cook: vietnamese spring rolls and taiwanese three cup chicken

I decided to turn my Sunday in a cooking day and make shrimp and pork salad rolls to eat for the week. But first breakfast to use up the spinach in my vegetable bin because I had a lot leftover from my Tuscan Salmon. I wanted bread for breakfast and made a run to Safeway. I can't believe that the groceries below added up to $20.26. I used to marvel that food used to be so cheap. I thought I was going to make a spinach and cheese omelette with baby garlic and Parmesan.

 

I sauteed the aromatic first in butter and then added ALL the spinach. A lot. But I knew it would shrink down.

 

I forgot to add more butter or olive oil to the pan, and so the scrambled egg stuck and decided it would be a spinach scramble instead. I made sure not to overcook and leave it creamy.

 

But I wanted it cheesier and decided to top it with more Parmesan and put my eggs under a low broil. Kind of a fail, but my English muffin was delicious and so too, the sausage. The rest of the sausages will be for homemade Sausage McMuffins, but with real cheese, not cheese food.

After breakfast, I cleaned up my succulent gardens a bit. More cleaning chores in the kitchen and dining room. I disposed of dead flowers and refreshed a bouquet of Bird of Paradise and a yellow Gladiolus with blooms from my Columbine plant. I think I adhered to the rules of Ikebana: Silence; Minimalism; Shape and Line.

Making Vietnamese spring rolls took up my whole afternoon. I decided to include noodles into the rolls, which I normally omit and which came with exacting directions of soaking in boiling water for no longer than 1 minutes and 15 seconds and then soaking in cool water for no longer than 20 seconds and then draining for 15 minutes.

 

I plan on first using up all the dried rice noodles in my pantry for noodle bowls next week. In the meantime, I broiled pork belly, thawed frozen shrimp, rinsed and sorted mint leaves and cilantro, and drained pickled daikon and carrots before assembling it all into a roll-making station.

Wow was it a long afternoon, and I made enough to share with the neighbors, whereupon Patrick complained why was I feeding them? Because I'd rather them eat it than we not and then waste. However, I kept thinking there was a missing ingredient in the spring rolls, but what? Not bean sprouts, for they perish too easily before we can eat them. I realized today what the missing vegetable was. Cucumber! However, cucumbers are like bean sprouts for my household, whereupon if we don't eat them right away, they rot too fast in my fridge. Next time. 

Patrick brought home garlic scapes from the vegetable garden, and the New York Times food newsletter featured three-cup chicken, which unfortunately was behind a paywall (bastards! but I get it and am willing to pay for a general New York Times subscription. Instead I found a Food and Wine recipe recipe online. And instead of scallions, I decided to sub it out for the baby garlic. You really only need Asian cooking wine (I had Japanese in my cupboard), sesame oil, and soy sauce as well as garlic, ginger, and scallions. My mise en place was a mess because I spilled all the liquid ingredients while browning the chicken thighs.                     

And because I must always have vegetables at a meal, I added baby bok choy and sugar snap peas during the last few minutes of the braise. At the very last, I sprinkled lots of chopped basil into the dish.

I managed to not cook the Jasmine and Japanese rice get too soggy

 

The meal reminded me of Chinese restaurant meals though my palate was confused and wanted adobo. I wonder if I could incorporate vegetables into my adobo?

clay: cone 10 firing + cactus & columbines

I’ve been on a tear with the kurinuki. Seriously, obsessed with the Japanese technique of hollowing out clay forms and then carving away from the pots to resemble rock formations in nature. 

I did manage to make some Cone 6 clay boxes from reclaimed clay at the community studio, but most of my boxes are from Cone 10 clay bodies.

 

From the scraps of clay hollowed out, if they did not go back into the bag of clay after serious watering with the spray bottle, then I formed them into what Cassie, loading the kiln, called cool rocks.

 

And another rock...

 

And while telling my clay friend, Jeff to enter his sgraffito vase into the county fair competition, I impulsively decided to enter the one successful candelabra. If I recall rightly, the clay body is both speckled buff and Hawaiian red which I couldn't tell the difference when making it from the wet clays. And I then glazed only the flowers in honey and the vines and leaves in warm green. And yesterday in the community studio, I finally finished a similar candelabra in BMix, which I'll probably color the blooms in underglazes and then overglaze the sculptural form in khaki. I also made 3-stem taper holder also in Bmix with flowers and leaves--which I'll probably just glaze in June Perry Pink and Emerald Green and White Gloss. Must remember to photograph the greenware next weekend, during which I think they'll be bone dry enough to go into the kiln for a bisque firing. And the school kiln produced these three watercolor palettes I made. I love 'em.

 

Last week, I saw this on Instagram and want to sculpt something similar, but of course, I want to make it functional as a candelabra.

I LOVE THE MERMAIDS, even though I've never made any in my clay career. But if my candelabra is gonna have a mermaid, then it has be an underwater theme with coral and seaweed and starfish and a clam shell. Maybe I'll perch her in a bed of coral and the taper holders will be hidden behind long strands of giant kelp. In the meantime, I've a lot of glazing to do. Below are all the bisque pots on to which I adhered wax resist. I glazed one of the kurinuki boxes in Rutile, an iridescent glaze with a lovely blue cast, and the other box in Coleman Red, an oxblood glaze with purple and blue undertones if I'm lucky.

I also glazed a cup or bowl in Shino because I loved the sample with brown and pearlescent orange and another pot in cobalt oxide and blue celadon. I've still a lot more pots on which to decide which Cone 10 glazes.

Yesterday, I also noticed the big bloom on my moon cactus. A few months ago, the pup fell off, but I kept the root stock in the pot. I noticed a couple weeks ago, a pup on one of the bottom spines. And lo and behold, it BLOOMED. Holy moly, is it surreal.

Earlier in the week, I noticed that my Columbine contained red in its bloom. Where the heck did that peachy red come from?

 

The rest of the blooms are yellow and white. Did a bee pollinate the Columbine from this geranium?

Such a lovely mystery that I don't mind that for the past few days, I've been sneezing and blowing snot galore because of spring allergies.

cook: tuscan salmon

It all started with leeks I had bought weeks ago at Trader Joe’s and which were starting to molder in the vegetable bin. Maybe vichyssoise because of a bunch of potatoes in my bin, but I was never a fan of cold soup. I was craving salmon, and Eureka! I resolved to use the leeks in a Tuscan salmon, which I hadn't cooked in ever so long a time. I had picked up a gourmet pappardelle pasta at World Market, Alaskan sockeye salmon, heavy whipping cream, and basil at Trader Joe's.    

 

Our faculty lounge had a bunch of vegetable donations, of which I had picked a bunch of potatoes but also beets, radishes, and Brussels sprouts. Patrick had also overbought tomatoes at Costco. And so except for the potatoes, all were chopped or cut in half for roasting along with the aforementioned leeks and cloves of garlic. 

I seared the salmon in a bit of olive oil, removed the fish and then sautéed all the aromatics and vegetables. And then the wine and cream and lastly spinach. Before adding back the salmon into my cast iron, I also sprinkled grated Parmesan cheese.

We've leftovers for the week!

And I wished I had thickened the sauce a bit more before adding the salmon, but blame the spinach. At least my plating had many colors and textures.

The next day was Nancy's birthday, and we went to Emelina's Peruvian Restaurant to celebrate. We started with Ceviche de Pescado or fresh fish marinated lemon juice and Peruvian spices which were served with sweet potatoes and Peruvian corn, red onion and corn nuts and also Anticucho de Corazon or grilled beef heart marinated with a panca sauce and served with golden potatoes.

 

And then the rest of our order came--papas frita (or fried potato), yuca frita (or fried yucca) with huacaina sauce, Tacu Tacu con Carne or New York grilled steak with potatoes and paella and Pescado a la Macho or fish, calamari, shrimp, mussels, clams, stewed in a white wine and cream sauce, served with rice. And I was too busy tucking in and heaping more sauce onto rice and potatoes on to my plate to take any more pictures. At home, I promptly napped with Sadie. Good Sunday.