Cooking: Poke Bowl

Poke, pronounced POH-keh, or cubed raw fish like ahi tuna or salmon or albacore (all my favorites) seasoned with ingredients like soy sauce or ponzu for salt, wasabi for heat, yuzo for tart is one of my favorite foods that I sometimes buy at my local Safeway or Costco.  I never knew that I could extend and mix the cold poke with hot rice for a more complete meal.  Recently here in the San Francisco Bay Area, I've been sampling the new customized fast food trend of poke bowl restaurants.  My favorite ingredients to include in my bowls are cucumbers, white onion, scallions, kukui nut, tobiko, avocado and seaweed salad.  I've been playing with other ingredients to discover my poke palate or what proportions constitute my own tasty combination.  I discovered a love for kelp noodles and citrus kale salad to make a more paleo-friendly bowl.  Here was my recent DIY poke bowl.

I normally like a 50/50 base of greens and steamed brown rice, but I was too lazy and time-constrained to cook.  And so mixed greens from our garden and Japanese cucumbers formed my base.

 Sauces!  My favorite embellishments of Sriracha mayo, Wasabi sauce, Yuzu Kosho (think Japanese citrus and green chili sauce) and Miso salad dressing.

My protein of Negi Toro tuna and scallions.

My other protein of salmon poke from my favorite Japanese grocery shop with soy sauce seasoning, a bit of seaweed salad and sunflower sprouts.

Sides!  Seaweed salad and avocado.  Alas my avocado wasn't ripe enough for today's poke bowl.

Lunch is served.

Embroidery: Work in Progress

Can you tell I'm obsessed with color wheels and mandalas?

Cooking: Smoky Fish Chowder

I grew up cooking and eating New England clam chowder, for I had a father who kept our freezer stocked with the blue fish, blue crabs, and littleneck clams for which he cast a rod, netted or dug into sand with his toes and then dived into the Connecticut blue sea as well as his military-issued Joy of Cooking with the recipes for me to follow.  And so when I saw in the New York Times this recipe for a smoky fish chowder, I had to taste my childhood again.  This chowder calls instead for leeks and Hungarian hot smoked paprika.  Really it's the sautéing bacon and simmering of potatoes that is the smell and taste of my childhood nostalgia.  Also I substituted Dutch baby yellow potatoes, chunks of Chilean sea bass, a bit of whipping cream and fresh thyme from my herb garden which made for a magical tasting and comforting soup.

I had 2 Chilean sea bass filets defrosted.  I didn't cook the second filet as I luckily had seafood stock with potatoes leftover.  My second bowl the next day for lunch was even more delicious and am glad that I reserved that second filet or didn't allow it to get overcooked for my later meal.

Sewing: Lavender Heart Sachets

I finished embellishing hearts with seed beads, sewed them and then filled them with lavender and sold most of them at my studio's ceramic Valentine pop-up shop yesterday.  

Two hearts on hold for a woman walking her dog at Central Park who came back with cash to buy sachets.

My basket of hearts.

A heart sachet on a doorknob.

These are the valentine supplies I didn't get to use this year.  Oh well.  2018.

Morning and Evening Embroidery Work-in-Progress: Lavender Heart Sachets

Ceramics: Heart Mobile

 

 

I made these hearts a year ago--and they were a pain because I had to stilt them in the kiln because they are two-sided or glazed on both sides.  I used a Western low-fire red glaze which worked great on a piece I fired at a class at Skyline but burned out at my regular studio!  So only the large heart retained the red.  I re-glazed them and fired them again and still no color.  Later I was told by a ceramics teacher at my high school that red glaze is tricky, and I'm wondering if the fast firing perhaps leached the red out.