It is impossible for me to walk into Costco and just leave with what was on my list. They just always have something new on the shelf that I haven’t tried yet or have been missing for a long time. I’m usually pretty skeptical on new frozen items, unless it is ice cream of course, but on our last trip these breaded panko shrimp caught my eye. A 3-point shot into the cart later and once again I’m leaving the store with another unlisted item.
I love how simple the packaging is. There aren’t any false promises to pull you in to buy it. It’s just panko shrimp, plain and simple. This is exactly what it is. I simply followed the box’s instructions to bake it and they didn’t disappoint.
Before and after baking
Just look at the beautiful color on the panko crust! Even after running after the kids to sit down and getting their drinks and 10 minutes later finally sitting down to enjoy, they were still very crispy and the shrimp was surprisingly moist. We paired it with some broccoli and homemade maki rolls. Delicious! On the scale that I just made up in my head with no basis whatsoever I give these an 8 out of 10!
Maybe I’ll rip off the tails next time and make some po’ boys!
The current state of the world has had me out of work for the last 7ish months. This has obviously been very trying at times but I’m choosing to focus on the positives. I would have never had the opportunity to spend this quality time with my family without the current pandemic. It has also allowed me to get back into some of my hobbies and push them to new levels. This post is about one such hobby: Gardening.
I love everything about gardening. The manual labor, the being outdoors, the smell of the dirt, the killing of pests, and of course the harvests. With all the extra time on my hands this year I decided to give hydroponic growing a try and I have yet to be disappointed. I can do a post later on the details of my hydroponic system if anyone is interested but in this post we’re going to talk about basil.
Hydro basil/soil basil/picked basil (soil on top, hydo on bottom)
I actually propagated a few basil plants from the soil one in the picture. One went into the hydro set up and the rest went into soil. The speed of growth from the hydro basil is bout 10x the growth of the soil basil. The size of the leaves in the hydroponics are about 1.5x that of the soil plants. The other interesting part is that the hydro basil has a stronger, more herbaceous, slightly more bitter flavor than its soil counterpart.
Once put into a pesto, this still holds true, but the differences are much slighter. I personally like the hydro pesto better as I enjoy those herbaceous bitter flavors but when tasted side by side, the family enjoys the soil pesto. I’m sure when we throw it on some chicken or in a sauce, no one will be able to tell the difference though.
Basil Pesto
2c Basil leaves 2Tbsp Pine nuts 1Tbsp Sugar 1 large cloves of garlic 1/2c Extra-virgin olive oil 1/2c grated parmesan cheese
Start off by toasting your pine nuts over a medium low heat in a sauté pan. This is not something you can throw on the stove and just let it go, you want to be constantly tossing the pine nuts to get an even deep golden brown. Allow the pine nuts to cool before moving onto the next step. Hot pine nuts will start to cook the basil leaves which will make your pesto dark and a bit watery.
Put your basil leaves into a mason jar and use an immersion blender to chop up the leaves. Add the rest of the ingredients to the mason jar. Feel free to leave out the sugar. I add it to tone down the bitterness of the basil and find that it helps meld all the flavors together.
Use your immersion blender again and blend until it turns into a beautiful bright green paste. You can season with salt and pepper if you wish but I like to leave the seasoning for when I use the pesto in other dishes so I can tune the seasoning for what I’m preparing. Pesto chicken for example I’ll season the chicken with more salt and pepper than I would for roasted pesto butternut squash.
Getting kids to eat their veggies is never easy. We’ve gotten lucky with our 2 monsters enjoying broccoli and zucchini, but as soon as we move outside of that 2 vegetable safe zone we have to play games to get them to eat them. We have incognito mode for mushrooms (puree in a sauce), dress up for kale (kale chips), and hide and go seek for spinach (hide it in something they love like cornbread).
If you need to sneak your kiddos some veggies or just want to feel better about your next batch of cornbread here’s an easy way to get that done.
*I refuse to use tasteless oils in baking. If you have to have oil, use it as a vehicle for flavor. The recipe calls for vegetable oil or butter so if you don’t have coconut oil I highly recommend going the butter route.
Instructions
Simple Spinach Cornbread
Bring a pot of water to a boil. Add in 1tsp salt. Set up an ice bath that your strainer can fit into. Dump all the spinach into the pot and boil just until soft. Strain off the hot water and place spinach/strainer into the ice bath. This will stop the cooking and lock in the color, flavor, and texture. Once the spinach is cold squeeze out as much water as you can with your hands.
Move the spinach to a cutting board and pat dry with paper towel.
Follow directions on box (listed below) for cornbread Preheat oven to 400F Lightly grease 9″x9″ baking pan Place all ingredients in large bowl, add chopped spinach Stir together and spoon batter into prepared baking pan Put in the oven and turn the oven down to 375F Bake for 27-29min at 375F
Let cool for 5 min – 10 min before cutting and serving. Let any leftovers cool completely before storing in an airtight container.
What are your favorite ways to hide veggies from kids?
Sometime in your life you’re going to think it’s a good idea to invite a few of your closest friends over to your place for drinks. You’re not wrong! When I have friends over I typically create some of the happiest memories of my life. You just need to go about this with some tact so your cupboards aren’t left bare when the affects of the alcohol takes effect on your friend’s stomachs. I suggest a preemptive strike by supplying snacks if you’re not going all out with dinner.
Now, my friends know that I’m fairly capable in the kitchen so their expectations are relatively high. Here is a simple favorite that wont clash with most beverages you may be consuming (pairs best with white wine and bubbly).
This is literately a slap it together kind of appetizer, snack, or hors d’oeuvres which you may have all the ingredients you need (besides the fish eggs) on hand already. I took Chicken in a Biscuit, topped it with garlic cream cheese mixed with some chives, and topped it with lump fish roe. I know lump fish roe may not be readily available at your local grocer so instead you could top it with crispy bacon bits or smoked salmon.
Serve these up at your next cocktail party and I’m pretty sure you’ll be asked more than once, “When is the next time we’re all getting together?”.
Today for lunch the Mrs. and I went out for Japanese noodles. She’s a big fan of ramen so while we were wondering aimlessly with empty stomachs and I saw the restaurant I knew it was supposed to be. Well, at least once we got inside…and I saw the menu…because let’s be honest, I didn’t even push the floor on the elevator, it just happened to stop there.
ANYWAY!!! This place had some pretty good noodles. Of course I didn’t get a card so I have no idea what it was called but they were tasty. The point of this story however would be my fascination with the condiments that they provided. They had some of the typical things, chilis, soy sauce, and garlic…but this was no standard overly roasted/fried garlic crumbs stuff. This was grade A raw garlic with a press so you could add super fresh garlic to you noodles at your will.
Perhaps even more impressive than the garlic press, was the sesame seed dispenser. They had toasted sesame seeds in this container. And you could hold it over your bowl, and spin the wheel thingy…aaaaaaannnnd PRESTO!!!
A twist on the magical wheel would send cracked pepper sized toasted sesame seed powder clouds floating onto your ramen. Not only was it super cool but it actually added a great depth to the broth.
Somebody please find one of these things and send it to me asap! I’ll be adding it to everything!
Finding yourself at the end of Kimberly Rd in Tst after dark can be a bit sketchy. It’s definitely not the dirtiest place in town, but it’s not where I would typically send my readers for a great bite. Yet here we are. Just on the corner you’ll see the grey blue walls sticking out like a sore thumb. Just slide open the door and you’ve reached fried chicken heaven! Or have you? I doubted it the first time I was brought here. The majority of the staff don’t speak English, or Cantonese. If you happen to know a bit of Korean or Japanese you’re in luck! Otherwise you’ll be going over your order a few times. Just order like this: “I would like an order of the fried chicken with no sauce.” It also helps to point at the first picture on the fried chicken page of the menu. Once they confirm your sauceless chicken you may request mayonnaise and/or spicy sauce on the side. I’m simply a purist and will have beer as my only condiment, thank you. With kpop videos blaring away, crispy juicy fried chicken in one hand and an ice cold glass of Hite in the other you too will be saying, “move over Kentucky, Korea has this fried chicken business on lock down!”
*Caution* The rest of the food isn’t really up to par and the chicken is enough for two.
Last night we celebrated my mother and grandmother in-law’s birthdays. Eating with my mother in-law is always a real treat as my father in-law is a HUGE seafood lover. I happen to enjoy it as well and can appreciate that every meal must have some seafood component.
The entire meal was fantastic. We went to our favorite neighborhood haunt 張記 Cheung Kei which you can read more about here. One of my new favorite things about this restaurant is that they will let you bring in your own food and they will cook it for you. We do this mostly with fish that my father in-law catches but this time it was my brother in-law who brought the goodies. He brought 2 fish which were smooth and delicious but the star of the evening was the scallops.
My favorite way to have scallops is steamed in their shells with garlic, some rice noodles, and a dusting of cilantro. YUMMY!
While western bakeries are busy pumping out flakey croissants and crusty baguettes that take hours and sometimes days to make, Chinese bakeries here in Hong Kong are making a single dough into every shape imaginable. They then stuff it with meats and cheeses and turn them into tasty soft bready goodnesses. My favorite Chinese Bread is the one pictured above. It’s filled with corned beef and cheese and topped with a crunch that I really have no idea what it is. Do you have a favorite baked good?
As many of you may know, I am a bean head. This refers not to the shape of my cranium but my love of coffee and espresso based beverages. I’m sure this has something to do with years of conditioning from my mother who every morning at her first sip of java with announce with glee, “COFFEE COFFEE COFFEE COFFEE COFFEE”. Yes, it is five times in a row….every time.
My father then took the liberty of turning me into a I must have a cappuccino after a nice meal kind of guy.
Then comes university with late night cramming where coffee and straight espresso got me through many finals.
I’m a rather frugal feller when it comes to spending on myself so a triple tall caramel macchiato and a sausage roll from Starbucks is a real treat and my favorite morning indulgence.
Are you a bean head? What’s your favorite morning indulgence?
Eat to Live, Live to Eat 