melon.) The easiest thing to do with winter melon is soup, so we decided to make a soup without using salt. Instead, we would use chicken bouillon to make chicken broth and also incorporate some chopped ham.

The soup ingredients were simple: half of the winter melon, a pound of carrots, a bowl of shiitake mushrooms (plus the soaking water), about 3 big scoops of bouillon, that entire ham steak, and a little white pepper, plus some more water to make broth. No salt itself.

The steps for making the soup were:

1. Prep: Soak shiitake mushrooms in warm water for about 20 minutes or until soft, and then remove mushrooms from water but save the water. Squeeze excess water from mushrooms and chop into slices. Peel and chop carrots.

2. Add carrots and mushrooms to large soup pot. Add the mushroom soaking water plus however much water you think you need for soup broth. (Didn't measure, but we ended up removing at least a few ladles full later because we had too much water.) Bring to boil.

3. While waiting for water to boil, prep winter melon. Scoop out seeds and peel, then chop into smaller chunks. Chop up ham.

4. Once water is boiling, add winter melon, bouillon, and ham. Season with white pepper and stir everything together well. Bring back to boil over medium heat, and then lower to simmer. Simmer half-covered for about half an hour.

This was a very simple soup to make, and we based it on the soups that a lot of Chinatown restaurants serve before meals. We didn't plan to eat the entire pot of soup in one night but we did, mostly because it isn't exceptionally filling with just winter melon and carrots and mushrooms in it. It had so much more flavor than we were expecting it to, and it definitely tasted like there was salt added even though there technically wasn't. Probably wasn't what this challenge was intended to be about, but works for me. Would definitely make this again.

Week 19 - Tea

We have a lot of tea at home, but when the tea challenge came up, I really wasn't sure what to make. I didn't want to make dessert, and nothing really inspired me until I looked through what other people submitted for the challenge and saw something I had never heard of called ochazuke. A simple Japanese dish, it's made by pouring tea (or dashi or a combination) over rice and savory ingredients. After reading more about it, it reminded me a lot of a dish we had gotten in Vancouver, but we just hadn't known this was what it was called.

Since ochazuke is usually made with green tea, I decided to use genmaicha, in part because it's one of my favorites and in part because I thought the roasted rice flavor would go well with the cooked rice. (If you're unfamiliar with genmaicha, it's green tea combined with roasted brown rice.) Apparently the other common teas used besides genmaicha are sencha and hojicha, and I'm not sure if we even have either of those at the moment. I wasn't sure how the savory ingredients would go with the tea alone, so I decided to experiment and for each of our two bowls, make one with just tea and one with a tea/dashi mix.

The ingredients for the ochazuke were:

- 2 cups (uncooked) brown rice ($2)

- smoked salmon ($7.26)

- 3 green onions ($0.30)

- 1 package of Maui onion seaweed snacks ($0.33)

- 1/2 tsp of sesame seeds ($0.10)

- 3 genmaicha tea bags ($0.50)

- small spoonful of Hondashi mixed with water ($0.15)

On the side, I also made sunomono (based on a Japanese Cooking 101 recipe) because I wasn't sure there would be enough vegetable matter in the ochazuke alone. Unfortunately, the time I went to Trader Joe's they were out of the non-organic Persian cucumbers, so I had to go with a regular hothouse cucumber, which probably contributed to this not being as good as we had hoped. I probably also made too much sauce for it and should have drizzled it in instead of pouring in the whole bowl at once, as the salad was a little too drenched. It tasted fine, but just like cucumbers with soy sauce and vinegar, nothing we need to do again. I mention all this now because I was so unenthused about it that I forgot to even take a picture of the finished product. Anyway, the ingredients were:

- 1 hothouse cucumber ($1.29)

- about 1 tbsp sugar ($0.10)

- 3 tbsp rice vinegar ($0.25)

- splash of soy sauce ($0.05)

- a few shakes of sesame seeds ($0.10)

Combined with the ochazuke, that put the grand total for dinner at approximately $12.43, but that wasn't surprising since smoked salmon isn't cheap. We need to eat more fish on a regular basis though, so no complaints.

The first thing we did for this was start the rice since that would take the longest to cook. While the rice was cooking, I made the sunomono and also did prep for the ochazuke. The prep steps were to chop the scallions, tear up the sheets of seaweed, toast the sesame seeds, make the dashi, and of course to steep the tea.

I remembered one of the sites that I had looked at about ochazuke talked about cooking the rice so it would get some nice browning. We tried doing that with some rice patties, but it didn't really make much difference so we only did it for the first bowl.

This dish was basically all about prep, and once everything was prepped, it was easy. A ball of rice at the bottom, and then layer on the toppings of salmon, scallions, seaweed, and sesame seeds. (I just realized those all start with S!)

After everything is in the bowl, you pour over the tea (and/or dashi) and then let all the ingredients soak in the broth. It ends up being kind of like having soup.

The ochazuke wasn't bad - very light and healthy tasting - but also not amazingly flavorful outside of the delicious smoked salmon. The tea didn't have as much flavor as we thought it would, and it definitely tasted better once we added the dashi. It was good though to have such a healthy, simple dinner.

I don't know that I would plan to make this again since it was good but not amazing, but outside of the smoked salmon, we have pretty much all the ingredients on hand most of the time, so it might work as a good way to use up ingredients sometime. What this dinner really did more than anything else was remind me that I should incorporate smoked salmon into more dishes. So much flavor, and a little bit goes a long way. It's basically the fish equivalent of bacon.

9th Ave Food Festival 2017 Part II

The second day of the 9th Avenue International Food Festival was warm and sunny, and the good weather meant even bigger crowds. While we spent our first day mostly visiting places familiar to us, the second day was all about trying small snacks from places in the neighborhood that we've known about but never made it to. It was an easy (and cheaper) way to sample their food and see whether we might want to go for a return visit sometime.

Our first stop was back at the Spam house as we're all about free snacks, especially when they're tasty. This time there was no musubi offered, just sliders and fries, so we both went with the slider. It tasted a little better than the day before, but that could just be because we each got a full slider to ourselves. We were much happier with a full slider as opposed to half and half of a musubi.

As we made our way up the avenue, we stopped first at K Rico, a South American steakhouse that seems to be sticking in a spot that has seen a lot of turnover since we've lived in the area. They had chicken legs, arepas, and empanadas, and after a staff recommendation, we went with one of the beef empanadas.

Unlike some empanadas we've had, these were more deep fried, sort of like a pastelillo. The inside had beef, egg, raisins, and some herbs. The raisins and the sauce made it a little sweeter than most similar beef empanadas we've had, and we think we prefer the more flavorful, more savory ones. A didn't get much meat in his bites, but that could also be because he somehow dropped a piece while eating. He also didn't really like the raisin addition in this case. In the end he thought it just tasted fried. M got more flavor from it, but not as much as she was expecting.

Our next stop was Tacuba which had caught our eye the day before because they had a rotating al pastor spit outside with pineapple on top. Unfortunately, the spit was gone when we got there, but they still had al pastor left. In addition to the pork, each taco had onions, cilantro, pineapple, and a green sauce. They were really good. The pork was flavorful and had just the right amount of "crisp" to the edges that only come from rotating spits. The pineapples were also grilled so they were nice and soft with a bit of smoky sweetness. The only negative here was that the taco filling amounts were pretty uneven from taco to taco.

The other thing that had caught our eye the day before was the clam chowder from Blue Seafood Bar, mostly because it wasn't that expensive and we love chowder. While this was a creamy chowder, it wasn't as heavy on the cream as some others we've had which we liked. Not sure if this is how it usually is or if it's because of how it was cooking on the grill outside, but it was good. In addition to the clams and broth, there was celery, corn, potatoes, and lots of herbs. The flavors here were good, but having just been to the Pacific Northwest, we've been spoiled on amazing chowders. As good as this was, there was almost no way for it to compare.

Our final stop was Ding which was selling an assortment of Chinese dishes for $5. A lot of them looked good, and in the end we went with dan dan noodles, one of our favorites. We watched as they scooped out the noodles and topped it with sauces, seasonings, and garnishes from at least eight different bowls. The noodles had a good amount of late hitting heat from the Chinese peppercorns, but wasn't unbearably spicy at all. Also the meat sauce and additional sauces and flavorings all melded to form a very tasty dish. We got a menu from the vendors there, and from this first taste we both think we'd like to give the restaurant a try.

We had a pretty successful visit to the food festival this year unlike the one year that we only got pierogi, curry puffs, and doughnuts on both days. We do still miss the pierogi though.