Rituals

The summer has gone in the blink of an eye, once again it seems.

I look outside my window as I'm typing this, and see the tinges of gold and amber working their way through the trees.

Autumn always makes me feel nostalgic, ushering back memories of waking up at 6am to sleepily head to school. New notebooks, sharp pencils, fresh minds and outlook. As one season comes to an end, a new beginning is ushered in.

It's been years - 6, to be exact! - since my back to school (including grad school. Whoa, 6 years already?!) days have ended.

I don't pack school bags anymore, but there are still ways of marking seasons, acknowledging the end of one while welcoming the next.

Such as beverages :)

This summer it was all about cold water with lemon, coconut water, ice-cold berry smoothies.

I made my first cup of spice chai this morning. The air was cool and refreshing when I opened the windows, a breeze dancing its way through the leaves. My first thought was - it's a perfect day for a hot cup of chai. 

Out came my packet of chai, black tea leaves packed with abundant amounts of spices, whole cardamoms proudly punctuating the mix. The heady aroma was a perfect complement to the scene outdoors. To the tea, once it was steeped, I added a tiny bit of honey, and just enough milk until the white clouds found their way to the top of the cup.

We have a few days of warmth left to us yet, the true cold lurking behind the scenes until its time has come.

In the meantime, this cup of tea is a comforting and reassuring way to welcome the season. I'm looking forward to many more.

What are some of your morning rituals? What do you do to welcome new seasons? 

Easy does it - burgers and carottes râpées (grated carrot salad)

The makings of a delicious and quick salad - fresh carrots and parsley

I was first introduced to carottes râpées by the great author and cooking teacher Susan Herrmann Loomis, via her beautifully written book, On Rue Tatin.

In this book, Ms. Loomis chronicles her culinary journey from her days as a stagiaire at La Varenne, to her adventures in building a home for herself and her family in France.

Her story is filled with challenges and triumphs - I admire anyone with  enough patience and resolve to wrestle a completely foreign bureaucracy over arcane housing regulations and codes (heck, I admire anyone who can wade through that here in the States, let alone having to do it in a new language!) - and stories of food. Food at the markets, food cooked by the wonderful friends she made, food she makes and shares with us in the form of recipe manna. I ate up this book the first time I read it a few years ago (figuratively, though many of the recipes were mouth-watering enough to do so literally..), and one intriguing little dish that always stuck with me was the grated carrot salad.

It was mentioned without any fanfare, and there was no recipe accompanying it, though I knew from the book that it was one part of a simple and lovely meal that her then-host (and now dear friend) had made for her, after a long day of hard work. This past winter, searching for a way to break the monotony of stews and braises, I finally looked it up - thanks, Google! - and quickly became enamored with it.

This is apparently everywhere in France, and just about everyone has their own version, according to David Lebovitz (another food hero of mine!), though it seems safe to say that all versions contain grated fresh carrots, lemon juice, olive oil, sugar, and parsley. I tried Mr. Lebovitz's rendition, and have no need to seek any alternatives. It's perfect, and tasting it - bright, lightly sweet, crunchy - brings me that much closer to really experiencing the quiet comfort and joy Ms. Loomis must have felt with that meal.

You can read all about the dish, and the recipe, here.

The only thing I do differently, as you can see from my picture, is peeling my carrots so that I end up with ribbons of shaved carrot. This is only because I had grated carrots flying everywhere the first time I tried this recipe with my plane grater. A box grater will contain the little pieces that would inevitably fly away otherwise, but as I'm currently too lazy to replace my grater (I know, I know...), I 'improvised' with my peeler. Which doesn't make things like carrot bits fly amok - always a plus in my book :D

This salad was the perfect accompaniment to these easy and very delicious (read - juicy, tender, beefy) burgers below.

Mm, meat - a girl's gotta have her beef sometimes!

Although I love a good burger once in a while, I've never actually tried making it. Burgers have come a long way since the White Castle and McDonald's/Burger King/ Wendy's of my childhood. Nowadays, they're pretty much a bona fide gourmet food (or can be) - the beef from some sort of grass-fed, free roaming, pedigreed cow, the bread made from stone-ground organic heirloom grains, the toppings  tony and posh.

I'm not trying to be too snarky here - if a burger's good, it's good - and sometimes those things can make a difference. Most of the time though, I feel they are just over the top, and can make you lose sight of what you're really going for with a burger. For me, it's that first bite filled with hot, juicy, full bodied meat flavor balanced out with a little bit of sharp, sweet, and sour. The bread has always been secondary to me, merely a vessel for holding all the yummy ingredients together. Definitely a really good, zesty, crisp pickle on the side. The basics :)

Anyway, I was intimidated by the thought of making my own burgers - after all, there are some pretty high standards these days! I was overwhelmed by choice - there are tons of burger recipes out there, and all of them call for different seasonings, mixes, spice rubs, the list goes on. Failure seemed imminent, and a fantastic burger seemed out of reach.

But I persisted, because 1) I had a pound of really fresh and rosy ground beef from my local co-op and I was determined to use it, and 2) I was super hungry and starting to become hangry.

Miraculously, I stumbled upon this recipe by Bobby Flay. It is so simple and yielded a fabulous burger - absolutely perfect and just what I was looking for.

You need only the basics - about 1 lb of the best ground sirloin you can get your hands on - because you want the pure flavor to shine through. Divide the meat into four portions, and work the meat with your hands, forming each into a patty about 3/4 inch thick. Season each side liberally with black pepper, and sprinkle each side with salt. To keep the patties from puffing up too much while cooking, make a little well with your thumbs in the center of each patty (this was a great tip from Mr. Flay's recipe and worked like a charm).

In your pan, heat some oil on medium high heat until the oil begins to shimmer. Place each patty in the pan, and let them cook undisturbed for 4 minutes. Flip over and cook for another 3. It's important that you don't move the patties around so that they have a chance to brown and cook properly - same principle for pan frying steaks.

Before serving, I let the patties rest on a covered plate to trap the moisture escaping so that it can go back into the burgers (I told you I liked them burgers juicy!).

It's eatin' time! (Nicer than 'Clobberin' Time*' ;)

Served on a lightly toasted brioche bun, with a quick onion and tomato salsa topping (there was ketchup and mustard too - I put it on after I took this photo and realized I had forgotten!), accompanied by a nice big mound of that grated carrot salad and some kale - it was burger heaven. 

And now, after all that, I have only two words for you - Dig. In.

*As Ben Grimm, aka the Thing of the Fantastic Four, would say! 

Simple scallops

Simple broiled scallops, parsley and lemon pasta, 'kickin' sautéed asparagus

I made this after I was flush with fresh new finds (try saying that 5 times fast!) from grocery shopping. Gorgeous scallops, incredibly fresh, rosy-hued and sweetly fragranced; asparagus snapping away to be eaten; firm, bright parsley that looked like mini green fans.  The makings of a light and satisfying dinner!

We ate the scallops with a generous serving of spicy asparagus and a tangle of spaghetti laced with fresh parsley, lemon, and garlic. Light and flavorful, it was a well-balanced and very satisfying dinner. A glass of crisp Pinot Grigio or sparkling rosé would go great with this meal (must remember this for next time!).


Simple broiled scallops:

With seafood that's this fresh, very little preparation is needed to let the flavors take center stage. This serves 3 (4 scallops each).

I drizzled the scallops (12 whole, fresh scallops) with olive oil, a bit of salt and pepper, and set them to broil on high for about 8 minutes (4 minutes on each side, until the scallops became opaque and were no longer translucent.

I finished it off with a drizzle of good extra virgin olive oil and fresh lemon juiced squeezed all over. That's it! As long as you start with the freshest scallops you can find, you really can't go wrong.


Parsley and lemon pasta:

This was also very simple to make. This serves about 3 (2 if you're extra hungry :).

After the pasta (1/3 of a 1 lb package) was cooked and drained, I melted about 1 tbsp of butter over low heat (the lowest setting), added the drained pasta right back in, and stirred to coat the spaghetti with the butter.

Next, I added about 1 tsp of freshly pressed garlic (2-3 large-ish cloves), a pinch of salt, and a generous sprinkling of black pepper.

I added coarsely chopped fresh parsley right before serving (about 1/2 cup of chopped parsley), and topped it off with a generous glug of extra virgin olive oil and freshly squeezed lemon juice.


'Kickin' sautéed asparagus:

Start with 1 bunch of asparagus, washed and trimmed of the tough bottom part of the stem. I like to cut about an inch off from the bottom, and use my peeler on the couple of inches above it to expose as much of the tender insides as possible.

I snapped my asparagus a couple of times so they were about finger length. In a large saucepan, heat one chopped garlic clove with olive oil (chop another garlic clove and reserve for the last step), 1/2 finely chopped jalapeno pepper, a bit of salt, and black pepper until it begins to sizzle. Add the asparagus, stir to coat, and cover. Let cook for about 4 minutes, occasionally giving it a quick stir. Add 1/2 cup of tomato sauce (I just use whatever is sitting around in the fridge), stir, cover, and cook for another 3 minutes. Keep an eye on your asparagus at this point - you want it to stay vibrantly green and for it to stay tender and yet still toothy crisp. At the last minute before shutting off the heat, toss in the rest of your garlic, stir, and cover for a couple of minutes after you've shut off the heat to let the flavors meld. Serve hot and squeezed with fresh lemon juice.

Show and Tell Tuesday

I had this for lunch today, and it was too good not to share.

It's nothing complicated at all, and it all started with a frozen veggie burger. I don't typically eat these very often, but my mom had given me some to use in a pinch, and I was determined to put them to good use.

I cooked the frozen patty in a little bit of olive oil for about 10 minutes on medium low heat, flipping every few minutes. The bun is lightly toasted brioche, leftover from our burger night a few evenings ago (mm, brioche..and I still have to write about the burgers!). I added a fried egg, sliced onions, Dijon mustard (underneath the patty, directly on the bun), and ketchup, resulting in this delicious sandwich. A side of sautéed kale completed this meal.

The whole thing took only 20 minutes, from start to finish. 27, if you count how long it took for me to devour this :D

And now to ponder the all-important question - what's for dinner??

Happy Tuesday!

Garlicky pasta with smoked salmon, red onion, and dill

I feel I'm on a roll with these pictures (no pun intended..you know, camera roll..anyone? :-) )

When you have a quick and easy base like garlicky, buttery pasta, a variety of delicious and satisfying meals is at your fingertips.

In the case of this dish, it took little more than preparing the pasta, and assembling the salmon, onions, and dill, before a fantastic and vibrant dish was mine for lunch last weekend.

Feel free to use this as a go-to base for quick weeknight suppers – all you need are a vegetable and a protein to complete the meal. 

Kale and a fried egg are great options – easy to prepare and loaded with nutrients. Or you can do sautéed green beans and sausage of your choice. How about an easy microwaved sweet potato (mixed with some oil or butter and a dash of cinnamon), quick pickled cucumbers, and roast chicken? Or green beans and roast chicken and potatoes. I can go on - pick whatever vegetable and protein suit your fancy, or whatever you happen to have on hand!

For a light lunch or side dish, just add the salmon, onion, and dill (plus some good extra virgin olive oil and fresh lemon juice) following my instructions below.

Garlicky, buttery pasta:

-8 ounces dried fusilli pasta, cooked in plenty of salted water, drained. I recommend fusilli for its corkscrew shape that maximizes the absorption of the delicious oils, butters, and spices we’ll be mixing it with. There is nothing like these wonderful ingredients clinging to every nook and cranny of the pasta. It also looks pretty :D

-1 tbsp olive oil

-1 tbsp butter

-generous shake of red pepper flakes

-1/2 tsp black pepper

-about 1 tbsp dried parsley (fresh would be wonderful here too – just make sure it’s very finely chopped)

-4 cloves of garlic, finely minced – try to take care of this step first, or at least with enough time to allow the minced garlic to sit for at least 5 minutes before you mix it in.

After you’ve emptied your pasta cooking pot of the freshly cooked pasta, turn the heat to low, and add the olive oil and butter to the pot. Immediately add the hot, drained pasta, spices and herbs (except the garlic), and stir together to coat. Turn off the heat, add the garlic, and mix to combine and evenly distribute the garlic. Voila – your base is completed!

**To make the dish pictured above, simply add for each serving 4 ounces of flaked smoked salmon, about 2 tbsp of finely chopped red onion (I soaked mine in a little bit of rice vinegar, to help take off some of the pungency and sharpness), and about 1 tbsp finely chopped fresh dill. Mix it all together, and top it off with a drizzle of your best extra virgin olive oil and a splash of fresh lemon juice. Mix again and enjoy your refreshing and zesty dish!

Almost spring - bok choy and carrot sauté

Hey look, a picture! ;-)

I really love vegetables. Growing up, vegetables took up the biggest part of my plate, and my mother prepared all different kinds of veggies in different ways. It doesn’t hurt that the cuisine from my parents’ region in China focuses heavily on freshly prepared vegetables with flavors ranging from delicate and subtle to bold and zesty.  I ate all different kinds of wonderful greens, shoots, tubers, fruits, roots, etc - always eager to explore the endless variety with my parents. I loved anything green and crunchy, and nothing was more delicious or exciting to me than a plate filled with colorful veggies.

I’m thankful for the way that my parents ate and continue to eat now, and for managing to stay true to their roots in a new country while also incorporating local flavors and produce into their diets. I attribute my sense of culinary adventure to the way my parents raised me and for sharing their love of food with me – one of the best and many gifts they’ve given me. It helps me stay grounded and calms me after stressful and busy days, to be able to come home and prepare a meal full of healthy and delicious veggies, and knowing that it’ll sustain and nourish me as I prepare for whatever comes next.

That’s something I hope I can share with you too, to provide inspiration and ideas for preparing healthy and satisfying meals. It really is something quietly empowering and refreshing, to be able to do this for yourself and for the people you love. What better gift can you give to yourself and your family than good health and a happy, satisfied tummy and palate? I think the answer to that would comprise a pretty short list J

In this spirit, I’d like to share this recipe with you. It’s inspired by a salad of Chinese napa cabbage, carrots, cilantro, and shredded grilled chicken that my mom makes and which my brother and I basically shovel into our mouths (we may also fight for the last bits but you didn’t hear me say that :D). She quickly sautés the cabbage and carrots to mellow out their flavors, while still maintaining their crispness and bite, and adds a dressing made of Chinese black vinegar, pressed garlic, soy sauce, and sesame oil. It is divine and I’m telling you that you feel your health levels increase as you eat it (like in video games, haha). Seriously though, it’s one of my favorite hot-weather foods, and I wanted to try making a cold-weather version of it.

Organic bok choy is well-priced and fresh at my local Whole Foods, and giant bags of organic carrots are ridiculously cheap there. I had both in my fridge several weeks ago, and also a plump red onion sitting on my counter. It was time to experiment J

I cooked the carrots first with plenty of garlic and spices, until they became sweet and tender but still plenty toothy. I added soy sauce and the stalks of the bok choy and red onions, letting them sweat and soften a bit before finally adding the bok choy leaves. They get just enough heat to wilt and turn a brilliant green, and a final helping of minced garlic ensures there is plenty of flavor.

This dish is crunchy, juicy, flavorful, and judging by the number of times I’ve made it since then, and N’s response each time, quickly being established as a favorite and a go-to. I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as we do – happy cooking!

Bok choy and carrot sauté:

-1 head of bok choy cabbage – washed, with stalks separated from leaves, and cut into finger-sized pieces. You can quickly tear the leaves a couple of times, or chop them as well. Just make sure to maintain some uniformity of size for your stalks and leaves – they don’t need to be the same size, and I prefer my leaves to be about half a palm sized, just make sure your stalks are pretty uniform and your leaves as well.

-6-8 small-medium carrots, peeled, and cut into finger sized sticks (about 4-5 total cups. Load up the veggies!)

-½ red onion, cut into thin ringlets

-2 tbsp olive oil (not extra virgin, just regular will do you here)

-4 cloves of garlic, chopped, portioned into 4

-¼ tsp sea salt

-¼ tsp black pepper

-½ tsp dried red pepper flakes

-pinch of turmeric and Old Bay

-soy sauce to taste

In a skillet, heat oil, spices, and ¼ of your chopped garlic on medium high heat (tending more towards the medium), until garlic begins to sizzle slightly and become fragrant. Add the carrots, stir to combine, and cover. Let cook for about 7 minutes, making sure to stir occasionally. Add soy sauce to taste (I end up using about 1-2 tsps), stirring with the carrots. Then add the bok choy stalks and onion, and another ¼ of your garlic, stir it all together, and cover. Let cook for about 2-3 minutes – you want the onion to retain as much of its color as possible. Add the bok choy leaves last, along with the rest of your garlic, stir to mix all together, turn off the heat, cover, and let sit for a few minutes. This will allow the leaves to wilt without overcooking and for the garlic to incorporate with the rest of the veggies.

Serves 2 as a main course (I would suggest some quinoa and a fried egg to accompany), and 4 as a side (may I suggest some delicious garlicky and buttery pasta with sausage?).

Baby steps

My dear readers and friends, I have been neglecting this blog for so long that an apology hardly feels adequate or relevant at this point. I mean, how do you apologize and explain for not posting consistently for over a year? The feeble excuse of 'time sure flies' doesn't seem to cut it. There is just one reasonable thing to do, which is to try to make up for lost time, and hopefully be much more diligent about updating this little chunk of internet space!

Recently, I've made some delicious dishes that I am dying to share with you. Since I'm about to have my breakfast, I'll start with the breakfast I'm currently loving:

Steel cut oatmeal with dates and cinnamon

I have a funny history with dates (incidentally, this includes the going-out-with-a-person-you-kind-of-like variety...but that's a post for another day!), which is that I never really saw their appeal. They've always seemed weirdly mushy and grainy at the same time, and overly sweet - the dried fruit equivalent of that horrible 'caramel' coating on most caramel-coated apples. My teeth are aching from the sugar anticipation as I type about this! My dad loves them and they're always stockpiled at my parents', but I couldn't fathom why until fairly recently.

It started with an innocent little Larabar - I happened to notice they were majorly on sale at WholeFoods a few weeks ago, and figured I'd stock up for the office since they're made with good ingredients and very few additives. I didn't expect to love that first bite so much - soft and tender texture, filled with wholesome nuts and lightly, perfectly sweet from...dates?! Turns out they're the first ingredient in those bars! That's when I finally started paying attention to their potential.

The next time I went grocery shopping, I noticed some packages of Medjool dates sitting casually near the bulk food section of my local co-op, plump and shiny and ready to be taken home. I stuck a box in my shopping basket, tucked amongst my produce and bags of oatmeal and grains. A match made in heaven, I was about to discover.

I like to make batches of steel cut oatmeal for breakfast most weeks. They could not be easier or less fussy, and you get a versatile base for delicious and healthy breakfasts for the entire week. On a whim one day, I decided to chop up some of those dates and toss it in my oatmeal, along with a pat of butter, a splash of buttermilk, cinnamon, and some flax and chia seeds. The result was the most fluffy and light bowl of oatmeal - there was the wonderful mouthfeel you get from the smooth butter, and it was delicately sweet from the dates melting into the hot oatmeal, with a pleasant and subtle tang from the buttermilk. I couldn't stop raving about it, and apparently I still have the need to rave about it on this blog :) I hope you'll get a chance to try it - it's a nice way to mix it up for breakfast, and if you're already an oatmeal lover, perhaps this will make its way into your repertoire.

Ingredients (serves 4):
The work is all front-loaded here - making the oatmeal, chopping the dates, portioning out the rest of the ingredients. You can do this while the oatmeal cooks to save time.

• Steel cut oatmeal, prepared (Add 1 cup of oats to 3 cups of water in a pot, with 1/4 tsp of salt. Bring to a boil, then cover and let it simmer, making sure to stir occasionally so it doesn't overflow out of the pot. I like to cook mine for about 20 minutes after the boil for soft and chewy hot cereal)
• 12 dried dates, cut into half length-wise then finely chopped into little cubes 
• 1 tbsp butter, portioned for four
• 4 tbsp buttermilk
• 4 tsp chia seeds
• 4 tsp ground flax 
• Cinnamon to taste

Stir together all the ingredients and serve hot, enjoy and savor the texture and flavor!

A new sandwich on the block :)

Recently, I’ve had some really delicious dishes. Some were planned, and some were not. Some were old favorites, others were new discoveries. All have since stood tested by time to be reliably tasty and easy to make, a combination that can be tricky to achieve. All of them use ingredients that are commonly found in pantries, or at least are not difficult to obtain.

My partner in crime and I were wondering what to do for dinner, which happens pretty frequently during the week. It was a little too late in the day to do serious, heavy duty grocery shopping, but still early enough to pick up a few things at the store down the street. I wanted to eat fresh - with lots of veggies - and he wanted pizza or deli sandwiches. With a few ingredients we already had on hand, plus a bell pepper purchased last minute from the store, both of us were able to have what we wanted.

( [picture of the tartine] <----Alas, for I have no photo to share with you of this dish! It's been lost to the sands of time and more honestly, my own forgetfulness of where I stored it. However, if you end up making this, please share a photo as I would love to see your creation!)

Ta-da! A tartine! Well, kind of, though I suppose since tartines are really open faced sandwiches, this one is no different by that definition. What made this stand out, and what suited it perfectly for our dinner tastes that night, is how it straddled the gap between a pizza and a sandwich, while still managing to be full of veggies.

Since it’s on a naan, should we name it a naan-tine? Pronounced nahn-tahn? It has a rather nice ring to it.

Naan-tine : )

1 naan

1 bell pepper

1 tomato

2 ounces feta cheese

1 scallion, trimmed, washed, and thinly sliced

2 cloves of garlic, finely minced

Extra virgin olive oil

This is very simple, and very delicious. Start by crumbling the feta cheese over the naan, making sure there is an even layer covering the naan. Sprinkle with the minced garlic. Next, arrange the diced tomatoes in a layer, then the diced bell pepper. Bake in a 400 degree oven until the feta starts to melt, the tomato gives their juices, and the pepper wilts/softens just a bit. Remove from oven, sprinkle with scallions, and drizzle with a generous tablespoon of the best extra virgin olive oil you have on hand. If you like, squeeze some fresh lemon juice all over! Serve hot and enjoy.

Happy New Year :)

It's been a long time since I've posted on my blog, and with the start of a new year, I can't think of a better time to start again.

The past half year has been full of adventure and new things (new job! new apartment in a new neighborhood! new car! and indeed, the license to go with it! new friends! new restaurants and food! etc), that it feels like it simply swirled by in a crazy and colorful blur. Many times, I found myself thinking 'Ohh this is so delicious/amazing/neat,  I have to share this on my blog!' and just as many times, I never was able to do so. Always rushing off to do something else, or when I was just too worn out from it all, just trying to catch my breath and re-center myself! 

This year, now that my life has somewhat settled down into a more steady flow, I would love to post more on this blog and share my discoveries with you. I've missed this community, the wonderful feeling of sharing a great discovery with you, and the exchanges of inspiration, and vow to be a more active and participating member in it!

Since I founded this blog on my love for food, I think it only makes sense to start off the new year by telling you about a new dish I've experimented with tonight. 

It all started with a story my friend M told me one day last year, at work, about a pasta dish her Greek grandmother makes. Not just any dish, of course, but her very favorite - macaroni and cheese, a special treat she looks forward to each time she visits her grandmother. She explained its composition to me: Greek pasta or 'makaronia' with a special cheese called mizithra (alternative spelling: myzithra). The pasta is like spaghetti, but, as she put it, 'with a hole through it.' The memory of my sweet friend trying to impress and convey this unique quality of the pasta upon clueless (but intrigued) me still makes me smile. And as for the cheese, I went immediately to Google it even as she stood there describing it. I guess I was already hooked.

Fast forward to tonight. Snowed in by Winter Storm Hercules, and loathe to go out yet again to peruse the grocery store (my 20 minutes spent unearthing my car was enough!), I decided to make the best of what I had in-house. I had pasta, manchego cheese, salmon defrosting in my fridge. Suddenly, I remembered a blog post I had very quickly scanned and mentally bookmarked a few weeks ago, a post by my lovely friend at Dare to Eat a Peach (you'll remember her from this post)! And here I must stop and take you back in time yet again, but just a few months this time, when I traveled for work to Seattle, and ate some of the most delicious pasta I'd ever tasted. One of the pasta dishes may even have been life-changing, or at the very least, I had no idea that the simple ingredients in it could come together to create something so unique and mouthwateringly delicious. 

You'll see why I have to take you with me down memory lane to Seattle, because my friend's post is also about a pasta dish she tasted while in Seattle (sadly, we didn't cross paths in Seattle as our trips took place nearly a month apart), and that dish was a life and game changer as well. During my trip to Seattle, my team and I ate at Tavolàta, a restaurant most enthusiastically recommended to us by a knowledgeable colleague. He was a strong advocate of their spaghetti with anchovies, which had me interested from the moment I heard of it. Tavolàta is a beautifully rustic and elegant space, all wood, reclaimed-chic tables and decor, and an almost medieval sense with the dim lighting and candles flickering on the tables. From the moment we walked in, we were greeted by the most tantalizing aromas, and I just knew that a dish named in such a deceptively simple way had to be special. 

As it turns out, our colleague was spot on in his recommendation of the restaurant and of the spaghetti with anchovies. I know when someone says a dish is life-changing, 'anchovy' is probably not the first ingredient that comes to mind, but what an incredible change in perspective that dish afforded us. The pasta itself was fantastic, perfectly cooked and textured, but the sauce was something else. If a typical red pasta sauce is Brooks Brothers, classic and tried-and-true, an everyday staple, then that anchovy 'sauce' is Proenza Schouler, boldly quirky and yet balanced enough to become a classic itself. 

The flavors paraded by and sang on my tongue. The spaghetti was enrobed in a luscious and yet sheer concoction that was earthy and savory, umami with a hint of heat comes to mind, and lightly pungent and smoky reminiscent of roasted garlic. Forget the stereotypical 'stinky fish' smell that anchovies are unfortunately associated with. I wasn't able to detect anything fishy about the pasta, just that complex and addictive blend of flavors. I am certain I can eat that pasta a few times every week and never tire of it. 

Anchovies and all the lore surrounding them have their redemption in that sauce. Definitely a game changer, and perhaps even a life-changer for me, because I now have a better sense of anchovy's potential.

But wait, you exclaim to me - weren't you just rambling about a cheese and pasta dish earlier on?? 

Why yes, I was! And here's where it all comes together. M's grandmother's mizithra pasta dish, my life-changing pasta dish in Seattle, plus my friend's life-changing pasta dish that she also experienced in Seattle except with mizithra, not anchovies, and her recipe for - ta da! - pasta with mizithra! 

We have come full circle! The universe has conspired to link all these elements together, bringing you today's post! (OK, that may have been a little overly dramatic but you see my point :)

And tonight, I urge you to read her post all about the wonders of that mizithra pasta dish. Tonight, this was the dish I wanted to create for myself as a snow-day meal/treat, except, if you'll remember from above, I had manchego, not mizithra, cheese. This made for some interesting results.

As my friend notes, that particular dish is a success largely due to an interesting property of mizithra, which is that it doesn't melt when heated, but allows for some amazing caramelization action. Then, as described in my friend's recipe and post, those little bits of caramelized mizithra coat the pasta, along with garlic and olive oil, resulting in a very tasty dish. 

Well, manchego cheese, though it may be similar in taste and texture, definitely melts, and not only that, grated and heated manchego cheese clumps. I followed my friend's recipe in all respects, except the type of cheese used (and the amount of garlic! I doubled it; garlic lover, right here!), and very quickly found myself standing over a hot skillet stirring an egg-sized lump of fried cheese and garlic in the oil and wondering what I was to do with the mini-monster I'd created. It didn't look like pasta bliss at that point, though I might have been able to give cheese curds a run for their money :)

As it turns out, the pasta I ended up with was still really, really delicious. The oil benefited from the high heat and the strong flavors of the cheese and garlic, which essentially left it lightly perfumed enough to coat my pasta with a wonderfully deep and rich flavor. I added some pasta sauce as well, good old red sauce from Rao's, and upon plating my portion for my dinner, decided that freshly squeezed lemon (I had a wedge of it sitting around from making lemon-ginger-honey tea earlier) and a few drops of truffle oil would be an extremely good idea. And so they were. I intended to eat that pasta with my salmon, which was baking away in the oven, but it was so good that I just inhaled it right there in my kitchen, standing over my plate and gleefully finishing it to the last bit. 

What happened to that glop of cheese and garlic? 1/3 of it sits on my counter top. The other 2/3, well, let's just say that that gooey, chewy, garlicky little chap didn't stand a chance against me :) 

Sometimes my improvisations work, sometimes they just don't, and sometimes they lead to a new discovery. I will probably never serve anyone that cheese and garlic glop, but that pasta with an arugula salad (tangy/sharp dressing), and a fried egg, would make an amazing and quick meal any day. I'll try my friend's recipe again - either with mizithra cheese for which it was intended, or by simply letting the grated manchego and garlic melt into the pasta itself instead of trying to caramelize them first. Even though I wasn't able to make that exact dish today, something delicious and new still resulted (whew, thankfully. Otherwise, it would have been a sad night for me!).

And in this spirit of discovery, I wish you a wonderful new year full of happiness, good health, and of course, good food!

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Here is my friend's pasta with mizithra and garlic recipe. I would recommend following her recipe and not messing around like I did, because her recipes result in amazing food and I know this one is extra-special:

http://ieatthepeach.wordpress.com/2013/11/04/pasta-with-mizithra-and-garlic/

However, if you feel like being adventurous, or would like to try to replicate my happy accident, go ahead and substitute manchego for the mizithra. The pasta dish I made tonight was a result of letting the grated manchego and chopped garlic cook in the hot oil; I stirred frequently, and when the garlic started to caramelize, I removed the cheese clump and added my cooked pasta. Stir thoroughly to coat your pasta, add enough of your favorite red sauce just to coat the pasta (there shouldn't be excess sauce that's not bound to pasta), stir again and heat through, then plate your portion and enjoy. 

Lemon juice and truffle oil: Lemon juice is a must, truffle oil is an optional 'nice to have.' I have a tiny bottle of good truffle oil which I parcel out very occasionally, and tonight just a few drops gave the pasta that extra 'oomph.' The lemon juice's tang brightened everything perfectly and even without the truffle oil, makes the pasta sing. 

Sometimes, it's good to be bad.

Especially when 'being bad' means having fried chicken and buttermilk biscuits that knock your socks off. From one of the best food trucks, in my humble opinion :)

That's right, juicy, tender chicken, coated in light and crispy batter with hints of sweet and savory. Perfectly balanced with cool and slightly zingy buttermilk ranch dressing. I'm a convert thanks to this dressing, and I usually don't even like ranch! And to finish it all off, a buttermilk biscuit that is flaky, tender-crumbed, with the wonderful buttery goodness that makes you say 'ahhh...' Delicious enough to make me want to blog about it, right here and right now!

Er, sorry about the image orientation. I'm not sure how I can get it to rotate on Blogger. If you don't mind tilting your head to the left, you'll see how it looked when I took the photo. But in any case - there is the beauty. My lunch today :)

Philadelphia friends, and anyone who visits Philly - do make sure you check out Street Food Philly, a wonderful food truck with a constantly changing menu of goodies. You can follow them on Facebook and Twitter.  You can find them on the Drexel University Campus, near the intersection of N. 33rd and Arch Streets. You should definitely try their food if you get a chance - I promise you won't be disappointed!

Until my next trip, I'll be thinking of nothing but fried chicken and how to re-create this deliciousness at home. Do you have any favorite fried chicken or buttermilk biscuit recipes? Please share in the comments!

Happy Wednesday!

I stumbled upon a wonderful blog and poem today.

Some of you may already be familiar with Ms. Maureen Abood's work. She cooks, photographs, and writes for her blog Rose Water & Orange Blossoms: Modern Musings on Lebanese cuisine, and has been published in the Washington Post and Chicago Tribune (among many others).

I have been a lover of cuisine from the Levant ever since I had my first bite of hummus and billowy pita, too many years ago to remember. That opened up new worlds for me; before then, I didn't know that I was missing these savory, fragrant, delicate, hearty and healthy foods from my life. The colors and flavors are utterly enticing, and I was hooked for good. Ms. Abood deftly captures the wonder inspired by the flavors of the food, but she does so much more than that. She gives us, in her lovely and moving prose, and through glimpses into her family's life, the history and the love that stands behind the dishes. It's a reminder of how deeply we are bound to each other and how food and love can transcend all. It's wonderful. 

I have been hungrily perusing her blog and recipes this afternoon. Her beautiful writing, recipes, and photos come together in what feels like a virtual hug. Good for the eyes, mind, and soul, and reading through her thoughtful recipes, good for the stomach and taste buds too!

These are some of the recipes I'm bookmarking:

Lebanese quick pickles

Kibbeh nayeh

Lebanese butter cookies

And of course, the poem:

In one of her posts, she refers to a poem - Kindness, by Naomi Shihab Nye - which touched me deeply. I am sharing it with you below. I hope it inspires you as much as it did me.

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.

"Kindness" by Naomi Shihab Nye, from The Words Under the Words: Selected Poems

Happy Pi Day!

Today is March 14, or 3/14. Therefore:

Happy Pi Day!

Sign courtesy of Justin :)

In honor of the gloriously irrational (and delicious) number that is pi, some of my awesome colleagues at work have been busy in their kitchens. And some of us in the office have been busy too ;) Witness below:

Clockwise from top left: Michelle's caramel apple pie, Molly's Italian Easter pie, Justin's French silk pie, and someone's portion of caramel apple pie.

I would show you my plate, which contained a nice sample of each of these delicious creations, except that I have finished everything on it :) They were each wonderful! As you can see, the caramel apple pie is going quickly, probably because everyone wanted it for breakfast. The Italian Easter pie is a close second. I have a feeling we are all saving the French silk pie for dessert later on today :)

Italian Easter pie is new to me; apparently it is one of Giada's recipes. It was light, faintly reminiscent of rice pudding, custard, and cheesecake, and the orange zest was refreshing. I would love to try making this one day!

Will you be celebrating Pi Day? If so, I hope it's filled with lots of delicious pie and a nice sprinkle of whimsy :)

Hi everyone! I have been away from this blog for much longer than I've intended, and I'm sorry to anyone who's been kind enough to check in once in a while only to be disappointed. I know I have at least a couple of nice friends for whom this is true, because they have told me so themselves :) And because I've promised my friends that I would have a post this weekend, here we are tonight.

It's been very busy here in my neck of the woods, and there is much that I want to share with you and write about, but it may not be wisest to do a retrospective of the past three months or so that I've been away, at least not in one post alone. I'm a little intimidated by the fact that it has indeed been more than three months since I've posted, and the buildup, if you will, of blog material, is just too much. Many new things happen and so rather than try to dig through the backlog, let me start afresh with more recent experiences and thoughts. It will feel more timely to you since I will do a better job of writing about it, and it helps me to feel more in control of the blogging process.

Here in the mid-Atlantic region, we were blessed with truly beautiful weather for the entire weekend. My boyfriend and I took advantage of the sunlight and breeze to go to our favorite spots in Philadelphia, taking our time to stroll through the city and take in the sights and food. On Saturday, we walked through the Rittenhouse Park area, which was filled with people, tents, and lots and lots of food and merchandise for the Annual Rittenhouse Row Spring Festival.

We kind of luckily stumbled upon this event, and I wish I had brought my camera to document the sights! Imagine the graceful buildings and streets surrounding the lush green park that is Rittenhouse Square, bursting with tents snugly compacted side by side on the streets, thousands upon thousands of people milling about. Restaurants all around the area had tents where they sold $5 or $6 bites of their food, so you can wander around and get full on delicious treats for a very reasonable amount of money. We shared delicious crab cake sandwiches, white truffle gnocchi, chicken teriyaki, crab rangoon, General Tso's chicken, and spring rolls, and sipped on organic cranberry and lemon sodas (this, and this!).

Don't things almost always taste better when eaten outside? This was certainly the case, as we milled along the booths and sampled the fare, finally settling on a lion statue in the Park to concentrate on our goodies.

After an obligatory stop at the flagship Anthropologie store (this, obviously, was really just for me to check out their sale, although after a brief respite in the air conditioning, my boyfriend was able to appreciate its beauty as well), we continued walking to the Italian Market/Bella Vista area, to stop at our favorite cafe, possibly in the whole world (or what we know of it, so far!).

Cups and Chairs is a beautiful tea and coffee house, run by the lovely Kylie, who makes teas, coffees, and treats so delicious you wish you could stay and eat there every single day. She offers 30-40 different kinds of teas, ranging from sencha, oolong, and lapsang souchong to soothing and fragrant herbal blends, that she or one of her friendly assistants will brew for you on the spot. There is also a full menu of special blended teas, coffees, and drinks, including perfectly made bubble teas. My favorite tea blends are O-Cha with hojicha, and the light and rejuvenating Wellness Tea herbal blend.

You can go to Cups and Chairs many times and be endlessly fascinated by the teas she has on hand, and the expertise that she will give you, but that's not all! Kylie has amazing taste and offers home made food ranging from sandwiches, quiche, and salads, to sweet treats and most recently a full breakfast menu of omelets, waffles, and breakfast sandwiches. Everything is made with great care, and visiting Cups and Chairs is like visiting the home of a very warm and gracious friend.

My partner-in-crime and I spent a good amount of time at Cups and Chairs on Saturday, one of our last stops before heading home for the evening, and enjoyed a fruit salad, Indonesian Chicken Salad (bright, crisp, refreshing), and wonderful iced teas. We also went back this morning for brunch! He ordered a spinach and mushroom omelet, and I ordered the Thai green curry omelet. We shared a green tea waffle with azuki (red bean) topping.

Both omelets were delicious - fluffy eggs filled with goodies - and came with expertly dressed side salads and home fries. My Thai green curry omelet deserves special mention. I have been intrigued by this dish since my boyfriend mentioned it to me, and knew that this was the dish I would try today. I really didn't know what to expect, except that I love Thai green curry and eggs, and had no doubt they would be fantastic together. I was not disappointed. The omelet was perfectly cooked, studded with golden sweet corn kernels and chopped scallions, and the Thai green curry was just the right amount to give the entire combination a subtle piquancy and hint of heat. Overall the flavors were very balanced, and kept me coming back for more, each bite tasting a little different from the previous, and revealing new insights about the flavors.

So the omelets were wonderful, and the green tea waffle did not last long after we devoured every bit of food on our omelet plates. The waffle was perfectly tender crisp on the outside, with a meltingly fluffy crumb, and the addition of green tea in the batter, coupled with a delicately sweet red bean topping and freshly whipped cream, sent the entire concoction into the stratosphere. Perfectly blended flavors, just the right amount of sweetness (which is to say, for us at least, not too sweet), and cloudlike waffle textures meant that this dish lasted for a grand total of 1 minute and a half.

Just writing about this makes me hungry, which is probably why I am having a rather late night snack of a salmon burger and zucchini/mushroom saute. I hope you've enjoyed reading about my food and adventures (and food adventures) this weekend. If you are ever in Philadelphia, I strongly encourage you to visit Cups and Chairs (and if you wish to know, I am not receiving any sort of compensation for writing about this place. I just love it very much and really wanted to share it with you). Stop by, have some expertly brewed tea, and chat with the wonderful owner, and enjoy life, sip by sip. Which is what we should make time for ourselves to do, any and every day, to enjoy the small and beautiful moments in life. And on that note, I wish you a wonderful week filled with such moments, and hope to see you again soon!