Month: August 2018

Hi, Jeremy here! Sushi, a mixture of textures, flavors, and smells. It seems every place I go to order sushi comes with a large variety, however it always seems as if it is a large variety of the same mixtures of fish, meat, and vegetables. I have never actually been to Japan, but it is one of my dreams to go and visit there. Obviously, one of the many things we need to try while we’re there is the sushi. I have heard of all the different types of sushi possible. The closest place I have had such a wide variety of sushi was in China – close but no cigar I suppose. Last week, me and Lauren went to Sushi Na Ra (check out their website), Lauren’s choice, and boy did she get it right. It’s like I always tell her, “when in doubt, Lauren wins” and “when in doubt, Lauren’s right.” We entered into Sushi Na Ra and I immediately thought to myself, “boy, I am horribly under-dressed.” The decor was out of this world for such a small place located in a strip mall setting. It was small, but comfy all at the same time. There was a group behind us having a good time which added to the feeling of warmth. We sat down to look over the menu and I was impressed at how affordable everything was. To think, it costs about the same to go to Market 32 / Price Chopper but with less selection. 

Speaking of selection…, they gave us a traditional menu, which had a large selection that included other dishes besides sushi, including some Korean fair (the owners were Korean, so it made sense). They also gave us the usual specials menu, as expected. On a side note, they had a spicy sushi roll. Now, I am no spice eater, per se. However, I do like to eat spice. This reminds me of when we took a day trip to Boston. The we entered the pepper palace to my delight. Little did I know just how much I would be in for. They had advertised this particular form of pain and suffering called “The End”. Pure capsaicin, the stuff that makes hot things hot. Since that dreadful choice (dreadful in my stomach’s mind), spice hasn’t bothered me so much. So I put my resistance to the test, and took a leap of faith and ordered it without even looking at the third and main act of the experience.

They presented us with a piece of standard letter size paper with a list of a great multitude of sushi. I wish I had not rushed into the self-imposed spice challenge, but I couldn’t resist. They had all sorts of sushi including both spicy and not. We ended up ordering this one tuna and avocado roll. But, in my mind, the main attraction were the extras we ordered. My roll was only eight pieces, so I figured why not, let’s order two more and make it an even 10. I got the spicy scallop and the squid roll whilst Lauren ordered the sea urchin. I had never thought to put a squid body on a roll, but according to Lauren, it was really good. The two rolls we ordered – my spicy, and her tuna were alright, nothing to brag about. My spicy roll primarily consisted of tuna and jalapeno. The extra pieces we ordered were what won the night. My spicy scallop (again, not too spicy) was interesting. The scallops were raw, but tasty and succulent. The sea urchin reminded me of the tamale of a lobster except it was orange and not green. It kind of has a buttery consistency but it hits you in the face with seafood flavor. I even made my world’s famous “prissy face.” All in all, our experience was out of this world. Good sushi, good variety, excellent atmosphere, all for an excellent price. As Lauren put, this is our new go to restaurant.

Did someone mention my name? Lauren here!

Globalization is here and now more than ever. Food is only one example. Sushi was considered taboo until after WWII when it was introduced to the US. You know that certain friend or relative that gags at the thought of raw fish and you want to yell at them, “FYI, there ARE COOKED rolls and VEGGIE ones TOO!” <Stop, Breathe and Collect yourself here.> Watch Raina Huang eat 100 of them!

Since then, America has been busy at the bar creating new and exciting tastes inspired by our side of the world. Some people prefer to stick with the traditional rolls and pieces from Tokyo, but for you more liberal sushi eaters, we have a few rolls for you to raise your chopsticks. Pictures of some of the rolls I’m discussing are on this list. https://www.sheknows.com/food-and-recipes/articles/1079110/unique-american-sushi-rolls

More often, traditional rolls will be only 6 small cylinder pieces of a single piece of raw fish, with vegetables in the center of sticky white rice with nori (papery seaweed) on the outside. They don’t come as complicated as the ones I’ve just mentioned or with cold brown rice like you find at Market Bistro. Cooking some of the fishier rolls was another change to eliminate the fear of contamination. Americans are trying to cut the calories since the millennium obesity epidemic and be super innovative about incorporating elements of Japanese cuisine into our wacky world, but these aren’t things you find in traditional parts of Japan.

A major cue that you’re not eating a Japanese original is in the ingredients. Hawaiian spam, buffalo chicken and waffle cones are purely ideas from the USA. Los Angeles partook largely by adding avocado into the mix 45 years ago because a chef ran out of fatty tuna. Sushi nowadays has it not only inside, but other times, on the outside. Some of my favorites like the rainbow roll, the snow crab roll and the self-explanatory cucumber and avocado roll have it in spades. Anyone who has eaten a delicious caterpillar roll can see that this ingredient is not going to go away any time soon. I’m going to try one myself next time I can.

Cream cheese is a US favorite to bring some sweetness to the sticky rice. (Even though sticky rice already has sugar in it) California rolls, Philadelphia rolls and of course the Boston roll have it. It goes to show that something like the bagel with cream cheese and lox can be appreciated by switching it up a bit and making it more relative to how someone else understands similar food. This technique of using similar flavor profiles can make it easier to try new flavors and invent different entrees. Example: We took my brother out for Vietnamese food at “Saigon Springs” once. He found a simple chicken noodle soup minus the can, dug in & gave it a thumbs-up.

We even have fruity dessert-like rolls, like the rock and roll berry roll covered in strawberries, and the pink lady filled with chocolate raspberry sauce. I personally don’t like mixing something so sweet with something fishy, but if you have a sweet tooth and want to get in some vitamin C, or curb that red velvet craving then by all means, GO for it. Your body will be much happier with fruit and rice instead of cupcakes.

So, what have we learned? It’s very tricky to convince people that something so out of left field will be delicious if there isn’t much wiggle room. Not all Americans are going to go out for raw fish wrapped in seaweed. Then again, it isn’t polite to completely miss the point of the traditional values of someone else’s culture and totally misunderstand how things are meant to be done. Sure, Americans want creativity, (I mean come on, we’ve seen Raina Huang eat MASSIVE sushi rolls like this one.) but let’s not go so out of bounds that the true art of sushi is gone for good. We can have some leeway in the ingredients, but let’s never forget what went in to the training and mastery of the sushi chef and the original balance of sweet, sticky, savory and vinegar-flavored maki. 

 

This week we did things a little differently.  I caught a glimpse of my old favorite Arthur episode “D.W. The Picky Eater” on television last week, found the book version I shared in first grade where in the Children’s Menu, the “Pirate Pita Pocket” gave me a Blair Warner brilliant idea. We love watching cooking game shows together when Big Brother has the night off. This time, we did a version of Worst Cooks in America with a criterion like Cutthroat Kitchen with points for creativity, so it’s easier to convert to a percentage. Creativity is becoming increasingly important in culinary ARTS.

Does it look great?

Does it taste great?

Is it creative?

Does it remind me of a pita pocket?

A whole, half or zero point value can be given for each category. We will grade ourselves as well as each other’s pitas and then average them out for a final score.

Ladies first, my darling.

 

Lauren’s Greek Lobster Pita

I originally wanted to do salmon with olives and arugula, but when I saw the lobster, I was reminded of the creamy lobster roll I had in Boston. I used seaweed salad as a creative stretch to avoid seasoning. I let it sit in a hot pan first so it wouldn’t be too soggy. (That didn’t exactly work, but I tried) and used a garlic-free tzatziki sauce with some sweet nutty artigiano cheese said to have been soaked in red wine. It had a nice crumble and interesting color to the outside. I’ll bear that in mind for cranberry and apple salads.

Looked inviting and colorful. Yes, it was clean as it could be. There was a sense of order in the layers. Lots of color.

Lots going on.  Overwhelmed by seaweed and slightly too much Greek Yogurt. Dill cheese, onion, yogurt lobster blended well and an experience, but muddled by seaweed. No lime. The cheese mixed with the yogurt made it taste like a foot. Try Feta instead, or pickled pepper. There was so much lime juice; it started to disintegrate the yogurt.  The onions, lobster and dill work great together with seaweed salad, or with the Greek sauce, but not all at once.

HELL YEAH! Had an idea and stuck with it. Best to stay in one culture. Liked the idea and want to try in future. Yes, this was on point in creativity without going too far out in space. This was interesting and fun.

Yes. Yes.         Jeremy Scores: 3.5  Lauren Scores: 3.5 Final score: 3.5/4= 88%

 

Jeremy’s Gold Doubloon Scallop Pita

Looked sophisticated, like a gourmet dinner inside whole wheat. Clean. Few ingredients. Didn’t like the finished product. Looked all brown note. Lettuce got wilted and off-color.

Tasted only scallops and onions. Where’s the tomato? Needs layering and a wall of lettuce to get that crunch he described. Maybe slice the scallops?  Large tomato slices instead of cherry halves. Liked the taste, but the wine needed reduce more. Tomatoes and lettuce could crunch more. Scallops were perfect.

In a sense. Not in the happy go lucky way, but in a beautiful fashion-model way. It was sultry. Going for pirate golden brown. Looked more like rum bottle spilled on it. It fell apart all over.

Yes. Loosely Yes.                       Lauren Scores 3.5  Jeremy Scores 1.5 Final Score 2.5/4=62.5%

It looks like we have a winner…Lauren Montera!

The world is getting smaller and smaller by the minute. Globalization is bringing palette-pleasing menus from all across the globe. We know that not everyone wants to have a plate of chicken, fish or beef in front of them, so we specifically looked into finding a way to work with a hated ingredient among adults, tofu. What came from our efforts was an Indian recipe called “Tofu Tikka Marsala” found on Cooking with Manali. Breaking down the name, it means “Roasted tofu in curry sauce”. I remembered having a sample of this at Karavalli with our friends, Lianna and Dan. I only have a medium tolerance to spice, so this was a great way for me to enjoy some of India’s famous flavors while not having to gobble down everyone’s share of naan bread as compensation. Let’s get to cooking!

The texture of the rice can be a major point in the overall rating of a dish. We played it smart and used a rice-cooker I bought back when I was in China. There they sell some of the best quality rice cookers for the lowest prices I’ve ever seen. Firstly, we can’t stress enough the point that the water has to be cold. When rice hits warm water, it starts to cook very quickly, if not too quickly. With just a small drizzle of olive oil, salt and some vinegar, (Not too much, we don’t want vinegar flavored rice!) We were able to let the machine do the work for us. Brown needs more water than white, but let’s not drown it, shall we? A little over the ratio of two cups rice to three cups water will be satisfactory. For this, we stuck with brown rice. Brown rice is a whole grain, containing the bran, germ, and endosperm. Rice bran, according to Wikipedia, is the hard shell surrounding the rice kernel and contains a lot of nutrients, including antioxidants, vitamins, and fiber. The germ is the “seed” of the rice, if you will. The endosperm is what both white rice and brown rice have in common and is mostly just starch. For all its nutritional worth however, brown rice may contain some arsenic, so user beware. 

The smell of the curry sauce is spiked with ginger, sweet BBQ and molded into the tomato. In fact, most of the spices were very potent in smell. It all became a symphony, one unified aroma made from what I’m calling “The 5 C’s” Curry, Coriander, Cumin, Cilantro and much to my surprise, Cinnamon. (But of course you know the greatest C food of all…sing it with me!) We’re so use to seeing it in autumn with our chai lattes and powdered our pumpkin pies. This reminds me of the way some Italians always put sugar in their tomato sauces, but others (Like my family) forbid it. More or less, a few shakes of cinnamon proved to be both aromatic and able to blend in smoothly.

The sauce really brought me back home to my mother over the stove. Onions, peppers, tomato paste (in lieu of tomato chunks) pureed with our own add-in, mushrooms. This was one of our impulse buys in the vegetable section.

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We began by marinating the tofu which had been drained of all its water. I like to think of the stuff like a big edible sponge. This is why most people say they don’t like it. It’s so soft and squishy to the touch and has a taste like cold wet macaroni dough without any flour. A little garlic, (We LOVE this stuff like it was our godmother) ginger, a melody of spices, and Greek yogurt (we didn’t have any of the yogurt demanded, but the tang added an extra dimension to the overall flavor profile). The tofu was then thrown into the refrigerator for an hour to absorb all those flavors. Next came the sauce. We forgot to buy the tomatoes, so we improvised with some tomato paste. This came through very distinctly in the final product. Next time, let’s not forget them. In addition to the mushrooms, we also added in a sweet pepper. The original recipe called for sugar. Since I’m trying to cut down on the stuff, we figured the pepper would contribute some sweetness (I still added some raw honey, just to be on the safe side). We let the onions, peppers, and tomato paste stew for 10 minutes, then into the blender to puree. At this point, it was like we were swimming in the aromas.

The sauce had a really rich deep orange-red color, accentuated when we added the heavy cream. It reminded me of going to a cafe and ordering a latte, the way how the barista would sculpt the steamed cream in an artistic way. The rich red contrasted with the creamy white, while all congealed together to form one harmonious dish. Once we let that settle down, we sauteed the tofu and mushrooms. This was where I was a little unsure of myself. The original recipe called to “roast” the tofu until browned, but no specific instructions. I have never cooked with the stuff, Me neither and as a result it came out not as firm as we would have wished. It started to break apart as we stirred it. Oh well, you live and learn. The mushrooms though came out beautifully. They really stood out with the heavy sauce. Next time, I think it should be called “Mushroom Tikka Masala”.

All-in-all, I would give this recipe a 4.5/5 stars. Next time, we definitely need tomatoes and we need to cook the tofu longer. I on the other hand was very engulfed in the Indian spice blend. Despite this however, I found myself voraciously devouring this. Definitely a must revisit in the future and who knows, maybe we can find other was to spin this dish.

Just this past week, Nick suggested we use his gift card to Ninety nine. We tried the shrimp flatbread appetizer. It turned out to be very gooey with 3 classic cheeses, mozzarella, Parmesan and extra sharp cheddar. I didn’t like the sharp cheddar in this case, since it made the overall dish slightly more salty than desirable. The crust was very crunchy. I swear the next table heard me bite into it. The oil factor was heavy enough to blot, but not enough to dribble. Minus the cheddar cheese, this reminded me of when I used to cook for an Italian pizzeria in Potsdam, NY called “Mama Lucia’s”. I was a pizza cook there for about a year, and one of the pizzas that we would make was called the Umbria. It was a hit with my friends, who would often come in and specifically order the pizza. This seemed like ages ago though – so much life has happened since then that I felt it was time to resurrect this dish.

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According to Wikipedia, pesto (or as it is sometimes referred to as Pesto Alla Genovese) derives its name from the Genoese word pestâ which means to pound or to crush. It consists of garlic, pine nuts, salt, basil leaves, olive oil, and (of course) parmigiano-reggiano (you gotta add cheese to it). This serves as the base for the pizza. The golden brown toasted pine nuts are essential to pesto sauce having the right subtle undertones, though, according to this post from StackExchange, you can add a variety of nuts to the sauce.

Sorry to tree-nut allergy sufferers like my best friend from middle school, Matt. You can substitute with sunflower seeds. This is one case where simply omitting an ingredient would lead to disaster, in this case mushy basil. Simply grind your leaves together with your pine nuts/sunflower seeds, (Or both if you want to do some kind of half and half) Parmesan and a trio of Garlic, Pepper, and Salt. That’s how you use a GPS in the kitchen. Most important is the drizzle of olive oil, otherwise it would all be a grainy mess. We want to have pesto SAUCE. This is only my second time making it.

Did you know, Marie Osmond’s first name is actually Olive! They called her by her middle name as their mother was an “Olive” too. For all you Italians out there, it’s superstitiously bad luck to spill olive oil because the good stuff didn’t always come at a cheap price back in the day. Just dab a drop behind the ears if you have an accident.

I took care of the shrimp all by my very own self! I used Mediterranean Sea salt with lemon pepper and a roasting clove of garlic. I pulled them off of the flame early because we would be finishing the cook off in the oven. Don’t be fooled cooking them just right in the pan only to have them turn to rubber in the oven. Are you having trouble with your timing? Check out our shrimp salad for reference.

We used a simple flat bread recipe found at Hilah Cooking. This was a relatively simple way of preparing dough compared to what it normally takes to make pizza dough. We accidentally started cooking really late, so we wanted something simple. The baking powder normally helps with the rising process in bread, however with so much of it as the recipe calls for, it tasted like biscuits. If you’re like my uncle and are sensitive to gluten, you might want to try this recipe from http://keepinitkind.com/easy-homemade-yeast-free-vegan-gluten-free-flatbread/  instead. It’s also vegan! Once the dough was all set and rolled out, I threw it onto the skillet to brown on both sides. They only needed a minute or so on each side before they were ready.

Now for the fun part! We spread the pesto sauce out and then dolloped huge amounts of ricotta cheese. Lauren swears that it had the look of Jell-o. I thought it looked more like panna cotta. (hmmmm….. maybe later) With that we also topped out pizza with the sauteed shrimp and some mozzarella cheese. The restaurant I worked at had a wood fire oven. It was really nice to cook with, when it worked. It adds more flavor and crunch to your pizza. Boy, let me tell you, when it fails it fails. It’s a real pain to keep the temp just right. Sticky things are hopeless. Wood chips are a hazard too. Nevertheless, wood fire pizza is simply amazing to eat. I found the best substitute for lack of luxury was to broil it for 5-10 minutes until the mozzarella is all melted.

 

Once it came out of the oven, it was piping hot and still gooey in the cheese. This is where we threw on our sun-dried tomatoes. To me, they looked like big red raisins.

The sun-dried tomatoes help to contrast the savory notes with some sweetness. Everything in general came out okay, the pesto could have stood out a little more – maybe some more basil (nice and fresh from the garden) and more garlic. Also (and I am astounded that I am saying this) but there was a little too much ricotta. This was one of those late night comfort foods so we decided to eat on the floor. We even made a little fort like when we were kids and watched some videos with one of our “kids” Prince Daniel. Good night!

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