Cooking: Chinese Baked Fish

Like everyone else in this pandemic, we’re having to cook our own takeout. I didn’t realize I had two filets of Chilean sea bass in my freezer, and so I thawed one. I also set out chili fermented black beans, toasted sesame oil, Maggi (MSG baby!), soy sauce and Shaoxhing cooking wine to make into a cooking sauce for the fish.              

I grated ginger onto the fish and salted and peppered both sides.

I then wrapped the fish in parchment paper and baked in 400 F degree oven for 10 minutes, but really it needed to cook for another 5 minutes because it was such a thick filet. And so for those last five minutes, I poured the sauce on along with some minced garlic (which should have gone on with the grated ginger)before popping it back into the hot oven. Once finished, I sprinkled sliced scallions and chopped cilantro.

In the meantime, I also chopped Napa cabbage which hubs harvested the day before and which I sauteed with garlic and salt in peanut oil in a hot wok.

Fish, rice and vegetables. I ate many a simple meal like this in my single days especially when I was doing a lot of hot yoga. There is enough left over from this dinner to eat for a light lunch during the work week.

Cooking: Breakfast Burritos

Last night I started cooking Oaxacan black beans and soyrizo as separate components for this morning’s breakfast burritos, but as I was frying the soyrizo in my nonstick cooking pan and it was still sticking, I thought oh heck it’s all gonna end up inside a tortilla, so I might as well cook it all up inside one pot. 

 

And so the next morning, I started cooking down my soyrizo beans--I was looking for a consistency of wallpaper paste or moist refried beans--and commenced building a burrito making assembly line.     

I zap a slice of Monterey Jack or Colby or cheddar onto a tortilla for 30 seconds. I also start beating an egg with a bit of heavy whipping cream and a pinch of salt and then cook it for a couple minutes until soft curds form. I then scoop half of the scrambled egg onto the melted cheese on the tortilla along with chopped white onion, chopped jalapeño, and chopped cilantro. And then a bead of soyrizo black beans, which I roll and then pop onto a baking sheet.

Once the burritos are rolled and laid onto a baking sheet, bake in a 350 degree oven for 10 minutes.

And then I wrap the burritos in foil and bring them while still hot to a friend to share. I also threw a couple in the fridge to reheat and eat for breakfast during the week.

Weekday Cooking and Cocktailing and Crafting

I think I mentioned that hubs doesn’t like to eat the same meal two days in a row, which is not to say he won’t eat leftovers. He just has to have it rotated out with a different leftover or another dish altogether. Yesterday I was going to serve leftover Baked Cavatappi, but I was craving lemony tartar sauce and ketchup, and so I popped into the oven frozen lobster cakes and spicy French fries because they were just gonna be the vehicles of what I really wanted--the condiments.           

I made my own tartar sauce with mayonnaise, dill weed, sweet pickle relish, Old Bay seasoning, celery seed, lemon zest, lemon juice and grated onion. Since I was slicing up red cabbage for the American coleslaw, I also sliced radishes, a jalapeno and white onion for a Curtido or Central American coleslaw, which will be delicious with enchiladas or atop tacos.

I've also been trying to change up my drinking game of a whole bottle of Chardonnay by playing with lower alcohol cocktails. I bought this set of aperitifs from Haus and chose samplers of Citrus Flower (lemon and elderflower), Rose Rose (supposedly "notes of raspberry, rose, and strawberry"), Ginger Yuzu ("spicy, bold and fragrant"), and Spiced Cherry. I also bought a large bottle of Lemon Lavender, my favorite flavors.

I wasn't prepared for the bitterness of the aperitif straight up on ice and so mixed in blood orange juice as well as tonic water in the Rose Rose. The next night I opened the Ginger Yuzu and mixed with Prosecco and limoncello and tonic water. I'm playing with proportions of harder liquors as well as sparkling waters and fruit juices.

Over the weekend, I also shopped at the warehouse grocery store much to the dismay of the hubs (if there's room in the freezer, then I feel compelled to shop to fill it) and cooked a stroganoff and egg noodles to use up the mushrooms in the fridge and eat during the week.

I'm becoming more accustomed to the bitterness of the aperitif, and I'll probably like them as much as I like IPAs.

This week I also ventured to my favorite trail. The parking lot wasn't packed, and if I can pull right away into a designated parking space, then it's a go. There weren't too many people, and for the most part, other hikers and runners were also masked. 

The afternoon was windy and chilly but brilliantly sunny.

And my days include my art practice of drawing and coloring as well as collating images to create iron oxide decals. I've a bag of frost porcelain clay and a need for vessels to house my scissors and cutting tools, pens, graphite pencils, colored pencils, markers and paintbrushes.

And mugs. A couple of Frida Kahlo cups decorated to the nines with flowers and hearts which I have been drawing and painting like crazy. And a lamp base with ocean-themed imagery and mermaids and a sailing ship.

Back to leftovers. Made a Caesar Salad and garlic bread to accompany the leftover Baked Cavatappi.

And this time, I squeezed fresh blood oranges for the juice in my aperitif with Prosecco and tonic water.

Such a pretty drink. I also had taken out of my freezer some sous vide steak I bought at Costco and came home to purple cauliflower on my kitchen counter, which made me remember the rainbow Swiss chard in the fridge and the potatoes that hubs said we couldn't possibly finish from my pantry.

You know how everyone loves the sides of a Thanksgiving dinner? Well I love vegetable sides taking up more room than than a protein on a plate. I gave over the task of cooking the purple cauliflower to hubs, who sautés vegetables in olive oil and garlic. I don't discard the stems like I do with dinosaur kale. I chop up the chard stems and cook them first and then add in the chopped leaves.

Since the steak was already cooked, I had time to sauté the chard stems in chicken fat and then dry steamed all of the stems and leaves in chicken broth. Before cooking, I used up the last of my spicy cherry aperitif (my favorite thus far) by mixing it up with the last of the Cava and blood orange juice.

And vegetable dinner (get it? not steak but vegetable) done.

I've been plotting and planning my pottery weekend coming up. I adhered the crackle glaze I bought to use on a future bonsai pot on a few of my bud vases and succulent pots. And cut out more templates for even more bud vases inspired by ancient Greek vases. I also saw at the virtual Renegade Fair this colander. Brilliant. And so this is another pot goal for my bag of speckled buff.

I also made it out again to my favorite trail and my halfway point or turnaround happened sooner than I wanted because I kept thinking that I needed to get dinner on the table by six even though there was plenty of daylight.

And oh deer! Yeah other people think aww it's Bambi. Not me. My first thought is no ticks! No Lyme disease!

Once home, it was time to make Rachel sandwiches, which are basically Reuben sandwiches, but made with coleslaw instead of sauerkraut. I laid leftover corned beef from the Saint Paddy's Day holiday on rye bread with Swiss cheese, Russian dressing and coleslaw (also leftover from my condiment dinner)and dinner done.

I know a messy sandwich isn't hubs' favorite, and so I just put one slice of Swiss and none of the Gruyere that I included on mine. He was a trooper though and consumed it along with his homemade pickles.

And you know what? I'm gonna have another there's still a couple slices of corned beef for more Rachel sandwiches. I can also grill a roast beef with some other yellow cheese on rye for hubs.

And I know now what I'm gonna make for a cone 10 firing that my colleague, the ceramics teacher is gonna undertake before the end of the school year. I just bought a bag of Aardvark Coleman porcelain clay from which to make a dinner ware set. 

I dithered between an 12.5" and 11" round fiberboard form, but now I'm also thinking I could make a lamp base too from that bag of clay. A table lamp with sea life. I've got a texture roller to impress waves and currents. And the shape of the lamp base will be ad large the bottle bud vase I recently made--I'll have the spout at top large enough to house the harp, socket and socket shell. No bottom on the bottle but a hole at the bottom on the side of the base to run the cord set through. I've been collecting images of coral, seaweed, a sperm whale, a mermaid, schools of fish, a squid, seahorses, conch shells, and compasses on to a word doc to later print out into iron oxide decals. I'm wondering if the Archie coyote glaze will be too runny to use on a lamp. I might have to go with a more stable glaze like Jim Bob with some accents of marine blue underglaze. But oh yeah, as Zan my ceramic teacher colleague pointed out—I’d need to use a Cone 10 glaze, and luckily she says she has lots of Cone 10 glazes.                                                                        

Cooking: Corned Beef, Cabbage, Carrots and Colcannon and Clay Play

Earlier this week was St. Patrick’s Day, and luckily I remembered to take out the brisket from the freezer before leaving for work.       

I never thought I'd be one to boil dinner, but I once watched my dad make corned beef and cabbage and remember liking it. However, unlike my dad, I don't throw the potatoes into my boiled dinner and I don't like all the color leached out of my vegetables. While the brisket boiled for a good two and half to three hours, I waited a half hour before dinner to cook the potatoes, carrots and cabbage. I laid the quartered cabbage and carrots atop the boiling beef and decided to mash the potatoes with lots of butter, cream and green onion and chives to make Colcannon.

The cabbage might have been a little too limp for my liking, but at least the carrots were bright orange.

And with all the mustards set out, I feel like March is United Kingdom cooking month, having served Shepherd's Pie, Madras chicken curry, a smoky halibut chowder, and baked a Guinness stout cake.

I had served during the week leftover Madras chicken curry and finally got to making a green curry. I visited our garden plot with the dog and harvested a lot of mint. Add to my Vitamix blender to that mint, cilantro, ground ginger, smashed garlic cloves, jalapenos that I de-seeded and removed the membrane, cumin powder, coriander powder, lime juice, palm sugar, tamarind paste.

Game changer! Hubs even liked and said it enhanced the flavor of the curry. I added a little yogurt hoping to lighten the color, but no go. It doesn't really emulsify, but luckily I didn't add too much to ruin the appearance. I plan on cooking a tandoori chicken with that yogurt and biriyani minus the raisins and nuts and serve this mint cilantro chutney with it. It's so delicious and can freeze for later.

And then it was Saturyay! A day for clay play. First stop, Clay Planet where I bought two bottles of clear glaze and two bags of clay for a friend. For myself, I bought this jar of crackle glaze to make some bonsai pots for the hubs and bag of speckled buff clay. I'll be making my way next through a bag of frost porcelain. I'm pondering making a dinnerware set of four coupe plates--no foot, but a slight rim on the edge. I was telling my clay mates yesterday that I had bought a plate from Haand which was too big for my cupboard, but which I love and will keep as a serving platter. And so my handmade plates will be mimic and complement that North Carolina porcelain platter. 

And I can't stop making bud vases. I made a bottle vase with a quote from Corita Kent: "Flowers grow out of dark moments." I've a number of flower quotes that I want to add to vases. I'm leaning toward minimalist forms with of course, the wabi sabi of my imperfect making. I just could not for the life of me get the spout of my bottle vase made with some of the last of my Electric Brown clay perfectly round. It's wonky as all heck. 

And aargh, I threw away the paper templates of the other bud vases I've made and decided they're forms I like. More templates to locate and cut out on Monday. I remember how much I love the contrast of glossy white stripes on the speckled buff and am wanting to make frost porcelain vases with marine blue stripes like in the picture below. Their shapes are gorgeous too.

And decal work too! That's another surface decoration that excites me too.

I would love to make some more of the Greek amphora vases with the frost porcelain and adhere some commercial decals on to them.