I don’t think I can survive without rice. I can eat it for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks.
Rice goes with anything and I’m always learning new ways to enjoy this personal food staple. My cousin and hubby gave us “Seductions of Rice” for Christmas. It’s a big cookbook with beautiful pictures on how rice is used around the world. I love trying out the book’s tasty recipes for rice and other dishes. A few weeks ago, I whipped up this Low-Country Pulao with Chicken and Bacon.
I try to find new recipes to try out on my weekends. I’m thrilled with the huge kitchen space in our Vacaville home. There’s plenty of room to spread out my herbs, veggies, meat and cutting areas. Sometimes I have my PowerBook open to a tasty online recipe. When I’m prepping meals, sometimes I stare out at the backyard and watch my Daisy defend the house against blue jays, squirrels and pedestrians.
After almost a decade of cooking, I still feel like a novice in the kitchen. I think that’s cool because I’ll always find something new and challenging to tickle my taste buds. My love of culinary adventures goes back to my family. I’m happy we had a chance to return to some good home cooking for the P-Day Weekend.
I loved my dad’s home cooking: fish, laarb, fried rice and more. He’s the first one to teach me how to cook. During my 2nd year at Cal, he showed me how to make chicken adobo in the our tiny dorm kitchen. Little by little, I got more daring in the kitchen. Sometimes I had misses when it came to my cooking. Other times, one bite showed me that it was all worth the time and prep invested in the dish.
I’ve been thinking about Balut. I think it’s time I try this Filipino delicacy. Hell, Mark already sampled it.
I wonder if this is a good price for the half-hatched duck eggs. We found this vendor at the Fremont Farmers Market last September. Sadly, I had to catch a plane to Kansas that day…so we passed on the Balut.
This week, I stumbled on this informational blog entry on Balut aka Hot Vit Lon.
I remember eating them with my siblings, tapping on the egg shell with a spoon and then breaking the membrane underneath to sip at the flavorful liquid, which was broth like. Then we ate the solid stuff, which basically was the embryo. I don’t recall beak, bones or feathers, but they can be in there, depending on the age of the egg. We didn’t eat the hard white albumen. It was a kind of weird dare and that was it.
OK — some day I will try Balut. Maybe on my next trip home to LA…we’re thinking about doing a quick visit on President’s Day weekend. I know that falls in the middle of sweeps, but I happen to have that holiday off. Neato.
Currently listening to the Amelie soundtrack and catching up on Top Chef and my blog reading. I am wiped out from the work week. I know it’s only Thursday.
My positive vibes recharge after watching shows about food and reading about amazing meals. Over the years, I found more comfort in good food and my waistline showed that. I try to balance out the adventurous eating with running and yoga.
In California, I drove almost 600 miles — from Sacramento to Fresno. It wiped me out almost every day, but tasty California meals helped me unwind from those road trips — Indian, Thai, California pizza and more. I also found time to run a few miles in Fremont.
Then we headed over to San Francisco to check out the Cal v. Oregon game and visit our favorite San Francisco couple, Susan and Tom.
Many tourists with rental cars try to stop by Treasure Island. I can’t get enough of this beautiful view of the City by the Bay. When my brother came home from basic training, we stopped here to say hello to San Francisco. I remember a dorm-mate introduced me to this beautiful sight at night…before we hopped on a cable ride from Powell Street to the Wharf. We asked some European visitors to snap this shot for us. Sunny weather, sea breeze, the cityscape, the Bay Bridge and a wonderful weekend with my hubby — frozen in time on our digital camera.
Susan, Tom, Mark and I couldn’t get enough of the foie gras at Piperade. Susan made dinner reservations at this Basque-inspired haunt on Battery Street. On the web site, the chef describes his food as “West Coast Basque” cuisine. Fresh, decadent ingredients with a rustic touch. This was one of the best meals of my California vacation — amazing haute cuisine in a cozy brick dining spot…good friends, cocktails and conversation.
Things are bumping nicely at work. It seems fireworks, cookies and the Independence holiday put folks back in a good mood.
I had a blast taking live shots from Lake Shawnee for the choreographed light show. One anchor was kind enough to thank me for providing July 4th fun for the newscast.
After our July 4th show, we stepped outside to check out everyone else’s fireworks. The air smelled like gunpowder. Driving home, I could see people shooting off their fireworks by the highway.
At home, I watched the last explosives light-up the sky with my hubby. Mark pointed out that with everyone shooting off their fireworks - the sounds would muffle gun shots. We figured Independence night would be a smart time for a naughty person to shoot someone. The next morning, I read about four shootings in Northeast Topeka. Good grief.
I had my kitchen groove on the other day. So, I cooked up some Morning Star meat starter with rice and a lemon cilantro sauce. I added chick peas and frozen peas. I was pleasantly surprised by the texture and flavor of the chick peas - chewy, hearty and complimentary to the sauce and the tofu meat. I think I’m cooking more rice in our paella pan than with our rice cooker.
I thought this would be the Easter Sunday when I get to prepare a lovely dinner for Mark and Daisy…and enjoy a relaxing celebration of Spring, the Lord and all that jazz.
Well, I fit in plenty of relaxing with a long nap in the middle of the day. Then I spent the early evening hours with my yoga practice and reading headlines. I hope these morning rituals will fool my body into waking up for my graveyard shift. Instead of enjoying the Easter holiday, I’m getting ready for work. Hello to the lonely hours in the newsroom, the scanner harping about mothers, sons, fathers and daughters smacking themselves around like a Jerry Springer show and guzzling 6 cups of coffee to stay awake until sunrise.
Bottom-line: I’m a team player, willing to step off my night shift to cover the morning show. Plus, some people were not cut out to be journalists.
Let’s move on to some happier thoughts, pictures and flavors.
A happy moment from my morning, Daisy trying out her snazzy new shirt from my sister-in-law and family in Cali. She loves it! She really does!
For St. Patrick’s Day, we took a roadtrip down the Turnpike to Emporia. We toasted the holiday at Natasha’s.
If you get a chance, I hope you’d consider voting for this pix. The more votes it get’s the more chances it has to be published in the next issue of JPG Magazine. How neat is that?
So, I gave up meat for Lent. This usually makes cooking a challenge for me, since I like to craft my meals around the meat-of-the-day. I’m still cool with chicken and seafood, I just made a promise to myself to avoid red meat.
So far…I’ve managed to avoid red meat. At work, someone’s mom treated us to a pizza meal for his birthday. Very sweet, but all the pies were meat pies! Eeck! I stuck with the bread sticks. I also ended-up picking off the pepperoni slices, after I saw another co-worker do so.
I decided to embrace tofu as my meat-of-the-day.
This is an Alfredo risotto with tofu, grounded-up and seasoned to look and taste like ground beef. During this kitchen session, I tried out Morning Star’s Sausage Crumbles. Not bad…I’d love to a do a side-by-side taste test with ground beef. Maybe after lent.
I’m getting used to my new schedule. It’s nice to chill in the morning with my honey.We’re chilling to sounds of home with Morning Becomes Eclectic on KCRW in Santa Monica. I love Internet radio.
Now, I’m browsing headlines, blogs and indulging in my new digital distraction, twitter. I can update this social network site from anywhere: through aol IM, the web site and my cell phone. I’m intrigued with the random musings posted from all over the US and the world. A few days ago, somebody twittered about doing lunch at Trafalgar Square. That brought back memories of living in London. Other people twitter about waiting for a doctor’s appointment or heading out to an LA club. It’s like viewing other people’s lives through a peephole. Feel free to join the conversation….or lurk on the sidelines. We’ll see how long this web fad will last.
Now on to random musings about food and going out.
On my work blog, I raved about doing brunch at the Brick Oven in Topeka. I didn’t think they could disappoint me until they served up this poor excuse for a side of bacon.
I’m used to celebrating Thanksgiving with a lot of people. This year, I had the folks who mattered most to me in Topeka - inside the kitchen: Mark and Daisy. We had a lovely holiday. In the tradition of my working experience, we did a Thanksgiving lunch. Sometimes I thought having to work on the holiday was a great excuse for my family to chow down early. I’m grateful Mark and Daisy were flexible to modfiy their feasting time to my work schedule. They rock my world!
We figured a turkey would be too much…so I whipped up my parents’ chicken adobo.
Favorite Shows
Book List 2008
Book List 2007
Book List 2006
Book List 2005
Book List 2004
No worries...
Queenkv is feeling 
Subscribe to Queenkv's Brainpickings
In My Belly! Del.icio.us for Queenkv Digg by Queenkv
